Weekend Open Thread

Filed in National by on January 23, 2010

Hooray for the weekend! I’ve had a busy weekend so far because I just got back from the pancake breakfast fundraiser. I’m ready for a nap! Anyway, let’s go with this open thread.

The “urban heat island” effect does not explain away global warming:

Many skeptics for years have sought to explain away decades of climate research by showing slides of weather station thermometers sited next to heating vents or surrounded by asphalt.

This much-touted “urban heat island effect” was supposed to trump all those fancy graphs and equations that egghead scientists were fixated on. Except it’s not true.

A recent peer-reviewed paper in the Journal of Geophysical Research looked at data from 114 weather stations from across the US over the last twenty years and compared measurements from locations that were well sited and those that weren’t.

They did find an overall bias, but it was towards cooling rather warming.

Oh well, it’s still cold outside in winter so they’ll find something to talk about. Oh, by the way, the 2000s were the warmest decade ever recorded.

The Sunday political shows are stuck in a time warp. Guess who’s going to be on Sunday TV again.

Yes, we’ve reached the first anniversary of President Obama’s inauguration, so it’s time once again to have John McCain appear on yet another Sunday morning talk show.

For those keeping score, this will be McCain’s 19th appearance on a Sunday morning talk show since Obama took office 12 months ago. That’s an average of one appearance every 2.9 weeks for a year — more than any other public official in the country.

That liberal media strikes again!

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Opinionated chemist, troublemaker, blogger on national and Delaware politics.

Comments (19)

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  1. Lizard says:

    which of you is Ellie Light?

  2. Interesting.

    Radio Ranch founder and Creative Director Dick Orkin is asking the NAB to remove his plaque from the Broadcast Hall of Fame because the hall also honors Premiere Radio Networks personality Rush Limbaugh.

    In an open letter to the NAB, Orkin says he was “enormously proud” to have been inducted into the Hall of Fame in 2002 in “such distinguished company as Edward R. Murrow, Robert Trout, Paul Harvey, Jerry Lewis, Bob Hope, Red Skelton, William S. Paley, Ronald Reagan, just to name a few.” He continues, “Apart from ‘leadership’ recognition, it seemed to me that at the core of the selection criteria was also the essential ‘humanitarian’ character of the chosen inductee.”

    Orkin notes that Limbaugh has been a member of the NAB Broadcast Hall of Fame since 1998 and says, “Although my political views were not in line with his, I agreed with many in broadcasting, including my longtime friend Eric Rhoads of Radio Ink, that the uniqueness of his controversial radio style and performance made Limbaugh an appropriate choice.”

    But, Orkin continues, “that initial opinion has been gradually eroding over the last few years and has dramatically changed for me recently with the capper coming during the disaster that struck Haiti last week.”

    Orkin says Limbaugh has in recent broadcasts “blasted the giving of aid to Haiti” and has characterized President Obama’s endorsement of $100 million in relief as “a cheap political effort with the U.S. black community.” Orkin says he agrees with those who say Limbaugh “still fits the leadership and performance criteria of the NAB award,” but adds,”I am also fully aware that he reveals a reckless insensitivity to one of the most horrific human tragedies of our time.” He calls on “caring radio broadcast leaders” to censure Limbaugh or “remove this dangerous hatemonger from the airwaves.”

  3. Lizard says:

    one appearance every 2.9 weeks

    how does that compare with the pre-muzzle Joe Biden ?

  4. John Young says:

    Now it’s a fantastical movie trailer: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uZs8k4pJcyk

    The R’s have gone overboard with this no doubt.

  5. Rebecca says:

    John, that is pretty horrifying. Now think about it showing up not on YouTube but on mainstream TV the night before Election Day. Funded by unlimited corporate money. Thank you Supremes. Things just got even uglier.

  6. Bob White says:

    Yeah.

    Damn the Supreme Court.

    Damn the Constitution.

    Damn freedom of speech.

    Why can’t anyone see that Congress should be able to limit the communication of political ideas it doesn’t like so as to help preserve incumbents and limit those who express ideas that might upset the current order!

  7. Bob White says:

    Yeah, Rebecca, because we know that George Soros and other wealthy liberals would never come up with such a commercial against Republicans.

    And we all know that the best solution to speech we disagree with is government censorship of that speech and not speech to counter it.

  8. anonone says:

    Hi Bob,

    Do you think that the Constitution grants the identical rights to corporations as legal entities as it does to individual citizens?

  9. Jason330 says:

    Yes Bob. You are on it. This is just going to be great for our Democracy. What could possibly go wrong?

  10. Bob White says:

    I suggest that you consider this from Kennedy’s opinion:

    The law before us is an outright ban, backed by criminal sanctions. Section 441b makes it a felony for all corporations — including nonprofit advocacy corporations—either to expressly advocate the election or defeat of candidates or to broadcast electioneering communications within 30days of a primary election and 60 days of a general election. Thus, the following acts would all be felonies under §441b: The Sierra Club runs an ad, within the crucial phase of 60 days before the general election, that exhorts the public to disapprove of a Congressman who favors logging in national forests; the National Rifle Association publishes a book urging the public to vote for the challenger because the incumbent U. S. Senator supports a handgun ban; and the American Civil Liberties Union creates a Web site telling the public to vote for a Presidential candidate in light of that candidate’s defense of free speech. These prohibitions are classic examples of censorship.

