To be continued ....: September 2024

Tuesday, September 24, 2024

Wrong, Media and Climate Plaintiffs, Exxon Can’t Have Known What Is Still Being Studied and Debated

“The contrived sense of accomplishment in history matching is spurious correlation for an infinitesimally small period of time. Using Exxon’s internal analysis of CO2 climate forcing is little more than a propaganda tool.”

“Exxon Knew” is a political-lawyer campaign focusing on certain internal company documents to make a case that the oil major knew that carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions were a future threat to human betterment.

Smoking gun? Hardly.

A half century later, the IPCC is still trying to update and figure out physical climate science. Exxon did not do a study on the benefits of CO2 or the offset of sulfur dioxide emissions. The concern way back then was Global Cooling, Peak Oil, and Peak Gas. And as the company knew, fossil fuels had no viable substitute, as in wind and solar.

This historical correction has been documented in many posts here at MasterResource, including:

Big Oil, Exxon Not Guilty as Charged: Six-part Rebuttal (September 22, 2022)

‘ExxonKnew’: More Correction (September 18, 2023)

Shell Knew? No (July 19, 2023)

Climate Alarmist as ExxonMobil Whistleblower (March 27, 2024)

In Search of the “Greenhouse Signal” in the 1990s (June 21, 2023)

Unsettled Science, IPCC-style (February 18, 2020)

It became my turn when I encountered this argument by Mark Burger on social media, He stated:

As opposed to fossil fuel industries war on hiding their impacts for decades? One example: “Exxon scientists predicted global warming with ‘shocking skill and accuracy,’ Harvard researchers say“

My Rebuttal

To which I respond (expanded from my reply on social media):

To say that Exxon knew the truth back in the early 80s is a laughable fallacy. Effectively they built a primitive model that is characteristically similar to the erroneous modern climate models of today.

Fundamentally their work is based on the poorly understood climate sensitivity (ECS) derived from radiative convective models and GCM models. To their credit, they actually acknowledged the high degree of uncertainty in these estimations. Today, even Hausfather (2022 vs 2019) is beginning to understand the climate sensitivity (ECS) is too high. CMIP6 is running still even hotter than CMIP5 and using ECS of 3 to 5° C rather than ~ 1.2° C as highlighted in Nick Lewis’s 2022 study.

CMIP6 should have been better because it incorporated solar particle forcing (Matthes et. al.) and as they incorporate more elements of natural forcing (an active area of research as we still do not have a predictive theory for climate), the effect is highlighting more underlying problems with the models.

However, Exxon investigators fell into the same trap that climate modelers of today where they build the models to history match temperatures and then wow, because they can create a model that appears to history match temperatures, they assume it is telling them something. Truth? Anyone can create a model to do this, but it would never mean the model is correct. While the models today are much more complex, they are based on a complex set of non-linear equations, and the understanding of the various sources of nonlineararity is poor. This opens up wide degrees of uncertainty yet wide opportunity for tuning. Furthermore, natural forcing is undercharacterized and deemed inconsequential.

The contrived sense of accomplishment in history matching is spurious correlation for an infinitesimally small period of time. Using Exxon’s internal analysis of CO2 climate forcing is little more than a propaganda tool. Current climate models, much more sophisticated, face the same problem of unknown, false causality.

https://climaterealism.com/2024/09/wrong-media-and-climate-plaintiffs-exxon-cant-have-known-what-is-still-being-studied-and-debated/

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Wrong, Time, Climate Change Did Not Cause Flooding in Europe

Time magazine recently posted an article, titled “Is Climate Change Causing the Deadly Floods in Europe?” that, while providing some balance, still asserts that the recent flooding in Poland and other parts of Europe reflects a broader worsening pattern caused by climate change. This is false. There is no indication in the data showing a “pattern” of increasing flood severity or incidence.

Time admits that it’s “difficult to draw a conclusive link between this event and climate change,” but then says “experts say the most severe floods to hit the region in at least two decades fit into a broader pattern of extreme weather events.”

