Free Republic

MANILA, Philippines -- A powerful typhoon battered the northern Philippines on Monday, toppling power lines and dumping heavy rain across cities and food-growing plains. The storm left at least two people dead and 44 missing. (MORE: Typhoon Utor Forecast) Typhoon Utor, described as the strongest globally this year, slammed ashore in mountainous eastern Aurora province with sustained winds of 175 kilometers (109 miles) per hour and gusts of up to 210 kph (130 mph). Footage from ABS-CBN TV network showed a woman swept away by a raging river in neighboring Isabela province. The woman waved her hands for help as...

Japan’s temperature hit 40-degrees over the weekend, reaching a record high in 6 years and claiming the lives of four people. Back in August 2007, the Japan Meteorological Agency reported two cities reaching an all-time high of 40.9 degrees. Last month also caused more than 700 people hospitalized and one dead because of heatstroke. On Saturday, two senior citizens from western Japan passed away due to the intense heat. A 66-year old man and an 84-year old woman were both reported to have collapsed in the fields. The weather bureau warned 39 prefectures early Sunday of another past-35 degree temperature....

SEOUL, Aug. 11 (Xinhua) -- South Korea on Sunday warned of a possible power-shortage crisis that may lead to a rolling power outage as seen in Sept. 2011 amid a scorching heat wave across the country. Nationwide heat wave was expected to cause the most dangerous crisis in supply and demand of electricity here for three days through Wednesday, according to the Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy (MOTIE). Last Friday, power demand reached a record high of 79.35 million kilowatts (kWs), surpassing the country's power-generation capacity of 77.15 million kWs. Power reserves temporarily dropped to 3.29 million kWs, below...

REPORTER: "Would anything stop you (from running)?" WEINER: "(laughs at question) I just have a feelling I  -like- stepped into a Monty Python bit!" "Anything else I can do for ITV- can I do the weather, or something?" REPORTER: If you can do the weather  -you can do the weather here in New York. WEINER: "...No, no, I'll do yours: Where's this from, England?  OK, it's going to be raining, cloudy, and grey, so do what you can, guys... keep a -what is it?- keep a stiff upper lip!" _______________________________________________________ Video at Reaganite Republican

Another uncertainty for climate models – different results on different computers using the same code Posted on July 27, 2013     |     by Anthony Watts New peer reviewed paper finds the same global forecast model produces different results when run on different computers Did you ever wonder how spaghetti like this is produced and why there is broad disagreement in the output that increases with time? Increasing mathematical uncertainty from initial starting conditions is the main reason. But, some of it might be due to the fact that while some of the models share common code,...

What if your home could protect itself from dangerous weather  by retreating underground automatically long before it hits? If you think about it, a house -or entire neighborhood/town- that could withstand higher winds than boxy, frail wood structures -and actually hide underground if necessary- could have one heck of a lot of applications: not just in tornado alley, but avoiding fires in California, tsunamis in Japan, or of course hurricane season in the Carolinas. Why build an expensive underground shelter only to watch your house and belongings be scraped from the face of the Earth, washed-away, or turned to...

After I retired from UAL as a Standards Captain on the -400, I got a job as a simulator instructor working for Alteon (a Boeing subsidiary) at Asiana. When I first got there, I was shocked and surprised by the lack of basic piloting skills shown by most of the pilots. It is not a normal situation with normal progression from new hire, right seat, left seat taking a decade or two. One big difference is that ex-Military pilots are given super-seniority and progress to the left seat much faster. Compared to the US, they also upgrade fairly rapidly because...

Increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) have helped boost green foliage across the world’s arid regions over the past 30 years through a process called CO2 fertilisation, according to CSIRO research. In findings based on satellite observations, CSIRO, in collaboration with the Australian National University (ANU), found that this CO2 fertilisation correlated with an 11 per cent increase in foliage cover from 1982-2010 across parts of the arid areas studied in Australia, North America, the Middle East and Africa, according to CSIRO research scientist, Dr Randall Donohue. “In Australia, our native vegetation is superbly adapted to surviving in arid environments...

The deluded fools who actually believe in man–made global warming got some bad news recently; Obama says he’s going to fix it. The man who promised us shovel-ready jobs, and joked when it didn't work, is going to change the earth's climate. This is the same man who ... o Promised that his first act as President was to close Guantanamo o Focused like a laser beam on creating jobs, causing millions to flee the labor market o Promised to fix the economy and presided over the worst recovery in the last hundred years o Employed “smart diplomacy” to transform...

