Aug 1, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
Here's the cutting edge of victimology:
Last week, the Congressional Black Caucus released a report that concluded that blacks are disproportionately affected by climate change.
According to the report, blacks are more likely to live in polluted areas, to lose their jobs, or even to die in heat waves because of climate change. All this suffering, even though "both historically and at present, African Americans emit less greenhouse gas" than other Americans, according to the report.
Thus we see a marriage of two great themes of modern American public
life: identity politics and environmental hand-wringing. Even if a problem affects the entire planet, some group will find a way to don the mantle of victimhood. [NYSun]
Aug 1, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
James M. Taylor a Heartland Institute senior fellow and convener of the 2008 and 2009 International Conferences on Climate Change wrote this letter crtiticizing the BBC series “Earth: The Climate Wars.”
I am writing to protest the misrepresentation of the views of scientists who spoke at the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change, hosted by The Heartland Institute in March, in the BBC series “Earth: The Climate Wars.”
The BBC series is entirely one-sided and riddled with scientific errors. We regret that film taken at our conference was used in such a partisan and even mean-spirited piece of propaganda. It was particularly unfair and unethical to deliberately quote out of context scientists who spoke at our conference, plainly with the intent to mislead viewers about what they actually said and believe.
For example, climatologist Dr. Patrick Michaels gave a 30-minute keynote presentation at the International Conference with a theme (that has appeared in virtually all of his writing on the subject) that while some warming is taking place and human activity is partly responsible, there is no evidence that a global warming crisis looms. Michaels demonstrates how many “skeptics” in the global warming debate do not “deny” the basic science of climate change, but rather understand that science better than most of the “alarmists” in the debate. Global warming is “real,” but it is not a “crisis.”
BBC presented a few of Michaels’ short statements out of context to assert that he “is in surprising agreement with the advocates of global warming.” BBC entirely and deliberately obscures Michaels’ central point, that it is the amount of warming and its likely consequences that are the crux of the debate.
BBC showed a brief clip of Dr. Roy Spencer, who oversees satellite temperature data for NASA, acknowledging minor errors that needed correction in the NASA temperature datasets. BBC then took Spencer’s statement out of context to assert that Spencer now agrees the corrupted data from poorly located surface temperature stations confirm an alarming rise in global temperatures. Even the most cursory look at Dr. Spencer’s scientific work confirms that Dr. Spencer certainly does not believe what BBC asserted he believes.
BBC repeatedly asserts that only a very small minority of “maverick” scientists disagrees with the proposition that humans are causing a global warming crisis. Yet BBC fails to mention there were more than 500 “skeptical” scientists, economists, and policy experts at the conference. It fails to mention that more than 32,000 scientists have signed a petition presented by a past president of the National Academy of Sciences documenting that humans are not creating a global warming crisis.
BBC also fails to mention that an international survey completed by more than 500 climate scientists found widespread doubts about how much of the warming of the twentieth century was due to human activities and the reliability of forecasts of future warming. Or that fewer than half of the scientists surveyed believe the science is sufficiently settled to justify turning the issue of global warming over to policymakers.
The BBC goes to great lengths to assert that scientists at the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change engaged in a scientifically baseless and mean-spirited campaign to cast doubt on Michael Mann’s infamous “hockey stick” graph of alleged global temperatures during the past 1,000 years. The BBC somehow fails to note that a panel of scientists and statisticians appointed by the U.S. Congress concluded that the hockey stick graph is based on cherry-picked data and is not supported by sound science.
The BBC failed to report that The Heartland Institute invited scientists who believe global warming is a crisis to attend its conference and defend their thesis; none attended. (Joseph Bast reported this in his opening remarks at the conference; it was not a secret.) Or that the conference featured 100 speakers from a dozen countries and more than 30 universities who delivered presentations that asked questions the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change refuses to address, and delivered reports on new research casting doubt on the fundamental assumptions of the alarmist position. Somehow, the BBC managed to miss those presentations, and its “documentary” hides them from its viewers. That is a disservice to the BBC’s viewers.
Thankfully, the BBC has a chance to “get it right.” The Heartland Institute is hosting a second International Conference on Climate Change, once again in New York, on March 8-10, and we once again expect to attract hundreds of scientists from around the world who want to be heard in the debate over global warming. The BBC is once again welcome to attend and film presentations. This time, we hope they have the integrity and honesty to share with the BBC’s viewers what the speakers actually have to say.
