George Soros gave Ivanka's husband's business a $250 million credit line in 2015 per WSJ. Soros is also an investor in Jared's business.

Tuesday, May 31, 2011

Egyptian Arab Spring officials gave random 'virginity checks' to women a month after Mubarek was gone. Say 'none were virgins'

Islamist perverts gave girls electric shocks too. Obama, please give the Arab Spring more hard earned American taxpayer money to further Sharia sexual degradation. Anybody home in congress? Stop giving our money to these animals.

5/31/11, "Egyptian general admits 'virginity checks' conducted on protesters," CNN, Shahira Amin

"A senior Egyptian general admits that "virginity checks" were performed on women arrested at a demonstration this spring, the first such admission after previous denials by military authorities.

The allegations arose in an Amnesty International report, published weeks after the March 9 protest. It claimed female demonstrators were beaten, given electric shocks, strip-searched, threatened with prostitution charges

  • and forced to submit to virginity checks.

At that time, Maj. Amr Imam said 17 women had been arrested but denied allegations of torture or "virginity tests."

But now a senior general who asked not to be identified said the virginity tests were conducted
  • and defended the practice.

"The girls who were detained were not like your daughter or mine," the general said. "These were girls who had camped out in tents with male protesters in Tahrir Square, and we found in the tents Molotov cocktails and (drugs)."

The general said the virginity checks were done so that the women wouldn't later claim they had been raped by Egyptian authorities.

"We didn't want them to say we had sexually assaulted or raped them, so we wanted to prove that they weren't virgins in the first place," the general said.

  • "None of them were (virgins)."

This demonstration occurred nearly a month after Egypt's longtime President Hosni Mubarak stepped down amid a wave of popular and mostly peaceful unrest aimed at his ouster and the institution of democratic reforms.

Afterward, Egypt's military -- which had largely stayed on the sidelines of the revolution -- officially took control of the nation's political apparatus as well, until an agreed-upon constitution and elections.

Mubarak denies ordering shootings

The March 9 protest occurred in Tahrir Square, which became famous over 18 historic and sometimes bloody days and nights of protests that led to Mubarak's resignation.

But unlike in those previous demonstrations, the Egyptian military targeted the protesters. Soldiers dragged dozens of demonstrators from the square and through the gates of the landmark Egyptian Museum.

Salwa Hosseini, a 20-year-old hairdresser and one of the women named in the Amnesty report, described to CNN how uniformed soldiers tied her up on the museum's grounds, forced her to the ground and slapped her, then shocked her with a stun gun while calling her a prostitute.

"They wanted to teach us a lesson," Hosseini said soon after the Amnesty report came out. "They wanted to make us feel that we do not have dignity."

The treatment got worse, Hosseini said, when she and the 16 other female prisoners were taken to a military detention center in Heikstep.

There, she said, she and several of other female detainees were subjected to a "virginity test."

"We did not agree for a male doctor to perform the test," she said. But Hosseini said her captors forced her to comply by threatening her with more stun-gun shocks.

"I was going through a nervous breakdown at that moment," she recalled. "There was no one standing during the test, except for a woman and the male doctor. But several soldiers were standing behind us watching the backside of the bed. I think they had them standing there as witnesses."

The senior Egyptian general said the 149 people detained after the March 9 protest were subsequently tried in military courts, and most have been sentenced to a year in prison.

Authorities later revoked those sentences "when we discovered that some of the detainees had university degrees, so we decided to give them a second chance," he said.

The senior general reaffirmed that the military council was determined to make Egypt's democratic transition a success.

"The date for handover to a civil government can't come soon enough for the ruling military council," he said. "The army can't wait to return to its barracks and do what it does best --


via Lucianne.com

Ground Zero Imam wife advertises to hire Sharia Manager


5/30/11, "Ground Zero Mosque Supremacist "Daisy" Farhat Khan Seeks Sharia Law Program Manager," Atlas Shrugs, Pamela Geller

"The secular spinning queen of deception, Daisy the Khan, and her multi-married radical husband, the notorious imam of the Ground Zero triumphal mosque, Feisal Rauf, are seeking a sharia law project manager. Rauf is a fierce supporter of the sharia, as advanced in his book, Call to Prayer: Islamic Proselytizing for the World Trade Center Rubble.

For what? For what, sharia law? And where do they get ($)55,000 for this position?


AMERICAN SOCIETY FOR MUSLIM ADVANCEMENT (hat tip Marvin B)

Program Manager- Islamic Law

Position title: Program Manager-Islamic Law

Reports to: Executive Director

Apply by: Immediately-no later than June 6, 2011


Overview:

The American Society for Muslim Advancement (ASMA) is a New-York based nonprofit organization founded in 1997 to elevate the discourse on Islam and foster environments in which Muslims thrive. We are dedicated to strengthening an authentic expression of Islam based on cultural and religious harmony through interfaith collaboration, youth and women’s empowerment, and arts and cultural exchange. To find out more about ASMA, please visit http://www.asmasociety.org/about/index.html.

