Guffaw of the Day

From the Onion:

EARTH—Former vice president Al Gore—who for the past three decades has unsuccessfully attempted to warn humanity of the coming destruction of our planet, only to be mocked and derided by the very people he has tried to save—launched his infant son into space Monday in the faint hope that his only child would reach the safety of another world.

caption: Young Gore sets out for his new home, where the sky is clear, the water is clean, and there are no Republicans.


"I tried to warn them, but the Elders of this planet would not listen," said Gore, who in 2000 was nearly banished to a featureless realm of nonexistence for promoting his unpopular message. "They called me foolish and laughed at my predictions. Yet even now, the Midwest is flooded, the ice caps are melting, and the cities are rocked with tremors, just as I foretold. Fools! Why didn't they heed me before it was too late?"

(via reader Kurt D.)

JOTD

An email from Ireland to all of their brethren in the States. . .a point to ponder whatever your political affiliation:

We, in Ireland, can't figure out why you people are even bothering to hold an election in the United States.

On one side, you had a pants wearing female lawyer, married to another lawyer who can't seem to keep his pants on, who just lost a long and heated primary against a lawyer, who goes to the wrong church, who is married to yet another lawyer, who doesn't even like the country her husband wants to run !

Now... On the other side, you have a nice old war hero whose name starts with the appropriate 'Mc' terminology, married to a good looking younger woman who owns a beer distributorship!!

What in God's name are ya lads thinkin over in the colonies!?!?

(via reader Josh A.)

QOTD

From Richard Ellis' Tuna: A Love Story (2008), at 70 n.*:

Leighton Taylor, an ichthyologist turned winemaker, once claimed to be a member of the "American Miscellaneous Society's Committee to Inform Animals of Their Scientific Names."

Evidence The Europeans Are More Civilized Than Americans

Not--"The world was shocked by Italian sunbathers ignoring dead gipsy girls."


source: Daily Mail (U.K.)

(via National Review's Media Blog)

QOTD

John McCain in a July 24th St. Petersburg Times op-ed:

Fannie and Freddie are the poster children for a lack of transparency and accountability. Fannie Mae employees deliberately manipulated financial reports to trigger bonuses for senior executives. Freddie Mac manipulated its earnings by $5-billion. They've misled us about their accounting, and now they are endangering financial markets. More than two years ago, I said: "If Congress does not act, American taxpayers will continue to be exposed to the enormous risk that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac pose." Fannie and Freddie's lobbyists succeeded; Congress failed to act. They've stayed in business, grown, and profited mightily by showering money on lobbyists and favors on the Washington establishment. Now the bill has come due.

What should be done? We are stuck with the reality that they have grown so large that we must support Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac through the current rough spell. But if a dime of taxpayer money ends up being directly invested, the management and the board should immediately be replaced, multimillion dollar salaries should be cut, and bonuses and other compensation should be eliminated. They should cease all lobbying activities and drop all payments to outside lobbyists. And taxpayers should be first in line for any repayments.

Even with those terms, sticking Main Street Americans with Wall Street's bill is a shame on Washington. If elected, I'll continue my crusade for the right reform of the institutions: making them go away. I will get real regulation that limits their ability to borrow, shrinks their size until they are no longer a threat to our economy, and privatizes and eliminates their links to the government.

(via The Wall Street Journal, Ed Morrissey)

Explain This

Why is Barack Obama still against the surge after it succeeded?

(Remember, he opposed it from the start. And look at McCain's surge Op-ed as edited by the New York Times.)

QOTD

Charlie Martin in Pajamas Media:

It says a lot about John McCain that he went out of his way to visit the [Dalai Lama] — especially when contrasted with his Democratic rival's behavior in Germany.

Agreed.

(via Instapundit)

Foreign Policy of the Obamessiah

Former Ambassador to the United Nations John Bolton deconstructs Obama's Berlin speech in Saturday's Los Angeles Times:

Sen. Barack Obama said in an interview the day after his Berlin speech that it "allowed me to send a message to the American people that the judgments I have made and the judgments I will make are ones that are going to result in them being safer."

If that is what the senator thought he was doing, he still has a lot to learn about both foreign policy and the views of the American people. . . Consider just the following two examples.

First, urging greater U.S.-European cooperation, Obama said, "The burdens of global citizenship continue to bind us together." Having earlier proclaimed himself "a fellow citizen of the world" with his German hosts, Obama explained that the fall of the Berlin Wall and the reunification of Europe proved "that there is no challenge too great for a world that stands as one."

Perhaps Obama needs a remedial course in Cold War history, but the Berlin Wall most certainly did not come down because "the world stood as one." The wall fell because of a decades-long, existential struggle against one of the greatest totalitarian ideologies mankind has ever faced. It was a struggle in which strong and determined U.S. leadership was constantly questioned, both in Europe and by substantial segments of the senator's own Democratic Party. In Germany in the later years of the Cold War, Ostpolitik -- "eastern politics," a policy of rapprochement rather than resistance -- continuously risked a split in the Western alliance and might have allowed communism to survive. The U.S. president who made the final successful assault on communism, Ronald Reagan, was derided by many in Europe as not very bright, too unilateralist and too provocative.

But there are larger implications to Obama's rediscovery of the "one world" concept, first announced in the U.S. by Wendell Willkie, the failed Republican 1940 presidential nominee, and subsequently buried by the Cold War's realities.

The successes Obama refers to in his speech -- the defeat of Nazism, the Berlin airlift and the collapse of communism -- were all gained by strong alliances defeating determined opponents of freedom, not by "one-worldism." Although the senator was trying to distinguish himself from perceptions of Bush administration policy within the Atlantic Alliance, he was in fact sketching out a post-alliance policy, perhaps one that would unfold in global organizations such as the United Nations. This is far-reaching indeed.

Second, Obama used the Berlin Wall metaphor to describe his foreign policy priorities as president: "The walls between old allies on either side of the Atlantic cannot stand. The walls between the countries with the most and those with the least cannot stand. The walls between races and tribes; natives and immigrants; Christian and Muslim and Jew cannot stand. These now are the walls we must tear down."

This is a confused, nearly incoherent compilation, to say the least, amalgamating tensions in the Atlantic Alliance with ancient historical conflicts. One hopes even Obama, inexperienced as he is, doesn't see all these "walls" as essentially the same in size and scope. But beyond the incoherence, there is a deeper problem, namely that "walls" exist not simply because of a lack of understanding about who is on the other side but because there are true differences in values and interests that lead to human conflict. The Berlin Wall itself was not built because of a failure of communication but because of the implacable hostility of communism toward freedom. The wall was a reflection of that reality, not an unfortunate mistake.

Tearing down the Berlin Wall was possible because one side -- our side -- defeated the other. Differences in levels of economic development, or the treatment of racial, immigration or religious questions, are not susceptible to the same analysis or solution. Even more basically, challenges to our very civilization, as the Cold War surely was, are not overcome by naively "tearing down walls" with our adversaries.

