Count me as one among millions of the skeptics of this whole “human-induced global warming” chicken little phenomena. I believe it is, by far, the biggest money grab ever concocted by a bunch of ne’er say die hippies from the 60’s who never fully got over being ignored. That said, we have an interesting response from the head whiner caught in the middle of the aptly named “Climate Gate” conspiracy:

Michael Mann, co-author of the Copenhagen Diagnosis and lead author of the UN IPCC Third Assessment Report, blamed skeptics for taking the personal emails out of context.

“What they’ve done is search through stolen personal emails—confidential between colleagues who often speak in a language they understand and is often foreign to the outside world. Suddenly, all these are subject to cherry picking,” he said.

They’ve turned “something innocent into something nefarious,” Mann added.

The vital point being left out, he said, is that “regardless of how cherry-picked,” there is “absolutely nothing in any of the emails that calls into the question the deep level of consensus of climate change.”

This is a “smear campaign to distract the public,” said Mann. “Those opposed to climate action, simply don’t have the science on their side,” he added.

Translation?

“We, here in our cushy little echo chamber, talk in our own language of colloquialisms and double-speak and we all agree with each other. That makes us right because we’re smarter than you are.”

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• A Tale of Two Hard Drives: Apple’s Secret Weapon?
  Amen.

Dave Hinz, who died in an auto accident on his way to work early Friday morning, will be missed.  Steve Foley broke the tragic news at TMR, and the local paper gives us more details on Dave’s life and death.  Below, Gamecock remembers him.   The Directors and Contributors share the grief of our readers at Dave’s loss.  - Dan McLaughlin.

The first time I moved to Atlanta was in 2001 after losing my father, best friend and pastor in South Carolina. Now, three months after moving back, this time from North Carolina after a 30 month absence, I lose one the best friends I never saw.

Dave Hinz and several other close friends I made on-line over the years, beginning at Redstate.com, helped to fill part of the void even though we never met face-to-face. I don’t like to leave the house, you see, unless I just have to.

After yesterday’s tragic loss of my good friend, I never will see Dave in the flesh, but am thankful that I got to know him so well and learned so much from him via telephone, email and the web. God surely sent Hinz my way to help guide the DeVine dinosaur (He always forded me to make technological leaps, as he said, beyond communication via smoke signals through Tweets!) in his new Atlanta, 21st Century life.

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Two years ago the Democrats in Congress and the Bush administration got together to deliver a payoff to farmers: they required refiners to use 15 billion gallons of biofuels by 2012. They did not expect that a crashing recession would lead to a reduction in the amount of gasoline the nation consumes - the first such reduction in years. And they also didn’t expect a White House to push so aggressively for higher-mileage vehicle fleets.

Each potential solution would anger one interest group or another, so the agency has been subjected to fierce lobbying, including from members of Congress lining up behind various factions. One possibility is to raise the maximum proportion of ethanol in gasoline to 15 or 20 percent.

But that idea is opposed by some carmakers and pollution experts. They contend that high ethanol blends can cause damage to cars, including making catalytic converters run hotter.

The Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers says it believes this could cause the converters, components that help control pollution, to fail at around 50,000 miles. They are supposed to last for 120,000 to 150,000 miles. “We are sensitive to the issues facing the ethanol industry, but the government must make decisions based on sound science,” said Dave McCurdy, president and chief executive of the alliance, in a letter to the E.P.A.

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Noel Sheppard has a great post at NewsBusters about Barack Obama teaming up with the NFL to fight obesity.

Seriously, is nothing sacred? Can we not escape this man at all? People watch sports in general for the love of the game and to escape the daily minutia of life. Barack Obama showing up randomly like a bad rash is annoying.

Some major news has been hitting global financial markets hard over the last day or so: there is a prospective default by Dubai World, which is an investment vehicle operated by the second-largest of the seven United Arab Emirates.

It appears that a total of about $80 billion in debt is now at risk. About $10 billion of that is subject to rollover in the very short term, and may not be fully repaid. Major holders of the assets include HSBC, the London-based banking giant; the Royal Bank of Scotland; Japan’s Sumitomo; and others. None of these organizations is in a position to sustain another big hit to capital. RBS, in particular, has been all-but-nationalized by the UK government.

