Posts that may be deleted
2-28-2021
Here in the USA - Will we ever be able to again have open, honest discussions This is a topic I've been anxious to post on for some time. I have OP'd threads on closely aligned topics, Boston Public Schools Suspend Honors Program - Too Many Whites & Asians cited as reason, see School Reopening = White Supremacy, and PODS, or Parent Organized Discovery Sites Upending Public Education in Age of COVID being examples. Years ago, before the largely salubrious civil rights era, academics in the elite programs were rigorous. While there was such a thing as a "Gentleman's C" there is no doubt that people attended private schools and endowed universities to learn. New York City set up a formerly excellent City Collage of New York system. These colleges were for the frequently poor or lower middle class children of immigrants who were brilliant but could not afford Ivy League tuition. Alan Dershowitz, a Brooklyn College alum is but one example of this situation. In that regard I highly recommend the autobiographical Taking the Stand: My Life in the Law by Alan M. Dershowitz. The book is is a classic American story or someone from an immigrant family who did very well for himself, earning every penny he had and helping many along the way.
When CCNY was shifted to "open enrollment" in the late 1960's already no one had the courage to oppose the vandalism of a great institution of higher learning. Similarly when colleges began quotas, formal or informal, to oppose these was "racist." Nowadays anyone who takes a view differing from the consensus is a "racist" or worse.
Similarly, discussion is off-limits with "climate change." People who disagree are called "deniers", borrowing a horrific term formerly reserved for Nazi sympathizers, Holocaust deniers. When there's a hurricane, drought, heat wave or episode of tidal flooding the alarmists blame it on anthropogenic global warming ("AGW"). When there's a cold wave or blizzard, or unusually cool summer it's "weather." We need some consistency. The climate alarm was foisted on us during an unusually hot summer in the eastern two-thirds of the country, 1988. That was when we heard Hansen's "greenhouse effect" testimony. It morphed to "climate change" after the trends turned out to be difficult to detect. As I have pointed out in No Evidence of Climate Change (At Least in Chicago or Other Inhabited Areas) that temperatures have been trendless in most locations with lengthy, reliable records. The alarmists cite to a so-called "world temperature," which is based on proxy data and extrapolation. If AGW were real there would be at least some cities with a steady warming trend, albeit with year to year jumping around or "noise." And you can be sure you'd never hear the end of it.
If you read history texts about the Revolutionary and Civil War, the weather and climate conditions are about the same as now. A New York City summer is a New York City summer. A New York City winter is a New York City winter. And that is from pre-Industrial times. One response on the aforementioned thread (poster will not be identified) is: "Science is hard for idiots. It requires years of education and actual thinking. Best to ignore the ignoramus trolls and move on." Another such response is: "Corporations don't care as long as they make lots of money, do we really want to allow them to sentence our descendants to live on a ruined earth with scarce resources and no quality of life??" That is what happens in discussions where on tries to argue for more study.
When New York State eliminated cash bail, similarly, opposition was met with hysterical accusations of "racism" and supporting "mass incarceration." When municipalities are asked to enact bans on plastic bags at stores, opposition to those largely pointless bans is similarly shrill.
In other words, what happens is not discussion; it is shouting. This has all the logic of shouting down a speaker; happens too often, no one stops it.
2-28-2021
The linked article below should be cause for concern. Shorn of bureaucratic and educational jargon, this means that successful students should be held down to the level of students in single-parent homes, multiple siblings, no discipline and utter chaos. See linked article, excerpts below:
Boston Public Schools Suspends Test For Advanced Learning Classes; Concerns About Program’s Racial Inequities Linger (linked article)
It's a real pity that successful groups such as Asians and Jews are discriminated against. These people have a mad desire for a certain spurious and damaging equality. Equality must be about meeting and where possible raising peoples' potential. It must not, in the manner of Kurt Vonnegut's short story Harrison Bergeron (not sure whether short story names are underlined) be about dragging down higher-functioning people. In the story, people were "handicapped" so that they could not excel:It seems we are alarmingly close to this and it's 60 years away from 2081. We are now persecuting high achievers.
1-19-2020
I used to be one of the few Americans on the forums previously sponsored by a major Canadian media outlet. In March 2004 I attempted to post "Happy Purim from the Jews to the non-Jews" written as "Happy Purim from the J3ws to the non-J3ws." It was erased, the administrator claiming that it was merely "filtered" for hate speech. That was unbelievable. I reported this to the Canadian newspaper. One of their reporters asked me to post an innocuous similar message using both forbidden words "Jews" and "Israel" encrypted as "J3ws" and "Israel" encrypted as "1sra31." The posts were promptly deleted.
