Climate Change, Nasa And Sketchy Astronauts

April 11th, 2012

HT to Oliver Willis

This morning over at NRO, Jonah Goldberg is hyping a Washington Examiner (yeah, they're not biased) article which opens as follows:

"In an unprecedented slap at NASA's endorsement of global warming science, nearly 50 former astronauts and scientists--including the ex-boss of the Johnson Space Center--claim the agency is on the wrong side of science and must change course or ruin the reputation of the world’s top space agency.

Challenging statements from NASA that man is causing climate change, the former NASA executives demanded in a letter to Administrator Charles Bolden that he and the agency "refrain from including unproven remarks" supporting global warming in the media."

Okay, it sounds big and dramatic. In fact, it's as breathless as print propaganda gets. It's still certifiable horseshit. Who is behind this effort? This is who:

"Former Apollo astronauts Walter Cunningham and Harrison “Jack” Schmitt are listed as the main contacts for the letter, and their past advocacy against climate change science calls into question the scientific validity of the petition.

In 2009 Schmitt appeared on the talk show of 9/11 conspiracy theorist Alex Jones and said that he believed that the environmental movement was a front for Communism.

"I think the whole trend really began with the fall of the Soviet Union. Because the great champion of the opponents of liberty, namely communism, had to find some other place to go and they basically went into the environmental movement," Schmitt said." EMPHASIS MINE

Uh huh. 

What's the real latest information on this critical issue? Well, there's this...

And then there is THIS and THIS and THIS (which is especially depressing) and THIS.

But let's be honest. We really have no time for provable, empirical climate science when we are hot on the trail of the far bigger threat... the vast and insidious global Communist conspiracy.

WTF?

Mitt Romney's Empathy Problem, cont...

Feb 3rd, 2012
by F. Grey Parker

The fallout from Wednesday's gaffe continues to mount... particularly on the right.

As I noted shortly after this blew up, Romney seemed not only detached from the common citizen but also from his own party.

A growing chorus of conservative voices is afraid that Romney's pronouncements about "the very poor" are a sign that he's exactly the kind of "Massachusetts Liberal" Newt has been portraying for weeks.

Some of them are also saying, flat out, that Mitt's just an idiot.

The Riots and Conservative Audacity

Aug 13th, 2011
by F. Grey Parker

As the meltdown of order overcame England last week, the reading public was simultaneously subjected to a riot online. There were absurd proclamations by the left that this was a desperate response to the "austerity" measures enacted by the Torys. There were equally vulgar rushes to judgment, a lot of them, from the right. In particular, there was an incredible smear from England's answer to Michelle Rhee, Katharine Birbalsingh, who wrote hastily about the "race" of the man who was killed by London's police in the incident that lit the fuse:

"I'd like to know what they’re angry about. Mark Duggan is dead. He was shot by the police in a shootout. Duggan was in a minicab and shots were fired from both the cab and the police elsewhere. A police officer was hurt in the incident and a bullet was found lodged in a police radio. Either Duggan was shooting at the police or the driver of the minicab was. Either Duggan was in the wrong place at the wrong time and his death is a terrible tragedy – he was caught in the crossfire – or he shot at the police and the police defended themselves. Whatever the explanation, the police did not kill this man in cold blood."

First of all, she exposes a viewpoint which is actually shocking... outside of American right wing circles. The casual acceptance of official violence against people "in the wrong place" has become so common here that we in the States no longer raise much more than an eyebrow. Second of all, this sputtering and angry little rant demonstrates again why no one, either on the left or right, should rush to make political hay before the facts are established.

Sarah Palin Breaks Her Silence

Jan 12th, 2011

by F. Grey Parker

FULL VIDEO OF THE STATEMENT IS BELOW.

Sarah Palin has finally issued a formal statement regarding the murder of six Americans and the wounding of 14 others, including Rep. Gabrielle Giffords (D-AZ) 4 days ago. 

She had the chance to help bridge the growing divide over the meaning of the tragedy, if any, and rise above the ugliness and the cacophony of both the Left and Right shrieking "you are worse than we." She failed.

An Interesting Spat

Oct 13th, 2010


Anyone concerned with the dreary wave of anti-intellectualism from the right over the last year should read Anne Applebaum's piece in yesterday's Washington Post. Her perspective:


"These modern meritocrats are clearly not admired, or at least not for their upward mobility, by many Americans. On the contrary"... "they are resented as "elitist." Which is at some level strange: To study hard, to do well, to improve yourself -- isn't that the American dream? The backlash against graduates of "elite" universities seems particularly odd given that the most elite American universities have in the past two decades made the greatest effort to broaden their student bodies."


Seems straightforward enough. Apparently, Jonah Goldberg wasn't going to take this sitting down. He has picked a fight with Applebaum and launched a defense of the new-stupid. His piece is an exemplar of the situational ethics that have come to define his work.


"Applebaum doesn’t seem to comprehend that it is not status-class anxiety that is driving the main critique of the elite. It is that this particular elite is hellbent on bossing the country around that will make America less meritocratic." Italics his.


Goldberg is stipulating that this most recent wave of disrespect for the intellectual class is okay because it is being directed at his ideological enemies. At least he is consistent. This sort of argument makes perfect sense coming from a committed torture apologist. 


Applebaum fires back:


"Goldberg seems to think the anti-elitist rhetoric which is in wide use at the moment (the subject of my column) is acceptable because it is aimed at a particular elite: the liberals, the Obamas, “a very specific and self-styled elite.” He should listen harder, because in fact the rhetoric is far more sweeping than that, encompassing not only liberals but anyone with higher education.  Sarah Palin told O’Reilly that Americans are seeking to rid themselves of “spineless” people with an “Ivy League Education.”  Glenn Beck has mocked “the Ivy League” and people with degrees at great length. Christine O’Donnell’s political ad (the one which begins “I didn’t go to Yale…”) doesn’t attack “liberals who went to Yale.”  It attacks anyone who went to Yale."


Jonah hasn't responded to the response yet. We eagerly await watching him dig his hole deeper.

The Continuing Freakshow

Oct. 8th, 2010

On this morning's FOX and Friends, there was a spectacle that only a few years ago would have been impossibly absurd. Following an appearance by Newt Gingrich during which Brian Kilmeade seemed to want to give him a hummer, Brian went to his "panel." It consisted of Jonah Goldberg, The National Review's brilliant but generally wrong neo-con, Robin Quivers of Howard Stern fame and pseudo-stoner-comedian Jim Breuer. You can't make this up.

Little was learned. The only comment that was interesting or amusing came from Breuer, who said of Newt's head that it's "getting bigger and bigger." One wonders what Paddy Chayefsky would say.