Meet Your Climate-Science Skeptics
From Kate’s ClimateSight blog: Who are the Skeptics?
…there is a remarkable level of scientific consensus on the reality and severity of human-caused global warming. However, most members of the public are unaware of this consensus – a topic which we will focus on in the next installment. Anyone with an Internet connection or a newspaper subscription will be able to tell you that many scientists think global warming is natural or nonexistent. As we know, these scientists are in the vast minority, but they have enjoyed widespread media coverage. Let’s look at three of the most prominent skeptics, and examine what they’re saying.
Those who claim there is an absence of scientific consensus on global warming have an obligation to actually look at the credentials and track-record of the scientists on both “sides” of the controversy. When you do that, it quickly becomes apparent that on the one hand, we have apples. On the other, oranges. Ladies and gentlemen, I give you your oranges.
August 5th, 2011 at 11:12 am
Wow, what a reasonable blog. I particularly love the convenient links to papers and whatnot!
August 5th, 2011 at 6:42 pm
Nothing new here “98% of the experts that agree with me, agree with me” guess what, 98% of the experts that agree with me agree with me too.
August 5th, 2011 at 7:43 pm
Sigh. Just because someone has a moral and logical obligation to examine the credentials and track-record of those on both sides is no guarantee that he’ll actually conduct such an examination.
August 5th, 2011 at 9:11 pm
Sigh. So true, JBC…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=yIOC1J44RYw#at=155
August 5th, 2011 at 9:14 pm
(…Clip needs rewind to about the ten second mark.)
August 6th, 2011 at 5:23 am
Oh look, willful ignorance from shcb, and a 9/11 link from knarly. Is everyone else as surprised as I am? I am expecting great things from this comment section.
August 6th, 2011 at 5:27 am
I believe that is what those of my opinion did with Mann and Jones, we examined their track record, and their methodology and transparency, and yet we were the bad guys for doing it, climategate verified many of our suspicions.
I wasn’t referring to this article, this is a ho hummer, if I look at the scientists that agree with you about AGW, and by your estimation I would have a whole bunch to look at, if I were to find say 4 that had written papers that were retracted or someone on my side of the argument had disputed would I win? What if I found 6 or 10? I was referring to the previous article in this series (linked to in this piece) where they dredge up the old study that turned 40% of a thousand scientists being skeptical into 98%.
I think you do have a moral and logical obligation to examine the evidence provided. Anyone that professes faith in this study starts off with a huge handicap in my mind.
August 6th, 2011 at 5:31 am
….and snide, nonproductive comments from our resident curmudgeon, nope no surprise.
August 6th, 2011 at 6:11 am
Ah yes, if only my comments could be as polite and productive as this:
http://www.lies.com/wp/2011/07/25/nothing-to-see-here-folks-move-along-move-along/#comment-227259
“I was talking about the killer and those like him asshole, god you’re a prick.”
Yep.
August 6th, 2011 at 3:34 pm
jbc,
You can lead an idiot to knowledge, but you can’t make him think.
August 7th, 2011 at 8:12 pm
I so enjoy reading these articles you big brain folks seem so entranced by. They say Michaels said that “natural variations in oceanic cycles such as El Niño explain most of the warming” when you click on the link, the document that comes up doesn’t even contain the word El Nino. One of the links explains that the models are correct because if you add the increase in ocean temps and the increase in air temps the models work, except the models are for the atmosphere only. I’m no rocket scientist but golly I can see through this bs.
Now none of this proves or disproves AGW but this whole series of articles is a joke.
August 8th, 2011 at 6:33 am
Do you hear that phrase often, Smith?
August 8th, 2011 at 10:39 am
“Canada, France, Germany, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland are among those with the undisputed stamp of approval (AAA Credit Rating).”
Not bad for a bunch of socialist-treehugging-liberal-hippy-douchebags.
August 8th, 2011 at 11:00 am
ok, tell the rest of the story of France, what has it done to maintain the AAA rating?
August 8th, 2011 at 11:36 am
I dunno, probably just collects enough revenue to pay its bills?
August 8th, 2011 at 12:19 pm
…almost…
http://www.reuters.com/article/2011/08/08/us-crisis-ratings-idUSTRE7773KG20110808
August 8th, 2011 at 12:36 pm
knarly, the major difference is that France isn’t opertating in a completely dysfunctional and toxic political environment. That was the main reason for the U.S. downgrade (them showing no signs of being able to fix the problem).
August 8th, 2011 at 12:53 pm
You are correct, the good folks in France pushed back runaway socialism , or at least showed the will to do so, now they have to do what they said or they will do or they will loose their rating but there seems to not be the will to do the same in the USA.
August 8th, 2011 at 2:13 pm
damn socialism
August 8th, 2011 at 4:47 pm
well, it is the root of all evil after all
August 9th, 2011 at 5:49 am
With all that being said, I don’t think going from AAA to AA+ is really the armageddon some are making it out to be.
A self-inflicted wound, yes. A death punch, no.
August 9th, 2011 at 6:17 am
I agree, I think it does two things it sends a message to all these governments that they need to get a handle on their finances and it makes people in places like France really nervous. Now they really have to follow through with their promise of smaller government.
One thing for certain, for better or worse, justified or not, the Republicans are going to bludgeon Obama with this.
August 9th, 2011 at 9:51 am
I’ll tell ya one thing though, it sure is a good thing that you didn’t take any action on climate change, that would’ve seriously harmed your economy…
August 9th, 2011 at 9:58 am
You’re right again, you’re on a roll
August 9th, 2011 at 11:42 am
I know right, like the last thing we need right now is an economy just limping along.
August 9th, 2011 at 1:42 pm
As bad as the ecconmy is it could be worse and would have been if we would have been wasting money on things like Kyoto. We’ve taken a lot of action on climate change, we just don’t want to make changes that don’t make sense. I had lunch with the owner of the largest lighting supplier in a three or four state area today and most of the conversation revolved around what you would consider “green” technology, LED lighting and such, we’re trying to co-develop a couple products that would be very energy miserly.
But then we got to things that don’t make sense. They recently built a solar farm out at DIA, for a fraction of the cost of the farm they could have made a bigger impact on power usage by replacing outdated lighting fixtures. So much of what you consider “action on climate change” has little to do with climate change, it is just redistrobution of wealth.
August 9th, 2011 at 3:23 pm
“One thing for certain, for better or worse, justified or not, the Republicans are going to bludgeon Obama with this.”
That works both ways. S&P called out the Repubs.
August 9th, 2011 at 7:21 pm
R’s don’t have the veto pen though, but you are right if they get in power, it will definately be put up or shut up time.
August 10th, 2011 at 5:16 am
The more I think about it the more interesting lunch yesterday was. We had almost all the elements we have here except everyone at the table enjoyed each other’s company. There was socialism (communism actually), global warming hysteria, rich guys (not me), not so rich guys (me) and the super rich (top 200 in the world anyway) represented. The super rich weren’t there but they were represented.
It all revolved around the fluorescent light bulb situation. We are building new corporate offices in New York and my boss is coordinating the ceiling and lighting, the boys, sons of the super rich guy, had called and asked where the light bulbs for their new office are. So my boss was up until 11:00 the night before finding what was going on, he had some idea but at lunch the rich guy, who is in the lighting industry filled in the blanks.
It seems China produces something like 95% of the rare earth components for florescent bulbs and as of the last week or so are holding the world hostage by increasing the cost of one of the components astronomically, as much as 100 times from what I understand . Now this increase isn’t due to anything but profiteering by the government as far as the lighting guy could see (taxation). This is what happens when government controls the production, it can arbitrarily change the rules of the game. Now what made this all possible is environmental concerns, which is why we haven’t developed our own reserves of these materials on the Canadian/US border, and global warming hysteria. We have taken efficient coal offline and replaced it with more expensive forms of generation, which is ok if the AGW is real, not ok if it isn’t. The price of electricity has gone up so much and the hysteria is so high that we are now totally dependent on fluorescent lights that we can now be controlled by the Chinese, just like a game a weiqi. What this does in the real world is raise the cost of light bulbs in a typical school district as much as $40k per year, so one less substitute teacher, and one less union member.
No capitalism yet is there? The reason for my boss staying up till 11? The boys wanted information on the mining of the rare earth elements here so they can invest and maybe move into the top 150, all over no light bulbs in their office. Oh yeah, a few minutes before that the rich guy and I had been talking about shooting prairie dogs. Pretty much covers this site in the time it took to eat a burger and salad.
August 10th, 2011 at 6:24 am
shcb,
My province (Canada’s largest) has shut down all its coal plants over the past few years. No “smog days” since. Clear air, no CO2 dumping. We’ve recovered 95% of the jobs lost during the recession by investing in green tech and now control 20% of the world’s renewable energy sector, and growing fast. The unemployment rate is 7%. First quarter growth was 3.9%.
Contrary to your bullshit, we’ve made great progress on reducing our climate change impact while growing our economy at the same time – and making it more sustainable.
So while you write about “this could happen” or that “could’ve happened” I have actual proof to the contrary.
You talk about a redistribution of wealth which is really ironic since the course you’re on and advocating for is the biggest transfer of wealth ever in history – sending billions everyday to the Saudi’s.
August 10th, 2011 at 7:44 am
what portion of the renewable is hydro?
August 10th, 2011 at 8:36 am
-Hydro: 26%
-Nukes: 55%
-Gas: 13%
-Other: Wind, Solar, etc.: 6%
August 10th, 2011 at 10:35 am
-Hydro: 26%
-Nukes: 55%
-Gas: 13%
-Other: Wind, Solar, etc.: 6%
That sounds like a very reasonable mix to me. We don’t have water here for hydro and the anti nukes won’t let us have nuke plants. They built one up the road a piece a few decades ago, it really never did much. The regulations kept getting tighter, they had some problems with it and in the end it didn’t work, now that is the model for nukes in Colorado, Fort St Vrain didn’t work, therefore nukes don’t work. We have the fuel, you could almost haul it from the mine to the plant via ox cart. But it is politically doubtful another will be built.
Gas has it’s places, outlaying areas, backup for solar/wind that type of thing. 13% sounds right. You can’t go much more than 10% from renewables and even then it has to be 100% backed up so without nukes or hydro you would have to change that gas number to 100% in an area like Colorado (capacity, you could produce 10% from renewables) to replace coal, something we have in abundance in the west, just doesn’t make sense to me. Gas is too valuable in other areas.
