Local Left Situationally Unaware (updated 14dec15)

George Rebane

The local Left joins the national Left in their happy dance about the ‘Climate Change agreement’ reached in Paris this week.  What they don’t seem to appreciate is that it will have about as much impact on earth’s climate, no matter how widely it is accepted or rejected, as does the Iran deal have on that country’s development of nuclear weapons.  It is all a desperate search for some optics to bolster the community organizer’s legacy and support heir apparent Hillary’s campaign.

The humorous part of their awareness spills over to more immediate concerns about economics and development of the local economy.  For openers our devout Democrats are overjoyed that California is on the upswing in job creation and corporate formation.  The feds (Census Bureau) recently tried quietly to pour some calming water on these breathless reports, pointing out that one fifth of California’s population lives in poverty, the state has the highest poverty rate in the nation, and the largest fraction receiving welfare of one kind or another.  And our unemployment rate (5.7%) remains doggedly above the national average no matter how the numbers are tortured.

But the real knee slapper is that the local Left has finally discovered STEM and the benefits that jobs in that sector bestow upon those who can do numbers among other things.  I was pointed to one loud local luminary who now advertises a ‘how to’ posting on lifting the local economy – he advises we become a major STEM employer.  Now sumbich, why didn’t the rest of us think about that ten years ago?!  The knarly part is that their ‘how to’ isn’t a ‘how to’ at all – liberals have no clues in this department – but only a ‘what if we only could’ dissertation.  One worthy even uses Boulder,CO as a template for Nevada County, apparently ignorant of the extensive workshop put on by our ERC last January that also featured Boulder in its unsuccessful attempt at a ‘how to’ for us.  It turned out then and does still today that Boulder and Nevada County have almost nothing in common save some H. Sapiens inhabitants.

Many of us in Nevada County have known for years (at least a generation?) that STEM is the third and now wobbly leg of our local economy, the other two being tourism and the retirees.  (I don’t want to include government because it brings to mind shuttered socialist towns like Lakeview, OR.)  But the promotion of STEM employment here is a longstanding effort that is made difficult by our politically correct econut faction and the obstacles they place and maintain in the path of any development.  That kind of opposition is endemic across the state, but it really impacts low population rural counties, especially those off the beaten path and not in the armpit of a coastal urban area.

Among other things, I would like to see the establishment of a technical high school in the county that would form a tight bond with our local Sierra College campus and also expand its STEM curriculum.  The NC Technical High School would focus on preparing kids for degree and certification based STEM careers.  Such a high school would most likely require a merit based entrance exam such as the existing SESF sponsored TechTestJr taken annually by county eighth graders.  No feel good politically correct or artsy-fartsy curriculum paths would be offered, there are already enough of those in our county.  NCTHS would draw in the elite kids who can, and as such would also be an attractant for the kind of parents who see value in putting their offspring into educational programs that lead to rewarding wealth generating careers.  Who knows what would follow such a successful initiative?

I predict that the Left would oppose this approach because promoting such highly discriminating education does not guarantee a reliable klatch of liberal voters upon matriculation.

[14dec12 update] The post conference drumbeat about green jobs from Obama and Kerry is getting louder again.  These socialists, as the many failed before them, continue to believe that imposing government mandated markets to supply unwanted products to enable citizens and businesses to comply to unneeded regulations counts as creating new jobs.

Any fool (well, not quite) knows that with a gun you can force people to do what they would not do if not forced. Were I a tyrant I could mandate that life-sized paper mache statues of me would be placed at every city street corner.  Since inclement weather is rough on such artifacts, new ones would have to be emplaced every time it rains.  The businesses and towns would be required to buy them, and the manufactories would be subsidized to keep supplying them.  The requirement for implementing such an enterprise would create thousands of jobs in the land, but to what productive end?

This is effect is doubly true when forcing private individuals and commercial enterprises to dance to the tidal wave of new green laws and regulations that are supposed prevent a global warming catastrophe. Our know-nothing elites even argue that these mandates will also induce economic growth.  Nothing could be further from the truth.  Were these diktats shown to actually create wealth, no government guns would be required.  That they don’t and cannot explains why force must be used to guarantee the required response from the rest of us.

