 Part four of a series.
On May 3, 2012, the president of The Heartland Institute Joseph Bast wrote an essay originally titled “Our Billboards” to accompany the Chicago billboard that inaccurately suggested actual climate realists (those who accept the overwhelming scientific evidence supporting human-driven climate disruption) were the same as the terrorist Ted Kaczynski. The essay, since moved from the website of the Heartland-organized seventh International Climate Change Conference to the main Heartland website and renamed, contained multiple dishonest claims and examples of both Heartland’s and Bast’s hypocrisy. It also contained a great many examples of distortion and deception, both large and small. Three significant examples of this will be addressed in this article, namely the claim that global warming “believers” are a “radical fringe,” that two published climate disruption consensus studies are supposedly meaningless, and that claims of a general scientific consensus on climate disruption are all wrong. Full story »
In the Hindu on May 8, we catch Hillary Clinton putting too fine a distinction on the Israel-Iran rivalry.
Drawing a distinction between Iran, which has violated provisions of the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT), and Israel, which hasn’t signed it, United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said here on Monday that the latter has “made numerous overtures to try to have a peaceful resolution” to the situation in the Middle-East.
Of course, logic dictates that an overriding distinction be drawn between a state with an unacknowledged nuclear-weapons program that never signed the nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT) and one with not only no nukes, but no development program and that has signed the NPT, with no evidence of substantive violations. Secretary of State Clinton, however, attempts to suggest that Israel’s other virtues more than compensate for an illegal nuclear arms program (not that we believe, according to international law, that any nuclear program is exactly legal). First, she claims that Israel “‘has made numerous overtures to try to have a peaceful resolution’ to the situation in the Middle-East.” Full story »
 After spending a little time video-gaming last week, I decided to hit up the great grand-daddy of zombie video games: Resident Evil. First booted up in 1996, the franchise has spawned more sequels than I can literally keep track of, including the newest installment released in March: Resident Evil: Operation Raccoon City.
Except that I don’t play video games. So I decided to watch the movies. Full story »
The new Ryan Shaw CD dropped today and I’m giddy as a schoolgirl at her first sock hop. Shaw has one of the absolute best pure voices in the entire neo-Soul genre – maybe the best. It’s like listening to Otis or Marvin or Wilson Pickett or, in more recent days, the criminally underappreciated Malford Milligan.
Still on my first listen, but in the meantime how about I share the wonderfulness with the S&R community? Here’s ”Karina.”
 Full story »
 by Michael Smith
It’s no secret that the video games industry likes to compare its successes to those of the film industry. For several years now, game sales have surpassed the box office. The recent Avengers film set an opening weekend record, grossing $200 million in its first three days. Compare that to last November’s hit game, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3, which did $400 million of business on day one. And that doesn’t even get into the recent revolutions in social gaming and the ironically named free-to-play games.
In spite of this, the film industry continues to lead the games industry in one important way — a sustainable business environment. Full story »
 So at last one shoe dropped today, and it’s a pretty meaningful one. Rebekah Brooks, former editor of both the News of the World and The Sun, and the former CEO of News International here in the UK, is being charged today with conspiracy to pervert the course of justice. Along with her husband Charlie, who is usually referred to as “racehorse trainer Charlie Brooks.” Oh, and along with several other News International employees, including the Chief of Security. Specifically, they’ll be charged with attempting to prevent the police from finding a batch of evidence—trying to hide it, essentially. As Sandra Laville over at The Guardian succinctly puts it: Full story »
Two verse satires, a call by me and a response by Paul Kibble, were spawned after these words in last week’s column: “All in all, Romney works as political vampire, the bloodless fiend who gets vitality by predating the life force from less affluent victims. Just as vulture capitalism feeds off hemorrhaging companies, Romney campaigns like a spider, ready to pounce, anesthetize, then suck the life out of foes.” I hope you enjoy them as much as we enjoyed writing, then tinkering with them. – RB
Full story »
 Update 5/15/2012: On either May 13th or 14th, The Heartland Institute moved the “Our Billboards” essay and an associated press release from the website associated with Heartland’s seventh International Climate Change Conference to the Press Releases portion of the main Heartland website. The essay was also renamed from “Our Billboards” to “‘Do You Still Believe in Global Warming?’ Billboards hit Chicago.” In addition, both documents have been backdated to May 3rd and 4th, the dates when they were published at their original home. The original link remains in the original post below, but the new links have been added here: “Our Billboards” essay and the billboard take-down press release.. In addition, Heartland president Joseph Bast has been identified as the author of the essay.
