GREENIE WATCH

The Democratic Leadership Council released on March 18 a commentary, Carbon Flip, Mercury Flop. The screed begins: "When it comes to environmental issues, the Bush administration seems determined to destroy its own limited credibility." For a point by point refutation, see here

Some current posts on ecoNOT:
* Much a-doo: Greens advise moms not to use diapers!
* Misanthropic quotation of the week: from "animal rights" philosopher Tom Regan
* "Alternative energy" -- but not in environmentalists' back yards
* A new primer on the Mother of All Eco-Crises

If the scientists don't understand climate change, how can anyone be so sure of what to do about it? "As scientists have studied the climate record trapped in glacial ice from Antarctica and Greenland, and in mud samples extracted from beneath the ocean floor, their respect for the speed of change has grown. In the mid-1950s, a change of roughly 3 degrees C over more than 1,000 years was deemed abrupt. In 1999, a team led by Jeffrey Severinghaus at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in La Jolla, Calif., determined that the last ice age ended with a temperature burst that raised the thermostat at Greenland by some 9 degrees C over a mere decade.... "We still don't understand the causes" behind the increase, he says. .... But here, too, the picture grows murky. At a meeting last fall at the WHOI, researchers from the US and Canada looked at the problem and raised more questions than answers."

More elitist trash from the Green/Left: "In Growth Fetish, Hamilton admits that, in the past times of scarcity, growth was beneficial - but he argues that in today's era of superabundance development no longer leads to subjective wellbeing. To support his argument, he quotes opinion polls showing that people in prosperous societies are often unhappy with their lives... There is a nauseating undertone of elitism in Hamilton's work. In his view, the marketing industry, including advertising, plays a key role in shaping individual desires. He refers to 'gullible consumers' and goes on to argue that 'today's average consumer may be an everyday victim of foolishness and feeble-mindedness in their consumption behaviour' .... Whatever people's subjective sense of wellbeing, there remains a huge amount to be done to raise living standards, even in the more developed countries. For instance, we are constantly being told that there is a demographic problem that means that the elderly cannot expect a reasonable standard of living. But with greater economic growth it will become possible for the elderly and others not able to work to have higher living standards." I wonder how many working people today share the judgment that we are living in a world of "superabundance"? Only a "limousine liberal" would think so.

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OUTSOURCING AND INTERFERENCE WITH FREE TRADE

Who's outsourcing whom? "Airwaves and newspapers are abuzz of late with talk about the loss of manufacturing jobs, the offshoring of tech jobs, immigration, and general alarmism about the 'outsourcing' of the American worker. We hear lots of talk about exactly why (and if) this is happening, but rarely do pundits and commentators look at the relationship between companies moving plants overseas, and the kinds of tax and regulatory policies employed by the states they're moving away from. As it turns out, states with business-friendly public policies attract and retain jobs. States with policies hostile to business tend to lose them."

Outsourcing creates AMERICAN jobs: "When Americans hear the word 'outsourcing,' they typically imagine the movement of U.S. jobs overseas. But globalization has created many forms of outsourcing. Consider the world's appetite for American popular culture. America annually exports $90 billion worth of movies, TV shows, sound recordings and other products created by U.S. 'copyright industries.'"

South Africa's Leftist leaders have been successful in their vow to stop SA becoming the West's African "sweat shop". Pity about their 40% unemployed.

For years we have been hearing about a water shortage in the western states... What specifically is a shortage? It is a situation where you are willing to pay the price but simply cannot find as much as you want.... a shortage is a sign that somebody is keeping the price artificially lower than it would be if supply and demand were allowed to operate freely. That is precisely why there is a water shortage in the western states.... Even in California's dry Central Valley, less than 10 percent of the water available from federal water projects is used by cities and industries. The vast majority of it is used by farmers, who pay a fraction of what urban users pay, thanks to federal price fixing.The long-term contracts under which this ridiculous arrangement goes on expire this year, so theoretically these contracts could be renegotiated so that everyone who uses water supplied by federal water projects has to pay his own way and cover the costs of the operation. Alas, this is an election year, so you can bet the rent money that no such thing is going to happen.

Western protectionists to India. Don't do as I say. "I read about one Indian who said something like the following: "Hey, you lectured us for decades during the Cold War and Indian socialism. Aren't we now doing exactly what you told us to?"

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ELSEWHERE

Jeff Jacoby says: "Once upon time it was racists who insisted that "nonwhite" was a synonym for "intellectually deficient." Today that attitude is promoted most emphatically by the defenders of affirmative action, a system rooted in the belief that blacks and certain other minorities can't hope to win if they have to compete on a level playing field."

Even the tolerant Dutch cannot stand Muslims: "Dutch parents are abandoning the state-run school system in droves, and sending their children to private schools with high education standards, which just coincidently happen to be almost exclusively native Dutch. The private schools are referred to as 'white' schools, and the remaining high-ethnic state schools are referred to as 'black' schools, and the phenomena is being called 'white flight'."

Spanish "socialism": "Here are some of the economic promises on which Zapatero's Socialist Workers Party campaigned: lowering the corporate tax rate from 35 percent to 30 percent, cutting income taxes, and reducing the value-added tax. Oh, and they're going to balance the budget and control inflation."

I have just put up a recipe for Korean fried meatballs. I am betting that they are the best meatballs you have ever tasted. See here. Food names change a lot from country to country. I can translate some Australian food names into more widely understood ones but I will no doubt miss some. For instance, in yesterday's recipe I mentioned "zucchini". They are "courgettes" in England and "Italian squash" in the USA.

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The Left have always wanted more spent on welfare and made "Fascism" a swear-word. President Bush deposed a brutal Fascist dictator and sponsored a big expansion of welfare. But instead of being admired by the Left, he is hated with a passion. What does that tell you about the Left? It tells you that they have no principles at all: That everything they have ever claimed to stand for is fake.

Three more examples of Leftist dishonesty: They blame the 9/11 attacks on "poverty" in the Islamic world. Yet most of the attackers were Saudis and Saudi Arabia is one of the world's richest countries! They also say that they oppose racism yet support "affirmative action" -- which judges people by the colour of their skin! They say that they care about "the poor" but how often do you hear them calling for the one thing that would bring about a worldwide economic boom in poor countries -- the USA and the EU abandoning their agricultural protectionism? Leftists obviously care more about conservative farmers than they do about the poor!

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