JoEconomy: Epic Cargo Backlog Hits Northern California

By William Teach October 6, 2021 – 8:22 am

The San Francisco Chronicle has now noticed just how bad the global supply chain has become, and how bad it is hitting the Bay area

The supply chain crisis has hit the Bay Area – partly because of epic cargo backlogs in Southern California

Where's Joe BidenMac Harman, CEO of Redwood City’s Balsam Hill, is paying 270% more to import artificial Christmas trees and decorations from overseas factories. “Ocean freight rates have gone up like crazy,” he said.

Steve Snodgrass, chief financial officer of Graniterock, a major Watsonville construction materials supplier, paid $2.5 million for spring delivery of 10 concrete mixer trucks. He’s still waiting.

Their travails illustrate how clogged the global supply chain has become. Pandemic disruptions and labor shortages are exacerbating issues with the complex way products are sourced from components made all over the world. A single choke point — such as carmakers’ current struggles to get key computer chips — can create a significant bottleneck for an entire industry.

“These are problems that have always been there but the pandemic exposed a lot of them,” said Trent Willis, president of ILWU Local 10, the union for Oakland longshore workers.

Can you guess what word is missing from the entire story? It’s “Biden”. Now, Surrender Joe is not necessarily to blame for this, but, you know that if Trump was president the media would be noticing the supply chain issues quite a bit more and be Blaming him. Certainly, Biden’s anti-business policies do not help, but, for the most part, it’s not his fault. He’s just doing absolutely nothing to alleviate the issue. Even all you Trump haters have to admit that Trump would be working hard to fix the problem. Perhaps involving Mean Tweets, but, Joe and his administration are MIA

Downstream, all those holdups will translate for consumers into higher prices and longer waits. It won’t mean a return to the early pandemic days when store shelves were stripped bare of essentials. You’ll still be able to buy a laptop, exercise bike or jeans — if you’re flexible about which brand. If you have your heart set on a specific model, however, you may have months-long delays. And there may be spot shortages of some goods, ranging from cars to appliances to home decor.

It’s not just one factor hindering the production and movement of goods.

“Every part of the supply chain has reached capacity,” said Jim McKenna, CEO of the Pacific Maritime Association, which represents the ocean carriers and terminal operators who operate at the 29 West Coast ports. “It’s a global issue, and there are no easy ways to fix it. The volume is unrelenting and it’s forecasted to continue through the first part of 2023. This is far from over.”

Joe doesn’t care how this is hurting the Little People. He’s focused on his hardcore, big government agenda. And taking every weekend off.

Read: JoEconomy: Epic Cargo Backlog Hits Northern California »

Posted in Economy, Joe Biden | 14 Comments | Trackback URL

Climate Disaster Today: Peaches And Antarctica

By William Teach October 5, 2021 – 3:00 pm

Today’s prognostication of Doom is about peaches

Climate may harm the future of Georgia’s state symbol, the peach. But there may be answers.

Lush, fuzzy, delicious: the Georgia peach is a succulent state symbol.

But human-caused climate change could spell doom for Georgia’s peach crops – and the threat has begun to affect the area.

In a feature story for National Geographic, environment and conservation journalist Sarah Gibbens looks at the toll the warming climate has already taken on Georgia’s peach industry, and how scientists and farmers are planning for a precarious future. (snip)

“Peach trees need a minimum number of chilly hours for their spring buds to bear fruit,” Gibbens writes. “Every winter, when temperatures fall below 45°F, peach trees produce the hormones that tell them to go dormant. The average Georgia peach needs anywhere from 650 to 850 hours of cold weather in a season – so-called chill hours.”

A warming climate imperils those necessary colder hours, and the American South’s winters are getting shorter and hotter every year.

The implication here is that this is your fault and things are going to go badly. The National Geographic piece is behind a “we want your email address to read this” wall, which I’m not doing, but, you can be sure that it prognosticates doom.

Antarctica’s South Pole froze over in coldest winter on record despite climate crisis

Between April and September this year, the average temperatures at the Amundsen–Scott South Pole Station dropped to a bone-chilling -61C (-78F). These were the coldest average temperatures recorded in the Antarctic South Pole since records began in 1957 but may come as a surprise to most. The extraordinary cold was recorded despite the planet as a whole experiencing one of its hottest summers ever. (snip)

The Antarctic’s bitter winter was likely the product of a strong polar vortex in the stratosphere, an atmospheric layer that begins about 33,0000ft or 6.2 miles (10km) up.