What do you think Fred Phelps, the fringe preacher with the Westboro Baptist Church, would say about Alberta's floods? He'd say what he always says - that they are God's punishment for Canada because of our tolerance for gays. Or, as his protest placards say, "God Hates Fags." He's the idiot who protests at funerals of U.S. soldiers. See, he even blames wars on gays. Canada has our own versions of Fred Phelps. They say natural weather events, like seasonal floods, are "proof" that God Hates Oilsands. (They tend to say Mother Earth or Gaia.) As TV images of Albertans...

Let’s say that a progressive community decides to implement a law that requires its residents to have a body mass index within the “normal range”. Undeniably such a measure would be good for the citizens of this community. It would reduce obesity, improve overall health, decrease health care costs and if practiced across the country would reduce food consumption causing food demand to lessen, food costs to fall, and the demand for agricultural land to lessen. To make this law more palatable to the population it will be called the Pink Code: like being “in the pink” (a healthy condition)...

There are people in certain areas of the United States who know how we feel, living in Tornado Alley. The area earned has earned its name again, as multiple tornadoes touched down in Oklahoma. Five more people are dead after the twisters struck the Oklahoma City area Friday afternoon and night. I have sent an email to Charles Phipps, author of OK Politechs and coauthor here at Political Realities, as he lives in the Oklahoma City area. I'll update this post when I make sure he is okay. The power of these storms is amazing and nothing can seem to...

No politics today. The state of Oklahoma has suffered another blow, courtesy of mother nature and the privilege of living in the middle of Tornado Alley. I watched yesterday as parts of Moore was torn apart. I wondered about my aunt and uncle, living just off I-35. They are okay, but their house did sustain damage. They are elderly and were unable to heed the warnings to flee from the path of the storm. They had no underground shelter, so they rode it out in the bathtub. I can also report that Charles Phipps, the news contributor to Political Realities...

Note that either this new 'Sustainability' merit badge -to be released in July 2013- OR 'Environmental Science' is now required for attainment of the top Eagle Scout rank (makes me feel better about just getting to 'Life') So as with American schools, KGB-initiated leftist infiltration of our country is nearly complete- as is demoralization of the populace.  Continuing to force this junk science down our -and our childrens'- throats does nothing but distract the entire society from reality while NWO statists take the reigns... might as well offer an 'Alchemy' MB while they're at it: MeritBadge.org   h/t Doug Powers-

A group of 17 Northern Michigan residents have filed a lawsuit claiming a new Consumers Energy wind farm has been making people sick. According to the lawsuit, the $250 million Lake Winds Energy Park wind farm, south of Ludington in Mason County, was built too close to homes. The lawsuit says residents are suffering from dizziness, sleeplessness, headaches and other physical symptoms because of the noise. The 56 turbines (some as far away as a half mile) also are causing vibrations and flickering lights in houses, the lawsuit says. Economic losses are also claimed in the suit. The Shineldecker house...

THE high priests of global warming are in a panic these days as their prophecies of doom have proved to be as credible as a the Mayan calendar. "Research by Ed Hawkins of University of Reading shows surface temperatures since 2005 are already at the low end of the range projections derived from 20 climate models and if they remain flat, they will fall outside the models' range within a few years," the newspaper Australian reported over the weekend. As always, global warmists blame carbon dioxide. "Another paper published by leading climate scientist James Hansen, the head of NASA's Goddard...

Associate Director of College Communications, Unity College claims in a press release this month: “Every college or university that claims to be holding a ‘green’ commencement needs to have divested from investments in fossil fuels, or admit that they cannot truly make that claim.” “As the first college in the United States to adopt sustainability science as its central focus, Unity College ascended to the leading-edge of higher education, training the next generation of environmental leaders to pursue trans-disciplinary solutions to the earth’s most pressing problems including global climate change.” “With a unanimous vote by the Board of Trustees in...

As severe cold grips the eastern U.S. on March 21, Punxsutawney Phil’s forecast for an early spring is best described as an epic failure. The prosecuting attorney of Butler County, Ohio, Michael Gmoser, wants the groundhog to pay for his flawed prediction, with his life.

When you buy a car, there are various ratings outfits in the business of calculating the true cost of owning that particular vehicle, inc. insurance, depreciation, maintenance, cost of repairs, etc. Such a comprehensive model is surely more realistic than just looking at the monthly payment or sticker price, and the customer knows if they're actually making a cost-effective, bottom-line decision. But even if you buy-into the now imploding globaloney scam, wouldn't it make sense to apply similar logic to calculate the entire environmental impact of electric vs. internal combustion cars over the full service life... esp since the actual...