Aug 1, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
On write in candidate John Galt Jr. (Pennsylvania):
A writer, this candidate explains that he assumed the identity "John Galt Jr." several years ago after being deeply influenced by the John Galt character in Ayn Rand's classic libertarian novel Atlas Shrugged. Galt is waging a write-in campaign for President in 2004, just as he did in 2000. As for views, he supports drug legalization, "direct democracy, that is to say [having] the people voting on what should and shouldn't be laws." Galt advocates environmentalist views, supports drug legalization -- and, surprisingly, is also rather hostile towards corporations ("We need new laws to limit the powers and scopes of corporate involvement in community and politics"). Galt's 2000 VP runningmate was Kay Lee, a drug legalization activist from Florida. [Politics1]
Being for a proper government, Ayn Rand was no libertarian. And "John Galt Jr." is no John Galt.
Aug 1, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
Earlier this week, The Detroit News published our recent Fahranheit 9/11 cartoon, making it the first Cox & Forkum editorial cartoon to appear in a large American daily newspaper -- approximately 200,000 circulation. Not only that, but there are plans to make our cartoons part of a new weekly feature. "Yaaahooooo!" doesn't quite express our high level of excitement....
...Arrangements have also been made for Investor's Business Daily to feature Cox & Forkum editorial cartoons. IBD is a national daily newspaper with a circulation of 200,000 (and they also have tens of thousand of online subscribers). What is the significance of this? For the first time ever, you can walk into major bookstores and airports in America (even some public transportation stations) and purchase a newspaper with a Cox & Forkum editorial cartoon. In fact, you may do so this weekend -- the IBD Monday Special edition (available Saturday morning through Monday) will contain our Martha Stewart cartoon. IBD is expanding its already excellent op-ed section, and our cartoons will be included on occasion...
To sum up: Over 400,000 printed copies of Cox & Forkum editorial cartoons are being circulated this week with even more to come in the future. John and I are quite proud at the moment. So excuse us while we beam.
Congratulations guys! Next stop: The Wall Street Journal and the New York Times.Aug 1, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses, Dollars & Crosses 2
I found the following in release notes for a recent Sun Solaris 8 security patch:
ROC timezone should be avoided for political reasons
I.e., if Sun wants to be allowed to export its computers to mainland China, they're not allowed to have anything in their operating system that implicitly recognizes Taiwan, like a time zone for the Republic of China. Sheesh.
Aug 1, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
From the Houston Chronicle: Pregnant al Sadr commander an unlikely warrior in Iraq.Umm Muhammad's green eyes flashed one day last week as she listened to the imam at a run-down Baghdad mosque preach about how women should be silent and unseen, traveling only "from the home to the grave."
She knew the edict didn't apply to her; the same imam had blessed her before battle when she became one of the first female commanders in rebel cleric Muqtada al-Sadr's Mahdi's Army militia.
"Even my husband didn't know I was fighting, or he pretended not to know," Muhammad, 34, said. "He tells me, 'One day you're going to go and never come back.' I tell him I dream of martyrdom."
The article bends over backwards to put the best possible spin on the fact that women, mothers even, are volunteering to blow themselves up to murder other people -- and planning to train their kids to do the same. The words "terror" or "terrorism" don't even appear in the article. These new female terrorists are "soldiers" and "warriors." It's as if we're to take these developments as a positive sign that feminism is taking hold among Islamists in Iraq. And "rebel cleric"? Al-Sadr is wanted for murder by the Iraqi government. Apparently the writer didn't think that little fact was relevant.
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution ran basically the same article as above. But The Detroit Free Press ran another version that had this tidbit:Women fought alongside men during al-Sadr's uprising against U.S. forces in April, and at least two female guerrillas died in combat. Their funeral banners proclaimed them shaheeda, the feminine form of the Arabic word for martyr.
Sabriya Beqal, a 50-year-old mother of eight, was killed by U.S. fire last month as she was bringing water to the Mahdi's Army fighters camped out in her courtyard, her family said. Her sons and other militiamen carried her coffin to the cemetery and noted the shock of passersby who overheard that the fallen fighter was a woman.
"No less than 10 Americans will be killed to avenge my mother," said Beqal's 25-year-old son, Ahmed. "She was such an honor for us. All my friends wish their mothers could be martyrs, too. When we're all dead, we know the women will still be there, fighting."
It's been said before, but if so many of the enemy are wishing for martyrdom, we ought to help them reach their goal before they have a chance to take others with them.Jul 31, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
A column in the New York Sun reports on Nicolas Sarkozy, a popular French politician whose star is rising:
Mr.Sarkozy's popularity is evidence that the French have had enough of Chirac and everything he represents--good news for France, good news for America. Mr. Chirac is of the neo-Gaullist school that conflates French nationalism with anti-Americanism.
