The prologue to my book, over at PJMedia.
Actually, I’ll probably expand a little more in the book, though.
Chuck Schumer
Roger Simon is far too kind to him:
You would think with the “Arab Spring” turning into an unremitting display of psychotic religious fascism and fanaticism, chemical weapons ping-ponging between Syria and Hezbollah, Egypt imploding, Iran on the brink, etc., Schumer would take his role more seriously. Evidently not. His ambition has trumped all. He, with Obama’s other “good Jews” (Lew, Emanuel, Axelrod, etc.), plays along to get along, in almost any situation.
But are they, as some suggested in the comments to my January 22 column, the equivalent of the “kapos” and “sonderkommandos” of World War II, Jews who worked for the Nazis? Of course not. Not even close. But they are extremely weak men whose ambition makes them blind to what is in plain sight and not willing to risk anything to jeopardize their position, the very essence of corruption.
Chuck Schumer’s ringing endorsement of Chuck Hagel now seems like one mammoth embarrassment. If Schumer were a man of substance or even relative decency, he would now apologize or at least distance himself in some way. This is not even a matter of political ideology at this point. It is an matter of basic honesty. Hagel is quite simply not qualified for one of the most crucial positions in our country on any level. Will Schumer admit it? If not — liberal, conservative or Zen Buddhist — he is a contemptible hack.
When has he not been a contemptible hack?
[Update a few minutes later]
Schumer’s travails are hardly over. Soon Republicans will be going populist, going after the big banks (some of his favorite donors) and decrying all those retirement benefits for rich people (“Hey, they’re my rich people!” Schumer would say.). By the end of this he’ll look like a phony Zionist, a faux immigration reformer and a pal of the rich and powerful.
Sure, Schumer is an infamous demagogue. There is no senator more partisan. And yes, the most dangerous place in D.C. is still between Schumer and a microphone. But have some heart, Republicans. The guy has a “kick me” sign on his back and the White House is kicking away.
They deserve each other.
NASA’s Mission Is Not Safety
My column, on the tenth anniversary of the Columbia loss, at USA Today.
Hagel’s Performance
Senators in shock over it.
That’s because they’re as stupid as he is. He’s always been a profound mediocrity. As noted at the link, that was just as “unexpected” as Obama doing poorly in the first debate. Senators are too credulous about their own press clippings.
After Ten Years
Enduring lessons from Wayne Hale.
Unfortunately, the NASA culture is ill suited to take many of them.
America 3.0
There’s a new book
Exploring The Earth
With Google Earth and Kim Komando. I wasn’t aware of the 5000-year-old impact crater. Or any of the other things, really.
Peace, Love And Rape
Well, it’s easy to see why this guy would want to be sure women are disarmed:
Jerome is an expert on what kind of guns can be used to protect someone, since he is the kind of guy that people buy guns to protect against.
But according to him, you don’t need an AK-47 or M16 to stop him from raping you. It’s just overkill. When Jerome bursts into your bedroom, you don’t need that much firepower, says the guy bursting into your bedroom.
Senator Feinstein needs to bring Jerome down to D.C. as an expert witness so he can testify on just how much firepower a woman needs to defend herself from him. And maybe Piers Morgan can have him on too.
This is just insane.
“The Prince Of Dead Air”
Heh. #TooEthnicCNNShows
Global Warming
Though you wouldn’t know it from the antagonistic nature of public discussions about global warming, a large measure of scientific agreement and shared interpretation exists amongst nearly all scientists who consider the issue. The common ground, much of which was traversed by Dr. Hayhoe in her article, includes:
· that climate has always changed and always will,
· that carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas and warms the lower atmosphere,
· that human emissions are accumulating in the atmosphere,
· that a global warming of around 0.5OC occurred in the 20th century, but
· that global warming has ceased over the last 15 years.
The scientific argument over DAGW is therefore about none of these things. Rather, it is almost entirely about three other, albeit related, issues. They are:
· the amount of net warming that is, or will be, produced by human-related emissions,
· whether any actual evidence exists for dangerous warming of human causation over the last 50 years, and
· whether the IPCC’s computer models can provide accurate climate predictions 100 years into the future.
Dr. Hayhoe’s answers to those questions would probably be along the line of: substantial, lots and yes. My answers would be: insignificant, none and no.
What can possibly explain such disparate responses to a largely agreed set of factual climate data?
I tend to the latter view. As I’ve noted in the past, I have zero confidence in the predictive power of existing climate models, for very good reason.