Part three of a series.
When The Heartland Institute launched their perverse billboard comparing climate realists to the Unabomber Ted Kaczynski, they published an accompanying essay titled Our Billboards.” The essay continues their long history of dishonesty by repeating well-known errors as if they were true. In the process, Heartland demonstrates that they are being dishonest about Climategate, about the state of climate science and the IPCC, and even about Ted Kaczynski’s own views about human-driven climate disruption. Full story »
Vern Harmon’s pipe had been carved from blood-red soapstone by a Missouri River Mandan. To Beth it was a menacing totem. When spring squabbled with winter on the Cumberland Plateau she’d wait for the siren winds. It was then that her husband would take the pipe from its beaded case. He’d just sit quietly and study the pipe, his eyes distant and vacant.
Her restless sleep had been disturbed last night when he’d slipped from the Skinners Creek cabin. Loons called mournfully, and soon the wind had brought her the wild odor of his hoarded kinnickinnick tobacco. She’d stared up into the darkness as the winds whispered darkly that they’d come for him yet again, and that this time they’d not be denied. Full story »
 About last night. Here’s what I predicted. Here’s what happened. A few brief comments and then we’ll put it to bed.
First, the officials did indeed arrive in a clown car and, as expected, they spent a great deal of time hosing the guys in blue shirts down with seltzer. In the end, though, their performance probably wasn’t much worse than it is during any other game, so your final grades will reflect whether or not your gauges are calibrated to “basic competence” or “sucked about like they normally do.” Full story »
 by Deb Caponera
If there could be any one person responsible for the “cool” of my generation, and well, all those to follow, it would be Maurice Sendak. But his influence goes far beyond what hip, creative things he inspired in us 40-somethings with his array of stories and pictures. He wasn’t just a children’s writer; in fact, he despised being categorized that way.
Straight-talking, wild-eyed and honest, Maurice gave us “kids” a taste of truth, of beauty, of pain, and of love. He gave us permission to be ourselves, however uncomfortable that was, and a strength that most of our parents discounted or denied us, and he never looked back.
For that alone, we adored him. Full story »
 Normally I keep my work and the rest of my life separated, and therefore blog little about financial industry matters. There are lots of people out there better mentally equipped, and with more time, to do that. But the JP Morgan $2 billion trading loss story is too good to pass up, for any number of reasons. For one thing, it’s fun to see Morgan CEO Jamie Dimon with some egg on his face. Karma is usually a good thing. For another, it will almost certainly derail the impact of the massive lobbying effort the banks over the past several years have put into fighting any further regulation of what we call the financial services industry. I say “almost” because who would have thought three years ago that banks would still be free to put on ridiculous trades that have the capacity to lose billions, three years after similar cavalier actions nearly sank the global financial system?
Actually, this is a bit unfair, because as far as I can tell, it wasn’t a ridiculous trade. Full story »
“As most people continue to batten down the financial hatches, an elite group of the world’s ‘stateless super-rich’ is blossoming, and transcending geographical boundaries to purchase properties in major cities across the globe,” reported Tanya Powley and Lucy Warwick-Ching in April at the Financial Times. They lead “nomadic, season-driven lives [with] no strong ties to specific countries.” [Emphasis added.]
At AlterNet, Sam Pizzigatti, who linked to the FT article, explains that this practice creates
… havoc in the hotspots where the stateless super rich most often gather. Their gathering, a veritable gentrification on steroids, tends to supersize prices for all sorts of local products and services — and price out local residents. The massive mansions and apartments of the stateless super rich also exacerbate local housing shortages — and constitute as assault on any healthy sense of urban community. Full story »
 Tonight, the Los Angeles Lakers will square off with the visiting Denver Nuggets in a first-round playoff Game 7 that promises to be crackling with intensity. I’m a big fan of my hometown Nugs and I expect them to bring their A games.
I also expect them to lose, no matter what, because however well prepared they are, however brilliant George Karl’s game planning, however incredibly they may shoot and rebound and defend, they’re playing 5-on-8.