According to Amy Butler, an atmospheric scientist at NOAA, the vortex would have helped trap cold air over the South Pole.

And, of course, that strong vortex is surely your fault for driving a fossil fueled vehicle, eating meat, and refusing to give your money and freedom to Government.

No Tricks Zone covers this all in detail, including

The Washington Post’s suggestion that Antarctica “continues to warm rapidly” is also contradicted by recent studies showing the entire South Pole continent has in fact cooled since data recording began in the 1950s.

Read here, here and here.

There are a lot fake news and misleading press releases out there, and they are being consistently exposed by objective peer-reviewed science.

The graphic is pretty much dead on for the Cult of Climastrology, except 10. They have peer review. It’s just mule fritters peer review, people propping up each other’s BS.

Read: Climate Disaster Today: Peaches And Antarctica »

Posted in AGW Scaremongering, Collapsing Science, Global Warming | 22 Comments | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach October 5, 2021 – 1:00 pm

…is a horrible paved road meant to move fossil fueled vehicles, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Dissecting Leftism, with a post on a COVID test which is a saliva swab.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | Comments Off on If All You See… | Trackback URL

Authoritarianism Wins If Democrats Don’t Pass Reconciliation Bill Or Something

By William Teach October 5, 2021 – 10:30 am

You wanted a hot take? This one will burn you, from the mind of Michael Tomasky at The New Republic

The Reconciliation Bill Is About Saving Democracy
Democrats have to prove that the government can deliver for people. If they don’t, authoritarianism wins.

Why do the Democrats behave this way? We’ve heard the standard answers. They’re not as disciplined as the Republicans, instinctively less inclined to obey orders (a good thing). They’re more ideologically diverse (also a good thing, up to a point). They actually care about policy outcomes, unlike Republicans, so they have genuine substantive disagreements (another good thing—again, up to a point).

But here’s another reason, and this one is not a good thing. They, or at least some of them, have no grasp of the historical moment in which they find themselves. And this moment is unlike anything any of them have lived through, anything the country has been through: The opposition party is trying to destroy democracy. Republicans all over the country are passing laws and making rules in broad daylight that will allow them to overturn the results (if adverse) of the next presidential election. They’re not hiding this. They’re advertising it. John Eastman’s memo is Exhibit A, but we also have exhibits B through double-Z. They couldn’t be making their intentions clearer.

So the Democrats have to be the party of democracy. That means they need to make some obvious moves, such as protecting voting rights, which seems tragically iffy at the moment; but it also means, as Joe Biden repeatedly and correctly says, that they need to show the country that democracy works and can produce positive outcomes. If they don’t manage to come to terms on this reconciliation bill, the negative impacts won’t be merely economic. This reconciliation bill is about democracy. If they don’t pass it and don’t show that democracy works, especially with the government in the hands of one party, the Republican Party will benefit—they’ll almost certainly take the House and the Senate in 2022, and they’ll be teed up to steal the 2024 election for Donald Trump, and American democracy will be on life support.

Really, there’s no need to go beyond the first three paragraphs. Heck, no reason to go beyond the sub-head. It says all you need to know. They have to pass a massive, Big Government bill which implements massive governmental controls on citizens and states, along with tons of taxes, which seems rather authoritarian, to avoid authoritarianism. It’s this kind of BS that let’s you know they are utterly insincere, that they’re trying to hoodwink people.

They seem pretty upset over laws which protect voting rights, that require people to prove who they are, that they’re actually eligible to vote. See, if we don’t let illegal aliens, felons, and people who vote elsewhere vote “democracy” is at stake. That if they don’t pass a wishlist of hard left insanity democracy is at stake. This is all insane. But, if you don’t give it to them, democracy is at stake. Can we just split the nation and let these lunatics do their thing on their own already?