Later, Time quotes a professor from the University of Bristol who recommends attribution studies to determine whether or not the flooding is caused by climate change:

“It’s really difficult to relate a single event to climate change impact,” says Paul Bates, a professor of hydrology at the University of Bristol who specializes in the science of flooding. Bates says that in order to definitively prove whether or not climate change contributed to the flooding in Europe, researchers will need to conduct an attribution study, which takes at least several weeks. “Every time we do an attribution study, we tend to find that the events we see have been exacerbated by climate change, and I’m pretty sure that will be the case here, but we don’t yet conclusively know,” says Bates.

Several weeks for a peer reviewed study, that would be amazingly rapid.

As Climate Realism has pointed out before many times, attribution studies are over-trusted by the media and scientists, and are often used more like propaganda than science. Attribution studies compare unverified, counterfactual models of the Earth’s climate and emissions, assuming ahead of time that any difference between the models is due to human-caused carbon dioxide emissions. Neither model represents the world as it really is, and the modelers assume the conclusion before it is reached, using the models only to confirm their preexisting belief. As a result, the models never discover anything other than a human influence on weather events, and almost invariably suggest that human activities likely contributed to each event studied.

While it is true that warmer air holds more water, that does not translate directly to an increase in intense rainfall. Also, warming does not occur consistently even within a nation’s own borders, with some places (like cities) seeing more warming than the countryside, which in some places can even see cooling trends. Global average warming does not cause regional storms.

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 6th Assessment Report indicates that there is no sign yet of any increase in heavy precipitation and pluvial (flash or rain-caused) flooding. And only under the most extreme, unrealistic scenario does the IPCC speculate with medium confidence that climate change might impact flooding after 2050.

The European flood discussed in the article was not unprecedented. The Danube River, which carried much of the flooding in Europe this year, had an even worse flood in 1997. Similar floods devastated Budapest in 1838, Vienna has always fought with the Danube, and there are many other longstanding historical records of major floods throughout history in the region.

https://climaterealism.com/2024/09/wong-time-climate-change-did-not-cause-flooding-in-europe/

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Two Days of Fall Weather in Late Summer Demonstrates Industrial Wind’s Incredible Costs

Here in Ontario and elsewhere in North America we are heading for the fall and the weather it brings us, but waking up this morning in Prince Edward County our outside thermometer noted it was only 8°C. Had fall arrived early was the question on my mind! That question led to a check on the temperature in Timmins, Ontario at 8 AM and the weather network noted it was a not so balmy 4°C! Hardly “summer weather”!

So does that mean we have solved climate change or did the fox take over the chicken coop when the IWT (industrial wind turbines), solar panels, and battery storage suddenly became de rigour?

It is humorous and somewhat frightening here in Ontario when one reads a recent article in the Financial Post about the plans to add 5,000 MW of new capacity as directed by the Minister of Energy and Electrification, Steven Lecce! Some of that may be natural gas generation which has the ability to ramp up or down unlike renewable generation so actually available when it is needed and help to avoid blackouts.

The article contains quotes from lawyers and eco-warriors such as Keith Brooks, programs director at Environmental Defence, who blatantly claim solar and wind generation projects are more affordable then natural gas generation. It should be noted those two sources of generation can only be ramped down so when demand is heading higher, they are totally useless!

It appears those the media frequently contact, and quote, are those who dance around the truth and are members of the Church of the Climate Change Cult. Maybe those reporters should either spend some time examining what is actually happening or get quotes from those who understand how the electricity grid operates!

The recent two days of cool fall weather while we are still in the summer season are great examples of what the media appear to ignore!

What Actually Happens:

September 6th and 7th were fall like days (no air-conditioners on and no furnaces running) resulting in Ontario’s peak demand only reaching 17,961MW at Hour 14 on the 6th (a workday) and 15,284 MW on the 7th at Hour 20! While the sun wasn’t shining as long as it does in the early summer the wind was blowing and those IWT were humming. The IWT generated 29% of their capacity on the 6th and 40% on the 7th! It is worth mentioning that IESO forecast those IWT will only average 15% during the summer months but 45% during the Spring and Fall.

