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De Omnibus Dubitandum - Lux Veritas

Saturday, November 4, 2023

Celebrating Norman Borlaug: He Was Always Ahead Of His Time

By Henry I. Miller, MS, MD — March 30, 2023 @  @American Council on Science and Health

Twenty years ago, Nobel Laureate Norman Borlaug wrote about agricultural biotechnology – its promise, importance, over-regulation, and the mindless opposition to it from activists. His words ring true today.

Agronomist and plant breeder extraordinaire Norman Borlaug, often described as “The Father of the Green Revolution,” was an inspiration to many of us involved in inception of the late 20th Century's “biotechnology revolution.” As well as the recipient of the Nobel Peace Prize and innumerable other honors, Norman was a loyal friend and mentor and a tireless antagonist of the anti-science movement that seems ever to be with us.

On the occasion of what would have been Norman’s 109th birthday last week, I re-read the Foreword he wrote 20 years ago for “The Frankenfood Myth: How Protest and Politics Threaten the Biotech Revolution,” , coauthored by Gregory Conko and me.  (It was selected by Barron's as one of the Best Books of 2004.) 

Norman's words have aged well; in fact, the propagation of misinformation and disinformation via social media have worsened the problems that he described.  Below are some excerpts from that Foreword.  (I would also note that he was one of the co-founders of the American Council on Science and Health, and he mentions ACSH in it.)

“From 1950 to 1992, the world’s grain output rose from 692 million tons produced on 1.7 billion acres of cropland to 1.9 billion tons on 1.73 billion acres of cropland – an increase of more than 150 percent.  Without high-yield agriculture, either millions would have starved or increases in food output would have been realized only through drastic expansion of acres under cultivation – with losses of pristine wilderness a hundred times greater than all the losses to urban and suburban expansion.

“Today, we confront a similar problem: feeding the anticipated global population of more than eight billion people in the coming quarter of a century.  The world has or will soon have the agricultural technology available to meet this challenge.  The new biotechnology can help us to do things that we could not do before, and to do it in a more precise, predictable, and efficient way.  The crucial question today is whether farmers and ranchers will be permitted to use that technology.  Extremists in the environmental movement are doing everything they can to stop scientific progress in its tracks, and their allies in the regulatory agencies are more than eager to help.”

“If the naysayers do manage to stop agricultural biotechnology, they might actually precipitate the famines and the crisis of global biodiversity they have been predicting for nearly forty years.

"For a decade, the United States has produced ever-larger quantities of gene-spliced, insect-resistant corn that yields as much or more than the best traditional hybrids but with far less need for chemical pesticides.  No negative health or environmental effects have been observed.  Yet there is an immensely strong, rabid anti-biotech lobby, especially in Europe, where activists have convinced many governments to thwart new approvals and have opposed the use of gene-spliced corn and soybeans as food aid in famine-stricken parts of Africa and Asia.”

“Tragically, [biotechnology] is not an isolated case.  There are many other examples of overreaction and resistance to technology.  The American Council on Science and Health has documented a series of twenty cases – including pesticides on cranberries in 1959, and Alar on Pacific coast apples in 1989 – in which scare stories trumpeted by the media became widely known and accepted but later were shown to be of little or no consequence.  The resistance to gene splicing is yet another sordid episode in this larger anti-technology, junk-science movement.

“In spite of the many powerful and precise new tools and the greater health and well-being that science and technology have offered us, our society has become overly risk-averse… We must be more rational about our approach to risks.  We need to think in broader terms, recognizing, for example, that the world cannot feed all its 6.3 billion people from organic farms or power all its cities and industries by wind and solar energy.

“Although we must be prudent in assessing new technologies, these assessments must not be based on overly conservative – or overtly inaccurate – assumptions or be swayed by the anti-business, anti-establishment, anti-globalization agenda of a few activists, or by the self-interest of bureaucrats.  They must be based on good science and good sense.  It is easy to forget that science offers more than a body of knowledge and a process for adding new knowledge.  It tells us not only what we know but what we don’t know.  It identifies areas of uncertainty and offers an estimate of how great and how critical that uncertainty may be.”

Thank you, Norman.  We remember your wisdom, warmth, and generosity.  You are greatly missed.

Okay, Let's Try and Get This Right Once and For All: Biden Was Elected Through Voter Fraud.

Why do I have to keep repeating that?

By Rich Kozlovich

Editor's Note:  I originally published this on October 31, 2022, but today, nine months later Blogger decided this article offended "their community standards", and removed it from the site.  I protested, and now they've totally deleted it.  Apparently I've picked up my own personal censor at Blogger.  I will save this elsewhere and keep posting it as need be.  RK

Since I search out and store so much material on all I write about I come to conclusions on issues more quickly than most, and usually it's because I see patterns easily and usually before everyone else, which isn't a big deal if you keep those conclusions to yourself.  

Then I make the mistake I've made forever in my life.  I just assume since I know all this stuff, everyone must know all this stuff.  That is a totally erroneous conclusion, and a serious error in judgement, especially when your conclusion is out of step with the narrative of the moment, and it boggles my mind  how many conservatives refuse to accept the fact voter fraud, a nationally organized massive conspiracy of voter fraud, is real, it's been going on for decades and it's going on right now.

Let's start with my, "old retired men's coffee klatsch group", that met at the McDonald's in the morning before they closed it to prevent a pandemic disaster from an affliction that had a 99.7% recovery rate, and it still isn't open for sit down customers.  

One morning one of the guys came in and announced regarding the 2020 election that "Trump is screwed".  I said stop believing in polls and look at the crowds.  Trump draws massive crowds and Biden draws crickets.  I then said the only way Biden will be elected is through voter fraud, and said I thought fraud was going to be massive in the 2020 election.

Everyone had either a look of surprise or a look of disbelief.  

So, the history book in me came out.  I said I've been closely following this trend since 2008 when Al Franken defeated Republican incumbent Norm Coleman by 312 votes.  Votes that kept appearing out of nowhere.  It amazes me how they can keep "finding" votes that seemingly disappeared.  Where did they go?  How did they disappear?  Why is it "found" votes always elect a Democrat?  

 Political Cartoons by AF Branco

Not to mention votes of people all over who aren't allowed to vote, like in Chicago where dead people have the right to vote, but there's one thing in common.   No matter where this is happening, these "found" votes are almost sure to be for Democrats, with a sprinkling for Republicans to make it look legit, except in Michigan were 138,000 votes miraculously appeared in the middle of the night and guess what.  They all, every one of them, voted for Biden.   A miracle!  Or maybe Scotty beamed them down from the Enterprise.  Oh, wait....that's fiction.....imagine that.  Even the Post Office "finds" them, two years later.

At any rate, I then went on to note voter fraud is how LBJ first got elected to Congress and how Kennedy was elected through voter fraud, all of which is now acknowledged as fact.   Everyone knew Kennedy was elected through fraud, and so too did Nixon, but he refused to challenge the vote because he feared it would be detrimental to the nation.  Another Nixon failure, since if he'd done it then perhaps that would have prevented what we're seeing today. 