The reporter (who I will not name for TOS reasons) ran a news story two days later in the National Post, after the Canadian media outlet did not respond to requests for comment. The Canadian Media Outlet in question shut down their forums about two weeks late. One of their posters opened a replacement forum with a similar name to that Canadian media outlet, which was unmoderated. I posted there for about a year, but was heavily vilified by other posters who had read the National Post article, which used my posting name. I stopped posting after just about everyone put me on "ignore." This replacement board folded in April 2019 with this farewell message (I will "report" my own post and let the moderators decide whether to identify the entity):
To my mind that is the risk in having unbridled "freedom" on a board.
I am "reporting" my own post. I don't know if I had to delete certain information but these are the editorial replacements if identifying them is OK:
Canadian Media Outlet = Canadian Broadcasting Company
(I will "report" my own post and let the moderators decide whether to identify the entity) replaced by link to http://freecbc.ca/
admin@xxx.ca = admin@freecbc.ca
Canadian newspaper = National Post
1-13-2020
Top Shia and Hezbollah killed by US drone strike - MERGED
I also assume that you think that gasoline comes out of a pump, ready-made? Or would come that way if the evil oil companies didn't insist on drilling it or fracking (gas) from somewhere.
All joking aside, there is no clean way to produce energy. Even wind farms are tearing communities to pieces. See Wind energy in the western U.S. is growing — and so are conflicts (link). See also Want Hate-Filled Communities? Then Just Add Wind Farms (link). Santa Claus doesn't provide free energy.
1-11-2019
Meghan Markle for Democratic Nominiee for President
Meghan Markle is 38 years old, and a natural-born U.S. citizen (link). Like Barack Obama she's half-black and half-white, though her mother is the African-American side, not her father. Ms. Markle checks off the "boxes" for diversity, youth and female gender. And she's apparently widely admired. My virtue of Megxit she's no longer royalty.
This is in stark contrast to most of the announced candidates, see Ready The Clown Car: The First Batch of Democrats Are Ready To Announce Their 2020 Bids. An interesting candidate, I say.
1-5-2020 in Great Debates
What follows is a letter I wrote regarding a recent Tablet Magazine article, linked below. To comply with forum rules, I redacted the names of the recipients. Recently, New York, California and New Jersey, among other states, have enacted criminal justice reforms as a result of the perceived bias of requiring cash bail against certain minorities. As the reader can perceive, I believe these "reforms" to be reckless at worst, misguided at best.
================================================== ========================
I am writing because I am disturbed by your recent article in Tablet, Should Jews Oppose Bail Reform?, https://www.tabletmag.com/scroll/296...se-bail-reform. Let me start out by saying that I am an extremely liberal Democrat and observant Reform Jew. I am also a long-time and respectful reader of Tablet Magazine. I had considered contributing but articles of this kind place my contribution and that of others in jeopardy. I am also an attorney who has been actively practicing since 1983, with a deep reverence for due process.
When someone is arrested, of course they must enjoy the presumption of innocence prior to trial. However, only naiveté would indulge a view that someone with multiple arrests, often accompanied by prior convictions, is not a threat to society. New York State’s new bail reform, effective as of January 1, 2020 is already proving a grave threat. Even Mayor DiBlasio, previously a supporter, recognizes the need for judicial discretion to incarcerate people who the judges deem to be a threat. While the rights of the defendant are important, the rights of lower-class and middle-class people to continue their working lives free of the threat of crime must be overriding.
If one believes in racial justice one must believe that the rights of all people are equal, regardless of color. The fact that people of color are incarcerated out of proportion to their representation n the population does not prove a “racist dysfunction in the criminal justice system.” There are many alternative explanations and one should not leap to the conclusion that this is caused by racism. The lack of a family structure may play a role. Nothing in your article makes such an allowance.
Governor Cuomo’s statement about recent anti-Jewish incidents was indeed powerful. But the statement elides the fact that Grafton Arthur had a serious arrest record and had no business being at liberty.
The Scriptures and Talmud do not demand a greater focus on the rights of offenders. Ordinary people have rights as well. Presumption of innocence does not mean taking leave of society’s senses.
What I would like to hear, especially from the attorney among the writers, Matt _______ Esq., is perhaps some support of alternative solutions to the lengthy incarceration of innocent people. How about additional judgeships and better funding for Legal Aid, so trials could be held in the matter of weeks, not years? Ignoring straightforward facts, such as the fact that most arrestees have “been there before” may signal some form of virtue and compassion. But how about compassion for those that cannot afford to live in tony, relatively safe neighborhoods?
1-3-2020
Iran Hostage Crisis v. Dead Iranian Soleimani - What a Difference 40 Years Makes
Back in November 1979 Iranian "students" seized the U.S. embassy in Teheran, holiding over 40 Americans hostage. The Carter Administration relied upon "quiet diplomacy" to obtain their release. This was successful, over one year and two months later. As the November 9, 1979 New York Times reported (link):
By contrast, after the Iranian government, led by Qasem Soleimani incinerated the U.S. embassy in Baghdad, our President speedily had him removed, with extreme prejudice. What a difference 40 years, almost to the day makes.