August 10th, 2011 at 11:08 am
Nice to hear that Ontario and Colorado no longer use oil. ;-)
August 10th, 2011 at 12:31 pm
we still burn coal like ther’s no tomorrow, we don’t have much choice, we’re just waisting a lot of gas and not burning as much coal. The trains still back up traffic in Brighton taking their load of rock to the plants in Denver. There is one that runs at 2 am, I love it when I wake up and hear the click clack 2 or three miles away, then the lonesome whistile, for a moment you’re transported to another era.
but I would welcome 50% of our power coming from clean nukes.
August 10th, 2011 at 4:08 pm
“R’s don’t have the veto pen though”
The budget mess had far more to do with the inability of the Repubs to control their own party than it did with vetos. You can’t veto a bill that never got out of the House. The extremists the Goopers spent time courting are proving to be a liability.
August 10th, 2011 at 7:02 pm
It was some of both. The R’s are divided right now, now doubt about that, they wouldn’t have gotten elected without the tea party, but the tea partiers aren’t very pragmatic, and that does make them a liability but no more so than the yes we canners that elected Obama, they’re people that have a lot of energy but not much practical knowledge of politics.
As far as you veto what you don’t get out of the House. True, but you know how the process works, you have a pretty good idea if it is going to progress before you send it to the next level, the deals have been made, the votes counted. Not always of course but usually, especially on something this important (politically?). The problem was Obama wouldn’t bargain, he didn’t seem to have an alternative plan, no specifics, still doesn’t. I just don’t think he really cares that much, you could see that in his statement the other day, there was nothing about the credit rating drop in outline of his statement before hand, then he was late a couple times, makes you think they were writing on the fly.
What I thought was telling was when he said we have always been a triple A country and always would, this is the problem with American liberalism, they think the money will just always be there.
August 10th, 2011 at 7:04 pm
“As far as you veto what you don’t get out of the House” change that to “as far as you can’t veto what you don’t get out of the house”
August 11th, 2011 at 7:59 am
So do Ontario and Colorado cars run on coal? Still trying to make sense of that % breakdown…
August 11th, 2011 at 10:14 am
we’re talking about electrical generation.
August 11th, 2011 at 10:14 am
natural gas, not gasoline
August 11th, 2011 at 10:32 am
Yeah, we were talking about generating electricity.
If you’re point is that cars emit CO2, yes, I realize that. I still think closing down coal plants was a major step.
Like I said, we used to have numerous really bad smog days here in Toronto every summer and we haven’t had one in two years. Whether you think AGW is real or not, as a person who breathes oxygen all day and all night, I think that’s pretty significant.
August 11th, 2011 at 11:21 am
No doubt, I’ve said many times I’m on board with many of the solutions to AGW if they are sensible, economical and are done for reasons other than AGW.
We just send our smog to Kansas :-)
August 11th, 2011 at 11:28 am
Enky/smith says:
aug 11th, at (after a few beers)
“We just send our smog to Kansas”
(*&^Liun retugs just push it down the road. typical jerks, now we know why the earth is so screwed up, they should all be made to breath their own garbage. bla bla bla…. and ect.
schb says:
Aug 11th, at (after a rum and Coke)
Why did you leave the smiley face out of the quote?
(Preemptive strike)
August 11th, 2011 at 11:35 am
The rich guy I had lunch with the other day was talking about a new electric car. I think it was being marketed under the Tesla name or some variation of Tesla, maybe that was the model (I was hungry and wasn’t paying that close attention). I guess it is a sports car with great performance, goes 300 miles on a charge and can be topped off without hurting the batteries. Goes for something like $100k. Couple that with nuke power and you have something, doesn’t make much sense if the power is coming from coal though.
August 11th, 2011 at 1:28 pm
shcb, thanks 4 elect gen, I should have guessed.
You’re talking about the Tesla model S, looks like a sweet ride and cost is $57,000. The new BMW’s look awesome too.
But for my money, I’d go for the Intermecanica roadster replicas, because they do not have to obey traffic lights or stop signs: http://www.intermeccanica.com/ (refer to the video’s 27 second mark)
August 11th, 2011 at 3:01 pm
blah blah blah sociamalism! hurf durf (same old wwnj blather)
mb an atom is more your style?
http://jdmpure.files.wordpress.com/2009/01/dark_vader.jpg
I’ve seen a half dozen Tesla Roadsters on the streets now. Nice. But ridiculously expensive. You have to be an enormous e-hole to buy one at that price (or a bankster). We’ll see how things go once they get the old NUMMI plant running again.
hey wwnj, perhaps they don’t let yall see the real news these days, but Germany (and China ) make a whole lot of these things called PV solar panels… try the google. btw – people need the most energy when the sun is shining… lol
August 11th, 2011 at 6:56 pm
Yeah, I moved a pallet of those things out of my shop into a storage room a couple months ago, they were just collecting dust. We’ve been running tests on them for a year or so now I suppose. We’re finding they have a ways to go, they really don’t produce enough to do much. The specs say they do but in reality that is only in a lab environment. And again the problem is storage, as wimpy as they are you can put up enough to eventually make a little power. We’re finding battery technology is really the limiting factor.
One of the things we wanted to do was put them inside a window, between the glass, but they won’t produce electricity if they are close to glass, some little quirk. It’s not my project so I don’t know a lot about it but it seems the computers and control systems are just collecting data, I haven’t heard anyone get too excited about it for quite a few months
August 12th, 2011 at 8:30 am
Knarly, wasn’t it nice to misread something in your haste and have couple guys explain it to you and move on without being called an idiot or worse?
August 12th, 2011 at 9:07 am
shcb,
What a self-serving, stupid post. You’re an idiot. ;-)
August 12th, 2011 at 9:11 am
I’ll second that
August 12th, 2011 at 10:19 am
lol (2x)
August 14th, 2011 at 7:08 pm
NL, saw the Jays highlights today, what a game, two rundowns in one play, cool!
August 15th, 2011 at 7:58 am
We’re not in Climate-Science anymore, Toto.
A= http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/top-business-stories/roubini-on-fate-of-capitalism-karl-marx-was-partly-right/article2129822/
B= http://www.theprovince.com/news/Buffett+mega+rich+friends/5256593/story.html
A + B = Change
August 15th, 2011 at 11:58 am
There is a lot of truth in “A” but it doesn’t tackle the real problem, entitlements near and far. He seems to work all around the edges and sneaks a jab at the actual problem in a place or two but he doesn’t get to the real core of the problem. “redistribution of income and wealth from labour to capital could lead capitalism to self-destruct” I think there is some truth here, probably not the way he meant it but some truth. I think it is true that when you move from “labour” in terms of making something tangible to simply money making money a collapse is inevitable. Not saying investments shouldn’t make a return but somewhere there needs to be something tangible. We saw this with the dotcom boom and bust, and were did it resurge to? People selling things online someone had to make.
This dovetails into
When you have insurance salesmen selling insurance to stock brokers who then make a commission on selling and buying insurance stock to insurance salesmen the system will break down. Somewhere there needs to be an influx of hard products.
Where I really disagree is “‘productive’ infrastructure investment”. So he is conceding some (most?) of Obama’s stimulus didn’t do anything but increase the debt (same with Bush’s stimulus) but somewhere there is something productive in government making work. Maybe short term but long term the solution is for government to get the hell out of the way as much as possible, I don’t Roubini is willing to go this far, just can’t quite do it.
As far as Buffett, I love his nephew’s music.
Change is coming, more socialism is a very real possibility, and we will continue to degrade, eventually helpful change will occur, small business will prevail, hopefully.
August 16th, 2011 at 4:45 am
Now that the Valium has wore off, had an MRI yesterday, a few points about Buffett.
1. He is a populist
2. He is smart and shrewd
3. His comparison that he only pays this while the poor waitress pays that is apples to oranges because his money is mostly investment money that has already been taxed once. The problem when you apply that to the normal investor is they will just stop investing
4. His policy would hurt the small to medium business the most. At the margins some would just sell and retire.
5. He makes his living buying small to medium businesses and merging them with larger companies.
Now go back up and read “A”
August 16th, 2011 at 7:45 am
Sounds like the GOP was a day late in issuing their talking points.
August 16th, 2011 at 8:19 am
not so fast big guy, S&P was probably a little gloomy but Fitch reserved the right to change it’s mind too. In both cases a shot has definately been fired over the bow to congress (and present and future presidents). S&P just aimed a little closer. But to be fair S&P has the least credibility of the big 3.
August 16th, 2011 at 9:19 am
It’s okay shcb, I’m being dismissive because I don’t really have time to argue with your points, & they sound valid to me now (e.g. wages vs. investment income.) … but I’d wonder about the impact of payoll deductions i.e. those are not deducted from investment income, therefore there is some alignment of the wages vs investment tax rate comparison.
I’ll concede that Buffet’s comments are probably made in self-interest but reserve judgment as to whether or not they are true nonetheless.
August 16th, 2011 at 11:27 am
I think Buffett truely believes in his populism, he really does think he should pay more, but at the same time if it helps him win, that is ok with him too.
Payroll deductions like fica are suposed to be for a different purpose so the aren’t applicable here. The question is really one of fairness, money I invest has already been taxed, it turns into double taxation, which takes us back to your “a” article and Marx being partially correct, when too much money is being made on capital and not labour invertments must be taxed, which kills investments… I’m busy too. We should have this discussion though when we have time
August 17th, 2011 at 10:25 am
I liked this comment reguarding Obama’s speech on fixing the worlds ills next month.
August 18th, 2011 at 4:57 am
You have to give the guy credit, he’s always in campaign mode. This is like the trailer to the 3rd or 4th installment of a movie that wasn’t that good in the first place.
August 18th, 2011 at 8:02 am
Yea sure, & we all know you’re not biased. What a stupid comment, idiot.
August 18th, 2011 at 8:39 am
A stupid comment? It may not be one you want to hear but I don’t think it is stupid. I said he is always in campaign mode, if he has a plan why wait for a month. The reason is simple, timing is everything. Now if you look what was included in his trailer there really is anything new, extended unemployment make new make work projects that will be paid for with taxes, just more of the same. So what is the point in a month-long buildup to a huge earth shattering speech when all you’re going to do is stay the course you’re already on?