Despite those two low demand days IESO accepted most of the IWT generation only curtailing about 4,500 MWh on the 7th! On September 6th IESO accepted 34,211 MWh and on the 7th forecast they would generate 55,211 MWh but only accepted 50,726 MWh.

Where Was that IWT Generation Used:

As noted above Ontario’s demand for generation on both days was low and as it turned out our baseload power (nuclear and most hydro) could have supplied what we needed for most hours but those “first-to-the-grid” rights enjoyed by the IWT owners takes precedent. As a result they were handed just over $12 million dollars for UNNEEDED surplus power!

IESO were busy on both days selling off our surplus power for cheap prices averaging only $27.30/MWh (2.7 cents/kWh) on the 6th and a piddly $20.34/MWh (2 cents/kWh) on the 7th! The result is we recovered only about $1.9 Million of the IWT costs meaning we ratepayers and taxpayers coughed up over $10 million for just those two days for the unneeded power.

Over those two days IESO exported over 153,000 MWh or 68,000 MWh more then the 85,000 MWh those IWT generated suggesting some baseload power along with solar, hydro and gas plant were surplus generation and added more costs to the $10 million for those IWT! Needless to say Quebec, New York and Michigan were scooping up that cheap power paid for by us Ontario ratepayers and taxpayers. That cheap power allows Hydro-Quebec to keep their hydro reservoirs full so they can continue to sell their power under those lucrative contracts they have with several US entities.

Conclusion:

Should we be confident that Minister Lecce and IESO are viewing future demand in the province in a sensible way or is the planned full “electrification” simply a “pie in the sky” outlook. Driving costs of our electric generation up in the manner we Ontarians have become accustomed to will not attract the jobs the Federal or Provincial governments tell us and will instead increase our costs of living along with energy poverty.

The media and the politicians should stop believing we can change the climate by eliminating our use of fossil fuels as IWT and solar panels, along with battery storage are not the panacea the eco-warrior’s push!

Time to recognize the fox has indeed “taken over the chicken coop”!

https://parkergallantenergyperspectivesblog.wordpress.com/2024/09/08/two-days-of-fall-weather-in-late-summer-demonstrates-industrial-winds-incredible-costs/

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Political ambition may endanger Australia's energy costs for a long time

Robert Gottliebsen

The intense political pressure to win the renewables/climate debate is now creating great danger to Australia’s long term energy costs.

Both the ALP government and the Coalition are setting themselves on a path that, unless modified, could make us a high cost poorer nation unable to afford current social services.

To accuse both major political parties of getting it wrong is obviously a big call for a commentator, but when you’ve been around six decades, you get a sixth sense that tells you when politicians are aiming at elections.

My justification for these statements start with clear facts:

* Both the ALP and the Coalition attempted to reduce emissions with major projects, which have failed. The Coalition’s attempt via Snowy hydro is plagued with exploding costs and delays.

The ALP’s equivalent disaster is massive wind and solar farms in rural areas where the farmers are white-hot with anger, and that anger is multiplied many times when the projects attempt to bring power to market through some of Australia’s best rural and tourist areas with ugly transmission towers. When projects don’t have community support, they normally fail and end in courts to enrich lawyers.

* Given the above big project disasters, the target of reducing emissions by 43 per cent by 2030 is simply not achievable, and politicians who claim it can be done are either lying or ignoring the facts.

* We now have more major project plans where have not learned either from the above two disasters or from the projects that have worked.

One idea is to connect Tasmanian power to the mainland. This was originally a pre-election, a Coalition plan. The costs are becoming monumental and it simply not feasible on present technology.

Victoria is planning an uneconomic Bass Strait wind farm, and NSW has a similar project offshore from the Hunter Region. Victoria is the most advanced, and it is being erected in the middle of a global wind farm boom with costs will saddle the state with uneconomic power for a generation. While there is debate about nuclear costs, there was no proper debate about the enormous cost of uneconomic offshore wind projects. This reflects very poorly on the media and on the opposition.