Comments

[Account Deleted]

from the NYT: "The new deal will not, on its own, solve global warming. At best, scientists who have analyzed it say, it will cut global greenhouse gas emissions by about half enough as is necessary to stave off an increase in atmospheric temperatures of 2 degrees Celsius or 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit. That is the point at which, scientific studies have concluded, the world will be locked into a future of devastating consequences, including rising sea levels, severe droughts and flooding, widespread food and water shortages and more destructive storms."
So we have this great historic agreement that isn't going to prevent the very catastrophe that they are saying is now fixed.
And the 'poor' countries are miffed because the payday part of the deal isn't included in the main language of the agreement. They want a guaranteed 100 billion a year handed over.
And of course, this agreement is 'legally binding'.
I kid you not. If we don't comply, the UN green police will - what? Unlike us on Facebook?

[Todd Juvinall]

I did a story today as well. It is truly a blessing the "conference" was a failure. America may get a momentary breather from the fanatics on the left. Here is Lord Monckton's view.

https://youtu.be/sDTvt1jVVDg

[Gregory]

The 2deg per degC CO2 sensitivity figure of merit is where the computer models show positive feedback temperature spikes... but there's only been a 1/3 increase in CO2 (about 300 to 400ppm) so we're 200ppm short of a doubling, and the actual increases have been below what the alarmist's models have predicted, most of the by a VERY wide margin.

There is no "consensus" among IPCC alarmists... their range for CO2 sensitivity is currently from 1.5 to 4.5C for a doubling, while the climate realists have it at about 1.0 to 1.8... and nobody thinks we have a problem in that range... unfortunately, the Alarmists have had it in the 1.5 to 4.5 range for over 30 years without a narrowing. Perhaps an IPCC apologist can explain that here.

2deg C by itself is nothing, very common in the geologic record. HELL, the oceans show a 6 degC peak to peak temperatur swings over 140 million million year periods, thought to be the galact cosmic ray influence and that represents an amount of energy fantastically larger than the 2degC increase in land surface temps the scare is all about.

[Gregory]

Make the first sentence above read:
The 2degC per doubling of CO2 sensitivity figure of merit is where the computer models show positive feedback temperature spikes..

[Account Deleted]

Greg at 4:27 - "Perhaps an IPCC apologist can explain that here."
The 'true believers' have a lot of explaining to do. Instead of monstrous killer hurricanes and tornadoes, we have had a period of record calm. Our tax payer funded agencies are hiding data and the wealthiest folks on earth are dictating the world's policies. What happened to the lefties screeching about DEMOCRACY!
Oh - the cricket corp is in full song tonight!

[Account Deleted]

It gets better and better:
"Secretary of State John Kerry said Sunday the climate agreement reached this week in Paris did not contain any enforcement provisions because Congress would not have approved them.

'It doesn't have mandatory targets for reduction and it doesn't have an enforcement, compliance mechanism', Kerry said during an interview on "Fox News Sunday."
So we put up an octagonal red sign that says 'stop' but you can just ignore it because there is no enforcement.
I think they just like to go party in Paris and put it on the public tab.
No wonder they are trying to disarm the American people.

[Russ Steele]

Looking at all of Outside's STEM Towns, they are all University towns. Last time I checked, we do not have a University in Nevada County, only a community college that does not have a great track record for graduating students with AA degrees in STEM-related subjects.

[Russ Steele]

Quote of the day on the Paris Global Warming agreement:

This is an unattainable deal based on a domestic energy plan that is likely illegal, that half the states have sued to halt, and that Congress has already voted to reject

- US Senator Mitch McConnell

Financial Times has the details HERE.

[Ben Emery]

Too little too late. Large transnational corporations are a cancer to us all. The only thing that will cause the collective action needed at this point is a complete global financial collapse, which is on the horizon and has been for awhile.

[Bill Tozer]

Well Ben, we still need good STEM folks who are quite proficient in math to count the loses accuranty when the next global financial collapse happens.

[Michael R. Kesti]

Bill Tozer 13Dec15 10:18 PM

Such counting requires only simple arithmetic rather than math, Bill.

[Gregory]

There already is a NU Technical High School... the continuation high school that Linda Campbell was Principal of before she retired and ran for the NJUHS board of trustees. It's "technically a high school".

Ghidotti does a great job both at taking good students and turning out great graduates... but it seems to have hollowed out the comprehensive schools.

The problem with our high schools is the problem with our K-8 feeders... if kids are making it into the 8th grade (oops, Common Core pushed that to the 9th) not ready for Algebra, they won't be taking Geometry, Algebra II, Trig or AP Calc; and even before Common Core, the GVSD was doing a lousy job of teaching math before CC made its arrival, but then they drank that same NCTM koolaid in the early 90's.

