Let them forget...

Some years ago we were at UCLA and heard Ray Bradbury tell about his career. One of the best things he wrote was this:

“If you don’t want a man unhappy politically, don’t give him two sides to a question to worry him; give him one. Better yet, give him none. Let him forget there is such a thing as war. If the government is inefficient, top-heavy, and tax-mad, better it be all those than that people worry over it…. Give the people contests they win by remembering the words to more popular songs or the names of state capitals or how much corn Iowa grew last year. Cram them full of noncombustible data, chock them so damned full of ‘facts’ they feel stuffed, but absolutely ‘brilliant’ with information. Then they’ll feel they’re thinking, they’ll get a sense of motion without moving. And they’ll be happy, because facts of that sort don’t change.” ― Ray Bradbury, Fahrenheit 451 - 

John W. Whitehead wrote an excellent discussion of the state of free speech in today's America. Here's an excerpt:

How do you change the way people think? You start by changing the words they use. In totalitarian regimes—a.k.a. police states—where conformity and compliance are enforced at the end of a loaded gun, the government dictates what words can and cannot be used. In countries where the police state hides behind a benevolent mask and disguises itself as tolerance, the citizens censor themselves, policing their words and thoughts to conform to the dictates of the mass mind. Even when the motives behind this rigidly calibrated reorientation of societal language appear well-intentioned—discouraging racism, condemning violence, denouncing discrimination and hatred—inevitably, the end result is the same: intolerance, indoctrination and infantilism. It’s political correctness disguised as tolerance, civility and love, but what it really amounts to is the chilling of free speech and the demonizing of viewpoints that run counter to the cultural elite.

He concludes with this:

This freedom for those in the unpopular minority constitutes the ultimate tolerance in a free society. Conversely, when we fail to abide by Madison’s dictates about greater tolerance for all viewpoints, no matter how distasteful, the end result is always the same: an indoctrinated, infantilized citizenry that marches in lockstep with the governmental regime.

Some of this past century’s greatest dystopian literature shows what happens when the populace is transformed into mindless automatons. In Ray Bradbury’s Fahrenheit 451, reading is banned and books are burned in order to suppress dissenting ideas, while televised entertainment is used to anesthetize the populace and render them easily pacified, distracted and controlled.

In Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, serious literature, scientific thinking and experimentation are banned as subversive, while critical thinking is discouraged through the use of conditioning, social taboos and inferior education. Likewise, expressions of individuality, independence and morality are viewed as vulgar and abnormal.

And in George Orwell’s 1984, Big Brother does away with all undesirable and unnecessary words and meanings, even going so far as to routinely rewrite history and punish “thoughtcrimes.” In this dystopian vision of the future, the Thought Police serve as the eyes and ears of Big Brother, while the Ministry of Peace deals with war and defense, the Ministry of Plenty deals with economic affairs (rationing and starvation), the Ministry of Love deals with law and order (torture and brainwashing), and the Ministry of Truth deals with news, entertainment, education and art (propaganda). The mottos of Oceania: WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, and IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.

All three—Bradbury, Huxley and Orwell—had an uncanny knack for realizing the future, yet it is Orwell who best understood the power of language to manipulate the masses. Orwell’s Big Brother relied on Newspeak to eliminate undesirable words, strip such words as remained of unorthodox meanings and make independent, non-government-approved thought altogether unnecessary. To give a single example, as psychologist Erich Fromm illustrates in his afterword to 1984:

The word free still existed in Newspeak, but it could only be used in such statements as "This dog is free from lice" or "This field is free from weeds." It could not be used in its old sense of "politically free" or "intellectually free," since political and intellectual freedom no longer existed as concepts....

Where we stand now is at the juncture of OldSpeak (where words have meanings, and ideas can be dangerous) and Newspeak (where only that which is “safe” and “accepted” by the majority is permitted). The power elite has made their intentions clear: they will pursue and prosecute any and all words, thoughts and expressions that challenge their authority.

This is the final link in the police state chain.