12-16-2019
The woke, progressive sect seems to believe in enhanced rights and freedoms for the mentally ill. Those rights include:
Or help train the general public in "open-air therapy"? I'd appreciate some insights into how this meshes into the progressive agenda.
12-13-2019
18 Year Old Barnard Student Dead; Sensitive Policies to Blame
People who support police actions like 'stop & frisk' tend to be the type that believe most violent crimes are committed by brown and black people.
See this article, Barnard stabbing suspect held without bail after Tessa Majors’ murder if you are in favor of woke policies concerning "stop, question and frisk." See Michael Bloomberg Pushed ‘Stop-and-Frisk’ Policing. Now He’s Apologizing. Bloomberg said, in part:
Police, in my view, tend to know what teens or other high-crime age groups are carrying around books, which ones carrying knives or guns. Current Mayor DeBlasio has stopped this policy, out of "sensitivity." It's at least good that DeBlasio can manage a speech condemning the "senseless" murder. Out of a desire to be sensitive to the hurt and anguish of certain political activists, and 18 year old Barnard student lies dead.
Progressives, I'm sure you feel virtuous. The 13 year old perpetrator, after all, was not stopped and harassed by police.
9-12-2019
//www.city-data.com/forum/politics-other-controversies/3085208-arent-children-taught-not-attack-school.html#post56159323
This is an excerpt of a National Education Association publication (link):
What's gone wrong? Don't children learn at home to respect their teachers? Part of the problem may stem from state and federal initiatives such as President Obama Signs New Initiative to Improve Educational Outcomes.... But since when is open combat against teachers sanctioned or even permitted? Excerpt from Executive Order:
Is it appropriate for the Chief Executive to chill school discipline?
8-27-2019
//www.city-data.com/forum/politics-other-controversies/3080008-dr-hockey-stick-refuses-produce-data-8.html#post56033677
This was not the first time that Mann has been called out on his data. On June 23, 2005 the House Energy and Commerce Committee sent a letter to Michael E. Mann, then of the University of Virginia. Excerpts (from quotes from Congressional source so no copyright) below (link to source):
*****************
"In light of the Committee's jurisdiction over energy policy and certain environmental issues, the Committee must have full and accurate information when considering matters relating to climate change policy. We open this review because this dispute surrounding your studies bears directly on important questions about the federally funded work upon which climate studies rely and the quality and transparency of analyses used to support the IPCC assessment process. With the IPCC currently working to produce a fourth assessment report, addressing questions of quality and transparency in the process and underlying analyses supporting that assessment, both scientific and economic, are of utmost importance if Congress is eventually going to make policy decisions drawing from this work." At this point, the committee's letter asks for answers to eight far-ranging questions, including the private and public sources of Mann's research funding, location of his data, computer codes, his response to critical reviews of his work, including "Did you calculate the R2 statistic for the temperature reconstruction, particularly for the 15th Century proxy record calculations and what were the results?"
8-25-2019
Is Purpose of Integration to Exclude Poor Asian Students From Schools?
To my mind, integration and civil rights are supposed to be about opening educational opportunities to all. In the "old days" elite educations were the province of those who could afford prep schools such as Choate, Groton and Exeter. In other words the stuff of books and movies such as A Separate Peace. A laudable objective. It seems that, as usual, identity politics gets in the way.New York’s schools chancellor, Richard Carranza, has decided that it is very important to lower poor Asian student's participation, to benefit the manic drive to diversity. See these two linked N.Y. Times article.
Desegregating N.Y. Schools Was His Top Priority. What Happened?
Entrenched inequality, attacks by conservatives, student protests: Richard A. Carranza’s first year as schools chancellor.
By Eliza Shapiro
Amid Racial Divisions, Mayor’s Plan to Scrap Elite School Exam Fails
Opposition from Asian lawmakers and a billionaire’s lobbying push helped block Bill de Blasio’s plan to desegregate New York’s specialized schools.
The opposition to the ruination of great specialized schools is said to be led by "conservatives." There is nothing "liberal" or "progressive" about taking the wrecking ball to great education. Is the goal to force high-achieving families out of New York City to turn it into another segregated ghetto?
8-24-2019
Green Beret hero accused of killing terrorist suspected Taliban bomb maker
Green Beret accused of killing suspected Taliban bomb maker facing 'agonizing' wait for trial, wife says
This is an example of the U.S. fights its wars with both hands tied behind its back. Many lives may have been saved, and yet the powers that be, in Obama-era 2010 feel the need to appear righteous before the world. Make no mistake; the Taliban are the same animals that plowed planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Are Afghani authorities trying anyone for that mass, cold-blooded murder? Yet we are making dainty distinctions to persecute a hero.
Sickening.
8-15-2019
See Tragedy, Possible Mass Shooting Avoided in Tuckahoe by Minding Others' Business.