Responsibilities:

Program Manager-Islamic Law is responsible for leading several key programs, including WISE Muslim Women’s Shura Council and Muftiyyah Training Program. The WISE Shura Council is a global and inclusive council of Muslim women scholars, activists and specialists that critically engage with dominant Islamic interpretations of social issues and practices; promote religiously grounded arguments that enable Muslim women to make dignified choices based on their own religious tradition; disseminate these authoritative opinions around the world; develop a variety of training programs, both short-term intensive and long term, in order to equip women with expertise in the Islamic legal traditions. The Muftiyyah Training Program, a long-term goal of the Shura Council, will create Muslim women jurists educated in Islamic law and secular disciplines of relevance. (To find out more, visit http://www.wisemuslimwomen.org/about/shuracouncil/.)

Working as an in-house expert, Program Manager-Islamic Law will also provide oversight to other initiatives related to Islamic law/governance and religious interpretation.

Specific responsibilities include the following:
. Frequently interact with the Executive Director
. Coordinate all logistics and set agenda for Shura Council meetings/conference calls
. Spearhead the research, writing and dissemination of Shura Council informed opinions
. Serve as rapporteur for Shura Council meetings/conference calls
. Help in obtaining formal commitments and collaborating plans with key academic institutions, private-public partnerships, funding agencies, and other organizations as they relate to the work of the Shura Council and the Muftiyyah Training Program
. Assist with Shura Council and Muftiyyah Training Program grant proposals/budgets/reports, in collaboration with development staff
.Assist in programming of various WISE forums, such as conferences, trainings, panel discussions, etc.
. Represent ASMA at various public events and collaborative committees
. Work as an in-house expert on Islamic law and aid with other initiatives related to Islam, Islamic law/governance, and religious interpretation, as necessary
. Promote a work environment that facilitates hard work, cohesion, and creative solutions to further improve ASMA and its outputs, including but not limited to the Shura Council and the Muftiyyah Training Program

Qualifications: Program Manager- Islamic Law is the heart of two essential and vibrant ASMA programs relating to religious education and interpretation. In addition, Program Manager-Islamic Law works as an in-house scholar and expert. ASMA is seeking a highly qualified, motivated, energetic, bright and collegial
individual for this important position.

• Advanced degree in relevant field i.e. Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies. Expertise and deep personal interest in Islamic law and/or Islamic education highly preferred

• Excellent research and writing skills for a variety of outlets, including academic, media, online and more
• Knowledge of Arabic and/or additional relevant languages
• Experience working in activism for Muslim women and or Islamic education
• Eagerness to work with a diverse spectrum of cultures, nationalities, religions, and ideologies
• Basic familiarity with budgeting principles and grant writing
• Technical skills in Microsoft Word, Excel, and Power Point (HTML preferred)
• Excellent organizational and communication skills (verbal and written)
Strong interpersonal skills: ability to work with strong personalities and negotiate conflicts of opinion a must
• Self-motivated worker and team player
• Ability to manage multiple tasks/responsibilities in a fast-paced environment
• Experience working in resource-scare environments
• Flexibility with working hours in case of urgent deadlines, after work events etc

Salary Range: $45,000-$55,000 plus benefits. Commensurate with qualifications and experience.

Interested applicants should send cover letter, CV, and a short writing sample to Dr. Perin Gurel at perin@asmasociety.org."



.

Monday, May 30, 2011

Low wind power in UK due to sun spot activity expected to last 40 years, 2010 least wind in decade-Telegraph

Too bad UK citizens are subservient to EU cronies and don't have a sovereign nation anymore.

5/29/11, "Wind farms: Britain is 'running out of wind'," Telegraph UK, Tim Ross

"According to government figures, 13 of the past 16 months have been calmer than normal - while 2010 was the “stillest” year of the past decade.

Meteorologists believe that changes to the Atlantic jet stream could alter the pattern of winds over the next 40 years and leave much of the nation’s growing army of power-generating turbines

  • becalmed.

The Coalition has drawn up plans to open more wind farms in an effort to meet Britain’s European Union target of providing 15 per cent of its energy from renewable sources by 2020. More than 3,600 turbines are expected to be installed in offshore wind farms over the next nine years.

But statistics suggest that the winds that sweep across the British Isles may be weakening. Last year, wind speeds over the UK averaged 7.8 knots (8.9mph), a fall of 20 per cent on 2008, and well below the mean for this century, which stands at 9.1 knots (10.5mph).

Usually Britain has warm, wet and windy winters, thanks to Caribbean air carried here by the Atlantic jet stream, a fast-flowing current of air.

But the last two winters have featured exceptionally low temperatures and were remarkably still when they should have been the windiest seasons of all, as

  • high pressure diverted the jet stream from its normal position.

Meteorologists have found that the position of the jet stream has been influenced by the lower levels of activity on the Sun. This decline in sun-spot activity is expected to continue for the next 40 years, with potentially



via Lucianne.com

Watch small children brutally smacked in Muslim school, little girl cries as gleeful man keeps hitting her-(censored by You Tube and Facebook)

Update: You Tube and Facebook continually censor the truth about how children are abused in Muslim schools. They take down videos as soon as they're put up.

---------------------------------------

Adults laughing in the background at cruelest beating.

5/29/11, "Treatment of Children at school in Islamic countries," Atlas Shrugs, Pamela Geller

Islam children

(click on picture)

"Treatment of Children at school in Islamic countries

by Secular Democracy & Human Rights For IRAN (videos)

Is it any wonder that children raised in Muslim countries under the sharia grow up to hate? Each child systematically hit. The adults laughing after a particularly cruel beating is as bad as the beating itself. Facebook has no embed code; click on the image or go here to view."