Having been reduced to a cowering citizenry—mute in the face of elected officials who refuse to represent us, helpless in the face of police brutality, powerless in the face of militarized tactics and technology that treat us like enemy combatants on a battlefield, and naked in the face of government surveillance that sees and hears all—we have nowhere left to go. Our backs are to the walls. From this point on, we have only two options: go down fighting, or capitulate and betray our loved ones, our friends and our selves by insisting that, as a brainwashed Winston Smith does at the end of Orwell’s 1984, yes, 2+2 does equal 5.

See more at: https://www.rutherford.org/publications_resources/john_whiteheads_commentary/the_emergence_of_orwellian_newspeak_and_the_death_of_free_speech#sthash.fue4iqew.dpuf

2+2=5

George Orwell in 1984:

In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five, and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality, was tacitly denied by their philosophy.

Mark Steyn commented: 

Two plus two equals five. A severed head plus "Allahu Akbar!" equals "Nothing to do with Islam." Network screenings of Gone With The Wind plus Uncle Ben's rice equals blatant incitement to mass murder. A nice chichi gay couple at 27 Elm Street and a firebreathing imam and his four child brides at 29 Elm Street equals the social harmony of a multiculti utopia.

Where is this story headed? The warriors of the caliphate divide the planet into the dar al Islam and the dar al harb - the house of war. In reality, it's a struggle between the dar al Islam and the dar al Gay: Liberty in the fin de civilisation west means sexual liberty and nothing else - which is why one consequence of yesterday's decision is that freedom of expression and freedom of religion will increasingly be confined to what Justice Alito called the deepest recesses of your home.

Yet one particular demographic is ever more aggressively assertive in the name of its religion, even as prime ministers and federal prosecutors deny any such thing. So today, in Oklahoma as in Saint-Quentin-Fallavier, you get up in the morning, go to work, and wind up decapitated. Oh, don't worry, it's a low risk - for the moment. And, unlike with "homophobic" bakers and florists, the implicit threat of violence ensures plenty of preemptive concessions.

Since 9/11, every western nation has dramatically accelerated Muslim immigration: "Islam is a religion of peace" isn't just a meaningless platitude, they live it.

Yet ultimately you can be either a gay-wedding society or a semi-Islamized society. By choosing both, the west will tear itself apart - and in the end it's the Islamic imperialists who have the less shaky relationship with "the very existence of external reality". What Marx called the internal contradictions of capitalism have nothing on those of "diversity".

And so the leader of the free world lights the White House LGBT as the tourist corpses are removed from their sunbeds.

Recycling propaganda

President Obama, Secretary of State Kerry, and the mass media frequently talk about the problem of melting ice causing the seas to rise. Now the President has tasked the military with measuring sea ice. But is this really a problem? 

Sea ice fluctuates over time. As I've pointed out, the recent predictions of a "death spiral" in the Arctic have not materialized. The projections started in 1978 at a peak of Arctic ice, so of course the ice would be expected to decline. So is this a problem, or is it an example of alarmism intended to frighten the public into accepting higher energy costs and a lower standard of living, while also repressing the poor in developing countries?

It's kind of amazing that the media either doesn't realize, or doesn't care, that this exact same claim has been made periodically in the past.

Here's a graph of total sea ice on the planet:

http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/iphone/images/iphone.anomaly.global.png

Just to provide some historical perspective, here are some headlines over the years raising fears of ice melting and flooding the coastlines:

2014:

http://www.nytimes.com/2014/05/13/science/earth/collapse-of-parts-of-west-antarctica-ice-sheet-has-begun-scientists-say.html?_r=0

1947:

http://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1947/05/30/87757175.html?pageNumber=23

1932:

http://timesmachine.nytimes.com/timesmachine/1932/05/15/100739680.html?pageNumber=159

Boy Meets Girl

Mark Steyn has done a nice job describing how NEWSPEAK has permeated society, although he doesn't always use that reference to Orwell.

