Friends,
I make the mistake of tuning in Bill O’Reilly this evening, 22, Feb, and boy, did he get my dander up.
I was already upset with his anti-Second Amendment rhetoric a few days ago. In case you didn’t hear it he tried to make the case that during an emergency, like Hurricane Katrina, government has the right to suspend the Second Amendment and confiscate personal firearms. I was aghast when I heard that. You just can’t cherry-pick application of the Constitution. The Constitution is applicable at all times. Unfortunately, our Colorado State Legislature seems to have the same opinion as Mr. O’Reilly. A couple of weeks ago the Democrats in the Senate Veterans and Military Affairs Committee decided that they were going to protect the government from us radical citizens by denying us our Second Amendment rights during emergency situations. The governor still can declare an emergency and take our guns.
This same august group also decided that they really do not want to acknowledge that the States have rights that supersede the federal government. They voted to table a bill that would have made any gun manufactured in Colorado, sold in Colorado and intended for use exclusively in Colorado exempt from federal regulations. This is the same bill passed in a number of other states whose legislatures and governors have shown the courage to be Americans as envisioned by the Founders. It looks like our Colorado Legislature doesn’t want to exercise the rights guaranteed by the Constitution. I can understand that; exercising rights is hard work and requires that you take responsibility for your decisions and actions. We sure don’t want the Colorado Democrats to be too stressed out by being responsible for anything.
However, as usual, I have moved myself off on a tangent. I was talking about Mr. O’Reilly. Tonight he showed a clip of Rush Limbaugh doing a parody of him. Mr. O’Reilly seemed to be flattered that he would be parodied by such as Mr. Limbaugh. But I have to wonder, was it a parody or was he being mocked. Juan Williams thought the later. I agree. Mr. Limbaugh was mocking Mr. O’Reilly’s take on the OWH’s political philosophy. Mr. O’Reilly doesn’t believe that the OWH is a socialist. Really, he isn’t? As Speaker Gingrich pointed out, the OWH has taken over a great deal of the banking industry, garnered control over two of three major auto manufactures, and is trying to take over the entire health care system, fully one-sixth of the American economy. I have to ask Mr. O’Reilly, “What qualifies for socialist in your political science dictionary?”
It seems that he wants to give the OWH the benefit of the doubt to see what will come out of this grand experiment on the American economy, and our very way of life. I can’t be that generous. The OWH has worked tirelessly to eradicate out freedoms and the very foundations of our society. The Founders realized that the strength of this country was in the individual, not the government. That is why the Constitution could only be ratified with the guarantee that a bill of rights would be soon forth coming. As I have pointed out in these pages numerous times, the Constitution and the Bill of Rights specifically enumerate the limits on government and the individual rights guaranteed to all citizens. That government derives its power from the people, not the other way around.
Bill O’Reilly is wrong. This is not the time to give the OWH a pass on anything. We, as strict Constitutionalists, must constantly hold the OWH to the standard set down by the Founders. In this the first year of this administration he is failing us. American ingenuity and exercise of the free market, only, will pull us out of the depression that this administration has plunged us into.
As always, I welcome your comments and discussion.
Dan
Dan Lanotte
- The Carpenter's Mate
- Falcon, Colorado
- I am a 31 year Navy veteran, 15 years as a SONAR Technician and 16 years as an Intelligence Officer. I am a Goldwater-Reagan Conservative with a deep love for this wonderful country of opportunity and am concerned about the continued abrogation of our freedoms. In addition to putting my thoughts and political philosophy in these pages I enjoy teaching firearms and personal protection in keeping with the spirit of the Second Amendment. My courses are listed at www.carpmateconsulting.com.
Monday, February 22, 2010
Friday, February 19, 2010
Post-Mortem of a Fraud
Friends,
The following is another excellent guest Discourse from Andy Pico.