----------------------------------------------------------

Chart below from Pew Reports, 12/2/10, "Muslims Publics Divided on Hamas and Hezbollah"

Muslims trained in Islamic punishment from birth think the following:

-------------------------------------------------------------

A Muslim who claims, "this is not true Islam" and then does nothing to seek out and stop this behavior is complicit. ed.



.

More civilization jihad in Brooklyn. NYC gov. again cheering for a mosque. How can Americans get in on the 'tolerance and compassion' game?

5/29/11, "Hamas-Tied MAS (Muslims American Society) Mosque Lies in Court Documents, Protests Continue Political Collusion with Muslim Brotherhood Mosque in Sheepshead Bay (Brooklyn)," Atlas Shrugs, Pamela Geller

"In the recent motion to dismiss by the Muslim Brotherhood-tied MAS mosque in Sheepshead Bay, the Hamas-tied organization regurgitated its usual whining and victim narrative in its deception to build a rabat on Voorhies Avenue. Read the whole thing here. Download MAS affidavit (full)

This alleged "house of worship" traffics in lies and smears and political fixing. Why the deceit by this "house of worship"? What religion does that?

Mas mosque

In the document, the Muslim Brotherhood-tied group made an extraordinary admission: "NYC officials" asked the stealth jihadists to "remain quiet" so as not to "ruffle any feathers," while these NYC officials do what? Grease the wheels in building an inappropriate super-mosque on a quiet street. Who are all those officials in NYC that have been informing the Muslim Brotherhood-tied MAS ?...

The Bay People are out there every Sunday, every Sunday, protesting this illegal structure on their quiet street. Here is last Sunday 5/22:

The group behind the mosque is an Islamic supremacist group named co-conspirator in the largest Hamas funding trial in American history. Their lawyer, Lamis Deek, is a notorious Jew-hater who incites Muslims to violence against the tiny Jewish state. These people are fighting for their neighborhood.

The Muslim Brotherhood delights in destroying American neighborhoods ["civilization jihad"] -- this is part of the war strategy laid out in the internal captured document entered into evidence in the Holy Land trial.

In one of the Muslim Brotherhood’s documents delineating its strategy for Islamizing the United States and entered into evidence in the largest Hamas funding trial in American history, it calls for the establishment of “centers” that will function in American cities much like Muhammad’s base in Medina. From Medina, Muhammad conquered and Islamized the Arabian Peninsula."....(more documents and pictures at Atlas Shrugs)



.

Sunday, May 29, 2011

Gov. Christie 'climate' advisor off base in his sea level alarmism, per NOAA satellite

Governor Christie did not speak to experts on both sides of this issue, just the extreme embedded global warming profiteer side. In this particular case the 'expert' is also inaccurate.

5/28/11, "Christie's fine advisor #1," Steven Goddard

Rutgers geologist Ken Miller says it's increasing at 4mm/year. Government satellite says only .76mm year.



Source, Aviso Satellite Ocean Observatory, graph above from Steven Goddard

11/18/10, UN Climate official Edenhofer: " This has almost nothing to do with environmental policy anymore, with problems such as deforestation or the ozone hole....Africa will be the big winner, and huge amounts of money will flow there."...

------------------------------------------------

5/28/11
, "
NJ Gov. Chris Christie picks UN climate insider for his 'come to Jesus' global redistribution confession"


---------------------------------------------------
About the satellite

------------------------------------------

5/27/11,
"Gov. Christie a Global Warming Disciple," The Dakota, Bob Ellis



via Tom Nelson


Saturday, May 28, 2011

NJ Gov. Chris Christie incredibly picks UN climate insider for his 'come to Jesus' global redistribution humiliation

Why would the governor only seek opinions of embedded profiteers in the global warming industry? Why not seek experts on both sides of the issue?

"Rutgers Scientists Contributed to Nobel-Winning Climate Assessments," Rutgers.edu, 2007

"Several Rutgers scientists were participants in the (2007 UN) IPCC and contributed to its series of climate assessments as contributing authors or reviewers. They are Richard Anyah, research associate; Anthony Broccoli, associate professor; Alan Robock, professor II; and Georgiy Stenchikov, research professor, all in the Department of Environmental Sciences" and 4 others.

---------------------------------------------------

The CO2 industry rests on the theory that all Americans are criminals and must pay billions to UN grifters, hedge fund thugs, and equatorial dictators who will use our money as others at the UN do, to redecorate their summer homes. ed.
--------------------------------------------------

5/27/11, "Chris Christie defers to the experts on climate change," Discover Magazine, Jamie L. Vernon, Ph.D., an HIV research scientist and aspiring policy wonk, who recently moved to D.C. to get a taste of the action

"Yesterday, he announced that he has changed his position. ... As far as I know, the science today is exactly the same as the science then. Regardless, Christie recently met with two expert scientists, Ken Miller, a geologist with long experience documenting sea level changes, and atmospheric science (professor) Anthony Broccoli, both from Rutgers University. I guess all politics (and now science) is local....Is this a sign that the Republican Party may soon be
  • “coming to Jesus” on the climate issue? We can only hope..."...
The author makes a statement which a commenter disputes:

"Now, this sounds a lot like Bush’s justifications for pulling out of the Kyoto Treaty," ...
  • Commenter, John:
"Why are you lying about Bush and Kyoto? You know full well Bush could not have “pulled out of” a treaty that the United States never signed or ratified. You know that the Congress voted unanimously to reject Kyoto. Not one vote for it, not one."