We don't need special schools that are math and science only (and we don't particularly need "technology" or "engineering" which tend only to water down the math, physics, chemistry and chemistry that they should be getting in secondary school... some real computer science, too. A well run and competently staffed comprehensive high school gives all students access to the classes they may need, but it doesn't do a damn for anyone if the kids arriving in the 8th grade are not ready to tackle 8th grade work with no good reason besides lack of good teachers and good teaching methods.

[George Rebane]

Re Gregory’s 1140pm – I was referring to the kind of technical high schools represented by Brooklyn Tech and Arsenal Tech (Indianapolis). To my knowledge nothing like this exists in Nevada County. And yes, it would be nice to go back to yesteryear when we all got plenty of math and science in high school that qualified us to enter four-year research universities, that possibility is long gone for too many reasons to list here. However, we have covered them in past posts and their comment streams.

From time to time I tutor advanced students in math and science. My current charge is a brilliant sophomore whose parents are very much up on what’s locally available. No joy, so the graybeard is filling in again.

[Account Deleted]

Ben at 9:30 -
"The only thing that will cause the collective action needed at this point is a complete global financial collapse..."
When in history has a financial collapse ever brought about a peaceful rise of a magic wonderful democracy?
A world-wide financial collapse will bring nothing but unrest, bloodshed and ever more tyrannical govts.
The folks Ben despises will be the ones still in control and sitting pretty while the peasant class sinks lower.
"We, the people" as a country, voted for the govt we have and the debt it has run up. And the volk want more debt and free stuff from Santa Claus.
While our leaders whip up nonsense about how we're all going to die if we don't accept less freedoms and a lower standard of living.

[fish]

Posted by: Scott Obermuller | 14 December 2015 at 08:55 AM

But Scott.....collective action.......collective....... action!!

Because collective.

[Ben Emery]

Scott,

When Black Tuesday hit the factories shut down and production stopped, why? The same thing will happen when the next crash happens because their is no more political will to bail out banks again. When this happens large transnational corporations will lose their cash flow and extraction will stop, which in turn will stop the western lifestyle. The western lifestyle is what is driving the Asian emerging markets. The result will be massive suffering and with that suffering the people will return to regional economies and cooperation to survive. Out of this crash and rebooting economies the new economic paradigm will be born. That paradigm will be what principled conservatives and true progressives have been advocating all along. It is all laid out in the "New Golden Age" by Ravi Batra

The New Golden Age: The Coming Revolution Against Political Corruption and Economic Chaos
http://www.texasmonthly.com/politics/ravi-batra/

As for your- "When in history has a financial collapse ever brought about a peaceful rise of a magic wonderful democracy?"

Are you kidding? First off nobody mentioned a peaceful anything. Change is only gotten through constant struggle. Do you not remember FDR, the New Deal, Great Society, any of these ringing a bell? It created the largest middle class in world history. It also allowed the labor, civil rights, and womens rights movements to flourish and we in fact received more democracy. This scared the shit out of conservatives and corporate world so much Lewis Powell wrote a little memo about it and the conservative movement and Republican Party have been following it since the 1970's to make sure the breakout of democracy and increase of the standard living for working people wouldn't continue.

The Powell Memo: A Call-to-Arms for Corporations
http://billmoyers.com/content/the-powell-memo-a-call-to-arms-for-corporations/

[Jon]

Thanks Ben. And now that American middle class is largely gone due to the policies began by Reagan 35 years ago. Grown under a progressive, killed by right wing fantasy policies to benefit the wealthy.

[fish]

I guess we'll see if the US let itself get taken to the woodshed again with this non-treaty treaty.....the US will find a way to use it to extract more money rom the peasantry and enrich the cronies (Tom Steyer, Warren Buffett, etc.) I imagine.......the rest of the world will just line up with their hands out.

http://www.nationalreview.com/article/428448/paris-climate-agreement-bad-for-us-needs-congressional-approval

Remember this the next time that the NRC assures you just how important it is to keep voting Republican.

NORMAN LEAR: Trump 'Scares the Hell Out of Me'...

.....Norman Lear is still alive? Are we sure.....? I mean there's been a lot of talk of Zombies recently.

[Todd Juvinall]

"jon": i smoking the ganga again. Jeeze, how can someone be that dumb about their own country.

[Ben Emery]

Yep Jon,
The regressives here can't seem to grasp anything outside the propaganda of the establishment of the our nation and increasingly the establishment of the international corporate one world government. They have chosen the R team in this two team league that represents one boss, and it isn't the American people. The D team is the problem with everything and the R team is the answer to everything.