Enjoy,
Dan
Post-Mortem of a Fraud
The widening scandal known as Climategate is snaring an ever increasing number of scientists and organizations. Much of the media coverage so far has focused only on the emails which revealed a cabal of unethical scientists at the core of the scandal. These emails show a clear intent to deceive. The key issue is that the emails, bad enough as they are, constitute less than a quarter of the release. The other 3/4 of the files includes the data, analysis and programming code used to fabricate a fraudulent climate history and exaggerate the recent warming trend.
The scandal has gone far beyond the unethical and criminal misconduct at the Climate Research Unit (CRU). The widening scandal has uncovered scientific misconduct in the fabrication of data at the CRU as well as other surface station reporting agencies in Australia, New Zealand, and the US (NASA and NOAA) which deliberately reduce earlier, recorded temperatures and inflate recent temperature rise.
The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has now been caught in the manipulation of data, the suppression of viewpoints, and the use of non-scientific papers from environmental advocacy groups as the basis for multiple “findings”.
To put this in perspective one has to go to the earlier reports of the UN IPCC. In the first and second reports, the climate history was based on research by hundreds of scientists using a wide number and variety of proxies to reconstruct the climate history of the world. This history described the significant climate cycles including the Medieval Warm Period (MWP), the Little Ice Age (LIA) and the current “Unprecedented Warming” Period (UWP). This climate history posed a problem for the IPCC in trying to raise urgency about Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) in the UWP since the IPCC’s own reports showed the MWP was several degrees warmer than the current UWP.
The IPCC third report included the now infamous Hockey Stick Graph which eliminated the earlier climate variation and showed a flat climate history with a recent, sharp rise. What was done was to carefully cherry-pick data sets and eliminate any which didn't support the intended result. A small data-set in central, northern Russia was used. The result was based on a single data set consisting of just 12 trees in a small geographic area. Within that small data set the results are skewed by just one unusual tree. Just. One. Tree.
The station data from CRU and NASA was then used, after manipulation to magnify the warming trend, to append to the tree ring data and present a falsely contrived climate history with greatly exaggerated, recent warming. One example of this manipulation is the dropping of cooler stations and replacing real stations with “constructive stations” based on the retained, urban heat islands.
This fraudulent data was used to zero out natural climate variations in the input to the 22 climate models which form the entire basis for the IPCC climate change predictions and upon which all of the rest of the so-called “overwhelming climate science” is based. This is how natural climate change has been falsely attributed to human activities.
The scientific fraud of Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) is collapsing with almost unprecedented speed. Many scientists on the IPCC are themselves calling for a complete overhaul and even abolition of this agency.
The size and depth of this fraud goes far beyond the direct scientific misconduct so far exposed. The theory of AGW, or climate change, has been used as the justification for a massive expansion in international, global governance and control or seizure of global energy markets. Here in this country, the Environmental Protection Agency is moving towards the extra-legal regulation of every activity that emits greenhouse gasses, based entirely on the now fully discredited science of the IPCC. Carbon Markets across the globe are based not on clearly defined securities valuation, but solely on the cap and trade value manufactured out of hot air. This market bubble is now in the process of worldwide collapse as the extent of the greatest attempted fraud and swindle in history crashes into rubble.
Andres Pico, of Colorado Springs, is a retired Navy Commander, Naval Flight Officer and project manager in the defense industry. He is a signatory of the Manhattan Declaration.
The following is another excellent guest Discourse from Andy Pico.
Enjoy,
Dan
Post-Mortem of a Fraud
The widening scandal known as Climategate is snaring an ever increasing number of scientists and organizations. Much of the media coverage so far has focused only on the emails which revealed a cabal of unethical scientists at the core of the scandal. These emails show a clear intent to deceive. The key issue is that the emails, bad enough as they are, constitute less than a quarter of the release. The other 3/4 of the files includes the data, analysis and programming code used to fabricate a fraudulent climate history and exaggerate the recent warming trend.
The scandal has gone far beyond the unethical and criminal misconduct at the Climate Research Unit (CRU). The widening scandal has uncovered scientific misconduct in the fabrication of data at the CRU as well as other surface station reporting agencies in Australia, New Zealand, and the US (NASA and NOAA) which deliberately reduce earlier, recorded temperatures and inflate recent temperature rise.
The UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has now been caught in the manipulation of data, the suppression of viewpoints, and the use of non-scientific papers from environmental advocacy groups as the basis for multiple “findings”.
To put this in perspective one has to go to the earlier reports of the UN IPCC. In the first and second reports, the climate history was based on research by hundreds of scientists using a wide number and variety of proxies to reconstruct the climate history of the world. This history described the significant climate cycles including the Medieval Warm Period (MWP), the Little Ice Age (LIA) and the current “Unprecedented Warming” Period (UWP). This climate history posed a problem for the IPCC in trying to raise urgency about Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) in the UWP since the IPCC’s own reports showed the MWP was several degrees warmer than the current UWP.
The IPCC third report included the now infamous Hockey Stick Graph which eliminated the earlier climate variation and showed a flat climate history with a recent, sharp rise. What was done was to carefully cherry-pick data sets and eliminate any which didn't support the intended result. A small data-set in central, northern Russia was used. The result was based on a single data set consisting of just 12 trees in a small geographic area. Within that small data set the results are skewed by just one unusual tree. Just. One. Tree.
The station data from CRU and NASA was then used, after manipulation to magnify the warming trend, to append to the tree ring data and present a falsely contrived climate history with greatly exaggerated, recent warming. One example of this manipulation is the dropping of cooler stations and replacing real stations with “constructive stations” based on the retained, urban heat islands.
This fraudulent data was used to zero out natural climate variations in the input to the 22 climate models which form the entire basis for the IPCC climate change predictions and upon which all of the rest of the so-called “overwhelming climate science” is based. This is how natural climate change has been falsely attributed to human activities.
The scientific fraud of Anthropogenic Global Warming (AGW) is collapsing with almost unprecedented speed. Many scientists on the IPCC are themselves calling for a complete overhaul and even abolition of this agency.
The size and depth of this fraud goes far beyond the direct scientific misconduct so far exposed. The theory of AGW, or climate change, has been used as the justification for a massive expansion in international, global governance and control or seizure of global energy markets. Here in this country, the Environmental Protection Agency is moving towards the extra-legal regulation of every activity that emits greenhouse gasses, based entirely on the now fully discredited science of the IPCC. Carbon Markets across the globe are based not on clearly defined securities valuation, but solely on the cap and trade value manufactured out of hot air. This market bubble is now in the process of worldwide collapse as the extent of the greatest attempted fraud and swindle in history crashes into rubble.
Andres Pico, of Colorado Springs, is a retired Navy Commander, Naval Flight Officer and project manager in the defense industry. He is a signatory of the Manhattan Declaration.
Thursday, February 11, 2010
A Resurgence of Patriotism
Friends,
Has anyone besides me noticed the upsurge in patriotism over the past year? It seems like every few days someone sends me another email linking to a new rendition of the National Anthem or a new patriotic song about America, or some stirring story about our brave men and women in uniform. I have been reflecting on this phenomenon over the past few days and have come up with some conclusions as to the cause of this new-found national pride.
In November 2008, the voters became enamored with “hope and change.” We had had eight years of an administration that concentrated on defense and, I believe, that it was effective. However, fiscal and social policy had some serious problems; then came the new administration and a completely new philosophy of governing. This strange new philosophy may be called the “Philosophy of the Campaign” because the OWH has been campaigning since early 2008, nonstop. I have never made any secret about the fact that I don’t trust him or any of his czars. Also, I am sick and tired of seeing him on this interview or that interview where people are “getting shivers up their legs” just for the thrill of talking to him.
Let’s take a look at what all this campaigning has been about. He and his socialist minions decided that it would be appropriate to undermine the free market by bailing out anyone who had a sad song to sing. This is just a short look at some of the bailouts:
AIG - $70B (ever look at where the congressmen and senators have their retirement funds?)
Asset Guarantee Program (Citigroup/BofA) - $12.5B
Automotive Industry Financing Program (GM, GMAC, Chrysler, Chrysler Financial) - $80.1B
Public-Private Investment Program (bailing out toxic assets from financial institutions) - $100B
I will admit that not all of these funds have been used and some that have been used have been paid back. But my point is that the OWH and his minions are using the taxpayers’ money, our money, to subvert the free market. Why is this necessary? I would like to take a quick glance at a couple of the above examples and see what is behind them.