    Is that the sort of America that YOU want to live in, where government can fine or jail those who engage in political speech at the wrong time?

  11. anonone says:

    Hey Bob White,

    I really am curious – do you think that the Constitution grants the identical rights to corporations as legal entities as it does to individual citizens?

  12. Bob White says:

    Given that corporations are nothing more than individuals acting together, then I would have to say that they do have the same sort of civil liberties granted to individuals (and not just citizens, either).

    By the way, I find it interesting that since Thursday I have consistently heard liberals been going on about how the guarantees of the Bill of Rights apply to citizens alone. Do non-citizens have the right to speak on political issues? Do they have the rest of the rights guaranteed under the Bill of Rights? Or do you believe that they should not have those rights since they, like corporations, are not citizens.

    Furthermore, since most newspapers are owned by corporations, should the same limits that apply to political speech by corporations apply to them as well — meaning no endorsement editorials and no columnists taking positions on candidates? After all, the NY Times is not an individual citizen, either.

  13. Lizard says:

    and the topic is money in politics:

    Obama’s Lead Blocker on Wall Street [Soros’ Friend Robert Wolf Raised $200,000 for Obama]
    Wall St. Journal ^ | January 24, 2010 | Neil King Jr.

    JANUARY 23, 2010 Obama’s Lead Blocker on Wall Street UBS Executive Advises President on Economic Issues Even as Feud Between White House, Finance Industry Heats Up

    By NEIL KING JR.

    President Barack Obama’s long feud with Wall Street is getting only hotter. He is pushing a regulatory revamp that would rein in the size and power of the big banks, after jabbing at “fat cat bankers” and denouncing Wall Street greed.

    But Mr. Obama has at least one buddy in the banking business: a former University of Pennsylvania fullback and ex-Salomon Brothers bond trader who now serves as an outside White House adviser.

    “People joke that 50% of those who like Obama don’t like Wall Street, and vice versa, so it’s a good thing I have family and friends,” says Robert Wolf, chief executive of UBS Group Americas, the U.S. arm of one of Switzerland’s largest banks, UBS AG. Mr. Wolf oversees the bank’s U.S. operations, working with clients and dealing with regulators.

    Robert Wolf, [Pic in URL] chief executive of UBS Group Americas, first met then-Sen. Obama at the office of George Soros.

    Mr. Wolf has visited the White House nearly 20 times since Mr. Obama moved in last January. Mr. Wolf lunched alone with the president in June. He joined him July 4th to watch the national fireworks from the White House lawn. They golfed together on Martha’s Vineyard in August.

    Making the relationship all the more unusual is that Mr. Wolf works for a foreign bank that agreed last year to pay the U.S. government $780 million to settle accusations that it had helped defraud the Internal Revenue Service. The Justice Department alleged that UBS helped 52,000 wealthy Americans hide billions of dollars in assets to avoid U.S. income taxes.

  14. anonone says:

    Thanks for answering the question. Let me point out a few things:

    Corporations are specific legal entities created by, defined by, and governed by laws. They are not, by any definition, “nothing more than individuals acting together.” There are no inalienable rights for corporations. There are no “free speech rights” of corporations in the Bill of Rights or Constitution. The Constitution was written for people, not corporations.

    Because corporations exist under statute only, the government does have the right to enact laws governing their conduct, including speech like, for example, truth in advertising laws and laws governing the speech of tax-exempt non-profits. If the government cannot regulate corporate political speech directly, it should be able to do it by regulating corporate governance policies.

    Given the propensity of the current administration and congress to place corporate profits ahead of the general welfare, I don’t expect that this will happen anytime soon.

  15. Bob White says:

    Because corporations exist under statute only, the government does have the right to enact laws governing their conduct, including speech. . .

    Apparently that is not what the Supreme Court has to say on the matter.

  16. Bob White says:

    By the way, here are two excellent analyses of why the arguments against First Amendment protection for corporate speech fail — and fail badly. They are directed specifically at your “corporations are not individuals, they are a href=”http://volokh.com/2010/01/22/should-people-acting-through-corporations-be-denied-constitutional-rights-because-corporations-are-state-created-entities/”>state-created entities” argument.

    And no one dares to answer why they believe that corporations operating newspapers should be treated as having First Amendment rights while those not operating them should not not be so treated. It certainly raises an equal protection argument in my eyes — especially when speech is limited even for not-for-profit organizations organized specifically for the purpose of engaging in speech (or having that as one of several specific purposes).

  17. Bob White says:

    For some reason I can’t edit that error above, so let’s try it again.

    By the way, here are two excellent analyses of why the arguments against First Amendment protection for corporate speech fail — and fail badly. They are directed specifically at your “corporations are not individuals, they are state-created entities” argument.