A Note on the North Carolina Primary:

A Note on the North Carolina Primary:

*************

Obama easily steamrolled Clinton to win by 14 points.

In the GOP contest for President, it was McCain by 74 percentage points. Huckabee was a distant second.

Interesting fact: 26% of the North Carolina Republican voters voted “against” McCain! In Indiana, 22 % for GOP voters voted against McCain. Suddenly, I don’t feel as “lonely” as I did before the primary yesterday!

For today's featured article, by Alan Caruba, scroll down to the next post.

Longstreet

Filed under:
conservative+NC+PRIMARY+McCAIN+OBAMA+CLINTON

Forecasting Hurricanes. Not! ... by Alan Caruba

Forecasting Hurricanes. Not!
By Alan Caruba
*******************************
In late April, AccuWeather.com, led by Joe Bastardi, its chief meteorologist, issued a news release that was, to be kind, pure mush. The early warning forecast for 2008’s June to November hurricane season said that conditions like La Nina and a “continued warm water cycle in the Atlantic Basin” held forth the “chance for U.S. landfalling storms.”

The operative word here is “chance” when predicting hurricanes because it is largely a question of gaming odds on how many. What no self-respecting meteorologist, whether in private forecasting or working for the U.S. government’s weather service, wants you to know is that their highly sophisticated computer weather models quite simply cannot factor in a whole range of factors, not the least of which is clouds. Yes, clouds.
As I am fond of telling people, the best definition of the weather is “chaos” which is to say, beyond maybe four days, accurately predicting it is nearly impossible. This is not to denigrate the work of meteorologists and the scholarship of climatologists who study long-term trends and cycles. Bless them, bless them all!

Men have been trying to predict the weather since ancient shamans studied the entrails of chickens. The weather is one of the great determinant factors in all aspects of life on Earth and it is in a constant state of change.

A fine example is the last ten thousand years or so of temperate, even moderate, weather the planet has enjoyed. It gave rise to civilizations based on agriculture, allowing some to grow food while others engaged in conquest on foot, on horseback or sailing to places they then claimed for themselves. Nasty bunch those human beings. What we call history some might uncharitably call organized thievery, but farmers still want to know if it will rain next week.

Knowing about hurricanes takes on importance these days because most of the nation’s population lives within fifty miles of either coast. Since hurricanes are an East Coast and Gulf of Mexico event, the West Coast has to content itself with earthquakes (entirely unpredictable), wildfires, and other unpleasantries.

In recent years, environmentalists and just flat-out liars like Al Gore have taken to claiming that global warming has been responsible for more intense hurricanes, but in April a prominent hurricane specialist, MIT’s Kerry Emanuel, publicly reversed his opinion that global warming had anything to do with it.

The fact that the Earth has been cooling since 1998 might have had something to do with that. Emanuel said he’d checked his data and now concluded that there would not be any substantial increase in frequency or intensity of hurricanes for the next two centuries. He had nothing to offer regarding a pending ice age.

In July 2007, James M. Taylor of the Heartland Institute pointed out that the previous month’s issue of “Nature” had published an article about the way scientists had documented Atlantic Ocean hurricane activity dating back 270 years. “They found the 1970s and 1980s were periods of ‘anomalously low’ hurricane activity compared with historic norms.” This ironically corresponds to the period when environmentalists switched from warning about a coming ice age to global warming. What followed in the 1990s was merely “a recovery to normal hurricane activity.”

Given the record of some presumably very smart meteorological people, it almost doesn’t matter what any of them have to say on the subject of hurricanes. I’m not being mean because even the predictors are quick to say they haven’t gotten things right in a while. In fact, for the last three years, they’ve been mostly wrong or shall we just say surprised?

“We are calling for a very active hurricane season this year,” said Phil Klotzbach of Colorado State University, “but not as active as the 2004 or 2005 seasons.” In 2005 Hurricane Katrina obliterated New Orleans and a large swath of Louisiana and Mississippi.

Though everyone knew the Gulf was due a Category Five hurricane it still totally astonished most people. Typically they were not prepared and the aftermath was a perfect example of why expecting either your state or the federal government to do anything right is probably a bad idea. In the end, local communities, neighbors, put things right.

The thing about hurricanes that make landfall so awful is the fact that so many people live close to the East Coast. It just intensifies the level of damage even a mid-sized hurricane can and will do. Predicting how many will occur, however, is (a) a great way to get your name in the newspaper and (b) fairly useless. If there was a reasonable level of accuracy it might be helpful, but bad forecasts just make people anxious for no good reason.

I personally love scientists, but they often get things wrong, are oblivious to human nature, and haven’t a clue how their predictions—when they make them—can have seriously consequences in places that depend heavily on tourism, which is pretty much the entire East Coast from Florida up to the Carolinas.

