This blog is mainly about the spectacular train wreck at The Sacramento Bee and its parent company, the McClatchy Company. But I also post about current events, the Iraq and Afghanistan wars, politics, anything else that grabs my attention. Take a look around this blog, hope you enjoy it.
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Wednesday December 2 -- Got news or an update?
If you have news or an update, leave it in comments. . . .
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USA Today cutting 26 jobs (Politico.com)
USA Today editor John Hillkirk, who took over the job in April, informed staff today that there will be 26 jobs cut at the newspaper.
Hillkirk, in an memo obtained by POLITICO, wrote that those laid off will “be notified today or as soon as possible.” In a second memo, staffers were informed that there will be a merger between USA Today's news operation and USA WEEKEND.
The moves come on the same day that parent-company Gannett announced the institution of furloughs for 2010, just as they did this year.
In addition to layoffs, Hillkirk explained in the memo how USA Today would deal with a “challenging time for our industry.”
Over the next several weeks, we'll be examining changes in our structure and workflow that will help us to push the news to multiple platforms in the most efficient, non-bureaucratic way possible.
Finding ways to maximize our resources, while eliminating duplication and less valuable or unnecessary work, will be the goal.
In addition, we will be working with a team from USA WEEKEND to integrate the two operations. As Marcia describes in her email, there will be a number of people moving into the LIFE section shortly.
We look forward to working with WEEKEND in a collaborative fashion to publish a high-quality magazine using our combined resources.
USA Today, like other news organizations, is facing a tough economic situation.
Right now, the New York Times is in the midst of a buyout program, with layoffs coming if 100 staffers don’t sign up. The Washington Post recently cut positions as part of its web-print merger, and the Associated Press laid off staff throughout the country last month.
Gannett to institute furloughs in first quarter of 2010 (Poynter.org)
Memo to Gannett employees December 1, 2009 To: All US Community Publishing employees From: Bob Dickey
We are just completing the preliminary budgets for 2010. Thanks to all of your hard work and efforts to keep our costs down this year and create greater efficiencies across the division, we are heading into the new year with some solid improvements under our belt.
We have seen some promising trends in advertising with ad declines slowing throughout the year and as we begin the holiday shopping season, we are also seeing some indication that retailers may be spending more on advertising.
While these trends are encouraging, the overall economy is still fragile with a number of business uncertainties.
Therefore, as we head into 2010, we think it is prudent to take a conservative approach toward managing our business.
Toward that end, we have decided to implement furloughs across USCP during the first quarter. This is not a companywide initiative though Corporate and some of Gannett’s other operations have also decided to put furloughs into place during the first quarter.
No one on the Gannett Management Committee makes these decisions lightly and we understand and appreciate the difficulties furloughs have placed on many of you and your families.
The furloughs we took companywide this year, however, saved Gannett a significant amount of money and helped us get through what has been unquestionably the toughest time we have ever faced as a company and division.
Journicide: A looming, lost generation of scribes (Newsosour.com)
Vanishing employment opportunities and shrinking freelance compensation threaten to wipe out a substantial percentage of the next generation of professional journalists.
This journicide, to coin a term, is not merely going to be difficult and disappointing for the affected young people, who mostly will move on to find rewarding careers in other endeavors.
But the loss of a substantial portion of what would have been the next generation of journalists also will be tragic for society. The loss will deprive citizens in the future with the insights that only can be delivered by dedicated professionals with the time, skills and motivation to dig deeply into difficult stories.
Bloggers and other bloviators, this writer expressly included, will not take up the slack. Absent some miracle that motivates someone, anyone, to start fairly compensating journalists again, we are going to lose something that has been very important to our democracy throughout the life of the nation. I can’t imagine what it will be like without professional journalists, but I don’t think we will like the outcome.
Journicide has been under way since newspapers and other mainstream media began losing their formidable revenue-generating juju in 2006.
The elimination of full-time professional journalism jobs since then has been so relentless that it has become remarkably, depressingly commonplace.
Paper Cuts reports that nearly 15,000 newspaper jobs were eliminated so far this year, putting the industry on track to rival, or potentially surpass, the nearly 16,000 jobs axed in 2008.
Last month, the Associated Press zapped 90 positions to cut 10% of its payroll costs, and BusinessWeek pink-slipped a reported 130 individuals, or approximately a third of its staff.
As bad as things are for still-working and formerly employed journalists – and they are bad – the opportunities are even worse for journalists seeking their first gigs.
There are two reasons: First, young journalists trying to land entry-level jobs find themselves competing with seasoned pros who have been knocked off perches higher up in the food chain.
Second, the miserable state of the media business has combined with a sharp increase in the supply of available journalists to reduce compensation to humiliatingly low levels.
snip
“People no longer want to pay you to write,” said Gorov in a telephone interview from Los Angeles, where she was dispatched by the Globe before her position was eliminated in one of its early cutbacks.
“It’s not just that freelance rates have gone down. It’s that they don’t exist. ‘We’ll give you exposure’ is the phrase we hear now.”
Provoices will pay writers from $50to $250 a story. “I don’t see dinosaur journalists who used to make $90,000 a year writing for $250,” she acknowledged. “But this is a chance for a lot of people scrambling to get a start at making a career in journalism or to continue working as a foreign correspondent in a country where $25o is a lot of money.”
snip
The starving-artist lifestyle may be colorful and appealing for a while, but it gets old fast if you are bunking on a friend’s sofa, living under the same roof you did in junior high and lying awake at night wondering how you are going to repay your staggering five-figure student loan.
If nothing changes, the next generation of journalists will give up and move on to entirely different pursuits. And you can’t blame them.
How many journalistas do you think will be satisfied having to make ends meet by working as baristas?
Journalists struggle with finances, retirement after parting L.A. Times (TheJournalismShop.com)
Former Los Angeles Times journalists continue to struggle with severe underemployment, soon-to-expire unemployment benefits and worries about retirement, a recent informal survey of 75 former staffers found.
Nearly three-quarters of the respondents said they had been laid off or asked to leave by the financially troubled Tribune Company; the rest left the company voluntarily.
More than two-thirds are still receiving unemployment checks, though 68 percent expect those benefits to expire within 30 weeks of when the survey was taken in mid-November.
The loss of benefits are despite the 14-20 week-extension recently signed by President Barack Obama.
The eventual end of benefits weighs heavily on the former Times employees.
“I’m hanging in there, but don’t know what I’ll do when I don’t have unemployment as a base,” wrote one female ex-staffer.
“I’m in my 50s and it isn’t easy to find a job at my level and impossible to find one that pays what I used to make.”
All comments were offered anonymously in the survey. The survey, which was conducted by TheJournalismShop, targeted 124 writers, editors, news editors, managers and artists who banded together to discuss benefit, health care and career options on a Yahoo message group.
The group, which began in December of 2008, grew to its present size as layoffs mounted at the Times.
Turning Point: Couric Rips Obama (Newsmax.com) I'll be darned. A pig just flew by my window.
Katie Couric may be best known for her unflattering interview with Sarah Palin. But her nightly news broadcast this past Monday night may be an indicator that the big liberal media are now turning their guns on Obama.
Couric said on “CBS Evening News” that Americans are growing “disenchanted” with Obama and are openly questioning his credibility.
“Is the honeymoon over?” anchor Couric said at the beginning of her correspondent’s report.
“Although President Obama has been in office less than a year, many Americans are growing disenchanted with his handling of the enormous problems he and the country are facing, from healthcare to unemployment to Afghanistan.
“His poll numbers are sliding, and at least one poll shows his job approval rating has fallen, for the first time, below 50 percent.”
Correspondent Chris Reid chimed in: “The president is getting battered on everything from the economy to foreign policy. Some polls show Americans are increasingly questioning his credibility.”
The report asserted that while Obama talks about dealing with unemployment, which is over 10 percent and expected to rise, he has developed “no new ideas” for dealing with the problem.
“he has developed “no new ideas” for dealing with the problem.” Of course not!
Do they think a doctor can heal a patient while simultaneously trying to kill that patient?
Obama to Spend Two Nights in Oslo For Peace Prize Functions (deutsche press)
Oslo (dpa) -- US President Barack Obama will likely spend two nights in Oslo next week where he is to receive his Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said Tuesday.
"What can be confirm today is that that he will arrive on Wednesday the 9th, and he will arrive 'late evening' it is said," Geir Lundestad, secretary of the committee, told broadcaster NRK.
Obama is due on December 10 to receive his Nobel Peace Prize. He was cited by the five-member Norwegian Nobel Committee for "his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."
WTF? Doesn't this guy have a fairly important day job? Our President should use his time to solve the economic problem, create jobs, win the Afghan War. Not hobnob and dither with the Leftist Groupies of the world. This is shaping up like the latest world tour from U2 or the Rolling Stones.
HOW MUCH WILL YOUR STATES’ TAXES GO UP IN OBAMACARE? (dickmorris.com)
The Obama health care initiative will be the biggest unfunded federal mandate on the states in history.
It will force dozens of states, particularly in the South, to abandon their low tax ways and to move toward dramatically higher rates of taxation. It may even force Florida and Texas to impose an income tax!