Here he articulates the way in which so-called progressives are pursuing the complete disintegration of society.

http://www.steynonline.com/6982/boy-meets-girl

http://www.steynonline.com/6987/everybody-did-it

Here is an excerpt from the latter:

My column on British Columbia's litigious transgender middle-schooler brought in a ton of mail, some of which we'll try to run in the days ahead. D C Alan writes, appropriately, from DC:

The fascinating thing about "sexual orientation" and "gender-identity" is that NO ONE ACTUALLY BELIEVES ANY OF IT. Morgane Oger doesn't really believe it; barbara findlay doesn't believe it; Dan Savage, Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton, and GLADD don't actually believe any of it...and, yet, everyone has to play along with it (or else!). Why???
You have hit the nail on the head: "[A]fter the abolition of biology, what can't be redefined?" The anti-rational, relativistic, totalitarian Left knows that if you can get people to believe this stuff, then there is nothing that you cannot get them to accept. If such outlandish premises and assumptions about biological nature become a part of the conventional wisdom, then there is little about human nature that will appear so outrageous. By manipulating the citizenry into screaming at each other about "gender" (and "race"), then they are distracted and diverted from the genuine tyranny taking shape in the economic spheres - none of which will be recognized for the danger that it is by the confused collective mindset.
What is truly malevolent is how many people the Left is willing to exploit - including 12-year-olds - in order to foist all of this on us.
Oh, by the way: You quote Morgane Oger: "[I]f you want to find out somebody's gender, you ask them and you can ask them to declare it." How universal is the right to "declare"? For example, if someone declares in reply to a particular declaration, "That's horsespit" - will this be equally acceptable to the vast state apparatus?
Oh, and also by the way: Will next year's Summer Olympics still be operating under such discriminatory distinctions as "men's" and "women's" sports?
Oh, and further by the way: It ain't just B.C. - the federal Trudeaupians have this on the front burner, too.
Anyway, this is not the type of story that gets much coverage in the "mainstream media", so for bringing it to our attention, thanks...I guess.
D C Alan
Washington, DC

I pay attention to these stories because ultimately they're far more important than whether Marco Rubio or Jeb Bush is ahead in Iowa. As to whether or not the proponents believe a word of it, it's certainly true that they believe whatever suits their needs at the time: To the progressive totalitarians, "gender" is a social construct, so feel free to change your sex, but "sexual orientation" is immutable, so don't even think of changing your orientation, because we've passed a law telling you to cut out all that pray-away-the-gay stuff. The Vagina Monologues is so last millennium because of its transphobic exclusion of women with penises so it's now déclassé author is frantically writing in scenes featuring non-ciswomen ...but, if a WASP sings "La Cucaracha" on American Idol, that's cultural appropriation.

Whatever works.

Systematic Corruption Has Destroyed America

Here's an example of how the schools are being used as tools (or laboratories).

http://eagnews.org/teachers-complain-chaos-reigns-as-st-paul-schools-spend-millions-on-white-privilege-training/

This piece from zerohedge is an excellent summary of the underlying rot in the federal government. I've written about this before, but these are relatively recent news items that show the trend continues to accelerate. Yet I can't find examples of politicians focusing on this as the fundamental reason our government is failing.

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2015-06-03/systemic-corruption-has-destroyed-america

Systemic Corruption Has Destroyed America

It's been less than a month since we posted on this topic. But sadly, there are already many new entries.