Read: Authoritarianism Wins If Democrats Don’t Pass Reconciliation Bill Or Something »

Posted in Barking Moonbats, Democrats | Comments Off on Authoritarianism Wins If Democrats Don’t Pass Reconciliation Bill Or Something | Trackback URL

Pope, Other Religious Leaders Issue Appeal On Climate Crisis (scam)

By William Teach October 5, 2021 – 7:04 am

Perhaps they should deal with their own issues and talk the Bible. You don’t hear them say all that much about abortion on demand, yet, they’ll yammer about ‘climate change’, manufacturing Reasons while scouring the Bible for backing, all while refusing to make their own lives net zero

Pope, other religious leaders issue pre-COP26 appeal on climate change

Pope Francis and other religious leaders made a joint appeal on Monday for next month’s U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP26) to offer concrete solutions to save the planet from “an unprecedented ecological crisis”.

The “Faith and Science: Towards COP26” meeting brought together Christian leaders including Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby and Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, as well as representatives of Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism, Confucianism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism and Jainism.

“COP26 in Glasgow represents an urgent summons to provide effective responses to the unprecedented ecological crisis and the crisis of values that we are presently experiencing, and in this way to offer concrete hope to future generations,” the pope said.

There is no ecological crisis linked to a slight increase in global temperatures, even if this was mostly/solely caused by Mankind. If they want to talk about actual environmental issues, I’m up for that. Climate change is not one. If they want to talk about values, sure, let’s talk about those. If they’re linking those values to the climate emergency? No, especially when the Vatican relies on people taking fossil fueled trips to visit the Vatican.

The appeal, which described climate change as a “grave threat”, was handed to Italian Foreign Minister Luigi Di Maio and Britain’s Alok Sharma, president of COP26 in Glasgow.

“The faith leaders who have come here today represent around 3/4 of the world’s population. That is by any measure a significant percentage of people across the globe and that’s why their voice matters so much,” Sharma said after the meeting, which was organised by the Vatican, Britain and Italy.

I wonder how many of those people think the same as these “religious leaders”? They do not speak for me as a Christian. Nor do they reduce their own carbon footprints.

Welby, spiritual leader of the world’s Anglicans, called for a “global financial architecture which repents of its past sins”, including changes in tax rules to promote green activity.

“We have in the past 100 years declared war on creation… Our war against the climate affects the poorest among us,” Welby said.

Interesting. Welby is calling for a world government that has the power to punish “green” sin, rather than keeping religion and government separate.

“We plead with the international community, gathered at COP26, to take speedy, responsible and shared action to safeguard, restore and heal our wounded humanity and the home entrusted to our stewardship,” said the appeal, which followed months of online meetings among the 40 or so religious leaders.

They do realize that the True Believers in the Cult of Climastrology want to end organized religion, right?

Read: Pope, Other Religious Leaders Issue Appeal On Climate Crisis (scam) »

Posted in AGW Socialism, Global Warming | 2 Comments | Trackback URL

#Unity: Biden’s Politicized DOJ To Go After Protesting Parents

By William Teach October 5, 2021 – 6:49 am

They’re using the excuse of “threats of violence” to criminalize people expressing their 1st Amendment Rights (speech, protest, grievance), which are also protected by every single state constitution

DOJ launching effort to combat threats of violence against school officials

The Department of Justice is launching an effort to combat what it said is an “increase” in “threats of violence” against school officials and teachers across the country.

“Threats against public servants are not only illegal, they run counter to our nation’s core values,” Attorney General Garland said of the effort in a statement Monday. “Those who dedicate their time and energy to ensuring that our children receive a proper education in a safe environment deserve to be able to do their work without fear for their safety.”

Garland directed the FBI and U.S. attorney’s offices to hold meetings with federal, state and local law enforcement leaders in the next 30 days, during which they will discuss ways to combat what the DOJ called a “disturbing trend” of harassment and threats against school officials.

Critics say the move amounts to an attempt by the Biden administration to bully parents from exercising their First Amendment rights.

Why is the DOJ even getting involved in local issues to start with? These are not national crimes. None of this, in the few cases where parents went too far (usually after being enticed and abused by school officials and school boards), crossed state line. This will be an utter abuse of the power of the federal government, purely to intimidate parents.