Buck asked him for something on paper, a plan, you know like a business plan, something every middle-management executive has to give upper management every month, that doesn’t seem stupid, seems like a pretty reasonable request. He teased us just like they tease us in a movie trailer. Now the adoring and fawning media will replay the trailer on the Sunday shows for the next four weeks. That doesn’t seem stupid, seems pretty appropriate to me.
August 18th, 2011 at 1:23 pm
Sorry, I was being flippant. I’m having a very good week & barely know what you are talking about & feel priveledged not to care either. Anyway, I’d take back my comment if I could but alas can only give you this inadequate: sorry, no harm intended. cheers.
August 18th, 2011 at 3:07 pm
Cheeers!
August 23rd, 2011 at 2:01 pm
had to lol
looks like you’ve gained a bit more weight wwnj (so cute that you make your own teabagger protest shirt)
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_6-IIXAF5HOE/S7VVF2ObM2I/AAAAAAAAJLE/6yhiH0oDOis/s800/Chebama.png
Recession: When your neighbor loses his job!
Depression: When you loose your job!
Recovery: When Obama losses his job!
hurf durf! and lorry!
mb Huntsman in 2016, he doesn’t seem quite so batsh!t crazy
August 23rd, 2011 at 2:56 pm
Love it! Where do I get one!
Did you see where NASA and Penn State figure ET is going to kill us all to stop AGW? Your tax dollars at work.
August 23rd, 2011 at 4:04 pm
The irony being that you can’t parse the words “loses, loose and losses” correctly…
Them liberal pinko commie fags at Penis State and NASA must be in league with that sociamalist Paul (smartest guy on the planet) Krugman
http://boingboing.net/2011/08/17/paul-krugman-save-the-economy-by-staging-an-alien-invasion-hoax.html
Note: PK uses the word IF (actually stuttering it a bit… ) just as a ‘thought experiment’ (I know wwnjs don’t do that sissy ‘thinkin’ stuff real good-like). Also, don’t forget that we flattened most of the rest of the industrial world manufacturing capability in WWII. Then we had a Keynesian stimulus with Marshall plan spending (best investment of the 20th C). Combine that w the Keynesian GI Bill creating the world’s most highly educated workforce and…
Hey maybe if we spend some money on bridges, rail, roads, refurbs, energy efficiency and stop with the endless tax cuts (and invasions/wars), we might actually not be in such bad shape! Oh wait, the Teabaggers don’t do science, or anything that might be considered a success for ‘the boy’.
August 23rd, 2011 at 7:04 pm
Ha ha, Enky’s back, hide the women and children.
August 24th, 2011 at 5:16 am
“Taxation may be so high as to defeat its objective. In that given a sufficient time to gather its fruits, a reduction of taxation will run a better chance than an increase of balancing the budget.”
John Maynard Keynes, 1937
Even the godfather of the New Deal had some common sense.
August 24th, 2011 at 8:11 am
Hey there, been on vacation… Yeah that was an awesome play by the Jays. We’ve pretty much changed our whole team over the past year and I’m really liking the new talent. It just really sucks being in the same division as Boston and NY.
August 24th, 2011 at 9:17 am
Keynes was probably talking of tax in the 50 – 60 % range, not the 20 – 30% range taht you are at.
August 24th, 2011 at 10:11 am
I happened to catch Jon Stewart last week talking about taxes. He highlighted the fact that the forty-something percent that don’t pay any net federal taxes (they still pay state, local and sales taxes, which seems to be lost on right-wingers) only control 2.5% of American wealth. The other 97.5% of wealth is controlled by the other fifty-something percent.
He was talking about this because Fox News folks were belittling the fact that the Bush tax cuts “only equals $700 billion over ten years” which they said was peanuts compared to the overall debt problem. Then they went on to attack the poor for, um, being poor and not paying “their fair share.”
Jon then masterfully demonstrated that even if you took half of everything – their homes, cars, retirement savings, their children’s toys, etc – from the people who don’t pay any net federal taxes that would add up to about $350 billion. If you took absolutely everything from these folks – everything they own – it would add up to about $700 billion.
The man is a freaking genius.
August 24th, 2011 at 10:16 am
He really doesn’t get into the specifics of rates, he uses some examples of wages at the time for illustrative purposes but only in very general terms. He also doesn’t seem to be concerned with the beggar they neighbor politics of envy you ‘al seem to hold so dear. Keynes limits himself to categorizing those that are working and those that aren’t since that is the only important distinction for this pamphlet. He is also very clear that there are only certain times his policies should be used, otherwise they are a waste of resources. I don’t agree with a lot of Keynes’ ideas but he is certainly more sensible than the socialists and union beneficiaries that have hijacked his theories for their own greed.
August 24th, 2011 at 10:23 am
Nl, what he forgot (yeah right) to mention is the problem is they each have a vote, same as the producers, when you reach a point that 51% of the population can vote themselves the bounty of the 49% you have a problem. He is a smart fellow but he is spinning by omission just as much as those on the right he is criticizing.
August 24th, 2011 at 10:33 am
sigh
August 24th, 2011 at 10:55 am
wwnj – your dog whistle is broken
51% of the people can vote themselves the bounty of the 49%
lol
taxes are at historic lows
as Warren Buffett says There’s class warfare, all right, but it’s my class, the rich class, that’s making war, and we’re winning.
August 24th, 2011 at 11:32 am
No they’re not :) not even close! you only care about the taxes of those making $1 more than you because you have bought into this class warfare bs. This is about more than taxes, this is about the development of a large dependent class and many other aspects, it’s pretty complicated, I’m not sure you can keep up.
Any bets Enky’s rebuttle will be about the top 1%?
August 24th, 2011 at 12:42 pm
might be, the top 1%, as a class in the USA, are becoming very dependent on tax cuts and bailouts…
August 24th, 2011 at 12:43 pm
..from everyone else. It seems to be bringing the country down. bummer.
August 24th, 2011 at 1:15 pm
Actually, my ‘rebuttle’ (snicker) would be to point out the implicit racism in your ‘thinking’. You think the financial meltdown was caused by ‘negroes n mexicans’. But it plays well with your ludicrous sense of persecution: ‘some negro is eatin t-bone steak an drivin a cadillac on my tax money!1!1!!’
taxes are indeed at historic lows (facts is so dang lib)
That you are chronically mal-informed is a by-product of the wealthiest controlling the ‘debate’. They have paid a ton of money (pennies on the dollar really) to hoodwink a huge swath of the stupid, racist and cantankerous.
hurf durf!
I so look forward to your ‘rebuttle’!
August 24th, 2011 at 1:29 pm
good points Enk, but don’t forget the “hurf durf and lorry!”
August 24th, 2011 at 1:31 pm
quite right I forgot the “and lorry!”
sociamalism!
August 24th, 2011 at 6:11 pm
You guys are absolutely right, I apologize for all the racist remarks I’ve made on this thread.
The last bastion of a liberal is to play the race card.
Pathetic.
August 25th, 2011 at 3:12 am
Tolerate my intolerance.
August 25th, 2011 at 4:38 am
Pinky and the Brain have gotten their racism charge out of the way, bless their hearts, now let’s look at Enky’s logic.
What does one have to do with the other? There is a market clearing limit to taxes if that limit is at historic lows, which it isn’t, so be it. Keynes understood this just like so many economists going back to at least the 1300 or 1400s.
The dynamic of the non producers being able to dictate the tax rate of the producers is just as dangerous no matter where that limit currently rests because at that point they can arbitrarily set that limit without regard to its consequences.
August 25th, 2011 at 6:33 am
wwnj – stop spouting racist bullshit and we’ll stop complaining about it
yeah the tyranny of the masses and their 15% capital gains taxes are ruining this country (club)! I love how anyone who disagrees with you is a ‘non producer’. You produce more than enough bullshit for a hundred normal people. Aren’t you the numbskull who thinks the ‘Laffer Curve’ is even remotely based in reality? (the notion that as you reduce tax rates, revenue taxamagically increases… hey lets set it to zero and tax revenue will be infinite!)
Quite the ‘rebuttle’ there ace.
August 25th, 2011 at 7:39 am
What does one have to do with the other? Simply that 51% of the people have not voted themselves the bounty of the other 49% in America’s history, ergo you need to provide some evidence that they are going to actually do so in the present situation in order to be taken seriously and not be dismissed as a racist scaremonger. Note: assertions that it will happen because them folks are lazy does not cut it.
August 25th, 2011 at 7:45 am
Enk, I think you and shcb assuming the US economy sits on opposite sides of the Laffer curve – the theory behind the curve seems fine to me. From wiki:
” It is clear that a 0% tax rate raises no revenue, but the Laffer curve hypothesis is that a 100% tax rate will also generate no revenue because at such a rate there is no longer any incentive for a rational taxpayer to earn any income, thus the revenue raised will be 100% of nothing. If both a 0% rate and 100% rate of taxation generate no revenue, it follows that there must exist at least one rate in between where tax revenue would be a maximum. The Laffer curve is typically represented as a graph which starts at 0% tax, zero revenue, rises to a maximum rate of revenue raised at an intermediate rate of taxation and then falls again to zero revenue at a 100% tax rate. However, there are infinitely many curves satisfying these boundary conditions. Little can be said without further assumptions or empirical data.”
August 25th, 2011 at 9:02 am
” at that point they can arbitrarily set that limit without regard to its consequences.” Wrong. The consequences are that the revenues dry up and they are worse off than they were before, people get that.
In fact, producers “being able to dictate the tax rate of the producers” the least desirable situation, and it seems with congress et al doing the bidding of lobbyists that is what you have.
August 25th, 2011 at 10:57 am
51% giving themselves the proceeds of the 49 has never happened in America, that is correct, I’ve never been the fatality in a auto wreck either that doesn’t mean I shouldn’t guard against it happening. It has happened before, Argentina for example. There was a country in Africa, don’t remember which where the poor drove off the rich landowners and the government did little to stop them and they did drive the country into poverty, even though the poor were hurt the worst.
What is it with the racism? I think the largest percentage of net tax receivers are white! While many of the net tax receivers are lazy, many are hard working, the idea is to get as many as possible to contribute, that gives them a stake in the action. 51% have never stolen from the 49 because we have never been this close to that proportion before, even people at the bottom paid their fair share in bygone days. In this way people at both ends of the spectrum become stewards of government largess and your concern in your last paragraph becomes less.