[Gregory]

"it would be nice to go back to yesteryear when we all got plenty of math and science in high school that qualified us to enter four-year research universities, that possibility is long gone for too many reasons to list here"

There never was a time that "when we all got plenty of math and science in high school" to meet Cal or CalTech standards, and there still exist many comprehensive high schools in the US where *all* can take a course of study that is appropriately challenging. For some that will always be barely enough algebra to earn a real diploma, for others it will be not enough algebra to earn a real diploma, and it's quite possible to get a diploma from NU or BR and find yourself at a Cal, Stanford, CalTech, MIT or Harvard in a math or science PhD program four years later... at least from my direct knowledge that was true four years ago. With Common Core, that is now less probable.

With the current population of Nevada County, there shouldn't be a special "college prep for math and science study at four year research universities" high school as there will never be the number of qualified students for that here, and I'd argue there probably shouldn't be one anywhere. Effective high schools can serve diverse needs, including at least a taste of the arts for all.

[fish]

Yep Jon,
The regressives here can't seem to grasp anything outside the propaganda of the establishment of the our nation and increasingly the establishment of the international one world government. They have chosen the D team in this two team league that represents one boss, and it isn't the American people. The R team is the problem with everything and the D team is the answer to everything.

But hey kudos to you for yet another flawless recitation of the standard proggie catechism.

[drivebyposter]

"Change is only gotten through constant struggle. Do you not remember FDR, the New Deal, Great Society, any of these ringing a bell? It created the largest middle class in world history."

- B. Emery

Everyone should be above average by now you would think.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_3bGnkNeoPxk/SbEbx4MWJrI/AAAAAAAACfA/AIxIVAJ5tTc/s400/Government-Spending-Graph.PNG

My take is that anyone who can claim to understand economic cycles and their causes is a lot smarter than I am. You should run for office.

[George Rebane]

Gregory 1041am - I and my fellow students on the STEM path most certainly did get the education in our public high schools (Indiana and soCal) to meet ALL standards of America's top tech schools.

[Gregory]

" I and my fellow students on the STEM path most certainly did get the education in our public high schools"

George, you didn't have the "on the STEM path" qualifier in the opinion I was responding to. Even in my crappy east LA high school there were a classroom's worth of students taking a real physics and math class ... about 30, and we went off to colleges like CalTech (2), MIT (1), Stanford (1), Mudd (1) and numerous UCLA, UCSD, CalPoly and CSU's, etc. But that was 30 out of over 900 graduates. There were also programs in music and industrial arts that kicked some arse.

There really is no structural deficiency in our current schools; the problems are in staffing (teaching and administration) and the Nationalized pedagogies du jour that have put schools on a course to an academic meltdown. My son, a 2007 NUHS grad, had enough AP credits to cover many of the UC Berkeley general ed requirements and was ready to graduate in chemistry after 3 1/2 years. A '15 Mudd graduate now pursuing a PhD at MIT was from Bear River '11. The problem isn't that we don't have specialized high schools, which would suffer the same problems under the Common Core thumb that is holding everyone down.

[Gregory]

Here's the BA Anthropologist and one-time AP computer science teacher's take on what is needed to educate kids to be at the top of their game upon graduation:

If this county’s Right really wanted to support STEM, beyond their own few precious kids and grandkids going on to “first tier schools,” they would have put a county wide fiber optics backbone in place already.

Educationist to the core... if the school is falling short, the problem is that someone else didn't buy some tool that could have been useful. The truth is that a solid foundation of 18th century math, physics and chemistry with some Spackle to patch the gaps where they got it wrong and some very basic computer knowledge and skill with a keyboard is enough to launch a 12th grader into any top tier undergraduate program. To make a useful citizen, a coverage of civics, history, the arts, etc (add your sacred cow if necessary) had better be available.

[Don Bessee]

The idea the FDR created the middle class explosion is fantasy. The country was mired until the rest of the world started WWII and industrial production surged. War production and post war issues led to the burgeoning middle class that was really squashed by the Clinton-Frank destruction of underwritten home loans, that came home to roost in the collapse. More revisionista history from the 'jons' of the world.

[George Rebane]

Gregory 1230pm - Understand, apologies.

DonB 114pm - 'He who owns the past, owns the present. He who owns the present, owns the future.' Orwell?

[fish]

Not all leftys are situationally unaware.....