The greatest threat to American liberty is naive foreign policy. As NY Times columnist David Brooks observed:

Obama’s tone was serious. But he pulled out his “this is our moment” rhetoric and offered visions of a world transformed. Obama speeches almost always have the same narrative arc. Some problem threatens. The odds are against the forces of righteousness. But then people of good faith unite and walls come tumbling down. Obama used the word “walls” 16 times in the Berlin speech, and in 11 of those cases, he was talking about walls coming down. . .

The golden rhetoric impresses less, the evasion of hard choices strikes one more.

When John F. Kennedy and Ronald Reagan went to Berlin, their rhetoric soared, but their optimism was grounded in the reality of politics, conflict and hard choices. Kennedy didn’t dream of the universal brotherhood of man. He drew lines that reflected hard realities: “There are some who say, in Europe and elsewhere, we can work with the Communists. Let them come to Berlin.” Reagan didn’t call for a kumbaya moment. He cited tough policies that sparked harsh political disagreements — the deployment of U.S. missiles in response to the Soviet SS-20s — but still worked.

Breaching the Berlin Wall signaled the end of the cold war. But, importantly, it was evidence of victory over Soviet communism, as well as a consequence of knowing, hard-line policies that challenged the other side to exceed our risk to blood and treasure. This was uncertain at the time--we didn't know whether it would work, or even what policy was best. But, the bottom line was that détente didn't fell the wall--defiance, backed by force did. As Brooks says:

Obama has benefited from a week of good images. But substantively, optimism without reality isn’t eloquence. It’s just Disney.

Agreed. So, here's hoping Obama's "only fooling."

BTW, don't miss Gerard Baker's London Times take on Obama's visit to Israel and Palestine:

And the Child spake and the tribes of Nato immediately loosed the Caveats that had previously bound them. And in the great battle that ensued the forces of the light were triumphant. For as long as the Child stood with his arms raised aloft, the enemy suffered great blows and the threat of terror was no more.

Chart of the Day

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD), Economic Assessment of Biofuel Support Policies (July 2008), at 8, 9:

In most countries, biofuels remain highly dependent on public support policy. This report estimates support to the US, EU and Canadian biofuel supply and use in 2006 at about USD 11 billion per year, projected to rise to USD 25 billion in the medium term (all medium-term projections in this executive summary refer to the annual average for the 2013-17 period). . .

The sometimes predicted improved economic viability of biofuel production and use associated with higher crude oil prices so far has not materialised in many countries. Most production chains for biofuels have costs per unit of fuel energy significantly above those for the fossil fuels they aim to replace. Despite the rapid and substantial increase in crude oil prices and hence in the costs for gasoline and fossil diesel, the cost disadvantage of biofuels has widened in the past two years as agricultural commodity prices soared and thereby feedstock costs increased.


source: OECD at 20

(via Planet Gore)

Rollback

From Strategy Page on July 19th:

While the mass media continues to feature wars and terrorism, the overall trend continues away from such unpleasantness. Such stories are anathema to the mass media, because they do not attract eyeballs, and revenue. That's the way people are, and the result is a distorted view of trends in global violence.

Worldwide, violence continues to decline, as it has for the last few years. Violence has also greatly diminished, or disappeared completely, in places like Iraq, Nepal, Chechnya, Congo, Indonesia and Burundi. Even Afghanistan, touted as the new war zone, is seeing less violence this year than last.

All this continues a trend that began when the Cold War ended, and the Soviet Union no longer subsidized terrorist and rebel groups everywhere. The current wars are basically uprisings against police states or feudal societies, which are seen as out-of-step with the modern world. Many are led by radicals preaching failed dogmas (Islamic conservatism, Maoism), that still resonate among people who don't know about the dismal track records of these movements.

Also among progressives who do. (Strategy Page's post includes a useful country-by-country overview of global hotspots.)

(via Instapundit)

QOTD

Ann Coulter:

Announcing the Democrats' bold new "plan" on energy last week, Pelosi said breaking into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve "is one alternative." That's not an energy plan. It's using what we already have -- much like "conservation," which is also part of the Democrats' plan.

Conservation, efficiency and using oil we hold in reserve for emergencies does not get us more energy. It's as if we were running out of food and the Democrats were telling us: "Just eat a little less every day." Great! We'll die a little more slowly. That's not what we call a "plan." We need more energy, not a plan for a slower death.

Agreed.

BTW, John McCain's latest ad: "Don't hope for more energy; vote for it." Compare Obama.

(via Right Wing News, Planet Gore)

Quote Without Comment

From the Wall Street Journal this morning:

A majority of commissioners at the Federal Communications Commission have reached a deal to approve Sirius Satellite Radio Inc.'s long-pending purchase of XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc.

The final hold-out, Republican commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate, agreed to vote to approve the deal after winning several concessions from the companies involving enforcement issues.

"I think it's fair to say an agreement in principle has been reached," FCC Chairman Kevin Martin said in an interview Thursday morning. "We're still trying to work out the language."

Terrifying and Awesome

Nuclear blasts: nine photos. Number seven is new to me:


source: Wired

caption: The exact moment of detonation at Nagasaki is captured in this remarkable photograph. Notice the three people in the foreground, as yet unaware that anything has happened.


(via Conservative Grapevine)

QOTD

This may be the best Charles Krauthammer column ever, from the July 11th Washington Post :

On the day the Colombian military freed Ingrid Betancourt and 14 other long-held hostages, the Italian Parliament passed yet another resolution demanding her release. Europe had long ago adopted this French-Colombian politician as a cause celebre. France had made her an honorary citizen of Paris, passed numerous resolutions and held many vigils.

Unfortunately, karma does not easily cross the Atlantic. Betancourt languished for six years in cruel captivity until freed in a brilliant operation conducted by the Colombian military, intelligence agencies and special forces -- an operation so well executed that the captors were overpowered without a shot being fired.

This in foreign policy establishment circles is called "hard power." In the Bush years, hard power is terribly out of fashion, seen as a mere obsession of cowboys and neocons. Both in Europe and America, the sophisticates worship at the altar of "soft power" -- the use of diplomatic and moral resources to achieve one's ends.

Europe luxuriates in soft power, nowhere more than in l'affaire Betancourt in which Europe's repeated gestures of solidarity hovered somewhere between the fatuous and the destructive. Europe had been pressing the Colombian government to negotiate for the hostages. . .

She was, however, only one of the high-minded West's many causes. Solemn condemnations have been issued from every forum of soft-power fecklessness -- the European Union, the United Nations, the G-8 foreign ministers -- demanding that Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe stop butchering his opponents and step down. Before that, the cause du jour was Burma, where a vicious dictatorship allowed thousands of cyclone victims to die by denying them independently delivered foreign aid lest it weaken the junta's grip on power.

