Al Gore, Ignoramus

Power Line - Al Gore, Ignoramus: "It is a remarkable fact that Al Gore has had a significant influence on public policy relating to science when he is, in fact, utterly uneducated in scientific matters and is of very limited intelligence.

On the other hand, he's gotten rich, so I guess the joke is on us."

Hockey night in Liberia: NHL jerseys everywhere in war-torn nation

Hockey night in Liberia: NHL jerseys everywhere in war-torn nation: "Under the shade of a lush green palm tree, a hefty Liberian man sells pineapples and tries to escape the muggy tropical heat. All the while, he proudly sports a long-sleeved heavy-knit Toronto Maple Leafs hockey sweater."

The Supposed Sham of Advertising

The Supposed Sham of Advertising - Jeremiah Dyke - Mises Institute

The Smart Branding Story Behind Haiti's Brightly-Painted Buses

The Smart Branding Story Behind Haiti's Brightly-Painted Buses | Designerati | Fast Company

Marginal Revolution: Equality Shoes

Marginal Revolution: Equality Shoes: "At 6'2', I prefer this to equality limb shortening!"

QOTW

SteynOnline - Steynposts: "The quality of your argument is only important if you want to win by persuasion."

Renewable energy: Illinois moves to add tire burning to definition of renewable energy

Renewable energy: Illinois moves to add tire burning to definition of renewable energy - chicagotribune.com

Blessed are those the rentseekers for they seek free rent.

Africa's Cyber WMD

Africa's Cyber WMD - By Franz-Stefan Gady | Foreign Policy

Some Truckee Residents Not Cool With Penis Snow Sculpture

Some Truckee Residents Not Cool With Penis Snow Sculpture - KTXL

They rejected my headline of "Truckee Residents Choked at MTV's Behaviour"

S. Weasel

S. Weasel: "So let’s point out the utterly fucking obvious, shall we? There is no relationship between blogs and trees. Nobody is waiting around for a pingback before they go stick a spruce in the ground."

The case against the hockey stick

The case against the hockey stick - Prospect Magazine: "Andrew Montford’s The Hockey Stick Illusion is one of the best science books in years. It exposes in delicious detail, datum by datum, how a great scientific mistake of immense political weight was perpetrated, defended and camouflaged by a scientific establishment that should now be red with shame. It is a book about principal components, data mining and confidence intervals—subjects that have never before been made thrilling. It is the biography of a graph."

Theodore H. Frank: I am not afraid of my Toyota Prius

Theodore H. Frank: I am not afraid of my Toyota Prius | Washington Examiner: "In the 24 cases where driver age was reported or readily inferred, the drivers included those of the ages 60, 61, 63, 66, 68, 71, 72, 72, 77, 79, 83, 85, 89—and I’m leaving out the son whose age wasn’t identified, but whose 94-year-old father died as a passenger.

These “electronic defects” apparently discriminate against the elderly, just as the sudden acceleration of Audis and GM autos did before them. (If computers are going to discriminate against anyone, they should be picking on the young, who are more likely to take up arms against the rise of the machines and future Terminators)."

American lawmakers look to pull out of NAFTA

American lawmakers look to pull out of NAFTA: "Forget about the trouble Canada had with the Buy America policy, there is a new game in Washington; it’s called Block Canada. A group of congressmen have given their backing to a bill that if passed, would see President Barack Obama give six-months notice that the United States was withdrawing from the North American Free Trade Agreement."

American lawmakers look to give up supply of freshwater, oil, lumber, gold, diamonds, tourism, good faith and zinc.

Mirror, Mirror

Mirror, Mirror - WSJ.com: "Krugman scoffs: 'To me, that's a bizarre point of view--but then, I don't live in Mr. Kyl's universe.'

What does textbook economics have to say about this question? Here is a passage from a textbook called 'Macroeconomics':

Public policy designed to help workers who lose their jobs can lead to structural unemployment as an unintended side effect. . . . In other countries, particularly in Europe, benefits are more generous and last longer. The drawback to this generosity is that it reduces a worker's incentive to quickly find a new job. Generous unemployment benefits in some European countries are widely believed to be one of the main causes of 'Eurosclerosis,' the persistent high unemployment that affects a number of European countries.

So it turns out that what Krugman calls Sen. Kyl's 'bizarre point of view' is, in fact, textbook economics. The authors of that textbook are Paul Krugman and Robin Wells. Miss Wells is also known as Mrs. Paul Krugman."

E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial

E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial | Ten Geekiest Best Picture Nominees | Power Grid | Geekosystem: "The makers of M&Ms, as well, found E.T. himself so ugly that they passed up the use of their candy in the film, a place that Reese's Pieces was glad to fill."

Lol at the autobiography joke.

U.S. Economy Grinds To Halt As Nation Realizes Money Just A Symbolic, Mutually Shared Illusion

U.S. Economy Grinds To Halt As Nation Realizes Money Just A Symbolic, Mutually Shared Illusion | The Onion - America's Finest News Source

Waiting to hear 'we're sorry'

Waiting to hear 'we're sorry': "How can reporters assigned to write about the IPCC's credibility problem fail to Google 'IPCC hockey stick'? It's called 'research.' For that matter, why did journalists tell us the IPCC was an 'international panel of climate scientists' (New York Times editorial board) when that organization's own website says it's 'comprised of government delegations'?"

OK Go, "This Too Shall Pass"

OK Go, "This Too Shall Pass" (RGM version) [VIDEO]

Killer tiger safe: Ontario police

CBC News - Toronto - Killer tiger safe: Ontario police

Tigers in the news.

ht Kyle

The global warming guerrillas

The global warming guerrillas | The Spectator

He's entirely right about the failure of the investigative reporters.

Danny Williams going to U.S. for heart surgery

CBC News - Nfld. & Labrador - Danny Williams going to U.S. for heart surgery: "Newfoundland and Labrador Premier Danny Williams is set to undergo heart surgery this week in the United States."

It'll shorten wait times in Goose Bay.

Osama bin Laden enters global warming debate

Osama bin Laden enters global warming debate - Telegraph

Something comes to mind about lying with dogs and fleas.... and then it passes... strange.

California: Not Dysfunctional Enough!

small dead animals: California: Not Dysfunctional Enough!: "Now is the time at SDA when we juxtapose

BBC - California 'protects' Apollo 11 landing site on Moon

Mercury News - California controller: State will run out of cash before April"

J. D. Salinger, Enigmatic Author of ‘The Catcher in the Rye,’ Dies at 91

J. D. Salinger, Enigmatic Author of ‘The Catcher in the Rye,’ Dies at 91 - Obituary (Obit) - NYTimes.com: "(Mr. Salinger, who used italics almost as a form of musical notation, was a master not of literary speech but of speech as people actually spoke it)"

The “FDIC lotto” reason banks aren’t lending

The “FDIC lotto” reason banks aren’t lending | Analysis & Opinion | Reuters: "The problem here is that healthy banks end up competing with each other to have the largest capital surplus and therefore the greatest chance of being anointed in this manner by the FDIC. If everybody was lending, the FDIC would still have to place failed banks’ assets and deposits with someone. But instead we get the opposite corner solution, where nobody is lending — except, presumably, for banks which are close to failure and need all the interest income they can get. I wonder whether the FDIC has anybody thinking about how to counteract this syndrome."