The way I see it, if folks want to vacation in Florida between June and November they can take their chances just like the people who live there. I lived in Florida for four years while a student at the University of Miami and returned for a brief stint around 1962. If there were hurricanes then I was blissfully unaware of them. Coming from New Jersey I just assumed they were just really big storms. There is no denying I was, well, young and not the brightest child on the bus.

This fatalistic behavior pretty much describes most folks in the path of any hurricane. An Associated Press headline in November 2007 said, “A quiet season for hurricanes stirs some fears.” Having dodged the bullet, Floridians returned to a reasoned degree of apathy after putting out the patio furniture once again and those responsible for public safety officials were worried about it.

The point is that it just doesn’t matter how many hurricanes are predicted. What matters is how many make it across the Atlantic Ocean and arrive with a bad attitude. There will be hurricanes. They are a perfectly natural event.

Be satisfied that satellites can spot them and give you some idea where they are headed. That’s called progress. What you do with the information after that is your responsibility.

If any of us had a scintilla of humility, we would know that we have two choices, either batten down the hatches or run like hell.

Alan Caruba writes a weekly column posted on the Internet site of The National Anxiety Center, http://www.anxietycenter.com/. He blogs at http://factsnotfantasy.blogspot.com/.

© Alan Caruba, May 2008

***************************************

(Note: The 2008 Hurricane Season officially begins June 1st, 2008.)

Filed under:

conservative+Global+Warming+Religion+Pagan+Socialism+hoax+Hurricanes

“Thinning the Herd.”

It is called “Thinning the Herd.”

*******************************

Have you noticed the common thread running through all the dire warnings and predictions and prognostications coming from the Greenies? Sure you have. You couldn’t miss it… unless you have been mesmerized by the hypnotic avalanche of Marxist propaganda re-labeled as environmental concern and thrown at you from all sides day in and day out.

Well, OK. There is always that ten percent who do not get the word, as we used to say in the Army. So here is the message buried in plain sight in all the green propaganda: Humans must go! The planet must be cleansed of all human life! Humans are parasites on the earth and must be eradicated! Genocide!

Whoa!!!! That’s heavy, man! Yeah, it is. And it was in your face all the while and you did not see it! The Greenies view the human race as a toxic virus to the earth.

Look, we have, what, six billion plus humans on the earth right now. It is an ungovernable lot. There are too many people to rule. So, the herd needs thinning.

Look at this: “According to a new report released by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the world's leading climate scientists believe that global warming is “very likely” caused by man………………… The phrase “very likely” translates to a more than 90 percent certainty that global warming is caused by man.” That comes for an article at:

http://www.naftc.wvu.edu/NAFTC%20eNews/March07/fault.html

Or this:


“The most comprehensive climate change report to date suggests man is the cause of global warming.” That comes for an article at:

http://www.cbn.com/CBNnews/97975.aspx

Then there is this: “We're told by those enlightened Global Warming know-it-alls that scientists all agree that GW is caused by man.” This from an article entitled: “But, Global Warming is all Man’s Fault”. You’ll find it at:

http://cheapseatview.blogspot.com/2007/01/but-global-warming-is-all-mans-fault.html

Now, these are just samples of thousands, if not millions, of articles out in the ether, in cyberspace, on the ’Net... and these are quite tame. Actually the folks at www.cheapseatview.blogspot.com/ favor my point of view. I congratulate them! Ahem.

The point of all this, in my opinion, is there are simply to many people on the planet to govern. Since, I believe the goal is to actually bring all the nations of the world under one governance, then crowd control is called for… and necessary. The most efficient way to thin the herd is to have the herd participate in the thinning. Better yet, encourage them to do it themselves!

“How the hell do you do that”, you ask? “Any number of ways”, I answer. For instance bar the use of DDT and allow Malaria to kill millions in third world countries. Or convince the inhabitants of the earth they are running out of oil and instigate “Oil Wars” around the globe, killing off even more thousands and eventually millions. Add to that worldwide famine caused by burning the food crops to produce a product we are told will take the place of petroleum based fuels, even though the “powers-that-be” understand the product is not now, nor ever will be, able to produce the energy necessary to take the place of energy from oil. But… that doesn’t matter, because the end goal is to kill off millions through starvation. It’s working!

OK… so I am paranoid! What the hell difference does it make if you ARE paranoid, or not, if they truly ARE out to get you???

The ultimate goal, it seems to me, is to bring the earth’s population down to a manageable level so that a single government can control the planet. (And before you ask… NO, I am not wearing a tin foil hat… and YES, I DID take my meds this morning!)

This whole Global Warming/Climate Change movement reminds me of a movie made back in 1973 titled: “Soylent Green”. The movie is set in 2022. An overpopulated earth is starving and must depend upon government manufactured food items called Soylent Green, Red, and Yellow to exist. But in the midst of a murder investigation, a cop discovers the secret ingredient of Soylent Green. It is the flesh of other humans. The government had discovered a way to “thin the herd” by allowing the herd to do it for them.