There was a show on the History Channel the other night about the lynching of a man and woman in turn of the century Cheyenne or that area, Sweetwater actually. The land barons of the era did it, never said they didn’t do it, and got away with it. In no small way because of the two witnesses not showing up at the hearing, or ever again, one an 11 year old boy. Too much power in the hands of a few is a bad thing, but as we saw in the French Revolution, too much power in the hands of the many is bad too.
August 25th, 2011 at 12:08 pm
hmm knarly, not sure if the 100% or 0% cases are realistic in any way. Obama isn’t talking about raising the fed income taxes on the wealthiest to 100%. More like +3%. Income growth has been going in one direction in America: the rich are getting richer (and the poor poorer, oh, right except they can buy a cheap @$$ second hand Chinese made microwave) What most wwnj tropes don’t say about the folks too poor to pay any federal income taxes is that these folks pay a higher proportion of their income to state, local, sales and excise type taxes (think the poor dummy who just can’t stop smokin his cigs). They are too poor to take any more taxes from them and it’d wouldn’t amount to much anyway.
Obviously if taxes are ridiculously high there is additional incentive to cheat, evade, shelter or otherwise avoid taxes. But taxes are quite low in the US. If paying 3% more in taxes is tyranny, wwnjs should move someplace without a functioning government, libertarian paradises like Somalia. These Grover Norquist types are arguing that *any* taxes are bad. Their idea of fixing the problems with SS and Medicare is indeed to dismantle them. Bush doubled the debt (with two wars and new medicare drug giveaways off the books!) and trashed the economy, Obama is still sweeping up the mess.
I’d pay 2% more if Richie Rich would! I’m sure Joe 6pack would too. But not Joe the Plumber (actually Sam the Tax Cheat, google it). Heck let’s be progressive about it! 1% more from Joe 6pack, 2% more from Mr Middle Class and 3% more from Mr Rich. We’d be right back at the Clinton rates! Maybe increase the capital gains tax by 5% and fiddle w carried interest and short term gains. Make some adjustments to SS, single payer healthcare (Medicare for all) some hiring tax credit (see I’m *for* tax breaks too!) and the confidence fairy would sprinkle her taxamagical dust all over everything.
PS note to President Obama: when negotiating, start higher than you’d accept in the end. So your opening bid should be say 5% across the board tax increases and a 10% increase on capital gains (long or short). Negotiate *down* from there. Just try it. Really.
I personally think a 3, 2, 1 and done approach would share the sacrifice and at least show that we can raise revenues and make reasonable cuts to get our fiscal house back in order (plus no more invasions of the wrong country).
PPS nicely done on the Libya thing, sir! I’ve taken heat here for supporting Obama’s approach vis a vis Libya. Nice to see those folks achieving a Arab Summer revolution. Next up: Syria (maybe we won’t even have to use missiles and bombs)
August 25th, 2011 at 12:30 pm
Yes, I think Obama deserves credit for backing the Libya mission but not leading it.
Compare the removal of this asshat dictator to that of Saddam, and the cost to U.S. taxpayers.
I was leary at first of another “fiasco” and to be sure there’s still a lot that can happen, but they (NATO) are demonstrating that they’ve actually learned a few things. This is (so far) a pretty well executed mission.
August 26th, 2011 at 6:53 am
so close to 100 comments, hate for it to stall out now, I’ll start.
Bush Sucks!!!
August 26th, 2011 at 8:22 am
Looks like you have finally said something that was right instead of right wing.
August 26th, 2011 at 9:30 am
I think he is kind of immature, and a bit of an arrogant asshole, he certainly has had some successes but he seems to lack the knack to run a business. I think a lot of that is because he just isn’t that great of a leader.
August 26th, 2011 at 2:00 pm
Lol. I see Republicans are still pretending they never liked Bush in order to distance themselves from his taint. What a load of cowardly bullshit.
August 26th, 2011 at 2:16 pm
I really mean that, he can drive the wheels off that number 18 car , you have to give him credit for that but he is just such a little prick. He is just dumping money into his truck ownership. I mean if you can’t run a Camping World truck how are you going to make it as a Sprint Cup owner! Half those guys pull their cars behind their motorhomes, they don’t even have haulers. I just don’t think he is a good leader, good thing he drives for the Coach, now there is a leader!
Newman’s on the pole!!!
August 26th, 2011 at 4:39 pm
Few things are less interesting than watching people drive in circles for 3 hours. It is like watching grass grow, only louder.
August 26th, 2011 at 5:19 pm
Almost every sport is boring if you don’t understand it
August 27th, 2011 at 5:44 am
I accomplished my goal of getting to 100 comments and had a little fun at Enky and Smith’s expense, not a bad day. Seriously, can anyone remember the last time Smith contributed anything other than to disparage one of us in some way? At least Enky adds to the conversation every 10th or 12th post.
Preemptive strike:
Enky/Smith says:
Sometime tomorrow
Shcb, Oh, yeah! Well you have never added anything to the conversation other than spew your racist bullshit. (or some variation)
It’s the bullring at Bristol tonight, bet you ‘ll are excited!!!
August 27th, 2011 at 6:16 am
You act as though there is anything here worth contributing to. The comment section on this site died years ago, if it ever really lived at all. Jbc is clearly aware of that fact, hence his general lack of participation. There is little more to do here than continue beating a dead horse. This site cannot sustain intelligent conversation. It is nothing more than trolls trolling trolls, plus overly polite commentary from NL. It is a way to fill in gaps in the day, but there is nothing to gain from this site, so why should anyone be expected to contribute? There are intelligent forums and blogs out there, but this is not one of them.
Vroom vroom, me likey fast thing. Me turn real gud.
August 27th, 2011 at 1:51 pm
Being so dern smart must be a burden
August 29th, 2011 at 12:59 pm
Question to the trolls, do you think this dual command set up by the Obama administration in response to Irene is constitutional? It is something of a moot point since federal troops weren’t used, at least not officially the National Guard were in control of active duty forces even though those forces weren’t officially used.
I need to find out from my niece if she was on duty this weekend. Her Facebook page said she had visited all the affected states this weekend so I assume it was in a C18. But I don’t know that for a fact, but it seems likely she was flying in response, and she is most certainly active duty Air Force and not National Guard.
There was much criticism of Bush for doing things unconstitutional (in areas other than Katrina) and much criticism for the response to Katrina, but if one of the cures for the problems that plagued Katrina is unconstitutional is that ok?
To be clear, this was set up a year ago so it wasn’t an knee jerk reaction by the Obama administration and I’m sure it has been look at by the administration’s lawyers just as the invasion of Iraq was looked at by the Bush administration’s lawyers. I’m not saying it’s a bad idea I just have questions of whether it is legal.
August 29th, 2011 at 4:37 pm
I had no idea you were still steamed about losing the Civil War.
Maybe you are just steamed watching effective government in action?
You will have to work harder to find something with which to impeach “the boy”
August 29th, 2011 at 5:08 pm
Sir! We’re in an unknown zone! I don’t know what he’s talking about, and even if I did I don’t know what he’s talking agout!
Read the manual sometime young man! Play the race card! Do it now!
Yes sir!
August 29th, 2011 at 5:18 pm
shcb,
Enk has made a few points there.
Besides that, those types of questions such as you ask are indicative of the degree to which your country has strayed from the true path of a righteously just and lawful democratic society. I mean, if a guy like you can’t figure that out what the hell good are the laws?
I’d question whether your government is still operating under “COG” plans, i.e whether the constitution is relevant any more. I don’t know, it’s too much for me to grapple with (& besides I live in Canada, the True North Strong and Free!) – a quick google brings this up, I haven’t read it, but by all means fill yer boots http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=14654
Cheers,
August 29th, 2011 at 6:54 pm
I don’t see the connection to y our link. I guess you didn’t read my comment, Enky said I’m steamed at watching effective government in action. I’m not arguing that, bypassing the Constitution is effective, mainly because the constitution was written to put as many roadblocks in the way of the federal government as possible, giving the states broad powers, hence the tenth amendment. One of the failures of Katrina was Bush abided by the law and waited until the states asked for help. This is a mistake governors since haven’t made. But putting the military in charge of an area that is explicitly forbidden in the constitution, is it right to do that if it makes sense? Is torture right if it makes sense? Is continuing a war without congressional approval right if it makes sense?
I assume when you say Enky made some good points you weren’t referring to “You will have to work harder to find something with which to impeach “the boy”
Back up to Smith’s comments, he says there are good blogs out there but this isn’t one of them. I’ll bet they are dominated by liberals without an opposing point of view. I’ve read some of the earlier years, I didn’t see much difference, maybe the conservatives quit a little easier. Maybe people like Matt blocked them like he did me and they didn’t have the gumption to fight back, ah, the good old days.
August 31st, 2011 at 9:29 am
Speaking of which, I’ve been meaning to ask our northern neighbors what you folks think of the tar sands pipeline (from Athabasca to the Gulf of Mexico). Seems like it would be cheaper to process it into oil on site or nearby, but all the way across the USA? We need every barrel, but using fewer barrels and investing in what replaces ‘the dirtiest oil on Earth’ with something lean, green and mean might be a better investment in the future.
Keystone XL (OK, who didn’t just have a cougar growl like those awful beer commercials?)
August 31st, 2011 at 10:03 am
I try not to think about it too much. It seems like one of those battles that, despite the logic one way or another if you choose to oppose you’d better be prepared to lose everything because it just might be an unstopable force – objecting to it seems a lot like objecting to the planetary orbit. Maybe that’s the result of a successful PR campaign by the proponents. Whatever. I choose to pick my battles, and right now I’m trying to get my daughter to wear more sensible shoes (without much success.)
Tar sands = unbelievable Power and Money.
But if you are asking for my opinion on mining the tar sands, here it is: I’d rather keep the tar sands in situ and mine it sparingly and solely for the purpose of applying to birchbark canoes as a waterproofing sealant.
September 1st, 2011 at 5:10 am
I’ll bet Carville and Beckel went out and had a couple drinks and shook their heads a lot last night. They had to be saying who in the hell are the political strategists for Obama and what were they thinking. They schedule a major speech for the exact time the Republicans are having a televised debate, then Obama does his I’m the boss, reschedule your little event so I can have my big event shtick. The high point of the day was the Obama spokesman that said they couldn’t be worried about every little event, he even included working around the airing of a cooking show in his list.