The Cop Is On the Take

Government corruption has become rampant:

• Senior SEC employees spent up to 8 hours a day surfing porn sites instead of cracking down on financial crimes

• Nuclear Regulatory Commission workers watch porn instead of cracking down on unsafe conditions at nuclear plants

• An EPA employee who downloaded 7,000 porn files, then spent 2-6 hours each workdaywatching porn. He’s been doing it for years … but the EPA never fired him. Another EPA employeeharassed 16 women co-workers … and then was promoted to a higher-paying job with more responsibility, where he harassed more women

• NSA spies pass around homemade sexual videos and pictures they’ve collected from spying on the American people

• NSA employees have also been caught using their mass surveillance powers to spy on love interests, such as girlfriends, obsessions or former wives … and to eavesdrop on American soldiers’ intimate conversations with their wives back home. Andsee this (“routinely shared salacious or tantalizing phone calls that had been intercepted” … “‘Hey, check this out … there’s good phone sex’”)

• An employee of the Transportation Security Administration admitted that TSA agents share – and laugh at – nude scans of passengers. Another TSA employee says that screeners make excuses so they can grope and fondletravelers that they’re attracted to (maybe that’s why the TSA failed to find mock explosives or banned weapons going through checkpoints in95% of trials)

• Investigators from the Treasury’s Office of the Inspector General found that some of the regulator’s employees surfed erotic websites, hired prostitutes and accepted gifts from bank executives … instead of actually working to help the economy

• The Minerals Management Service – the regulator charged with overseeing BP and other oil companies to ensure that oil spills don’t occur – was riddled with “a culture of substance abuse and promiscuity”, which included “sex with industry contacts”

• Agents for the Drug Enforcement Agency haddozens of sex parties with prostitutes hired by the drug cartels they were supposed to stop (they also received money, gifts and weaponsfrom drug cartel members)

• Drug Enforcement agents also RAN New Jersey’ssleaziest strip club – using illegal, undocumented girls – which included aprostitution ring

• Pentagon employees used government credit cards to pay for adult “escorts” (i.e. prostitutes) and to gamble

• Federal agents with the Drug Enforcement Administration and Secret Service investigating Bitcoin money laundering extorted and stole over $1 million in Bitcoin

• The IRS gave promotions to employees who were themselves tax cheats

• The Commodity Futures Trading Commission hasconspired with big banks to manipulate commodities prices for decades

• The government-sponsored rating agenciescommitted massive fraud (and see this)

• The Treasury department allowed banks to “cook their books”

• Regulators knew of and allowed the use of debt-hiding accounting tricks by the big banks

• The SEC has been shredding Wall Street documents for decades to help the big bankscover up their fraud

• The Secretary of Treasury (Tim Geithner) wascomplicit in Lehman’s accounting fraud, (and see this)

• The former chief accountant for the SEC says thatBernanke and Paulson broke the law and should be prosecuted

• The government knew about mortgage fraud a long time ago. For example, the FBI warned of an “epidemic” of mortgage fraud in 2004. However, the FBI, DOJ and other government agencies then stood down and did nothing. See this and this. For example, the Federal Reserve turned its cheek and allowed massive fraud, and the SEC has repeatedly ignored accounting fraud (a whistleblower also “gift-wrapped and delivered” the Madoff scandal to the SEC, but they refused to take action). Indeed, Alan Greenspan took the position that fraud could never happen

• Paulson and Bernanke falsely stated that the big banks receiving Tarp money were healthy, when they were not. The Treasury Secretary also falsely told Congress that the bailouts would be used to dispose of toxic assets … but then used the money for something else entirely

• A high-level Federal Reserve official says quantitative easing is “the greatest backdoor Wall Street bailout of all time”

• Bailout funds were not used to help Main Street or the little guy. Instead, the government threw money at “several billionaires and tens of multi-millionaires”, as well as hedge funds, giant corporations like McDonald’s and Harley-Davidson, and numerous foreign banks, including Gaddafi’s Libyan bank, the Arab Banking Corp. of Bahrain, and the Banks of Bavaria, Korea and Mexico

• The non-partisan Government Accountability Office calls the Fed corrupt and riddled with conflicts of interest. Nobel prize-winning economist Joe Stiglitz says the World Bank would view any country which had a banking structure like the Fed as being corrupt and untrustworthy. The former vice president at the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas said said he worried that the failure of the government to provide more information about its rescue spending could signal corruption. “Nontransparency in government programs is always associated with corruption in other countries, so I don’t see why it wouldn’t be here,” he said

• Arguably, both the Bush and Obama administrations broke the law by refusing to close insolvent banks

• Congress may have covered up illegal tax breaks for the big banks

• Congress recently told the courts that Congresscan’t be investigated for insider trading

• Congress has exempted itself from the healthcare rules it insists everyone else follow

• State lawmakers are routinely wined and dined by corporate lobbyists who literally TELL THEM what laws to pass

• North Carolina passed a law LEGALIZING PROSTITUTES for state lawmakers.

