Tag Archives: Environment

News

CRISIS: Obama administration files court papers against the Defense of Marriage Act

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Story from the Associated Press. (H/T Breitbart)

Excerpt:

The Obama administration filed court papers Monday claiming a federal marriage law discriminates against gays, even as government lawyers continue to defend the law.

[…]In the court papers, the administration urges the repeal of the law but says in the meantime, government lawyers will continue to defend it as a law on the books.

[…]”The administration believes the Defense of Marriage Act is discriminatory and should be repealed,” said Justice Department spokeswoman Tracy Schmaler, because it prevents equal rights and benefits.

The law, often called DOMA, denies federal recognition of gay marriage and gives states the right to refuse to recognize same-sex marriages performed in other states.

Obama has pledged to work to repeal the law.

I have written before about the real reasons why people oppose same-sex marriage: because it is bad for children and because it is bad for liberty. So, by extension, everyone who voted for Obama is (effectively) voting against the well-being of children and against liberty, especially religious liberty and freedom of speech. Obviously most of them don’t know what they are voting for, but that’s their own fault for not studying hard enough.

At this point, it may be worth recalling all the “Christians” who voted for the most pro-abortion President ever, and who have now voted for the most anti-family, anti-marriage, anti-child President ever.

2008 voting broken by religious groups
2008 voting broken by religious groups

(Click for larger image)

Part of the reason that I am disappointed with the church is because they never discuss anything related to the real world. Too much time is spent on inwardly-focused practices like singing. And then the “Bible-believing Christians” go out and vote for Democrat candidates who oppose authentic Christianity (and religious liberty itself). They seem do vote Democrat on the basis of vague feelings of compassion, which causes them to support big government social programs instead of individual charity.

I wonder if the pastors will finally learn their lesson when the state jails them for refusing to perform same-sex marriages or for citing the Bible? Or will they just compromise on moral issues tomorrow, the same way they compromise on intellectual rigor today? It was so easy to invent nice-sounding justifications for dismissing apologetics from the church. I am sure they will find it easy to justify same-sex marriage and abortion in time, in order to keep the pews filled. Just look at Rick Warren.

And I think the root of the problem is the unwillingness to talk about evidence for and against Christianity in the church, to show debates and to host public debates as well. If Christianity is not real, then people are not going to integrate their faith with the rest of their lives outside of church in the real world. And that real world includes the voting booth.

Note: I am angry. To my regular commenters, please cut me some slack. I went to church again on Sunday and it was fine. (Mostly useless, but not heretical). But right now, I am incensed at the spiritual malpractice that led to “Christians” voting for a thoroughly anti-Christian candidate for President.

Commentary

New Heritage Foundation study says cap-and-trade will kill jobs and the economy

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New study from The Heritage Foundation, my favorite think tank! (H/T Hot Air)

This image tells all:

Job losses per year if cap and trade passes.
Job losses per year if cap and trade passes.

Summary of the effects: (adjusted for inflation to 2009 dollars)

  • Cumulative gross domestic product (GDP) losses are $9.4 trillion between 2012 and 2035;
  • Single-year GDP losses reach $400 billion by 2025 and will ultimately exceed $700 billion;
  • Net job losses approach 1.9 million in 2012 and could approach 2.5 million by 2035. Manufacturing loses 1.4 million jobs in 2035;
  • The annual cost of emissions permits to energy users will be at least $100 billion by 2012 and could exceed $390 billion by 2035;
  • A typical family of four will pay, on average, an additional $829 each year for energy-based utility costs; and
  • Gasoline prices will rise by 58 percent ($1.38 more per gallon) and average household electric rates will increase by 90 percent.

FYI, current GDP is around 14 trillion per year. The current labor force is around 130 million (non-farm).

News

New peer-reviewed paper in Science should end the global warming debate

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Here is the link to the published paper in Science. (H/T Watts Up With That via ECM)

Excerpt from the press release:

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A team of researchers says it has largely put to rest a long debate on the underlying mechanism that has caused periodic ice ages on Earth for the past 2.5 million years – they are ultimately linked to slight shifts in solar radiation caused by predictable changes in Earth’s rotation and axis.

In a publication to be released Friday in the journal Science, researchers from Oregon State University and other institutions conclude that the known wobbles in Earth’s rotation caused global ice levels to reach their peak about 26,000 years ago, stabilize for 7,000 years and then begin melting 19,000 years ago, eventually bringing to an end the last ice age.

The melting was first caused by more solar radiation, not changes in carbon dioxide levels or ocean temperatures, as some scientists have suggested in recent years.

“Solar radiation was the trigger that started the ice melting, that’s now pretty certain,” said Peter Clark, a professor of geosciences at OSU. “There were also changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and ocean circulation, but those happened later and amplified a process that had already begun.”

That should be the end of global warming alarmism, but it won’t be, because this whole brouhaha isn’t about science. It’s about money and power. The power to control other people. The power to control the free market. So it doesn’t matter if solar radiation cycles cause global warming as a matter of fact, because facts don’t decide here.

Here’s a helpful quote from the neo-Darwinian George Gaylor Simpson that ECM sent me from Uncommon Descent:

The verdict of paleontologists is practically unanimous: almost all agree in opposing [Alfred Wegener’s hypothesis that the continents used to be one land mass and have since drifted apart]… The fact that almost all paleontologists say that the paleontological data oppose the various theories of continental drift should, perhaps, obviate further discussion of this point … It must be almost unique in scientific history for a group of students admittedly without special competence in a given field thus to reject the all but unanimous verdict of those who do have such competence.

George Gaylord Simpson, “Mammals and the Nature of Continents”, American Journal of Science 241 (1943): 1-31, p. 2.

Yes, there was a time when the consensus of scientists was against the theory of continental drift. Something to keep in mind.

CORVALLIS, Ore. – A team of researchers says it has largely put to rest a long debate on the underlying mechanism that has caused periodic ice ages on Earth for the past 2.5 million years – they are ultimately linked to slight shifts in solar radiation caused by predictable changes in Earth’s rotation and axis.

In a publication to be released Friday in the journal Science, researchers from Oregon State University and other institutions conclude that the known wobbles in Earth’s rotation caused global ice levels to reach their peak about 26,000 years ago, stabilize for 7,000 years and then begin melting 19,000 years ago, eventually bringing to an end the last ice age.

The melting was first caused by more solar radiation, not changes in carbon dioxide levels or ocean temperatures, as some scientists have suggested in recent years.

“Solar radiation was the trigger that started the ice melting, that’s now pretty certain,” said Peter Clark, a professor of geosciences at OSU. “There were also changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and ocean circulation, but those happened later and amplified a process that had already begun.”