Beware of SWAT

Well, here is another example of our loss of civil liberties that I talked about before. Now it appears we no longer have the right to care for our own children. In Colorado, a family's home was raided by a SWAT team, the parents arrested, and their 10-year old son taken into custody. Why you ask? Find out.

I'm telling you folks, this is the type of stuff that seriously scares me. We aren't allowed to make any decisions for ourselves anymore. I may not be the smartest person alive, but if I want to eat 10 Big Mac's, shouldn't that be my prerogative? If I want to wolf (sorry to all Canis lupus familiaris around the world who have taken offense to this derogatory characterization) down a bunch of unhealthy, full of cholesterol and trans-fat burgers, why should that be anyone's business but my own? I don't have children, but if I did and if I wanted to discipline my child through the use of spanking, why can't I do that? Who are you to tell me how to best run my life? If the government wanted to issue decrees saying that eating cheeseburgers is bad for you health and you shouldn't eat them, great. If they want to state that they don't condone corporal punishment, that's fine too. But outlawing them? That's called a nanny-state folks.

Edison is Pissed

I don't know if you have heard about this, but Congress just passed a law (H.R. 6) that bans the incandescent light bulb. Why you ask? Because apparently these harmless globes of tungsten and argon are responsible for nearly every possible catastrophe over the past decade.

Despite the fact that global warming is sketchy at best, why on earth would we eliminate the light bulb? Could someone please show me even one scientific experiment that documents the demise of Himalayan glaciers because of the use of light bulbs? I didn't think so. But its not just that they got rid of the light bulb that concerns me most, its that Congress mandated their demise without even a peep! I never once heard that there was even legislation about this being introduced until after it was passed. What's next? Our barbeque's? Our children? Our lawn-mowers? Yeah, it may sound idiotic, but these global warming fanatics have proposed getting rid of all of these things. Folks, if you don't see how we are slowly losing our liberties here you are are unable to see which way the winds are blowing. This is death by a thousand little cuts. I'm not sure what the answer is here, but it frightens me when "junk science" is setting the course of legislation.

As a bonus, here's a list of things why losing the incandescent bulb is a bad idea. This doesn't even address the fact that if fluorescent bulbs are turned on and off repeatedly their lifespan can be reduced to that of the incandescent bulb. But I digress...

1 - You must leave the new bulbs on for a minimum of 15 minutes at a time. To rapidly turn them on and off causes a shorter life. This is what most people do, so thus in turn it will cause more money to be wasted.

2 - They have mercury! And you KNOW people aren't going to take the time to 'properly' recycle their bulbs. So they are going to go into the environment.

3 - High clean-up bills if broken

4 - We've been taught since grade school that fluorescent light is bad for your eyesight.


More articles on this debacle:

• Bye, Bye Lightbulb
• Looming Lightbulb Liability
• The Dark Side of "Green" bulbs
  

Introduction to the Fair Tax

I'm not sure how many of you have actually looked into this idea of a Fair Tax, but its quite interesting. I'm by no means an economist so I have no way of knowing whether this will actually work or not, but the very thought of keeping 100% of what I earn makes me a little giddy. I know there is still a lot of debate to be had on this whole topic and I can't wait to hear it.

Some of the things I'd like to get clarified is exactly what percentage of tax would need to be applied to all sales to make this work. The two numbers everyone tosses around are 23% and 30%. The other thing that I'd be interested in hearing more about is the effects of "tax evaders." There will certainly be businesses who will try and cheat the system. So what affect on our economy would there be if 2% of the businesses cheated? 5%? 10%? Hopefully there will be some good discussion on all of these things as we move forward.

Some background from the organization who is supporting it:
http://www.fairtax.org/site/PageServer?pagename=about_main
http://www.fairtax.org/PDF/FairTax-Fundamentals_and_facts-070122.pdf


I have found a lot of articles talking about the Fair Tax. Along with getting background information I found it helpful to read what the real pundits thought. I've found that there seems to be more opposed to the idea of a Fair Tax than there are that are for it. However, I rarely ever agree with the mainstream, for whatever that is worth. The Tax Foundation has a great collection of articles for and against the Fair Tax. Here is a few I found on my own as well.