• Police have been busted framing numerous innocent people

• Systemic corruption at the FBI lab led to theEXECUTION of innocent people

• Police raise money by handing out tickets … andthey’re given quotas by their bosses. And see this

• Law enforcement also grabs massive amounts of people’s cash, cars and property … even when people aren’t CHARGED with – let alone convicted of – any crime

• Private prisons are huge profit-making centers for giant companies, and private prison corporations obtain quotas from the government, where thegovernment guarantees a certain number of prisoners at any given time

• The government has gone to great lengths tocover up nuclear accidents, radiation dangers, and unsafe conditions at nuclear plants

• The government made sure that false claimswere made about the amount of oil spilled by BP in the Gulf

• The government covered up the health risks to New Orleans residents associated with polluted water from hurricane Katrina, and FEMA covered up the cancer risk from the toxic trailers which it provided to refugees of the hurricane.  The Centers for Disease Control – the lead agency tasked with addressing disease in America –covered up lead poisoning in children in the Washington, D.C. area (the Centers for Disease Control has also been outed as receiving industry funding)

• The government’s response to the outbreak of mad cow disease was simple: it STOPPED TESTING for mad cow, and PREVENTED cattle ranchers and meat processors from VOLUNTARILY testing their own cows (and see this and this)

• In response to new studies showing the substantial dangers of genetically modified foods, the government passed legislation more or lessPUSHING IT onto our plates

• When one of the most respected radiologists in America – the former head of the radiology department at Yale University – attempted to blow the whistle on the fact that the FDA had approved a medical device manufactured by General Electric because it put out massive amounts of radiation, the FDA installed spyware to record his private emails and surfing activities (including installing cameras to snap pictures of his screen), and then used the information to smear him and other whistleblowers

• In an effort to protect Bank of America from the threatened Wikileaks expose of wrongdoing – theDepartment of Justice told Bank of America to a hire a specific hardball-playing law firm to assemble a team to take down WikiLeaks (and see this)

• The Bush White House worked hard to smearCIA officers, bloggers and anyone else who criticized the Iraq war

• The FBI smeared top scientists who pointed out the numerous holes in its anthrax case. Indeed, the head of the FBI’s investigation agrees that corruption was rampant

• Senior judges in Pennsylvania have pleaded guilty to falsely convicting and imprisoning hundreds of YOUTHS (they got kickbacks from the prisons).   The Pennsylvania Supreme Court refused to hear a case regarding the corrupt judges. A month later – only after the judges confessed to criminal wrongdoing – did the Supreme Court change its mind and take any interest

• The government has intentionally whipped up hysteria about terrorism for cynical political purposes.  For example, former Secretary of Homeland Security Tom Ridge admitted that he was pressured to raise terror alerts to help the president win reelection

• Warmongers in the U.S. government knowingly and intentionally lied us into a war of aggression in Iraq. The former head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – the highest ranking military officer in the United States – said that the Iraq war was“based on a series of lies”. The same is true inLibya and other wars. Indeed, the U.S. has often launched or proposed launching wars based upon FALSE PREMISES

• When the American government got caught assassinating innocent civilians, it changed its definition of “enemy combatants” to include all young men – between the ages of say 15 and 35– who happen to be in battle zones. When it got busted killing kids with drones, it changed the definition again to include kids as “enemy combatants”

• $8.5 TRILLION dollars in taxpayer money doled out by Congress to the Pentagon since 1996 hasNEVER been accounted for. The military wastes and “loses” trillions of dollars. And Congress pushes expensive boondoggles that our generalssay are unnecessary and unhelpful … because it’s pork for their district