And then there is Darfur, a perennial for which myriad diplomats and foreign policy experts have devoted uncountable hours at the finest five-star hotels to deplore the genocide and urgently urge relief.

What is done to free these people? Nothing. Everyone knows it will take the hardest of hard power to remove the oppressors in Zimbabwe, Burma, Sudan and other godforsaken places where the bad guys have the guns and use them. Indeed, as the Zimbabwean opposition leader suggested (before quickly retracting) from his hideout in the Dutch embassy -- Europe specializes in providing haven for those fleeing the evil that Europe does nothing about -- the only solution is foreign intervention.

And who's going to intervene? The only country that could is the country that in the past two decades led coalitions that liberated Kuwait, Bosnia, Kosovo and Afghanistan. Having sacrificed much blood and treasure in its latest endeavor -- the liberation of 25 million Iraqis from the most barbarous tyranny of all, and its replacement with what is beginning to emerge as the Arab world's first democracy -- and having earned near-universal condemnation for its pains, America has absolutely no appetite for such missions.

And so the innocent languish, as did Betancourt, until some local power, inexplicably under the sway of the Bush notion of hard power, gets it done -- often with the support of the American military. "Behind the rescue in a jungle clearing stood years of clandestine American work," explained The Post. "It included the deployment of elite U.S. Special Forces . . . a vast intelligence-gathering operation . . . and training programs for Colombian troops."

Upon her liberation, Betancourt offered profuse thanks to God and the Virgin Mary, to her supporters and the media, to France and Colombia and just about everybody else. As of this writing, none to the United States.

(via reader OBH)

Quote Without Comment

Minutes ago from the Wall Street Journal:

A tentative deal has been reached by a majority of commissioners at the Federal Communications Commission to approve the merger of Sirius Satellite Radio Inc. and XM Satellite Radio Holdings Inc., a FCC source close to the review said Wednesday.

Republican commissioner Deborah Taylor Tate is the only FCC member left to vote on the deal and she is expected to do so shortly, two FCC officials close to the negotiations said. She is expected to sign off on the deal in exchange for a consent decree that resolves several enforcement issues involving the satellite radio companies and a combined fine of about $20 million, an FCC source close to the deal said.

Ms. Tate has also asked for a variety of other minor conditions, an FCC source said. An adviser to Ms. Tate did not respond to a call for comment. Exact details about the deal are not known since FCC officials and lawyers for the companies appear to still be working them out.

Ms. Tate's vote would finally end the agency's 13-month review of the deal. Her vote is critical for the deal's approval since the rest of the five-member board remained evenly split on the deal.

QOTD

William McGurn describes the anti-war left, including the mainsteam media, in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal:

the aim here is not reasonable debate. The aim is to close debate by shouting accusations so often that they become accepted.

Thus memos that are mostly about a commander-in-chief's legal authority are now routinely described as "torture memos." Thus the drumbeat for hearings on "war crimes." And thus the Washington Post column on David's congressional testimony, where he is described "hunched" and said to have "barked," "growled" and "snarled" -- language you would use to describe an animal. . .

In his own book, Jack Goldsmith -- former head of the Justice Department's Office of Legal Counsel and perhaps David's greatest critic -- put it this way: "Our sharp disagreement over the requirements of national security law and the meaning of the imponderable phrases of the U.S. Constitution was not a fight between one who loves the Constitution and one who wants to shred it." Mr. Goldsmith went on to say that "whether and how aggressively to check the terrorist threat, and whether and how far to push the law in so doing, are rarely obvious" -- and that for all their fights, David is a man is who acted "in good faith" to serve his country.

It's a tribute to our society that even amid a terrible war we are capable of seeing the humanity of an enemy raised and trained to hate and kill us. Some of us are still waiting for that same presumption of humanity to be extended to the good men and women doing their imperfect best to keep us safe.

(via Instapundit)

Chart(s) of the Day

Lefties often presume Bush's tax policy aided the rich at the expense of the poor. I have previously shown this wrong: overall tax revenues rose (FY07 data), the percentage, share and average tax rates of wealthy Americans are up, income inequality is overstated via statistical manipulation, income mobility remains high, and incomes among the lower quintiles are rising far faster than those at the top. Monday, the Wall Street Journal and Powerline updated the numbers with 2006 data, the latest available from the Treasury Department:




source: WSJ





source: Powerline


Spread the word--before the tax system becomes FUBAR.

(via Qando, RedState)

Odd News Article of the Day

From the Canadian Broadcast Corporation last Monday:

An American war deserter living in Canada since 2005 has lost his bid to stay in the country while his legal case unfolds and could be deported as early as Tuesday.

A Federal Court judge in Vancouver on Monday rejected Robin Long's application for a stay of his deportation order.


source: CBC

The 25-year-old fled to Canada to avoid serving in Iraq. He was arrested in Nelson, B.C., last October on a Canada-wide warrant.

Long had said he tried to gain refugee status in Canada because he believes he would suffer harm if he had to return to his home country.

In her ruling, Federal Court of Canada Justice Anne Mactavish said Long did not provide clear and convincing evidence that he would suffer irreparable harm if he is returned home.

Outside the court, one of Long's supporters said he is unaware of any other recourse for Long and that he will likely be deported on Tuesday.

A reminder: ours is a volunteer Army.

(via Gateway Pundit)

QOTD

John Nolte in Pajamas Media on July 20th:

In March of 2008, Stop-Loss was about to open, but the Washington Post had already its obituary written:

A spate of Iraq-themed movies and TV shows haven’t just failed at the box office. They’ve usually failed spectacularly, despite big stars, big budgets and serious intentions.

The underwhelming reception from the public raises a question: Are audiences turned off by the war, or are they simply voting against the way filmmakers have depicted it?

The Post, as you can see, followed the studio narrative in lamenting the box office failure of “Iraq-themed” films, as opposed to what they really are: pro-defeat films that in some cases are outright anti-American and too often defame the troops. This focus on the term “Iraq-themed” to explain box office humiliation is still in use by the left-wing media for reasons obvious to anyone interested in what audiences are truly interested in seeing.

Had the media (and Hollywood, for that matter) broadened their focus from “Iraq-themed” to “War on Terror-themed” films this would have forced them to talk about the single war film that made a profit: Vantage Point, a little Islamic terrorist thriller starring Dennis Quaid and William Hurt. This $40 million film was released the month before the Washington Post piece was written to lukewarm reviews, but still it managed to make a respectable $73 million here in America and another $78 million overseas — making it by far the biggest moneymaker of all the war-themed films to come out this last year.

No one wants to talk about the standalone success of Vantage Point because it’s a pro-American film that portrays the American President (Hurt) as a noble, brave, and selfless man. Imagine the denial some would be forced to overcome in reporting that a dozen pro-defeat films failed miserably, but the one pro-American one didn’t.

(via reader Doug J.)

