Right Wing Granny

News behind the news. This picture is me (white spot) standing on the bridge connecting European and North American tectonic plates. It is located in the Reykjanes area of Iceland. By-the-way, this is a color picture.

Right Wing Granny

What Global Warming Is Really About

On Friday, Issues & Insights posted an article about global warming. The article includes a number of statements by people who claim to be alarmed at global warming that might cause you to question their motives.

The article reports those statements:

  • Christiana Figueres, one-time executive secretary of United Nations’ Framework Convention on Climate Change, admitted that the climate activists’ agenda is not to protect the environment but to break capitalism. The task ahead, she said in 2015, is “to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution.”
  • The late Rajenda Pachauri was the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Chairman until 2015. He openly conceded “the protection of planet Earth, the survival of all species and sustainability of our ecosystems” was “more than a mission” to him. It was his “religion” and “dharma.”
  • Activist and influential author Naomi Klein once wondered if the fearmongering was “the best chance we’re ever going to get to build a better world?” The world must “change, or be changed,” she says, because an “economic system” — our free and open markets — has caused environmental “wreckage.”
  • Democratic Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez said almost five years ago that Miami will not exist “in a few years” due to the effects of global warming. She of course had a plan, not to deal with the changes, but to pass Democratic Party policies. “The interesting thing about the Green New Deal is it wasn’t originally a climate thing at all,” former Ocasio-Cortez chief of staff Saikat Chakrabarti said, according to the Washington Post Magazine. “Do you guys think of it as a climate thing?” Chakrabarti asked an aide to Washington Gov. Jay Inslee while the pair met at a Washington, D.C. coffee shop in May. “Because we really think of it as a how-do-you-change-the-entire-economy thing.”

The free market will always provide a cleaner environment than government regulation. It should also be noted that many of those complaining about the carbon footprint of our cars are flying around the world in private jets. If they truly believed climate change was an existential crisis, would they be doing that?

 

 

Economic Vulnerability

Author: R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D

A strong economy is essential to the security of any nation. Not only to provide a reasonable standard of living for its citizens, but as protection from external adversaries. This was never more evident than in World War II when American industrial might saved the world from fascist tyranny.  As the “Arsenal of Democracy,” America provided the military equipment and weapons without which Nazi Germany and Imperial Japan would have succeeded in their wars of conquest. This was made possible, in large part, by the conversion of existing factories producing consumer goods to producing military hardware. Unfortunately, the American economy does not have the dominant manufacturing capabilities that we once had.

Let’s look at manufacturing in America today. It is difficult to find any manufactured product nowadays that is not labeled “Made in China.” In 1980, 22% of jobs in the U.S. were in manufacturing; now that percentage is 8%. Just this past July, 24,000 manufacturing jobs were lost. In addition, many factories are owned by foreign entities. The recent approval by the Biden/Harris administration to allow the purchase of U.S. Steel by a Japanese company is a perfect example of what has been occurring. Not only has this been occurring in the manufacturing sector, but with pharmaceuticals as well. Many Americans were shocked during the COVID crisis to find out that most of our essential medications are manufacture overseas. A disruption in the supply chain signaled what could happen if a global conflict occurred.

Recently, we have begun to rely on imports of essential food products. A recent article in the Epoch Times reported that thousands of U.S. cattle raising operations have gone out of business. This appears to be due to increasing imports of beef from Mexico and South America as well as the burden of green energy demands imposed on U.S. farmers. In addition, China has been greatly expanding its commercial fishing fleet. Like many things done by China, they are violating international restrictions. China was described as the world’s “biggest perpetrator of illegal fishing.” Not only does China have over 3,000 commercial fishing vessels deployed worldwide, but they pay poor countries to allow them to fly those countries flags so they can fish in their local waters. They are putting our fishing sector out of business and destroying fish stocks.

It should concern every American that our economy can no longer support our needs. Former President Trump recently announced his intention to reverse this dependency on foreign countries. One way is to give tax incentives to American corporations to return production to this county and cancel the green new deal. So far, no comments from the Harris campaign on this critical issue.

Why The Internet Is A Valuable Tool During The Election Season

The Internet is not perfect. It’s search engines are generally skewed, and pop-up ads are a pain in the neck. However, the Internet is very useful during the election season.

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller reported:

Vice President Kamala Harris’ campaign has said she no longer endorses a ban on fracking, but political strategists and energy experts say the sudden policy shift will do little to move the needle with key voters in November.