• The government lied when it said it doesn’t conduct mass surveillance on Americans, and then lied again when it said that spying was aimed at protecting America against terrorists (Why do so many in Congress support NSA spying? Because NSA contractors give them money)

• The government also lied when it said America doesn’t torture (and see this), and then lied once again when it said torture was aimed at protecting America against terrorists

•  The government protects criminalwrongdoing by prosecuting whistleblowers.   The Obama administration has sentenced whistleblowers to dozens of times the jail time ofall other presidents COMBINED). And the government has framed whistleblowers with false evidence

• The government treats journalists who report on government corruption as CRIMINALS OR TERRORISTS.  And it goes to great lengths to smear them. For example, when USA Today reporters busted the Pentagon for illegally targeting Americans with propaganda, the Pentagon launched a SMEAR CAMPAIGN against the reporters

• The intelligence services BLACKMAIL people in both government and the private sector withevidence of homosexuality, nude pictures andother information that people want to stop from going public

• Terror attacks such as 9/11, the Boston Marathon bombing and the Texas shooting all happened because of PERVASIVE CORRUPTIONin our intelligence agencies

The biggest companies own the D.C. politicians. Indeed, the head of the economics department at George Mason University has pointed out that it is unfair to call politicians “prostitutes”. They are in factpimps … selling out the American people for a price.

Government regulators have become so corrupted and“captured” by those they regulate that Americans knowthat the cop is on the take. Institutional corruption is killing people’s trust in our government and our institutions.

Neither the Democratic or Republican parties represent the interests of the American people.  Elections have become nothing but scripted beauty contests, with both parties ignoring the desires of their own bases.

Indeed, America is no longer a democracy or republic …it’s officially an oligarchy. And the allowance of unlimited campaign spending allows the oligarchs topurchase politicians more directly than ever.

No wonder polls show that the American people say that the system is thoroughly corrupt.

Moreover, there are two systems of justice in America …one for the big banks and other fatcats … and one for everyone else. Indeed, Americans have less access to justice than Botswanans … and are more abused by police than Kazakhstanis.

Big Corporations Are Also Thoroughly Corrupt

But the private sector is no better … for example, the big banks have literally turned into criminal syndicatesengaged in systemic fraud.

Wall Street and giant corporations are literallymanipulating every single market.

And the big corporations are cutting corners to make an extra penny … wreaking havoc with their carelessness. For example:

• Fracking companies dumped 3 billion gallons of highly-toxic waste into California’s drinking water supply. Fracking is polluting water all over the country. A study published in the journal Ground Water predicts that the highly-toxic fluids used in fracking can migrate to aquifers within a few short years. In addition, it is now official that fracking can cause earthquakes. Yet fracking companies are using military psychological operations techniques to discredit opponents(and see this)

• U.S. military contractors have pocketed hugesums of money earmarked for humanitarian and reconstruction aid. And see this (whistleblowersalerted the government about the looting of Iraq reconstruction funds, but nothing was done)

• General Electric and other nuclear companiesKNEW their designs were faulty and unsafe … but hid that fact for decades

• Monsanto has claimed for decades that Roundup is safe, but the World Health Organization just said that it probably causes cancer. Monsantoforbids independent scientists from testing its GMO crops for safety, attacks the computers of people who oppose GMO foods and sue small farmers when Monsanto GMO crops drift onto their fields

• Big farmers are drenching their crops with Roundup right before harvest … to save a buck

• Big food companies work hand-in-glove with the government to dish up unhealthy food

• BP’s criminal negligence led to the giant Gulf oil spill

• There is systemic corruption among drug companies, scientific journals, university medical departments, and medical groups which set the criteria for diagnosis and treatment

(Further examples here, here, here, here and here.)