(Obama continues to say he will not support Kyoto, but the author doesn't mention that. ed)

The author says "the science" is exactly the same today as it was 6 months ago. Isn't "science" always discovering new things? Why would an intellectual "hope" nothing new happened in science?

====================================

The two who advised Christie on global warming tell 200 students global warming is especially important for poor countries because they "must use more energy" to raise their standard of living. Professor Broccoli is connected with the UN climate group which believes climate is subordinate to economics. Broccoli shows his UN/NRDC orientation that it's about money first. His ethics are so challenged that he seeks to scare captive high school children who then will go home and try to scare their parents.

5/25/11, "Rutgers scientists briefed Christie on climate change," Asbury Park Press (NJ), Kirk Moore

"Professor Ken Miller, a geologist with long experience documenting sea level changes, said he and atmospheric science professor Anthony Broccoli met with the governor on this about a week ago” along with state environmental Commissioner Bob Martin for a talk that lasted about 90 minutes....

Miller and Broccoli are among speakers today at a Toms River conference on hazards that climate change and specifically sea level rise will pose to the Shore.

"This is not about good guys and bad guys. This happened by accident," Broccoli stressed to an audience that includes more than 200 students from area high schools.

Nations with emerging economies that need to raise their citizens' standard of living must use more energy, and even best-case scenarios for finding alternative energy sources show that heat-retaining greenhouse gases will continue to double in this century, Broccoli and Miller said."

----------------------------------

11/18/2010, UN "IPCC Official: “Climate Policy Is Redistributing The World's Wealth”," Global Warming Policy Foundation

UN climate official Ottmar Edenhofer, 11/18/10: "Basically it's a big mistake to discuss climate policy separately from the major themes of globalization. The climate summit in Cancun at the end of the month is not a climate conference, but one of the largest economic conferences since the Second World War....
  • Developed countries have basically expropriated the atmosphere of the world community.
But one must say clearly that we redistribute de facto the world's wealth by climate policy. Obviously, the owners of coal and oil will not be enthusiastic about this. One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. This has almost nothing to do with environmental policy anymore, with problems such as deforestation or the ozone hole....Africa will be the big winner, and huge amounts of money will flow there. This will have enormous implications for development policy. And it will raise the question if these countries can deal responsibly
German economist "Ottmar Edenhofer was appointed as joint chair of Working Group 3 at the Twenty-Ninth Session of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)."

------------------------------------------

NRDC Mission Statement, last paragraph:

"We seek to break down the pattern of disproportionate environmental burdens
  • borne by people of color and others who face social or economic inequities."...
(NRDC is Natural Resources Defense Council.)

===========================

Christie adviser Broccoli was a federal government employee for 21 years:

Anthony Broccoli resume: "
He moved to Rutgers in February 2003 after 21 years in the NOAA Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory in Princeton, N.J.

His primary research interest is climate modeling, with particular emphasis on the simulation of past climates and climate change, and the use of such simulations in evaluating climate model performance."

----------------------------------------

Al Gore and Rutgers Professor Al Robock at American Geophysical Union conference. photo Rutgers Edu.

"In an October 12 (2007) IPCC press release, Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the IPCC, stated, "This is an honour that goes to all the scientists and authors who have contributed to the work of the IPCC, which alone has resulted in enormous prestige for this organization and the remarkable effectiveness of the message that it contains.""...

----------------------------------------------------

5/29/11, "Kyoto deal loses 4 big nations," Sydney Morning Herald (Au.),

DEAUVILLE, France:"Russia, Japan and Canada told the G8 they would not join a second round of carbon cuts under the Kyoto Protocol at United Nations talks this year and the US reiterated it would remain outside the treaty, European diplomats have said."...

-----------------------------------------------------

Rutgers profits from US taxpayer stimulus grants:

3/30/10, "Rutgers lab puts $9.6M in stimulus funding to work"

-------------------------------------------------

3/15/11, "Consortium for Ocean Leadership Names Rutgers to OOI Team" Ocean Observatoris Initiatives

"The OOI five-year construction phase began in September 2010, with nearly $106 million of first-year funds coming from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009, and $5.91 million in NSF construction funds. Requests in FY 2010 and beyond, totaling $274.58 million for construction, fund the acquisition of OOI instruments and sensors, production of key infrastructure elements such as the coastal and open ocean moorings and the deployment of these assets....

The OOI Program is managed and coordinated by the OOI Project Office at the Consortium for Ocean Leadership in Washington, D.C., and is responsible for construction and initial operations of the OOI network. Rutgers, with its partners the University of Maine and Raytheon, joins three implementing organizations responsible for construction and development of the overall OOI program. Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution and its partners, Oregon State University and Scripps Institution of Oceanography are responsible for the coastal and global moorings and their autonomous vehicles. The University of Washington is responsible for cabled seafloor systems and moorings. The University of California, San Diego is implementing the cyberinfrastructure component."...

