LOL: Memes And Mass Emails Create Climate Doom

By William Teach August 16, 2024 – 7:00 am

Someone seriously paid to do this study (via Green Jihad)

Excess memes and ‘reply all’ emails are bad for climate, researcher warns

When “I can has cheezburger?” became one of the first internet memes to blow our minds, it’s unlikely that anyone worried about how much energy it would use up.

But research has now found that the vast majority of data stored in the cloud is “dark data”, meaning it is used once then never visited again. That means that all the memes and jokes and films that we love to share with friends and family – from “All your base are belong to us”, through Ryan Gosling saying “Hey Girl”, to Tim Walz with a piglet – are out there somewhere, sitting in a datacentre, using up energy. By 2030, the National Grid anticipates that datacentres will account for just under 6% of the UK’s total electricity consumption, so tackling junk data is an important part of tackling the climate crisis.

Ian Hodgkinson, a professor of strategy at Loughborough University has been studying the climate impact of dark data and how it can be reduced.

“I really started a couple of years ago, it was about trying to understand the negative environmental impact that digital data might have,” he said. “And at the top of it might be quite an easy question to answer, but it turns out actually, it’s a whole lot more complex. But absolutely, data does have a negative environmental impact.”

Oh, bugger off

He discovered that 68% of data used by companies is never used again, and estimates that personal data tells the same story.

How much of the UK Guardian’s data is never used again? Maybe they should erase it all.

One thing people can do to stop the data juggernaut, he said, is to send fewer pointless emails: “One [figure] that often does the rounds is that for every standard email, that equates to about 4g of carbon. If we then think about the amount of what we mainly call ‘legacy data’ that we hold, so if we think about all the digital photos that we have, for instance, there will be a cumulative impact.”

It’s all so tiresome.

Read: LOL: Memes And Mass Emails Create Climate Doom »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Global Warming | 4 Comments | Trackback URL

Kamala Wants To Crack Down On Price Gouging Or Something

By William Teach August 16, 2024 – 6:45 am

This is the first thing she’s going to release as her “economic policy”

Harris to unveil economic agenda that would crack down on ‘price gouging’ on food, groceries

Vice President Kamala Harris is set to release her economic agenda on Friday following calls for her campaign to zero in on policy after their unprecedented rise to the top of Democratic ticket.

Harris is set to outline her plans at an event in Raleigh, North Carolina — a pivotal battleground state both Harris and former President Donald Trump will work to win in November. Among the economic policies Harris is set to announce is a plan to provide up to $25,000 in down payment support for first-time homeowners, according to a campaign official.

The campaign is vowing that during her first term, the Harris-Walz administration would provide working families who have paid their rent on time for two years and are buying their first home up to $25,000 in down-payment assistance, with more generous support for first-generation homeowners.

Oh, good, another cash giveaway, ie, bribe. Where’s this money going to come from? The Biden-Harris admin has already seen home values double and triple, this would see them go up even more

Harris is also set introduce is a federal ban on “corporate price gouging” on food and groceries, the campaign said.

“In her first 100 days, Vice President Harris will work to enact a plan to bring down Americans’ grocery costs and keep inflation in check,” the campaign said.

Has Kamala ever worked a retail job? Does she understand what goes into running a supermarket? Does she understand that post-COVID inflation, some of which is the fault of her and Biden and their Congressional Democrats, along with Democrats at the state level, along with higher gas prices, and much more impact prices at the supermarket? No one is really gouging anyone.

Harris Plans to Ban Grocery ‘Price Gouging.’ What Does the Evidence Say?

In detailing her presidential campaign’s economic agenda, Vice President Kamala Harris will highlight an argument that blames corporate price gouging for high grocery prices.

That message polls well with swing voters. It has been embraced by progressive groups, which regularly point to price gouging as a driver of rapid inflation, or at least something that contributes to rapid price increases. Those groups cheered the announcement late Wednesday that Ms. Harris will call for a federal ban on corporate price gouging on groceries in an economic policy speech on Friday.

Even if there was gouging going on, who the heck will figure it out? What is gouging? Why is a can of soup more expensive at the regular grocery stores than at my Walmart? Why can I buy a pack of guitar strings for less via Amazon than at the local guitar store? Is that gouging? If milk is $1.78 at Lidl buy $2.49 at Food Lion, is that gouging?