I cannot over-repeat myself with regard to gun violence; Charleston Demonstrates: You ARE Your Brother's Keeper; Mental Health, Not Guns, Root of Problem. While this involved a relationship gone bad rather than a crazed psychotic, a Plastic surgeon (was) arrested in Tuckahoe with large cache of weapons, threatens to kill estranged wife: DA. Basically, the assailant-in-waiting was at a Tuckahoe (suburban NYC) bar, boasting of the intended carnage. Now, he's held in a Westchester County jail, without bail. There will be no headlines about a bloodbath.
Remember, You ARE Your Brother's Keeper.
================================================== ===========
8-12-2019
Well I wouldn't be staying somewhere all my life I resented and had a snowballs chance in Singapore of materially changing. There are people dying in the world crossing Ocean's and Sea's to escape a place they so resented, and have nowhere else to go in their home country because everywhere is the same. In Canada you are fortunate to have the choice. I'm sure you're fine in Oakville, it is one of the wealthiest places in the country.
In many respects, Quebec's anti-English hostility is reminiscent of the German Nuremberg laws. People facing legislation essentially depriving them of equal protection are often well-advised to leave, even if the result in not fatal.
When Snowhound was born, presumably, Quebeckers of both languages assumed they had the rights of Canadians. When Lower Canada organized its Parliament (now called Assemblée nationale du Québec for some reason) in the 1790's, the decision was made to allow debate in both the English and French languages. Indeed, engraved signs in French and English, albeit with French being in the predominate position, are present throughout the Old City of Quebec. When the Quiet Revolution hit, and asserting a "nationality", no doubt with U.N. aid attached became fashionable throughout the world, French politicians went on the warpath. De Gaulle famously asserted "Vive le Québec Libre ! - Charles de Gaulle 1967" while visiting Expo '67, Lester Pearson pointedly informed him he was interfering in Canada's internal affairs. His successor, Trudeau the Smarter reacted quite strongly to revolutionary activities in October 1970. The response became one of appeasement.
Robert Bourassa, the Liberal Premier of Quebec shepherded through Bill 22, the first major anti-English legislation, restricting English language signs. Bill 101, during Rene Levesque's mandate, revolutionized Quebec education. Both had the effect of rendering Anglophones people unwelcome in their homes. Snowhound makes a powerful point here.
Here in the USA - Will we ever be able to again have open, honest discussions This is a topic I've been anxious to post on for some time. I have OP'd threads on closely aligned topics, Boston Public Schools Suspend Honors Program - Too Many Whites & Asians cited as reason, see School Reopening = White Supremacy, and PODS, or Parent Organized Discovery Sites Upending Public Education in Age of COVID being examples. Years ago, before the largely salubrious civil rights era, academics in the elite programs were rigorous. While there was such a thing as a "Gentleman's C" there is no doubt that people attended private schools and endowed universities to learn. New York City set up a formerly excellent City Collage of New York system. These colleges were for the frequently poor or lower middle class children of immigrants who were brilliant but could not afford Ivy League tuition. Alan Dershowitz, a Brooklyn College alum is but one example of this situation. In that regard I highly recommend the autobiographical Taking the Stand: My Life in the Law by Alan M. Dershowitz. The book is is a classic American story or someone from an immigrant family who did very well for himself, earning every penny he had and helping many along the way.
When CCNY was shifted to "open enrollment" in the late 1960's already no one had the courage to oppose the vandalism of a great institution of higher learning. Similarly when colleges began quotas, formal or informal, to oppose these was "racist." Nowadays anyone who takes a view differing from the consensus is a "racist" or worse.
Similarly, discussion is off-limits with "climate change." People who disagree are called "deniers", borrowing a horrific term formerly reserved for Nazi sympathizers, Holocaust deniers. When there's a hurricane, drought, heat wave or episode of tidal flooding the alarmists blame it on anthropogenic global warming ("AGW"). When there's a cold wave or blizzard, or unusually cool summer it's "weather." We need some consistency. The climate alarm was foisted on us during an unusually hot summer in the eastern two-thirds of the country, 1988. That was when we heard Hansen's "greenhouse effect" testimony. It morphed to "climate change" after the trends turned out to be difficult to detect. As I have pointed out in No Evidence of Climate Change (At Least in Chicago or Other Inhabited Areas) that temperatures have been trendless in most locations with lengthy, reliable records. The alarmists cite to a so-called "world temperature," which is based on proxy data and extrapolation. If AGW were real there would be at least some cities with a steady warming trend, albeit with year to year jumping around or "noise." And you can be sure you'd never hear the end of it.
If you read history texts about the Revolutionary and Civil War, the weather and climate conditions are about the same as now. A New York City summer is a New York City summer. A New York City winter is a New York City winter. And that is from pre-Industrial times. One response on the aforementioned thread (poster will not be identified) is: "Science is hard for idiots. It requires years of education and actual thinking. Best to ignore the ignoramus trolls and move on." Another such response is: "Corporations don't care as long as they make lots of money, do we really want to allow them to sentence our descendants to live on a ruined earth with scarce resources and no quality of life??" That is what happens in discussions where on tries to argue for more study.