"Street gangs have been a part of Chicago politics at least since the days of the notorious First Ward bosses “Bathhouse John” Coughlin and Michael “Hinky Dink” Kenna, who a century ago ran their vice-ridden Levee district using gangs of toughs armed with bats and pistols to bully voters and stuff ballot boxes. “Gangs and politics have always gone together in this city,” says John Hagedorn, a gang expert and professor of criminal justice at the University of Illinois at Chicago. It’s a shadowy alliance, he adds, that is deeply ingrained in Chicago’s political culture: “You take care of them; they’ll take care of us.”

http://www.chicagomag.com/Chicago-Magazine/January-2012/Gangs-and-Politicians-An-Unholy-Alliance/

[Jon]

Don, nice right wing spin on the New Deal, but like many things you guys believe, its not grounded in reality. There are hundreds of scholars who know a bit more about that subject :), and they know the New Deal was a capitalist tool that brought never-before seen prosperity to many pockets of the US that were formally poverty-ridden pits such as the Pacific NW and the TN. Valley. It expanded the great middle class well beyond the traditional pockets of wealth that existed before the 1930s. It was the growth of unions and progressive tax policy, obviously enhanced by the economy of wartime production. Middle class prosperity and economic purchasing power clearly peaked around 1979-1980 with the Reagan policies came into being. So, sorry Don.

[fish]

Posted by: Jon | 14 December 2015 at 02:07 PM

God but you're a nitwit.....most scholars of economic history make a better case that the thieving putz extended the depression .....bought time economically during WWII and finally it ended after the war when the US was the only industrial power still intact and able to transition to non war material production rapidly......but by all means continue to believe the hagiographic tributes that confirm your political views.

[Don Bessee]

Again, another micron thin depth of knowledge from the comic stylings of the 'jon'. The big Black migration did not begin until the wars demand for labor and facts are facts no matter what 'they' have told you. There was no middle class growth explosion under FDR. Who told you that, Bernnie Sanders? Kennedy did more for the middle class in his short time than FDR ever did. Another example of a person who can read but not comprehend. LOL

[Don Bessee]

Lets toss a little troll chow and see what bites. Gallup reports that twice as many Americans are concerned about the government protecting them from jihadi terrorists than those who say gun control is the most important issue. Security is the number 1 issue now in a way as never before. Gee wonder why, perhaps the results of the attitude displayed by the Chicago crew in the White House?

[Gregory]

Another bit to bring in on the post WWII economy... it was driven by the use of fossil fuels, what the Left is doing its damnedest to shut off.

Subsistence farming and near starvation is the ultimate in Green farm to table experiences.

[George Rebane]

DonB 219pm - What our liberal neighbor Jon (and his historians) don't seem to know is 1) SecTreas Morgenthau told Congress in 1939, when unemployment was unchanged from when FDR took office, was that they had tried everything including throwing massive amounts of money at the economy, and nothing worked. He appealed for new ideas and told Congress that the administration was open to anything to get the country moving again (WW2 turned out to be a brilliant 'new idea'). When the depression continued in 1946, Truman helped by agreeing to terminate all New Deal work programs and almost all subsidies. The country took off and never looked back, until the Great Society kicked in.

2) What followed was the decade of 'stagflation' (I was there) where the economy stagnated and inflation soared. Middle class savings were essentially wiped out, only real estate kept its value. Jimmy Carter hand Reagan a doozy, and nobody (including Democrats) thought that Carter had done anything positive for the country. There was a reason he lost and was thought to be the most incapable president in living memory, that is until Obama showed us his speed.

A month or so ago I had a chance to spend some quality time with the AP history book used at NUHS. Wow! It was as if I was reading the history of a parallel Earth, yet I had spent my life in most of the recent decades. Unbelievable.

The Left has owned the union schools for at least a half a century and has been able to pour down the throats of our little darlins any narrative they wanted. That is why today we have the 'Jons' and 'Bens', true believers viewing the world through carefully colored glasses. As in the USSR and PRC, it has to get a lot worse before these people or their progeny will again demand the next fundamental transformation. In the interval we will continue talking past each other.

[Don Bessee]

The traitor Bergahl will be court marshaled for desertion and misbehavior before the enemy, if convicted life in prison. Good. A deserter who got fellow soldiers killed and 0 traded 5 jihadi generals for the deserter. Another stunning negotiating victory on par with the mullah economic stimulus package aka the iran nuke deal and the recent non binding irrelevancy in Paris. How many Gulfstream, private airbus and Boeing air miles were carbonized in organizing the Paris shindig? Back in town and catching up on the Union and todays cartoon sums up the al gore elitists perfectly. ;-)

[Bill Tozer]

Kind of on topic about the force of the gun to get people to go along. I wish more laws were followed and less broken by the unelected gun holders.