Subsidies of around $4bn and $5bn a year to generate big profits for the project investors are on the table.

The most promising technology is nuclear, and the world is now spending vast sums to adapt it to current conditions. In the UK, Rolls-Royce has joined nuclear development. We don’t have to commit at this stage, but we can undertake preliminary cost estimates that show that nuclear is far cheaper than offshore wind. But both technologies are likely to improve dramatically in the next two or three years.

It is completely ludicrous to ban any technology, as the ALP has done with nuclear.

While the world has decided that nuclear looks the best option, we don’t have to race in and commit to nuclear at this stage. After two disasters, it’s time to go for cheaper options that will be popular in the community.

* Arguably, Daniel Andrews led one of the nation’s worst state governments since federation. But he won three elections because he was one of the best “one-liners” in the country, and he embarked on an infrastructure program – removing rail level crossings – that worked.

The politicians in both major parties can actually learn from Andrews. Embark on projects that have community support and work. If you don’t do that and saddle the country with uneconomic power generation, the whole process of emissions reductions will be put in jeopardy, which is happening in many parts of the world, including Europe.

Here are some simple ideas that will work and will have popular appeal among Australians.

We have large areas of factory/warehouse roof space in all our capital cities. We should embark on a program of incentives that puts solar panels on every available factory/warehouse roof. They can be linked to the established network which will require alterations that are a lot easier and, cheaper than those destroying our countryside

And the investment can be used to improve the economics of home rooftop generation. It will attract capital investment.

There are areas near transmission lines where wind farms can be erected if the farmers are happy to sell their land or rent the space. There are many such areas around our cities.

One of Australia’s biggest and lowest cost gas deposit sits on the national pipeline but is being blocked by one person – Victorian Energy Minister Lily D’Ambrosio.

The deposit does require six wells to determine permeability, but the deep water in which the gas is dissolved can be used to promote irrigation and carbon reducing plantings to make Victoria’s on shore non fracking gas the lowest net emitting gas in the world.

Gas was always seen as an interim stage and our unique gas cannot only help the nation but gas fired power stations can replace ageing brown coal station with enormous reductions in emissions especially when combined with the use of water for stored carbon plantings.

Naturally, the Palestine/Green movement will oppose it, but I think Australians will understand the benefits. Selected coal eliminating gas power than works well with renewables helps us buy time so that we can actually undertake a major project whether it be nuclear, technology improved offshore wind or other global developments without the sort of disasters that have so far plagued our carbon reduction efforts.

https://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/political-madness-may-endanger-our-energy-costs-for-a-long-time/news-story/0a01fb8da8dbba9d08f7c22f011a4f36

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All my main blogs below:

http://jonjayray.com/covidwatch.html (COVID WATCH)

http://dissectleft.blogspot.com (DISSECTING LEFTISM)

http://edwatch.blogspot.com (EDUCATION WATCH)

https://westpsychol.blogspot.com (POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH -- new site)

https://john-ray.blogspot.com/ (FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC -- revived)

https://australian-politics.blogspot.com (AUSTRALIAN POLITICS)

http://snorphty.blogspot.com (TONGUE-TIED)

https://immigwatch.blogspot.com (IMMIGRATION WATCH)

http://jonjayray.com/select.html (SELECT POSTS)

http://jonjayray.com/short/short.html (Subject index to my blog posts)

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Some brief observations

Leftists think that utopia can be coerced into existence -- so no dishonesty or brutality is beyond them in pursuit of that "noble" goal

Evan Sayet: The Left sides "...invariably with evil over good, wrong over right, and the behaviors that lead to failure over those that lead to success." (t=5:35+ on video)

Some useful definitions:

If a conservative doesn't like guns, he doesn't buy one. If a liberal doesn't like guns, he wants all guns outlawed.
If a conservative is a vegetarian, he doesn't eat meat. If a liberal is a vegetarian, he wants all meat products banned for everyone.
If a conservative is down-and-out, he thinks about how to better his situation. A liberal wonders who is going to take care of him.
If a conservative doesn't like a talk show host, he switches channels. Liberals demand that those they don't like be shut down.
If a conservative is a non-believer, he doesn't go to church. A liberal non-believer wants any mention of God and religion silenced. (Unless it's a foreign religion, of course!)
If a conservative decides he needs health care, he goes about shopping for it, or may choose a job that provides it. A liberal demands that the rest of us pay for his.

Leftists are classic weak characters. They dish out abuse by the bucketload but cannot take it when they get it back. Witness the Loughner hysteria.

Death taxes: You would expect a conscientious person, of whatever degree of intelligence, to reflect on the strange contradiction involved in denying people the right to unearned wealth, while supporting programs that give people unearned wealth.

America is no longer the land of the free. It is now the land of the regulated -- though it is not alone in that, of course

The Leftist motto: "I love humanity. It's just people I can't stand"

Why are Leftists always talking about hate? Because it fills their own hearts

Envy is a strong and widespread human emotion so there has alway been widespread support for policies of economic "levelling". Both the USA and the modern-day State of Israel were founded by communists but reality taught both societies that respect for the individual gave much better outcomes than levelling ideas. Sadly, there are many people in both societies in whom hatred for others is so strong that they are incapable of respect for the individual. The destructiveness of what they support causes them to call themselves many names in different times and places but they are the backbone of the political Left

The large number of rich Leftists suggests that, for them, envy is secondary. They are directly driven by hatred and scorn for many of the other people that they see about them. Hatred of others can be rooted in many things, not only in envy. But the haters come together as the Left.

Leftists hate the world around them and want to change it: the people in it most particularly. Conservatives just want to be left alone to make their own decisions and follow their own values.

The failure of the Soviet experiment has definitely made the American Left more vicious and hate-filled than they were. The plain failure of what passed for ideas among them has enraged rather than humbled them.

Ronald Reagan famously observed that the status quo is Latin for “the mess we’re in.” So much for the vacant Leftist claim that conservatives are simply defenders of the status quo. They think that conservatives are as lacking in principles as they are.

The shallow thinkers of the Left sometimes claim that conservatives want to impose their own will on others in the matter of abortion. To make that claim is however to confuse religion with politics. Conservatives are in fact divided about their response to abortion. The REAL opposition to abortion is religious rather than political. And the church which has historically tended to support the LEFT -- the Roman Catholic church -- is the most fervent in the anti-abortion cause. Conservatives are indeed the one side of politics to have moral qualms on the issue but they tend to seek a middle road in dealing with it. Taking the issue to the point of legal prohibitions is a religious doctrine rather than a conservative one -- and the religion concerned may or may not be characteristically conservative. More on that here

Some Leftist hatred arises from the fact that they blame "society" for their own personal problems and inadequacies

The Leftist hunger for change to the society that they hate leads to a hunger for control over other people. And they will do and say anything to get that control: "Power at any price". Leftist politicians are mostly self-aggrandizing crooks who gain power by deceiving the uninformed with snake-oil promises -- power which they invariably use to destroy. Destruction is all that they are good at. Destruction is what haters do.

Leftists are consistent only in their hate. They don't have principles. How can they when "there is no such thing as right and wrong"? All they have is postures, pretend-principles that can be changed as easily as one changes one's shirt

A Leftist assumption: Making money doesn't entitle you to it, but wanting money does.

