Part One. Partisan Blogging; Leftist Edition

I've been pretty much inactive lately. Especially when compared to my early years in this blogging thing. I do still read many blogs. I do still get my dander up when folks on either side spread political BS like it was so much fertilizer.

The latest fertilizer spreaders I've noticed are Lowell Feld and that perpetual spreader, Waldo Jaquith.

Blogging.

On the surface, blogging is easy. Real journalism, now that's a bit tougher. I don't claim to do either, let alone one or the other particularly well. Both these characters claim, publicly or privately, to be experts at one or the other. Or both.

Let's examine a couple of recent "posts", as bloggers call an article, and see where they really come from.

Let's start off with Waldo. I'm sure you know Waldo, the cute kid from Charlottesville with a great smile and good hair. He's also got a really good looking wife and a pretty smart brother. I never really learned how to smile for a photograph, and I ain't got good hair. Oh, I got hair, just not much of it anymore, and what's there has gone really, really blonde.

Waldo recently "posted" what he would call an "article" about the "Global Warming Crisis". Yes, apparently Waldo is an Al Gore disciple.

Waldo has discovered an old report from the Global Climate Coalition, an enregy industry-financed group, that he says, decided years ago, that “the scientific basis for the Greenhouse Effect and the potential impact of human emissions of greenhouse gases such as CO2 on climate is well established and cannot be denied,”

Waldo does not include a link to the report he quotes. Oh, he does include a link to the New York Times report on the report, but once there you have to have really sharp eyes to find the link to the actual report.

Here you need to remember the quote from Waldo; "...the scientific basis for the Greenhouse Effect and the potential impact of human emissions of greenhouse gases such as CO2 on climate is well established and cannot be denied..."

There's more.(PDF link) Read the report yourself. NOTE: Unlike Waldo, this is a link to the actual report. Read it yourself.

Waldo could have included this link, but chose not to.

Read the entire report and you find that not only can man's contribution to climate change cannot be denied, you also cannot determine whether man's contribution will add more to global warming, or global cooling.

Read that again. The report does say that man's contribution to global warming cannot be denied. It also says that it cannot be determined whether or not man can contribute to warming or cooling. The report is also very careful to note that, although the hypothetical contribution by mankind to climate change cannot be denied, it cannot be determined how much or how little mankind may be able to contribute.

Sure. We may be able to affect the global temperature, but to what degree, and in which direction, no one can say.

Next, Lowell Feld and the recent Unemployment fiasco in Virginia.

Warner On The Democratic Process, Failing Grade

I've not written much on the Employee Free Choice Act before. I have, however, written about my thoughts on unions in general;

Any union, whether it be my old brotherhood the Teamsters, or my Grandfather's UMWA, or your local teacher's union, the VEA, is based on a single flawed premise. All unions are based on the concept that all workers are equal. Anyone who has spent a day on the factory floor, or a night in a mine, or a few miles on the road in a Freightliner knows that just ain't true. Even Dan, my beloved uncle, if he were to be honest about it would tell you that, given a choice, he would rather go down the road with Gary Martin than Roger Potter, two drivers I had the privilege to work with at that time. Yet in the eyes of the union they were equal. Horse hockey!

As a former union member, and an engineer working in two heavily unionized industries, I know a thing or two about unions and their organizing methods.

All's fair that ain't ruled unfair. And even then it's iffy.

There is no way to put a pretty face on this blatant power grab by unions and their bought Democratic stooges. If enough workers in a plant, store, jobsite, mine, or whatever can be arm-twisted into signing a card, the union is in.

No democratic election. No secret ballot. No anonymity allowed. You've been arm-twisted, your "vote" has been recorded.

Then the nightmare begins.

The workers and their employer will be forced into a binding arbitration if the employer does not immediately capitulate to the union's demands. Even if this arbitration is so detrimental to the company's business that it results in the demise of the company.

Virginians need to know that Senator Mark Warner has decided that the democratic (small "d") process need not apply to you and your workplace.

L'affaire Frederick

I spent quite a bit of time today on the phone with an RPV executive committee member in whom I have quite a bit of trust.

I will report in more detail on my thoughts concerning the L'affaire Frederick soon, it's being written, revised, re-written now.

H/T to JAB for the title.