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/12/15/us/politics/epa-broke-the-law-by-using-social-media-to-push-water-rule-auditor-finds.html?_r=0

[Bill Tozer]

I am hesitant to post this after reading RR's take on STEM and our local economy after a poster or two veered the conservation to the usual R vs D Great Divide and the usual powerful corporations call the shots and by inference, must be dismantled. Long sentence to justify being a hypocrite and veering briefly off topic myself.

Be that as it may, I never check the box at the bottom of the 1040s asking if I would like to donate a dollar to the presidential campaigns. Some years I felt that perhaps I should as it was a way of helping some poor Ross, Ralph, Jesse, or some other 3rd Party Stiff gain a voice in our expensive political campaigns. Now, I am glad and relieved I have not even once checked the "I wish to donate a dollar to Ben's wet dream." One never knows where that money will be siphoned off to. At least there was no gun to my head. Always a silver lining.

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2015/dec/13/dnc-craves-tax-dollars-for-convention/

[Gregory]

BT I've also avoided the check off; having yet another lot full of cash accumulate for politicians to spend... on themselves... does not do me, my family or neighbors any good. Besides, most Libertarian candidates have sworn not to take it.

[jon]

Bessee 1515

Please elaborate on your service...

[Ben Emery]

FDR saved Capitalism from itself, hence Ralph Nader quote "Capitalism will never fail because socialism will always be there to bail it out"

As Bernie Sanders talks about Capitalism he correctly talks about ending the type of capitalism that has been in practice for the last 40 years.

".....as Professor Lawrence Davidson has written, “Roosevelt and the New Deal saved capitalism from itself.”

As writer Russell Baker has noted, “Roosevelt and his advisers introduced a new philosophy, one that held that Americans had responsibilities to one another, and that government had a duty to intervene when capitalism failed.” In effect, FDR gave meaning to the mandate of the U.S. Constitution for the federal government to “promote” and “provide for … the general Welfare.”- Benerly Bandler
https://consortiumnews.com/2015/01/30/why-fdr-matters-now-more-than-ever/

I don't necessarily agree with this article but it gives something to think about.
http://www.hoover.org/research/how-fdr-saved-capitalism

[George Rebane]

BenE 612pm - FDR invented the notion that "Americans had responsibilities to one another"?? My, my, my - de Toqueville already noted it as established and admirable attribute of the average American in the 1830s. What next, WEB Dubois invented the telegraph?

[Bill Tozer]

Touching on the idea of a STEM high school in western Nevada County, Dr. Rebane touched on some are sure to decry such a public high school as being a school for rich people's kids and (my words, not the good doc's) inherently unfair to those off spring of parents of lower social-economics status. Perhaps creating a private high school would be more feasible and cause less angst amoung our lefties. Accepting only the best and brightest may cause some waves. The bar may be just too high to satisfy government run school criteria.
Noting that so many STEM grads in larger cities have landed internships at tech companies, I must add that there is not a glut of internship offerings to those that reside locally, even figuring in per capita. There is also no guarantee that our fine students even want to settle down here locally. It's a big wide world out there.
On the current national topic of diversity and revenge....er...fairness...on campuses at some of our finest institutions of higher learning, I enjoyed this link.

http://patriotpost.us/articles/39477

[Don Bessee]

Interesting that the 'jon' has multiple squiggly box versions in just the last few posts. Too many hands trying to fit in one sock puppet? ;-)

Get back to the point the 'jon'. I know, I know when presented with pesky facts that don't follow the PC talking points its always CCC and hey look was the Elvis over there? LOL

[George Rebane]

BillT 630pm - For the record Mr Tozer, the schools I cited, and many others of their ilk across the country, are public schools who qualify their entering classes through merit based exams.

[Account Deleted]

"Capitalism will never fail because socialism will always be there to bail it out"
Haaaaaaaaaaaaaa ha ha - oh dear, wait: I need time to catch my breath from laughing so hard.
In the last crash, they bailed out Govt Motors to protect the union contracts, which in a lawful manner, should have been torn up. They bailed out SOME of the banks and financial institutions based on how connected you were with the powers that be. Housing should have just been left to crash. Folks like me with cash would have been able to scoop up real estate dead cheap. The folks who lost their homes could keep them by renting from the new owners (me) at hugely reduced costs and could have then saved for a new home later. The big problem if they let everything just fall and recover on its own would have been the slanted eyes of the new owners of most of corporate America. Gasp! We can't have that, now surely! Socialism didn't save anything but the hides of the idiots that helped to cause the problem in the first place. Our 'recovery' has taken 7 years now and we are deeper in debt and addicted to zero interest rates. The greedy thieves were made whole and the honest working class were hosed. Oh - THANK YOU, socialism.