Mr. Sarkozy adores America and has declared himself proud that critics call him more American than French. Mr. Chirac believes in the primacy of the Franco-German relationship. Mr. Sarkozy is indifferent to Germany, instead favoring alliances with Britain, Spain, and America.
Mr. Chirac opposes a referendum on the European constitution; Mr. Sarkozy insists upon it.
Mr. Chirac delivers patronizing lecture to the new European Union member states of Eastern Europe--"badly brought up," he called them for their support of America's policy in Iraq--but Mr. Sarkozy, with his Hungarian background, gets along with them splendidly.
Mr. Sarkozy is said to have opposed Chirac's stance on the Iraq war.
Mr. Chirac courts the Arabs. Mr. Sarkozy prefers the Israelis. Mr. Sarkozy, unlike Mr. Chirac, is not a graduate of the Ecole Nationale d'Administration... [NYSun]
Jul 30, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum: 
From the transcript of Senator John Kerry's speech:"I will never hesitate to use force when it is required. Any attack will be met with a swift and certain response."
As Charles Johnson has pointed out, Kerry seems to be admitting here that another attack will be required for him to use military force. Underscoring that notion, Kerry declared that he would not send troops to war unless the threat was "real and imminent." Instead of striking an enemy to prevent the growth of an imminent threat (one of Bush's justifications for the Iraq war), Kerry is willing to wait for an enemy to mount an attack. Kerry then says: "I will never give any nation or international institution a veto over our national security." He has claimed this before but rendered it meaningless by also claiming that he would "treat the United Nations as a full partner ... in the war on terror." In his convention speech, he didn't go this far, but he stressed the "need to rebuild our alliances." Apparently Kerry wanted to give the impression that he could be a strong commander-in-chief, but his consistent criticism of unilateralism and wars of "choice" indicate otherwise.Jul 30, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Richard E. Ralston, Executive Director, Americans for Free Choice in Medicine (AFCM):
In last night's Democratic National Convention acceptance speech, Sen.John Kerry proclaimed that everyone has a "right" to health care. He also said that doctors and patients should always be able to make health care decisions without the approval of HMO bureaucrats.
No one has the right to force others to give them anything they want regardless of cost. No health care system in the world ever has or ever will do that. It is impossible.
Instead of promising the health care equivalent of bread and circuses, Sen. Kerry should offer Americans more freedom and less government control of medicine.
Recommended Reading:
Health Care Is Not A Right
"I do not agree that socialized medicine is moral and well-intentioned, but impractical. Of course, it is impractical -- it does not work -- but I hold that it is impractical because it is immoral...."Jul 28, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
Senator John Kerry arrived in Boston today and said:"I can't tell you how much I'm looking forward to my opportunity, a little more than 24 hours from now, to share with you and all of America a vision for how we're going to make this country stronger at home and respected in the world..."
And that's the Democrats' theme for their convention: "Stronger at Home, Respected in the World" -- which is just a euphemistic way of saying, "More Socialism At Home, Less Military Self-Defense Abroad." Though Senators Kerry and Edwards are not going to dress up like Super Heroes at the convention (we can dream), the GOP is nonetheless keeping an eye out for an "extreme makeover."
Robert Tracinski at TIA Daily has some relevant historical context for one of the convention speakers: 34 Months vs. 444 Days: There Jimmy Carter Goes Again, Blaming America for His Failures.Those looking for "a virtually unbroken series of mistakes and miscalculations" might be tempted to remember, not the past 32 months, but the 444 days of the Iran hostage crisis, when Carter stood passive and paralyzed, his only attempt at action ending in a pathetically under-supported, doomed rescue mission. If one were to look for a moment at which America lost credibility and respect in the world, this would be it.
It was also the moment that created the terrorist threat we face today. It allowed an Islamic theocracy to establish itself in Iran, becoming the leading sponsor of terrorism in the Middle East for the last 25 years. And it showed a generation of Muslim fanatics that terror attacks and hostage taking -- the very strategies now employed by our enemies in Iraq -- could defeat America.
We've highlighted Clinton's legacy recently; let's not forget Carter's.Jul 27, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
AP reported last Friday: Attacks in Sudan's Darfur region are genocide: US CongressBy a vote of 422 to zero, the House of Representatives and "the Senate concurring" passed the resolution introduced a month ago by New Jersey Democrat Donald Payne stressing that in Darfur 30,000 people have been "brutally murdered", 130,000 have fled to neighboring Chad and more than one million have been internally displaced by the violence.