Telegram For Mr. Gore, Mr. Al Gore

As reported in the July 16th DailyTech:

The American Physical Society, an organization representing nearly 50,000 physicists, has reversed its stance on climate change and is now proclaiming that many of its members disbelieve in human-induced global warming. The APS is also sponsoring public debate on the validity of global warming science. The leadership of the society had previously called the evidence for global warming "incontrovertible."

APS forum editor Jeffrey Marque explains:

With this issue of Physics & Society, we kick off a debate concerning one of the main conclusions of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the UN body which, together with Al Gore, recently won the Nobel Prize for its work concerning climate change research. There is a considerable presence within the scientific community of people who do not agree with the IPCC conclusion that anthropogenic CO₂ emissions are very probably likely to be primarily responsible for the global warming that has occurred since the Industrial Revolution. Since the correctness or fallacy of that conclusion has immense implications for public policy and for the future of the biosphere, we thought it appropriate to present a debate within the pages of P&S concerning that conclusion. . .

We, the editors of P&S, invite reasoned rebuttals from the authors as well as further contributions from the physics community. Please contact me . . . if you wish to jump into this fray with comments or articles that are scientific in nature. However, we will not publish articles that are political or polemical in nature. Stick to the science!

Soon after, the APS Physics homepage said this:

The American Physical Society reaffirms the following position on climate change, adopted by its governing body, the APS Council, on November 18, 2007:

"Emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities are changing the atmosphere in ways that affect the Earth's climate."

An article at odds with this statement recently appeared in an online newsletter of the APS Forum on Physics and Society, one of 39 units of APS. The header of this newsletter carries the statement that "Opinions expressed are those of the authors alone and do not necessarily reflect the views of the APS or of the Forum." This newsletter is not a journal of the APS and it is not peer reviewed.

So stop debating, damn it! No matter that warming's halted; never mind that the costs of carbon emission reduction greatly exceeds any benefits. As Tom Maguire observes:

Well, fine, but are human activities "primarily responsible", as per the IPCC? If the sacrifices demanded by environmentalists will reduce global warming by 8% rather than 80% will people still support them? The APS position remains unchanged and uninformative.

(via Instapundit)

QOTD

From the July 19-25th Economist:

On July 13th Hank Paulson, America’s treasury secretary, stood on his department’s steps like some emerging-market finance minister, and unveiled an emergency plan to save Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, two mortgage giants that owe or guarantee $5.2 trillion. Two days later, Ben Bernanke, chairman of the Federal Reserve, put the fear of God into the markets, warning Congress of a foul amalgam of inflation and economic distress.

The immediate lesson is that the financial crisis, nearly a year old, is far from over. Gloomy investors are gunning for banks of all types. In America the prices of houses and shares are falling, and the cost of food and energy has soared. Consumers are almost certain to cut back. The euro-area economy may have shrunk in the latest quarter. Central banks around the world are having to raise interest rates to curb inflation, and the dollar looks vulnerable. Even if the downturn proves less sharp than pessimists fear, it is likely to last longer than optimists hope.

Freddie and Fannie have changed that equation only slightly. Their importance lies in what their rescue says about the financial system. At Fannie and Freddie—and, shockingly, at the investment banks—the profits were privatised, but the risks were socialised. One Republican senator complained that he thought he had “woken up in France”.

Agreed.

Treaty Treatment at Git'mo

Progressives, the media and Congressional Democrats have been shrilly certain our treatment of Guantanamo Bay detainees violates international law. According to this view, America has transgressed human rights, destroyed the evidence and denied the facts. And many progressives are convinced the Bush Administration deliberately ignored the rule of law.

I have previously rebutted this notion. Tuesday's testimony by Former Undersecretary of Defense Douglas Feith supplies additional support. Feith spoke before the House Judiciary Committee's Subcommittee on the Constitution, Civil Rights and Civil Liberties; his opening statement in part says:

the United States had a compelling interest in showing respect for Geneva. The Secretary, we said, should urge the President to acknowledge that Geneva governed our war with the Taliban. We argued that Taliban detainees should receive the treatment to which they were entitled under Geneva. But we did not think they had met the defined conditions for POW privileges under Geneva.

After our meeting, Secretary Rumsfeld asked me to write up what General Myers and I had argued for. The Secretary wanted to use the write up as “talking points” for the National Security Council meeting with the President on February 4, 2002.

The memo I drafted and then cleared with General Myers stressed that Geneva is crucial for our own armed forces. It said that it is “important that the President appreciate DOD’s interest in the Convention.” I described Geneva as a “good treaty” that “requires its parties to treat prisoners of war the way we want our captured military personnel treated.” I noted that “US armed forces are trained to treat captured enemy forces according to the Convention” and this training is “an essential element of US military culture.” I wrote that Geneva is “morally important, crucial to US morale” and it is also “practically important, for it makes US forces the gold standard in the world, facilitating our winning cooperation from other countries.”

The memo said that “US forces are more likely to benefit from the Convention’s protections if the Convention is applied universally.” So I warned: It is “Highly dangerous if countries make application of [the] Convention hinge on subjective or moral judgments as to the quality or decency of the enemy’s government. (That’s why it is dangerous to say that [the] US is not legally required to apply the Convention to the Taliban as the illegitimate government of a ‘failed state.’)”

The memo explained why a “pro-Convention” position is dictated by the logic of our stand against terrorism. I argued:

o The essence of the Convention is the distinction between soldiers and civilians (i.e., between combatants and non-combatants).

o Terrorists are reprehensible precisely because they negate that distinction by purposefully targeting civilians.

o The Convention aims to protect civilians by requiring soldiers to wear uniforms and otherwise distinguish themselves from civilians.

o The Convention creates an incentive system for good behavior. The key incentive is that soldiers who play by the rules get POW status if they [are] captured.

o The US can apply the Convention to the Taliban (and al-Qaida) detainees as a matter of policy without having to give them POW status because none of the detainees remaining in US hands played by the rules.

The memo urged “Humane treatment for all detainees” and recommended that the President explain that Geneva “does not squarely address circumstances that we are confronting in this new global war against terrorism, but while we work through the legal questions, we are upholding the principle of universal applicability of the Convention.”

This memo represented the thinking of the top civilian and military leadership of the Defense Department. I felt confident being aligned with General Myers on this matter and we were both pleased that Secretary Rumsfeld asked me to make these points to the President at the NSC meeting, which I did. The department’s leadership took a strongly pro-Geneva position.

The Committee can therefore see that the charge that the department’s leadership was hostile to Geneva is untrue. . . I pointed out that Geneva grants POW privileges to captured fighters as a incentive to encourage good behavior. Geneva’s drafters wisely demanded that fighters meet four conditions if they are to receive such privileges: They must (1) wear uniforms, (2) carry their arms openly, (3) operate within a chain of command and (4) obey the laws of war. These conditions serve the Convention’s highest purpose, which is protecting the safety of non-combatants in war zones. Many journalists and others wrongly assume that if Geneva governs a conflict then the detainees must receive POW treatment. But that is misconception. Detainees in wars governed by Geneva are entitled to POW treatment only if they meet these four conditions.