Until the financial crisis got really bad a year ago, Dubai had been on an ambitious campaign to become a global center for finance and high-end real estate. The original funding came from oil-rich Abu Dhabi, the largest emirate in the UAE. (Dubai has no oil of its own.) There are stories that Abu Dhabi decided to pull the plug on what is now not looking like a good investment story.

I’m still trying to figure out what the real impact is here, a process which may take some time because many people won’t be in the office today. $80 billion is a relatively small default in the grand scheme of things, but it is a sovereign default, and if it results in any kind of sizable loss-recognition by Dubai’s bankers, then that’s a hit to capital, and no one needs that right now.

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The argument being made by former Democratic Party Chairman Dean is really pretty simple: the only health care reform in the Senate bill is the public option, and if the four moderate Senators kill the public option, then the bill should die. Senator Sanders, again, re-affirms his opposition to his any bill that does not have a public option.

Watch it here.

[UPDATE: It turns out that the Salahis had contact with President Obama. Oy vey.]

Dear Sirs:

I expect better of you. Seriously. Even if, as some have suggested, this is a put-up deal, it can’t help but reflect poorly on the reputation and performance of your fine Service, which has provided a century and a half of efficient professionalism and security to the nation.

Couple slips though security to crash White House state dinner

Let me be direct. My plans for November 2012 include voting against Barack Obama for the Office of the Presidency. Your #1 job is keeping the man safe until then. Safe, as in not-letting-harm-come-to-a-single-hair-on-his-head safe.

Joe Blow can’t get through airport security with a 4-oz. bottle of mouthwash, and these two shameless, self-promoting dipsticks get within shouting distance of the leader of the Free World. Or whatever.

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Michaele Salahi and husband (and partner-in-crime) Tareq join United States Vice President Joe Biden (D) in a photo-op.

• “Just Below Zero”
  yeah, because I like stuff like this and Moleskins got trendy.
• Democrats Quietly Announce a Holiday Tax Increase
  Thanks you Democrats! Please sirs, can we have another?!
• Focus on the Family FAIL
  There's big news out of the evangelical movement — the Manhattan Declaration. It's a great document put together by committed Christian conservatives.

  Just one problem — they decided to announce on the day before Thanksgiving when not one person on earth is paying attention.

  Come on FOF. Relaunch next week please.

• The Meal of Love
  How do I know my wife loves me? She made this for me. This morning. Yup. She got up, sneaked out of bed, down the hall, into the kitchen, and whipped this up. Just for me. Damn, but I have got to lose some serious weight between now and January. This ain't helping. But I am loved.
• Buttered Rosemary Rolls – Tasty Kitchen
  If you need a last minute bread item for Thanksgiving, these are SUPER easy and delicious.
• Riehl World View: Climate Change: BBC Didn't Hide The Story?
  Good post. BTW, the only blog I find myself reading every single day these days besides RedState and Instapundit is Dan's blog. You should be reading it too.
• The Complete List of NewEgg Black Friday Deals
  More! BTW, I refuse to venture out on Friday, even to the Apple Store. If I can't buy my clothes and stuff from a place ending in dot-com, I don't want 'em.
• Black Friday Deals on Amazon.com
  Awesome. (H/T Kottke)

I am thankful for my wife and family who support what I do and let me do this. I’m thankful for Eagle Publishing, which since 2007, has provided a helpful team to make RedState happen. I’m thankful for Neil Stevens who keeps the lights on for us. I’m thanking for each of our front page contributors who daily work hard to provide some of the best insight and commentary on the internet.

I am thankful for Mike Pence and Jim DeMint being leading voices of conservatism in the House and Senate. I am thankful for Jim DeMint’s Senate Conservatives Fund, which has provided conservative activists an alternative to the NRSC to elect real conservatives to the United States Senate.

I am thankful for Rush Limbaugh willing to, every week day, take on the left and inspire and embolden Levin, Hannity, Beck, Ingraham, and many others to be voices for the right.

Above all save my God and my family, though, I am tremendously thankful for each and every one of you. You guys inspire me, give me energy, and drive my passion to fight the left and clean up the right. I thank each and every one of you for your friendship.

Have a wonderful Thanksgiving Day.

Bring on the food!!!!!!!!!