The evidence of voter fraud for Biden being elected to be President of the United States is massive and overwhelming, and if the bugman can track this stuff how is it possible the media and political elements, on both sides of the aisle are incapable of it?  They're not, they're part of the problem.  

The 2020 Election Requires Believing the Unbelievable:

In order for anyone to believe Biden is a legitimately elected President of the United States you must believe all these anomalies are natural and normal coincidences.    That's simply not believable!  And there's no such thing as a conspiracy! Right?

What started this piece was this article about Pennsylvania.   Pennsylvania’s Department of State Has Sent Out 249,000 Ballots to Unverified Voters in 2022 Election, saying:

In Pennsylvania, the Department of State has allowed at least 249,000 unverified voters to receive mail-in ballots so far in the 2022 general election, due to an odd process for verifying the identity of those requesting mail-in ballots where people vote first and verify their identification later.

Pennsylvania has been a rotten fruit of voter fraud, and it appears nothing's changed.   Voter fraud is a rotten fruit that infected Arizona, California, Michigan, Nevada, North Carolina, Georgia, Wisconsin, Texas, even in the military.  We're even seeing it taking place right now in Florida.  

Political Cartoons by Bob Gorrell

According to Just The News:  “Ballot brokers typically work up to a year in advance, ” ..........So this has been going on for years in the Orlando area and, up until now, nobody did anything about it. It's coercive, illegal, anti-democratic, widespread, and slimy.  According to a 2020 GOP congressional investigation of ballot harvesting, the kinds of problems this largely illegal (outside California) practice, which is growing, is all about this kind of activity:

The article linked above shows just  how corrupt and coercive this has become, and it's real.   And the failure of the courts, especially the Supreme court has in effect institutionalized voter fraud in America, although we're now seeing some movement in the courts to change that.  

Here's my entire now it's time to review, so please pay attention!!!!!! 

 Voter Fraud: The Continuing Saga, Part III.  Here I list 20 of my articles dealing with this:

  1. The 2020 Election Requires Believing the Unbelievable 
  2. Church of Wokeness and Voter Fraud (Multiple links)
  3. P&D Today: Voter Fraud and Abounding Corruption Everywhere.  (December of 2021 with 66 links showing voter fraud.)
  4.  Voter Fraud and the Media  
  5. Texas: The Eyes of the World Are Upon You!  
  6. What Americans Are Up Against? Dolchstosslegende, American Style!
  7. Election Fraud Happened! If Proven it Happened, It's a Constitutional Crisis
  8. Texas: A Tale of Two Planets
  9. Republicans are Shocked, Shocked I Tell You!
  10. Biden and Harris Have Much to be Grateful For!
  11. The Five American Heroes From Ohio and the Boyd Principle! 
  12. The Vote, The Fraud, The Consequence! Part II
  13. Republican Leaders Really Are Oblivious to the Obvious! (Multiple Links)
  14. Voter Fraud and the Media 
  15. The Vote, The Fraud, The Consequence! (Multiple Links)
  16.  Voter Fraud: The Continuing Saga (Many Links)
  17. Voter Fraud: The Continuing Saga Update (243 Links) 
  18. This Election Really is Shaping Up to be a Nightmare.
  19. SCOTUS Has Failed. That Failure May Be An Opportunity!
  20.  Scotus: The Eyes of Justice Were Upon You. And You Failed!

That's followed by 275 links demonstrating the reality of that fraud, with some of my articles in that mix. So, let's make it a mere paltry 255 links.  Then there's my  starting with, Where Artificial Intelligence Can Expose Leftist Vote Fraud.

Voter fraud elected Biden, and Pennsylvania is going to attempt to do the same to elect Fetterman, and any other state where the numbers are close, and that's why the Democrats like early voting, that way they know how many votes need to "be found", and how many votes need to be shredded.

 

 

P&D and The Week That Was

Truth is the Sublime Convergence of History and Reality

De Omnibus Dubitandum (Everything is to be questioned)

 This Link will take you to My Commentaries.  This Link will take you to My Commentaries by topic.  This Link will take you to My Global Warming Commentaries

By Rich Kozlovich

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It's almost mind boggling to think over 75% of Democrats, 35% of Independents, and 5% of Republicans think Biden is doing a good job.

The people in charge of the nation's money have no idea what they're doing.  Massive debt, unrestrained borrowing, massive spending, inflation at a 40 year high, a banking crisis, frozen housing market, de-dollarization abroad, massive corruption, massive government activity that's blatantly criminal, international political and social instability, and cryptocurrency.  Things aren't wonderful, and there's not one logical reason to be happy about it.

The Israel/Hamas War, the consequences of illegal immigrants being dumped on the streets of Northern "sanctuary cities and states", and the battle for Speaker of the House has caused an explosion of insight.  All of a sudden America is finding out everything conservatives have been saying is true....and they're shocked.....shocked I tell you.  

Climate change has been turned into a religion, the Church of the Warming Globe, and as more and more information becomes available, people are shocked to find this has been the second greatest scientific hoax ever perpetrated on humanity, with this blatantly political epidemic known as Covid running a close third.  Evolution is the first.  

America is on the cusp of disaster, economically, socially, culturally, and at some point, I think violently.  There are books out there that discuss historical cycles, and as all cycles, they repeat over and over again, and each and every one of them outline how the world is coming to the end of a cycle, and each of the end cycles end with economic disaster, and more often than not, a lot of violence.  

We're now at the end of a cycle, but much of that disaster can be avoided, but that will require guts, persistence, and the willingness of true leaders to be unliked and vilified rocks in the current forcing  America's "leaders" into fiscally responsible behavior.  That will be discussed in my Seldon Crisis commentaries. 