Put simply, it is not in the league’s financial interest to have LA lose to Denver. Full story »
 So, here it is, Saturday morning, and I’m scanning the headlines through Google Reader while downing my second cup of java. There’s lots of news in which to be interested, of course. Most of it I can just click on and, voila, there it is. Now and again I’ll bump into a paywall. That’s okay (or maybe it isn’t?). The publishers need to make a buck somehow, right?
But what about this?
Washington Can’t Be Fixed
from Arkansas Online stories by Richard L. Hasen in Slate
I’m game. Full story »
 Over the past year, people in a house I drive by each day have been selling cars from their side yard. The most recent was an ’80s-era Chevrolet Monte Carlo in a color resembling electric lime slices. “Mean Green Machine” shouted a decal in green letters along the top of the windshield.
This house is a typical out-on-the-country-roads house in this poor corner of New York state. It is sided with rolled asphalt the color of pine needles. A dusty driveway leads down to the road. Grass grows thigh-high on the steep roadside bank. Across the road is a dirt lot where the people who live in the house chop tree carcasses into piles of firewood the size of two-car garages so they can sell it. Full story »
 Rachel Held Evans nails it:
When asked by The Barna Group what words or phrases best describe Christianity, the top response among Americans ages 16-29 was “antihomosexual.” For a staggering 91 percent of non-Christians, this was the first word that came to their mind when asked about the Christian faith. The same was true for 80 percent of young churchgoers. (The next most common negative images? : “judgmental,” “hypocritical,” and “too involved in politics.”)
…
My generation is tired of the culture wars. Full story »
Missile defense systems against nuclear strikes are often considered “destabilizing” to the strategic balance.” On May 3, Russia’s RIA Novosti demonstrated this principle in action.
Russia does not exclude preemptive use of weapons against [NATO] missile defense systems in Europe but only as a last resort, the Russian General Staff said on Thursday at a missile defense conference in Moscow.
“The placement of new strike weapons in the south and northwest of Russia against [NATO] missile defense components … is one possible way of incapacitating the European missile defense infrastructure,” Chief of the General Staff Nikolai Makarov said.
Taking into account the “destabilizing nature of the missile defense system… the decision on the pre-emptive use of available weapons will be made during an aggravation of the situation,” he said. Full story »
Update 5/15/2012: On either May 13th or 14th, The Heartland Institute moved the “Our Billboards” essay and an associated press release from the website associated with Heartland’s seventh International Climate Change Conference to the Press Releases portion of the main Heartland website. The essay was also renamed from “Our Billboards” to “‘Do You Still Believe in Global Warming?’ Billboards hit Chicago.” In addition, both documents have been backdated to May 3rd and 4th, the dates when they were published at their original home. The original link remains in the original post below, but the new links have been added here: “Our Billboards” essay and the billboard take-down press release.. In addition, Heartland president Joseph Bast has been identified as the author of the essay.
Part two of a series.
Since The Heartland Institute came to the attention of Scholars & Rogues in early 2010, S&R has documented a pattern of double standards and institutional hypocrisy in Heartland’s activities. While the Heartland’s billboard advertisement comparing climate realists to terrorist Ted Kaczynski is perverse on its own, an essay explaining Heartland’s rationale is worse, albeit less obvious. That essay, titled “Our Billboards”, continues Heartland’s long history of hypocrisy. Full story »
At ten minutes before ten o’clock on a morning absent of fog, a worn-out, wood-sided cottage began rolling down from close to Russian Hill’s top. The uncommon sight of a house moving down the street stopped the tourists who’d just stepped off the cable car. They leaned forward, their rectangular digital cameras raised, though they didn’t have a clue why this strange thing was happening. But they were in San Francisco after all, on vacation from cookie cutter suburbs in Ohio, Tennessee, New Jersey and Illinois, where nothing of much interest ever happened. Several women were already thinking that this little old house rolling down the hill on some sort of flatbed truck would make a great story, along with the cable car ride up a street so steep, it made their hearts throb in their throats.
Further down the hill, a crowd of a different sort had gathered. These were working men, mostly dressed in navy blue nylon windbreakers, with their union local stitched in white, over diagonally zippered pockets that carried half-smoked packs of cigarettes. These men knew about the cottage, why it was being moved and where the truck towing it was headed. Full story »
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