Eventually they had to give in, they realized their ploy was too transparent, dang it anyway. Now this isn’t going to hurt Obama, most people didn’t even realize it happened and those that did won’t remember past this weekend, but it gives us another insight into the man and the people he has surrounded himself with.
Did you see Jimmy Hansen got arrested protesting even as the data coming from his own NASA lab is pumping out data that is showing the models used to justify AGW are pretty much useless. I wonder if he got Daryl Hannah’s autograph, she still looks good in handcuffs even though she’s getting older.
September 1st, 2011 at 8:05 am
birchbark canoes… lol
about as likely as functional women’s shoes
just had that conversation with a mom we were camping with last weekend
‘crocs are not good shoes’ ‘no, they are not’
my kids love em too
sigh
September 1st, 2011 at 9:41 am
I’ll take my Tevas over my Crocs any day,
September 1st, 2011 at 11:32 am
I don’t really see the logic in spending tens of billions to build a continental pipeline, destroying tonnes of precious land in the process to send the world’s dirtiest oil through. I mean, why not just build some refineries closer to the source? I guess that makes too much sense. I’m sure it has to do with the folks who own the current refineries. More refineries = lower prices for gasoline and there are very powerful and rich men who will simply not let that happen.
September 1st, 2011 at 11:34 am
Is it just me, or does Obama seem like he’s ready to throw in the towel? He just seems like he doesn’t want the job anymore.
Here’s a good column on the latest example of that:
http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/09/01/granderson.obama.speech/index.html
September 1st, 2011 at 12:46 pm
Welllll he has that a little wrong from what I understand. The president doesn’t get to call that meeting, not technically anyway. The speaker calls the meeting, the president requests it. Now the way Washington works is your people call my people and my people call your people. The whole thing gets scheduled behind the scenes, times are set, then the Pres officially requests the time and the Speaker officially gives his approval and calls the meeting.
From what I understand, in this case the Pres’s peeps sent a note to the Speak’s peeps just a few minutes before they sent out a press release, no back and forth preceding that note, the timing of course wasn’t coincidental, this is the first time Perry will be showcased. The Pres and his advisers tried to pull a fast one, they were seeing if they can push the Speaker around, kind of like Clinton did to Newt with the budget lie. The difference is Newt stood there with a deer in the headlight look because he knew he had been snookered. Boehner on the other hand, walked up to the table and deftly banked the ball to knock the little red one in the pocket, then walked away like he’d done it before, cause he has.
Granderson seems to think the president is the king, he ain’t, he’s just the president, his office is a co-equal branch just as Boehner is. But I think you’re right, I think he’s done. I think he wanted the job just to mark it off his bucket list, and he wanted the power to do what he thought needed to be done to socialize America but he didn’t want the rest. There are people that live for the fight as much as they do the cause, Perry is one, Reagan was to a degree although the cause, the whole cause, was more important to Reagan.
The problem with Obama is he has a very narrow agenda that he is really passionate about and he isn’t getting it done to the degree he wants, he thought he would be king. Same thing happened to Nixon, he loved the foreign affairs aspect of the job but the home front and specifically the economy just bored the hell out of him.
As far as the pipeline goes, it may be more efficient from a standpoint of production and transportation to do it all those thousands of miles away, I don’t think it is greed since the same people would be making the profits in either case. The other consideration is it may not be feasible to make new refineries because of environmental regulations, or at least the pipeline may be more feasible. I don’t know, just educated guesses.
September 1st, 2011 at 12:58 pm
hurf durf!
September 2nd, 2011 at 5:40 am
From what I understand of your history, when the President requests speaking time in Congress the Speaker makes it happen. The GOP obviously has little or no respect for Obama and because of his weakness and constant cowering I’m losing respect for him too.
I don’t think your comments on the pipeline make any sense it all.
September 2nd, 2011 at 6:53 am
Yes you are correct, and the Speaker did make it happen. There needs to be mutual respect. The problem here was the administration tried to pull a fast one, they didn’t go through channels, they should have called the speaker’s office asked for Wednesday, hashed something out, maybe the debate could be moved back or forward an hour, the president could pick a time that didn’t conflict, see what I mean? But they didn’t, they did what the Japanese were supposed to did at Pearl Harbor, hand over the document a few minutes before the attack. They technically did what they should, they asked for the speaker to make it happen at this time at this date, but before the speaker could get back to them they issued a press release, the idea was to force the speaker to grant the time slot. Not a bad trick. It just didn’t work, the speaker called the bluff. Now there are a lot of good reasons to have it on Wednesday from the President’s point of view, he said he would have this speech right after Labor day, so Monday is out, Tuesday is hectic since everyone is just getting back to Washington, Thursday is the opening of the NFL season, can’t have these things on Friday, so Wednesday is the perfect day. But the president doesn’t want to go on before the debate, Republicans would use the debate to trash what the Pres just said, after the debate? Will people watch both?
Obama just lost this one, but it’s just one point, not the game, problem is he lost more than one point because of the way it was handled.
What Obama should have done is just give the speech the following week, if someone said “you lied! You said the speech would be right after the Labor day weekend!” he could say we took the high moral ground, we didn’t want to impose on the Republican debate or the start of the NFL season, and they would have been right and they would have earned respect.
Pipeline paragraph, makes perfect sense to me, is there a part I can maybe explain better?
September 2nd, 2011 at 8:27 am
I think the tens of millions that are unemployed and underemployed probably don’t really give a fuck about the Repulican debate or the NFL opener.
I don’t think it made sense because I can’t see how building a refinery closer to the second largest oil deposit on the planet is more harmful to the environment and less efficient than building a continental pipeline and sending the stuff thousands of miles. Not to mention the cost to build a refinery would be cheaper than building this mega pipeline.
September 2nd, 2011 at 9:29 am
That may all be true, my point is the same people are going to profit whether there is a pipeline or a refinery, so they are going to do whatever will make them the most money (cost less). There aren’t two competing entities, one building a pipeline and one building refineries, one being responsible and one not. So there has to be another consideration. It is possible the pipeline is indeed more expensive than onsite refineries but that cost is offset by trucking the finished product to market. Refining it in a place where the finished product can be moved by rail, ship or truck, and other existing pipelines may offset the higher initial cost.
Another consideration is regulations may make it easier to expand existing refineries than build new, this is of course easy to reverse with the stroke of the pen but is there the political will.
There is also opportunity costs, if a pipeline has been approved but refineries will not make it through the political process for a number of years if ever the oil supplier has no choice but to take the sure bet.
These guys aren’t evil, they don’t want to kill the environment out of spite even if it costs them double. Now they may cut corners to help the bottom line at the margins which seems to be what happen with Deepwater Horizons (I think I have that right) but the basic concept is built on solid economic ground.
Now environmental issues is a tangible intangible that has to be considered, the lesser of two evils. A pipeline is going to cut a scar, one that is temporary if it can be burred. Is that worse than a constant line of trucks and trains hauling finished product across the south of Canada and the north of the US? What happens when the snows blow for week? How much energy is lost stopping and restarting a refinery?
There is a lot to consider.
They probably care more about the NFL than the debate for sure:) but they probably wouldn’t mind waiting until the following Monday either.
September 2nd, 2011 at 9:42 am
Let me expand my second paragraph. Local people are more likely to be receptive of expanding refineries if they are already established and a large percentage of the local population is employed by the refineries. It may be harder to get local government to approve refineries in an area that doesn’t have many if any. There is a good chance this isn’t true in this case since this type of extraction already has feel of a dirty refinery it’s not just a little hole in the ground in the middle of a wheat field.
September 2nd, 2011 at 9:47 am
protip: you can save a ton of time by replacing any wwnj post with “hurf durf”
use the extra time you saved to drink beer, fish, compose pithy blog comments or pursue a time consuming hobby
September 2nd, 2011 at 10:03 am
Trust me, the ultra-conservative people of Alberta (our version of Texas) don’t seem too conserned about the enviromental impact of this industry and wouldn’t put up a fight over building a refinery there close to the source.
I know how greedy these companies are and I don’t think you’ll be able to convince me that the reason they’re not building more refineries is because it would result in more gasoline being produced in the market which would result in the price of gas coming down.
Oh, and we have a railroad network here in Canada. A pretty good one too. It even connects to yours. And we’re really good at clearing snow. Experts.
September 2nd, 2011 at 2:12 pm
I’m not following your logic.
A) the oil is extracted from the sand and processed to something like crude, then it is sent to a refinery a few miles away and turned into sellable products and distributed.
B) the oil is extracted from the sand and processed to something like crude, then it is sent to a refinery thousands of miles away via a pipeline and turned into sellable products and distributed.
Now somehow B will produce a shortage that will drive up prices and A will not. You lose me there.
It seems the only way to produce a shortage to drive up prices is to not extract it. That of course assumes you have another source to sell from and no one else is filling that need. I suppose you could extract it and not process it but why would you incur that cost? You could process it and not sell it but then you have storage costs.
September 2nd, 2011 at 8:58 pm
http://www.nature.com/news/2011/110824/full/news.2011.504.html
This study in Nature Magazine is a very early, yet sucessful, testing of a possible alternative explanation for part, or maybe even most, of the climate change over time. May be nothing. May be something.
September 4th, 2011 at 5:38 am
Thanks for that Craig, I’m guessing that will fall into the category of understanding the intricacies of something that is already known. We know the sun is the driving force of not only climate change but the climate itself. It is really interesting to understand how it actually works though.
My physical therapist and I were having a similar discussion the other day. She said they are using viruses to attack cancer. The prevailing theory is that the virus produces heat and kills the cancer. The tie in is that I had heard of a study maybe 15 years ago that showed if you have a cold or flu every year or even every two years you stand a 50% chance of having cancer than someone that never gets sick. The theory then was the body fighting off the flu killed the cancer cells if they weren’t too far advanced. Sounds like they have done enough research to understand the theory of what was happening was wrong but the statistic was right. Of course 15 years from now that might change again.
It was nice to see the President stop the EPA from tightening smog regulations. Even if it is temporary. I’m sure the administration is hoping to reverse that job killing measure as soon as they win the election but hopefully enough on the left will not understand that, and see this as another failure of Obama and not vote so we can keep those jobs, don’t need to make things worse.
Luckily Obama is in a position where he can’t tell them he will reverse that decision.