In early 2002, it was clear that the President would be urged by some commentators to grant POW status to all the detainees as a magnanimous gesture, without regard to whether they met the conditions. I believed that would be a bad idea. First of all, it would have the opposite of its intended humanitarian result. Granting POW status to terrorists who pose as civilians and who purposefully target civilians would undermine the incentive mechanism that Geneva’s drafters knew was crucial to the Convention’s humanitarian purposes.

Merely saying so doesn't mean Feith is right. But progressives rarely address the issue. In particular, I remain frustrated by the left's (see Dahlia Lithwick mocking Feith) continued citation to inapplicable Geneva Convention provisions, fostered by ignorance of the treaties' approach and application. Even apart from the possible weakening of national security, given that the treaties were designed as mutual obligations, unilaterally treating armed and concealed terrorists as prisoners of war who have surrendered could undermine carefully established disincentives to war crimes.

Can you say "unintended consequences"? Sure--I knew you could.

(via Combs Spouts Off, Gateway Pundit)

QOTD

Economist Henri Truchy writing in 1904 about the French national character:

We judged it better to content ourselves with the untroubled possession of the domestic market than to risk the hazards of the world market, and we built a solid fortress of tariffs. Within the boundaries of this limited, but assured market, the French live calmly, comfortably enough, and leaving to others the torment of great ambition, are no more than spectators in the struggles for economic supremacy.

From the "standard work" on the period, E.O. Golob's The Méline Tariff, at 245, quoted in William Bernstein's A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World, at 345 (2008).

QOTD

Powerline's Scott Johnson:

In short, the procedural protections afforded the Guantanamo detainees under the statute before the Supreme Court in Boumediene substantially exceed those accorded the Nuremberg defendants. Obama's unfavorable comparison of the legal treatment of the Guantanamo detainees with that of the Nuremberg defendants suggests either that he does not know what he's talking about, or that he feels free to take great liberties with the truth.

Agreed.

(via National Review's Andy McCarthy)

Light in Darkness

John 1:5 (Latin here), in video, accompanied by Gregorian Chant.

(via MaxedOutMama)

Cartoon of the Day

Jim Borgman lampoons humorless liberals:


source: Slate

QOTD

UPDATE: below

Fred Kagan, Kimberly Kagan and Jack Keane in Tuesday's Wall Street Journal:

All of the most important objectives of the surge have been accomplished in Iraq. The sectarian civil war is ended; al Qaeda in Iraq (AQI) has been dealt a devastating blow; and the Sadrist militia and other Iranian-backed militant groups have been disrupted.

Meanwhile, the Iraqi government has accomplished almost all of the legislative benchmarks set by the U.S. Congress and the Bush administration. More important, it is gaining wider legitimacy among the population. The attention of Iraqis across the country is focused on the upcoming provincial elections, which will be a pivotal moment in Iraq's development.

The result is that we have an extraordinary – but fleeting – opportunity to advance America's security and the stability of a vital region of the world.

MORE:

Wolf Howling lays out the evidence of "victory in Iraq."

I Know I'm Late To the Party

But there's a new Jib-Jab video.

JOTD

UPDATE: below

Comic Andy Borowitz:

Saying he is "sympathetic to late night comedians' struggle to find jokes to make about me," Sen. Barack Obama (D-Ill) today issued a list of official campaign-approved Barack Obama jokes.

The five jokes, which Sen. Obama said he is making available to all comedians free of charge, are as follows:

1. Barack Obama and a kangaroo pull up to a gas station. The gas station attendant takes one look at the kangaroo and says, "You know, we don't get many kangaroos here." Barack Obama replies, "At these prices, I'm not surprised. That's why we need to reduce our dependence on foreign oil."



2. A traveling salesman knocks on the door of a farmhouse, and much to his surprise, Barack Obama answers the door. The salesman says, "I was expecting the farmer's daughter." Barack Obama replies, "She's not here. The farm was foreclosed on because of subprime loans that are making a mockery of the American Dream."



3. A horse walks into a bar. The bartender says, "Why the long face?" Barack Obama replies, "His jockey just lost his health insurance, which should be the right of all Americans."



4. Q: What's black and white and red all over?
   Barack Obama: The New Yorker magazine, which should be embarrassed after publishing such a tasteless and offensive cover, which I reject and denounce.



5. A Christian, a Jew and Barack Obama are in a rowboat in the middle of the ocean. Barack Obama says, "This joke isn't going to work because there's no Muslim in this boat."

MORE:

Assistant Village Idiot posts more Obama jokes.

(via reader Ken R.)

Too Late

I'm going to sleep--tell me who wins.

Energy--Excluded, Not Exhausted

UPDATE: below

No one likes importing America's energy, and nothing concentrates the policy mind quite like 4 bucks a gallon. Well, except for lefties, including Obama, who have no realistic energy policy. Most oppose resuming construction of nuclear plants--despite being the least carbon-emitting of all cost-effective power sources. And Congressional Dems scrubbed a scheduled mid-July vote over fears Republicans would push for expanded off-shore and shale exploration--which Democrats historically have opposed. Why?

1. Some worry about the environment. A few Judges want to save songbirds. Even John McCain, who favors off-shore drilling, would preserve the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge "undisturbed." Similarly, others against opening ANWR tout the need to protect its supposedly pristine ecology. But drilling opponents plainly never read Jonah Goldberg's iconic August 6, 2001, National Review cover story--some photos here--forever debunking any Eden-like beauty. Besides, Jonah Goldberg recently emphasized the small scope of the proposal:

   ANWR is roughly the size of South Carolina, and it is spectacular. However, the area where, according to Department of Interior estimates, some 5.7 billion to 16 billion barrels of recoverable oil reside is much smaller and not necessarily as awe-inspiring. It would amount to the size of Dulles airport.
   
   Question for McCain: Has South Carolina been ruined because it has an airport?

   Answer: only if you're "bitter."



2. Others argue about timing. These opponents of expanded domestic energy exploration insist increased domestic production--particularly from ANWR--would take too long to reduce gas prices. This view (which not all lefties share) is economically illiterate--energy is sold on a global futures market, as economist Larry Kudlow explained on National Review:

   should Congress overturn its offshore-drilling moratorium, [energy] speculators are gonna start selling crude-oil futures contracts and price declines will filter backwards from the longer-term contracts to the cash market. In other words, what can be bought will be sold. If drilling expectations change on the hope that future oil supplies will rise, prices will adjust lower and it will happen fast.

   (Progressives motivated by oil company profits to oppose enhanced domestic exploration--a group encompassing Dem Congressional leaders--are equally clueless, economically-speaking.)