Harris said in 2020 there is “no question” she would end fracking if elected president, but her campaign recently told The Hill she no longer wants to outlaw the practice after videos of her endorsing a ban resurfaced following President Joe Biden’s withdrawal from the 2024 race. The campaign can walk back Harris’ old fracking position as it pleases, but it likely won’t be enough to allay the concerns of crucial voting blocs — particularly more rural, blue-collar voters in Pennsylvania — that Harris may wage war on the industry or otherwise escalate Biden’s climate agenda to their detriment if elected, political strategists and energy experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The video of Kamala Harris stating that she will ban fracking is easily found on YouTube. There are also other videos that either contradict what she is saying now or simply show her saying things that don’t make sense. The Internet is a valuable tool for election research.

The article concludes:

Dave McCormick, the GOP candidate for U.S. Senate in Pennsylvania, is already running an advertisement attacking Harris’ energy positions and tying together the vice president and his opponent, incumbent Democratic Pennsylvania Sen. Bob Casey.

Some pundits have suggested that Harris could mitigate risks she may face in Pennsylvania by picking Democratic Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro as her running mate. However, selecting Shapiro could cause problems for Harris in other states and isolate voting blocs she needs to win due to his support of Israel and criticisms of pro-Palestinian activists, McHenry told the DCNF.

“Bob Casey and Kamala Harris have opposed Pennsylvania energy every step of the way, and their anti-fossil fuel agenda would be disastrous for our commonwealth and the 600,000 workers who rely on the energy sector for a paycheck,” McCormick said in a statement shared with the DCNF. “Banning fracking and abolishing the filibuster to pass a Green New Deal may be popular among the far-left, but here in Pennsylvania these radical proposals are radically out of step with the needs of working families.”

The Harris and Casey campaigns did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

Do your homework before you vote!

The War On Christian Day Care In The Build Back Better Bill

On Thursday, PJ Media posted an article about some of the provisions in the Build Back Better Bill that the Biden administration is attempting to get through Congress. This bill is a combination of the ‘green new deal’,  leftover Obama administration policies that never got passed, and tax breaks for the rich. The icing on the cake is that while the bill pretty much funds anything you can think of, it prevents religious preschools and child care centers from receiving any of the handouts.

The article reports:

The New York Times is reporting that lobbyists are trying to talk Congress into stripping a provision from Build Back Better that would prevent religious preschools and child care centers from receiving their share of the gargantuan funds.

The provision at issue is a standard one in many federal laws, which would mandate that all providers comply with federal nondiscrimination statutes. Religious organizations, whose child care programs are currently exempt from some such laws, argue that it would effectively block many of their providers from participating, while civil rights advocates contend it is long past time for such institutions to comply.

Some of the faith groups are pressing lawmakers to scrap or modify the nondiscrimination language, asserting that it would essentially shut them out of the new federal program unless they made major changes to the way they operate. For instance, it could bar federal funds from going to programs that refused to hire a gay employee, gave preference to applicants of their faith or failed to renovate their facilities to accommodate disabled students.

There are provisions in this bill that blatantly go against the freedoms listed in the First Amendment. Frankly, if the bill is challenged in court, I am not sure our courts will uphold the First Amendment.

The article concludes:

The left has made the LGBTQ agenda a sacred cow, and as a result, they’ve doubled down on promoting it through culture, higher education, and K-12 schools. Now they want to use the power and purse strings of the federal government to ensure that they can push their sexual agenda to American preschoolers.

If First Amendment protected religious liberty gets in the way of that agenda, they will restrict it. This is one of many reasons why Build Back Better must be stopped.

If we don’t fight for the rights granted by Our Creator and guaranteed by our Constitution, we will lose those rights very soon.

A Representative Introduces Common Sense

Yesterday The Daily Signal reported that North Carolina Congressman Ted Budd has introduced an amendment to remove all earmarks from a transportation spending bill slated for a House vote this week.

The article reports:

“Taxpayers across the country are getting their first look at what Washington is like in the new earmark era,” Rep. Ted Budd, R-N.C., said in a statement to The Daily Signal.

“It’s not a pretty sight,” Budd said. “This transportation spending bill includes 1,474 examples of the Washington swamp saying they know best when it comes to spending taxpayer dollars. If an earmarked project is truly worthy of taxpayer funding, then it should be proposed individually on the House floor or as a competitive grant.”

The House is voting on the Invest in America Act, which Budd’s office says includes 1,473 earmarks. Together, those earmarks total $5.66 billion.