When New York State eliminated cash bail, similarly, opposition was met with hysterical accusations of "racism" and supporting "mass incarceration." When municipalities are asked to enact bans on plastic bags at stores, opposition to those largely pointless bans is similarly shrill.
In other words, what happens is not discussion; it is shouting. This has all the logic of shouting down a speaker; happens too often, no one stops it.
2-28-2021
The linked article below should be cause for concern. Shorn of bureaucratic and educational jargon, this means that successful students should be held down to the level of students in single-parent homes, multiple siblings, no discipline and utter chaos. See linked article, excerpts below:
Boston Public Schools Suspends Test For Advanced Learning Classes; Concerns About Program’s Racial Inequities Linger (linked article)
It's a real pity that successful groups such as Asians and Jews are discriminated against. These people have a mad desire for a certain spurious and damaging equality. Equality must be about meeting and where possible raising peoples' potential. It must not, in the manner of Kurt Vonnegut's short story Harrison Bergeron (not sure whether short story names are underlined) be about dragging down higher-functioning people. In the story, people were "handicapped" so that they could not excel:It seems we are alarmingly close to this and it's 60 years away from 2081. We are now persecuting high achievers.
1-19-2020
I used to be one of the few Americans on the forums previously sponsored by a major Canadian media outlet. In March 2004 I attempted to post "Happy Purim from the Jews to the non-Jews" written as "Happy Purim from the J3ws to the non-J3ws." It was erased, the administrator claiming that it was merely "filtered" for hate speech. That was unbelievable. I reported this to the Canadian newspaper. One of their reporters asked me to post an innocuous similar message using both forbidden words "Jews" and "Israel" encrypted as "J3ws" and "Israel" encrypted as "1sra31." The posts were promptly deleted.
The reporter (who I will not name for TOS reasons) ran a news story two days later in the National Post, after the Canadian media outlet did not respond to requests for comment. The Canadian Media Outlet in question shut down their forums about two weeks late. One of their posters opened a replacement forum with a similar name to that Canadian media outlet, which was unmoderated. I posted there for about a year, but was heavily vilified by other posters who had read the National Post article, which used my posting name. I stopped posting after just about everyone put me on "ignore." This replacement board folded in April 2019 with this farewell message (I will "report" my own post and let the moderators decide whether to identify the entity):
Quote:
Originally Posted by Replaceement Board Administrator
Hey there.
Well, it's been an interesting ride. We registered this domain way back in August 2004 in response to the closing of xxx's open web forums, and little did we expect at the time that we would still be going here almost 15 years later. A lot of posters have come and gone over that time. We hope we have at least provided some entertaiment (sic), and some sadly all too infrequent intelligent conversation. To all the former participants who have joined and left us over the years, we wish you all the best! To the online friends who have passed on from this life, we hope you are at peace. To anyone still looking for this former site, if we can help you find what you are looking for or if you just want to connect in other ways, we can still be reached at admin@xxx.ca Some of you will have my personal contact info as well - your correspondence is always welcome.
It has become long since apparent that a discussion forum without moderation is just not a practical reality on today's internet. While the concept of free speech is exceedingly precious, it's also obvious that given the opportunity any place that truly embodies that spirit is simply going to be flooded with extremism and hate trying to drown out everything else. I don't have a solution, I'll leave that to others to search for and hopefully one day find, but I no longer want to provide a platform for just more ugliness in the world. There is already quite enough of that - if that is what you desire, no worries you won't have to look far.
I'll leave you all with a simple tenet to live by; "Good thoughts, good words, good deeds." If I have any regrets it's that I'm sorry this website was not able to embody that philosophy.
Take care and be well.
Blair (aka KK)
Well, it's been an interesting ride. We registered this domain way back in August 2004 in response to the closing of xxx's open web forums, and little did we expect at the time that we would still be going here almost 15 years later. A lot of posters have come and gone over that time. We hope we have at least provided some entertaiment (sic), and some sadly all too infrequent intelligent conversation. To all the former participants who have joined and left us over the years, we wish you all the best! To the online friends who have passed on from this life, we hope you are at peace. To anyone still looking for this former site, if we can help you find what you are looking for or if you just want to connect in other ways, we can still be reached at admin@xxx.ca Some of you will have my personal contact info as well - your correspondence is always welcome.
It has become long since apparent that a discussion forum without moderation is just not a practical reality on today's internet. While the concept of free speech is exceedingly precious, it's also obvious that given the opportunity any place that truly embodies that spirit is simply going to be flooded with extremism and hate trying to drown out everything else. I don't have a solution, I'll leave that to others to search for and hopefully one day find, but I no longer want to provide a platform for just more ugliness in the world. There is already quite enough of that - if that is what you desire, no worries you won't have to look far.