Economists have cited a range of forces for pushing up prices in the recovery from the pandemic recession, including snarled supply chains, a sudden shift in consumer buying patterns, and the increased customer demand fueled by stimulus from the government and low rates from the Federal Reserve. Most economists say those forces are far more responsible than corporate behavior for the rise in prices in that period.

Obviously, the Biden-Harris admin blames companies, despite never sitting down and listening to them explain why the prices went up and will mostly not come down.

Mr. Furman, by contrast, said there was a risk that policies meant to curb corporate price gouging could instead keep the economy from adjusting. If prices do not rise in response to strong demand, new companies may not have as much inclination to jump into the market to ramp up supply.

“This is not sensible policy, and I think the biggest hope is that it ends up being a lot of rhetoric and no reality,” he said. “There’s no upside here, and there is some downside.”

What is it called when the Government is in charge of the economy?

More: A very interesting piece by Catherine Rampell at the Washington Post

When your opponent calls you ‘communist,’ maybe don’t propose price controls?

….

It’s hard to exaggerate how bad this policy is. It is, in all but name, a sweeping set of government-enforced price controls across every industry, not only food. Supply and demand would no longer determine prices or profit levels. Far-off Washington bureaucrats would. The FTC would be able to tell, say, a Kroger in Ohio the acceptable price it can charge for milk.

At best, this would lead to shortages, black markets and hoarding, among other distortions seen previous times countries tried to limit price growth by fiat. (There’s a reason narrower “price gouging” laws that exist in some U.S. states are rarely invoked.) At worst, it might accidentally raise prices.

That’s because, among other things, the legislation would ban companies from offering lower prices to a big customer such as Costco than to Joe’s Corner Store, which means quantity discounts are in trouble. Worse, it would require public companies to publish detailed internal data about costs, margins, contracts and their future pricing strategies. Posting cost and pricing plans publicly is a fantastic way for companies to collude to keep prices higher — all facilitated by the government.

Worth reading the whole thing. Commies.

Read: Kamala Wants To Crack Down On Price Gouging Or Something »

Posted in Democrats, Economy | 14 Comments | Trackback URL

Interesting: Pace Of Warming May Slow Down Soon

By William Teach August 15, 2024 – 4:45 pm

First, LOL

So, what are the scientists seeing in the data, which they’ll attribute to Mankind but will really be natural Earth processes?

Global warming slowdown projected, with caveats

Cuts in greenhouse gas emissions may soon begin slowing the rate of global warming, which some researchers say has been speeding up in recent years, according to a new study.

Why it matters: The research shows that a slowdown in the rate of emissions growth due to government policies, and eventual leveling off, could help arrest the rate at which the planet is warming.

But scientists say it shouldn’t trigger complacency.

What they’re saying: “Although bad actors could misinterpret these results as yet another reason to continue to delay more climate action, in fact they emphasize even more strongly the efficacy of the actions taken to date and the urgency of more,” Katharine Hayhoe, a climate researcher who is chief scientist at The Nature Conservancy, told Axios.

But, I thought there haven’t really been any true decrease in CO2 output, particularly post-Wuhan Flu? Which means if warming slows down, it is mostly natural, but, hey, regardless, the cultists require that Governments put their feet on the shoulders of the peasants to restrict their lives. Of course, they’re saying that the rate will slow down around 2050, and only if you are forced to change your life. Not the Warmists who take huge fossil fueled trips around the world, of course.

Yes, but: The study doesn’t address the reasons for the unusual spike in global average surface temperatures in 2023 into the first half of this year, NASA climate scientist Gavin Schmidt, who also wasn’t involved in the new paper, told Axios.

If their previous studies cannot account for what is supposedly a very warm year, then, maybe their studies and projections and models are wrong.

Read: Interesting: Pace Of Warming May Slow Down Soon »

Posted in Collapsing Science, Global Warming | 7 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach August 15, 2024 – 1:00 pm

…is a wonderful electric bike which Everyone Else should have to ride, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Cold Fury, with a post on Elon for Mt. Rushmore

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 6 Comments | Trackback URL

Pro-Hamas Demonstrators Throw Smoke Bombs At NYC Big Wig Event Supporting Harris

By William Teach August 15, 2024 – 10:30 am

It’s blue on blue fire, since these same wackos vote Democrat

NYC pro-Palestinian protesters disrupt Harris-Walz support rally; 14 arrested

Pro-Palestinian protesters disrupted a democratic rally held in NYC on Wednesday night supporting Kamala Harris’s presidential campaign.