I wonder if Washington spending would be so out of control if Congressmen were forced to spend their own money.

The article concludes:

According to Budd’s office, “dozens of these earmarks have to do with Green New Deal priorities like greenways, electric vehicles, etc.”

Conservatives long have opposed earmarks, which direct taxpayer money to lawmakers’ special interests and projects through the budget. Lawmakers banned earmarks under House rules in 2010, but House Democrats voted to bring earmarks back in February.

Earlier this year, Budd and Rep. Ralph Norman, R-S.C., introduced the Earmark Elimination Act, which would permanently ban congressional earmarks.

In March, the North Carolina congressman led a coalition of 10 senators and 25 House members to send a letter to the House and Senate Appropriations Committee chairs voicing their “strong opposition to the formal return of pork-barrel earmarks.”

“Every taxpayer dollar is sacred and should be treated that way,” Budd said. “If this Congress really believed that, then we should remove this pork-barrel spending.”

If you haven’t investigated the Cloward-Piven strategy, now is a really good time to do that.

Another Misnamed Bill

Yesterday Ed Morrissey posted an article at Hot Air about the Biden administration’s infrastructure bill. Just as the Covid Relief Bill was not about Covid relief, the infrastructure bill is not about infrastructure.

The article quotes The Wall Street Journals description of the bill:

Most Americans think of infrastructure as roads, highways, bridges and other traditional public works. That’s why it polls well, and every President has supported more of it.

Yet this accounts for a mere $115 billion of Mr. Biden’s proposal. There’s another $25 billion for airports and $17 billion for ports and waterways that also fill a public purpose. The rest of the $620 billion earmarked for “transportation” are subsidies for green energy and payouts to unions for the jobs his climate regulation will kill. This is really a plan to build government back bigger than it has ever been.

The magnitude of spending is something to behold. There’s $85 billion for mass transit plus $80 billion for Amtrak, which is on top of the $70 billion that Congress appropriated for mass transit in three Covid spending bills. The money is essentially a bailout for unions, whose generous pay and benefits have captured funds meant for subway and rail repairs. …

Note the political irony of all this. Mr. Biden says “public investment” has fallen as a share of the economy since the 1960s, and he has a point. But the main reason is that government spending on social welfare, entitlements and public unions have squeezed out public works. Now he’s redefining social welfare as public works to drive more social-welfare spending, which will further crowd out money for public works and government R&D to compete against China.

Essentially the bill is a place to park all of the legislation the Democrats want passed, but know won’t pass if correctly named.

The article concludes:

That’s not an accident. That’s by design. Rather than stick to real infrastructure needs, Biden wants to use this bait-and-switch to aggrandize power within the Beltway and make everyone more dependent on grants from lawmakers. It is precisely on the same curve as Biden’s entire political career, including his record on honesty and transparency.

Never read the titles of bills–they never tell the truth!

So Why Are We Doing This?

In a rare moment of honesty by a politician, President Biden’s climate czar, John Kerry, stated that America’s reducing its carbon emissions to zero wouldn’t really make a difference in the fight against climate change. Wow. So why are we wrecking the American economy for no apparent reason? I really don’t have a problem with virtue signalling as long as it doesn’t actually harm anyone, but this is going to hurt a lot of Americans–many Americans that the Biden administration promised to help.

The New York Post posted an article about the statement yesterday.

The article reports:

Kerry’s remarks were made ahead of Biden’s signing of a host of executive actions on Wednesday pushing his $2 trillion Green New Deal-inspired climate agenda.

“He knows Paris alone is not enough,” Kerry told reporters at a White House press briefing, referring to Biden re-entering the US in the Paris Climate Agreement in one of his first acts as president.

“Not when almost 90 percent of all of the planet’s global emissions come from outside of US borders. We could go to zero tomorrow and the problem isn’t solved,” Kerry conceded.

The former secretary of state, now Biden’s climate envoy, acknowledged that it would be difficult to bring the world’s top polluters to the table, including China, which produces 30 percent of the world’s carbon emissions.

Why is a man with a private jet and a yacht lecturing us on carbon footprints and climate change?

The Myth Of Green Energy

Yesterday John Hinderaker at Power Line Blog posted an article about the feasibility of achieving 100 percent green energy.

The article notes:

High on the Left’s agenda is mandating 100% “green” generation of electricity–if not 100% of energy, period. I believe Joe Biden, among others, has now come out for 100% “green” energy, meaning wind and solar. But for now, let’s stick with energy generation. Would it be feasible to get 100% of our electricity from wind and solar?