I'll leave you all with a simple tenet to live by; "Good thoughts, good words, good deeds." If I have any regrets it's that I'm sorry this website was not able to embody that philosophy.
Take care and be well.
Blair (aka KK)
April 2019
I am "reporting" my own post. I don't know if I had to delete certain information but these are the editorial replacements if identifying them is OK:
Canadian Media Outlet = Canadian Broadcasting Company
(I will "report" my own post and let the moderators decide whether to identify the entity) replaced by link to http://freecbc.ca/
admin@xxx.ca = admin@freecbc.ca
Canadian newspaper = National Post
1-13-2020
Top Shia and Hezbollah killed by US drone strike - MERGED
Quote:
Originally Posted by lchoro
You can't pollute the water table and the soil through fracking in areas that are more densely populated and also rely on agricultural activity to remain economically independent. The US suspended Clean Water rules for fracking around 2005. The drillers pump pressurized toxic radioactive fluids into the ground to break up the shale with the assumption that it'll take 100 years for the water table to become polluted. We'll find out more about the negative effects in the coming decades and how they materialize. Besides the negative effects on farming and grazing, it's already well known that property values are negatively affected by their proximity to fracking. Fracking is expected to peak in 1 to 4 years and drop off sharply. We will see. Drillers go under, and get taken over by bigger companies who can drill more oil at the lower breakeven by taking over their wells.
All joking aside, there is no clean way to produce energy. Even wind farms are tearing communities to pieces. See Wind energy in the western U.S. is growing — and so are conflicts (link). See also Want Hate-Filled Communities? Then Just Add Wind Farms (link). Santa Claus doesn't provide free energy.
1-11-2019
Meghan Markle for Democratic Nominiee for President
Meghan Markle is 38 years old, and a natural-born U.S. citizen (link). Like Barack Obama she's half-black and half-white, though her mother is the African-American side, not her father. Ms. Markle checks off the "boxes" for diversity, youth and female gender. And she's apparently widely admired. My virtue of Megxit she's no longer royalty.
This is in stark contrast to most of the announced candidates, see Ready The Clown Car: The First Batch of Democrats Are Ready To Announce Their 2020 Bids. An interesting candidate, I say.
1-5-2020 in Great Debates
What follows is a letter I wrote regarding a recent Tablet Magazine article, linked below. To comply with forum rules, I redacted the names of the recipients. Recently, New York, California and New Jersey, among other states, have enacted criminal justice reforms as a result of the perceived bias of requiring cash bail against certain minorities. As the reader can perceive, I believe these "reforms" to be reckless at worst, misguided at best.
================================================== ========================
I am writing because I am disturbed by your recent article in Tablet, Should Jews Oppose Bail Reform?, https://www.tabletmag.com/scroll/296...se-bail-reform. Let me start out by saying that I am an extremely liberal Democrat and observant Reform Jew. I am also a long-time and respectful reader of Tablet Magazine. I had considered contributing but articles of this kind place my contribution and that of others in jeopardy. I am also an attorney who has been actively practicing since 1983, with a deep reverence for due process.
When someone is arrested, of course they must enjoy the presumption of innocence prior to trial. However, only naiveté would indulge a view that someone with multiple arrests, often accompanied by prior convictions, is not a threat to society. New York State’s new bail reform, effective as of January 1, 2020 is already proving a grave threat. Even Mayor DiBlasio, previously a supporter, recognizes the need for judicial discretion to incarcerate people who the judges deem to be a threat. While the rights of the defendant are important, the rights of lower-class and middle-class people to continue their working lives free of the threat of crime must be overriding.
If one believes in racial justice one must believe that the rights of all people are equal, regardless of color. The fact that people of color are incarcerated out of proportion to their representation n the population does not prove a “racist dysfunction in the criminal justice system.” There are many alternative explanations and one should not leap to the conclusion that this is caused by racism. The lack of a family structure may play a role. Nothing in your article makes such an allowance.
Governor Cuomo’s statement about recent anti-Jewish incidents was indeed powerful. But the statement elides the fact that Grafton Arthur had a serious arrest record and had no business being at liberty.
The Scriptures and Talmud do not demand a greater focus on the rights of offenders. Ordinary people have rights as well. Presumption of innocence does not mean taking leave of society’s senses.
What I would like to hear, especially from the attorney among the writers, Matt _______ Esq., is perhaps some support of alternative solutions to the lengthy incarceration of innocent people. How about additional judgeships and better funding for Legal Aid, so trials could be held in the matter of weeks, not years? Ignoring straightforward facts, such as the fact that most arrestees have “been there before” may signal some form of virtue and compassion. But how about compassion for those that cannot afford to live in tony, relatively safe neighborhoods?