The DOJ will also be launching a task force aimed at addressing the issue, while attempting to determine how the federal government could use its powers to prosecute crimes and to assist local law enforcement in incidents that are not federal crimes.

“Not federal crimes”, so they’ll manufacture a way to prosecute parents. Trying to push this nation one step closer to splitting. This is all rather chilling. Mr. Unity is doing little to help the nation, like assisting with the blockages at the ports, skyrocketing fuel prices, which causes the cost of living to rise, and shortages, and doing all he can to tear the nation apart.

The move comes just four days after a leading organization representing the nation’s school boards called on the Biden administration and federal law enforcement agencies to assist school boards, which the group said have seen an increase in violent threats in response to COVID-19 restrictions and critical race theory curriculum.

In most of the stories about this so-called violence, there are no actual threats. It’s usually just parents being mad at school board meetings and telling the boards they won’t comply, and that the boards should be listening to parents. There’s almost never an actual threat. So, Dementia Joe will sick his DOJ, which has pretty much no Constitutional authority, on parents, just like they’re going after people who simply wandered around the Capitol Building while mostly ignoring the violence still going on from Antifa in Portland

Where’s the DOJ in going after the Antifa nuts who are still trying to burn federal buildings? How about those who are harassing a sitting U.S. Senator in bathrooms and on airplanes, which, are federal crimes, especially since the people are illegal aliens?

Read: #Unity: Biden’s Politicized DOJ To Go After Protesting Parents »

Posted in Joe Biden, Unhinged Tools | Comments Off on #Unity: Biden’s Politicized DOJ To Go After Protesting Parents | Trackback URL

Your Fault: Earth Is Dimming From Hotcoldwetdry

By William Teach October 4, 2021 – 3:00 pm

There couldn’t possibly be any other reason for this, right?

Earth is ‘dimming’ because of climate change, research suggests. Experts say it’s ‘concerning’

Earth is appearing to dim, and climate change is a big reason why, according to research.

The conclusion came from a group of researchers that studied two decades’ worth of data on earthshine, or the light reflected off Earth that illuminates the moon. The research letter, which was published in the peer-reviewed scientific journal Geophysical Research Letters in August but recently shared on Sept. 30, found that Earth’s reflectance, or albedo, fell about 0.5%, or half a watt less light per square meter.

While it may not seem significant considering Earth reflects about 30% of the light it receives, much of the drop in reflectance has “accelerated in the most recent years.”

“The albedo drop was such a surprise to us when we analyzed the last three years of data after 17 years of nearly flat albedo,” Philip Goode, a researcher at New Jersey Institute of Technology and lead author of the study, said in a statement.

The research showed that despite changes in the sun’s brightness, the central star in our solar system had no effect on how Earth got dimmer. Instead, it’s because of rising ocean temperatures.

In the past 100 years, the global sea surface temperature has increased 0.23 degrees Fahrenheit, according to data from the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

And it’s all Mankind’s fault, you know.

Steven Koonin, director of the center for Urban Science and Progress at New York University and former undersecretary for science at the U.S. Department of Energy, told USA TODAY the dimming of Earth is “significant.”

“It is unclear whether this dimming arises from the natural fluctuations of the climate system or is an unexpected result of human influences,” he said.

You know that Steven is getting a lot of hatemail right now for suggesting this could be natural. But, in reality, the study itself is blaming Mankind.

Earth’s dimness could become more significant in upcoming decades as well. A 2013 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change predicted the average global sea temperature could rise by as much as 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100.

“Could”. Who’s held responsible when that prognostication fails to come true? Think about it: they’re saying the sea temp has gone up just .23F over the last 100 years, now it’s supposed to jump 31 times that in 80 years?

Elsewhere

This electric car can go 520 miles on a charge but the CEO says that’s not important

The Lucid Air Dream Edition was recently rated by the Environmental Protection Agency with an estimated driving range of 520 miles on a full charge. That’s the longest range of any purely battery-powered car yet rated by the EPA, including Tesla’s Model S Long Range.

It’s not just a little longer, either. The Air goes an estimated 115 miles farther on a charge than the Tesla. It’s even farther than most gasoline cars can travel on a full tank.