(Apologies to Irving Berlin)… We knew that Barack Obama was turning DC into a mecca for sucking at the public teat, but it perhaps was not as obvious until recently as to what extent this is occurring.  RedState member Fred Maidment sent this blog entry from The American to me this morning. It illustrates the depth to which Obama is influenced on “governmentalization” of the private sector.  The graphic tells it all:

Unsurprisingly, the low points come during the Democrat(ic) Kennedy, Carter, Clinton and Obama administrations. But the dearth of private sector experience in the Obama cabinet is almost breathtaking. As Nick Schulz notes, “over 90 percent of its prior experience was in the public sector”. Wow.

It shouldn’t be a “wow” moment, though. The Obama administration is promoting exactly what we have suspected it would - elimination of private sector industry in favor of government control. From banking to automotive to health care to “net neutrality” - the government takeover is already well under way. And we shouldn’t be surprised - they’re just doin’ what comes naturally.

This is my second annual “WKRP Turkey Drop Open Thread”

“With God as my witness, I thought turkeys could fly”

Happy Thanksgiving, my friends.  Enjoy the day, and give thanks to God today for the many blessings in your lives.

A group of conservative Republicans is set to offer a resolution be considered at next month’s Republican National Committee meeting in Hawai’i, calling on party candidates to embrace a majority of a group of ten positions based on core conservative principles to gain and retain RNC endorsements and funding.  I think it’s a brilliant idea that is right for the times.  I acknowledge that there are those who disagree and are concerned that such a resolution may end up bringing about more problems than it will solve.  But I hold that the resolution will help demonstrate to Republican base voters that the party is serious about a return to conservative principles.

Erick spoke for many conservatives in his reasoned and sincere criticism of the pledge resolution.  They are primarily concerned that requiring candidates to take a pledge of this kind will give liberal Republicans cover to proclaim themselves conservative.  They worry the pledge will result in more, not less, fiascoes like the DeDe Scozzafava candidacy in New York’s 23rd congressional district.

But the ten positions are written in a way that is broad enough that any Republican should be able to easily clear the bar of 8 out of 10 that the resolution requires.  Yet, the positions are specific enough to demonstrate both to base voters and disillusioned independents just what Republicanism entails.  And, the positions talk about what we as Republicans stand for, rather than simply what we stand against.

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68 years ago, Americans around the nation settled into a peaceful Thanksgiving weekend and celebrated with their loved ones. A week later, the nation was viciously attacked by Japan – an attack that sparked our involvement in perhaps the greatest of all wars.

This Thanksgiving holiday is different from that weekend. While we should likewise celebrate and give thanks for our innumerable blessings, this time, the American people are staring at an attack on our nation and can stop it. This attack is coming from within. The Obama/Reid/Pelosi healthcare bill – in its various forms - is an assault on the American way of life and an affront to all the generations before us who fought to preserve and protect our cherished freedoms.

Why? Because the bill will eliminate your God-given ability to care for your family according to YOUR wishes and YOUR conscience. It will insert Washington D.C., and the incompetent bureaucrats who live there, into your hospital room, your doctor’s office, your insurance company, your home and ultimately, into your personal health decisions. As analyzed here, the bill is loaded with active-government terms like “shall,” “tax,” and “require.” And, even a cursory review of the text will show how much power this bill gives Washington to interfere with your healthcare (you know, the town that brought you the TARP bailout, Katrina-relief and over $12 Trillion in debt and counting…). Qualifications, panels, reports, studies, mandatory insurance whether you want it or not, penalties, taxes, fees, mandates on coverage but restrictions on prices… and 2079 pages of non-stop assaults on your right to live free and care for your family as you see fit.

Say hello to lines, waiting rooms, priority lists and more expensive, less effective healthcare. Say goodbye to freedom.

That is, unless you act now. It is your job – indeed, it is your duty – to talk to your friends and family this weekend and in the coming weeks. Call them to action. Other than our fine men and women in uniform fighting around the world, there is nothing more important that you can be doing right now to preserve our children’s birthright – heirs to the greatest nation the world has ever known.

Read over the bill. Read summaries. Whatever you need to do. Try the Heritage Foundation’s website, http://fixhealthcarepolicy.com/. Then… pause the football games and take a break from the turkey and cranberry sauce. Talk to friends and family this weekend. Explain it to them.

Then… next week, when the Senate come back in session - call your Senator. Email more friends. Email more family. Then… Call your Senator AGAIN. Don’t stop. Repeat. Then… call Senators on the fence. And, feel free to start with Senators Ben Nelson (R-NE), Blanche Lincoln (D-AR), and Mary Landrieu (D- LA). They represent solidly red states - and need to have their feat held to the fire. The list of Senate office phone numbers can be found here. Shut their phones down. Flood their offices. Visit their offices.