Basic problems with these energy sources include inefficiency and intermittency. Wind turbines produce energy around 40% of the time, and solar panels do much worse than that in many parts of the country. So how does a utility ensure that the lights will go on, even at night when the wind isn’t blowing?

The liberals’ favorite answer is “batteries.” Produce electricity when the wind is blowing and the sun is shining, and store the energy in batteries for use when electricity is not being generated. Batteries exist, of course; we use them all the time. But where is the battery that can store the entire output of a power plant or a wind farm? That battery does not exist. Further, battery storage is ruinously expensive. The cost of storing the entire electricity needs of the U.S. for even a day would be prohibitive.

But there are also other problems in terms of the materials required.

The article notes:

But that isn’t the worst of it. Wind and solar are low-intensity energy sources. It takes many acres of wind turbines to produce, on a best-case scenario, what a single power plant can produce. And solar panels are even worse. A single 3 mw wind turbine uses 335 tons of steel, 4.7 tons of copper, 3 tons of aluminum, 2 tons of rare earth elements, and 1,200 tons (2.4 million pounds!) of concrete. If we take seriously the idea of getting all of our electricity from wind and solar, where will all of those materials come from?

The article links to another article at Center of the American Experiment that explains how much metal would required in just Minnesota to implement the Green New Deal. Please follow the links above to read both articles. They are enlightening.

The article at Power Line Blog concludes:

The Democrats’ “green” agenda does not represent a set of meaningful policy proposals. Taken seriously, and objectively evaluated, they immediately crumble. It is literally true that the Democrats could propose to harness the energy of unicorns running on treadmills, and it would make as much sense as reliance on wind, solar and batteries. “Green” energy is driven by two closely related things: 1) politics, and 2) enormous quantities of money being made by politically-connected wind and solar entrepreneurs.

We need to use energy wisely and we need to do what we can to prevent pollution. But we also need to remember that as cultures become more advanced, those advancements tend to result in cleaner air and cleaner water. Many of the rivers and lakes in America are cleaner than they were 100 years ago because of scientific advancements in sewage treatment and manufacturing. We are capable of protecting the environment and also enjoying the fruits of civilization.

Policies Proposed By The Biden Campaign

Issues & Insights posted an article today about one of the proposals of the Biden campaign. All of us understand that politicians often do not keep their campaign promises, but in this case that might actually be a good thing.

The article reports:

Joe Biden’s $2 trillion climate change plan, released this week, was described by one liberal outlet as “the Green New Deal, minus the crazy.” We beg to differ. Just look at Biden’s plan to eliminate the internal combustion engine.

Biden says that on his first day in office, he will develop “rigorous new fuel economy standards aimed at ensuring 100% of new sales for light- and medium-duty vehicles will be zero emissions.”

…Aside from fuel economy mandates, Biden also wants to extend and expand the EV tax credit, pump federal money into charging stations, and create a new “cash for clunkers” program for those who trade in a gasoline-powered car for a plug-in.

The cost of all this? Who knows. Aside from the $2 trillion price tag that Biden put on his entire Green New Deal plan, he hasn’t broken down his EV mandate scheme. But Sen. Chuck Schumer has already proposed a cash-for-clunkers plan, which would cost $454 billion over a decade.

The article continues:

And for all this, the electric car mandate will have a negligible impact on CO2 emissions and zero impact on the climate.

For one thing, the CO2 advantage of electric cars is vastly oversold. These are not “zero emissions” vehicles. They simply change the source of the emissions from the car to power plants — most of them powered by coal and natural gas.

A study by the University of Michigan’s Transportation Research Institute found that when you factor in CO2 emissions from electricity production, the average plug-in produces as much CO2 over its lifetime as a gas-powered car that gets 55 miles per gallon.

The CO2 advantage of electric cars diminishes even more when you consider the entire lifecycle of the vehicle, including the environmental impact of mining required to manufacture the batteries. A study by the Union of Concerned Scientists found that CO2 emissions from manufacturing electric cars was 68% higher than gas-powered cars.

We already did cash-for-clunkers in 2009. The cars turned in had to be disabled or scrapped. The ultimate result of the program was that it artificially inflated the cost of used cars, hurting the people who couldn’t afford to buy new cars.

