Aftermath 2012

I'm disappointed. I go back to that scene in "A Fish Called Wanda" where the crazy brother is clinging to the plane shouting DIS A PPOINTED!! Maybe I was naive. I thought that a decent man with a good plan and a history of turning around failed enterprises could win a national election. I thought that mere expertise stood for something.

But I guess you can't compete with the Celebrity Presidency that has evolved under this president. He seems more eager to talk to Letterman or Leno than his own briefing committees. Obama has had the media run interference. They have ignored by and large the overruns of Obamacare, which will hit us all in January's paycheck. The media failed to fully reveal the extent of involvement of the Attorney General in Fast and Furious. The media absolutely covered for the president himself on Benghazi, with CBS only releasing the full transcripts of a key interview Sunday night before the election. I do not know what the media has been promised. I know newspapers are bleeding red ink. I suspect that networks are being hit by a similar change in allegiance as young people drift to internet shows or movies ignoring standard fare. Could a media bailout be in the works? And, like the GM bailout, would it be based along political lines? Who knows? All I know is that I feel that the media played a key role in Obama's reelection. And don't even get me started on the MSNBC ad buy as a gift in kind. The most disgusting aspect of this was how the media spewed venom and lies at the public as fact in regards to Mitt Romney. I had a student swear to me yesterday that her preacher told her Romney would reinstate slavery. This is an almost direct quote from Biden, which the media distributed with impunity. They have a great deal to answer for.

My fears are the same ones I have had for three years. We appear to have a president that operates without principles or a budget. We appears to have the same essential set up in Congress for stalemate. But what is worse, we have the same stale ideas in play. I think that term limits across the board would go a long way in changing the status quo. I also think "no budget, no pay" should be instated to compel Congress to write a budget and for a president to sign it. I also believe that despite all the backpatting and self-congratulatory chatter, the Democrats are digging a much deeper hole. Today 2000 workers were laid off from Boeing. The stock market lost 313 points. Tomorrow key numbers on employment are supposed to be issued, and many believe that the most recent October numbers will be adjusted upward due to California's "accidental" failure to report last month. All I know is that my family is treading water and there's the real possibility that January's check will be less than December's. With that type of thing occurring across the nation in order to pay higher taxes (our 'fair' share) and provide money for all those freebies that Democrats like to shower on favorable demographic groups, next year is looking more bleak than this one. And that's no way to start a new year. Hey, maybe those Mayans knew what they were talking about.

Another Global Warming "OOPSIE" Moment

So we have all these celebrity types who want to latch on and bask in the reflected glow of Al Gore under the dubious guise of "stopping Global Warming." Never mind that that particular moniker has recently been changed to "Global Change" which syncs nicely with someone's presidential campaign rhetoric, just pretend to go along. Well now it seems that some fairly heavy hitters who have spent more than a summer studying the weather, global currents and such are questioning the rush to judgment on the part of the Nobel committee and the Usual Suspects. Read the letter linked to the title above and the blog at Orange Punch and then ask yourself as the prices on gas rise and the demands of the liberal left further restrict domestic exploration and production if it's worth it to your family to keep throwing good money on bad science?
Bad Science

Now, Can We Drill?

I want you to consider the amount of damage that has been perpetrated in the name of environmentalism. Thanks to the China Syndrome, we stopped building nuclear power plants. And the last ones built were so challenged in the courts that their costs were three times the original plan. Thanks to other environmental programs, we can't drill off of the coasts of Florida-where one of the potentially richest oil fields is currently being illegally tapped by Cuba. We can't drill in ANWR in Alaska for fear of a dwindling caribou population. We are pushed by a Congress with eyes on rural votes to have corn ethanol in our fuel. We haven't built a refinery in 29 years. We can't use coal because of acid rain. So what are we to do?

The Ivory Tower advocates for clean air like to point to things such as hybrid cars, expensive fixes for homes and ethanol from corn-which not only reduced fuel efficiency but causes the price of gas at the pump to spike due to the necessary purging of fuel lines in order to have it added. The same people who so elegantly point to rows of cars don't stop to consider that average people cannot afford these things. And with the rising cost of fuel, everything is going to rise in cost from food to energy. It's funny how the same folks who push these ideas don't understand that those of us who work for a living can't just trash our old clunkers and spend $400 a month paying for a new car. And what's worse, they don't really seem to care.

There is the laissez-faire attitude that we "little people" can simply walk to work or turn off the air conditioning. What about the elderly, the infirm or the very young? I guess it's easy to do without air conditioning when you live in a climate were it's only needed a few weeks per year, but what are you going to tell folks in Houston, Dallas, Flagstaff, New Orleans, Phoenix or El Paso? Should we simply close shop and leave town from May until September? Should we wander around like previous generations of the Dust Bowl era?

And it goes farther than that. There's no question that the war in the Middle East has to do with national security in as much as oil is necessary to our livelihood. With Saddam in power and exercising control of the region, we would have been his virtual economic slaves. Right now, environmentalist are limiting our abilities to produce domestic fuel in so many ways, and yet they refuse to realize that these goals have forced our hand internationally. Oil is reaching record purchasing amounts, and the government makes money off of every gallon. We have reserves, we have potential sites for exploration and drilling, but the same folks who seem to be blind to the needs of everyday people are keeping us from progressing. It's the same attitude that helped Marie Antoinette lose her head. At estimated costs to the consumer of $4.00 a gallon coming soon to a neighborhood near you, isn't it time for us to stop this wasteful navel gazing nonsense and begin to use what resources we have available to tide us through until the next great wave of transportation technology comes along? Most midwives and obstetricians will tell you that an induced birth is more painful for the mother and the child. What organized environmentalism is doing to our nation now is the energy equivalent of a pitocin drip. So for the last time, NOW CAN WE DRILL?