But Lucid’s chief executive Peter Rawlinson, who once worked at Tesla and helped engineer the original Model S, thinks that jaw-dropping number, 520 miles, isn’t actually terribly important. For one thing, that range doesn’t come cheap. Prices for the Lucid Air sedan start at $74,000, but prices for the Dream Edition are more than double that, starting at $169,000.

That’s $1300 a month and $3000 a month, respectively, for a 5 year loan at 2.9 APR with nothing down, and doesn’t even include the sales tax, doc fees, or registration/tags. And then there’s the property tax. Other than very rich people, who can afford that? Of course, most who can afford just pay “cash”.

With greater energy efficiency, which contributes to the Lucid Air’s long range, electric cars will become accessible at all price ranges, he said. In fact, one of Rawlinson’s side projects is applying some of the efficiency tricks used at Lucid to something he calls the “T21,” meaning “the Model T for the 21st century.” This would be a car with fairly long driving range that almost anyone can afford.

When you can get one starting at $21k with at least a 300 mile range, then we’re talking. Till then? Shut up.

Read: Your Fault: Earth Is Dimming From Hotcoldwetdry »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Global Warming | Comments Off on Your Fault: Earth Is Dimming From Hotcoldwetdry | Trackback URL

If All You See…

By William Teach October 4, 2021 – 1:00 pm

…is rising sea from too much carbon pollution, you might just be a Warmist

The blog of the day is Bunkerville, with a post on what would it take to make America great again.

Read: If All You See… »

Posted in If All You See | 3 Comments | Trackback URL

Vax Mandate: Swiss Guards Leave Vatican, D.C. Has Lots Of Holdouts

By William Teach October 4, 2021 – 10:30 am

This is a rather wild one

Swiss Guards leave corps in order to avoid Vatican vaccine mandate

Three members of the Vatican’s Swiss Guard have voluntarily left the corps after refusing to be vaccinated against COVID-19, defying the Vatican’s mandate, AP reports.

Driving the news: Last week, the Vatican ordered all employees to get vaccinated or submit to testing, with the new policy going into effect on Oct. 1.

Employees unable to provide proper documentation will be considered “unjustly absent” and receive no salary.

The big picture: The Swiss Guards have been asked to be vaccinated “to protect their health and that of the others they come into contact with as part of their service,” Lt. Urs Breitenmoser, a spokesperson for the Swiss Guard, told AP.

Meh, just three, but, couldn’t they claim a religious exemption? They’re at the Vatican, after all.

2,500 DC health care workers miss vaccine mandate deadline, as many firefighters seek religious exemptions

Washington, D.C., city officials said nearly 2,500 health care workers have failed to comply with their COVID-19 mandate deadline requiring at least one dose of the inoculation by Thursday. Nearly 70% of those health care workers who have not yet been vaccinated have requested religious exemptions.

City Administrator Kevin Donahue said the largest number of exemption requests have come from the D.C. Fire and EMS Department, The Washington Post reported. About 267 of the agency’s some 2,000 employees have sought some type of exemption from the vaccine mandate, with the vast majority of that group citing their religion. All 20 requests which have been reviewed so far have been rejected.

Will that rejection of religious exemption lead to lawsuits, or the employees just saying “the hell with it, I’m moving, D.C. can deal with the staff shortages”? It might be lawsuits, because it is not that easy to move these days, not with the cost of housing skyrocketing. Also, it’s weird that a city that votes heavily Democrat has so many holdouts.

Donahue said 89% of all D.C. government employees had reported their vaccination status by Thursday afternoon, with 75% reporting that they were fully vaccinated. During a call Friday, D.C. City Council member Elissa Silverman suggested that the city health department might eliminate the religious exemption for the vaccine mandate, arguing possible abuse.

But members of the DC Firefighters Bodily Autonomy Affirmation Group, which is made up of members who hold Christian, Jewish and Muslim beliefs, insist that their requests for religious exemptions coincide with genuine expressions of their faith, which has comforted them during the pandemic. The group has retained legal counsel should their requests be denied.

Has the City Council read the 1st Amendment? Do they even care?

That mandate (for health workers) applies to some 82,000 licensed health care workers, not including fire department personnel, city officials said.

