Miss America 2010

Congratulations to our new Miss America for 2010, Caressa Cameron.














Now, at the risk of being indelicate, we have obviously reached the point where it is no big deal for a Black woman to win the Miss America pageant. Anyone want to bet on the chances of a White woman winning the Miss Black America pageant, or the existence of a Miss White America pageant?

It is long past time for separatist organizations like Miss Black America to go by the wayside.

Edit: Linked at The Other McCain

Democrat Style Politics

How about H.R. 4474 Idaho Wilderness Water Facilities Act?

The Republican from Idaho introduced a bill on Sept. 8, 2009: H.R. 3538: Idaho Wilderness Water Resources Protection Act. The Democrat from Idaho was the co-sponsor.

The purpose of the bill was: To authorize the continued use of certain water diversions located on National Forest System land in the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness and the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness in the State of Idaho, and for other purposes.

On January 20, 2010 the bill was defeated by the Democrats in the House 225-191 with 187 Democrats voting against it.

On January 20, 2010 The Democrat from Idaho introduced a bill: H.R. 4474: Idaho Wilderness Water Facilities Act. The republican from Idaho was the co-sponsor.

The purpose of the bill was: To authorize the continued use of certain water diversions located on National Forest System land in the Frank Church-River of No Return Wilderness and the Selway-Bitterroot Wilderness in the State of Idaho, and for other purposes.

On January 27, 2010 it passed the House 415-0.

So:

A Republican bill sits in the House for 5 months and is defeated by the Democrats.

The same bill is introduced by a Democrat, sits in the House for a week and is passed with no opposition.

Funny how that works.



(note: This post is comprised of two comments I made on a post over at The Living Room Times)

1/29/10 3:40 P.M.: edited for clarity

Hitler Finds Out About Brown's Election

Some "Inconvenient Truths" Pt. 2

I have spent a long time arguing AGW and Climategate, both here and at other blogs as a skeptic.

One of the most common rejoinders, especially from a particular lefty named David K, is that this may be messy and ugly, but the science is still good, and no paper or conclusion will have to be withdrawn.

Looks like that argument just fell by the wayside:

A WARNING that climate change will melt most of the Himalayan glaciers
by 2035 is likely to be retracted after a series of scientific blunders by the
United Nations body that issued it.
Two years ago the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a benchmark report that was claimed to
incorporate the latest and most detailed research into the impact of global
warming. A central claim was the world's glaciers were melting so fast that
those in the Himalayas could vanish by 2035.

In the past few days the scientists behind the warning have
admitted that it was based on a news story in the New Scientist, a popular
science journal, published eight years before the IPCC's 2007 report.
It has
also emerged that the New Scientist report was itself based on a short telephone
interview with Syed Hasnain, a little-known Indian scientist then based at
Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi.

Hasnain has since admitted that the claim was "speculation" and was not
supported by any formal research. If confirmed it would be one of the most
serious failures yet seen in climate research. The IPCC was set up precisely to
ensure that world leaders had the best possible scientific advice on climate
change.

So, the IPCC, in the most important document on AGW, one supported by "thousands of scientists" and the "scientific consensus", one written and peer reviewed by the top scientists in the field of AGW, a document designed to force a radical change in the economies of the world and transfer immense quantities of wealth, contains a section that relies on no science, but instead a pop science article based on a telephone interview.

I'm betting that this is only the tip of the iceberg.

Update 2/22/09: Predictably, David K rejected my example above. Well here is another example, one that explicitly states that a study published in one of the top journals in the field has been withdrawn:

Scientists have been forced to withdraw a study on projected sea level rise
due to global warming after finding mistakes that undermined the findings.
The
study, published in 2009 in Nature Geoscience, one of the top journals in
its field, confirmed the conclusions of the 2007
report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). It used
data over the last 22,000 years to predict that sea level would rise by between
7cm and 82cm by the end of the century.

My Three Wishes

If a genie granted me three wishes tomorrow, they would be:

1) Return the United States to a federal republic. All governmental actions and responsibilities would be moved to the closest point of contact with individual Americans. For instance, the Dept. of Education would be eliminated, and education would become the responsibility of city and county government. In fact all the cabinet positions created after the Washington administration would be eliminated and their responsibilities shifted to the states, counties and cities. I would abolish the income tax and the IRS, because the national government would no longer require absurd amounts of money if it returned to only true constitutional duties.

2) Withholding of any taxes or governmental payments to any level of government would be unconstitutional. Any and all payments to the government by American citizens and corporations would be due on the first Monday after the first of November every year. Furthermore, these payments would require an affirmative action by the individual. (writing a check, making an electronic payment, paying in cash, etc) This way, when they voted the next day every other year they would have a clear reminder of what they were voting on.

3) Anyone receiving any governmental money except payments for goods received would no longer be eligible to vote in elections for the level of government they received the payments from. This includes employees (except active duty members of the armed services). Federal employees would be prevented from voting in federal elections, state employees would be prevented from voting in state elections. Welfare recipients, food stamp recipients, social security recipients, farm subsidy recipients, members of the boards of directors for corporations receiving subsidies, etc..all would be prohibited from voting at the level they received governmental payments.

You may call me a dreamer, but I'm not the only one......