PRESS RELEASE

MY COMMENTARIES

  1. This is Our Seldon Crisis, Part II  By Rich Kozlovich
  2. Hamas Is Guilty of Crimes Against Humanity  By Rich Kozlovich
  3. McCarthy is Done and Now, the Real Story Begins, Part VIII  By Rich Kozlovich
  4. Israel/Hamas War Series  By Rich Kozlovich
  5. Israel/HAMAS War Series  By Rich Kozlovich
  6. But They Had No Plan! Yes, Actually, They Did!  By Rich Kozlovich
  7. Academia is a Cavern of Darkness  By Rich Kozlovich
  8. The Sewer Trout of Academia  By Rich Kozlovich
  9. This is Our Seldon Crisis!  By Rich Kozlovich
  10. Biden Reality In Perspective. The Lunatics Are in Charge of the Asylum! Part II  By Rich Kozlovich
      COMMENTARIES
  1. The Connecticut Green Amendment after Held v. Montana  By CFACT
  2. Who’s Behind the Pro-Palestinian Protests?  Leesa K. Donner
  3. Critical Threats to Israel: Hamas Propaganda and the Press  Leesa K. Donner
  4. Pentagon CFO’s Chief of Staff Has Family Ties to Islamic Terrorism  By Daniel Greenfield
  5. Obama, Iran and the Road to Gaza  By Daniel Greenfield
  6. American Blood on Iranian Hands  By Daniel Greenfield
  7. Climate Scare Blown Up By Geology  By Tom Harris 
  8. Eyewitness Account: Health Effects of Industrial Wind Turbines  By Tom Harris
  9. Patriot Neighbors: What Could Possibly Go Wrong?  By Robin Itzler
  10. AOC Doesn’t Dictate What Is Best For Israel or America  Mychal Massie
  11. Do We Really Know That Human Greenhouse Gas Emissions Cause Significant Climate Change?  By Francis Menton
  12. The Concerned Household Electricity Consumers Council Has Petitioned The Supreme Court For Certiorari  By Francis Menton
  13. What Passes For A "Demonstration Project" Among Our Government Geniuses  By Francis Menton
  14. The 2023 Tax Hell Index  Dan Mitchell
  15. The 2023 International Tax Competitiveness Index  Dan Mitchell
  16. America's Top National Security Threat Is Our Runaway Debt My Stephen Moore
  17. Investors abandoning “green” energy as they realize it’s never going to be cheap By Jo Nova
  18. Are We Winning or Losing? By Jeffrey Tucker


LINKS

Biden Consequence: America’s Existential Crisis, Deep State Corruption and Treason

  1. Federal Officials Collectively Silent on Sen. Kennedy’s Questions About Illegal Immigrants in the US
  2. A military dissent: Invisible Treason in America
  3. Dumb and dumber—Paying for our own destruction
  4.  Grassley: Over 40 FBI Confidential Sources Have Provided ‘Criminal Information’ on Bidens Since Joe Was VP

Climate:  The Second Greatest Scientific Fraud in World History

  1. Commentary: Climate Wokesters Find a New Way to Destroy Middle America
  2. The Current Republican Party No Longer Represents Me

Cost of Leftism

  1. Morris: Liberal Secular Jews Growing Disillusioned with the Left
  2. Viral Neo-Communism
  3. Billy Graham’s Christianity Today has been taken over by the radical Left

Democrat Demagoguery and Hypocrisy Go Hand in Hand

  1. Speaker Mike Johnson denigrated as an ‘election denier’ by the preeminent election deniers

Education in America is a Snare and a Racket

  1. Chicago’s Solution to Its Failing School System: Stop Grading Schools on Performance

Lawfare by Democrats is Banana Republican Political Persecution

  1. The Jenna Ellis Plea Deal: The Standard the Prosecutors Imposed on Her Was Impossible to Meet

Israel/HAMAS War Series

  1. Morris: Liberal Secular Jews Growing Disillusioned with the Left
  2. Major Left-Wing Nonprofit Funding Several Pro-Hamas Groups
  3. Explosive Journal report reveals an arms-smuggling route direct from Iran to ‘Palestinian’ terrorists… disguised as aid packages
  4. 'They are shooting at people': Terrorists block civilians trying to evacuate Gaza
Free North Star Clipart, Download Free North Star Clipart ...
Constant as the North Star

 

Tuesday, August 29, 2023

The Great Game of Let’s Pretend

Jeffrey A. Tucker Jeffrey A. Tucker @ Epoch Times

Last Wednesday, August 23, was supposed to be a night of reckoning and truth. The intrepid and independent journalist Tucker Carlson was to grill Donald Trump, who skipped the GOP debates because he is already the hands-down frontrunner and doesn’t want anything to do with conventional politics.

Tucker had spent the last three years on Fox correctly denouncing lockdowns, censorship, vaccine mandates, and medical segregation, plus the attacks on American liberty. He certainly knows what’s what. One might have supposed that the issues that tanked the Trump presidency and nearly the whole of American society and liberty would be front and center. Now was the time!

Oddly, none of it came up in his interview with Trump. The interview answered none of our questions about why Trump did what he did, which not only wrecked the American economy but arguably lost him the election. Even if you think the election was stolen, it was only through the mail-in ballots that the COVID controls unleashed. Tucker drilled down into none of this. It was as if 2020 did not happen at all.

The simultaneous GOP debate was even worse. Ron DeSantis started with a bang and spoke about lockdowns but the topic fizzled quickly. Following a flurry of pharma ads—indeed the entire event was funded by FDA-approved drug sales—the moderators briefly asked former vice president Mike Pence if he thought his administration bore any responsibility for learning loss because the Trump administration urged school closures.

Pence—who spent 2020 running cover for Anthony Fauci and Deborah Birx—wholly ignored the question and said something else. The topic was never revisited again.

There was not one word said about tech censorship, the millions displaced and harmed by vaccine mandates, the dictatorial reach of the administrative state, the vast flurry of litigation against everything and everybody, the mass loss of trust in government and media, the foundational attack on the Bill of Rights, or the very real threat that it could happen again.

On the same day as the debate, we already saw mask mandates being reimposed. But no one spoke about it.

You surely see what’s going on here. The biggest issues in American life, which everyone experienced with vast tragedy and death all around, and about which everyone knows, are suddenly too sensitive to bring up. It’s something of which multitudes are aware but because all official institutions were involved, all official institutions are quiet about it. As a result, the great reckoning we need for renewal is farther off than ever.

Meanwhile, we’ve got Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., out there on countless public interviews, as a presidential candidate, saying remarkable things like 1) the CIA in 1963 killed his uncle who was president, 2) the intelligence community works with Big Pharma on gain-of-function research to create and cure new killer viruses, 3) they germ-gamed the lockdowns since 2001, 4) the lockdowns of March 2020 was a coup d’état against representative democracy, 5) right now we have industry-captured Deep-State agencies that are ruling America who have no regard whatsoever for the U.S. Constitution or the idea of freedom.

He says all of this without any shyness and with a great deal of knowledge and detail. He provides the receipts. Indeed, he has written several books on these themes. People listen and think “Oh that’s very interesting” and go hear him speak, without any presumption that he stands any chance to be President despite his wild popularity because, essentially, the fix is in.

Biden has already been selected to get the nomination, which rather demonstrates RFK’s point. Meanwhile, I’ve never once heard any reporter or read any article that challenges him on any of the facts. It’s as if everyone knows that what he is saying is true but we cannot do anything about it anyway. So he is tolerated as a wayward eccentric from a noble lineage but best ignored if we know what’s good for us.

It’s a very strange time in American political history, no doubt. We have one line of thinking sweeping through the population—which is based on mass incredulity and fury—and then another which is a veneer of normalcy that is slathered on top of our anger by all official institutions, which work hard to keep all these topics out of respectable conversations. Meanwhile, the whole of academic, mainstream social media, major mainstream media, and all of government seems to agree that all these obvious topics are too incendiary to be raised in polite company.