On Tuesday, four Democrats in Congress unveiled a brand-new proposal for a carbon tax. The set-up is simple: The U.S. government would slap a fee on fossil-fuel emissions and refund the revenue back to the public. But there’s a twist: The precise details of the carbon tax have yet to be thrashed out. The four lawmakers are soliciting public comments for how big the tax should be and how best to rebate the money. The proposal is being put forward by Reps. Henry Waxman and Earl Blumenauer, as well as Sens. Sheldon Whitehouse and Brian Schatz. Here are the key...

A recent article by Brad Plumer at the Washington Post outlines the tension between climate change goals and the need to provide “energy impoverished” nations with access to electricity. “If we want to limit the amount of carbon-dioxide in the atmosphere and hit that 2°C goal, we’ll have to replace about 80 percent of our current fossil-fuel use with carbon-free energy and then use only carbon-free energy to meet our future needs,” he writes. “That’s hard enough.” “But if we want everyone in the world to have as much energy as the average Bulgarian enjoys, then we’ll need twice as...

At the height of Superstorm Sandy, city residents watching seawater pour into the subway system couldn’t help but wonder: What will become of all the rats? Four months later, that’s still a mystery. And experts aren’t so sure about stories of hordes of displaced rodents fleeing the flood zone and taking up residence in buildings that were previously rat-free. TV stations and newspapers have been rife with reports about rats infesting parked cars and fleeing the East River waterfront for the brownstones of Brooklyn Heights and exterminators enjoying a boom in business. For some city officials, the last straw came...

A recent article in the Washington Post exposes once again what climate change skeptics already know: the green movement is designed to lower living standards, not just make living more carbon efficient. “One of President Obama’s goals in his State of the Union address was to make American homes twice as energy-efficient by 2030,” writes Brad Plumer for the Washington Post today. “But would that actually curtail overall energy use and reduce U.S. carbon emissions? That’s a trickier question.” “A second way to look at this is that as Americans get richer, we’re inevitably going to want bigger homes and...

As mentioned in previous blog entries, several news outlets, including the Wall Street Journal and Washington Post, mentioned that the President, in his State of the Union address, would be addressing climate change. Indeed, in his speech the President called upon Congress to act and create a McCain-Liebermanesque solution while promoting his own executive actions. “I urge this Congress to get together, pursue a bipartisan, market-based solution to climate change, like the one John McCain and Joe Lieberman worked on together a few years ago,” said President Barack Obama. “I will direct my cabinet to come up with executive actions...

The language used in President Barack Obama’s upcoming State of the Union speech may be vague regarding specific climate change regulations, but two media outlets have now confirmed that new coal regulations by the Administration are likely. “In trying to slow climate change, Obama is considering acting through the Environmental Protection Agency to issue new rules governing carbon emissions by existing power plants, according to three people familiar with White House discussions,” states the Washington Post today (emphasis added). According to the Wall Street Journal’s Peter Nicholas and Keith Johnson, “In the run-up to the speech, Mr. Obama has been...

President Barack Obama’s upcoming State of the Union address is supposed to be about jobs and the economy. However, it will also likely carry a “green” message, if Politico’s Andrew Restuccia is correct: “‘You’re going to like what you hear,’ White House aides have told green groups, according to an official at one environmental organization who expects the president to publicly commit to moving forward with EPA climate regulations,” writes Restuccia, who asks in his article, “which Obama will show up on Tuesday night?” The Administration feels that a 2007 Supreme Court decision giving the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) authority...

Remember Enron, the corrupt firm whose failure should have disproved the myth "too big to fail", but didn't? At the time it was the seventh largest corporation. It's bankruptcy was the largest in history until Lehman Brothers failed. Incidentally, Lehman Brothers was also involved in carbon trading. Enron owed part of its early success to emissions trading. Basically emissions trading was established as a way for some companies to profit from pollution while allowing some companies to continue to produce the chemicals that can cause acid rain. Lawrence Solomon, executive director of Energy Probe and Urban Renaissance Institute, is reporting...

In what may be the first full digital storm panic, federal, state and business officials worried about the snow headed for the Mid-Atlantic and Northeast have taken to Twitter warn that a potential disaster is coming.

Climatologists pay too little attention to the role water plays in earth's energy system, including the way water vapor affects air temperature. Water's potential to affect air temperature is well established in science. As I have noted in previous posts the ability of CO2 to affect temperature is highly questionable. Those who spend much time in greenhouses know that they are often very humid places because water evaporates from plants and from surfaces that get wet when the plants are watered. Meteorologists typically refer to the water vapor content of the air as relative humidity which is how close the...