On Sunday... Pressure grows on Sudan over Darfur crisisSudanese President Omar al-Beshir has accused the international community of targeting Islam in Sudan, the pro-government Al-Anbaa reported Saturday. The paper quoted Beshir as telling supporters in the central region of Gezira following Friday prayers that the real aim of the campaign against his country was not the situation in Darfur but to derail the growth of Islam in the country. "The international concern about the Darfur issue is targeting the status of Islam in Sudan," claimed Beshir, who seized power in a bloodless Islamist coup in 1989.
Some Western countries, such as Britain and Australia, have threatened to intervene militarily. CNN reports today: Sudan 'will fight foreign troops'.Sudan will retaliate against international troops if they are sent to intervene in the troubled Darfur region, Khartoum's foreign minister has said. [...] Meanwhile a group calling itself Mohammed's army called on Muslims to prepare to fight Western forces sent on any mission to western Sudan.
AFP reports today that civilians in Darfur are being burned alive. (Via Little Green Footballs)
AU [African Union] monitors declared on Wednesday that government-backed Arab militiamen chained and burned alive civilians in a raid on a market in Darfur.
Jul 27, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From David Holcberg of the Ayn Rand Institute:
What is the White House doing about Iran's production of nuclear weapons? Insisting on a diplomatic solution through negotiations!
But it is precisely this wrongheaded approach that failed to prevent the current crisis--and which will allow Iran to become a nuclear power soon.Negotiations are moral--and practical--only between individuals who are open to reason, who respect each other's rights, and whose purpose is to exchange values for mutual benefit, without coercion.
But the Iranian leadership is wildly irrational, has no respect for individual rights, and seeks--by threatening nuclear attacks against the United States (the "big Satan")--to further advance the spread of Islamic totalitarianism over the globe.
The proper approach to eliminate this threat against the United States is not to negotiate with Iran's mullahs--but to eliminate them.
Jul 26, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
CNN reports: Clinton calls on voters to choose Kerry."They [Republicans] need a divided America, but we don't," Clinton said. "We Democrats want to build a world and an America of shared responsibilities and shared opportunities ... On the other hand, Republicans in Washington believe that America should be run by the right people, their people."
He said the Bush administration gave tax cuts to the wealthy while raising out-of-pocket health care costs for veterans and underfunding education.
Jul 23, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
FoxNews reports: Berger: 'I Deeply Regret' an 'Honest Mistake'.Berger and his lawyer, Lanny Breuer, said the former Clinton adviser knowingly removed the handwritten notes by placing them in his jacket and pants and inadvertently took copies of actual classified documents in a leather portfolio. He returned most of the documents, but some still are missing. [...]
The documents involved have been a key point of contention between the Clinton and Bush administrations on the question of who responded more forcefully to the threat of Al Qaeda terrorism. Written by former National Security Council aide Richard Clarke, they discuss the 1999 plot to attack U.S. millennium celebrations and offer more than two dozen recommendations for improving the response to Usama bin Laden's Al Qaeda network.
Also from FoxNews: Berger Steps Down From Kerry Campaign."I don't know what happened to these documents after they were put in Mr. Berger's pants, but it's been reported in the press that these documents related to homeland security and our airports and seaports and it's very interesting to note that those are two areas where Sen. Kerry has been critical of the Homeland Security Department," [Sen. Saxby] Chambliss [R-Ga.] said.
InstaPundit has numerous links and interesting comments on Sandy Berger's "honest mistake": here, here, here and here.
CNN reports: House panel opens own Berger probe.Jul 22, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
David Holcberg of the Ayn Rand Institute:
As the 9/11 commission's final report made clear, both the Clinton and Bush administrations were at fault for not striking at Al Qaeda before September 11. While leftists hypocritically have blamed Bush, conservatives retroactively blamed Clinton. Yet both camps are repeating the mistakes of the past and still trying the diplomatic approach in dealing with terrorist states.
Today there is no doubt about the threat to America posed by Iran, Syria and North Korea, among others. But almost no one is calling for an attack on any of these regimes. Hopefully, America will not wait for a more horrific version of 9/11 before striking at its avowed enemies. Hopefully, but--at this rate--not likely.
Required Reading:
End States That Sponsor Terrorism by Leonard Peikoff, Ph.D.