[Bill Tozer]

Yes, Dr. Rebane, you made that clear. I, however, sometimes wonder if merit based anything is allowed in the public sector, besides the 50-80k bumps that the head of the Va and IRS and EPA and their closest aides receive on a regular basis.
To the victor goes the spoils. Merit based? Ah, only in the private sector.

[Paul Emery]

Scott

Most , but not all, of the bailouts were under Bush's leadership. Especially the auto bailouts. Here's some background to refresh your memory

"Bush unilaterally agreed to lend $17.4 billion of taxpayers’ money to General Motors and Chrysler, of which $13.4 billion was to be extended immediately. He had to twist the law to get the money. Deprived of congressional funding, he diverted cash from the loathed TARP program, which Congress had already passed, but which was supposed to be restricted to rescuing the banks. “I didn’t want there to twenty-one-per-cent unemployment,” he said "...........

http://www.newyorker.com/news/john-cassidy/an-inconvenient-truth-it-was-george-w-bush-who-bailed-out-the-automakers

[George Rebane]

PaulE 752pm - Of all the govt handouts deriving from the 2008 recession, almost all economists agree that TARP was the only one that did any good; all the rest of the QEs was simply money pissed into the wind while distorting the monetary policy into a pretzel that the Fed is still trying to figure out. Today's report is that the Fed thinks its economic models have not been the correct ones to use since the recession began. All of them have predicted rising inflation due to the QEs, and none of that has happened - big puzzle, sorta like with the climate GCMs that can't explain anything either. Both climate and the economy are very complex systems which we don't yet understand (although the socialists claim to).

[Todd Juvinall]

I thought the auto bailouts were under Obama. Didn't he swipe all the bonds? And close down the Republican dealerships?

[Paul Emery]

Na Todd It was bush who did the auto bailouts in '08

" President George W. Bush stepped in Friday to keep America's auto industry afloat, announcing a $17.4 billion bailout for GM and Chrysler, with the terms of the loans requiring that the firms radically restructure and show they can become profitable soon.

"If we were to allow the free market to take its course now, it would almost certainly lead to disorderly bankruptcy," Bush said at the White House, in remarks carried live by the national broadcast networks. "In the midst of a financial crisis and a recession, allowing the U.S. auto industry to collapse is not a responsible course of action. The question is how we can best give it a chance to succeed."

Read more: http://www.politico.com/story/2008/12/bush-announces-174-billion-auto-bailout-016740#ixzz3uMcPaPUJ

[Account Deleted]

Paul - Obama GAVE Govt Motors 54 big ones. Bush LOANED much less. Ford got nothing but screwed.
How in the world (besides being stupid) does your reply to my post invalidate anything I said about the govt bailouts?
Govt Motors Bond holders were completely swindled out of their money that was owed by law.
Oh yeah - socialism really SAVED us.
If we had just let the chips fall as they might, we would have recovered in maybe a year or less. Well, "we" being those who were savy and careful. The greedy, stupid and crooked would have been hung out to dry. But "they" were "saved" by socialism. Way to go, socialism.
Really, Paul - were you that stoned? It wasn't that long ago.

[Don Bessee]

PE, you may want to include the years subsequent to that initial action in the discussion, that's where it turned into redistribution of wealth.

[Paul Emery]

Scott

So you believe that TARP, enacted under the Bush Admin was a big mistake.

[Bill Tozer]

Concerning the update to this post, Yo Jon, India good!

http://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/asiapacific/india-says-paris-climate/2345998.html

Oh yeah, China will consider to commence to think about playing along in 2030...if they are so inclined. 2 of the 3 world's largest nations by population say go pound sand...for now. There is always hope that someday, somewhere over the rainbow......
Hansen was correct when he said the Paris Pact was a fraud. At least the US is giving island nations another 700 million to combat rising oceans. When I think of Haiti and the Dominican Republic and Puerto Rico, they each need a heck of a lot more than 700 million each just to stay afloat, with or without rising sea levels.

[fish]

Posted by: Ben Emery | 14 December 2015 at 06:12 PM

FDR saved Capitalism from itself, hence Ralph Nader quote "Capitalism will never fail because socialism will always be there to bail it out"

I know this is difficult for you.....and Ralph....but the beauty of capitalism is failure and that the moment it was "bailed out" it ceased to be capitalism. Bad enough to have socialists enabling bad behavior.... worse still that they don't appear to understand that they're enabling bad behavior.

[Ben Emery]

Fish,
Let me make this as simple as possible. Capitalism would have been replaced by another form of economic system if it weren't for FDR. Do you understand?