September 4th, 2011 at 8:37 pm
Refineries are more profitable when run at as close to capacity as possible. There used to be large boom bust cycles in the refining industry where consumption would rise to the limit of refining capacity and prices would spike just because a little extra capacity was needed – but instead a whole mess of refineries would get built and suddenly profits would suck and they’d be closing refineries down. The industry got a handle on that and has been very careful about bringing extra refining capacity onstream.
Piping upgraded oil to existing refineries sounds a lot more efficient than building a big new refinery in the hinterlands and trucking or rail transporting finished products to the major markets. Just sayin.
My rudimentary understanding is that it’s not so much that the industry needs any more refining capacity, the need is to address shifts in supply sources. Existing refineries in Texas face declining Mayan and Venezuelan crude imports and as Canada ramps up production there is a huge motive to find a way to get it to those refineries instead of havign to decrease production due to silly tranportation bottlenecks.
& What is wrong with birchbark canoes covered tar pitch?
September 5th, 2011 at 8:24 am
That sounds reasonable, wouldn’t it be nice if all we needed oil for was birch bark canoes.
September 6th, 2011 at 6:24 am
“Piping upgraded oil to existing refineries sounds a lot more efficient…”
I guess if you don’t consider the environmental damage and financial costs from building and maintaining a pipeline across 1/3 of a continent and the risk of sabotage and leaks it’s efficient. And I’m pretty sure that once it gets down there and processed it gets loaded right back on a truck or train and sent right back out across the country. Basically it gets sent from one side of America to the other and back again. Perhaps our definitions of “efficient” are a little different.
When was the last time a new refinery was built in North America? The 70s?
Now ask yourself how much North American consumption has increased since the 70s. Any other industry creates more capacity to meet higher demand.
Not the oil industry apparently.
September 6th, 2011 at 8:39 am
From what I understand we have increased production at existing plants instead of building new plants because environmental regulations make it difficult to built new. That and what Knarley said.
As far as the efficiency of the pipeline, getting the oil to the refinery is only half the equation, you then have to get it distributed. The most efficient way is pipeline since there is no return empty trip as truck or rail. That spider web of pipelines already exists from existing refineries.
September 6th, 2011 at 10:29 am
Nl, here are a couple links to look at, it seems the number of refineries has been cut in half, but the production numbers has risen, so either the remaining refineries are much larger or more efficient.
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/hist/LeafHandler.ashx?n=PET&s=8_NA_8O0_NUS_C&f=A
http://www.eia.gov/dnav/pet/pet_pnp_unc_dcu_nus_m.htm
September 6th, 2011 at 12:39 pm
shcb, re: refineries – you missed one, and that is that way too much refining capacity was built in blind response to price signals. Hence the closure of refineries (the older more decrepid ones) and new resolve by the industry not to continue making the same stupid mistake (overbuilding refining capacity) over and over again any more.
NL- as for pipelines across the continent, sure there are detractions such as the enviro damage along the corridor you mention, and sabatage is a concern but has been managed okay so far… we got plenty of pipelines already, if we want to sell more oil into the major N. American trading hub(s) then we need ot increase capacity. It’s that simple. The alternative, i.e. trucking, rail, (or loading barrels into birchbark canoes) is not attractive when you do the math (& consider how often trucks crash / trains derail compared to pipeline sabatage.)
September 6th, 2011 at 12:39 pm
http://www.centreforenergy.com/FactsStats/MapsNorthAmerica/
September 6th, 2011 at 2:15 pm
I don’t know if it is true that too much capacity was built in blind response to price signals. You seem to know more about this than I do so if you say so that’s fine, I gave you blanket credit to all your points.
If you look at the chart that shows capacity it shows that as we reached the plateau of plant closures we also were at nearly 100% capacity, then capacity increased without an increase in the number of refineries. Demand was increasing all the while. That tells me the refineries got larger but didn’t keep up with demand for a while. Which is fine, that is in line with what you are saying, that we closed down older refineries. I’m guessing your comments about overbuilding and underbuilding was before the 1980 timeframe these charts refer to, so you’re probably giving information these charts don’t cover, thanks.
One side note, when I was a kid we had one of those old, little refineries south of the town I grew up in. They closed it probably 30 years ago or more. My brother being the delinquent he was broke into the place after it had been closed for quite some time. He said when they went into the control rooms and maintenance sheds the coffee cups were still on the tables and the lockers still had uniforms in them. He said it was really freaky, like everyone just evacuated the place.
September 6th, 2011 at 4:08 pm
shcb,
Good guess, yes my knowledge of refining history is dated – but it still seems to apply. Was surprised by the EIA table that so much excess capacity was added over the past ten years… Bush is to blame for that I’m sure. ;-)
September 6th, 2011 at 7:19 pm
Damn rethuglicans! :-)
I think your link with the crude pipelines was very informative, It seems we’re both in agreement on this one.
It seems NL just doesn’t want the oil gleaned from the sands, and I think that is a fair argument, the pipeline is just a tool though, not the core issue.
September 7th, 2011 at 7:31 am
My argument was never to truck or rail the tar anywhere. It was to refine it closer to the source.
Our (liberal hippy douchebags) number one concern is the environment – that shouldn’t be a secret to you guys. The Tar Sands are already an environmental nightmare so instead of ripping up thousands of hectares more to build a continental pipeline just put a refinery next to it. We already have pipelines (east-west) that can send it to the major markets. Most of the population in the U.S. and Canada is in the northern part, along our border.
September 7th, 2011 at 7:55 am
An yes, to be clear, I’d obviously rather not see vast expansion of the Oil Sands due to the massive waste of water, destruction of land, chemical contamination of the soil and water (which highly impacts the aboriginal population) and obviously the huge amounts of carbon emissions the extration process produces.
September 7th, 2011 at 8:35 am
NL, I’m fully on your side regarding expanding. Current output far exceeds local demand for birchbark canoe waterproofing material. I advocate bringing that supply/demand equation back into balance. That sounds insane, but I am not kidding. It would be best for the planet, and we all need this planet.
As such, the rest of my comments are strictly academic. I sense from your comments that you want the tar sands output to be used primarily for domestic needs. In my view that’s a lost opportunity. I say, if we’re operating in SNAFU mode anyway, we might as well maximize revenues (and resource / transport tax revenues) via whatever large mining and pipeline expansions or new pipeline corridors that seem feasible. With that comes more jobs, greater economic growth, and bigger and better Wal-Marts to mollify the masses. The ducks can find other wetlands, we need more land for parking stalls.
September 7th, 2011 at 8:43 am
Didn’t some study just come out that tar sand oil has a 85% larger carbon footprint than conventional oil? Oh wait, a cosmic ray experiment has disproven all anthropogenic climate change science. Nothing to see here folks, move along.
September 7th, 2011 at 9:16 am
I hear ya knarly… I (we) lost the oil sands battle long ago. Stupid to the Last Drop as they say…
On another note, did you guys hear about this new video game?
Video Game Targets ‘Tea Party Zombies,’ Fox News Personalities
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2011/09/07/video-game-targets-tea-party-zombies-fox-news-personalities/
September 7th, 2011 at 9:20 am
yea, but it is a really big cosmic ray.
September 7th, 2011 at 9:20 am
yea Enk, but it’s a really big cosmic ray.
September 7th, 2011 at 11:35 am
I love the foxbots who trumpet Trumka/Hoffa’s vicious quote. Only problem, as usual, it’s bullsh!t. The full quote is as follows:
So some douchebag is making a zombie game mod? bfd
A wwnj nutter (and who is to say this zombie game guy isn’t a Rethuggle?) shot one of my congressladies in the face. Not to mention the extreme wwnj who blew up a giant fertilizer bomb and shot up a youth summer camp in Norway.
Nothing to see here folks, move along.
September 7th, 2011 at 12:31 pm
The best comment I saw there was something like,
“Don’t you tea baggers ever get tired of bitching and whining about being picked on by liberals? Grow some effing balls. “Boo-hoo everyone is picking on me, I’m such a victim!” You people bitch and moan more than a 13 year old having her period!!”
LOL
September 7th, 2011 at 1:42 pm
Well,
If any Dem Senators or Representatives post the Zombie game on their website (refer to Sarah Impal’em Bullseyes) then that’d be a problem…
but not much you can say or do about some random guy making a political video game unless he was commissioned by Joe Bidden or something…
Go file this in the “get a life” category along with the timing of Obama’s speach.
September 8th, 2011 at 9:44 am
“Boo-hoo everyone is picking on me, I’m such a victim!”
Reminds me of poor widdle wwnj’s whine in this thread about how mean ol Mr Matt (or as we called him at the time yMom) was censoring him. Oh the huge manatee! yMatt censored me and others here too. Inappropriate censorship wasn’t just directed at our poow widdle wicky. Get a life.
September 8th, 2011 at 10:38 am
Yeah, but you deserve to be censored :-). If I had a life I wouldn’t be writing on this blog every day.
September 8th, 2011 at 9:46 pm
1000 words:
http://www.lewrockwell.com/politicaltheatre/2011/09/stop-telling-the-truth-about-me/?utm_medium=twitter&utm_source=twitterfeed
September 9th, 2011 at 1:09 pm
Strange no comments on the Repugnantans debate or Obama’s speech.
What’s wrong with you guys?
September 9th, 2011 at 2:35 pm
I won’t be posting much for a while, need to lay low
If Steve calls, I’m not here, I’m out, away, off, absent, wandering, anyplace else.
Got it?
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=n8riJCf-qvM
September 9th, 2011 at 6:32 pm
HA! Take care Enk.
This would seem to deserve some mention on LIES.com :
http://www.huntingtonnews.net/9134
e.g. random excerpt:
September 10th, 2011 at 11:16 am
LIES! (If it weren’t deliberate, it’d be fixed by now.)
Check out the green lines in this graph!
http://firstread.msnbc.msn.com/_news/2011/09/07/7658608-who-do-you-think-won-the-republican-debate-at-the-reagan-library
September 11th, 2011 at 7:07 am
Enky, the reason we haven’t talked about it is there wasn’t much to talk about. Obama gave a standard campaign speech, telling us all the wonderful things he is going to do without telling us what he is going to do. He wants congress to “pass this bill” he wants them to pass it really, really bad, so bad he repeated it over and over, “pass this bill”. The joke now is that Obama will revive the SNL subliminal man, maybe he can get Nealon to give him some pointers. “the crisis in the middle ease passthisbill is getting worse, we need passthisbill the United Nations to passthisbill come together and passthisbill stop the violence once and for all.” News flash, there isn’t a bill!!! There isn’t even an outline of a bill, that will be submitted this week, supposedly. The outline isn’t going to a senator or congressman who will sponsor it and get the official ball rolling, it’s going to the coffee klatch super committee. He has nothing, not a clue. This was the pep talk before the Hail Mary pass, the last gasp of Keynesian economics.