We’ve Forgotten the Lessons of History

The real problem is that we need to learn a little history:

• We’ve known for thousands of years that – when criminals are not punished – crime spreads

• We’ve known for hundreds of years that thefailure to punish financial fraud destroys economies, as it destroys all trust in the financial system

• We’ve known for centuries that powerful people – unless held to account – will get together and steal from everyone else

Beyond Partisan Politics

Liberals and conservatives tend to blame our country’s problems on different factors … but they are all connected.

The real problem is the malignant, symbiotic relationship between big corporations and big government.

Climate alarmists

Because one of my other blogs, http://natureoftheclimate.blogspot.com/ covers climate issues, I don't mention that topic here as much as I could. But lately, the NEWSPEAK on climate has reached new levels of absurdity. Today I'm going to point out just a couple of them.

1. Skepticism in science is usually considered important and productive for the advancement of knowledge, but that's not true in the arena of global warming, climate change, climate weirding, etc. The pejorative nomenclature is revealing. Those who promote CAGW (catastrophic anthropogenic global warming) are called "warmists" or "warmmongers," while those who question or challenge CAGW are called "deniers." The term "denier" is supposed to invoke the Holocaust; i.e., the warmists want to link CAGW skeptics to people who denied the Holocaust. The irony, of course, is that the warmists are the only ones who deny the science and data. Consequently, I'll use the term "skeptics" instead of "deniers."

Some skeptics of CAGW like to compare the CO2-based climate change theory to a religion because proponents insist the "science is settled" and should not be questioned. In my view, this is a reasonable approach based on most religion; i.e., most religions do ask followers to take things on face and not question them, just as the warmists do. Like the warmists, religions rely on a few foundational events from which they derive theories that they "prove" by anecdotal evidence. I happen to think not all religion functions like this; in fact, I think religion can lead to greater evidence and proof than nonreligion, but that's another topic.

The point here is that the skeptics are taking the correct scientific approach, while the warmists (such as President Obama and the IPCC) are taking the anti-science approach. For a good explanation of how this came about, see:  http://judithcurry.com/2015/06/03/why-skeptics-hate-climate-skeptics/

Here's an excerpt: Certainly the amount of CO2, a greenhouse gas, in the atmosphere is increasing. All else equal that will cause temperatures to increase. Skeptics argue that it is appropriate to go with our best scientific understandings when there are areas of doubt. As a society that’s a good plan, but that doesn’t mean we should not continue to question our current “best” understandings. Many “skeptics” have promoted fears and described consequences of CO2 emissions that contradict IPCC reports and go much further than can be justified by best our current scientific understandings. Perhaps with science as with magical thinking some embrace fears of climate change because they do not want to accept that weather is random and that bad things can happen for no reason.  Consistent with their role in regards to scams and hoaxes, many still see the task for skeptics as coming up with answers and explanations. Maybe the desire for impressive answers leads to excess certainty and an over-reliance on experts to quell doubts. Unfortunately today not enough skeptics see the value of critical thinking when it leads to an honest “I don’t know”.

JC comment:  Someone recently emailed me this 1995 article from Skeptical Enquirer: How to sell a pseudoscience.  Take a look; these tactics are all being used to sell climate science.

2.  Tony Heller runs an excellent blog. Here's a fine example:

http://realclimatescience.com/2015/05/ministry-of-truth-erasing-the-unanimous-consensus/

His latest entries are fantastic explanations of how CLIMATE NEWSPEAK has devolved into absurdity:

https://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/

http://realclimatescience.com/

Updating Katherine Hayhoe’s Drought Forecast

Posted on June 3, 2015by stevengoddard

Six weeks ago, this article appeared

APRIL 22, 2015

Climate change is making the Texas panhandle, birthplace of the state’s iconic Longhorn, too hot and dry to raise beef. What happens to the range when the water runs out?