The automotive industry arguably played a major role in the boom in American industrialization. When Henry Ford came up with the assembly line process, the manufacturing industry took off running. There are two things that I see as sucking the automobile industry dry. The first is government regulation. The government has regulated the automobile industry to such an extent that GM, Chrysler, and Ford spend millions each year just in regulation compliance. The other factor dragging down the auto industry is the unions. The unions have an incredible strangle hold on the auto manufacturers, and of course, the unions maintain this strangle hold by buying and running politicians. Congress cannot allow GM, or Chrysler to go out of business because they would be letting down their major constituents, the unions.
The Public-Private Investment Program is one that has been a long time coming and the sad thing is that everyone saw it coming. The Feds told bankers to loan money to people to buy houses even if these people did not qualify for the mortgage. But everyone got a house. Now, we, the taxpayers, are paying for people who cannot make their mortgage payments. This is part of that “entitlement mentality” I keep talking about. Here’s a quick quiz for you: What do you call someone who can’t afford to buy a house? Answer: A renter. (Thanks, Tom)
Another area I could waste several pages on is the government’s attempted takeover of 1/6th of the US economy in the form of health care reform but that is a topic for another Discourse.
Taken all together, I think that the average US citizen looks at all of the egregious actions taken by this Congress and the administration and they long for another time when America was great, when we were looked up to on the world stage. This has prompted a resurgence of patriotism as we look longingly at better days gone by and hope for a better tomorrow.
I think that better tomorrow is coming. The socialists in charge of the government today are so blind that they do not understand that their takeover of so many segments of our society is literally shredding the fabric of our nation. The Founders saw this danger and put safeguards in place to prevent it. Those safeguards are the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. It is past time for the Congress, the OWH, and the courts to reinstitute those documents. It is past time for the government to get out of the private sector and allow it to operate the way it was designed.
As always, I welcome your comments and discussion.
Dan
PS: On a personal note, I would like to wish my little brother a Happy Birthday.
Has anyone besides me noticed the upsurge in patriotism over the past year? It seems like every few days someone sends me another email linking to a new rendition of the National Anthem or a new patriotic song about America, or some stirring story about our brave men and women in uniform. I have been reflecting on this phenomenon over the past few days and have come up with some conclusions as to the cause of this new-found national pride.
In November 2008, the voters became enamored with “hope and change.” We had had eight years of an administration that concentrated on defense and, I believe, that it was effective. However, fiscal and social policy had some serious problems; then came the new administration and a completely new philosophy of governing. This strange new philosophy may be called the “Philosophy of the Campaign” because the OWH has been campaigning since early 2008, nonstop. I have never made any secret about the fact that I don’t trust him or any of his czars. Also, I am sick and tired of seeing him on this interview or that interview where people are “getting shivers up their legs” just for the thrill of talking to him.
Let’s take a look at what all this campaigning has been about. He and his socialist minions decided that it would be appropriate to undermine the free market by bailing out anyone who had a sad song to sing. This is just a short look at some of the bailouts:
AIG - $70B (ever look at where the congressmen and senators have their retirement funds?)
Asset Guarantee Program (Citigroup/BofA) - $12.5B
Automotive Industry Financing Program (GM, GMAC, Chrysler, Chrysler Financial) - $80.1B
Public-Private Investment Program (bailing out toxic assets from financial institutions) - $100B
I will admit that not all of these funds have been used and some that have been used have been paid back. But my point is that the OWH and his minions are using the taxpayers’ money, our money, to subvert the free market. Why is this necessary? I would like to take a quick glance at a couple of the above examples and see what is behind them.