In the Senate version of the bill, states must expand their Medicaid eligibility to cover everyone with an income that is 133% of the poverty level.
The House bill brings it up to 150%. But a host of states have kept their state taxes low precisely by so limiting eligibility for Medicaid that it essentially is only for seniors needing long term care and not for poor younger people who require acute care.
For example, Texas covers only those who make 27% of the poverty level or less. Florida covers only 55%. Pennsylvania covers only 36%. Arkansas covers only 17%. North Dakota covers only 62%. Nebraska covers only 58%. Louisiana covers only 26%. Indiana covers only 26%.
The revenue required to bring these states up to the 133% level in the Senate bill or the 150% level in the House would be enormous.
Even California only covers up to 106% of the poverty level.
U.K. Court Rules Secret Evidence Can't Be Used to Deny Bail
Associated Press
LONDON -- Britain's High Court dealt a blow to the government Tuesday by ruling that terror suspects can't be denied bail on the basis of secret evidence.
The court was ruling in the case of two men suspected of terrorist activities. They have been refused bail but their lawyers haven't been told why.
Home Secretary Alan Johnson said he was "surprised and disappointed" by the judgment. "We will do everything possible to keep this country safe and are taking steps accordingly in the light of this unhelpful judgment," he said.
Two High Court judges said suspects must be given an "irreducible minimum" of information about the case against them.
One of the suspects is a 23-year-old Pakistani student who was among a dozen people arrested in anti-terror raids in northwest England last year. All were released without charge, but the student is facing deportation on security grounds. The other suspect is an Algerian national. Neither has been identified by name.
The men won't be released immediately. The government is seeking permission to appeal.
Civil liberties groups praised the ruling. "Yet again it takes a senior judge to point out what most people already know -- if the government is going to lock you up, it needs to tell you why," said Shami Chakrabarti of the rights group Liberty.
Looks like the Democrats took another one on the chin. A month since election day and the recount on Long Island for Nassau County Executive is over with a virtual unknown Republican toppling incumbent Tom Suozzi.
One day after he trailed by slightly fewer than 400 votes after officials finished counting paper ballots, Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi has conceded to challenger Ed Mangano.
“I called Ed Mangano and congratulated him on his victory as the next county executive in Nassau County, and I offered him every assistance to help in a smooth transition,” Suozzi said at a Mineola press conference.
Mangano, an underdog Republican who was given little chance of winning leading up to Election Day, was able to tap into anti-incumbent sentiment fueled by a recession that has pushed unemployment in Nassau County to 7 percent in October, up from 4.9 percent a year ago.
High property taxes also led to Suozzi’s demise, though county government accounts for a small percentage of a homeowner’s tax bill.
(Baltimore Democrat Mayor Shelia) Dixon convicted of embezzlement (Baltimore Sun )
Jurors in the theft trial of Sheila Dixon convicted the Baltimore mayor Tuesday on a single charge of taking gift cards intended for the city's poor.
Although Dixon was acquitted of a felony theft charge, her conviction could force her from office.
The jury found Dixon not guilty of the most serious crime, felony theft. The jury decided that Dixon did not knowingly steal about $530 in Target and Best Buy gift cards purchased in December 2005 by developer Patrick Turner, who testified they were intended for "the children of Baltimore." Dixon was City Council president at the time.
The jury convicted Dixon of embezzlement for violating her fiduciary duties to the city and citizens of Baltimore by using about $530 in Target and Best Buy gift cards purchased in December 2005 by Turner. The developer testified the cards were intended for "the children of Baltimore." Dixon was City Council president at the time.
[Ordered Deported in 2004-Lives in Public Housing] Note the total lack of curiosity by the AP and the NYT as to who is giving her the money to live here and to fight her deportation. If she were a Muslim convert to Christianity fighting a court case, they would be investigating who was financing her.
BOSTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama's aunt buried her face in her hands and sobbed as she described her anguish over no longer having contact with him and his family after the revelation she had been living illegally for years in the United States in public housing.
Zeituni Onyango (zay-TUH'-nee awn-YAHN'-goh) told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview that she is troubled that her immigration woes have made her a political liability to her nephew.
Onyango, the half sister of Obama's late father, said she has exiled herself from the family after attending Obama's inauguration because she didn't want to become fodder for his foes.
Obama and his family have not reached out to her either, she said.
''Before, we were family. But right now, there is a lot of politics, and me, I am not interested in any politics at all,'' said Onyango, whose appeal for asylum from her native Kenya is before an immigration judge in Boston.
The Obamas are her only family in the United States, she said. ''It is very sad when such a thing happens.
Black Muslim Group Celebrates “Brother & Martyr” Maurice Clemmons(GatewayPundit)
“For Many Are Called But Few Are Chosen.” BOW Martyr Against White Terrorist & Racist Police Regime (Maurice Clemmons) Adorned With Virgins, Jewelry & Crowned; “When the Battle is Over, We Shall Wear a Crown.” – Seattle Black Foot Soldiers
The Seattle Blackfoot Soldiers, an offshoot of the Nation of Islam, celebrated cop killer Maurice Clemmons:
There’s more. The website also asks: “Who’s Your Favorite Officer Down: Mark Renninger, Tina Griswold, Greg Richards or Ronald Owens;” Seattle Black Foot Soldiers: Shootings a Preemptive Strike on Terrorists
The Last Crusade reportedly has learned from an Arkansas law enforcement official, became a member of the Nation of Islam while serving time in the Cummins Prison. (I haven’t been able to verify this.)
G8 leaders believe there is little time left for dialogue with Iran over its nuclear program, the Italian prime minister said Friday after a summit in Italy’s L’Aquila.
July 16, 2009 - Aljazeera: The US government has sent a strong message to Iran, saying it is running out of time to engage in dialogue over its nuclear programme to avoid further isolation or even military action.
September 18, 2009 – FOX News: Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Friday that Iran’s refusal to prove that its nuclear intentions are peaceful has “profound consequences” for world security… She also said that time is running out for the country to show it is serious about addressing concerns about its nuclear program.
November 15, 2009 – Reuters: U.S. President Barack Obama said Sunday time was running out for diplomacy to resolve a crisis over Iran’s nuclear program
November 30, 2009 – Radio Free Europe: The United States says “time is running out” for Iran to address international concerns about its nuclear program.
Confirmed: Saddam Planned Terror Strike on Prague RFE Headquarters (GatewayPundit)
Saddam stockpiled weapons in Prague for a terror strike on Radio Free Europe headquarters.
Czech officials confirmed on Sunday that Saddam Hussein had stockpiled weapons, including Kalashnikovs and rocket launchers, for a terrorist attack on the Radio Free Europe Headquarters in Prague in 2003.
Radio CZ reported, via Islam in Europe:
On Sunday, TV Nova aired an exclusive report with information that in 1999, Saddam Hussein ordered a terrorist attack that was to strike the Prague headquarters of Radio Free Europe, located at the time on Wenceslas square, in the heart of the city.
In 2003, Czech intelligence officers discovered the plot and confiscated the weapons that Iraqi secret agents had stockpiled. Jan Šubert is the spokesman for BIS – the Czech counter-intelligence service.
“The weapons that we secured included 11 pistols, 4 Kalashnikovs, two Heckler-Koch submachine guns with silencers, some 2,000 rounds with magazines, and the most important thing, a portable, anti-tank rocket propelled grenade weapon also known as an RPG-7.”
Saddam Hussein spent significant amounts of money on these weapons, which were to be used in an attack on the US-financed radio station from where programs criticizing Mr. Hussein’s regime were broadcast around the world.
Saddam Hussein had a long history of funding and organizing terror attacks and offering a safe haven and training to terrorists. He also reached out to Al-Qaeda.
Hero Dick Cheney: Obama Giving Aid and Comfort to the Enemy (GatewayPundit)
Dick Cheney slammed the Obama Administration for giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
FOX Nation reported on this Politico interview:
On the eve of the unveiling of the nation’s new Afghanistan policy, former Vice President Dick Cheney slammed President Barack Obama for projecting “weakness” to adversaries and warned that more workaday Afghans will side with the Taliban if they think the United States is heading for the exits.
In a 90-minute interview at his suburban Washington house, Cheney said the president’s “agonizing” about Afghanistan strategy “has consequences for your forces in the field.”
“I begin to get nervous when I see the commander in chief making decisions apparently for what I would describe as small ‘p’ political reasons, where he’s trying to balance off different competing groups in society,” Cheney said.
“Every time he delays, defers, debates, changes his position, it begins to raise questions: Is the commander in chief really behind what they’ve been asked to do?”
US Calls Honduras Election Significant but Insufficient Step to End Political Crisis (VOA)
If Zelaya had been a conservative, and Lobo was a liberal or Marxist, the current administration and the left would be declaring that ‘justice’ had been done and that ‘democracy’ had been reestablished.
The U.S. State Department says Sunday's presidential election in Honduras was a significant, but insufficient step, to end to political crisis that began there in June with the ouster of President Manuel Zelaya.