Measurement 'literally beyond index' Despite glowing words of praise from admirers in the neo-commie Obama Administration, by any measure -social security, health care, unemployment benefits, whatever- the booming China of today hasn't got much to do with socialism. Indeed, government handouts are far more prevalent in the US, and modern Chinese 'communist' leadership -who run a tight ship and enjoy a budget surplus- have come right out and said that American entitlement culture (with Obama as it's primary cheerleader) is precisely what's destroying us. So tell me who's the capitalists now: the Chinese may live under an oppressive dictatorship, but they learned not to restrain...

Stung by being called an “idiot” by Senator David Vitter (R-Louisiana) for his claim that victims of 2012′s Hurricane Sandy suffered more than victims of 2005′s Hurricane Katrina, Senator Harry Reid (D-Nev) attempted to explain his way out the scathing characterization. “My colleague’s focus on quantitative data overlooks qualitative differences between the two events,” Reid argued. “First, New Jersey and New York are states where many important people live. Many of the homes that were destroyed were million dollar properties. The same could be said for the businesses.” “Most of the properties destroyed by Katrina were more like broken down...

The following is a news release from the University of Copenhagen in March, 2007. I've decided not to put it in my own words because I agree with Professor Andresen, and want the article to reflect his views rather than mine. He is the professor not me. Discussions on global warming often refer to 'global temperature.' Yet the concept is thermodynamically as well as mathematically an impossibility, says Bjarne Andresen, a professor at The Niels Bohr Institute, University of Copenhagen, who has analyzed this topic in collaboration with professors Christopher Essex from University of Western Ontario and Ross McKitrick from...

The claim that carbon dioxide (CO2) can increase air temperatures by "trapping" infrared radiation (IR) ignores the fact that in 1909 physicist R.W. Wood disproved the popular 19th Century thesis that greenhouses stayed warm by trapping IR. Unfortunately, many people who claim to be scientists are unaware of Wood's experiment which was originally published in the Philosophical magazine , 1909, vol 17, p319-320. Philosophical Magazine might not sound like the name of a science publication, but a century ago leading scientists published their discoveries in it. During the early 19th Century many physicists supported the theory postulated by Benjamin Franklin...

Living in this city your entire life gives one the opportunity to experience things you would not normally encounter in any other part of the country. Many of these experiences are deeply unpleasant and disturbing, including periodic attempts, with varying degrees of success, by terrorists to blow up large sections of it, along with its inhabitants. Putting aside the preternatural feeling that I’m living in a very bad Michael Bay film-as if there is any other kind-there aren’t many things that occur to or in New York that shake me out of the existential torpor which stems from spending most...

The residents of California are about to become victims of what Weather Channel founder John Coleman has accurately called "the greatest scam in history". They will be paying higher energy bills to help carbon traders get richer. In the 1990's the corrupt Enron company began paying scientists and purported environmental groups to support the outright lie that slight increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide could increase atmospheric temperatures. Enron also supported politicians who were willing to go along with this scheme. Enron's goal was to get governments to establish a system for trading what the company called "carbon credits". Companies producing...

“Whumph!” It sounds like somebody just dropped a sack of potatoes from 50 feet high into 3 feet of powder snow. On instinct, you will turn to see where it came from. There are no indicators: A moonscape of fresh snow extends as far as you can see up the steep mountain slopes. If you’re not scared by now, then you don’t realize the risk: The daunting power of nature may be about to unleash its ultimate winter force, an avalanche. The “whumph” noise is a warning sound that an avalanche may be imminent. It occurs when a deep layer...

h/t Speedunque

Mayor Bloomberg made an impromptu visit to the Rockaways this week—although he was predominantly there to discuss Sandy recovery efforts with local paper The Wave (and declare that the age of the wooden boardwalk is so over), Bloomberg also was confronted by some Occupy Sandy members. And for once, he had nothing but praise for them: "Thank you for everything you've done. You guys are great," Bloomberg told them, as you can see in the video below. "We really do appreciate it, all kidding aside. You really are making a difference. Goodbye," he said. (VIDEO AT LINK) Bloomberg probably would...