1-3-2020
Iran Hostage Crisis v. Dead Iranian Soleimani - What a Difference 40 Years Makes
Back in November 1979 Iranian "students" seized the U.S. embassy in Teheran, holiding over 40 Americans hostage. The Carter Administration relied upon "quiet diplomacy" to obtain their release. This was successful, over one year and two months later. As the November 9, 1979 New York Times reported (link):
Quote:
Originally Posted by New York Times
A White House official said only "quiet and firm diplomacy" was being pursued and no consideration was being given to military action to free the hostages. It was learned that Pope John Paul II had been asked to help and that consultations were going on at the United Nations. Despite reports from Iran that appeared
discouraging, American officials were still pinning their hopes on the possibility that the P.L.O., with which the United States has avoided official dealings, might be able to persuade Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Iranian ruler, to order the release of the hostages.
discouraging, American officials were still pinning their hopes on the possibility that the P.L.O., with which the United States has avoided official dealings, might be able to persuade Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, the Iranian ruler, to order the release of the hostages.
12-16-2019
The woke, progressive sect seems to believe in enhanced rights and freedoms for the mentally ill. Those rights include:
- The right to scream at the air in subway stations;
- To defecate on sidewalks of their choice;
- To panhandle noisily and aggressively on the subways; and
- Most of all, to camp outside in subzero (F) weather.
Or help train the general public in "open-air therapy"? I'd appreciate some insights into how this meshes into the progressive agenda.
12-13-2019
18 Year Old Barnard Student Dead; Sensitive Policies to Blame
Quote:
Originally Posted by Screenwriter70
Quote:
Originally Posted by WRM20
Stop and frisk was completely unconstitutional, and ineffective in controlling crime. You wouldn't be a fan if you had been put up against a wall, or on the ground several times a day, merely for walking down the street while brown or black.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Mayor Michael Bloomberg
“Over time, I’ve come to understand something that I long struggled to admit to myself: I got something important wrong,” he said. “I got something important really wrong. I didn’t understand back then the full impact that stops were having on the black and Latino communities. I was totally focused on saving lives, but as we know, good intentions aren’t good enough.”
Progressives, I'm sure you feel virtuous. The 13 year old perpetrator, after all, was not stopped and harassed by police.
9-12-2019
//www.city-data.com/forum/politics-other-controversies/3085208-arent-children-taught-not-attack-school.html#post56159323
This is an excerpt of a National Education Association publication (link):
Quote:
Originally Posted by NEA
In her 15 years as a teacher, Fragoso was experienced enough to not panic at the sight of a knife-wielding student. She’d been there. A student once stabbed her in the back with a pencil, requiring Fragoso to seek medical attention.
“Luckily there were two of us or the outcome would have been much different,” she says. “My only thoughts were of my students and hoping none of them would get hurt.”
Many teachers, administrators, and education support professionals (ESPs) are at risk of being bitten, kicked, scratched, and punched while at work.
“Luckily there were two of us or the outcome would have been much different,” she says. “My only thoughts were of my students and hoping none of them would get hurt.”
Many teachers, administrators, and education support professionals (ESPs) are at risk of being bitten, kicked, scratched, and punched while at work.
Quote:
Originally Posted by The White House - Office of the Press Secretary
To deliver a complete and competitive education for all ...., the Initiative will promote, encourage, and undertake efforts designed to meet several objectives, including:...Promoting a positive school climate that does not rely on methods that result in disparate use of disciplinary tools, and decreasing the disproportionate number of referrals to special education by addressing root causes of the referrals;
8-27-2019
//www.city-data.com/forum/politics-other-controversies/3080008-dr-hockey-stick-refuses-produce-data-8.html#post56033677
This was not the first time that Mann has been called out on his data. On June 23, 2005 the House Energy and Commerce Committee sent a letter to Michael E. Mann, then of the University of Virginia. Excerpts (from quotes from Congressional source so no copyright) below (link to source):
Quote:
Questions have been raised, according to a February 14, 2005 article in The Wall Street Journal, about the significance of methodological flaws and data errors in your studies of the historical record of temperatures and climate change. We understand that these studies of temperature proxy records (tree rings, ice cores, corals, etc.) formed the basis for a new finding in the 2001 United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Third Assessment Report (TAR). This finding – that the increase in 20th century northern hemisphere temperatures is ‘likely to have been the largest of any century during the past 1,000 years' and that the ‘1990s was the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year' – has since been referenced widely and has become a prominent feature of the public debate surrounding climate change policy." The letter goes on: "However, in recent peer-reviewed articles in Science, Geophysical Research Letters, and Energy & Environment, researchers question the results of this work." It then states: "The concerns surrounding these studies reflect upon the quality and transparency of federally funded research and of the IPCC review process – two matters of particular interest to the Committee."