"Politicians never accuse you of 'greed' for wanting other people's money -- only for wanting to keep your own money." --columnist Joe Sobran (1946-2010)

I often wonder why Leftists refer to conservatives as "wingnuts". A wingnut is a very useful device that adds versatility wherever it is used. Clearly, Leftists are not even good at abuse. Once they have accused their opponents of racism and Nazism, their cupboard is bare. Similarly, Leftists seem to think it is a devastating critique to refer to "Worldnet Daily" as "Worldnut Daily". The poverty of their argumentation is truly pitiful

The Leftist assertion that there is no such thing as right and wrong has a distinguished history. It was Pontius Pilate who said "What is truth?" (John 18:38). From a Christian viewpoint, the assertion is undoubtedly the Devil's gospel

"If one rejects laissez faire on account of man's fallibility and moral weakness, one must for the same reason also reject every kind of government action." - Ludwig von Mises

The naive scholar who searches for a consistent Leftist program will not find it. What there is consists only in the negation of the present.

Because of their need to be different from the mainstream, Leftists are very good at pretending that sow's ears are silk purses

Among people who should know better, Leftism is a character defect. Leftists HATE success in others -- which is why notably successful societies such as the USA and Israel are hated and failures such as the Palestinians can do no wrong.

A Leftist's beliefs are all designed to pander to his ego. So when you have an argument with a Leftist, you are not really discussing the facts. You are threatening his self esteem. Which is why the normal Leftist response to challenge is mere abuse.

Because of the fragility of a Leftist's ego, anything that threatens it is intolerable and provokes rage. So most Leftist blogs can be summarized in one sentence: "How DARE anybody question what I believe!". Rage and abuse substitute for an appeal to facts and reason.

Their threatened egos sometimes drive Leftists into quite desperate flights from reality. For instance, they often call Israel an "Apartheid state" -- when it is in fact the Arab states that practice Apartheid -- witness the severe restrictions on Christians in Saudi Arabia. There are no such restrictions in Israel.

Because their beliefs serve their ego rather than reality, Leftists just KNOW what is good for us. Conservatives need evidence.

“Absolute certainty is the privilege of uneducated men and fanatics.” -- C.J. Keyser

"Almost all professors of the arts and sciences are egregiously conceited, and derive their happiness from their conceit" -- Erasmus

THE FALSIFICATION OF HISTORY HAS DONE MORE TO IMPEDE HUMAN DEVELOPMENT THAN ANY ONE THING KNOWN TO MANKIND -- ROUSSEAU

"Seest thou a man wise in his own conceit? there is more hope of a fool than of him" (Proverbs 26: 12). I think that sums up Leftists pretty well.

Eminent British astrophysicist Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington is often quoted as saying: "Not only is the universe stranger than we imagine, it is stranger than we can imagine." It was probably in fact said by his contemporary, J.B.S. Haldane. But regardless of authorship, it could well be a conservative credo not only about the cosmos but also about human beings and human society. Mankind is too complex to be summed up by simple rules and even complex rules are only approximations with many exceptions.

Politics is the only thing Leftists know about. They know nothing of economics, history or business. Their only expertise is in promoting feelings of grievance

Socialism makes the individual the slave of the state – capitalism frees them.

MESSAGE to Leftists: Even if you killed all conservatives tomorrow, you would just end up in another Soviet Union. Conservatives are all that stand between you and that dismal fate.

Many readers here will have noticed that what I say about Leftists sometimes sounds reminiscent of what Leftists say about conservatives. There is an excellent reason for that. Leftists are great "projectors" (people who see their own faults in others). So a good first step in finding out what is true of Leftists is to look at what they say about conservatives! They even accuse conservatives of projection (of course).

The research shows clearly that one's Left/Right stance is strongly genetically inherited but nobody knows just what specifically is inherited. What is inherited that makes people Leftist or Rightist? There is any amount of evidence that personality traits are strongly genetically inherited so my proposal is that hard-core Leftists are people who tend to let their emotions (including hatred and envy) run away with them and who are much more in need of seeing themselves as better than others -- two attributes that are probably related to one another. Such Leftists may be an evolutionary leftover from a more primitive past.

Leftists seem to believe that if someone like Al Gore says it, it must be right. They obviously have a strong need for an authority figure. The fact that the two most authoritarian regimes of the 20th century (Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia) were socialist is thus no surprise. Leftists often accuse conservatives of being "authoritarian" but that is just part of their usual "projective" strategy -- seeing in others what is really true of themselves.