Wikipedia (not always a reliable source, but in this case cited sources) reported:

The Economists’ Voice reported in 2009 that for each vehicle trade, the program had a net cost of approximately $2,000, with total costs outweighing all benefits by $1.4 billion. Edmunds reported that Cash for Clunkers cost US taxpayers $24,000 per vehicle sold, that nearly 690,000 vehicles were sold, and that only 125,000 of vehicle sales were incremental. Edmunds CEO concluded that without Cash for Clunkers, auto sales would have been even better.

I think we need to learn from our mistakes.

The Following Was Posted On Facebook On Sunday

DNM’s World posted the following on Facebook on Sunday:

Say what you like about the Star Trek: TOS episode “And The Children Shall Lead” but I am going to use it as an aid to make a real world point. More often than not, someone is using the children to advance evil causes and agendas.

In the episode Gorgan, a noncorporeal being (and anything BUT a “Friendly Angel”) is using the children of Federation scientists to advance his desires. Through these children, he has manged to kill those very scientists, and now Gorgan has his sights on Marcos XII and its population of children to recruit for his cause to rule the universe. Kirk was able to stop Gorgan by showing his evil to the children (using the videos of them with their families…and their deaths) and what this monster really did to their parents and the children called Gorgan’s bluff.

Now we have to deal with a similar evil and unlike the noncorporeal Gogan, the environmental statists of flesh and bone are using children to destroy our liberties and freedom. They are using the children not just in America, but the whole world (which for the most part has embraced Marxism) to advance their cause.

On September 20, 2019; with the approval of public school administrators and teachers (and the parents that agree with them), coupled with our major media news outlets with MSNBC leading the charge (remember they are trying to convince you that climate change is real and we must give up our freedoms for the greater good); most public high school students walked out of class to protest on behalf of our natural environment. Not just American governments (local, state, national), but governments all over the world to demand that they step up and do something to deal with our changing climate. 

“As You Believe So Shall You Do, As You Believe So Shall You Do, As You Believe So Shall You Do, As You Believe So Shall You Do…”

Here is a question to ponder. Would our schools grant dismissals if the children would go to some kind of rally in support of America or perhaps go in support of something like say…the Second Amendment or something that supports the true intentions of the First Amendment like freedom of faith and religion? The short answer is No, while my answer would be “I Don’t Think So.” The progressives leftists are truly in control of most of the educational institutions on the planet and that includes our so-called public/government (Common) elementary and secondary schools.

Spock and Dr. McCoy said it best regarding the evil that our “green blooded” hero and his best friend and captain would have to face very soon regarding Gorgan’s ‘adopted children;’  

Spock: “Evil does seek to maintain power by suppressing the truth.”

McCoy: “Or by misleading the innocent.”

While Swedish born Greta Thunberg, the 15 year old face of the movement; we adults have to question about the adults who are pulling the strings as the children do their “fist pounds” to make the rest of us submit to the powerful ‘Gorgans’ of the world who would not only impose terror and fear into our lives, but make us all slaves to the permanent underclass forever in poverty and forever needing the “help” of the rich elites everywhere in the world.

Thunberg has been given lots of publicity by our major media, and like any leftist either a mastermind or some kind of “useful idiot,” you know that the our own American Democrat Party Press (if not most major international media outlets that lean progressive) will jump on any opportunity to advance the progressive cause. Thunberg also has the blessings of Ellen DeGeneres, Michael Moore, Bette Midler, Whoopi Goldberg and Melissa Fumero.

Right now one of the biggest environmental causes at the moment is the very communist-socialist concept that is named the “Green New Deal” (by the way it does not impress our young environmentalist leader), which is not about saving the planet but rather setting back the human race a thousand years or so when we did not have electricity or food that could actually kill us and not because it’s processed but it was rancid.

Even the food inspectors will not be able to help the masses should the Green Statists have it their way…and chances are those very same statists will be able to enjoy the comforts of electricity and healthier food (processed or not) as they rule over the masses with Iron Fists of greater power. It seems they will never be happy until the masses are miserable…and even then they are not happy, but want to impose more suffering.

As with Captain Kirk and Spock, we must tame our own beasts and demons and do what we can to fight these children and their puppet masters who have enslaved them and their desire to enslave the rest of us…for if they are not stopped, we will not only be stripped if our liberty but our children’s liberty will be stripped as well.

Our environment will truly be worse and filthy if these Communist Greens have it their way.

Just look at what has happened to California. Rest assured the elite will have their personal clean environments and comfortable lifestyles as they look down on the “dead waste of civilization” who they view as neanderthals.

 

About That Climate Change Thing

When did we ever get so arrogant that we thought we could control the climate? Do you really believe that Republicans oppose clean air and clean water? If that were true, why has the United States reduced its carbon emissions under President Trump? So what is this really about?