U.S. officials are stopping short of recognizing opposition candidate Porfirio Lobo as the country's next president.
The State Department says the Honduran election met international standards for fairness and transparency and it has commended Porfirio Lobo for what it termed an "ample victory".
But at the same time, it stopped short of formally recognizing Lobo as the country's next president and says Honduras must still take steps toward political reconciliation before it can emerge from the isolation brought by the June 28 ouster of President Zelaya.
The U.S. response to the Honduran vote came Monday from Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Arturo Valenzuela.
The Chilean-born U.S. diplomat said the voting was a significant step, yet only a step, in Honduras' return to full democracy after the coup d'etat that drove Mr. Zelaya from office.
He said that given the gravity of the June 28th events - the region's first coup since 1991 and the political polarization of the country - more steps are required.
Obama: Kamikaze in chief (The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)
There's a new picture of President Obama that's sticking in my mind like a song that keeps playing in my head (the one that kept playing for me last week was "Empire State of Mind," especially the lines by Alicia Keys).
In this mental picture of Obama, he's crunched down in a tiny cockpit and wearing oversized kamikaze goggles.
His plane is completely coming apart, pieces flying off in all directions, and he's stepping on the gas, that big million-dollar smile fixed on his face like there's nothing wrong.
That picture popped into my mind when the latest survey from Gallup on Obama's crashing poll numbers showed that his approval rating among whites has dropped to 39 percent (down from 61 percent in February).
This, when the White House simultaneously announced that Obama will be flying off to Europe next month to pick up his peace prize and stop in Copenhagen to vow that the United States will cut its greenhouse gas emissions by nearly 20 percent over the next 10 years.
Given the administration's job-killing agenda, Obama might well be able to more than accomplish that energy-cutting goal without adding a single windmill.
No sooner did the international media let loose with withering criticism of President Obama, now the American media is tentatively piling on with this Politico article on the 7 stories Barack Obama doesn’t want told.
However, unlike the international stories, the tone of the Politico article is more of a cautionary note warning President Obama and his Administration not to let these themes take hold with the American public. The 7 themes are in bold and my commentary is in italics:
• He thinks he’s playing with Monopoly money — In other words, Obama needs to rein in spending.
As James Carville famously said: “It’s the economy, stupid.”
• Too much Leonard Nimoy — Obama is too cerebral, like Spock in Star Trek. All talk and no action; all hat and no cattle. I could go on but I won’t.
• That’s the Chicago Way — The Obama Administration prides itself on its image as a group of “shrewd, brass-knuckled political types” rather than the new style of political leader the voters wanted. I can’t tell if the Politico expects the Administration to stop acting like Chicago pols or to try harder to hide it from the American public.
• He’s a pushover — The worst of both worlds: He’s a fighter on the domestic scene and a pushover abroad.
• He sees America as another pleasant country on the U.N. roll call, somewhere between Albania and Zimbabwe — This point is related to the last but with an added subtext: America isn’t that exceptional, a theme that goes against the way most Americans see their country.
• President Pelosi — “The great hazard for Obama is if Republicans or journalists conclude — as some already have — that Pelosi’s achievements are more impressive than Obama’s or come at his expense.” This may be the Politico’s harshest criticism, not only because Obama has abdicated some executive responsibilities to Pelosi, but also because Pelosi and Congress have abysmally low rankings with the American public.
• He’s in love with the man in the mirror — Or the man on the cover of GQ. Take your pick. This is good advice but it seems to me the 7 things Politico warns Obama about are things he and his followers see as features, not bugs. If that’s true, they won’t avoid them anytime soon.
UPDATE – It seems the White House didn’t enjoy the Politico article: “It’s not just Fox News that’s become subject of White House derision.
The following is an excerpt from a joke e-mail that is circulating among White House staffers. It’s a response, of sorts, to the analytical essay that POLITICO editor-in-chief John Harris wrote about the “seven stories that Barack Obama doesn’t want told.”
Denying the global-cooling cover-up - Obama team puts politics above science on climate (The Washington Times)
President Obama's climate czar, Carol M. Browner, claims that Climategate is not important and that global warming is settled science.
"[The U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has] been studying this issue for a very long time and agree this problem is real," she said last week, six days after the scandal first broke about fudged global-warming research.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs repeated the claim yesterday. This obtuseness exposes the Obama administration's complicity in aiding and abetting the fraud involved to stir up climate-change hysteria.
Responsibility for continuing to perpetuate this scandal goes all the way to the top.
Mr. Obama ignored and thus belittled the controversy when he announced that he would be attending the upcoming Copenhagen global warming conference on Dec. 7
Unfortunately, the Obama administration is disregarding the fact that the very people caught up in Climategate are the very same ones who wrote the U.N. climate report that will form the basis of discussion at Copenhagen.
Obama and the CRUddites of Britain (American Thinker)
The CRU Crew of liars and scientific frauds of the UK have been driving the climate fraud campaign for years.
They shaped the corrupt and ridiculous IPCC UN report, designed to empower the Green Corruptocracy as the new international Ruling Class.
Now that they have been finally, and devastatingly exposed to the world -- including the British media, the BBC (reluctantly), the Guardian, the Times and the Telegraph, and the Daily Mail, which is smelling a huge scandal that will bring down the Labour Party (socialist).
The one thing the Brits still pride themselves on is their world class science. The CRU crusade shows that science, too, has become pervasively corrupt and sick in New Socialist Britain.
By flying to the rescue in Copenhagen Obama is actually joining the exposed fraudsters, presumably to rescue his good buds of the Chicago Climate Exchange, which depends for survival on the passage of cap and trade legislation.
The Chicago Way is going international, and Obama is its Prophet. All Hail Obama!
So Copenhagen, here we come! And the whole world that's been watching this --- which includes all the English speakers on the web, maybe a billion people who can now read The BBC and The Guardian's own confession -- they can watch Obama tearing off the mask and appear as Obama Capone.
Well, it's justice on a grand scale. This is Watergate for the whole world.
The 19th century Luddites tried to destroy the best technology of their time, the early Industrial Revolution.
They took sledgehammers to the new, steam-driven weaving looms, to destroy an unprecedented blessing for all of humanity.
If you're wearing machine-woven socks today you can thank the early Industrial Revolution and the defeat of the Luddites.
Environment Agency (U.K.) to propose individual carbon ration cards (BusinessGreen)
The Environment Agency will argue today that carbon rationing is the fairest and most effective way for the UK to meet its legally binding targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
The Agency’s chairman, Lord Smith, will propose at the organisation's annual conference in London that every citizen be provided with a "carbon account" and unique number that they submit when buying carbon-intensive items such as petrol, electricity or airline tickets.
Individuals would then periodically receive statements that show the carbon impact of each purchase and how much of their annual ration has been used up.
If they exceeded this ration, they would need to buy extra credits from those people that have not used their full allowance, in a similar fashion to existing emission cap-and-trade schemes.
Lord Smith, former culture secretary under the Blair Government, is expected to say that carbon rationing will help citizens "judge how they want to develop their own quality of life in a sustainable way".
Meet Al Gore at Copenhagen, for $1,209 (Washington Times)
A fleeting few moments with a former vice president now goes for $1,209.
An official announcement from this fair Danish city says all: the former vice president is getting star treatment when he arrives with an entire swarm of green-minded gadflies for the United Nation's week-long global warming extravaganza that begins Dec. 7.
"Have you ever shaken hands with an American vice president? If not, now is your chance.
Meet Al Gore in Copenhagen during the UN Climate Change Conference," notes the Danish tourism commission, which is helping Mr. Gore promote "Our Choice: A Plan to Solve the Climate Crisis," his newest book about global warming in all its alarming modalities.
"Tickets are available in different price ranges for the event. If you want it all, you can purchase a VIP ticket, where you get a chance to shake hands with Al Gore, get a copy of Our Choice and have your picture taken with him. The VIP event costs DKK 5,999 and includes drinks and a light snack."
White House Dismisses ‘Climategate’ Because ‘Most People’ Believe in Global Warming (CNSnews)
Most little children believe in Santa Clause. And they quite concrete reasons for doing so.
As President Barack Obama prepares to travel to a global climate summit next week in Copenhagen, the White House is dismissing the “climategate” controversy that has arisen over the leak of email communications between top climate-change scientists that some skeptics say cast doubt on the legitimacy of the science behind the theory that human activity is causing global warming.
Obama will be attending the United Nations Climate Change Conference on Dec. 9. The conference in Copenhagen comes soon after the emails released by a computer hacker has led one Republican U.S. senator to call for an investigtation.
Some global warming skeptics have referred to the e-mails--from the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit in England--as “climategate.”
But White House Spokesman Robert Gibbs dismissed the controversy on Monday, saying that most people don’t dispute global warming.
“In the order of several thousand scientists have come to the conclusion that climate change is happening,” Gibbs said.
“I don’t think that any of that is, quite frankly among most people, in dispute.”
Climategate claims its first big political scalp, Australia (The Telegraph)
Australian conservatives have shown the way by dumping the party leader who was in favour of massive carbon taxes and replacing him with one who stated last month that AGW is “crap.”
