Debbie does climate change legislation

Update on the Waxman-Markey climate change bill: House energy bill gains support

Unfortunately some of those supporters fail even the the ecoweenie test. Case in point: Debbie Halvorson (from IL):

A presidential phone call helped win at least one vote: Rep. Debbie Halvorson (D-Ill.), a freshman lawmaker and former state senate colleague of Obama’s, said Thursday evening that after months of indecision, she “feels great” about the bill.

Here’s why she feels so great about it:

“I think it’s something that I’m going to support,” Halvorson said. “It’s a thousand-page bill. It has a lot of amendments. I wanted to read it, take my time.” Later, she added: “I had a nice chat with the president this morning.”

Well, hell, why wouldn’t you support a thousand page bill with lots of amendments that you’ve never read after “a nice chat” with the president.

Ecoweenies on parade (part 3)

You know, this shit writes itself. Today’s contributor is none other than President Barack Obama. In his press conference today, he threw his support behind the Waxman-Markey climate change bill. And he is supposed to be the smartest guy in Washington:

At a time of great fiscal challenges, this legislation is paid for by the polluters who currently emit the dangerous carbon emissions that contaminate the water we drink and pollute the air we breathe.

I’m no science whiz but the water I drink hasn’t turned into Perrier yet. And I’m confused. Am I included in the “polluter” category because I am emitting “dangerous” emissions that “pollute the air we breathe” by breathing out?

In the end I suppose it doesn’t matter. I will pay for it.

Ecoweenies on parade (part 2)

Today’s example is Julie Johnston’s comment on Real Climate. Julie says:

I keep thinking that what would actually help is a little bit of urgency, of panic, of fear, of scared-shitlessness on the part of the scientists. These are the people who *know* what is going to happen…

Holy flying leaps, what does it take to get 2500 scientists excited? “Difficult for contemporary societies to cope with”?! Thousands — hundreds of thousands — of people are already losing their lives and their livelihoods, their food security and water sources, their homes and their whole nations at only +0.78 degrees C!

Holy flying leaps, Julie, you do love your drama (and your exclamation points).

She was kind enough to link to her site. Now it all makes sense. Julie says:

Sometimes I just break down and weep. I am one of the unlucky ones … I understand global climate change, I see it happening, I know who is being impacted the worst (and it ain’t rich white people with big cars) – and it breaks my heart.

Now I might feel sorry for Julie but her martyr complex is totally out of control:

I lament that more people don’t share this burden.

And then she goes on to quote global warming jokes. This was her favorite:

“According to a new UN report, the global warming outlook is much worse than originally predicted. Which is pretty bad when they originally predicted it would destroy the planet.” – Jay Leno

My professional diagnosis and prescription: Irony deficient Julie needs either a drink or a smack upside the head.

T-word

I love this title from NPR on the cost of Obama-care:

T-Word Looms Large In Health Care Cost Debate The T-word they are talking about is trillion.

Despite reassurances by President Obama and Democratic leaders that all new spending would be fully offset by other spending cuts or tax increases, Republicans immediately jumped on the T-word.

Now saying trillion is akin to swearing. Like N-word or B-word.

And it’s soap in the mouth for the head of the (nonpartisan) CBO :

According to our preliminary assessment, enacting the proposal would result in a net increase in federal budget deficits of about $1.0 trillion over the 2010-2019 period. When fully implemented, about 39 million individuals would obtain coverage through the new insurance exchanges. At the same time, the number of people who had coverage through an employer would decline by about 15 million (or roughly 10 percent), and coverage from other sources would fall by about 8 million, so the net decrease in the number of people uninsured would be about 16 million or 17 million

The full report here.

WTF? One t-word dollars (over ten years) and we will reduce the number of uninsured by only 17 m-word people? It works both ways right? F-word that.

Why not give one trillion dollars to the uninsured so they can buy their own insurance. The number of uninsured people in the US is roughly 48 million. If you split up the cost of this part of the Obama plan, an uninsured family of four would get over $8,000 a year to pay for insurance. If you take out the uninsured that already would be covered by Medicaid but haven’t applied, that number falls to 31 million. That means a family of four would get almost $13,000 a year. If you want to be harsh and subtract out illegal immigrants without health insurance, the amount rises to $17,000 a year. That should be enough to buy you some decent insurance.

Big science

Stumbled across this today: the International Space Station has now become large enough that you can see it during the day (h/t spaceweather.com). You can check out when it is over your neck of the woods here.. Remember to wave.

State capitals and child abuse

Dave’s recent post on (not his) kids at his house got me thinking. The kid’s name is Trenton. Now I’ve never heard that name before. In this world of made up names (I suppose they all are made up but…) that was a new one. Why would you name your child after the state capital of New Jersey? But then I had a V-8 moment. This is the thing to do. State capitals make great names. I thought of my own family. My first cousins twice removed are Cheyenne (WY), Madison (WI) and Austin (TX). And I’ve heard of other children being named Boston(MA) and Jackson (MS).

I’ve decided that I will name my children (if I ever decide to like hoo ha) in the same fashion. Daughters: Topeka (KS) and Tallahassee(FL). Sons: Bismarck(ND) and Annapolis(MD). Or maybe I will be a cruel parent and name the little crumb crunchers Des Moines (IA) or Sacramento (CA) or Springfield (IL).

I’m undecided on Little Rock(AR).

Answer man

Some recent commenters have suggested that I put up or shut up on this global warming shit. “Give a solution instead of being part of the problem” they say (damn that was hard not to put “problem” in quotes). Maybe you bitches have a point so here we go. Problem: Global Warming. Solution: Warming tax. If temperatures rise as predicted by what the UN climate models and their “consensus” of scientists say are correct then the tax on carbon emissions goes up dramatically. If the temperatures fall, the tax goes down. Surprisingly, this is not my idea but that of economist Ross McKitrick. He points out:

The IPCC predicts a warming rate in the tropical troposphere of about double that at the surface, implying about 0.2C to 1.2C per decade in the tropical troposphere under greenhouse-forcing scenarios. That implies the tax will climb by $4 to $24 per tonne per decade, a much more aggressive schedule of emission fee increases than most current proposals. At the upper end of warming forecasts, the tax could reach $200 per tonne of CO2 by 2100, forcing major carbon-emission reductions and a global shift to non-carbon energy sources.

Global-warming activists would like this. But so would skeptics, because they believe the models are exaggerating the warming forecasts.
…
Under the T3 tax, the regulator gets to call everyone’s bluff at once, without gambling in advance on who is right. If the tax goes up, it ought to have. If it doesn’t go up, it shouldn’t have. Either way we get a sensible outcome.

That makes sense. Wow. Look at me. Promoting a solution.