==================================

4/8/11, "Global Warming Alarmism's Long March through State and Local Institutions," American Thinker, Peter Wilson

================================

While many Americans weren't looking, every issue in this country has been made political. Global warming has little or nothing to do with climate, if it ever did. It is championed as a civil rights and justice issue. ed.

1/18/11, "Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Helped ‘Plant the Seeds’ for ‘Environmental Justice Movement,’ Says Attorney General Holder," CNS News, Nicholas Ballasy

--------------------------------------------

2/21/11, "Green economy needs 2% of every nation's income, says UN," UK Guardian, Fiona Harvey

-------------------------------------------

5/27/11, "Gov. Christie a Global Warming Disciple," The Dakota, Bob Ellis



via Tom Nelson

Judge tells facts of life to Obama EPA, they are subservient to congress, not the reverse re 2 yr delay on project in desperate San Joaquin Valley

Obama EPA contended that Congress and the Court are subservient to it. Judge said, "Horsefeathers."

May 27, 2011, "Court to EPA: 'Horsefeathers'!" GlobalWarming.org, Marlo Lewis

"Just because the Supreme Court in Massachusetts v. EPA legislated from the bench in order to empower EPA to legislate from the bureau does not necessarily mean that lower courts will tolerate
  • similar breaches of the separation of powers.

Yesterday (May 26, 2011), in Avenal Power Center v. EPA, District of Columbia Judge Richard Leon mockingly rejected EPA’s arguments for attempting to amend the Clean Air Act to suit the agency’s administrative convenience. Although not mentioned by him, Judge Leon’s reasoning may strengthen legal challenges to EPA’s greenhouse gas Tailoring Rule.

  • A quick overview of the case.

A company called Avenal Power Center seeks to build a state of the art 600 megawatt natural gas-fired power plant in California’s San Joaquin Valley. In February 2008, Avenal submitted to EPA an application for a Prevention of Significant Deterioration (PSD) preconstruction permit. Section 165(c) of the Clean Air Act (CAA) requires EPA to grant or deny a PSD permit application within one year. Almost two years later, EPA “still had no final or foreseeable resolution to its application.” On March 9, 2010, Avenal petitioned the District Court “seeking judicial relief to deal with

On February 4, 2011, the head of EPA’s Air Office announced that the agency would issue a final permit decision by May 27, 2011. “Unfortunately,” writes Judge Leon, “that was not to be! He continues: “As plaintiff appropriately points out, EPA’s promise of a ‘final permit decision’ under 40 C.F.R. § 124.15 was inherently disingenuous.” In reality, all EPA was promising to do was render an “interim decision” that can be appealed to EPA’s Environmental Appeal’s Board (EAB) — and then overturned. As EPA concedes, EAB review ”could take anywhere from six to eight months, or longer, to complete.”"...

The EPA contended the Court didn't have jurisdiction.

(continuing): "“For the following reasons,” writes Judge Leon, “I disagree with defendants’ oh so clever, but unsupportable, position.”

The EAB exists to serve EPA’s administrative convenience. However, Congress did not create the EAB via the CAA (Clean Air Act). Rather, EPA created the EAB via a 1992 rulemaking. “Unfortunately,” the Judge observes, ”when the Administrator created that process she failed to build into it the temporal requirement that the EAB’s decision must be completed within the CAA’s statutorily mandated one-year period. . . .As a result, the EPA put in place a review process that can be and has, in this case rendered meaningless this Congressional one-year mandate.”

Judge Leon continues:

"Unfazed, the EPA argues, in effect, that this regulatory process trumps Congress’s mandate and relieves the Administrator of complying with it until the EAB renders the Agency’s final decision. . . .In essence, the EPA contends that Congress’s statutory mandate is subservient to EPA’s regulatory process, and as such this Court has no authority to require the Administrator to comply with this statutory requirement. How absurd!"

The Judge gets constitutional:

It is axiomatic that an act of Congress that is patently clear and unambiguous — such as this requirement in the CAA — cannot be overriden by a regulatory process created for the convenience of an Administrator, no matter how much notice and comment preceded the creation. . . .Administrators of regulatory agencies derive their power from Congress’s statutory enactments not from their own discretionary regulatory pronouncements that are drafted for their assistance and convenience. . . .To the extent that a regulatory process frustrates or renders meaningless a Congressional statutory mandate, it must yield to Congress’s will.

Even tarter and tastier are comments Judge Leon imparts in a footnote:

The EPA has labored mightily to convince this Court that the temporal requirement enacted by Congress is somehow ambiguous and, therefore, this Court should defer to its interpretation under Chevron. . . .Horsefeathers! The EPA’s self-serving misinterpretation of Congress’s mandate is too clever by half and an obvious effort to protect its regulatory process at the expense of Congress’s clear intention. Put simply, that dog won’t hunt.

The decision may have implications for ongoing litigation on EPA’s greenhouse gas (GHG) regulations,

When EPA’s GHG motor vehicle emission standards took effect on Jan. 2, 2011, ”major” stationary sources of carbon dioxide (CO2) became “subject to regulation” under the PSD preconstruction permitting program and the Title V operating permits program. The problem, as is well known, is that literally millions of non-industrial facilities — office buildings, apartment complexes, big box stores, hospitals, schools, large houses of worship, Dunkin’ Donut shops – emit enough CO2 (25o tons per year, 100 tons per year) to

  • qualify as major sources under PSD and Title V.