This makes Malcolm Turnbull, the suddenly-ex-leader of Australia’s Liberal party, the first major political victim of the Climategate furore.
And his replacement Tony Abbott, the first politician to reap the benefits of the world’s growing scepticism towards ManBearPig.
Of the three candidates, he was the only one committed to delaying the Australian government’s proposed Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).
The trouble began last week when Australia’s opposition Liberal party began haemorrhaging frontbenchers, all of them preferring to lose their jobs than be railroaded by their leader into voting with the Government on Kevin Rudd’s new carbon tax.
ClimateGate Fraud Temporarily Steps Down (Second Scalp) JamieWearingFool)
Britain's University of East Anglia says the director of its prestigious Climatic Research Unit is stepping down pending an investigation into allegations that he overstated the case for man-made climate change.
The university says Phil Jones will relinquish his position until the completion of an independent review into allegations that he worked to alter the way in which global temperature data was presented.
Independent review. Ha ha Will the review be peer-reviewed?
The e-mails were seized upon by some skeptics of man-made climate change as proof that scientists are manipulating the data about its extent.
Uh, yes, and it was definitive proof. Next up, hopefully, will be a prosecution of Jones and his merry band of hoaxsters.
The MSM conspires to suppress stories harmful to the left-wing globalist agenda. Here is irrefutable proof.
Thanks to Google or other search engines, you can easily see how a story is promoted/reported... or not. The MSM can decide what is news, and they have unambiguously decided that Climategate is definitely not news.
The test below searches a number of leading news sites for the term "climategate". This test is quite revealing, for on the left-wing sites where it appears - which are very few - it is either in an opinion column, where it is somewhat laughingly disparaged or in a blog comment that somehow escaped the notice of the censors.
One might argue that they may use a different term for the fraud, which is, perhaps a fair observation... however, for that reason, the "Huffington Post", was included.
"The Huffington Post" is a left-wing Liberal site/forum/blog where the term 'climategate' has been published THOUSANDS of times by left-wing bloggers - all of which makes it more conspicuously absent from thousands of stories published daily by the MSM.
The Huffington Post left-wingers are using the term frequently and very freely amongst one-another - but you would never know that such a term even existed if you relied solely upon the MSM for your news and information.
See the chart below which shows actual numerical results according to Google site searches done earlier today (Dec. 1st, 2009).
Using Google, you can do a simple test to immediately expose such blatant press bias by searching each site individually for the term, and simply counting the number of results pages.
For example, to search CNN for the term "climategate" simply type the following into Google and see:
Climategate: Imminent Demise of Glaciers Due to … a Typo! (Pajamas Media)
At the present rate of retreat due to global warming, the Himalayan glaciers will disappear by 2350, not 2035 as has been reported. Ooops Sorry!
“Climategate” is now more than the massive fraud of one research institution.
Following the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit (CRU) data dump on November 19, many other issues with the political science of climate change are now being let out of the darkness. (See the complete Pajamas Media aggregator and document repository here, and find another PJM exclusive on research misconduct in the climate science community here.)
Most people following the climate change debate are aware that many sources claim that the Himalayan glaciers are disappearing “rapidly” — in fact, that they may disappear by 2035, a mere 25 years from now.
Today, in a guest post at Dr. Roger Pielke Sr.’s blog, Dr. Madhav Khandekar discusses this bit of folk science (Dr. Pielke is also the subject of an upcoming PJM interview...
Buchanan: Gore’s Moment 'Passed' - No Proof of Manmade Global Warming; Clift’s Response: 'No Known Proof There's God Either' (NewsBusters)
If you're curious to see how the mainstream Washington, D.C. press views the global warming debate, Newsweek's Eleanor Clift may have tipped off the public off.
On the Nov. 29 edition of "The McLaughlin Group," host John McLaughlin asked about the prospects of a Copenhagen climate change treaty and its possible impact on the U.S. economy.
MSNBC and "The McLaughlin Group" regular Pat Buchanan gave some spot-on analysis on global warming alarmist about former Vice President Al Gore and how it pertains to the climate change issue.
"Well, I don't think it's going to have any impact, John, because I don't think it's going to get through the United States Senate," Buchanan said. "And there's a reason for that John, and that's Al Gore's moment has come and gone.
The truth is they're changing the name to climate change rather than global warming for a reason."
Buchanan pointed to several anecdotal examples of not global warming, but global cooling and that this issue won't get much traction during economic downtime.
snip
Later in the show, Buchanan reiterated his point that global warming wasn't going on and said there was no proof that any of the warming that has occurred in recent history was caused by man.
However, Clift felt inclined to responded, rather emphatically. She said she believes U.S. policy should be proactive toward the issue.
Her view is arguably indicative of the mainstream media's sentiment on the debate, and she equated it to blind faith when she told Buchanan there's no proof there's a God either, which didn't mean global warming wasn't a danger.
"It's no known proof there's God, either. How much proof do you need, Pat?" Clift replied. "Oh, it is a danger. It's a danger in many places."
Warming will 'wipe out billions'(Women and minorities hit hardest)(news.scotsman.com)
MOST of the world's population will be wiped out if political leaders fail to agree a method of stopping current rates of global warming, one of the UK's most senior climate scientists has warned.
Professor Kevin Anderson, director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change, believes only around 10 per cent of the planet's population – around half a billion people – will survive if global temperatures rise by 4C.
Anderson's warning comes just eight days before global leaders meet in Copenhagen for the most crucial talks on climate change reversal since the Rio summit in 1992.
Current Met Office projections reveal that the lack of action in the intervening 17 years – in which emissions of climate changing gases such as carbon dioxide have soared – has set the world on a path towards potential 4C rises as early as 2060, and 6C rises by the end of the century.
Climategate: MSM Begins to Play Catchup on Scandal (NewsBusters)
Will this be the week when the MSM wall of silence finally breaks on the topic of Climategate? Judging from the cracks already developing in that wall that could well be the case.
A big crack in that wall occurred yesterday when George Stephanopoulos of ABC's This Week brought up the topic of Climategate for discussion with his guests.
Also yesterday, the readers of Newsday were finally introduced to this scandal via this Associated Press story.
The story headline alone has a sense of novelty about Climategate despite the fact readers of the blogosphere have known about it for over a week: 'Climategate' alleges global warming hoax.
The phrase "been there, done that" will roll around in the heads of many web surfers as they read the the AP story.
That could be because the AP story is from November 21 but yesterday was the first appearance of the story in Newsday...and now that newspaper is forced to play catchup:
LONDON - LONDON (AP) — Computer hackers have broken into a server at a well-respected climate change research center in Britain and posted hundreds of private e-mails and documents online — stoking debate over whether some scientists have overstated the case for man-made climate change.
This is breaking news to those Long Island folks relying solely on Newsday and the TV networks (except FOX) for the news.
However, for most of the rest of us on the web, 10 day old news is stale news.
The global warming hoax: The media's silent scandal http://www.brookesnews.com)
If a scandal isn't reported by the media, does that mean it never happened?
Nancy Morgan For the millions of Americans who don't watch Fox News or listen to talk radio, the answer is a resounding yes. Last Friday, November 20, evidence came to light that "appears to show a conspiracy to falsify data and suppress academic debate in order to exaggerate the possible threat of man-made global warming."
Translation: The global warming movement rests almost entirely on the IPCC's claim to represent the "consensus" of climate science. That entire movement now stands discredited.
In the face of this absolutely shameful and possibly criminal revelation of chicanery, deceit and manipulation of data, the mainstream media has stuck to their decades long policy of ignoring any evidence or opinion that challenges their firm belief that the world is undergoing a climate crisis.
A crisis that can only be rectified if all global citizens drastically change their behavior.
Despite these revelations, the AP's science writer continued reporting on the worsening climate non-crisis, "Since the 1997 international accord to fight global warming, climate change has worsened and accelerated — beyond some of the grimmest of warnings made back then." Scary stuff, if it were true.
CNN chimed in, reporting their own shocking headlines: Sea Level Rise Could Cost Port Cities $28 Trillion.
Remember, this 'news' story was published after evidence had come to light that credibly challenged the very facts CNN was reporting.
Yawn. Six days after this scandal came to light, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC and NBC had yet to make their viewers aware of what is being called "the greatest [scandal] in modern history."
A scandal that could derail the whole concept of man-made global warming.
And, coincidently, the $129 billion carbon market that rests on this shaky and manipulated data.
35 comments:
USA Today cutting 26 jobs (Politico.com)
USA Today editor John Hillkirk, who took over the job in April, informed staff today that there will be 26 jobs cut at the newspaper.
Hillkirk, in an memo obtained by POLITICO, wrote that those laid off will “be notified today or as soon as possible.” In a second memo, staffers were informed that there will be a merger between USA Today's news operation and USA WEEKEND.
The moves come on the same day that parent-company Gannett announced the institution of furloughs for 2010, just as they did this year.
In addition to layoffs, Hillkirk explained in the memo how USA Today would deal with a “challenging time for our industry.”