Townhall posted an article today that explains a lot of the thinking behind the politicians who are pushing drastic economic changes in the name of climate change.

The article reports:

Many of my friends have long referred to environmentalists as “watermelons” — green on the outside, red on the inside. The idea being, because communism and socialism (interchangeable political/economic systems in practice) have failed everywhere they’ve been imposed, doctrinaire socialist zealots have embraced environmental causes as a Trojan horse. Their goal is simple: use environmental policies as a backdoor way to implement socialist policies in the Western democracies. After all, who doesn’t care about the environment?

A recent admission by Saikat Chakrabarti, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s (D-NY) chief of staff, about the much-hyped Green New Deal (GND) reinforces the view socialists are using the environment to replace private property and free exchange in the market with state control of the economy.

In a meeting with Washington Gov. Jay Inslee, Chakrabarti said addressing climate change was not Ocasio-Cortez’s reason for proposing the GND, according to a report by The Washington Post.

“The interesting thing about the Green New Deal, is it wasn’t originally a climate thing at all,” Chakrabarti told Inslee’s climate director, Sam Ricketts, The Post reported. “Do you guys think of it as a climate thing? Because we really think of it as a how-do-you-change-the-entire-economy thing.”

This is not really a new idea. The article reports:

For instance, at a press conference in Brussels in early February 2015, in the run-up to negotiations culminating in the Paris climate agreement, Christiana Figueres, then executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, stated the global warming scaremongering going on for more than 25 years at the UN was about controlling peoples’ lives by controlling the economy, not fighting climate change.

“This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution,” Figueres said. “This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model, for the first time in human history,” she continued.

If we are stupid enough to fall for the lies some of our politicians are telling us, we deserve the mess that will ensue. God help our children and grandchildren.

If They Really Believed What They Are Saying, Would Their Behavior Change?

The Gateway Pundit reported the following today:

A slew of A-list celebrities have flocked to Sicily, Italy on private jets and massive yachts to discuss the woes of global warming caused, they say, by things like private jets and massive yachts.

The founders of Google invited a a throng of the rich and famous,  including former President Barack Obama, Prince Harry, actor Leonardo DiCaprio and singer Katy Perry for a huge party they’ve dubbed Google Camp.

“The three-day event will focus on fighting climate change — though it’s unknown how much time the attendees will spend discussing their own effect on the environment, such as the scores of private jets they arrived in and the mega yachts many have been staying on,” reports the New York Post.

“Everything is about global warming, that is the major topic this year,” a source told The Post.

The cost of the extravaganza — $20 million.

According to the Italian press, at least 114 private jets will land at the Palermo airport.

So let me get this straight. The Green New Deal wants to cripple the American economy in the name of saving the earth–no more fossil fuel, no more cows, etc., yet the richest of the rich attend a meeting on fighting climate change in machines with some of the biggest carbon footprints on earth.

I guess if we are all going to die in twelve years because of global warming, they are going to go out in style.

Sometimes The Truth Just Kind Of Slips Out

The Washington Examiner posted an article today that stated something that most of us know but haven’t seen widely reported in the media.

The article states:

In Europe, you will often hear politically savvy people refer to Green Party politicians as “watermelons.” The reason is that although they might be environmentalist “green” on the outside, these leftists are secretly communist red if you look beneath the surface.

They typically resort to such subterfuge because environmentalism is more popular than Marxism. A former East German communist is bound to be unpopular, but perhaps not so much if he rehabilitates himself as a renewable energy enthusiast.

The case of Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a Democrat from New York, is different in that she openly advertised herself as a socialist in a country with a well-grounded historical aversion to such alien ideologies. But her grand policy initiative, the $93 trillion Green New Deal, was still billed as if it were a legitimate environmentalist idea. We were supposedly trying to save the world from imminent destruction. As Ocasio-Cortez herself put it, “We’re, like, the world is going to end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change.”

When Representative Ocasio-Cortez makes statements like that, this is what she reminds me of:

At any rate, her chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti, let the cat out of the bag recently.

The article reports:

Her chief of staff Saikat Chakrabarti (the brains and the money behind her political operation ever since her 2018 primary victory) divulged in an unintentionally blunt comment in the Washington Post that the Green New Deal was not only not based in the science of climate change, but in fact not even designed with climate change in mind. “[I]t wasn’t originally a climate thing at all,” he is quoted as saying.