So everyone in the top layer of this manufactured consent is glad to play along with this great game of pretend. Meanwhile, people are fully aware now that the intelligence community is deeply involved in areas of life we previously thought were independent. And we suspect this is true even of organizations and publications we once thought were more-or-less trustworthy. How else to explain their silence and/or lies on all the crucial issues of our time?

As regards all the institutions that locked down the population just a few years ago, nothing has changed. Sure, there are a few court decisions extant that said they went too far but those are all being challenged and await appeals to the Supreme Court. But while these grueling processes play themselves out, Google, YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn, and all the rest of our formerly free social-media platforms are more brutally censorial than ever. YouTube even announced that it will tolerate no content that contradicts the World Health Organization (WHO), which only three years ago recommended to the entire world the lockdowns pioneered by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in Wuhan.

In the last few days, my own phone has blown up with people terrified of a new lockdown. They worry about leaving the country for fear of new travel restrictions. They worry about new vaccine mandates for their kids in school. They are thinking of moving to Florida and away from the big cities on the coasts where crime worsens by the day and skyscrapers are still mostly empty because workers won’t come back. And the #1 song in the world wails about the cruelty of this new world and how it is sending people to an early death.

Who would have imagined that a collapse on this level would happen in plain sight and everyone would see it and yet the entirety of the culture planners would in effect impose a fatwa on anyone who speaks about it?

Certainly I never imagined this scenario. Our whole lives we’ve sung about the “land of the free and the home of the brave” but here we are unfree and not brave. Because of facial-recognition technology, we cannot even hit the streets anymore. That was the real point of the post-January 6 crackdown: to serve as a lesson that if we resist in person, we will be recognized and dealt with severely.

The silence about the truth is utterly deafening. It’s not just that we aren’t getting answers to our questions; we aren’t even getting questions outside a handful of venues including this one.

Meanwhile, the highest hopes for saving the country from ruin are being placed in the hands of the very chief executive under whom all this began. And why? Because people believe that he was tricked and betrayed into greenlighting this wreckage even though he has never actually said anything like this. It’s the only hope people have. It’s a thin hope indeed.

When I first read Orwell’s “1984,” it seemed like a dark and implausible fantasy and warning. I never imagined that it was really a reductio ad absurdum of a reality that he saw unfolding before him in the rising totalitarianism of his time. It turns out that he was a prophet of just how corrupt a highly politicized society with overweening bureaucracy can be in practice when careerism trumps courage and the cash nexus spreads the coercive mindset throughout all the commanding heights of the social order.

We are finding out now. The soundtrack of the end times is not Mahler or Wagner. It is gaming music with dance numbers on TikTok, with darkly distant echoes of a simple country singer in Virginia decrying the rich men north of Richmond.


Jeffrey A. Tucker is the founder and president of the Brownstone Institute, and the author of many thousands of articles in the scholarly and popular press, as well as 10 books in five languages, most recently “Liberty or Lockdown.” He is also the editor of The Best of Mises. He writes a daily column on economics for The Epoch Times and speaks widely on the topics of economics, technology, social philosophy, and culture.

First GOP Debate for Election 2024 and What's Being Said

By Rich Kozlovich 

Okay, for transparency's sake, I almost never watch these "gong show" debates, including this one. The last debate I watched in full was the New City mayoral debate which included Weiner and DeBlasio, and believe it or not, Weiner was the sanest of the all, except DeBlasio won.  Why?  He won by answering every question and saying nothing.  

However, I do read all the commentaries afterward, and it's a bit amazing how so many people can see the same thing and come away with such different views.  And whether I agree or disagree with them, I really do have to congratulate them for their fortitude.

As far as I can tell, there wasn't one question regarding the fraudulent election of 2020, why?  The answer to that question is in my view the shibboleth for a conservative candidate.  And as far as I can tell, there was  only one question about these banana republic indictments, and that was:

“If former President Trump is convicted in a court of law, would you still support him as your party’s choice? Please raise your hand if you would?”  

Four candidates immediately raised their hands, DeSantis and Pence hesitated, and Hutchinson refused.  Vivek Ramaswamy made big points with that audience, saying “President Trump, I believe, was the best president of the 21st century. It’s a fact." Which makes one wonder why he's running against Trump if he believes that.  During the debate both Pence and Christie were booed.  

I've searched out and gathered as much information as I can, linking those articles for my benefit as well as that of my readers. Invariably I find a pattern emerges from such a collective effort, and I get a clear vision of what actually transpired. 

Andrea Widburg thought the questions were shallow, and compared it to a  junior high school debate , complete with the cool kids asking stupid questions and the geeks fighting on the stage", and was even less impressed with Bret Baier and Martha MacCallum.

I've decided Monica Showalter, who is a consistently conservative writer, must be among the kindest people in the world.  She loved it all, "intelligent, lively, not too destructively argumentative, and well-controlled in content. Bret Baier and Martha McCallum at Fox News did a terrific job".  Really?  That must be why Bret Baier had to tell the audience to stop booing Christie. 

Newt Gingrich thought everyone was wonderful, the candidates and the moderators.  Of course this is the same guy who sat down with Nancy Pelosi and touted all this climate change nonsense, later claiming that was the biggest mistake in his life.  Really?  If he believed it, why was it a mistake?  If he didn't believe it, why did he promote it?  If you look up integrity in the dictionary, Newt's picture won't be beside the definition.  He has zero credibility with me.  

Jack Hellner claimed, and I think this is all one needs to take away from this dog and pony show, no one matched the man who wasn't there, Donald Trump. He does go on to say:

Republicans should first stop giving in to the media and other Democrats by calling limits on abortion a "ban" on abortion. Six-, 13-, 15-, or 20-week limits on abortions are not bans any more than moving pornographic books out of children’s sections in libraries is a "ban."  It appears that many people are giving Nikki Haley high marks for the debate because she appeared moderate and reasonable and willing to work with Democrats.

Hellner wasn't impressed. He felt Haley is a Vichy Republican, weak on abortion and will break under leftist pressure. No guts, no brains.  Chris Christie fails in logic, history, values, and integrity, and continues to look like a fool, which I predicted.  He's a class act, only it's all low class.  

Many found Vivek Ramaswamy impressive with his views on climate and social dysfunction.  DeSantis came off well, but Pence has nothing to offer different than Trump, and that he's not Trump. All the while trying to take credit for what Trump initiated, and it seems Carlson Tucker's claim he's "creepy" may be coming to the fore.  

One of the problems with Republicans who claim to be conservative is they seem to have problem defining conservatism.  With the exception of Vivek, they all took a position big government has its place if only "it's done right".  That was Ted Kennedy, and Bernie Sanders position.  Which shouldn't surprise us, since even DeSantis has been waffling on this kind of thinking willing to be more "moderate".    

Haley was a shrill harridan, and for a former UN Ambassador, it appears she's a clueless globalist militarist, kind of like John Bolton.  As for Christie, it's clear he has the Ick Factor down pat.  Hutchinson wants Trump in prison, and Burgum did passingly well, but who cares?