Chaos descended on Bird In Hand, a restaurant in Harlem near where prominent democrats – including NY Gov. Kathy Hochul and NYC Mayor Eric Adams – had gathered earlier in the day to show their support for Harris and her running mate, Minnesota Gov. Tim Walz, neither of whom attended the event.

Demonstrators interrupted Adams as he spoke and later, stormed the restaurant during the afterparty, causing thousands of dollars in damage.

Funny how they are quickly arrested when it’s the elites being inconvenienced, eh? I wonder if they will make the charges stick since it was the elites. Too bad Kamala and Walz weren’t there. Should be fun once the DNC starts and there are pro-Hamas demonstrators in the streets of Chicago wearing Intifada keffiyehs, Hamas apparal, flying Palestinian and Hamas flags, vandalizing buildings and statues with anti-Jew and pro-Hamas messages.

Read: Pro-Hamas Demonstrators Throw Smoke Bombs At NYC Big Wig Event Supporting Harris »

Posted in Democrats, RoP | 11 Comments | Trackback URL

Biden-Harris Admin Going After Gas Stoves After Saying They Weren’t Going After Gas Stoves

By William Teach August 15, 2024 – 7:15 am

Will Biden be removing his gas stove?

Nah, rules for you peasants

Biden Admin Cements Gas Stove Rule After Insisting It Isn’t Going After Gas Stoves

The Biden administration locked in a gas stove rule on Monday after insisting that it is not trying to ban gas stoves, rejecting efforts by opposed organizations to nix the rule.

The Department of Energy’s (DOE) efficiency rule for gas stoves, announced in January, will come into effect as expected in January 2028, according to a Monday entry in the Federal Register. The finalized rule is less stringent than a 2023 proposal that was subsequently abandoned, and nuance in the rulemaking process allowed for the agency to walk back parts of the regulation if it received a significant volume of negative public comments on the docket, according to E&E News, but the DOE has gone ahead with its rule over the objections of several Republican state attorneys general and advocacy groups, including the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI).

The DOE rolled out the rule as a “direct final rulemaking,” meaning that there was no published proposal for the policy, according to E&E News. The “direct final rulemaking” process also allowed for groups like CEI to leave comments about the rule with a chance of getting the agency to water down the rule.

In its comments, CEI argued that the newer, less aggressive regulation was indeed watered down from the 2023 proposal, but that it nevertheless should be withdrawn because it represents federal overreach and remained a policy that would increase costs for American consumers, according to E&E News and the Federal Register entry. Besides CEI and some Republican attorneys general, the Antonin Scalia Law School Administrative Law Clinic and other groups also commented against the DOE’s rule.

It’s not really banning them, but, will make gas stoves in all forms a lot more expensive for consumers, forcing them to get electric. But, that will often mean capping the gas line coming into the home and installing a level 2 electric outlet.

This is exactly what the recent Supreme Court decision was about, that things like this should be something that the Congress passes, not unelected bureaucrats who are tasked with enforcing the law, not making it.

Will Cackles give up her gas stove?

Read: Biden-Harris Admin Going After Gas Stoves After Saying They Weren’t Going After Gas Stoves »

Posted in Global Warming, Joe Biden | 16 Comments | Trackback URL

Trump Finally Looks To Tie Harris To Biden On Economic Policy

By William Teach August 15, 2024 – 7:00 am

Really, this is what Trump should be doing, nailing Kamala on her record with Biden. Forget the Walz stolen valor, it won’t move the needle

Trump moves to tie Harris to Biden on the economy: ‘They are a team’

Donald Trump on Wednesday delivered a prebuttal of sorts to Kamala Harris’ anticipated economic policy rollout later this week, yoking the vice president to the Biden administration’s record on inflation while issuing his own vague promises for a second term.

“She really needs to explain the present suffering she has caused along with Joe Biden,” the former president told a crowd in North Carolina. “By the way, they are a team.”

