At Long Last, Have You No Shame

As I mentioned yesterday, a study was released by a United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change today which stated that global warming was indeed occuring and that it was "very likely" due to human actions...which in scientific terms translates to a "90% probability", which when you consider that many of the countries involved would like to continue polluting and not acknowledge global warming means that the evidence must be so overwhelming that even they can't prevent such strong assertions.

Never to be outdone, corporate evildoers are already on the offensive to prevent anything from being done about this. A think tank, funded by Exxon Mobil (true friends of the environment) have offered $10,000 plus travel and other expenses to any scientist who will critique or debunk this report. Now, obviously, peer review and analysis is part of the scientific process, and obviously people should always be checking each other's work to make sure it's accurate, but in this case, the conclusion is already decided. They aren't looking for the truth, they are looking for a specific answer and are willing to pay anyone who can give them that answer. Far from being scientific exploration, this is a P.R. move to debunk the notion of global warming in the minds of the public.

I honestly don't know how anyone can actually think that this was a good idea. Even if you want to keep polluting and this report spells trouble for you, they have to know how shady this is, and exactly how shady it will look when it gets out, which of course it does. It amounts to them saying "Yes, we know our products are to blame, but we want to keep selling them at all costs". What type of scientist would agree to what is essentially academic prostitution?

Although, a sign that our society is not completely without merit; in Detroit, Michigan, the U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals found that a man's use of the word "goddamn" during a town meeting is not criminal. Why would that even come up? Well, because during this town meeting, when this man uttered such a foul, terrifying word (please note sarcasm), he was arrested on the spot. Yes, arrested, but luckily our courts are still sane enough to recognize a violation of First and Fourth Amendment rights when they see it. An interesting question: I wonder if this man would have been arrested if he had merely said "damn" instead of "goddamn"? I don't understand how you can say "damn" on television or the radio and it's perfectly acceptable, but if you add "god" in front of it, it becomes equal to saying "f*ck" or "sh*t". Only in a puritanical and backwords culture could that happen.

president Bush is Right

And just in the nick of time. Tomorrow, a consortium of scientists from nations all over the globe, including the U.S. are releasing a report which states categorically that global warming is real, is caused by man-made pollution, and will have devastating effects for the next few hundred years, and those are their conservative estimates. After years of saying that the jury is still out on Global Warming, Mr. Bush has finally acknowledged that we are the cause of this global climate change. Wow, finally. Now we can start to do something about it.

Well, no, not so much. For you see, though he now acknowledges that it's our fault (and by our, I mean mankind...this is not all the United States' fault) he doesn't think that we should be limiting our greenhouse gas emissions. That would be incredibly inconvenient to industrial polluters pulling in record profits and those jackasses who don't care how much gas costs, they just want to drive their Hummers. But you know what, he's right. You see, the problem is not that we're polluting too much, but too little. At this rate, it'll take decades, maybe centuries, for all of the polar ice to melt. If we speed up that process, then sea levels will rise, salination will decrease, and oceanic currents will change thus sparking a new ice age. Believe me, no one will be complaining about summer heat death and tropical storms when the summer temperatures are below zero. Plus, frozen glaciers from here back to Asia will open new trade routes, as long as you've got a sled. China is an emerging market, and we should take advantage of that, especially since, with their growing energy needs, they have been even more insistent than the U.S. that there should be no greenhouse gas emmissions caps.

Good job, George. You are of the same mind as a communist dictatorship. So, let's get to work on swinging this climate pendulum the other way. Once we jump start a new ice age, you won't hear any hippie liberals complaining about global warming. In fact, they'll be begging for it.

File This Under Question Mark

While at work today, I read an interesting item from Reuters about a town in Quebec that has taken a proactive approach to integrating the 10% of their population made up of immigrants. Their iSolution (much like adding the number 2000 to products in the 20th century made them cutting edge, adding the lower-case "i" before words does the same in the 21st century) to this problem has been to post a set of guidelines on the town website informing immigrants of how Canadians roll. For instance, it says, literally, that women should not be stoned to death, set afire, or burned with acid. Now, some people might say it's racist to assume that a.) all Muslim and Hasidic immigrants are extremists who would be inclined to do these things unless we good Christians told them not to, and b.) that even if they did believe these things to be acceptable that they'd be so stupid to not understand that Canada has laws of it own that they have to follow. I disagree, because these are just good, common sense guidelines that should always be posted...all over town like "No Skateboarding" or "Employees Must Wash Hands" signs. Sometimes, when I'm walking through Central Park and I see a pretty woman with her face uncovered, I think to myself "you know, someone should really stone that women to death". Considering that the City of New York doesn't post that information explicity anywhere on their government site (I checked,) I'm surprised it doesn't happen more often. Don't they know that the only thing stopping our society from turning to cannibalism and forced sodomy is a strongly worded set of rules posted on a never-checked website.

Here's the thing, if you want to give people a heads-up about the cultural differences between the country they left and the Canada they've come to, go right ahead. Educate them about the principles of an open society, so they won't be so shocked when they see women driving and dancing (those are two things they actually do list in their guidelines...along with the suggestion that the only time your face should be covered is on Halloween - word for word). When you start down the path to reiterating things that are clearly illegal under the assumption that these people are all barbarians who have traveled around the world to Canada of all places to break those laws...well, as the Canadians say, that's just un-neighborly, eh?

You really have to wonder about the people who have such a low opinion of other people that they have to write idiotic and insulting guides for them. Recently, when Northwest Airlines laid off hundreds of their employees, they distributed a pamphlet called "101 ways to save money". Included in the suggestions were "Make your own baby food" and "Make your own kitty litter" (believe me, you do not want to mix those two up). So, let's just say it's only mildly degrading for your former employer who was apparently paying you so little that you wouldn't have any savings and has just laid you off to imply that you won't be able to find another job or manage your finances without resorting to making your own clothes out of newspaper scraps...but where this goes from rich poppycock to fatcat editorial cartoon absurdity is when they suggest, and I kid you not, they suggest you try dumpster diving. "Don't be afraid to look in dumpsters and take anything you like."

That's right. "Dig in, poor people. You like table scraps and soiled clothes, right?" If that's something people at some point need to resort to in order to survive or as a personal choice, that's their business. But for the people who laid you off to suggest that you shouldn't be shy about enjoying the trash of people who can afford to discard things...man is that arrogant and insulting. It's like saying "Poor people don't have dignity, right? I mean, I would never dig through trash in million years, but I'm sure poor people just love it. That's like shopping at Tiffany's to them."

And people wonder why everyone hates white people.