As EPA admits, regulating GHGs via the CAA leads to “absurd results” – policies that conflict with congressional intent. EPA and its state counterparts would have to process an estimated 81,000 PSD preconstruction permit applications per year (instead of 280) and 6.1 million Title V operating permits per year (instead of 15,000). The permitting programs would crash under their own weight, crippling both environmental enforcement and economic development.

EPA’s solution is to “tailor” the PSD and Title V programs to exempt all but the largest industrial CO2 emitters (power plants, refineries, cement kilns, steel plants, pulp and paper mills). “Tailoring,” however, is just bureaucrat-speak for “amending.” The Tailoring Rule substitutes one absurd result for another, because administrative agencies have no power to amend statutes.

To borrow Judge Leon’s words, the PSD and Title V numerical definitions of major source are patently clear and unambiguous.” If EPA’s claim that it may regulate around the statute’s one-year review deadline is “absurd,” why not its claim that it may regulate around the PSD and Title V major source thresholds?"

==============================

California's San Joaquin Valley. If you wanted to commit murder but not go to jail for it, this is how you'd do it:

12/28/10, "Fresno, Zimbabwe," IBD editorial

"Environmentalism: Fresno, Calif., stands as the de facto capital of California's mighty Central Valley, the breadbasket of America. So why is that city preoccupied with

  • winning a $1 million prize to stave off hunger?

Local newspapers and Fresno County officials are trying to rally Facebook users to vote for Fresno in a corporate contest sponsored by Wal-Mart for $1 million in charity food donations for the hungry. Fresno, a city of 505,000, has taken the national lead because

  • 24.1% of Fresno's families are going hungry.

Civic spirit is good, but something big is wrong here. Fresno is the agricultural capital of America. More food per acre in more variety can be grown in the fertile Central Valley surrounding this community than on any other land in America — perhaps in the world.

Yet far from being a paradise, Fresno is starting to resemble Zimbabwe or 1930s Ukraine, a

  • but by greens.
State and federal officials, driven by the agenda of environmental extremists, have made it extremely difficult for the valley's farms, introducing costly environmental regulations and
  • cutting off critical water supplies to save the Delta smelt, a bait fish.
  • It's all driving the economy to collapse.

In the southwest part of the Central Valley, water allotments as low as 10% of normal have created

  • a visible dust bowl.

The knock-on effect can be seen in cities like Fresno, where November's unemployment among the packers, cannery workers and professional fields that make agriculture productive

  • stands at 16.9%.

Other Central Valley cities such as Hanford-Corcoran, Merced, Modesto, Stockton and Visalia-Porterville have similar jobless numbers, the highest in the country. The Wal-Mart Foundation notes that "24.1% of families in this community (Fresno) cannot afford regular meals

  • compared to a national average of 9.2%."

That's right — a community that supplies a quarter of America's fruit and vegetables is begging for food.

City officials and the media seem oblivious to this irony.

"Even if Fresno doesn't finish first (in WalMart's Facebook contest) the fight against hunger will still come out a winner," the Fresno Bee crowed, citing publicity.

Fresno was ranked dead last at 102 as the worst city in America to do business, according to a 2010 MarketWatch survey.

  • Four other Central Valley cities made the national bottom 10 — Bakersfield, Sacramento, Modesto and Stockton.

If that's not a sign of a distressed region, what is?

  • Fresno shouldn't know the meaning of hunger or poverty,
  • given its natural bounty.

It's high time the greens who did this to the richest farmland in the country be held accountable. Far from bringing greenery,

--------------------------------------------------



California Central Valley

Now that Euro-Socialists have been revealed to be violent criminals protected by the system, we can put a stop to similar societal hijacks going on in the US. ed.




via Tom Nelson

Arnold et al. said snowpack would disappear due to global warming. Western states have 'epic snowpack' on May 27, and it's still snowing in Colorado

"Epic snowpack in parts of Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Oregon and California."...

5/27/11, "Heavy snows spoil weekend holiday plans in West," AP, S. Paulson

"
Ski resorts are bustling with activity. A key highway into Yellowstone is closed because parts of the road have seen more than 25 feet of snow. And campgrounds are feverishly removing snow from campsites to clear the way for visitors.

Welcome to Memorial Day weekend in much of the West.

The traditional kickoff of the summer season will have a decidedly wintry feel in the Rocky Mountains, as well as California's Sierra Nevada, because of a lingering record snowfall.

Epic snowpack in parts of Colorado, Utah, Wyoming, Montana, Idaho, Oregon and California is forcing many tourists to abandon the annual rites of launching their summer holidays with a camping trip. Others plan to take advantage of prolonged skiing and snowshoeing this strange spring....

Rocky Mountain National Park's popular Trail Ridge Road is closed because of 17-foot snow drifts. Normally, holiday motorists can cruise at altitudes surpassing 11,000 feet but not this year.

In Oregon, some resorts were still trying to dig out cabins - let alone campgrounds - from snowpack.

Yellowstone National Park has just one campground open. "We're telling people to be prepared for snow," said park spokesman Al Nash.