On global warming, only Ramaswamy got it right.  Haley is as slippery as an eel.  She hedged on climate change, weak on abortion and has claimed, we have to humanize abortion, and stop demonizing it.  In a recent interview she states:

I mean, Ainsley, that’s the answer from my heart,”........ You know, I am surrounded by blessings, and God has blessed me with an amazing husband and two wonderful children. But having said that, I think it’s really important that all of us remember everybody has a personal story. So while I’m unapologetically pro-life, I don’t judge anyone for being pro-choice. I think that we have to humanize this issue. We’ve got to stop demonizing this issue.

What kind of answer is that?  It's simple, it isn't an answer, it's a logical fallacy evasion.  Like DeBlasio, she talks a lot and says nothing, so let me help her.  Calling the murder of the innocent unborn murder isn't demonization, it's the truth.   She wants to humanize this issue? Fine, then call it what it is: Infanticide!

Clearly, she's not a conservative, and you have to wonder why these GOP political hacks are so cripplingly desirous of playing this game of appeasement to the left.  Do they really think anyone on the left is going to vote for them? Maybe they do it because they're gutless losers?  Yet, one commentator thought Haley came off as classy and presidential, and would be a great VP for Trump.  Given her backstabbing history, just how cognitively dissonant is that?  

Tim Scott did very well, and his "disdain for Wokedom" is very real, but he's not going anywhere.   Pence again offers nothing, except to say he's not Trump, yet attempting to take credit for what Trump initiated.  And he thinks that's really gonna work?  Sure, with MSNBC. It seems Carlson Tucker's claim he's "creepy" may be coming to the fore.  And again, Christie now owns the Ick Factor, and his "rule of law rants" ring hollow given he's famous for his bridge closure to get back at a political rival.  

There's been some resentment that Larry Elder wasn't allowed in on the debate, and while I've always felt he was a good man with a good mind, the fact is he simply didn't have sufficient support to qualify.  
 
But that brings up what I think is an important point.  
 
Why is it a well know writer and thinker like Larry Elder, who's widely respected, wasn't able to get sufficient support to be in on the debate, and yet a virtual unknown, Vivek Ramaswamy, come out of nowhere, soar in the polls and met the qualifications to be on that stage?

Based on how they all attacked him, he's the one they're all really afraid of, even implying the rest of the candidates are bought and paid for.  He didn't win any friends, but that may be the pot calling the kettle black, and their fear may not be justified.

His presentation at the debate was impressive, and he's adept at saying all the things conservatives want to hear:  End the war, secure the order, drain the swamp, even vowing to release Jeffery Epstein’s client list if he's elected, and he's been saying all this stuff all over the media.  Why hasn't he been banned or blocked?  Given how everyone else is censored when spouting anything the establishment doesn't like, you must wonder why he isn't censored?     

This video is profound.  A video by a man who says he's not a financial analysis, nor an investigative reporter, yet found all this publicly available information in a few hours.    He notes that all these media outlets are in fact mouthpieces of the establishment, so why aren't they censoring Vivek?  How can someone be anti-establishment when they’re being supported by the establishment media?

His business expertise must be seriously questioned, including where he got the money for his campaign.  According to the video, his company has never been profitable and never produced a single product.  So, why did Blackrock, Vanguard and State Street investment companies, all ESG promoting firms, the most powerful cartel in history pour millions into a company that lost a billion dollars making Vivek very rich.  In fact it's been claimed he made a billion dollars by tricking investors pushing an Alzheimer drug that didn’t work.

He says he’s going after the teacher's unions, yet the California teachers union was one of the investors in this losing company.  Why?   His connection with Soros and the covid mandates are truly troubling, and this business about being named a young global leader by the WEF didn't bother him for two years as he used that to generate investment money,  then claimed he never agreed to that and sued WEF and got them to remove him from the list and sent him a letter of apology, all in three months. 

He claims he will challenge China, and yet he has business ties to China.  He's even open to pardoning Biden family for all these crimes they've committed, claiming they're nothing more than 'politically motivated persecution'.  Amazing!  He claims to be anti-establishment but is he really, or is he a mole for the establishment?

There's talk he isn't a "natural born" citizen as required by the Constitution, but those who say this use the "three legged" stool argument.  Either the father is an American citizen, or the mother is an American citizen when born in the USA.  But the Constitution doesn't define what a natural born citizen is, and the Supreme Court has declared anyone born in the United States is a natural born citizen, irrespective of the citizenship of their parents.   

So, as far as I can tell, by law, this argument against Ramaswamy isn't going to go anywhere, but neither is he.  He soared after the debate, but now I think as more information comes out about him, his numbers have dropped to less than double digits, and DeSantis is now in the double digits.  the others have come up also, but no one really cares.  

It would appear the real winner of those on the stage turned out to be DeSantis, not Ramaswamy, and while Trump dropped six points, he's still 38 points ahead of DeSantis, and after the "mug shot seen around the world" appeared, contributions to Trump's campaign soared.  Trump drew  200 million,....that's ...200 million viewers in his Trucker Carlson interview, and Steve Bannon claims the The Old Republican Party ended in Milwaukee that night.   

Final real conclusion?  In spite of all the blather from the talking heads like Sununu, here and here, Sen. Cassidy insisting Trump should drop out of the race, Al Sharpton's keen understanding of history, and Karl Rove's whine:  Trump won!

Sunday, August 13, 2023

Friends Who Stand The Test of Time Are Priceless

By Rich Kozlovich

For the long time readers of P&D it's known I was an exterminator for 40 years, and I owned a pest control company for 30 of them.  I was also heavily involved in the affairs of my industry through our trade associations defending those who are pesticide and fertilizer users, along with manufacturers and sellers of those products in Ohio.   

A good friend, who was the CEO of a pesticide distribution company, once told me the real benefit for me being an active member of our trade organizations was, I “prevented other people from being talked about!”  It appears I’m amazingly good at that, and with almost no effort on my part.  

Heterodoxy isn't for the faint of heart, and for decades I was the heterodox to the structural pest control industry in defense of pesticides, especially DDT, and challenged all the health concerns and lies perpetrated by environmentalists    Even in an industry that's so intrinsically involved with pesticides, that offended a lot of people in our industry, including those involved in selling products to the industry. I viewed that as a betrayal to the nation, and said so. 

But, that's no big deal, since offending people seems to be my stock in trade since over the course of my life I’ve managed to offend an inordinate number of people. I seem to have a genetic propensity for it.  Some were offended the minute they met me, which always confused me.  I didn’t mind so much being scorned, I just thought they should allow me the opportunity to be obnoxious before rendering their judgement and receiving their contempt. 

As a result, no matter what I achieved (and those who were my friends, or at least fair minded, felt I achieved a lot) it was never quite as good as what others had not achieved.  Many of whom were lauded and ended up receiving awards for their lack of achievement.  Ya just gotta see the humor in that.