The American people can win this, but only if you take action to stop it. There is one thing that elected representatives fear - and that is YOU, the American people. Celebrate Thanksgiving this year in the American way - by fighting for freedom and working hard to preserve this, the last best earthly hope for mankind.

• Inside the numbers: How Obama has fallen
  Wow. Other than black voters, the poor, and the Godless atheists of America, Barack Obama isn't exactly winning anymore.

Dang.

With President Obama having concluded his trip through one of the fastest-dying regions of the planet, complete with literal prostrations to a symbolic Emperor and metaphorical prostrations to an Emperor in all but name, this is as good a time as any to ask whether his Administration has developed a coherent foreign policy grand strategy yet. The evidence, to date, suggests that Obama foreign policy is like Obama campaign promises: destined to be realized in some shadowy future likely – but not certain – to come, yet already awarded rich accolades merely for promise.

The usual people who don’t understand foreign policy – which is to say, the sorts of people who are well-received, if not employed, by the State Department (which hasn’t understood foreign policy since Kissinger, or perhaps Dulles) – are of course charmed by the President’s playacting on the global stage. This is probably because the kabuki-dance of Metternichian diplomacy, though likely to allow untold millions to die of starvation, rape, genocide, torture, ethnic cleansing, and imprisonment, is more visually appealing than war and open conflict – not least because all of that starvation, rape, genocide, torture, ethnic cleansing, and imprisonment tends to happen in countries that don’t allow cameras near the atrocities.

This terrible conflation of form over substance elides the fact that Baron von Metternich developed the balance of power system he did to avoid a repeat of the devastation of Napoleon, and that ultimately, that very system of diplomatic communiqués, bows, negotiations, dinners, and playacting not only failed to avert the First World War, it positively accelerated and worsened the Second. In other words, the modern system is a shell of a remnant of a means of preventing a disaster that has long-since passed, and that failed miserably both times it was really well-tested. It is, in short, a system intended to devolve larger conflicts into smaller, more manageable ones, and is instead a method for preventing small conflicts by accumulating them into larger ones. Perversely, the whole, nominal point of the modern system of international diplomacy is to provide channels through which substantive foreign policy – that is, the real goals and desires of nations and nation-states – can flow without having more wars than necessary. Its loveliness should be secondary to its effectiveness. Applauding what President Obama has delivered – a foreign policy with better aesthetics than President Bush’s, without President Bush’s substance – is like wanting a faster car always stuck in the driveway: There’s no point if it’s not going anywhere.

Go read the whole thing.

We know from Haystack’s earlier post that Barack Obama’s “casualty count is nearly DOUBLE that of George Bush’s worst year as Commander in Chief.”

We know that Barack Obama is dithering while our soldiers and sailors die in Afghanistan. Yesterday, Barack Obama fell back on his typical blame Bush.

At a news conference in the East Room with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh of India, Mr. Obama suggested that his approach would break from the policies he had inherited from the Bush administration and said that the goals would be to keep Al Qaeda from using the region to launch more attacks against the United States and to bring more stability to Afghanistan.

“After eight years — some of those years in which we did not have, I think, either the resources or the strategy to get the job done — it is my intention to finish the job,” he said.

How exactly was George Bush not committed to stability in Afghanistan and stopping Al Qaeda from “using the region to launch more attacks against the United States.”

Just because the guy says it, does not make it so. But there is something more troubling in all of this that is flying under the radar.

In Obama’s “prosecution” of the war and dealing with military issues, he has decided to treat American soldiers and sailors worse than the terrorists.

Fox News is reporting that Navy SEALs have captured the mastermind behind the 2004 Fallujah massacre that saw 4 Blackwater USA employees murdered and mutilated.

What thanks is the Commander in Chief giving to these American heros? He is send them to court martial. Why? Because the terrorist got a bloody lip while detained.

Seriously.

In Barack Obama’s America terrorists are treated better than our soldiers and sailors.

From 6:00 a.m. to 9:00 a.m. this morning, I’ll be on WMAC-AM in Macon, GA filling in for Chris Krok.

You can listen here if you are interested.

RedState Morning Briefing
For November 25, 2009

Go to www.RedStateMB.com to get
the Morning Briefing every morning at no charge.

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