Over the next several weeks, we'll be examining changes in our structure and workflow that will help us to push the news to multiple platforms in the most efficient, non-bureaucratic way possible.
Finding ways to maximize our resources, while eliminating duplication and less valuable or unnecessary work, will be the goal.
In addition, we will be working with a team from USA WEEKEND to integrate the two operations. As Marcia describes in her email, there will be a number of people moving into the LIFE section shortly.
We look forward to working with WEEKEND in a collaborative fashion to publish a high-quality magazine using our combined resources.
USA Today, like other news organizations, is facing a tough economic situation.
Right now, the New York Times is in the midst of a buyout program, with layoffs coming if 100 staffers don’t sign up. The Washington Post recently cut positions as part of its web-print merger, and the Associated Press laid off staff throughout the country last month.
Gannett to institute furloughs in first quarter of 2010 (Poynter.org)
Memo to Gannett employees December 1, 2009
To: All US Community Publishing employees
From: Bob Dickey
We are just completing the preliminary budgets for 2010. Thanks to all of your hard work and efforts to keep our costs down this year and create greater efficiencies across the division, we are heading into the new year with some solid improvements under our belt.
We have seen some promising trends in advertising with ad declines slowing throughout the year and as we begin the holiday shopping season, we are also seeing some indication that retailers may be spending more on advertising.
While these trends are encouraging, the overall economy is still fragile with a number of business uncertainties.
Therefore, as we head into 2010, we think it is prudent to take a conservative approach toward managing our business.
Toward that end, we have decided to implement furloughs across USCP during the first quarter. This is not a companywide initiative though Corporate and some of Gannett’s other operations have also decided to put furloughs into place during the first quarter.
No one on the Gannett Management Committee makes these decisions lightly and we understand and appreciate the difficulties furloughs have placed on many of you and your families.
The furloughs we took companywide this year, however, saved Gannett a significant amount of money and helped us get through what has been unquestionably the toughest time we have ever faced as a company and division.
Journicide: A looming, lost generation of scribes (Newsosour.com)
Vanishing employment opportunities and shrinking freelance compensation threaten to wipe out a substantial percentage of the next generation of professional journalists.
This journicide, to coin a term, is not merely going to be difficult and disappointing for the affected young people, who mostly will move on to find rewarding careers in other endeavors.
But the loss of a substantial portion of what would have been the next generation of journalists also will be tragic for society.
The loss will deprive citizens in the future with the insights that only can be delivered by dedicated professionals with the time, skills and motivation to dig deeply into difficult stories.
Bloggers and other bloviators, this writer expressly included, will not take up the slack. Absent some miracle that motivates someone, anyone, to start fairly compensating journalists again, we are going to lose something that has been very important to our democracy throughout the life of the nation. I can’t imagine what it will be like without professional journalists, but I don’t think we will like the outcome.
Journicide has been under way since newspapers and other mainstream media began losing their formidable revenue-generating juju in 2006.
The elimination of full-time professional journalism jobs since then has been so relentless that it has become remarkably, depressingly commonplace.
Paper Cuts reports that nearly 15,000 newspaper jobs were eliminated so far this year, putting the industry on track to rival, or potentially surpass, the nearly 16,000 jobs axed in 2008.
Last month, the Associated Press zapped 90 positions to cut 10% of its payroll costs, and BusinessWeek pink-slipped a reported 130 individuals, or approximately a third of its staff.
As bad as things are for still-working and formerly employed journalists – and they are bad – the opportunities are even worse for journalists seeking their first gigs.
There are two reasons: First, young journalists trying to land entry-level jobs find themselves competing with seasoned pros who have been knocked off perches higher up in the food chain.
Second, the miserable state of the media business has combined with a sharp increase in the supply of available journalists to reduce compensation to humiliatingly low levels.
snip
“People no longer want to pay you to write,” said Gorov in a telephone interview from Los Angeles, where she was dispatched by the Globe before her position was eliminated in one of its early cutbacks.
“It’s not just that freelance rates have gone down. It’s that they don’t exist. ‘We’ll give you exposure’ is the phrase we hear now.”
Provoices will pay writers from $50to $250 a story. “I don’t see dinosaur journalists who used to make $90,000 a year writing for $250,” she acknowledged. “But this is a chance for a lot of people scrambling to get a start at making a career in journalism or to continue working as a foreign correspondent in a country where $25o is a lot of money.”
snip
The starving-artist lifestyle may be colorful and appealing for a while, but it gets old fast if you are bunking on a friend’s sofa, living under the same roof you did in junior high and lying awake at night wondering how you are going to repay your staggering five-figure student loan.
If nothing changes, the next generation of journalists will give up and move on to entirely different pursuits. And you can’t blame them.
How many journalistas do you think will be satisfied having to make ends meet by working as baristas?
Journalists struggle with finances, retirement after parting L.A. Times (TheJournalismShop.com)
Former Los Angeles Times journalists continue to struggle with severe underemployment, soon-to-expire unemployment benefits and worries about retirement, a recent informal survey of 75 former staffers found.
Nearly three-quarters of the respondents said they had been laid off or asked to leave by the financially troubled Tribune Company; the rest left the company voluntarily.
More than two-thirds are still receiving unemployment checks, though 68 percent expect those benefits to expire within 30 weeks of when the survey was taken in mid-November.
The loss of benefits are despite the 14-20 week-extension recently signed by President Barack Obama.
The eventual end of benefits weighs heavily on the former Times employees.
“I’m hanging in there, but don’t know what I’ll do when I don’t have unemployment as a base,” wrote one female ex-staffer.
“I’m in my 50s and it isn’t easy to find a job at my level and impossible to find one that pays what I used to make.”
All comments were offered anonymously in the survey.
The survey, which was conducted by TheJournalismShop, targeted 124 writers, editors, news editors, managers and artists who banded together to discuss benefit, health care and career options on a Yahoo message group.
The group, which began in December of 2008, grew to its present size as layoffs mounted at the Times.
Turning Point: Couric Rips Obama (Newsmax.com) I'll be darned. A pig just flew by my window.
Katie Couric may be best known for her unflattering interview with Sarah Palin. But her nightly news broadcast this past Monday night may be an indicator that the big liberal media are now turning their guns on Obama.
Couric said on “CBS Evening News” that Americans are growing “disenchanted” with Obama and are openly questioning his credibility.
“Is the honeymoon over?” anchor Couric said at the beginning of her correspondent’s report.
“Although President Obama has been in office less than a year, many Americans are growing disenchanted with his handling of the enormous problems he and the country are facing, from healthcare to unemployment to Afghanistan.
“His poll numbers are sliding, and at least one poll shows his job approval rating has fallen, for the first time, below 50 percent.”
Correspondent Chris Reid chimed in: “The president is getting battered on everything from the economy to foreign policy. Some polls show Americans are increasingly questioning his credibility.”
The report asserted that while Obama talks about dealing with unemployment, which is over 10 percent and expected to rise, he has developed “no new ideas” for dealing with the problem.
“he has developed “no new ideas” for dealing with the problem.” Of course not!
Do they think a doctor can heal a patient while simultaneously trying to kill that patient?
Obama to Spend Two Nights in Oslo For Peace Prize Functions (deutsche press)
Oslo (dpa) -- US President Barack Obama will likely spend two nights in Oslo next week where he is to receive his Nobel Peace Prize, the Norwegian Nobel Committee said Tuesday.
"What can be confirm today is that that he will arrive on Wednesday the 9th, and he will arrive 'late evening' it is said," Geir Lundestad, secretary of the committee, told broadcaster NRK.
Obama is due on December 10 to receive his Nobel Peace Prize. He was cited by the five-member Norwegian Nobel Committee for "his extraordinary efforts to strengthen international diplomacy and cooperation between peoples."
WTF? Doesn't this guy have a fairly important day job? Our President should use his time to solve the economic problem, create jobs, win the Afghan War. Not hobnob and dither with the Leftist Groupies of the world. This is shaping up like the latest world tour from U2 or the Rolling Stones.
“Climategate” surpasses “Global Warming” on Google (http://wattsupwiththat.com) Gore so wishes he did not create the Internet........
Note: title suffix – “autosuggest still blocked” has been removed, see update2 at bottom of story.
We’ve had the term “global warming” in the lexicon since well before the Internet became a household tool, certainly well before Google itself.
So it is with amazement that I report the rise of a new term, “Climategate” in just a little over 1 week in the Google search engine.
HOW MUCH WILL YOUR STATES’ TAXES GO UP IN OBAMACARE? (dickmorris.com)
The Obama health care initiative will be the biggest unfunded federal mandate on the states in history.
It will force dozens of states, particularly in the South, to abandon their low tax ways and to move toward dramatically higher rates of taxation. It may even force Florida and Texas to impose an income tax!
In the Senate version of the bill, states must expand their Medicaid eligibility to cover everyone with an income that is 133% of the poverty level.
The House bill brings it up to 150%. But a host of states have kept their state taxes low precisely by so limiting eligibility for Medicaid that it essentially is only for seniors needing long term care and not for poor younger people who require acute care.