It was a link Trump returned to repeatedly throughout his hour-plus speech — an effort to blunt Harris’ polling and fundraising momentum by tethering her to Biden. And it comes as the former president has struggled to regain his footing in the race since Harris took Biden’s place.

Speaking in the same state in which Harris is due to unveil her economic policy on Friday, Trump jabbed the vice president for adopting one of his signature calls — to end taxes on tips. He suggested her broader economic proposal “will probably be a copy of my plan.” He claimed, without evidence, that the stock market is up “because people think I am going to win” — and said last week’s dip was because people “were not thinking that.” And he warned, again without evidence, that a Harris victory in November would sink the country into another Great Depression.

Trump should stay on message, as hard as that is for him. There’s no need to play to the base: he has to play to the Independents, squishy Democrats, and even the Never Trumpers. Woo them. Highlight how bad the Harris-Biden policies on the economy have been. Along with the border, crime, fentanyl, and a few others. But, mostly economics, including energy prices and food prices. Real world stuff.

Can Trump stay on message, though?

Read: Trump Finally Looks To Tie Harris To Biden On Economic Policy »

Posted in Democrats, Donald Trump | 5 Comments | Trackback URL

PRC Is Heading Towards Disaster As EV Owners Dodge Taxes

By William Teach August 14, 2024 – 3:00 pm

The Sacramento Bee, which has long been an advocate over the People’s Republik Of California forcing the peasants into electric vehicles, has Concerns over EV owners dodging taxes

California electric vehicle owners are dodging taxes — and disaster is looming | Opinion

electric vehicleCalifornia’s electric vehicle owners, who are disproportionately wealthy, are also tax dodgers. Ironically, the money the state should be collecting would battle — of all things — climate change, by funding transit and transportation projects.

The state has long funded transportation through a tax on gasoline, since its use was once ubiquitous. Electric vehicle owners get to skirt that tax. And because Gov. Gavin Newsom and the Democratically-controlled California Legislature haven’t found a substitute way to collect the necessary money, the taxes are now disproportionately falling onto lower-income residents.

For a governor who likes to crow about how progressive California’s tax structure is, he is not walking the walk when it comes to vehicles without gas tanks.

A train wreck is looming somewhere on the horizon on how the state maintains and improves its transportation system. If the state met its goals to dramatically shift our vehicle fleet to all-electric, half of this revenue source could be gone in 10 years, according to projections by the California Legislative Analyst’s Office.

Got that? Government is mandating the sale of EVs. Rich folks (well, really, studies show the majority of EV buyers make between $150k to $300K. The uber rich aren’t driving them) and the few others who get EVs do not have to pay gas taxes because EVs do not use Evil fossil fuels which the PRC government is trying to get rid of. And, somehow this is dodging taxes, like someone with a Cayman Islands account or laundering it through a child with a deal in Ukraine. Seriously, this is the system that the Warmists pushed for and the government created. It reminds me of the whining when Obama raised the CAFE standards and more people shifted to hybrids, which meant lower gas tax revenue. But, the Warmists want it both ways.

For Sacramento and every region of the state, gas taxes are the primary source of money to maintain local roads. Sacramento County roads on average barely rate above “poor” as it is. Every Californian who abandoned the internal combustion engine simply makes the problem worse.

Wait, what? They did what the government wanted them to do, and will soon be forcing them to do and it made the problem worse? Perhaps the PRC should spend the taxpayer’s money wisely. What about all those billions and billions for the worthless bullet train?

“There are two uses of taxes,” said Christopher Thornberg, head of Beacon Economics. “One is for revenue, the other is to alter decisions for public policy purposes.”

Currently, the state’s gas tax is 60 cents a gallon, which generates about $8 billion annually for state and local transportation projects. The state has a stunning 31 million registered vehicles. Each car, on average, generates about $260 a year in taxes via gasoline to fuel the state’s transportation system.

In the short run, California could increase gas tax revenue by increasing the tax itself. There is “no way you are going to go all electric without high gas taxes,” said Thornberg, who, in his next breath, evaluated the politics of this approach.

And then what? As people switch it means fewer gas vehicles, which means lower revenue. It also means higher costs for products as the increases are passed along for things like food.

Of course, their other idea is a per-mile road tax, which means the government tracking drivers. It never occurs to them that government is creating the problem.