In other parts of Wyoming, officials have extended winter closures of wildlife management areas to campers. The reason: To protect wildlife from humans because animals are still searching for food at lower elevations.

The Bridger-Teton National Forest Avalanche Center is fully staffed to warn outdoors enthusiasts.

"May snow depths are deeper than anything we have seen in the last 45 years," said avalanche center spokesman Bob Comey.

In California, a historic Sierra Nevada snowpack is making Yosemite National Park's springtime cascading waterfalls especially beautiful - and dangerous, with several accidental drownings already of people who failed to keep away from thundering waterfalls and swollen creeks and rivers.

Farther north, some popular campgrounds in Tahoe National Forest aren't expected to open for several weeks.

While the snow is bad for some campers, it's great for skiers in Colorado and elsewhere. Aspen is reopening 136 acres of trails for skiing this weekend, and Arapahoe Basin has extended its closing dates beyond June 5.

"We're getting amazing ski traffic for this time of year because of this snowpack," Dostie said of the conditions in the Lake Tahoe region

  • along the California-Nevada border."...

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"
In this May 18, 2011 photo provided by the Colorado Department of Transportation, a sign for Independence pass is nearly obstructed by snow in Colorado near Mt Evans. Trail Ridge Road is closed because of snow, Aspen-area cyclists had to cancel their Ride for the Pass over Independence Pass for the first time in 17 years and campers are being warned there is still 16 feet of snow in the Routt National Forest. While other states like Montana worry about flooding, Colorado is still coping with record snows. (AP Photo/Colorado Department of Transportation, File)"
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Where do we go to get billions in tax dollars back from the global warming cartel ? ed.




via Drudge Report

Friday, May 27, 2011

985 days since a hurricane hit the US, longest stretch since before the Civil War

5/26/11, "27, 658 days," Steven Goddard

"It has been 985 days since any hurricane hit the US. The longest hurricane-free spell
  • since before the Civil War."

via Climate Depot

Big money behind RGGI: Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, JP Morgan Chase, Barclays Bank, hedge funds. NJ Gov. Christie pulls out

5/26/11, "Christie to pull N.J. out of cap-and-trade energy program," NJ Record, Scott Fallon and John Reitmeyer

7/28/10, "The secrets 10 states and Wall Street don't want you to know," by Mark Lagerkvist, NJ Watchdog

"Under the RGGI scheme, the smell of profiteering is powerful. New Jersey and nine other Northeast states have sold
The bidders at RGGI auctions include Goldman Sachs, Morgan Stanley, Merrill Lynch, JPMorgan Chase and other Wall Street heavyweights....



RGGI publishes lists of potential bidders who submitted “intent to bid” applications. The lists offer a glimpse of whose trade secrets RGGI is keeping confidential.

The most conspicuous are the financial power brokers who generate money, not electricity. The most recent list includes

  • Morgan Stanley Capital Group, Merrill Lynch Commodities, Barclays Bank and Louis Dreyfus Energy Services.
  • Previous auctions have included JP Morgan Ventures Energy and
  • Goldman Sachs, through its J Arons & Co. subsidiary.

At RGGI auctions, the utilities that need the CO-2 allowances must compete against private interests that can profit by driving prices up. The scheme affects the 209 electric generating plants with capacities of 25 megawatts or more.

“The electric power sector will be vulnerable to competition from hedge funds and other financial institutions and entities that may drive up the price of RGGI allowances,” a PSEG Public Services Corp. official complained to regulators in a 2007 letter.

  • “The result will be higher energy prices.”

With 14 power plants in RGGI states – including 11 in New Jersey PSEG has estimated it needs to purchase 16 million permits a year to cover its carbon emissions....

  • But exactly who is buying what at these auctions? How much of the carbon market have they cornered?

What effect will the wheeling and dealing have on the electricity bills paid by consumers?

They denied New Jersey Watchdog’s Open Public Records Act requests for auction details,

  • contending the bidders’ “expectation of privacy” and
  • “trade secrets”
  • outweigh the public right to know.

RGGI executive director Jonathan Schrag claims RGGI is not a “public body” subject to state open records laws – even though it’s

The New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection contends it

Reached by telephone while vacationing, Schrag expressed surprise at NJDEP’s statement. He said RGGI provides details of auction particulars to all 10 states.

“Balancing the interests of the ten signatory states…and the potential harm to the performance of the auctions against the private right to access and disclosure of such documents, the private right to access would be outweighed by the public interest in confidentiality of any records maintained by RGGI Inc.,” concluded NJDEP.

When Schrag returned from vacation, he declined New Jersey Watchdog’s request for an interview. According to RGGI records,

  • even weeks, months or years after the auctions are over....
RGGI pretends its scheme provides “the maximum level of public disclosure.” For each quarterly auction, it releases aggregate totals and statistics in a report by an $185,000-a-year consultant who invariably concludes “the auction was administered in a fair and transparent manner” with “no material concerns regarding the auction process.”