The automotive industry arguably played a major role in the boom in American industrialization. When Henry Ford came up with the assembly line process, the manufacturing industry took off running. There are two things that I see as sucking the automobile industry dry. The first is government regulation. The government has regulated the automobile industry to such an extent that GM, Chrysler, and Ford spend millions each year just in regulation compliance. The other factor dragging down the auto industry is the unions. The unions have an incredible strangle hold on the auto manufacturers, and of course, the unions maintain this strangle hold by buying and running politicians. Congress cannot allow GM, or Chrysler to go out of business because they would be letting down their major constituents, the unions.
The Public-Private Investment Program is one that has been a long time coming and the sad thing is that everyone saw it coming. The Feds told bankers to loan money to people to buy houses even if these people did not qualify for the mortgage. But everyone got a house. Now, we, the taxpayers, are paying for people who cannot make their mortgage payments. This is part of that “entitlement mentality” I keep talking about. Here’s a quick quiz for you: What do you call someone who can’t afford to buy a house? Answer: A renter. (Thanks, Tom)
Another area I could waste several pages on is the government’s attempted takeover of 1/6th of the US economy in the form of health care reform but that is a topic for another Discourse.
Taken all together, I think that the average US citizen looks at all of the egregious actions taken by this Congress and the administration and they long for another time when America was great, when we were looked up to on the world stage. This has prompted a resurgence of patriotism as we look longingly at better days gone by and hope for a better tomorrow.
I think that better tomorrow is coming. The socialists in charge of the government today are so blind that they do not understand that their takeover of so many segments of our society is literally shredding the fabric of our nation. The Founders saw this danger and put safeguards in place to prevent it. Those safeguards are the Constitution and the Bill of Rights. It is past time for the Congress, the OWH, and the courts to reinstitute those documents. It is past time for the government to get out of the private sector and allow it to operate the way it was designed.
As always, I welcome your comments and discussion.
Dan
PS: On a personal note, I would like to wish my little brother a Happy Birthday.
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
What's Wrong America?
Friends,
Let me say right up front that this is going to be a rant. I haven’t done an old fashioned, down home type of rant in a long time and I'm over due.
Would someone please tell me what has happened to the gumption in this country? What happened to people standing up for injustices whether in the public halls, the corner grocer, or on the streets of Mogadishu? Every day I read about some pervert or other who has been caught and charged with child pornography or some gang of leaches being busted for running drugs, drugs that incapacitate and kill our kids; those same drugs that contribute to the delinquency of young and old alike. Where is the outrage?
What is just as bad if not worse is the absolute criminal behavior that takes place in the halls of Congress. In the name of progress, Congress and the OWH have decided that you and I don’t work for the betterment of ourselves and our families; we work for the betterment of the state collective. Does that ring a bell with anyone out there? Where in our Constitution does it say that each and every one of us is responsible to pay for someone else’s health care insurance? Where is it written in the Constitution that we are responsible for paying for Nancy Pelosi’s travel with several hundred of her closest friends and supporters?
I remember hearing a story out of Viet Nam where a small Vietnamese child walked up to a US GI and gave him a nice cold Coke. The GI took it, smiled, said “thank you,” and drank it. The Coke was laced with acid. The GI died. That is what those animals did; they recruited innocents to do their dirty work for them. Now we have radical jihadists doing the same thing all across the world because anyone who is not Muslim must die. Do you ever hear about a suicide bomber over the age of 30? There may have been some, but I don’t remember hearing about it. Have we become so desensitized that it just doesn’t matter anymore? Where is the public outcry?
In the halls of Congress, and even in the White House, there is a constant question about whether or not we should be the world’s police force. Where is the outrage in Congress and the White House when some over sexed and frustrated Muslim teenager blows himself and a few dozen of the surrounding citizenry into the next world? If we aren’t going to put the pipper on these guys, who is? What other country out there has gone into some absolute mess to clean it up, left with nothing to show for it, even gratitude, and gone on to the next mess without leaving a bunch of strings? And yet, the OWH went around the world and apologized for our actions. Where is the outrage?