Boy Knarly, those pollsters were up late at night scientifically polling 220,000 people in a matter of a few hours, doesn’t seem like we should have any unemployment at all with that many people making that many calls. Ron Paul is comic relief. Libertarianism is just too demanding for the average person, it will never win a national election.
September 11th, 2011 at 5:24 pm
I didn’t watch a lot of the 911 retrospective today, but what I watched made me realize how pathetically dangerous the liberal world view is.
September 12th, 2011 at 7:08 am
Ummmmm…
Obama to submit his jobs plan to Congress Monday
http://www.cnn.com/2011/POLITICS/09/12/obama.jobs.plan/index.html
With analysis as stellar as that, shcb, you should be working for Fox News.
I’m pretty sure your Liberal president has killed more Al Qaeda leaders, including the man who attacked you on 9/11, OBL, prevented further 9/11 style attacks (you knew that was going to come back and bite you) and showed you how to get rid of a dictator for a fraction of the cost. In fact he’s done more in three years and way less money than your cowboy conservative president ever did.
Indeed, if the 2008 meltdown and the 2003-?? Iraq War showed us anything, it’s how damaging the conservative world view is.
September 12th, 2011 at 7:24 am
Isn’t that what I said? He’s going to submit it next week, which is now this week. But it’s just more of the same, there isn’t anything in there (now that we’ve seen it) that will push business to expand, mayb at the margins but nothing of substance.
September 12th, 2011 at 8:42 am
“pathetically dangerous?” LOL
Paranoia and offensive wars are so much better, no blowback on economic fallout from that is there, eh Chief?
This is the only 911 memorial I watched: Funny! \
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yuC_4mGTs98&feature=player_embedded
September 12th, 2011 at 9:15 am
America marked the 10th anniversary of 9/11 with quiet dignity and reflection. Except our local wrong wing nut job. He is posting half-drunk with hate and the other half would seem to be lies/easily disproven bullshit.
For example, you can read some details about the bill here:
http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2011/09/09/american-jobs-act-read-all-details
So now the Rethuggles are against tax breaks (if they would help the average joe or actually, you know, create or preserve jobs). Pathetic. This won’t pass because the Rs are going to obstruct anything that could be construed as helping the US or Obama. Which makes me think we should think twice before dismissing the 9/11 truther bs: the Rs have proven to be an active insurgency attacking America from within (see tea-tard debt ceiling circus and downgrade). The debt has swollen under Obama because we are lacking jobs. jobs jobs jobs.
Every wwnj post makes me realize how violently dangerous the wrong wing nut job world view is. You microcephalics may be more dangerous than those mooselmen cave dwellers and uppity brown folk.
btw – jbc nice product placement on knarly’s video at the 2:21 mark!
September 12th, 2011 at 10:07 am
knarly, that was a really good video. It’s actually making me think a little more about all this.
September 12th, 2011 at 12:03 pm
shcb, he “outlined” his plan pretty clearly on Thursday and sent the bill to Congress today. And attended various ceremonies in between while dealing with potential attacks. I’m not sure what more he could do to please you
September 12th, 2011 at 12:27 pm
wwnj won’t be happy until every dang sociamalistical libtard is ‘impaled at the stake! or worse!’
wwnjs are orthogonal to reality
(go on, look it up on Algore’s information superhighway lil ricky, we’ll wait)
http://crooksandliars.com/tina-dupuy/obama-best-republican-president-lincoln
September 13th, 2011 at 3:40 pm
Validation of Enk’s assertions of WWNJ insane violence:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/sep/07/michael-moore-hated-man-america
September 13th, 2011 at 5:20 pm
Now that his request is out there I can see why he didn’t want us to see it first, he is for the most part just tacking on more of what isn’t working now. Half of it is extending unemployment. This is like the kid that turns in his homework on time for once but it isn’t complete. He simply tells the coffee klatch to figure out a way to pay for it, but don’t cut into the assignmet he gave them a few weeks ago. I don’t think this is going to go very far, for good reason. The part I thought was funny was he told them to figure out how to pay for it, but he is going to tell them how to do that in a week or two. Well golly gee, if you know how you want it done tell us! In the speech last week! Finish your homework!
September 14th, 2011 at 8:24 am
talk about orthogonal to reality…
wrong wing nut job vomits forth “Half of it is extending unemployment.” No. 2+2=4, not 2+2=sociamalism! The actual number is closer to 10% Not 50%, 10% (note that this spending is directly stimulative as it keeps aggregate demand from dropping even further) $250B in tax cuts and $200B in spending. Which is the larger number lil ricki? We’ll wait…
The actual (you know, factual) breakdown is as follows:
Tax Cuts: $253 billion total
Employer payroll taxes by $65 billion: This is designed to cut payroll taxes in half for 98 percent of businesses, according to a senior administration official.
Employee payroll cut by $175 billion: By extending the current tax holiday set to expire in December, the president’s plan would eliminate payroll taxes for firms that increase their payroll by adding new workers or increasing the wages of their current workers (up to $50 million in wage increases.)
Long-term unemployment tax credit by $8 billion: According to the Bureau of Labor Statistic, those out of work for more than 27 months make up the bulk of the unemployed in America.
Spending: $194 billion total
Infrastructure bank by $10 billion: Echoing the bipartisan proposition brought by Sens. John Kerry, D-Mass., and Kay Bailey Hutchison, R-Texas.
Transportation improvements by $50 billion: For immediate improvement to transportation surfaces.
Unemployment insurance and reform by $49 billion: Extending payments to the unemployed would keep 6 million people who would see the end of the line in December. The reform would allow unemployment insurance to be given to workers whose hours are reduced but not necessarily laid off. The money would work as a bridge for workers to keep gaining experience before they receive a full time job.
Modernizing schools by $30 billion: This supply would be split between federal and state hands to refurbish at least 35,000 public schools. The money that would be allocated is less than the $50 billion proposed by former White House adviser Jared Bernstein. The plan would also protect teachers at risk of losing their jobs.
Funds for low-income students by $5 billion: Part of the “pathway to work” fund. The current unemployment insurance rate for young people is “terrible, deplorable,” according to a senior administration official.
Rehabilitation and repurposing of vacant property by $15 billion: The government will pay people to tear down vacant homes and reduce urban blight.
source (now these guys is some real commiepinkofags! hurf durf! and lorry!)
http://www.nationaljournal.com/jobs-plan-by-the-numbers-20110908
As to your slightly racist (well, at least you didn’t call him boy like Pat Buchannan) screed about paying for it, over here in Reality, the Obama administration has put forth two different ways to pay for it.
Again, using these dang lib ‘facts’ the first method of payment would be to add this to the SuperDuper committee cutting spree (good luck with that!) The other method would be changing depreciation rates for expensive corporate jets (sorry richy rich!), limits for itemized deductions for those earning over $200,000 (sorry richy rich! this is the meat of it $400B in revenue/10yr) and finally closing some oil and gas tax loopholes (sorry richy rich and fu texas, no more fed subsidies for your crappy economy [which by the way only ‘grew’ due to public sector job growth… doh!]) Finally hedge fund managers (that is you again richy rich!) might not get their cushy 15% carried interest tax rate forever more. boo fuckin hoo
But please do go on with the hyperbole and miasma of misinformation.
September 14th, 2011 at 9:29 am
Here here.
September 14th, 2011 at 9:32 am
I mean, “Hear Hear” !
http://unbecominglevity.blogharbor.com/blog/_archives/2008/11/10/3970914.html
September 14th, 2011 at 5:40 pm
whatsamatter wrong wing nut job?
facts got yer tongue?
September 14th, 2011 at 8:03 pm
Facts never affected him before.
September 14th, 2011 at 8:07 pm
“Like” this, Jon Stewart at the 1:10 minute mark and the 2:00 minute mark.
September 14th, 2011 at 8:07 pm
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X0ld9QPlMJ8&NR=1
September 14th, 2011 at 8:44 pm
Facts don’t influence most people as much as does their emotional reactions to rhetoric. Witness NL, having given up on 911 Truth arguments only to admit he’s thinking a little more about it after seeing a well made video expressing much of the same information he’d discounted when presented to him by more boring means.
Whatever. A better assessment is here:
“The Critics of 911 Truth: do they have a case?”
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=26520
September 15th, 2011 at 5:44 am
:-)
http://www.thestar.com/news/article/1053604–bush-s-toronto-appearance-cancelled?bn=1
knarly, I’ve always said I wouldn’t put it past them (the Bush admin) to do something like that, my whole thing was, and still is, that to pull something like that off would involve thousands of people and somebody would have come forward by now.
September 15th, 2011 at 8:46 am
Thanks NL, I don’t intend to drag this thread into another 911 “debate”.
I just have a couple comments:
(1) Don’t negate what the evidence says (it is impossible for 911 to have happened as we are told) with the belief that the alternative theory is too improbable. As yet there is no alternative theory that fully holds water, that’s why an INDEPENDENT investigation is required rather than one set up by those who may have been involved and run by those with the most extreme conflict of interest (e.g. Phillip Zelikow.) In other words, first eliminate the impossible (the official conspiracy theory) then get to work on piecing together what the evidence really says.
(2) While technically “thousands of people” would have played a part, only a few people would have full knowledge of what was really going down. The rest just needed to follow their orders. (A possible example: the columns in the towers underwent fireproof insulation upgrading in the months proceeding the attack, the workers did not need to know that the spray-on material contained nano-thermite as the liquid and dried application is stable until properly detonated. What are they to think afterwards, except “Gee, I guess I didn’t do a very good job?”)
September 15th, 2011 at 9:37 am
I just find it vanishingly unlikely that the shrubco/cheney f!ups and wingnuts could have organized so vast a conspiracy so effectively. Their track record says they would have massively botched the biggest clandestine op ever. Just like every other thing they screwed up. Which is just about everything (see: Second Greater Depression, 2007 – ongoing)
Massive skyscrapers are not supposed to be slammed by giant jetliners full of fuel. Rich Miller has a book called Physics for Future Presidents, there is discussion of the energies involved and why it is no mystery why these giants collapsed.