While I’ve just chuckled, shook my head, and rolled my eyes, I have to admit, I always thought that was remarkable how people are so easily gulled.   However, it’s not inexplicable.  It’s been my experience that very often prominent people are only good at being prominent, and that especially applies to the go along to get along people, who are often rewarded for not getting anything done other than going along to get along. 

Often times getting things done means having to fix things, and usually that requires change.  People hate change, especially since they view those changes as a condemnation of what they’ve been doing, irrespective of their failures.  And they really don’t like those who promote that change.   

I've manage to fit very nicely in that group.   

Definition leads to clarity, and unfortunately people fail to, or refuse to, define things properly, and resent anyone who can, especially when that definition is in opposition to their preconceived, or failed notions. 

The world's leaders, government and industry, are made up of Winston Churchills, Neville Chamberlains, and Vidkun Quislings.  The Neville Chamberlain types are always finding a third way to get along and go along.   Everyone likes them, everyone applauds them and everyone hates the Winston Churchill types who are always difficult, always demanding, always insisting there’s only one right way, and insist everyone recognize the right way, which of course is their way.   Finally, there are the Quislings of the world who will betray everyone for their own benefit. 

But when the Chamberlains foul up everything who do they turn to?  The Winston Churchills of the world.  Of course, once they’ve fixed the mess the Chamberlains created, people can’t wait to kick them to the curbWhy?  Because ... they ... just.... won’t .... go.... along ... to ... get ... along.    That’s people, and people will always be people.   

Finally, there are the traitors like Vidkun Quisling, who was shot after WWII.   However, that type is very often rewarded for their betrayal, and we’re seeing a lot of that going on right now in the Deep State bureaucracies. 

I’ve lost decades long friends over my views.  It was their choice.  I've been scorned by prominent people with big egos, bad attitudes, endured back biters and whisperers in what can only be called character assassination, criticized for my articles by small minds over my positions, and accused of making false statements.  When that happens, I always demand that they name one, just one.  I get crickets.  I’ve openly challenged anyone from my industry, irrespective of position or education, to publicly debate me.  Crickets, it never happened.

I'm retired now, and I no longer interact officially with my former industry, and the folly the "leaders" of the industry foists on the membership.  But I wouldn't have missed all that controversy for a million dollars.  It was worth every minute of it!  Why?  Because I’m left with a few exceptionally good friends who’ve stood the test of time.   

And that’s priceless!

 

Friday, August 11, 2023

Ignorance Breeds Complacency. Complacency Breeds Tyranny - Or - Time and Truth Are on the Same Side, and Conspiracies Are Real

By Rich Kozlovich 

Biden is an idiot, his family is steeped in crime right up to their eyeballs, and the more Trump is attacked, the better he looks.  Another indictment and the nation may just anoint him as King Donald the First.  For a start, here's an excellent thought for the day.  I don’t remember who said this, but it’s a goodie. 

"Anyone who believes that politicians and bureaucrats who can't define what a woman is, who can't control the border, can't tell the truth about COVID, who can't teach children to read and do math at grade level, and who lied continuously about Obamacare can control temperatures, sea levels, and storm activity should make sure they never have to debate a five-year-old."

I've been a history buff for all of my life, and I concluded decades ago, everything is cyclical!  I read George Friedman's book,  "Storm Before Calm", which deals with this very well.   Currently I've been reading, "The Fourth Turning", which also deals with historical cycles.  Complicated book, complicated verbiage, entirely too long, way too wordy, which seem to me fails in “coherence through connectives”, a fundamental when it comes to writing and speaking if you really want people to understand what you’re saying. 

I’m not all that far into the book, and truthfully, reading it is a challenge.  At this point it seems to be as much mystical as historical in its projections, yet, the book has some interesting insights claiming among other things, we're in what he calls the Fourth Turning of the current cycle.  Actually, I agree with that.  While I do question his time lines, which seems to do some cherry picking, however, in his analyses every cycle has what he calls a Fourth Turning, and each of those “turnings” were crisis periods, and historically, his fourth turnings have always been conclusively violent.  I fear this is going to happen with or in America within the next ten years.  

China's military buildup has been financed by American trade, and now as a result, there are ten ways the US is falling behind China in national security.  That build up is intended to destroy America.  Hypersonic missiles, fleet size, air defense, manufacturing, technology, much of which they've stolen, mining for rare earths, gray zone altercations.  Gray zone altercations are non-shooting military intimidation tactics they regularly play with their neighbors.  In short, they're bullies, and don't care if anyone likes it or not. Then there’s their excursions into space, cyber operations, and artificial intelligence. 

But America's military is not to be outdone.  America’s Secretary of Defense, Lloyd Austin, a man of incredible vision, has clearly identified the military’s real problems undermining America's military readiness and capability.   The twin crises of white supremacy and gender.  And outlined an agenda to fix them.

We can't keep our subs repaired, recruitment is in the toilet, many combat aircraft are permanently on the ground, and the generals and admirals are all members of the Church of Wokeness. But hey, we gotta have our priorities.  Right?

The unending political persecution of  Donald Trump by the corrupt Deep State and the Democrat party is blatantly Stalinist.   While I can acknowledge the contributions of Thomas Jefferson, I'm not a big fan.  But he was brilliant as he once observed:

All the powers of government, legislative, executive, and judiciary, result to the legislative body. The concentrating these in the same hands is precisely the definition of despotic government. It will be no alleviation that these powers will be exercised by a plurality of hands, and not by a single one. 173 despots would surely be as oppressive as one. 

An elective despotism was not the government we fought for; but one which should not only be founded on free principles, but in which the powers of government should be so divided and balanced among several bodies of magistracy, as that no one could transcend their legal limits, without being effectually checked and restrained by the others. Nor should our assembly be deluded by the integrity of their own purposes, and conclude that these unlimited powers will never be abused, because themselves are not disposed to abuse them.

They should look forward to a time, and that not a distant one, when corruption in this, as in the country from which we derive our origin, will have seized the heads of government, and be spread by them through the body of the people…. Jefferson warned that relatively soon, “corruption” will have seized the heads of government” and “spread by them” through the “body of the people” — also known as…Congress.

How was Jefferson able to see this so clearly?   He read a history book or two, and there's nothing new under the sun. 

The fact is, what he warned about started happening not too long after the Constitution was ratified with the Whiskey Tax of 1791.  A tax which was clearly unequal, unfair, violated states’ rights, culminating with a greater violation of states’ rights with Washington leading an army into Pennsylvania to put down the Whiskey Rebellion of 1794.   It all merely expanded to what we're seeing. We now call it Crony Capitalism. 

This tax was promoted by then Secretary of the Treasury Alexander Hamilton, and was directly beneficial to the whiskey distillers in the major metropolitan areas.  The Constitution had just been ratified in 1787, a mere four years before, and Hamilton wanted to solidify support for the Constitution from the business community.   Hamilton was strong advocate of strong centralized federal power over republicanism and states’ rights, and Washington never made any effort to thwart this.  Washington was lauded by Congress for this action, and those who supported his venture claimed he once again saved the nation, and this time from a challenge to federal authority by the people. 