In other words, it’s not that they looked for a way to save the world, and just happened to find a way that involved full employment pledges, the retrofitting of millions of buildings, income for those unwilling to work, high-speed passenger rail, and the curtailment of plane travel and carnivorousness. That’s precisely backwards. The Green New Deal came about because Chakrabarti wanted to transform the U.S. economy into something more primitive, and environmentalism struck him as the best excuse for doing so.

The American economy currently is working for everyone who chooses to work. When people work, they are aware of how much money the government takes out of their paychecks. That in itself may present a problem for the Democrats running for election in 2020.

False Advertising

Hot Air posted an article today about the 5K Family Fun Run Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez held in Queens, New York, on Saturday.

The article reports:

It started innocently enough. AOC advertised the 5K run as an opportunity to support her far left aspirational environmental policy known as the Green New Deal. It was billed as “a Family Fun Run supporting U.S. Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal on the Saturday following Earth Day.” That’s a clear statement, right? The message says come out and support AOC’s Green New Deal. Period.

It turns out that the $30 registration fee plunked down by participants went directly into AOC’s campaign coffers. Instead of saving the planet, they are saving AOC’s congressional seat. Ocasio-Cortez even told the runners that the purpose was to “fight for the Green New Deal together.” It is reported that 400 people turned out for the event. So, that’s a tidy sum for a campaign to raise on a Saturday afternoon in a congressional district.

It seems that charging children a registration fee when the money is going into campaign coffers is a violation of campaign laws–it is illegal for parents to donate their money on behalf of their children. I  somewhat sympathize with Representative Ocasio-Cartez on this one. Campaign laws are complicated, and it is easy to violate them unintentionally. However, it does appear that the advertising for this run was misleading at best.

The article concludes:

So, the moral of the story is to read the fine print, just as your parents told you to do as you became old enough to sign your name on the dotted line.

The questions you have to answer when you contribute to a political campaign are a bit much–if you are retired, you have to list what you did for work before you retired. Why is that important? At any rate, campaign laws are complex, and candidates ought to have someone on their staff to make sure they are in compliance. This was a rookie mistake.

What Is Going To Happen To Nathan’s?

The following video was posted at The Gateway Pundit today:

The video reports:

Part of the law requires New York City officials to teach New Yorkers how to make healthy, environmentally conscious food choices by banning “problematic” items such as hot dogs from city menus.

The NYC Green New Deal “will cut purchases of red meat by 50 percent in its city-controlled facilities such as hospitals, schools, and correctional facilities.”

The Green New Deal also looks to make New York City “car-free” by 2050.

When Mayor de Blasio signed New York City’s crazy Green New Deal into law, he reiterated Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s outrageous and untrue claim that “we only have 12 years” left to save the world from permanent climate change.

Since the ban on hot dogs only applies to city-controlled facilities, I guess Nathan’s will still be able to stay in business. All kidding aside, the banning of hot dogs and red meat is just a smidgen of what radical environmentalists would do if they came into power on the federal level. Thank God Mayor de Blasio only has the power to mess up a city.

This Could Make The Next Two Years Very Interesting

Don Surber posted an article today that included some rather surprising information.

The article reports:

Brad Parscale, Donald John Trump’s 2020 campaign manager, told Jesse Watters last night that 34% of the people who attended the president’s rally in Grand Rapids were registered Democrats.

Parscale knows that because people needed to give the campaign their cellphone numbers to get tickets. The campaign then used the information to check their voting record.

…Parscale called the Green New Deal a big juicy steak for the campaign.

Axios limited its report on the interview to Parscale saying, “[Trump] has been very easy to work with this week. He’s been very smiley.

“I was in the White House this week; he served me hors d’oeuvres. That was a first. … [A] little pigs in a blanket, some meatballs. …He gave me a Diet Coke; he was very happy. It was my first [time] in nine years serving, of hors d’oeuvres from the president. Which is safe to say, very good mood.”

Axios was the only outlet (besides Fox News) that I could find with a report on the interview.

Gee, I wonder how the experts missed that last election?

It’s difficult to ignore the economic success of the Trump administration. I suspect those in the deep state will attempt to undermine that success during the next year or so, but there are some fundamental changes in regulations that will make that difficult. The unemployment rate and the workforce participation rate speak for themselves. Salaries at the lower end of the wage scale are going up. People are keeping more of what they earn. The mainstream media is not telling us all of the good news, but people are experiencing better economic times and discounting the media. This President has dealt with an unprecedented assault on our southern border and is beginning to deal with the problem in spite of Congress–not with the help of Congress. The President has also dealt with an unprecedented attack on him personally and on his family. It is time to stop harassing the President and let him lead. The attendance at his rallies are an indication that the public is not listening to the mainstream media–they are doing their own research and drawing their own conclusions.