For:
http://www.realclearmarkets.com/articles/2007/12/the_fair_tax_is_about_economic.html
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB119863013677849835.html

Against:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/01/05/pf/taxes/fair_tax.moneymag/index.htm?section=money_latest
http://www.edmondsun.com/opinion/local_story_005224038.html
http://www.ncpa.org/sub/dpd/index.php?Article_ID=15437

Could Someone Please Turn Up the Heat? - Pt. 3

Just more of the same, you know the drill...

http://www.newstatesman.com/200712190004
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/pages/live/articles/news/worldnews.html?in_article_id=458562&in_page_id=1811

Interesting how the meteorologist blames this event on "climate change" and not global warming, which is what he really means. If he truly meant climate change he wouldn't have said anything, since our climate is changing all the time. Apparently snowballs do stand a chance in hell... I mean Baghdad.

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=080111120350.qe0gt6lt&show_article=1

Environment & Public Works

Here is the governments website, specifically, the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works website. You've got Barbara Boxer as the majority leader supporting everything having to do with global warming. Luckily, I believe the committee does have atleast one voice of reason, Senator James Inhofe from Oklahoma.

http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Home.Home

Candidate Finder

I found this website that allows you to select from about 15 or 20 current issues and calculates from your responses which candidate lines up with your values. Unfortunately the guy I lined up with just withdrew his name from the race last week.

http://www.vajoe.com/candidate_calculator.html

The Blessed Virgin Lucy

Yet another example of political correctness run amok. The PC police are completely out of control and at some point we all need to stand up and say, "I'm mad as hell, and I'M NOT GONNA TAKE THIS ANYMORE!!!"

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/12/26/npc126.xml

Could Someone Please Turn Up the Heat? - Pt. 2

Yes folks, its snowing in Florida. Don't worry though, all of you global warming zealots. This minor weather anomoly can be explained away by global warming. (I've found that if you believe in something bad enough, you can justify it with anything).

http://www.local6.com/weather/14959516/detail.html

Global Warming Goodie Bag

Okay, rather than making a bunch of posts, I decided I would just create this one with a bunch of links related to global warming. Enjoy.


### list of over 400 global warming caused maladies. Everything from early marriages to dermatitis to frosts to smaller brains... I can't make this stuff up.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2007/11/everything_is_caused_by_global.html


### My favorite, a blog dealing with how inaccurate our temperature measurements are here in the US. He's got pictures showing these measuring stations. My favorite is "How not to measure temp, part 7" with the jet exhaust 5 ft from the station. "Wow, looks like it was 1214 degrees today. What a scorcher!"
http://www.norcalblogs.com/watts/weather_stations/

### Compare those pictures with the actual NOAA's standards for taking temperature measurements. It says, and I quote, "The sensor should be at least 100 feet from any paved or concrete surface."
http://www.nws.noaa.gov/om/coop/standard.htm

### scientific consensus
http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=f80a6386-802a-23ad-40c8-3c63dc2d02cb

### blogs dealing with climate change, quite extensive with some humor mixed in http://ncwatch.typepad.com/media/climate_change/index.html
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/

### In an effort to be fair balanced and not appear biased, here are some views from the other side....
http://globalwarmingwatch.blogspot.com/
http://www.climatehotmap.org/
http://www.ens-newswire.com/ens/jan2005/2005-01-28-10.asp
http://library.thinkquest.org/11013/gwviews.html

Is It Hot In Hear? Or Am I Just Happy To See You?

Okay, I can't say that I buy in to the whole global warming bit. But in an attempt to be fair, here is an article I found which claims to support it:

http://www.breitbart.com/article.php?id=D8TR6ASG0&show_article=1

However, the exact same argument can be made for Global Cooling. See what I have to say about it here.

Could Someone Please Turn Up the Heat?

I know we have heard an endless litany of folks claiming the world will melt away in the next 50 years if we all don't immediately buy a Prius and put halogen light bulbs into our homes. But I thought this article was worth noting:

http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2007/12/21/record-cold-events-around-the-world-in-2007/

I should take the time to note, however, that these documented incidents noted in the article above do not disprove global warming. All they do is accurately recount the weather in certain areas of the country. I think everyone on both sides of the issue are taking a few data points that fit there predisposed bias and extrapolate out. A similar argument can be made FOR global warming. Check this out.