Read: PRC Is Heading Towards Disaster As EV Owners Dodge Taxes »

Posted in Democrats, Global Warming, Taxation | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach August 14, 2024 – 1:00 pm

…is a cliff collapsing from ‘climate change’ driven earthquakes, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Climate Depot, with a post on California considering a government takeover of oil refineries.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 22 Comments | Trackback URL

Progressives Worry They Can’t Stop Those Jews From Spending To Defeat Jew Hating Elected Officials

By William Teach August 14, 2024 – 10:30 am

This is one hell of an article by Politico, reminiscent of something from late 1930’s Germany

Progressives face an existential threat from AIPAC. And there’s nothing to stop it.

Progressive Democrats just watched pro-Israel super PACs spend jaw-dropping sums to wipe out two top liberals in Congress. And leaders fear they have no way to stop it from happening again in 2026.

Those groups, chiefly the American Israel Public Affairs Committee’s super PAC, spent a combined $25 million on ads to defeat Reps. Jamaal Bowman (D-N.Y.) and Cori Bush (D-Mo.) this summer in what became the two most expensive House primaries ever. As a result, two more mainstream Democrats, George Latimer in New York and Wesley Bell in Missouri, are advancing in safe blue districts rather than two stalwart progressive voices.

After both Bowman and Bush crumbled under that avalanche of spending, prompted by their criticism of Israel in the country’s war with Hamas, progressive Democrats have awoken to a bleak new reality that could haunt them for years to come: They have no organized way to counter that kind of money. And they fear AIPAC and allied groups will be more empowered to take on even bigger targets next cycle and beyond because they know their strategy works.

“I think they smell success,” Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) said of AIPAC in an interview with POLITICO. “The point is not just them going after Jamaal and Cori, which is terrible. It is the intimidating presence they have over every member of Congress. … It bothers me that there hasn’t been more outrage.”

How dare those Jews go after elected officials which hate Israel and Jews and support Islamic terrorist groups! All that’s missing from this article is a caricature of a big nosed, shady looking Jew stealing money from the mouths of babies.

What Sanders and others have grimly surmised is that they have no way to match AIPAC’s power, with no big-money fundraising machine and no powerful nationwide door-knocking operation. And while progressives boast large numbers and significant power in Congress, they fear that those pro-Israel super PACs will continue to target high-profile lawmakers one by one, as well as quash new liberal candidates in open seats who the PACs also see as overly critical of Israel. That could make it harder to grow their ranks and potentially silence those already elected, particularly on support for Palestine, a galvanizing issue for younger liberal voters especially.

They’re afraid they won’t be able to discuss Jew/Israel hatred and support of Islamic terrorists with their unhinged base. And, come on, Democrats have plenty of deep pocketed groups and individuals who have spent huge amounts of cash on Democrat support. They’re just upset that someone did it back to them.

“The movement is going to have to do some deep soul searching,” said Nina Turner, a prominent progressive who lost her own House primary three years ago to an AIPAC-backed challenger. “The progressive movement has to show up in a deeper way. It did not.”

Turner, along with other progressive Democrats, say the left has no choice but to start organizing their own counterweight specifically focused on combating the pro-Israel money, adding: “So the movement itself is going to have to adjust very quickly.”

Well, maybe if those elected officials weren’t supporting Hamas and Islamic extremists who want to eradicate Jews and Israel they wouldn’t be targeted.

Another rising progressive, Rep. Summer Lee (D-Pa.), strategically avoided a well-funded challenge, in part, by working with Jewish communities in her district. She bowed out of an event with a Muslim group after backlash over antisemitic comments made by other speakers. But Omar, Tlaib and others are only safe because the pro-Israel groups couldn’t land challengers they felt were worth backing.

“They’ll pick, and they’ll choose,” Sanders said, summarizing AIPAC’s strategy. And he warned it would have a chilling effect on Democrats willing to talk about sensitive issues — particularly against Israel and Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu.

Yes, a chilling effect on American elected officials taking the side of a US State Department designated terrorist organization. Hitler would approve of this article. When will American Jews realize that most Democrats are no friends of theirs?

Read: Progressives Worry They Can’t Stop Those Jews From Spending To Defeat Jew Hating Elected Officials »

Posted in Democrats, Israel | 17 Comments | Trackback URL
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