The world is filled with “useful idiots”. They will do anything for public recognition and adulation. They will even serve those who would destroy, even THEIR own world. They will lead movements that would convince their fellowman that mankind is destroying his home planet. Yes, they ARE idiots… but… they are USEFUL to those who pull their strings!

Longstreet

Filed under:

conservative+overpopulation+famine

You are Known by the Company You Keep.

You are Known by the Company You Keep.

**********************

Obama had North Carolina wrapped up. He had a lock on the primary election Tuesday. Now, that is questionable.

Why? Obama’s pastor, or should I say, former pastor… and there are already some rumblings about his NEW pastor.

When I was a kid, one of the many things my parents drilled into me, in hopes of building a man with character, was this: “You are known by the company you keep.” It took. Lots of what my long suffering parents tried to teach me DID NOT STICK… but this one did! I was very particular about whom I chose as friends and associates as a teen and on into manhood. It kept me out of a lot of trouble I most certainly would have gotten into had those words not echoed in my mind then… and even today.

It has been the root cause of decisions I have made which have angered some people, some members of my family, and close friends. But, I am comfortable with my decisions as to associates…. and leaving the church.

Did I just say: “leaving the church?” Yes, I did!

I left a church and a denomination of which I had been a member since the late 1960’s. I loved that church and that denomination. The pastors and I were friends, fishing buddies, and such. Then came the church’s decision to turn left and drop it’s conservative interpretation of the scriptures, and even adopt so much of the political left’s philosophy, that I could not stay. Well, I could have stayed … and been miserable. And I was miserable. Finally, I made the decision to leave that church and that denomination. Friends and family were, and many remain, upset with me over that decision. But, I would do the same thing over given the same set of circumstances.

The point here is: yes, it is a difficult thing to leave a church you love if you do not agree with where that church is headed. But, a man’s character dictates that he do the right thing… and that, in my case, was to leave. It would have been wrong of me to remain in that church and try to worship. In fact it was impossible. I was, as I say, miserable.

So, why did, and why does, Obama remain a member of his church? He must agree with what is preached there. He must, else wise his character would dictate that he leave. He has not. He remains a member.

That fact has not escaped the attention of the North Carolina Democrat voters. Add to that the rather peculiar machinations of his former pastor, and current pastor, and the folks in the Tar Heel State have begun pushing away from Obama in droves.
Obama may still win the Democrat Primary tomorrow, here in NC, but the margin of victory, if indeed he does win, will be much closer than it need have been.

There is expected to be a huge turnout for the primary tomorrow. I expect there will. Obama will, as we said above, in all likelihood, win the democratic primary. Of course, McCain will win the GOP Primary. McCain will do it without my vote. This is another decision of mine, which has my family at my throat. Tough! I intend to do what I must do and be able to look at myself in the mirror the next morning as I scrape the whiskers from that well-worn old face.

It seems to me, the dye is cast in the choice of a nominee for the Democratic Party. Obama, it now appears, will take it all. The democrats are beside themselves with unbridled joy, even though Obama has about as much chance of winning the Presidency as he does of rolling a snowball clear across hell in the middle of August. So, my vote of “no confidence” in McCain should not hurt him at all in November.

Longstreet


Filed under:

conservative+politics+Obama+NC

History Revised by Political Correctness in Louisiana

SONS OF CONFEDERATE VETERANS PUBLIC RELATIONS AND MEDIA COMMITTEE
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
History Revised by Political Correctness in Louisiana

Elm Springs, Columbia, TN
April 14, 2008

The news of the changes in long-standing proclamations declaring Confederate History and Heritage Month observances in Shreveport and Bossier City, Lou­isiana has prompted the following statement from Christopher M. Sullivan, Commander-in-Chief, Sons of Confederate Veterans:

"We learned with immense dismay of the mayors of Bossier City and Shreveport, Louisiana, departing from a long- standing tradition of issuing proclama­tions honoring Confederate History and Heritage Month.

"According to local news accounts they have taken it upon themselves to change the observance to ‘Civil War History Month’.

"This is a direct act of political correctness that takes on more serious proportions as it undertakes revising or eliminating true history in America.

"Cities, counties and states annually issue proclamations honoring the vari­ous cultures and events that have made the greatness of America. Confederate History and Heritage Month is one of the most widely known throughout the United States with hundreds of proclamations and observances each year which honor the Confederate soldiers who are recognized by the U. S. Department of Veterans Affairs with the same rights and recognition as all veterans of U. S. service.

"It is indeed disheartening to see the success of this recognition distorted and intentionally eliminated by a small element whose agenda is to impugn or eradicate the history of the Confederate military."

"It is our hope the people of Shreveport and Bossier City will show a spirit of fairness and patriotism by effectively speaking out against censorship and historical revision."

END
Contact, J. A. Davis, SCV PR & Media Committee, 770 297-4788.

Filed under:

conservative+Confederate+History