Fifty years of increasing American appeasement in the Mideast have led to fifty years of increasing contempt in the Muslim world for the U.S. The climax was September 11, 2001.Jul 20, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
This cartoon was inspired by Robert Tranciski's first editorial on Martha Stewart: Martha and the Tall Poppies.There is a notorious saying in Australia: "You have to cut down the tall poppies." In other words, anyone who dares to poke his head above the crowd must be attacked, denigrated, and brought down to the common level. I don't know whether this "Tall Poppy Syndrome," as it is called, is really typical of Australian culture, but it is a widespread trend in American culture -- and Martha Stewart has long been one of its favorite targets. [...]
Stewart's lawyers suggest she is being targeted because she is a successful woman in a "man's world." But ask Bill Gates what kind of welcome a successful man can expect today. In fact, both are the target of a deeper hatred.
The basis for this hatred is not mere envy, but a moral code that makes that ugly emotion seem legitimate: the morality of altruism. We have been told for centuries that the weak, the incompetent, the most down-and-out bums on the street are the most worthy objects of our moral concern—while the highest achievers are at best the bum's servants, at worst his exploiters. The result is an upside-down morality, a code in which the better you are, the worse you are. The more you achieve, the more you are hated.
This hatred of the good is not merely ugly; it is destructive. A culture that attacks its highest achievers will mow down its tall poppies -- and end up with nothing but weeds.
With the recent sentencing of Stewart, Tracinski has revisited the issue with a number of good TIA Daily posts, including: Martha Stewart's Achievement.If the average person has little knowledge of how a business works -- of how it is run, what it does, and what is required to run it successfully -- then it is easy for the left to smear business leaders as "parasites" who get rich by exploiting the "little guy." How are people to know any better, if they know nothing of the history of great business leaders; if they know nothing of the structure of a corporation; if they know nothing of the innovation, unwavering focus, and long-range thinking necessary to create and maintain a successful enterprise?
The result is that people act as if they can ignore the history and origins of a great American corporation, like Microsoft or Martha Stewart Living Omnimedia, and treat it as if it just bloomed into existence as a fluke. And thus, the effort and virtue needed to create such a business seems, to them, just as vague and substanceless as the claims that insider trading is a terrible crime. The two ideas are equally devoid of substance and thus hold equal weight in people's minds.
We created one other Martha Stewart cartoon, and it turns out we were wrong about the effectiveness of her enemies if not their stature.
(Oh, and yes, we know the flower in the cartoon is not a poppy. It's a sunflower. There just wasn't enough room to write on a poppy.
The Ayn Rand Institute has an excellent editorial on insider trading by Andrew Bernstein: The Injustice of the Insider Trading Laws.Martha Stewart was investigated for the "crime" of insider trading and later convicted of obstructing justice for lying to authorities during the investigation. But the questions no one is asking are: Should Martha even have been the subject of a criminal investigation in the first place? Should anyone be investigated for insider trading? Is insider trading objectively a crime?[...]
Contrary to the egalitarian premise giving rise to opposition to insider trading, individuals have no more right to information they have not earned than to wealth they have not earned. Should a talented analyst, for example, be forced to make his research publicly available if it would otherwise give him a competitive edge on the market? The mere fact of participating in the financial markets does not confer upon one a right to the hard-won knowledge of others.
In a free market, corporate policy on insider trading would be knowledge available to the public. If a potential investor held that the practice involved too much risk to the value of a stock, he could refuse to purchase the stock of companies permitting the practice. And companies desiring to prohibit the practice among their employees would be free do so by contractual agreement. They would have the moral and legal right to bring civil charges against an executive who violated his contractual obligations.
Jul 16, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
From Cox and Forkum:
Jul 16, 2004 | Dollars & Crosses
Tracinski on Moore's Reviewers:
This gives a doubly ironic meaning to a tag-line used at the top of some posters for Moore's film: "Controversy--What Controversy?" What controversy, indeed? Nearly everyone tasked by the mainstream media to review this film is an acolyte of Moore's far-left views. But what is disturbing about the reaction to this film is not this near-universal agreement with Moore's un-intellectual vaporings. The most important common theme of the reviews is not an uncritical acceptance of Moore's slanted facts and weak reasoning: it is an openly expressed contempt for facts and reasoning as such...
...Behind all of these reviews is un-admitted Marxist premise--the root idea that is necessary to justify propaganda. In the ideology of materialist Marxist totalitarianism, it was widely accepted that ideas are just a "superstructure," a "legitimating ideology" whose sole purpose is to advance the power of one group or class over another. The seizure of political power, in this view, is the only truly important goal--and the marshalling of ideas and arguments is to be judged only by how it serves raw power politics... [TIA]
