If You Really Loved Me You'd Let Me Eat Your Brain

Would Al Gore like to explain how our recent spate of cold weather fits into The Model?

My copy of Earth in the Balance is still in the hands of our astute Manual Override Lab researchers.  They're working on ways to let people read the book without breaking into gales of derisive laughter.  I mean, c'mon, there isn't any science in the book.  It's a piece of fiction, just like the majority of Gore's claims about his past.

You know now that I think about it  I never really cared much for Louisiana.  What the UCC isn't good enough for them?  Base your legal system on French traditions of law, will you?  Not that I'd wish widespread tragedy on the supposedly good folks of LA, I just don't feel a terrible sense of loss having New Orleans and a few hundred thousand tar paper shacks washed away.

The last thing I want is a federal bailout for anyone stupid enough to rebuild in a flood plain or, say, a city sinking into the ocean.  Anne told me about a hyperventilating liberal woman she saw on ABC who was all verklempt about why somebody didn't build the levees/walls higher!  Why didn't someone do something to stop this from happening!!?? And the c*nt blathered on.  One wonders how she manages to find the time to hold down a job with her inability to change her own diaper.

All we need to do now is put up a big wall around New Orleans and we'd have 3XHAR's Prison Island.  It sounds like the survivors have been hit with a bit of the old ultraviolence already.

And Bush, releasing oil from the SPR.  How about repealing the Clinton gas tax (the only federal gas tax that wasn't spent on transportation) and doing away with the inane and inefficient gasoline reformulation scheme?  What a waste of time and money.  I don't see why Bush is complaining about gouging.  Hell, why not make all gas free?  If Bush has a magical correct non-gouging price for a gallon of gasoline I'd love to hear about it.  Me, I'll be curtailing long trips (I can literally walk to work) for a few weeks.

You can thank the Clinton-Gore Junta and their anti-progress green wackos for the current high gas prices.  No new refineries in 20 years + a lot of drilling and refining capacity in close proximity + restrictions on offshore drilling + MTBE = high gas prices.

Let's pretend that the world has gone to hell and people are using construction equipment to break into your residence or place of business.  They're taking your hard-earned stuff, your property!  Gangs of armed bandits roam the streets.

Which would you rather have, a sign asking them to please stop...or a rifle?  Ahhh, trusty rifle.  The last refuge of the truly civilized.

Oh, and for the record, Bush and those nasty Republicans are obviously to blame for the hurricane, at least according to Robert F. "Name Recognition Alone" Kennedy.  (Jr.?)

What happens when magnetar SGR 1806-20, an object 12 miles across, explodes and emits 10^40 watts of power (more energy than the Sun emits in 100,000 years) in 1/10th of a second?

Not much since SGR 1806-20 is 50,000 light-years from Earth. Wait 50,000 years and it's gamma ray time! Lots and lots of gamma rays. Dr. FrankenGore, tell us about gamma rays!? Please!?

Gnrrr. Gamma ray bad. Bad for environment. Gnnnrrrrr. Cause global warming. It in the model. Gnnnnr.

What I want to know is what has the Bush administration been doing for the past 50,000 years while this invisible threat sped towards the Earth at frightening speeds...WHILE THE CHILDREN SLEPT.

From China Replacing the United States as World's Leading Consumer by Lester R. Brown:

Looking at energy use in China means also considering coal, which supplies nearly two thirds of energy demand. Here China’s burning of 800 million tons easily exceeds the 574 million tons burned in the United States. With its coal use far exceeding that of the United States and with its oil and natural gas use climbing fast, it is only a matter of time until China will also be the world’s top emitter of carbon. Soon the world may have two major climate disrupters.

Which begs the question...why is China not included in Kyoto? Perhaps because they would never have been stupid enough to go along with it, and such a slap in the face of the Kyoto crowd would be too harsh a rebuke?

So, I look forward to the day when Brown et. al. stop calling the US the world’s largest polluter. I fully expect them to stop whining about US industry and us piggish, selfish consumers and turn all their attention to China.

China is now importing vast quantities of grain, soybeans, iron ore, aluminum, copper, platinum, phosphates, potash, oil and natural gas, forest products for lumber and paper, and the cotton needed for its world-dominating textile industry. These massive imports have put China at the center of the world raw materials economy. Its voracious appetite for materials is driving up not only commodity prices but ocean shipping rates as well.

He’s wrong about commodity prices, but don’t tell that to futures traders who earn a living knowing which way commodity prices are going. One of Simon's Laws: In the long run all commodity prices fall.

China’s eclipse of the United States as a consumer nation should be seen as another milestone along the path of its evolution as a world economic leader. Its record-high domestic savings and its huge trade surplus with the United States are but two of the more visible manifestations of its economic strength. It is now China, along with Japan, that is buying the U.S. treasury securities that enable the United States to run the largest fiscal deficit in history.

I feel like I'm watching a film strip in grade school: "Let's Meet Our New Chinese Masters!" with that happy 50’s music in the background ala Mr. Burns and Smithers traipsing around the power plant. Brown sounds positively overjoyed that China is set to kick America’s ass! Where are his usual complaints about resource use and overpopulation? Has he nothing to say about the tens of thousands of species driven to extinction by the Three Gorges Dam? Just kidding, of course, but he should try to be more consistent.

The United States, the world’s leading debtor nation, is now heavily dependent on Chinese capital to underwrite its fast-growing debt.

The leading debtor nation? In terms of absolute debt, maybe, but in terms of percentage of GDP we're fine. We're not dependent on Chinese capital but China’s growth is predicated on a pegged currency. If China gets uppity all we need to do is convince Soros & Co. that they can make a few billion by taking down the Yuan. It’s not like they haven't trashed Asian currencies before.