We are told that we should be more tolerant and understanding of Muslims. Why? They want to kill us and our way of life; I feel no obligation to be tolerant and understanding. We are told that the drug problem is just too hard and that we should treat the addicts with kindness and compassion to dry them out. Why? It’s called tough love. We are told that the illegal immigrants just want to find a better life and that we should let them in to work. Why? This is our country; if they want to better themselves they should make their home country better so that they can have the appropriate opportunity. Instead of turning tail and running from the problems in their country, fight them and clean up the place.
Where is the outrage? Back in the ‘60s and ‘70s we heard about “The Silent Majority.” Well, congratulations, folks, that silent majority has matured into “The Mute Majority.” It’s time we all stood on our own hind legs and tell the bad guys that “I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore.” The Coalition for a Conservative Majority, the Tea Partiers, and the 9/12 folks are doing a great job, but they can’t do it without the rest of us.
We, as Americans, should be proud enough of our country to want to protect it from “enemies, foreign and domestic.” That came from the oath I took in service to my country and I was not released from it when I retired, and neither are you.
As always, comments and discussion is welcome.
Dan
Let me say right up front that this is going to be a rant. I haven’t done an old fashioned, down home type of rant in a long time and I'm over due.
Would someone please tell me what has happened to the gumption in this country? What happened to people standing up for injustices whether in the public halls, the corner grocer, or on the streets of Mogadishu? Every day I read about some pervert or other who has been caught and charged with child pornography or some gang of leaches being busted for running drugs, drugs that incapacitate and kill our kids; those same drugs that contribute to the delinquency of young and old alike. Where is the outrage?
What is just as bad if not worse is the absolute criminal behavior that takes place in the halls of Congress. In the name of progress, Congress and the OWH have decided that you and I don’t work for the betterment of ourselves and our families; we work for the betterment of the state collective. Does that ring a bell with anyone out there? Where in our Constitution does it say that each and every one of us is responsible to pay for someone else’s health care insurance? Where is it written in the Constitution that we are responsible for paying for Nancy Pelosi’s travel with several hundred of her closest friends and supporters?
I remember hearing a story out of Viet Nam where a small Vietnamese child walked up to a US GI and gave him a nice cold Coke. The GI took it, smiled, said “thank you,” and drank it. The Coke was laced with acid. The GI died. That is what those animals did; they recruited innocents to do their dirty work for them. Now we have radical jihadists doing the same thing all across the world because anyone who is not Muslim must die. Do you ever hear about a suicide bomber over the age of 30? There may have been some, but I don’t remember hearing about it. Have we become so desensitized that it just doesn’t matter anymore? Where is the public outcry?
In the halls of Congress, and even in the White House, there is a constant question about whether or not we should be the world’s police force. Where is the outrage in Congress and the White House when some over sexed and frustrated Muslim teenager blows himself and a few dozen of the surrounding citizenry into the next world? If we aren’t going to put the pipper on these guys, who is? What other country out there has gone into some absolute mess to clean it up, left with nothing to show for it, even gratitude, and gone on to the next mess without leaving a bunch of strings? And yet, the OWH went around the world and apologized for our actions. Where is the outrage?
We are told that we should be more tolerant and understanding of Muslims. Why? They want to kill us and our way of life; I feel no obligation to be tolerant and understanding. We are told that the drug problem is just too hard and that we should treat the addicts with kindness and compassion to dry them out. Why? It’s called tough love. We are told that the illegal immigrants just want to find a better life and that we should let them in to work. Why? This is our country; if they want to better themselves they should make their home country better so that they can have the appropriate opportunity. Instead of turning tail and running from the problems in their country, fight them and clean up the place.
Where is the outrage? Back in the ‘60s and ‘70s we heard about “The Silent Majority.” Well, congratulations, folks, that silent majority has matured into “The Mute Majority.” It’s time we all stood on our own hind legs and tell the bad guys that “I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore.” The Coalition for a Conservative Majority, the Tea Partiers, and the 9/12 folks are doing a great job, but they can’t do it without the rest of us.
We, as Americans, should be proud enough of our country to want to protect it from “enemies, foreign and domestic.” That came from the oath I took in service to my country and I was not released from it when I retired, and neither are you.
As always, comments and discussion is welcome.
Dan
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