Jefferson rightly recognized if for what it was.  Washington's call for troops to put down this rebellion was in point of fact an abuse of Presidential power and authority, a veiled threat to the citizens of the nation, and a threat to republican ideals. While I do think Washington deserves praise as the Father of Our Nation because of his personal courage, amazing leadership skills, and his willingness to walk away from power after two terms, I also think he's overrated, most certainly as a general, but also as a President.

Jefferson's administration repealed the Whiskey Tax.

Banks are cancelling the accounts of people who hold political views they don't like, investment companies are ignoring their fiduciary responsibilities to their investors in order to support ESG and DEI conceptualized companies, many of which are either under performing or outright failing.  But they have no problem with the insane leftist radicals that are destroying western culture and ultimately civilization.  

Heresy is rampant at the highest levels of "Christian" churches. Biden can't afford to build a border wall, yet he really wants to give Ukraine another unaccountable, untraceable 20 billion dollars, to one of, if not the most, corrupt governments in Europe, and the Deep State and an international elite are creating what's being called "a new normal".  An international tyranny that you had better like or else. A tyranny determined to destroy all Constitutional guarantees.

All of that has now become obvious.

In years gone by there was a lot of laughing and friendly banter between me and my friends over my claims about conspiracies.  Well, whaddayaknow. There really is such a thing as a conspiracy after all, and they're not laughing any longer. 

Just like Jefferson, I read a history book or two, and there's nothing new under the sun. 

Monday, July 24, 2023

After All the Shouting Ends, It Will Still Be Trump, Part III

By Rich Kozlovich

When you follow the elections for President of the United States closely, or perhaps I should say deeply, you find a lot of really .....well....let's put it kindly and just say really unique scenarios. As an example, can anyone tell me how many declared candidates there were from all parties in 2016? I know you can't, so here's the answer. As of August 17, 2015, there were eighty eight. Shocked? Yeah, so was I when I wrote a piece about it on that date.

From the Democrat party there were 18 declared candidates. For the Republicans there were 38 declared candidates. Then there were the 32 declared third party candidates from, America's Third Party, Constitution Party, Greens, Independents, Libertarians, Reform Party, Socialists, and believe it or not, the Transhumanist Party.

Most of these people weren't even on the ballot of many, or even most states, had little funding, and absolutely no chance of even being invited to the debates let alone winning any primaries, and they had to know they were wasting everyone's time and any money thrown their way.   So why in the world would they tell the world they were running for the Presidency of the United States?

I haven't researched it, but as far as I can tell, this election isn't that strange, although it's still early for the loons to emerge from the political morass. But no matter the numbers, we still come back to one incontrovertible fact. Only one of the declared runners for the Republican nomination is going to get nominated, and most who are running will likely drop out before or after the first primary.  These aren't stupid people with no political savvy.   They had to have known from day one they were not going to make it!   So why bother?  What's going on in their minds? 

Big egos bad attitudes are part of it. The ability to say, "I ran for President of the United States", which I think fits Doug Burgum, who I think is a loon, and in order to meet debate requirements he's offering a $20 gift card if you give him a $1.00 donation. How wacky is that?  In the case of Chris Christie, it's blatantly a bad attitude, and the more interviews he does for the propaganda wing of the Democrat party, aka, the regime media, that becomes more apparent.  

Some have undeclared and undefined alternative motives, I put Asa Hutchinson there.  It seems some are in it hoping they can alter the narratives, or to help direct policy, which I think is Larry Elder's goal, and I also think Tim Scott, who's done very well thus far, fits in that mold.  He's stood up for Trump and if Trump wins I think he gets to play a major role in a Trump administration if he wants it, but I don't see him lasting beyond one primary, but not more than two.

Then, there are some who are surrounded by advisors with their own motives constantly whispering in their ear over and over again; you can do it, you can do it, you can do it, until they begin to believe it, and I think both DeSantis and Pence fit in that category, and Pence is burnt toast.  I guessing he'll be out after the first primary if not before since I'm reading his donations are dropping rapidly, and allegedly even Chris Christie raised more than Pence.  Pep talks are all fine and good, but being the Little Engine the Could, isn't the same as running for President.   Running for President goes beyond will power, and mostly, it involves money, lots of money.

DeSantis is running out of money, and laying off workers, and recent polls are troubling.  Trump  has a commanding lead in early states and DeSantis in now third in South Carolina.  It seems to me he's becoming desperate looking for a campaign boost in Utah.  And what must really be of concern to DeSantis is Vivek Ramaswamy has now tied him for second over all, and I've read that money that was going to go to DeSantis is now going to Ramaswamy, although I seriously doubt anyone can really prove that.  

His rise in the polls is totally understandable given his views on things.  Views which are deep in the hearts of conservatives.  But he has some troubling history, and I wonder at his foundational values and beliefs, either way, he's not going to be nominated and I think will last no more than two primaries, and may last longer than DeSantis, but if Trump is elected he may land a spot in that administration.  

DeSantis is well liked and respected by the conservative base, but I have no doubt while they like him, they resent his challenging Trump, and that's his Achilles heel.  They view his run as a betrayal. Can he land a spot in a Trump administration?  Maybe, he really hasn't attack Trump, but that depends on a lot of factors and options, many unknown.   Which brings me to Nikki Haley. 

Now, in order to understand some of these politicians, actually all politicians, we really need to talk about logical fallacies.  The reason Senators Cruz, Hawley and Kennedy make mincemeat of presidential appointees is because they understand logical fallacies, and recognize them when these nitwits give their "non answers" to their questions.

When I read or hear what politicians say, or don't say, I can't help but think of one of my favorites fallacies, the "If by whiskey" fallacy, which actually originated in 1952 in a speech "by Noah S. “Soggy” Sweat, Jr., a young lawmaker from the U.S. state of Mississippi, on the subject of whether Mississippi should continue to prohibit (which it did until 1966) or finally legalize alcoholic beverages."  It goes like this:

My friends, I had not intended to discuss this controversial subject at this particular time. However, I want you to know that I do not shun controversy. On the contrary, I will take a stand on any issue at any time, regardless of how fraught with controversy it might be. You have asked me how I feel about whiskey. All right, here is how I feel about whiskey:

If when you say whiskey you mean the devil’s brew, the poison scourge, the bloody monster, that defiles innocence, dethrones reason, destroys the home, creates misery and poverty, yea, literally takes the bread from the mouths of little children; if you mean the evil drink that topples the Christian man and woman from the pinnacle of righteous, gracious living into the bottomless pit of degradation, and despair, and shame and helplessness, and hopelessness, then certainly I am against it.