For example, Texas covers only those who make 27% of the poverty level or less. Florida covers only 55%. Pennsylvania covers only 36%. Arkansas covers only 17%. North Dakota covers only 62%. Nebraska covers only 58%. Louisiana covers only 26%. Indiana covers only 26%.
The revenue required to bring these states up to the 133% level in the Senate bill or the 150% level in the House would be enormous.
Even California only covers up to 106% of the poverty level.
A taste of the KSM-trial-to-come in NYC:
* DECEMBER 1, 2009, 10:14 A.M. ET
U.K. Court Rules Secret Evidence Can't Be Used to Deny Bail
Associated Press
LONDON -- Britain's High Court dealt a blow to the government Tuesday by ruling that terror suspects can't be denied bail on the basis of secret evidence.
The court was ruling in the case of two men suspected of terrorist activities. They have been refused bail but their lawyers haven't been told why.
Home Secretary Alan Johnson said he was "surprised and disappointed" by the judgment. "We will do everything possible to keep this country safe and are taking steps accordingly in the light of this unhelpful judgment," he said.
Two High Court judges said suspects must be given an "irreducible minimum" of information about the case against them.
One of the suspects is a 23-year-old Pakistani student who was among a dozen people arrested in anti-terror raids in northwest England last year. All were released without charge, but the student is facing deportation on security grounds. The other suspect is an Algerian national. Neither has been identified by name.
The men won't be released immediately. The government is seeking permission to appeal.
Civil liberties groups praised the ruling. "Yet again it takes a senior judge to point out what most people already know -- if the government is going to lock you up, it needs to tell you why," said Shami Chakrabarti of the rights group Liberty.
Copyright © 2009 Associated Press
GOP Wins Big Race in New York (JamieWearingFool)
Looks like the Democrats took another one on the chin. A month since election day and the recount on Long Island for Nassau County Executive is over with a virtual unknown Republican toppling incumbent Tom Suozzi.
One day after he trailed by slightly fewer than 400 votes after officials finished counting paper ballots, Nassau County Executive Tom Suozzi has conceded to challenger Ed Mangano.
“I called Ed Mangano and congratulated him on his victory as the next county executive in Nassau County, and I offered him every assistance to help in a smooth transition,” Suozzi said at a Mineola press conference.
Mangano, an underdog Republican who was given little chance of winning leading up to Election Day, was able to tap into anti-incumbent sentiment fueled by a recession that has pushed unemployment in Nassau County to 7 percent in October, up from 4.9 percent a year ago.
High property taxes also led to Suozzi’s demise, though county government accounts for a small percentage of a homeowner’s tax bill.
(Baltimore Democrat Mayor Shelia) Dixon convicted of embezzlement
(Baltimore Sun )
Jurors in the theft trial of Sheila Dixon convicted the Baltimore mayor Tuesday on a single charge of taking gift cards intended for the city's poor.
Although Dixon was acquitted of a felony theft charge, her conviction could force her from office.
The jury found Dixon not guilty of the most serious crime, felony theft. The jury decided that Dixon did not knowingly steal about $530 in Target and Best Buy gift cards purchased in December 2005 by developer Patrick Turner, who testified they were intended for "the children of Baltimore."
Dixon was City Council president at the time.
The jury convicted Dixon of embezzlement for violating her fiduciary duties to the city and citizens of Baltimore by using about $530 in Target and Best Buy gift cards purchased in December 2005 by Turner. The developer testified the cards were intended for "the children of Baltimore." Dixon was City Council president at the time.
AP Exclusive: Obama Aunt Anguished by Separation
[Ordered Deported in 2004-Lives in Public Housing] Note the total lack of curiosity by the AP and the NYT as to who is giving her the money to live here and to fight her deportation. If she were a Muslim convert to Christianity fighting a court case, they would be investigating who was financing her.
BOSTON (AP) -- President Barack Obama's aunt buried her face in her hands and sobbed as she described her anguish over no longer having contact with him and his family after the revelation she had been living illegally for years in the United States in public housing.
Zeituni Onyango (zay-TUH'-nee awn-YAHN'-goh) told The Associated Press in an exclusive interview that she is troubled that her immigration woes have made her a political liability to her nephew.
Onyango, the half sister of Obama's late father, said she has exiled herself from the family after attending Obama's inauguration because she didn't want to become fodder for his foes.
Obama and his family have not reached out to her either, she said.
''Before, we were family. But right now, there is a lot of politics, and me, I am not interested in any politics at all,'' said Onyango, whose appeal for asylum from her native Kenya is before an immigration judge in Boston.
The Obamas are her only family in the United States, she said.
''It is very sad when such a thing happens.
Black Muslim Group Celebrates “Brother & Martyr” Maurice Clemmons(GatewayPundit)
“For Many Are Called But Few Are Chosen.” BOW Martyr Against White Terrorist & Racist Police Regime (Maurice Clemmons) Adorned With Virgins, Jewelry & Crowned; “When the Battle is Over, We Shall Wear a Crown.” – Seattle Black Foot Soldiers
The Seattle Blackfoot Soldiers, an offshoot of the Nation of Islam, celebrated cop killer Maurice Clemmons:
There’s more. The website also asks: “Who’s Your Favorite Officer Down: Mark Renninger, Tina Griswold, Greg Richards or Ronald Owens;” Seattle Black Foot Soldiers: Shootings a Preemptive Strike on Terrorists
The Last Crusade reportedly has learned from an Arkansas law enforcement official, became a member of the Nation of Islam while serving time in the Cummins Prison. (I haven’t been able to verify this.)
White House Warns Iran That Time Is Running Out
G8 leaders believe there is little time left for dialogue with Iran over its nuclear program, the Italian prime minister said Friday after a summit in Italy’s L’Aquila.
July 16, 2009 - Aljazeera:
The US government has sent a strong message to Iran, saying it is running out of time to engage in dialogue over its nuclear programme to avoid further isolation or even military action.
September 18, 2009 – FOX News:
Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton said Friday that Iran’s refusal to prove that its nuclear intentions are peaceful has “profound consequences” for world security… She also said that time is running out for the country to show it is serious about addressing concerns about its nuclear program.
November 15, 2009 – Reuters:
U.S. President Barack Obama said Sunday time was running out for diplomacy to resolve a crisis over Iran’s nuclear program
November 30, 2009 – Radio Free Europe: The United States says “time is running out” for Iran to address international concerns about its nuclear program.
Confirmed: Saddam Planned Terror Strike on Prague RFE Headquarters (GatewayPundit)
Saddam stockpiled weapons in Prague for a terror strike on Radio Free Europe headquarters.
Czech officials confirmed on Sunday that Saddam Hussein had stockpiled weapons, including Kalashnikovs and rocket launchers, for a terrorist attack on the Radio Free Europe Headquarters in Prague in 2003.
Radio CZ reported, via Islam in Europe:
On Sunday, TV Nova aired an exclusive report with information that in 1999, Saddam Hussein ordered a terrorist attack that was to strike the Prague headquarters of Radio Free Europe, located at the time on Wenceslas square, in the heart of the city.
In 2003, Czech intelligence officers discovered the plot and confiscated the weapons that Iraqi secret agents had stockpiled. Jan Šubert is the spokesman for BIS – the Czech counter-intelligence service.
“The weapons that we secured included 11 pistols, 4 Kalashnikovs, two Heckler-Koch submachine guns with silencers, some 2,000 rounds with magazines, and the most important thing, a portable, anti-tank rocket propelled grenade weapon also known as an RPG-7.”
Saddam Hussein spent significant amounts of money on these weapons, which were to be used in an attack on the US-financed radio station from where programs criticizing Mr. Hussein’s regime were broadcast around the world.
Saddam Hussein had a long history of funding and organizing terror attacks and offering a safe haven and training to terrorists. He also reached out to Al-Qaeda.
Hero Dick Cheney: Obama Giving Aid and Comfort to the Enemy (GatewayPundit)
Dick Cheney slammed the Obama Administration for giving aid and comfort to the enemy.
FOX Nation reported on this Politico interview:
On the eve of the unveiling of the nation’s new Afghanistan policy, former Vice President Dick Cheney slammed President Barack Obama for projecting “weakness” to adversaries and warned that more workaday Afghans will side with the Taliban if they think the United States is heading for the exits.
In a 90-minute interview at his suburban Washington house, Cheney said the president’s “agonizing” about Afghanistan strategy “has consequences for your forces in the field.”
“I begin to get nervous when I see the commander in chief making decisions apparently for what I would describe as small ‘p’ political reasons, where he’s trying to balance off different competing groups in society,” Cheney said.
“Every time he delays, defers, debates, changes his position, it begins to raise questions: Is the commander in chief really behind what they’ve been asked to do?”
US Calls Honduras Election Significant but Insufficient Step to End Political Crisis (VOA)
If Zelaya had been a conservative, and Lobo was a liberal or Marxist, the current administration and the left would be declaring that ‘justice’ had been done and that ‘democracy’ had been reestablished.
The U.S. State Department says Sunday's presidential election in Honduras was a significant, but insufficient step, to end to political crisis that began there in June with the ouster of President Manuel Zelaya.