I was in Kyoto, Japan in 1997 for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. It was there that I first observed for myself the almost religious fervor of those who subscribe to the global warming orthodoxy; who accept, as an article of faith, that Earth’s 6.9 billion human inhabitants are dangerously overheating the planet. The Kyoto summit wasn’t about drafting an international treaty based on science. It was about promoting theology based on radical environmentalism. So it continues to this very week with a new study, published in the journal “Science,” reported uncritically in the mainstream media, warning...

A new scandal is enveloping the BBC. It has been revealed that they have taken an editorial decision not to give equal air time to two sides of a debate. Some scientists believe that the dodo is extinct, and their views are valuable. But should we not teach the controversy? What about the counter-argument: that dodos are not extinct, but in fact left Mauritius on a spaceship in 1685 and built the Martian canals? The BBC is peddling the "dodo extinct" theory, but it should be made clear that it is only one theory. We should teach the controversy. Of...

Borrowing an idea left over from the Carter Administration, New York City announced an odd/even gasoline rationing scheme. It was hoped that the scheme would cut four-hour wait times at gasoline pumps in half. However, a substantial portion of drivers are unable to determine whether the numbers on their license plates are odd or even. “My plate has four numbers on it,” one driver observed. “Which one should I use?” Another driver pointed out that “I have a vanity plate. All of the writing on my plate is letters. Do I go on an ‘odd’ day because it is odd...

The American Red Cross, which bills itself as “the world's largest humanitarian network,” is pushing back against critics of its response to Hurricane Sandy, with the head of the organization saying its relief effort has been “near flawless” despite criticism from stranded storm victims and elected officials. Two weeks after the superstorm slammed the East Coast, leaving millions of residents without power and in need of food, warmth and shelter, the venerable nonprofit has taken a public battering over what many victims and some officials saw as a lackluster and unfocused response. Thomas Donovan, a 43-year-old software salesman who was...

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews called “the timely arrival of Hurricane Sandy” last week “a God send,” and “a small price to pay for ensuring the reelection of President Obama.” “Prior to the storm, polls were showing that Romney might win this thing,” Matthews averred. “But the wreckage of people’s homes and the promise of redemption from the federal government that was held forth reinforced the case for big government in many voters’ minds.” “Governor Christie’s virtual endorsement of President Obama didn’t hurt either,” Matthews added. “Having a Republican governor laud the President’s leadership as ‘magnificent’ kind of deflated Romney’s contention that...

One of the tragedies of Hurricane Sandy, in addition to the enormous human and material cost it has exacted from our city, is the misery which the chronic inefficiency and incompetence of our government has wrought. From the economically incoherent and historically ignorant institution of price controls to the resuscitation of policies as intellectually vapid as the men who impose them, the specter of the state making the lives of those already suffering even more unbearable is everywhere. Even the federal bureaucracies established to ostensibly aid people who have been the victims of natural disasters are woefully incapable of executing...

This is really something. Americans rush massive and instantaneous aid to countries across the globe in a disaster situation. THEY get assistance almost overnight. Why not our own people on the coast?

Is there a smaller, more unprincipled man in the national political debate than Chris Matthews of MSNBC? No, there is not. Bereft of decency and devoid of soul, what mattered most for Matthews is that his candidate — in this case, President Obama — somehow was boosted over the top. And if millions of his fellow citizens encounter appalling deprivations along the way — well, to Matthews, they’re just eggs to be broken for the Obama omelet. “I’m so glad we had that storm last week,” he said Tuesday. By which he meant Hurricane Sandy, which sowed death and destruction...

Welcome to a magical world in which the scientific challenges to green energy have been resolved and renewable energy makes economic sense for the United States. Even in such a highly theoretical country, it is unlikely that green energy projects would make much headway due to a ‘green versus green’ regulatory structure where local environmentalist groups battle alternative energy projects, contend two authors in a recent Heritage Foundation presentation of their new book. “Most of the research for this was funded actually by the Department of Energy in a 2010 grant to look at [alternative] energy,” says Ryan M. Yonk,...

“(Obama) has been incredibly supportive and helpful to our state and not once did he bring up the election,” said an adoring Chris Christie of the president’s clearly selfless tour of New Jersey after hurricane Sandy. (1) Why of COURSE governor, politics couldn’t have been further from the mind of an individual who has campaigned literally each and every day since his inauguration in January of 2009. Prior to Governor Christie’s slobbering display of man-live before an obviously delighted battalion of media cameras, Rasmussen had Mitt Romney leading in the national tracking poll. Now, however, it is...

02:34 AM Via Twitchy, read about Alabama TV station WAFF’s report on non-union utility crews who traveled from the South to help restore power to Hurricane Sandy victims — only to be turned away because they were non-union.