3. Finally, there's the "drop in the bucket" objection. Such lefties--sometimes backed by the Bush Department of Energy!--say the amount of additional energy obtainable from ANWR and other domestic sources is too minute to matter. Setting aside the fact that almost any increase could help (see economically illiterate, above), is it true that recoverable domestic energy is insignificant compared with known reserves? Given the scope of prohibited exploration, no. According to the non-profit Institute for Energy Research, blocked reserves of oil, coal and natural gas are enormous:
   
   
   
   source: Institute for Energy Research
   
   
   Indeed, as AVI has noted, and I've previously observed, high oil prices make shale and tar sands particularly attractive:
   
   
   
   source: Institute for Energy Research
   
   
   So they're right that the "drop" isn't a bucket--more like billions of barrels.

Conclusion: The notion of energy independence is a mirage. But that doesn't make it sensible--where markets make it cost-effective--to bar domestic exploration that could increase energy supply. It's time to get serious about North American shale, sands as well as coastal and ANWR oil and natural gas--so drill.

MORE:

Jay Leno on the May 1st "Tonight Show" (video here):

Democrats say drilling in ANWR wouldn’t produce any oil for 10 years — the same point they’ve been making for more than 10 years now.

MORE & MORE:

Deroy Murdock in National Review:

Currently mired in red tape, Chevron’s Destin Dome field off Florida could produce within four years. Southern California deposits could yield within five to ten years. Besides, as Confucius said: “The best time to plant a tree is 10 years ago. The second best time is now.”

(via Powerline, Wolf Howling, Instapundit, Planet Gore)

QOTD

Ken Robinson's Telecommunications Policy Review, Vol. 24, No. 28 at 3 (sadly, not available online):

What's amazing to us is the media's continued tendency to over-analyze Democratic opposition. "Big Oil" is the biggest source of Republican political contributions, so it is Nancy Pelosi's enemy. Anything which helps oil companies is seen as helping Republicans -- and, thus is to be sternly resisted. The idea that environmental or other values have somehow insinuated themselves into this battle might be a nice story to tell small children. But the current opposition to drilling is almost completely a function of oil's Republican contributions and support (and, probably vice versa).

Don't Blame the War

UPDATE: below

Lefties often argue that our economic woes are a product of Defense spending, particularly in Iraq. This ignores the fact that the Federal budget was, until recently, rapidly moving toward balance. And radical lefties like Robert Scheer equate any military procurement with "pumping up the profits" of Republican defense industry donors, and thus--per force--"a betrayal of the public trust."

To some extent, this is just Stalinist "progressive" pacifism. But this view also is delusional--it ignores the actual engine of spending growth: entitlements. Entitlements are, essentially, payments to citizens via programs like Social Security, food stamps, unemployment insurance, Medicare and Medicaid.

Decades ago, defense did dominate Federal spending: in 1962, defense took just under 50 percent of total outlays. But entitlements are "the fastest-growing programs." In 2006, about 60 percent of the budget went to payments to individuals. As MaxedOutMama has detailed, the seven largest entitlements (including retirement payments for Federal workers) will consume three times their share of total GDP in 2016 as compared with 1962. The big three alone--Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid--claim 42 percent of this year's budget.

Here's a couple of graphical representations. According to the budget-hawk Concord Coalition, current outlays (using 2007 data) break out as follows:




source: Concord Coalition page 2


A "pie" chart of the same data that excludes interest payments:




source: NOfP chart based on Concord Coalition page 2


The Office of Management and Budget's historical data (produced in connection with the FY09 budget), clearly highlight the half-century trend:




source: NOfP chart based on Office of Management and Budget, FY09 Budget, Table 8.3

Conclusion: The war on terror isn't free. But defense spending has fallen over time. Today, entitlement outlays chew-up nearly three times the budget expenditures of discretionary defense spending. Income transfers, not Iraq, are the major budget busters. Will Bush-hating progressives ever acknowledge this reality?

MORE:

A chart by John Cogan and Glenn Hubbard, published in the Hoover Digest:




source: The Hoover Institution


MORE & MORE:

Assistant Village Idiot made a similar point last year.

(via National Review's Peter Robinson)

QOTD

Jonah Goldberg on National Review Online:

The Left uses Western society’s admirable desire not to offend to bludgeon competing ideas and arguments. Inconvenient facts are ridiculed as “insensitive.” Refusal to go along with the multicultural agenda, for example, is cast as a sign of backwardness and bigotry. We’re told we must have a frank conversation about race, but when conservatives take up the challenge, they are immediately demonized for the insensitivity of their honesty. . .

This strikes me as something beyond mere tolerance. This is will-to-power masquerading as tolerance. This sort of thing needs to be resisted, because there is no end to where thinking like this can lead. Indeed, if it doesn’t cause too much offense, one could even say it’s a black hole.

Globalization Didn't Happen Yesterday

The 7th Century Islamic ascendancy cut off European access to the Indian ocean. This ended direct East-West trade until Vasco da Gama rounded the southern Cape of Africa and sailed into Calicut, India, in May, 1498. Thereafter, the Portuguese swiftly expanded their empire. Their most important possessions were in today's Indonesia and Malaysia, location of the fabled "spice islands", the source of nutmeg, cloves and mace. In only a few years, Portugal's virtual monopoly on spices made it rich.

The importance of spice is evidenced by the fact that the first Portuguese ambassador to China Tomé Pires, was an apothecary. In India and Malacca between 1512-15, Pires wrote a path-breaking manuscript on Europe-Asian trade, the Suma Oriental: An Account of the East, from the Red Sea to China. Apart from a brief excerpt, it was thought lost until re-discovered by Armando Cortesão in a Paris library in the mid-20th Century.

Pires was among the first to witness globalization--and to understand that, once established, international trade creates inexorable expectations. This line is from volume II, page 87 of his Suma:

Whoever is the lord of Malacca has his hand on the throat of Venice.

My point? Don't think that alarm over the balance of trade, or fretting dependence on foreign energy, are unique to America or the Post-WWII world.

Tie A Rocket To Its Tail

Michael Benson has an odd article in today's Washington Post about the International Space Station. Even with a working toilet, Benson says the ISS, literally, is useless:

The only problem with this $156 billion manifestation of human genius -- a project as large as a football field that has been called the single most expensive thing ever built -- is that it's still going nowhere at a very high rate of speed. And as a scientific research platform, it still has virtually no purpose and is accomplishing nothing.

I try not to write this cavalierly. But if the station's goal is to conduct yet more research into the effects of zero gravity on human beings, well, there's more than enough of that already salted away in Russian archives, based on the many years of weightlessness that cosmonauts heroically logged in a series of space stations throughout the 1970s, '80s and '90s. By now, ISS crews have also spent serious time in zero gravity. We know exactly what weightlessness does and how to counter some of its atrophying effects. (Cue shot of exercycle.)