U.S. officials are stopping short of recognizing opposition candidate Porfirio Lobo as the country's next president.
The State Department says the Honduran election met international standards for fairness and transparency and it has commended Porfirio Lobo for what it termed an "ample victory".
But at the same time, it stopped short of formally recognizing Lobo as the country's next president and says Honduras must still take steps toward political reconciliation before it can emerge from the isolation brought by the June 28 ouster of President Zelaya.
The U.S. response to the Honduran vote came Monday from Assistant Secretary of State for Western Hemisphere Affairs Arturo Valenzuela.
The Chilean-born U.S. diplomat said the voting was a significant step, yet only a step, in Honduras' return to full democracy after the coup d'etat that drove Mr. Zelaya from office.
He said that given the gravity of the June 28th events - the region's first coup since 1991 and the political polarization of the country - more steps are required.
Obama: Kamikaze in chief (The Pittsburgh Tribune-Review)
There's a new picture of President Obama that's sticking in my mind like a song that keeps playing in my head (the one that kept playing for me last week was "Empire State of Mind," especially the lines by Alicia Keys).
In this mental picture of Obama, he's crunched down in a tiny cockpit and wearing oversized kamikaze goggles.
His plane is completely coming apart, pieces flying off in all directions, and he's stepping on the gas, that big million-dollar smile fixed on his face like there's nothing wrong.
That picture popped into my mind when the latest survey from Gallup on Obama's crashing poll numbers showed that his approval rating among whites has dropped to 39 percent (down from 61 percent in February).
This, when the White House simultaneously announced that Obama will be flying off to Europe next month to pick up his peace prize and stop in Copenhagen to vow that the United States will cut its greenhouse gas emissions by nearly 20 percent over the next 10 years.
Given the administration's job-killing agenda, Obama might well be able to more than accomplish that energy-cutting goal without adding a single windmill.
Politico: “7 Stories Barack Obama Doesn’t Want Told” (Updated) PATTERICO
No sooner did the international media let loose with withering criticism of President Obama, now the American media is tentatively piling on with this Politico article on the 7 stories Barack Obama doesn’t want told.
However, unlike the international stories, the tone of the Politico article is more of a cautionary note warning President Obama and his Administration not to let these themes take hold with the American public. The 7 themes are in bold and my commentary is in italics:
• He thinks he’s playing with Monopoly money — In other words, Obama needs to rein in spending.
As James Carville famously said: “It’s the economy, stupid.”
• Too much Leonard Nimoy — Obama is too cerebral, like Spock in Star Trek. All talk and no action; all hat and no cattle. I could go on but I won’t.
• That’s the Chicago Way — The Obama Administration prides itself on its image as a group of “shrewd, brass-knuckled political types” rather than the new style of political leader the voters wanted. I can’t tell if the Politico expects the Administration to stop acting like Chicago pols or to try harder to hide it from the American public.
• He’s a pushover — The worst of both worlds: He’s a fighter on the domestic scene and a pushover abroad.
• He sees America as another pleasant country on the U.N. roll call, somewhere between Albania and Zimbabwe — This point is related to the last but with an added subtext: America isn’t that exceptional, a theme that goes against the way most Americans see their country.
• President Pelosi — “The great hazard for Obama is if Republicans or journalists conclude — as some already have — that Pelosi’s achievements are more impressive than Obama’s or come at his expense.” This may be the Politico’s harshest criticism, not only because Obama has abdicated some executive responsibilities to Pelosi, but also because Pelosi and Congress have abysmally low rankings with the American public.
• He’s in love with the man in the mirror — Or the man on the cover of GQ. Take your pick.
This is good advice but it seems to me the 7 things Politico warns Obama about are things he and his followers see as features, not bugs. If that’s true, they won’t avoid them anytime soon.
UPDATE – It seems the White House didn’t enjoy the Politico article:
“It’s not just Fox News that’s become subject of White House derision.
The following is an excerpt from a joke e-mail that is circulating among White House staffers. It’s a response, of sorts, to the analytical essay that POLITICO editor-in-chief John Harris wrote about the “seven stories that Barack Obama doesn’t want told.”
The White House email is shown at the link.
Denying the global-cooling cover-up - Obama team puts politics above science on climate (The Washington Times)
President Obama's climate czar, Carol M. Browner, claims that Climategate is not important and that global warming is settled science.
"[The U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has] been studying this issue for a very long time and agree this problem is real," she said last week, six days after the scandal first broke about fudged global-warming research.
White House spokesman Robert Gibbs repeated the claim yesterday. This obtuseness exposes the Obama administration's complicity in aiding and abetting the fraud involved to stir up climate-change hysteria.
Responsibility for continuing to perpetuate this scandal goes all the way to the top.
Mr. Obama ignored and thus belittled the controversy when he announced that he would be attending the upcoming Copenhagen global warming conference on Dec. 7
Unfortunately, the Obama administration is disregarding the fact that the very people caught up in Climategate are the very same ones who wrote the U.N. climate report that will form the basis of discussion at Copenhagen.
Obama and the CRUddites of Britain (American Thinker)
The CRU Crew of liars and scientific frauds of the UK have been driving the climate fraud campaign for years.
They shaped the corrupt and ridiculous IPCC UN report, designed to empower the Green Corruptocracy as the new international Ruling Class.
Now that they have been finally, and devastatingly exposed to the world -- including the British media, the BBC (reluctantly), the Guardian, the Times and the Telegraph, and the Daily Mail, which is smelling a huge scandal that will bring down the Labour Party (socialist).
The one thing the Brits still pride themselves on is their world class science. The CRU crusade shows that science, too, has become pervasively corrupt and sick in New Socialist Britain.
By flying to the rescue in Copenhagen Obama is actually joining the exposed fraudsters, presumably to rescue his good buds of the Chicago Climate Exchange, which depends for survival on the passage of cap and trade legislation.
The Chicago Way is going international, and Obama is its Prophet. All Hail Obama!
So Copenhagen, here we come! And the whole world that's been watching this --- which includes all the English speakers on the web, maybe a billion people who can now read The BBC and The Guardian's own confession -- they can watch Obama tearing off the mask and appear as Obama Capone.
Well, it's justice on a grand scale. This is Watergate for the whole world.
The 19th century Luddites tried to destroy the best technology of their time, the early Industrial Revolution.
They took sledgehammers to the new, steam-driven weaving looms, to destroy an unprecedented blessing for all of humanity.
If you're wearing machine-woven socks today you can thank the early Industrial Revolution and the defeat of the Luddites.
Environment Agency (U.K.) to propose individual carbon ration cards (BusinessGreen)
The Environment Agency will argue today that carbon rationing is the fairest and most effective way for the UK to meet its legally binding targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions.
The Agency’s chairman, Lord Smith, will propose at the organisation's annual conference in London that every citizen be provided with a "carbon account" and unique number that they submit when buying carbon-intensive items such as petrol, electricity or airline tickets.
Individuals would then periodically receive statements that show the carbon impact of each purchase and how much of their annual ration has been used up.
If they exceeded this ration, they would need to buy extra credits from those people that have not used their full allowance, in a similar fashion to existing emission cap-and-trade schemes.
Lord Smith, former culture secretary under the Blair Government, is expected to say that carbon rationing will help citizens "judge how they want to develop their own quality of life in a sustainable way".
Meet Al Gore at Copenhagen, for $1,209 (Washington Times)
A fleeting few moments with a former vice president now goes for $1,209.
An official announcement from this fair Danish city says all: the former vice president is getting star treatment when he arrives with an entire swarm of green-minded gadflies for the United Nation's week-long global warming extravaganza that begins Dec. 7.
"Have you ever shaken hands with an American vice president? If not, now is your chance.
Meet Al Gore in Copenhagen during the UN Climate Change Conference," notes the Danish tourism commission, which is helping Mr. Gore promote "Our Choice: A Plan to Solve the Climate Crisis," his newest book about global warming in all its alarming modalities.
"Tickets are available in different price ranges for the event. If you want it all, you can purchase a VIP ticket, where you get a chance to shake hands with Al Gore, get a copy of Our Choice and have your picture taken with him. The VIP event costs DKK 5,999 and includes drinks and a light snack."
White House Dismisses ‘Climategate’ Because ‘Most People’ Believe in Global Warming (CNSnews)
Most little children believe in Santa Clause. And they quite concrete reasons for doing so.
As President Barack Obama prepares to travel to a global climate summit next week in Copenhagen, the White House is dismissing the “climategate” controversy that has arisen over the leak of email communications between top climate-change scientists that some skeptics say cast doubt on the legitimacy of the science behind the theory that human activity is causing global warming.
Obama will be attending the United Nations Climate Change Conference on Dec. 9. The conference in Copenhagen comes soon after the emails released by a computer hacker has led one Republican U.S. senator to call for an investigtation.
Some global warming skeptics have referred to the e-mails--from the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit in England--as “climategate.”
But White House Spokesman Robert Gibbs dismissed the controversy on Monday, saying that most people don’t dispute global warming.
“In the order of several thousand scientists have come to the conclusion that climate change is happening,” Gibbs said.