"Why should the German be interested in the liberation of the Jew, if the Jew is not interested in the liberation of the German?... We recognize in Judaism, therefore, a general anti-social element of the present time... In the final analysis, the emancipation of the Jews is the emancipation of mankind from Judaism.... Indeed, in North America, the practical domination of Judaism over the Christian world has achieved as its unambiguous and normal expression that the preaching of the Gospel itself and the Christian ministry have become articles of trade... Money is the jealous god of Israel, in face of which no other god may exist". Who said that? Hitler? No. It was Karl Marx. See also here and here and here. For roughly two centuries now, antisemitism has, throughout the Western world, been principally associated with Leftism (including the socialist Hitler) -- as it is to this day. See here.

Leftists call their hatred of Israel "Anti-Zionism" but Zionists are only a small minority in Israel

Some of the Leftist hatred of Israel is motivated by old-fashioned antisemitism (beliefs in Jewish "control" etc.) but most of it is just the regular Leftist hatred of success in others. And because the societies they inhabit do not give them the vast amount of recognition that their large but weak egos need, some of the most virulent haters of Israel and America live in those countries. So the hatred is the product of pathologically high self-esteem.

"With their infernal racial set-asides, racial quotas, and race norming, liberals share many of the Klan's premises. The Klan sees the world in terms of race and ethnicity. So do liberals! Indeed, liberals and white supremacists are the only people left in America who are neurotically obsessed with race. Conservatives champion a color-blind society" -- Ann Coulter

Who said this in 1968? "I am not, and never have been, a man of the right. My position was on the Left and is now in the centre of politics". It was Sir Oswald Mosley, founder and leader of the British Union of Fascists

The term "Fascism" is mostly used by the Left as a brainless term of abuse. But when they do make a serious attempt to define it, they produce very complex and elaborate definitions -- e.g. here and here. In fact, Fascism is simply extreme socialism plus nationalism. But great gyrations are needed to avoid mentioning the first part of that recipe, of course.

Politicians are in general only a little above average in intelligence so the idea that they can make better decisions for us that we can make ourselves is laughable

A quote from the late Dr. Adrian Rogers, 1931–2005: "You cannot legislate the poor into freedom by legislating the wealthy out of freedom. What one person receives without working for, another person must work for without receiving. The government cannot give to anybody anything that the government does not first take from somebody else. When half of the people get the idea that they do not have to work because the other half is going to take care of them, and when the other half gets the idea that it does no good to work because somebody else is going to get what they work for, that my dear friend, is about the end of any nation. You cannot multiply wealth by dividing it."

A lesson in Australian: When an Australian calls someone a "big-noter", he is saying that the person is a chronic and rather pathetic seeker of admiration -- as in someone who often pulls out "big notes" (e.g. $100.00 bills) to pay for things, thus endeavouring to create the impression that he is rich. The term describes the mentality rather than the actual behavior with money and it aptly describes many Leftists. When they purport to show "compassion" by advocating things that cost themselves nothing (e.g. advocating more taxes on "the rich" to help "the poor"), an Australian might say that the Leftist is "big-noting himself". There is an example of the usage here. The term conveys contempt. There is a wise description of Australians generally here

Heritage is what survives death: Very rare and hence very valuable

Two lines below of a famous hymn that would be incomprehensible to Leftists today ("honor"? "right"? "freedom?" Freedom to agree with them is the only freedom they believe in)

First to fight for right and freedom,
And to keep our honor clean

It is of course the hymn of the USMC -- still today the relentless warriors that they always were.

If any of the short observations above about Leftism seem wrong, note that they do not stand alone. The evidence for them is set out at great length in a MONOGRAPH on Leftism.

You can email me (John Ray) here (Hotmail address). In emailing me, you can address me as "John", "Jon", "Dr. Ray" or "JR" and that will be fine -- but my preference is for "JR"