The Details Matter

Campus Reform posted an article today about college students’ reaction to Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s Green New Deal. As might be expected, the students loved the idea–until they learned the details.

YouTube posted the video of the students’ reactions:

So what can we learn from this? When the 2020 campaign begins (actually, it already has), the key to success for Republicans will be getting the information out about what the Green New Deal actually entails and what socialism actually is. The example of Venezuela does not have traction for some reason, but when college students are confronted with the idea of people who don’t contribute to society getting paid, they seem to wake up a bit.  Venezuela is a striking example of a socialist society–there is no middle class–the majority of the population is equally poor. A small minority of the population is extremely wealthy. That’s not economic justice–that’s theft.

What Does The Green New Deal Have In Common With The United Nations’ Solutions To Global Warming?

Yesterday Investor’s Business Daily posted an editorial about the Democrat’s Green New Deal. Oddly enough, when you look at the consequences of the policies of the Green New Deal, they have a lot in common with ideas espoused by the United Nations.

The motives of both are somewhat questionable.

In March 2016, I posted an article with the following:

…Then listen to the words of former United Nations climate official Ottmar Edenhofer:

“One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. This has almost nothing to do with the environmental policy anymore, with problems such as deforestation or the ozone hole,” said Edenhofer, who co-chaired the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change working group on Mitigation of Climate Change from 2008 to 2015.

So what is the goal of environmental policy?

“We redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy,” said Edenhofer.

For those who want to believe that maybe Edenhofer just misspoke and doesn’t really mean that, consider that a little more than five years ago he also said that “the next world climate summit in Cancun is actually an economy summit during which the distribution of the world’s resources will be negotiated.”

Mad as they are, Edenhofer’s comments are nevertheless consistent with other alarmists who have spilled the movement’s dirty secret. Last year, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of U.N.’s Framework Convention on Climate Change, made a similar statement.

“This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution,” she said in anticipation of last year’s Paris climate summit.

“This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model for the first time in human history.”

Let’s compare that to the Green New Deal.

Investor’s Business Daily reports:

Reading the Green New Deal (GND) plan, put out Thursday by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Sen. Ed Markey, one is tempted to think it’s not real, just a joke from the satirical “The Onion.” The individual planks in the plan, individually and collectively, sound like the rantings of someone who should be institutionalized, not like a rational political plan to solve a real problem.

Let’s begin with what the plan promises: “a massive transformation of our society with clear goals and a timeline.”

That’s a sweeping, explicit pledge of radical socialist change. And that’s  not all. It offers “a 10-year plan to mobilize every aspect of American society at a scale not seen since World War 2 to achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions and create economic prosperity for all.”

The editorial at Investor’s Business Daily concludes:

“The so-called Green New Deal resolution presented today by Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, D-N.Y., and Sen. Ed Markey, D-Mass., is a Back-to-the-Dark Ages Manifesto,” said Myron Ebell, director of the Competitive Enterprise Institute’s Center for Energy and Environment. “It calls for net-zero greenhouse gas emissions in ten years, ‘upgrading all existing buildings’, and replacing our vehicle fleet with electric cars and more mass transit. And turning our energy economy upside down must be accomplished while ending historic income inequities and oppression of disadvantaged groups. Needless to say, the costs would be stupendous, and the damage done by its policies would be catastrophic.”

We’re grateful that President Trump threw down the gantlet against socialism during his Tuesday night State of the Union address. As he said, “America will never be a Socialist country.” And he drove that point home by adding: “We were born free and we will stay free.”

Scourge Of Socialism

We hope he’s right, and America’s declining education system and the increasingly far-left mainstream media have’t made socialism a palatable choice against the extraordinary success of  the free market. Socialism is among humanity’s worst ideas and it has failed everywhere — everywhere — it has been tried.

Those who don’t think the socialist disaster of Venezuela can happen here are sadly — tragically — mistaken.

It should never be tried again, anywhere, but especially not here.

They idea that a country can prosper by guaranteeing everyone a comfortable standard of living whether they choose to work or not goes against human nature. Prosperity comes from achievement, and achievement is generally spurred on by the rewards it receives. If hard work is not rewarded, there will be no great achievements. It’s that simple.