And if the station's purpose is to act as a "stepping stone" to places beyond -- well, that metaphor, most recently used by NASA Administrator Michael Griffin is pure propaganda. As any student of celestial mechanics can tell you, if you want to go somewhere in space, the best policy is to go directly there and not stop along the way, because stopping is a waste of precious fuel, time and treasure. Which is a pretty good description of the ISS, parked as it is in constant low Earth orbit.

I have no trouble believing this. But, rather than allowing it to become more "space junk," Benson has an audacious suggestion for the station:

Send the ISS somewhere.

The ISS, you see, is already an interplanetary spacecraft -- at least potentially. It's missing a drive system and a steerage module, but those are technicalities. Although it's ungainly in appearance, it's designed to be boosted periodically to a higher altitude by a shuttle, a Russian Soyuz or one of the upcoming new Constellation program Orion spacecraft. It could fairly easily be retrofitted for operations beyond low-Earth orbit. In principle, we could fly it almost anywhere within the inner solar system -- to any place where it could still receive enough solar power to keep all its systems running.

It's easy to predict what skeptics both inside and outside NASA will say to this idea. They'll point out that the new Constellation program is already supposed to have at least the beginnings of interplanetary ability. They'll say that the ISS needs to be resupplied too frequently for long missions. They'll worry about the amount of propellant needed to push the ISS's 1,040,000 pounds anywhere -- not to mention bringing them all back.

There are good answers to all these objections. We'll still need the new Constellation Ares boosters and Orion capsules -- fortuitously, they can easily be adapted to a scenario in which the ISS becomes the living- area and lab core of an interplanetary spacecraft. The Ares V heavy-lift booster could easily send aloft the additional supplies and storage and drive modules necessary to make the ISS truly deep-space-worthy.

The Orion crew exploration module is designed to be ISS-compatible. It could serve as a guidance system and also use its own rocket engine to help boost and orient the interplanetary ISS. After remaining dormant for much of the one-year journey to, say, Mars, it could then be available to conduct independent operations while the ISS core orbited the Red Planet, or to investigate an asteroid near Earth, for instance.

But, the skeptics will say, the new Orion capsule's engines wouldn't be nearly enough; a spacecraft as large as the ISS would need its own drive system. Here, too, we're in surprisingly good shape. The ISS is already in space; the amount of thrust it needs to go farther is a lot less than you might think. Moreover, a drive system doesn't have to be based on chemical rockets. Over the past two decades, both the U.S. and Japanese programs have conducted highly successful tests in space of ion-drive systems. Unlike the necessarily impatient rockets we use to escape Earth's gravity and reach orbit, these long-duration, low-thrust engines produce the kind of methodical acceleration (and deceleration) appropriate for travel once a spacecraft is already floating in zero gravity. They would be a perfect way to send the ISS on its way and bring it back to Earth again.

This leaves a lander. A lunar lander substantially larger than the spidery Apollo-era LEMs is currently on the drawing board. It's not nearly as far along in development as the Ares booster and Orion spacecraft components of the Constellation program -- which is a good thing. While I question the need to return to the moon in the first place, I wouldn't exclude it as a possible destination, so I think we should modify the lander's design to make it capable of touching down on either the moon or Mars and then returning to the ISS with samples for study in its laboratories.

I've no idea whether turning the ISS into an inter-planetary space ship is possible. But--especially since our two remaining shuttles will be retired in two years--anything would be better than the present orbiting roach motel that requires Americans to hitchhike just to check in.

Further Quote on What Hath Christianity Wrought

Following up on last week's speculation on theology, here's leftist William Bernstein contrasting the two well-known chroniclers of 14th Century China, Marco Polo and Ibn Battuta, in his spring 2008 work A Splendid Exchange: How Trade Shaped the World, at 96-97:

In many regards, the Genoese Polo and the Moroccan Battuta provided mirror images of the epic medieval wanderer: Polo was a Christian, intensely curious about the peoples, customs, and places he visited, and almost completely dependent on the goodwill of the Mongol khans of China and central Asia. By contrast, Battuta was Muslim, profoundly uncurious about the non-Islamic world, and achieved his greatest degree of wealth, fame and influence in the Muslim court of Delhi.

The Polos [Marco, his father Niccolò and uncle Maffeo] eagerly sought contact with the non-Christians of Asia, if for no other reason than simply to survive and conduct business. Polo's fascination with and openness to outside influences shines through every page of his memoirs; the same cannot be said of Battuta, who exudes a remarkable lack of interest in non-Muslim peoples and affairs. About all that ties the two accounts together is that concerned the East and were transcribed by a professional writer.

Cartoon of the Day

From Glenn McCoy:



source: Slate

QOTD

Ken Tremendous at FireJoeMorgan.com:

Ah, sac bunting. While it is excessively polite -- "Here, other team, take one of my precious outs. No no -- I insist! Allow me to make it as easy as possible for you." -- it is also strategically numbskulled. If you took the idea of bunting and applied it to World War II, it would be the equivalent of notifying the Germans ahead of time that the Allies were heading for Omaha, figuring: hell, we still have the advantage at Sword and Juno.

Russian Propaganda of the Day

Rooting-out reality in Soviet-era newspapers was a well-interstood art:

The common man of the Soviet Union understood how to read Izvestia, the daily news periodical whose name means "News" and Pravda, the journal of the Communist Party whose name means "Truth." The average Muscovite said: "There is no Pravda in Izvestia, and there is no Izvestia in Pravda" ("There is no truth in News, and there is no news in Truth.")

Putin's Imperial Russia has stuck to the same media strategy, as evidenced by this piece in the July 4th Pravda:

At least 2.5 million people have been killed in natural disasters over the recent 48 years. The number of casualties over the recent 20 years made up 1.6 million people, the UN said.

Rob Vos, the director of the Development Policy and Analysis Division of the Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA), said that the number of natural disasters taking place in the world nowadays has quadrupled in comparison with the 1970s. The disaster-related economic damage has increased at least seven times.

The authors of the report delivered at the UN headquarters in New York at the session of the UN Economic and Social Council did not specify the reason why natural disasters started happening more frequently in the world today. They said, however, that the frequency of catastrophes could be linked with the global climate change. It was also said that the death toll in developing states exceeds the number of casualties in developed states 20-30 times.

“The consequences of disasters become more and more destructive, whereas the countries are unable to overcome them effectively without the assistance from the international community. We believe it is necessary to set up a foundation to help the victims of natural disasters with the budget of 4 or 5 billion dollars,” Vos said.

As usual, Pravda lies. The best evidence comes from Indur Goklany, formerly Assistant Director, Science & Technology Policy, Office of Policy Analysis, Interior Department and a frequent author on climate change and environmental policy, in his paper Death and Death Rates Due to Extreme Weather Events: Global and U.S. Trends, 1900–2006 (Nov. 2007):

Some have claimed that, all else being equal, climate change will increase the frequency or severity of weather-related extreme events (see, e.g., IPCC 2001; Patz 2004; MacMichael and Woodruff 2004). This study examines whether losses due to such events (as measured by aggregate deaths and death rates2) have increased globally and for the United States in recent decades. It will also attempt to put these deaths and death rates into perspective by comparing them with the overall mortality burden, and briefly discuss what trends in these measures imply about human adaptive capacity. . .