But just 51,000 licensed health care workers had reported their vaccination status by Friday morning – about 49,000 of which said they had received one or more doses of the vaccine, The Washington Post reported. Meanwhile, some 1,640 licensed health care workers reported that they had not started a dosage – and 75% of that group said they are seeking a religious exemption.

Strange that so many health professionals are holding off.

Donahue said each exemption request must be reviewed on a case-by-case basis under federal law, and there is an appeals process, WTOP reported. But firefighters whose requests are ultimately denied might face termination. Other health care workers might face having their medical licenses revoked. Those workers who might appeal the decision will continue to be subjected to weekly testing.

Taking away an earned medical license for refusing to take a vaccine that is essentially in the testing phase? Where we don’t know the long term effects, or, really, even the short term effects? I’m pro-vaccine, but, I understand their concerns.

Read: Vax Mandate: Swiss Guards Leave Vatican, D.C. Has Lots Of Holdouts »

Posted in Bat Soup Virus, Democrats | 19 Comments | Trackback URL

Who’s Up For A More Radical Climate (scam) Movement Or Something

By William Teach October 4, 2021 – 8:33 am

Anyone who thinks Leftist movements can’t get even more radical hasn’t been watching. We thought they couldn’t get more crazy and more extreme during the first term of Bush43. The second term was even crazier. And they ramped that up even more during the Obama admin. And even more during the Trump admin. There is no “turning the amp to 11”, because they keep adding numbers to the amplifier. They always find a way to go more moonbat

The case for a more radical climate movement
Author Andreas Malm on the failures of climate activism and the need for escalation.

Has the climate movement failed?

It’s hard to look at the world at this moment and not conclude that the answer is yes. Despite all the activism, despite all the protests, despite all the warnings, the world is still in many ways hostage to the fossil fuel industry.

Here’s a solution: all you climate cultists can stop driving fossil fueled vehicles. Stop taking fossil fueled travel. Practice what you preach. If most members refuse to do anything in their own lives, that’s pretty much saying “we don’t really believe what we’re saying.”

A new book by Andreas Malm, a professor of human ecology at Sweden’s Lund University, asks a simple but perplexing question: Given the stakes, why hasn’t the global climate movement become far more radical than it is?

It’s a fair question. If we as a species were serious, if we really believed what we already know about climate change, we would be doing everything humanly possible to shift course. And yet we’re not. Even the most ambitious policy proposals on the table, with little chance of passing, are scarcely sufficient. This is the starting point of Malm’s book, and if you follow his logic it leads to some conclusions you may find uncomfortable.

He says it bluntly: We should “[d]amage and destroy new CO2-emitting devices. Put them out of commission, pick them apart, demolish them, burn them, blow them up. Let the capitalists who keep investing in the fire know that their properties will be trashed.” For Malm, we have a choice: Destroy the property that’s destroying the planet, or sacrifice the Earth on the altar of that property.

Malm’s book — it’s titled How to Blow Up a Pipeline — is obviously meant to provoke. But embedded in the provocation is a morally serious challenge to how we think about, and act on, the crisis humanity faces. And to be perfectly honest, I’m not sure how I feel about it. For instance, I think his summons to violence vastly overstates our ability to “control” such violence once it’s unleashed. I’m also less confident in the strategic utility of violence (even if it’s limited to the destruction of property, as Malm recommends) considering the enormous blowback that might result from it.

The thing is, Vox writer Sean Illing may have reservations, but, the violence has already started. Pipelines have already been attacked. And lunatics are doing things like throwing fake blood at buildings, gluing themselves to trucks and other transportation methods, dumping manure in the streets, completely shutting down transportation routes and streets. Look at Extinction Rebellion: do they look sane and reasonable? Do they look like they could snap into violence in a heartbeat?

Of course, this might drive people away from the climate cult. People in the U.K. are pretty unhappy with them right now as they disrupt the streets during rush hour and the delivery of petrol. This could backfire hugely. They’ve spent 30+ years spreading awareness, and more and more people are recognizing they’re all climahypocrites, and that this is all about creating a Fascist, controlling, domineering government.

Read: Who’s Up For A More Radical Climate (scam) Movement Or Something »

Posted in AGW Idiocy, Collapsing Science, Global Warming | 1 Comment | Trackback URL
Pirate's Cove