But, if when you say whiskey you mean the oil of conversation, the philosophic wine, the ale that is consumed when good fellows get together, that puts a song in their hearts and laughter on their lips, and the warm glow of contentment in their eyes; if you mean Christmas cheer; if you mean the stimulating drink that puts the spring in the old gentleman’s step on a frosty, crispy morning; if you mean the drink which enables a man to magnify his joy, and his happiness, and to forget, if only for a little while, life’s great tragedies, and heartaches, and sorrows; if you mean that drink, the sale of which pours into our treasuries untold millions of dollars, which are used to provide tender care for our little crippled children, our blind, our deaf, our dumb, our pitiful aged and infirm; to build highways and hospitals and schools, then certainly I am for it.

This is my stand. I will not retreat from it. I will not compromise.

I will admit, wanting to be on both sides of an issue is a troubling characteristic of all politicians, but that in my view is the real Nikki Haley.  Slippery as an eel and not even to be trusted if she said day was light and night was dark.  

Then there's Will Hurd, who I never heard of, and in spite of his pro-Trump voting record while in the House, he seems to be running on a "I hate Trump" platform now.  Then there's the Mayor of Miami, Francis Suarez, who I also never heard of and doesn't seem to have a platform, but has held views conservatives won't like. They clearly belong in the big ego category, as they have to know they're not going anywhere with this, and will be out long before the first primary. Hurd views himself as a moderate and Suarez views himself as a conservative.  Imagine that.

As for Trump, all these candidates are having almost as big a positive effect on his candidacy as all these so-called criminal charges. The more coming at him, the better he looks.  As a result, the more devoted the base is to his candidacy, and truthfully, Trump seems to thrive on controversy and battle. 

At some point I'll have to write a commentary regarding the Democrat candidates, who I'm calling the Gong Show candidates.  On The Gong Show people would "perform", degrade, and humiliate themselves in order to win money, even as much a whole $500!  Imagine that.

We have a neurologically afflicted sitting President who has no idea where he is half the time, babbles incoherently, is corrupt up to his eyeballs, along with his family who are involved in his criminal activity.  There's even a "he won't run" narrative".  Let's face it, if he says he's out, I have little doubt the number of weird claimants to the throne will be legion.  

Then we have a Kennedy who's a loon, hated by his own party, attacked by the leftist media, but looks sane by comparison to Biden, and has started the "no one is above the law" corruption criticism, and that's going to escalate as more and more irrefutable evidence emerges of his criminal activity. 

A radical racist black academic, Cornel West, as a third party candidate, and probably the most sane of the lot, author Marianne Williamson.  But like all leftists, she's worships at the Church of the Warming Globe, but she's just not as obviously nutty as the rest.  Of course, we don't know much about her yet, and probably won't as she'll be gone overnight.  

At this point I think patience is in order to see what Biden is going to do, or what's going to happen to him, assuming of course Congressional Republicans grow a backbone.  Because I really think the Democrat party is on the cusp of a battle royal between all these leftist demagogues who infest their party, and who actually hate each other almost as much as they hate conservatives.  Remember, leftism is a secular religion, and in so many ways they're like Muslims who hate other Muslims who belong to a different sect as much as they do infidels.  For both of these "religions", hate is a foundational tenet.

When it breaks, then I'll cover them more thoroughly, and probably break out in hives. 

Saturday, June 24, 2023

Supreme Court’s WOTUS ruling will shake things up across the board

By June 23rd, 2023 44 Comments @ CFACT

Last month’s landmark Supreme Court ruling in Sackett v. EPA not only narrowed the scope of the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) authority to regulate wetlands, but it will also have reverberations far beyond the Clean Water Act (CWA).

What began as an effort by Michael and Chantell Sackett to build their dream home on their 0.63-acre lot near Priest Lake in northern Idaho morphed into a 16-year legal battle that ended in a victory for the couple and a defeat for EPA when the High Court ruled that their property was not a wetland and thus not subject to EPA regulation under the 1972 CWA. But in decreeing that the only wetlands EPA could regulate were those with a “continuous surface flow” to a navigable water, such as a lake or river, the court rendered a judgment that will affect other federal environmental statutes as well.

Removing the need for many projects to obtain permits under Section 404 of the CWA, which governs dredge-and-fill discharges, will erase important triggers for National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) and Endangered Species Act (ESA) reviews, according to George Glicksman, a law professor at George Washington University.

Effects on NEPA and the ESA

“The programs are intertwined in ways that aren’t immediately obvious,” he told Greenwire (June 15). As Greenwire explained:

“Both NEPA and the ESA require federal action to trigger a review, which in turn forces developers to consider their project’s effect on the environment and vulnerable species. Otherwise, a Section 404 forms this federal connection. But without a Clean Water Act permit, that federal nexus – in some cases – disappears.

Depending on the complexity of the project, NEPA, for example, can require either an environmental assessment or a much more comprehensive environmental impact statement (EIS). It can take years for federal officials to complete an EIS, prompting some developers to walk away from a proposed project out of sheer frustration. Before the Supreme Court’s May 25 ruling, an EIS, which included a project’s effect on a wetland with no continuous surface connection to a navigable body of water, prolonged the permitting process. With wetlands lacking that continuous surface connection no longer subject to CWA Section 404 permits, some environmental reviews will be shorter.

As it happens, the court’s ruling coincided with the enactment of a debt-ceiling agreement, which put time limits on the issuance of some federal permits. The result of both developments is less red tape.

Similarly, determining what constitutes a threatened or endangered plant or animal’s “critical habitat” under the ESA will become simpler in some cases because the types of wetlands subject to federal authority have been reduced.

By declaring the Sacketts’ bone-dry property a wetland, and then putting the couple through 16 years of litigation hell, EPA ultimately wound up diminishing its own authority under the CWA. As Professor Glicksman points out, the Supreme Court’s decision also affected two other environmental statutes. For decades, provisions of the CWA, NEPA, and ESA were skillfully used by regulators and special interest groups as a form of federal zoning to snuff out development not to their liking.

To be sure, the ESA is still a hopelessly cumbersome law with a terrible record of recovering vulnerable species. And NEPA still makes it difficult for the United States to carry out much-needed infrastructure projects. But the administrative regulatory state has been dealt a setback, and the country has moved a few steps closer to restoring the Constitution’s separation of powers.

Author

  • Bonner Cohen, Ph. D.

    Bonner R. Cohen, Ph. D., is a senior policy analyst with CFACT, where he focuses on natural resources, energy, property rights, and geopolitical developments. Articles by Dr. Cohen have appeared in The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Investor’s Busines Daily, The New York Post, The Washington Examiner, The Washington Times, The Hill, The Epoch Times, The Philadelphia Inquirer, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The Miami Herald, and dozens of other newspapers around the country. He has been interviewed on Fox News, Fox Business Network, CNN, NBC News, NPR, BBC, BBC Worldwide Television, N24 (German-language news network), and scores of radio stations in the U.S. and Canada. He has testified before the U.S. Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, the U.S. House Judiciary Committee, and the U.S. House Natural Resources Committee. Dr. Cohen has addressed conferences in the United States, United Kingdom, Germany, and Bangladesh. He has a B.A. from the University of Georgia and a Ph. D. – summa cum laude – from the University of Munich.