“I don’t think that any of that is, quite frankly among most people, in dispute.”
Climategate claims its first big political scalp, Australia (The Telegraph)
Australian conservatives have shown the way by dumping the party leader who was in favour of massive carbon taxes and replacing him with one who stated last month that AGW is “crap.”
This makes Malcolm Turnbull, the suddenly-ex-leader of Australia’s Liberal party, the first major political victim of the Climategate furore.
And his replacement Tony Abbott, the first politician to reap the benefits of the world’s growing scepticism towards ManBearPig.
Of the three candidates, he was the only one committed to delaying the Australian government’s proposed Emissions Trading Scheme (ETS).
The trouble began last week when Australia’s opposition Liberal party began haemorrhaging frontbenchers, all of them preferring to lose their jobs than be railroaded by their leader into voting with the Government on Kevin Rudd’s new carbon tax.
ClimateGate Fraud Temporarily Steps Down (Second Scalp) JamieWearingFool)
Britain's University of East Anglia says the director of its prestigious Climatic Research Unit is stepping down pending an investigation into allegations that he overstated the case for man-made climate change.
The university says Phil Jones will relinquish his position until the completion of an independent review into allegations that he worked to alter the way in which global temperature data was presented.
Independent review. Ha ha Will the review be peer-reviewed?
The e-mails were seized upon by some skeptics of man-made climate change as proof that scientists are manipulating the data about its extent.
Uh, yes, and it was definitive proof. Next up, hopefully, will be a prosecution of Jones and his merry band of hoaxsters.
Another MSM Boycott, this time it’s Climategate
The MSM conspires to suppress stories harmful to the left-wing globalist agenda. Here is irrefutable proof.
Thanks to Google or other search engines, you can easily see how a story is promoted/reported... or not. The MSM can decide what is news, and they have unambiguously decided that Climategate is definitely not news.
The test below searches a number of leading news sites for the term "climategate". This test is quite revealing, for on the left-wing sites where it appears - which are very few - it is either in an opinion column, where it is somewhat laughingly disparaged or in a blog comment that somehow escaped the notice of the censors.
One might argue that they may use a different term for the fraud, which is, perhaps a fair observation... however, for that reason, the "Huffington Post", was included.
"The Huffington Post" is a left-wing Liberal site/forum/blog where the term 'climategate' has been published THOUSANDS of times by left-wing bloggers - all of which makes it more conspicuously absent from thousands of stories published daily by the MSM.
The Huffington Post left-wingers are using the term frequently and very freely amongst one-another - but you would never know that such a term even existed if you relied solely upon the MSM for your news and information.
See the chart below which shows actual numerical results according to Google site searches done earlier today (Dec. 1st, 2009).
Using Google, you can do a simple test to immediately expose such blatant press bias by searching each site individually for the term, and simply counting the number of results pages.
For example, to search CNN for the term "climategate" simply type the following into Google and see:
Climategate: Imminent Demise of Glaciers Due to … a Typo! (Pajamas Media)
At the present rate of retreat due to global warming, the Himalayan glaciers will disappear by 2350, not 2035 as has been reported. Ooops Sorry!
“Climategate” is now more than the massive fraud of one research institution.
Following the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit (CRU) data dump on November 19, many other issues with the political science of climate change are now being let out of the darkness. (See the complete Pajamas Media aggregator and document repository here, and find another PJM exclusive on research misconduct in the climate science community here.)
Most people following the climate change debate are aware that many sources claim that the Himalayan glaciers are disappearing “rapidly” — in fact, that they may disappear by 2035, a mere 25 years from now.
Today, in a guest post at Dr. Roger Pielke Sr.’s blog, Dr. Madhav Khandekar discusses this bit of folk science (Dr. Pielke is also the subject of an upcoming PJM interview...
Buchanan: Gore’s Moment 'Passed' - No Proof of Manmade Global Warming; Clift’s Response: 'No Known Proof There's God Either' (NewsBusters)
If you're curious to see how the mainstream Washington, D.C. press views the global warming debate, Newsweek's Eleanor Clift may have tipped off the public off.
On the Nov. 29 edition of "The McLaughlin Group," host John McLaughlin asked about the prospects of a Copenhagen climate change treaty and its possible impact on the U.S. economy.
MSNBC and "The McLaughlin Group" regular Pat Buchanan gave some spot-on analysis on global warming alarmist about former Vice President Al Gore and how it pertains to the climate change issue.
"Well, I don't think it's going to have any impact, John, because I don't think it's going to get through the United States Senate," Buchanan said. "And there's a reason for that John, and that's Al Gore's moment has come and gone.
The truth is they're changing the name to climate change rather than global warming for a reason."
Buchanan pointed to several anecdotal examples of not global warming, but global cooling and that this issue won't get much traction during economic downtime.
snip
Later in the show, Buchanan reiterated his point that global warming wasn't going on and said there was no proof that any of the warming that has occurred in recent history was caused by man.
However, Clift felt inclined to responded, rather emphatically.
She said she believes U.S. policy should be proactive toward the issue.
Her view is arguably indicative of the mainstream media's sentiment on the debate, and she equated it to blind faith when she told Buchanan there's no proof there's a God either, which didn't mean global warming wasn't a danger.
"It's no known proof there's God, either. How much proof do you need, Pat?" Clift replied. "Oh, it is a danger. It's a danger in many places."
Warming will 'wipe out billions'(Women and minorities hit hardest)(news.scotsman.com)
MOST of the world's population will be wiped out if political leaders fail to agree a method of stopping current rates of global warming, one of the UK's most senior climate scientists has warned.
Professor Kevin Anderson, director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change, believes only around 10 per cent of the planet's population – around half a billion people – will survive if global temperatures rise by 4C.
Anderson's warning comes just eight days before global leaders meet in Copenhagen for the most crucial talks on climate change reversal since the Rio summit in 1992.
Current Met Office projections reveal that the lack of action in the intervening 17 years – in which emissions of climate changing gases such as carbon dioxide have soared – has set the world on a path towards potential 4C rises as early as 2060, and 6C rises by the end of the century.
Climategate: MSM Begins to Play Catchup on Scandal (NewsBusters)
Will this be the week when the MSM wall of silence finally breaks on the topic of Climategate? Judging from the cracks already developing in that wall that could well be the case.
A big crack in that wall occurred yesterday when George Stephanopoulos of ABC's This Week brought up the topic of Climategate for discussion with his guests.
Also yesterday, the readers of Newsday were finally introduced to this scandal via this Associated Press story.
The story headline alone has a sense of novelty about Climategate despite the fact readers of the blogosphere have known about it for over a week: 'Climategate' alleges global warming hoax.
The phrase "been there, done that" will roll around in the heads of many web surfers as they read the the AP story.
That could be because the AP story is from November 21 but yesterday was the first appearance of the story in Newsday...and now that newspaper is forced to play catchup:
LONDON - LONDON (AP) — Computer hackers have broken into a server at a well-respected climate change research center in Britain and posted hundreds of private e-mails and documents online — stoking debate over whether some scientists have overstated the case for man-made climate change.
This is breaking news to those Long Island folks relying solely on Newsday and the TV networks (except FOX) for the news.
However, for most of the rest of us on the web, 10 day old news is stale news.
The global warming hoax: The media's silent scandal http://www.brookesnews.com)
If a scandal isn't reported by the media, does that mean it never happened?
Nancy Morgan For the millions of Americans who don't watch Fox News or listen to talk radio, the answer is a resounding yes. Last Friday, November 20, evidence came to light that "appears to show a conspiracy to falsify data and suppress academic debate in order to exaggerate the possible threat of man-made global warming."
Translation: The global warming movement rests almost entirely on the IPCC's claim to represent the "consensus" of climate science. That entire movement now stands discredited.
In the face of this absolutely shameful and possibly criminal revelation of chicanery, deceit and manipulation of data, the mainstream media has stuck to their decades long policy of ignoring any evidence or opinion that challenges their firm belief that the world is undergoing a climate crisis.
A crisis that can only be rectified if all global citizens drastically change their behavior.
Despite these revelations, the AP's science writer continued reporting on the worsening climate non-crisis, "Since the 1997 international accord to fight global warming, climate change has worsened and accelerated — beyond some of the grimmest of warnings made back then." Scary stuff, if it were true.
CNN chimed in, reporting their own shocking headlines: Sea Level Rise Could Cost Port Cities $28 Trillion.
Remember, this 'news' story was published after evidence had come to light that credibly challenged the very facts CNN was reporting.
Yawn. Six days after this scandal came to light, ABC, CBS, CNN, MSNBC and NBC had yet to make their viewers aware of what is being called "the greatest [scandal] in modern history."
A scandal that could derail the whole concept of man-made global warming.
And, coincidently, the $129 billion carbon market that rests on this shaky and manipulated data.
Dallas Morning News cuts 20 ad rep positions. Sounds like a great move.
Dallas may be targeting online advertising.
Unicorns, as a species, will be among the first that will go extinct due to global warming.
__Professor Michael "Piltdown" Mann, Penn State.
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