But when you consider how batsh!t crazy the right wing has gone over the last few decades… I am not so sure they wouldn’t
I mean the wwnjs tripled our debt (thanks Ronnie Raygun!), then doubled it again (f u dumbya). They crashed the global economy into a crater so deep, it makes every other recession look like a picnic, we’re into Depression territory, lads! Then when Balack Obama is elected suddenly the cause of our economic problems is public debt and the gubermint (also, negroes n mexicans). They are already reneging on the August debt ceiling ‘deal’/fiasco (gotta get those other rating agencies to dump on the US, eh TeaTards?) A vast Right Wing Insurgency, violent, armed, psychopathic, devouring a information stream so toxic and full of lies, sane folk can do little but shake their heads while the lunatics in revolutionary war costumes grab the media’s microphones and commandeer ‘the debate’.
September 15th, 2011 at 10:25 am
Enk, Maybe you are right and Shrubco was not involved, but first you have to eliminate the impossible – then whatever’s left no matter how improbable must be so.
You must have meant Richard S. Muller. (Nice picture of him on Beck’s show here: http://muller.lbl.gov/ , a quick scan of a few of his writings shows that he seems to be willing to give his opinion on everything regardless of whether or not he’s done any real research on the subject.)
The book you mention is just a first year textbook (replacing “Physics 10”)that presumably uses the Tower collapse as a teaching tool to motivate students, as such you can bet it is unduly simplified and that the assumptions used are tweaked – as NIST did – to show forces necessary in an false model to result in a collapse. That’s far from impressive and light years less convincing than the actual research done by the teams of structural engineers, architects and physics professors at http://www.ae911truth.org/
September 15th, 2011 at 12:59 pm
Still not convinced. And being as I’m such a liberal pinko commie sociamalist fag, you’d think I’d be desperate to pin the blame on the jackass, right?
I’m no demolition or physics expert, but it sure looks like the tops of those two buildings buckled onto the weakened, damaged steel of the floors beneath them. Recall that this is one of the world’s tallest and most aggressively engineered buildings ever constructed. There are incredible forces just from the sheer weight of material above the damaged areas. Controlled demolitions tend to have a series of pops as the *bottoms* of the structures are cut out and then they let gravity take them down. Gravity does the work. Gravity did most of the destruction, the planes and fires just made for a cascading series of eventually catastrophic top down failures inevitable.
I think it far more likely that Cheney and his criminal cronies allowed, nay willed this to happen. The Pentagon strike does seem very suspicious: a beginner pilot like that would probably have augured in long before he hit the building.
But it is a huge stretch to say they planted tons of explosives (ok, sprayed on [eye roll] thermite or pixie dust, whtvr). I just don’t think they were competent enough. Time magazine (the kids love it, bah) had a 9/11 commemorative issue. They have black n white portraits of lots of the majors… Cheney’s portrait makes him looks like a crazy psychopath (even my wife mentioned it).
ymmv
(Mittens sez Darth Cheney mucho presidential – nice pander to the nutbars mitt!)
September 15th, 2011 at 10:05 pm
No reason controlled demo has to be done at the bottom, it’s just easier & more efficient that way & therefore is the traditional way.
Enk, You’re not a demolition expert? Lorry! It’s okay, here’s an expert:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l6D4dla17aA
Not a structural engineer either, apparently, since you use the argument that they were the “most aggressively engineered buildings ever constructed” in a contradictory way – as such then they would have stopped a top down collapse. Truth is, the lower floors were built even stronger to hold up the higher floors. Look to physics for what happens when a smaller mass falls onto a stronger, larger mass, you have not done your homework my friend. Also, you speak of the “weakened damaged steel beneath them” & that’s not true, there were some 80 intact floors & hundreds of massive steel columns beneath yet there was no meaningful slowing of the collapse(s).
September 16th, 2011 at 6:35 am
You are distorting what I said
the “most aggressively engineered buildings ever constructed”
“this is one of the world’s tallest and most aggressively engineered buildings ever constructed” yes yes wwnj, caught me w a grammar error, should be “these are” now gfy
At the time they were indeed some of the most aggressively engineered systems ever constructed. I lived there, I’ve been there, I held my unborn child in my wife’s belly beneath those towers and said ‘these are the new cathedrals, the new monuments to reason and rationality, to commerce and trade and cooperation’ It seemed like an awfully bright and hopeful future in 1999 (ah the Clinton era, we’re living off our savings from that era)
A bunch of religious zealot cave men knocked them down. They caught us with our pants down. I wish we could find a smoking gun that leads back to Cheney and dumbya, I just don’t see it. ymmv
As a expert I am sure you have already calculated the enormous potential energy stored in X number of metric tons in the top portion of those buildings. Gravity is a biotch. It always wins. Always.
September 16th, 2011 at 8:42 am
Not intending to distort. I agree the buildings were agressively engineered (and as the WTC architect described set up so that the impact of a commercial jet would be like a pencil through the screen) and add that the thickness of steel and masses of concrete were substantial. Your description of how the “collapse” occured has been ruled out by all except the uninformed. Please do some homework before speaking of things of which you know not:
http://www.journalof911studies.com/volume/2010/ChandlerDownwardAccelerationOfWTC1.pdf
As for my calculating the potentail energy, no need to do so myself. This has been calculated numerous times. The obvious conclusion is that it is not sufficient to smash some 80 floors of steel and concrete virtually all the way to the ground. FYI, here’s a good explanation by experts, written in layman’s terms so all but the illiterate can understand it: http://www.journalof911studies.com/volume/2008/TheMissingJolt7.pdf
September 16th, 2011 at 10:09 am
np, it is hard to condense thoughts into words, then the words get launched onto the Information Superhighway, some other person either misinterprets them, doesn’t heed them or can’t be bother to read them (or in wwnj cases, not believe in them, sociamalism!)
I am not sure anyone prior to 9/11 was an expert in jumbo jets whacking into (some of the ) tallest buildings ever constructed.
September 16th, 2011 at 11:06 am
They were built to withstand the largest airliner of the day crashing into them in a storm. Granted, jets are bigger today but still… they were built to handle something like 100 mph winds or more (a huge force on the side of a building that tall.) There was very little wind that day.
If the planes had hit the base of the towers, and the whole of the buildings collapsed onto that lower impact zone AND the time period from collapse start to finish showed some lag from the resistance of crumbling floors, then I would give some credence to your theory of a pancake collapse. As it stands, the North Towers was struck between the 93rd and 98th floors out of a total of 110. The lower sections were built stronger to hold up the upper sections. That some 17 floors and gravity could turn those lower 93 floors into almost complete rubble all by itself is a little silly.
To get a pancake result, you’d have to lift those 17 floors waaaaaay up into the air and drop it on the lower floors and even then it would be deflect by the core columns (path of greatest resistance) outwards to slide off to the side. Try it with any scale model, you’ll see.
September 16th, 2011 at 1:25 pm
In conclusion, here is new(ish) 15 minute roundup:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hZEvA8BCoBw&feature=player_embedded
(500,000 view in 4 weeks)
September 16th, 2011 at 1:27 pm
Why was key FEMA evidence excluded from the NIST investigation? refer to 7:15 min. mark in the above.
September 18th, 2011 at 7:53 pm
Here’s another big win for shcb to dismiss… http://www.cagop.org/index.cfm/press_release_1500.htm
September 19th, 2011 at 2:17 pm
not to distract from your 9/11 thing there knarls, but… Ron Paul.
Yeah Ron Paul, hmmmmm.
Isn’t he the guy that said health insurance should be a personal responsibility? And who had a campaign manager, young guy, who died. Bankrupt. Without health insurance. Did the crowd cheer at the recent TeadTard debate? Oh wait, it never came up… just more grunting about Perry’s awesome record (234 executions)
Yeah, Ron Paul. The guy that sounds great with about 20% of his schtick, it is the other 80% that is bark-out-loud-crazy (must be a Texas thing)
September 20th, 2011 at 9:43 am
We’re close to agreeing on Ron Paul, except I’d say 80% is good, 20 % is bad with that 20% being really, really bad.
To clear up a couple of your misconceptions:
On the economy, he has warned of exactly what is happening now for years and had his recommendations been put in place 4+ years ago America would have made some tough adjustments but would not be better off now. As it stands America still has all its fundamental economic problems.
About the Health Care thing, that’s true about his position in a way, but his point is that the current system and Obama’s plans will still turn sick people away. Look closer at his Health Care proposals (view his site maybe?) for details.
September 20th, 2011 at 6:13 pm
funny that our ratios are reversed!
what does that say about us, eh?
I think your BS detector is broked (or more properly ‘borked’)
or the polarity on mine is reversed or something
You wrote “had his recommendations been put in place 4+ years ago America would have made some tough adjustments but would not be better off now.”
Could not agree more. If we had followed dear Doctor Paul’s Way, we would be totally borked right now (instead of mostly borked) o wait, yes, I realize you probably meant to remove the “not” there… or r u jes messin wit me?
September 20th, 2011 at 9:00 pm
maybe america would not be better off now, i’d worry about how far he’d go deregulating and union busting and such. Yet, he has substance and makes sense in his replies so he’s doing well in these early straw polls.
Interesting answer about health care at the 3:58 minute mark, even brings in the concept of “church care” vs. kowtowing to insurance companies…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=szHkBgXnS38
September 21st, 2011 at 8:39 am
http://2012.talkingpointsmemo.com/2011/09/ron-paul-says-aide-who-died-with-400k-medical-bill-didnt-need-government-help.php?ref=fpblg
So his advisor Kent didn’t have health insurance (denied due to pre-existing condition – which wouldn’t happen under ‘obamacare’ – gets sick, goes into a coma, racks up $400,000 in medical bills, dies. Ron Paul and friends set up a fund to pay his bills. It topped out at $38,000. The people at the ‘tea-party debate’ were cheering for Mr Kent to die on the street with no care.
This guy ‘took his own risks’ (or more likely, couldn’t ‘afford’ health insurance or was denied entirely) died and left us with the bill. Hey, that sure sounds like a great plan. It is time America controlled healthcare costs and provided universal coverage, just like every other first world country.
September 21st, 2011 at 10:25 am
I think you are right.