But there is no disclosure of the auction winners and how many
==============================

5/26/11, "Christie to pull N.J. out of cap-and-trade energy program," NJ Record, Scott Fallon and John Reitmeyer

"The withdrawal from RGGI undoes one of former Gov. Jon Corzine’s signature issues. Corzine signed onto RGGI in 2008 when it was a bi-partisan effort that was originally pushed by then-New York Governor George Pataki, a Republican. Corzine even touted it at
  • a 2007 European Union meeting in Portugal."



photo from NJ Watchdog

Thursday, May 26, 2011

CHEZ PERV, new DSK NYC apartment/townhouse


.



Top, NY Post front page; bottom, NY Daily News front page,
both Thursday, May 26, 2011

5/26/11, "Dominique Strauss-Kahn eats steak from pricey Landmarc in his new $14M Tribeca pad as neighbors fume," NY Daily News



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Benjamin Netanyahu is the Leader of the Free World. For a day, we had an American President.

5/25/11, "Congress Gets an American President -- For a Day," American Thinker, by Rabbi Aryeh Spero

"It was fitting that Barack Obama was out of the country on the day when a leader walked into a joint session of Congress and spoke the way an American President should.

Benjamin Netanyahu's speech extolled America and the ideals for which it stands. The enthusiasm of the members of both the House and Senate was born not only of their admiration and love for the State of Israel, but also because a man of stature stood before them and announced something they haven't heard during the last two years, namely, that America represents the best the world has ever seen.
  • Unlike President Obama, who has reminded us
that American values may not be suitable for most countries, Mr. Netanyahu spoke of his pride that his country, Israel, mirrors the idealism and nobility of America. Contrary to Barack Obama, Netanyahu believes
  • in American exceptionalism.
Having actually been in the House Chamber to witness the event, I was able to see a panorama that one doesn't see on television. The thrill and excitement on the faces, in the applause, in the thirty standing ovations, was internalized by all those who had the privilege of being an immediate participant in this historic moment.
  • They loved the Prime Minister and they loved his speech
  • because he showed his love for America.
When speaking of justice and liberty, Netanyahu spoke about them as enduring principles of the American personality, as opposed to the current President who speaks of them in terms of class warfare, not to mention an America at fault for those within our country he claims have not yet received justice or liberty. He spoke with awe when referring to our Founders and their inscriptions on the monuments that line the Potomac, America's River Jordan. There was nothing in his remarks, unlike the President, that appeared ambivalent about these great men. For Mr. Netanyahu and the members of Congress who rapturously drank in his words of praise about America,
  • it was a refreshing moment.
When speaking of the narrative of his country, Israel, he found no better model than that of America's own narrative. They cheered because, on that spot, where Presidents normally deliver an annual message to our citizens, stood a man who they knew revered what they revere and finds precious what is precious in the hearts of the countrymen
  • whom they represent.
He spoke truth and he spoke as a statesman -- as a leader. Finally, the people's representatives heard a leader casting Iran as the foremost threat to civilization. He spoke of a world divided between liberty and tyranny. The public has starved over the last two years for words of moral clarity. What it has received, instead, has been diplomatic, U.N.-type language that speaks about Iran as if it is but a problem in need of a solution, as opposed to the cataclysmic and moral challenge that it really is. Mr. Netanyahu speaks of ultimate victory, intoning a self-confident righteousness in our cause, whereas Mr. Obama uses the standard, lipid political jargon characteristic of bureaucrats dealing with
  • problems of "de-stabilization".
Instead of a president continually dodging the ideological threat that is Islam and, worse, denying the danger it poses, Mr. Netanyahu spoke forthrightly about the worldwide threat of extreme Islam. He did not speak like a community organizer, nor did he speak as one whose priority is to protect particular constituencies or befriend him to diplomats who populate the United Nations. Unlike the present occupant of the White House, Mr. Netanyahu spoke as
  • a world-class statesman, at times Reagan-esque, and even Churchill-ian.
I saw the faces, the body language, the enthusiasm, the immediacy on each of those filling the seats of august ancestors. Remember, a man such as Eric Cantor, for example, does not simply represent Culpepper, Virginia, but is heir to the seat of James Madison himself. And so it is with so many of our current representatives who are scions of great predecessors. For one hour on May, 24, 2011, our representatives, most of whom see themselves first as Americans, were allowed to imbibe feelings of America's majesty. Finally, the joint session of Congress was not victim of chastisement from a haughty overseer, but a recipient of sweet and reinforcing acknowledgment of our country's greatness. Today,
  • instead the justice of America was extolled.
It was evident from Mr. Netanyahu that not only does he love America, but also loves Americans. Over the last two years, the American people have heard how they "cling to their religion and their guns." They have been forced to listen how their police, such as in Cambridge, are "stupid." They have been humiliated by a man who has gone across the world apologizing for America and its precipitation of so many of the world's ills. They have heard their own president characterize this nation as "sometimes arrogant". Perhaps, worst of all, they have had to endure a nauseating rewriting of their own history and sacrifice by a President who errantly speaks of the great contributions that Islam made from early on in our history in the development of this country. Today Mr. Netanyahu came in front of the entire Congress of the United States "not to bury her, but to praise her."
we had an American President again."

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Commenter to above AT article:

"Posted by: Walking Horse
May 25, 10:22 PM

I have persevered in making this point to whomever is willing to listen: Mr. Netanyahu is the Leader of the Free World. The empirical evidence is unequivocal."



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I'm the daughter of a World War II Air Force pilot and outdoorsman who settled in New Jersey.