Figure 1 displays data on aggregate global mortality and mortality rates between 1900 and 2006 for the following weather-related extreme events: droughts, extreme temperatures (both extreme heat and extreme cold), floods, slides, waves and surges, wild fires and windstorms of different types (e.g., hurricanes, cyclones, tornados, typhoons, etc.).3,4 It indicates that both death and death rates have declined at least since the 1920s. Specifically, comparing the 1920s to the 2000–2006 period, the annual number of deaths declined from 485,200 to 22,100 (a 95 percent decline), while the death rate per million dropped from 241.8 to 3.5 (a decline of 99 percent).



source: Goklany page 4

Table 1 provides a breakdown of the average annual global deaths and death rates for the various categories of extreme events for 1900–1989 and 1990–2006. The columns are arranged in order of declining mortality ascribed to the various events (highest to lowest) for the former period.



source: Goklany page 5

Goklany's paper concludes (page 2):

Despite the recent spate of deadly extreme weather events – such as the 2003 European heat wave and the 2004 and 2005 hurricane seasons in the USA – aggregate mortality and mortality rates due to extreme weather events are generally lower today than they used to be.

Globally, mortality and mortality rates have declined by 95 percent or more since the 1920s. The largest improvements came from declines in mortality due to droughts and floods, which apparently were responsible for 93 percent of all deaths caused by extreme events during the 20th Century. For windstorms, which, at 6 percent, contributed most of the remaining fatalities, mortality rates are also lower today but there are no clear trends for mortality. Cumulatively, the declines more than compensated for increases due to the 2003 heat wave.

With regard to the U.S., current mortality and mortality rates due to extreme temperatures, tornados, lightning, floods and hurricanes are also below their peak levels of a few decades ago. The declines in annual mortality for the last four categories range from 62 to 81 percent, while mortality rates declined 75 to 95 percent.

If extreme weather has indeed become more extreme for whatever reason, global and U.S. declines in mortality and mortality rates are perhaps due to increases in societies’ collective adaptive capacities. This enhanced adaptive capacity is associated with a variety of interrelated factors – greater wealth, increases in technological options, and greater access to and availability of human and social capital – although luck may have played a role. Because of these developments, nowadays extreme weather events contribute less than 0.06 percent to the global and U.S. mortality burdens in an average year, and seem to be declining in general. Equally important, mortality due to extreme weather events has declined despite an increase in all-cause mortality, suggesting that humanity is adapting better to extreme events than to other causes of mortality. In summary, there is no signal in the mortality data to indicate increases in the overall frequencies or severities of extreme weather events, despite large increases in the population at risk.

Once, Pravda blamed everything on America. In today's post-Cold war world, there's unprecedented agreement among Americans, Russians and Europeans: climate change is the latest bogus boogeyman. That's not izvestia--and it sure ain't pravda.

(via Watts Up With That?, Wolf Howling)

Chart of the Day

From former television meteorologist (for 25 years), now blogger, Anthony Watts:


source: Watts Up With That?

For those preferring words to graphs, EU Referendum summarizes:

We have had no warming for eleven years [and] the current global temperature is the lowest it has been since 1999.

(via Wolf Howling)

QOTD

Dr Kelvin Kemm in South Africa's Engineering News on July 4th:

During 2008, have we seen many stories in the newspapers about 2007 being particularly warm as a result of global warming?

During 2006, the doomsters were predicting that 2007 would be the hottest year on record, so why have we seen no reports about this?

The answer is simple – 2007 turned out to be the coolest year for 30 years. It is also the case that there has been no global warming since 1998. In fact, since 1998, there has been steady cooling.

Even more dramatic is the fact that the most recent computer model predictions indicate that there will be no more global warming for the next ten years. But the doomsters say that, after this ten-year period, global warming will come back with a vengeance. Why?

I agree with this explanation of "why."

(via Moonbattery via Right Wing News)

Still Flip-Flopping After All These Years

Flop--John Kerry appearing on CBS's Face the Nation, July 6, 2008:

John McCain . . . has proven that he's been wrong about every judgment he's made about the war. Wrong about the Iraqis paying for the reconstruction, wrong about whether or not the oil would pay for it, wrong about Sunni and Shia violence through the years, wrong about the willingness of the Iraqis to stand up for themselves, wrong even about his own judgment about timelines, etc. Which he's now changed.. . .

There are very few people who walk around and say, `Going into Iraq was the right thing to do and we should've done it. I'd do it again if I had the chance.' John McCain does. John McCain believes this was the right decision. . .

I'm challenging Senator McCain's judgment, his judgment that says there's no violence history between Sunni and Shia. That's wrong. His judgment that says this is going to increase the stability of the Middle East. It hasn't. It's made it less stable. The judgment that says this will, quote "This will be the best thing for America and the world in a long time." It's the worst thing that we've done in a long time. And he's turned his eye away from Afghanistan and al-Qaeda and made America less safe. That's dangerous for our country.

Flip--John Kerry four years ago, according to the November 15, 2004, Newsweek:

He badly wanted Sen. John McCain to be his running mate. As far back as August 2003, Kerry had taken McCain to breakfast to sound him out: would the maverick Republican run on a unity ticket with Kerry? In the mid-'90s, the two Vietnam combat vets had forged a friendship, a brotherhood, while trying to calm down veterans groups obsessed over rumors about POWs and MIAs still alive in Vietnam. Kerry knew that McCain was still bitter over the dirty tricks played on him during the 2000 campaign by Bush mudslingers, who spread rumors that McCain had fathered a black child by a prostitute. Here was a chance for payback against Bush that would change history--not just a chance to get even, but much more grandly an opportunity to bridge the Red State/Blue State divide, break the Washington logjam and bring the country together.

McCain batted away the idea as not serious. But Kerry was intent, and after he wrapped up the nomination in March, he went back after McCain a half-dozen more times. "I can't say this is an offer because I've got to be able to deny it," Kerry told his friend. "But you've got to do this." To show just how sincere he was, he made an outlandish offer. If McCain said yes, he would expand the role of vice president to include secretary of Defense and the overall control of foreign policy. (The deal was reminiscent of the so-called co-presidency offered to Gerald Ford by Ronald Reagan at the 1980 Republican convention; the suggestion fell apart of its own weight.) McCain exclaimed, "You're out of your mind. I don't even know if it's constitutional, and it certainly wouldn't sell."

McCain, of course, has been famously consistent on the Iraq war. So, as Bill Hobbs says, Kerry was "For him before he was against him."

(via Instapundit)