Quote:
*****************
"In light of the Committee's jurisdiction over energy policy and certain environmental issues, the Committee must have full and accurate information when considering matters relating to climate change policy. We open this review because this dispute surrounding your studies bears directly on important questions about the federally funded work upon which climate studies rely and the quality and transparency of analyses used to support the IPCC assessment process. With the IPCC currently working to produce a fourth assessment report, addressing questions of quality and transparency in the process and underlying analyses supporting that assessment, both scientific and economic, are of utmost importance if Congress is eventually going to make policy decisions drawing from this work." At this point, the committee's letter asks for answers to eight far-ranging questions, including the private and public sources of Mann's research funding, location of his data, computer codes, his response to critical reviews of his work, including "Did you calculate the R2 statistic for the temperature reconstruction, particularly for the 15th Century proxy record calculations and what were the results?"
Is Purpose of Integration to Exclude Poor Asian Students From Schools?
To my mind, integration and civil rights are supposed to be about opening educational opportunities to all. In the "old days" elite educations were the province of those who could afford prep schools such as Choate, Groton and Exeter. In other words the stuff of books and movies such as A Separate Peace. A laudable objective. It seems that, as usual, identity politics gets in the way.New York’s schools chancellor, Richard Carranza, has decided that it is very important to lower poor Asian student's participation, to benefit the manic drive to diversity. See these two linked N.Y. Times article.
Desegregating N.Y. Schools Was His Top Priority. What Happened?
Entrenched inequality, attacks by conservatives, student protests: Richard A. Carranza’s first year as schools chancellor.
By Eliza Shapiro
Amid Racial Divisions, Mayor’s Plan to Scrap Elite School Exam Fails
Opposition from Asian lawmakers and a billionaire’s lobbying push helped block Bill de Blasio’s plan to desegregate New York’s specialized schools.
The opposition to the ruination of great specialized schools is said to be led by "conservatives." There is nothing "liberal" or "progressive" about taking the wrecking ball to great education. Is the goal to force high-achieving families out of New York City to turn it into another segregated ghetto?
8-24-2019
Green Beret hero accused of killing terrorist suspected Taliban bomb maker
Green Beret accused of killing suspected Taliban bomb maker facing 'agonizing' wait for trial, wife says
This is an example of the U.S. fights its wars with both hands tied behind its back. Many lives may have been saved, and yet the powers that be, in Obama-era 2010 feel the need to appear righteous before the world. Make no mistake; the Taliban are the same animals that plowed planes into the World Trade Center and Pentagon. Are Afghani authorities trying anyone for that mass, cold-blooded murder? Yet we are making dainty distinctions to persecute a hero.
Sickening.
8-15-2019
See Tragedy, Possible Mass Shooting Avoided in Tuckahoe by Minding Others' Business.
I cannot over-repeat myself with regard to gun violence; Charleston Demonstrates: You ARE Your Brother's Keeper; Mental Health, Not Guns, Root of Problem. While this involved a relationship gone bad rather than a crazed psychotic, a Plastic surgeon (was) arrested in Tuckahoe with large cache of weapons, threatens to kill estranged wife: DA. Basically, the assailant-in-waiting was at a Tuckahoe (suburban NYC) bar, boasting of the intended carnage. Now, he's held in a Westchester County jail, without bail. There will be no headlines about a bloodbath.
Remember, You ARE Your Brother's Keeper.
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8-12-2019
Quote:
Originally Posted by fusion2
Quote:
Originally Posted by Snowhound
What about those of us who had lived in Quebec for generations? Were just supposed to leave?
It wasnt fun for younger me to basically be forced out of where I grew up and called home, due to being the wrong ethnicity. One after another almost all of us left and had to start over in Ontario or BC or America or elsewhere.
Is that really what you endorse?
It wasnt fun for younger me to basically be forced out of where I grew up and called home, due to being the wrong ethnicity. One after another almost all of us left and had to start over in Ontario or BC or America or elsewhere.
Is that really what you endorse?
When Snowhound was born, presumably, Quebeckers of both languages assumed they had the rights of Canadians. When Lower Canada organized its Parliament (now called Assemblée nationale du Québec for some reason) in the 1790's, the decision was made to allow debate in both the English and French languages. Indeed, engraved signs in French and English, albeit with French being in the predominate position, are present throughout the Old City of Quebec. When the Quiet Revolution hit, and asserting a "nationality", no doubt with U.N. aid attached became fashionable throughout the world, French politicians went on the warpath. De Gaulle famously asserted "Vive le Québec Libre ! - Charles de Gaulle 1967" while visiting Expo '67, Lester Pearson pointedly informed him he was interfering in Canada's internal affairs. His successor, Trudeau the Smarter reacted quite strongly to revolutionary activities in October 1970. The response became one of appeasement.
Robert Bourassa, the Liberal Premier of Quebec shepherded through Bill 22, the first major anti-English legislation, restricting English language signs. Bill 101, during Rene Levesque's mandate, revolutionized Quebec education. Both had the effect of rendering Anglophones people unwelcome in their homes. Snowhound makes a powerful point here.
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