Soon, environmental activists and reporters began to ask whether “drought”—a temporary weather pattern—was really the right term for what was happening in the state, or whether “desertification” was more appropriate. “We’re on our fourth year of drought,” Katharine Hayhoe, director of the climate science center at Texas Tech University in Lubbock, told the industry magazine Meatingplace. “In order to replenish depleted reservoirs and soil moisture, we don’t need just a normal year or just a single rainfall. We need an unusually wet year to get back to normal conditions.” But the early months of 2015 have seen less than 1.4 inches of total precipitation—not even a third of what is considered normal rainfall, much less enough to replenish surface water and groundwater resources.

What Climate Change Is Doing to the Texas Cattle Ranch | The New Republic

By the end of May, all of Texas was unusually wet. The wettest state in the country.

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Texas Climate Is Not Changing

Posted on June 3, 2015by stevengoddard

There has been no change in Texas January-May rainfall over the past century.

The percent of days receiving more than 5 cm rainfall hasn’t changed

 There has been a slight, but meaningless increase in heaviest rainfall events. Most of the 20+ cm rainfall events occurred before 1960

Texas temperatures aren’t changing. They are about the same as they were in the 19th century

The Texas climate is not changing. All of the delusions of Katherine Hayhoe and Andrew Dessler are based on what they want to see, not on what is actually happening.

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My NOAA Climate Forecast

Posted on June 3, 2015by stevengoddard

I forecast that NOAA will lie about May 2015, and claim it was the warmest on record – even though it wasn’t even close.

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Children Just Won’t Know What A Competent Or Honest Scientist Is

Posted on June 3, 2015by stevengoddard

This is what Scotland looked like yesterday

http://www.snoweye.com/grabs/0071/95.jpg

Last summer, the BBC reported the early stages of glacier formation in Scotland

Glacier-like hazards found on Ben Nevis – BBC News

Six years ago, the Met Office warned that Scottish skiing is doomed

Skiing is ‘doomed’ … so enjoy it while it lasts – The Scotsman

Fifteen years ago, CRU warned that children won’t know what snow is

According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia,within a few years winter snowfall will become “a very rare and exciting event”.

“Children just aren’t going to know what snow is,” he said.

Snowfalls are now just a thing of the past – Environment – The Independent

Climate experts understand nothing about the climate. They simply look for any isolated evidence or short term trends which supports their ongoing funding.

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Climate BS Takes Only Milli-Seconds To Be Detected

Posted on June 3, 2015by stevengoddard

The warming from carbon dioxide released by burning a lump of coal exceeds the heat generated by the combustion in just 34 days.

It takes 45 days for oil combustion and 59 days for natural gas to achieve comparable warming to that generated by burning the respective fuel.

This shows that global warming does not take years and decades for its effects to be felt, shows a study by climate scientists at the Carnegie Institution for Science.

Global warming: Greenhouse gas warming takes only weeks to be felt

Only problem is, the atmosphere is not warming up.

Wood for Trees: Interactive Graphs

It doesn’t matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn’t matter how smart you are. If it doesn’t agree with experiment, it’s wrong.

– Richard P. Feynman

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Senator Wants To Criminalize Dissent From The CO2-Centricism Orthodoxy

Posted on June 3, 2015by stevengoddard

The fossil-fuel industry’s campaign to mislead the American people – The Washington Post

There is no question that there is racketeering going on here. The government is stealing $29 billion per year of our money to finance the biggest scientific fraud in history.

This is what Rhode Island looked like 200 years ago, before big-tobacco wrecked the climate

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Texas Is Vulnerable To Clueless Academics

Posted on June 2, 2015by stevengoddard

Cross posted from my new blog : Texas Is Vulnerable To Clueless Academics | Real Science

Four years ago, Andrew Dessler of Texas A&M announced that Texas would be hot and dry for the rest of the century

Texas is vulnerable to warming climate – Houston Chronicle

That forecast turned out to be a complete disaster.

Temperatures in Texas have fallen over the past century, and have plummeted since Dessler made his forecast.

It is clear that climate experts like Dessler and Hayhoe have little understanding of what actually drives the climate, yet the press continues to quote these same people over and over again – no matter how many times they are wrong.

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