[Ben Emery]

14 December 2015 at 06:19 PM
Yes George,
FDR shifted away from the rugged individualist mentality and brought a new zeitgeist to the nation of "We" are in this together. And NO FDR didn't invent the idea as you misinterpreted from the statement. If President Sanders pulls American soldiers out of Afghanistan it will be introducing a new philosophy and strategy that isn't an original idea but rather a shift away from the status quo.

[Jon]

The roblem Ben is that they don't want to be in this together. They hate that idea. They really don't want to be part of the United States, don't really want to be part of Planet Earth. No respect for anyone else on this planet except their little angry corp of "god fearing" right wingers.

[Account Deleted]

Paul - my point was that 'socialism' - ie, govt meddling and bailouts - didn't save us at all. It rewarded the rats and screwed the innocent.
Your fixation on Bush is ludicrous. I don't give a small rodent's behind WHO is in charge of socialism, it doesn't work.
Of course TARP was a joke - Bush even admitted it was a mistake.
The American auto industry was largely hurting but would have been able to make it without any govt intervention whatsoever. BMW, Toyota, Subaru, Mercedes Benz and Ford would just keep making cars and Chrysler and Govt Motors would go through reorganization.
The Chinese would have scooped up GM for sure. Guess where the 'saved' Govt Motors is opening new plants? That's right, China. Wow - we gave them 54 billion so they could then open plants in China.

[Todd Juvinall]

Jon | 15 December 2015 at 07:40 AM

You are a troll, we are real people. We love the planet and its people. We actually pay for your lifestyle and your bills since you are on the dole. What a hoot!

[Todd Juvinall]

ScottO, Paul Emery is fixated on Bush and I have come to the conclusion he has a illness about it. So maybe some meds and a few prayers would help him through the day?

[George Rebane]

It's always been the case that conservatarian arguments address the specific and explicit tenets of the leftist arguments. But to make their points, the liberals have to put their own words into the other's mouth or launch into hyperboles like conservatives really "don't want to be a part of the United States, don't really want to be part of Planet Earth." For them that is the pinnacle of argument.

[Bill Tozer]

Well, I wish you experts would make up your mind.

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/vegetarian-diet-bad-for-environment-meat-study-lettuce-three-times-worse-emissions-bacon-a6773671.html

[Paul Emery]

No fixation on Bush Todd I just had to remind you that is was the bushman who first sent bailout bucks to the Auto industry not Obama. Not only do you have a math and reading problem you also have a short memory and almost no conception of contemporary history.

[Todd Juvinall]

Paul Emery | 15 December 2015 at 08:40 AM

Paul Emery, my history is just fine. You are the person with the problem. Good luck.

[George Rebane]

PaulE 840am - Yes, Bush2 and a strongly Democratic Congress managed TARP as I pointed out in my 817pm. That did not allow the markets to clear but did save the status quo of the auto industry. Obama made things worse through successive QEs that have given us not a recovery but what historians will see as Depression2.

[fish]

Posted by: Ben Emery | 15 December 2015 at 06:57 AM

Fish,
Let me make this as simple as possible. Capitalism would have been replaced by another form of economic system if it weren't for FDR. Do you understand?

Oh I absolutely understand.....and it would have been what you guys always think is best......some form of a "command and control" system with edicts promulgated from the D.C. production board. It's the lefts default position on matters economic.

We've already had a sniff of it from your preferred candidate...."Phlegmy Bern".....with still another false equivalency..."...nobody needs 23 kinds of deodorant when there are children going hungry in America". One can only assume that should Mr. Sanders blunder into the White House each and every one of us will have an opportunity to work at "Glorious Deodorant Factory #1" where the approved scent for the masses will be produced....not sure what that is going to do about those hungry children but I'm sure he means well.

And isn't that all that counts in modern governance.

[fish]

Posted by: Jon | 15 December 2015 at 07:40 AM

The roblem Ben is that they don't want to be in this together. They hate that idea. They really don't want to be part of the United States, don't really want to be part of Planet Earth. No respect for anyone else on this planet except their little angry corp of "god fearing" right wingers.

Clutch those pearls........HARDER...clutch em jon. I love it when you guys flail away at psychoanalysis!

[Bill Tozer]

If I didn't know better, Brother Ben just repeated The Bern's campaign speech. Yes, I feel the Bern quite nicely, thank you.

Poor Ben. I was waiting for another long history lesson in white priveledge just as soon as this BLM thang got the get-up-and-go momentum and we would be naughty boys here for trashing the Black Students Matter (with the token white chick with protest sign always on the left of center) as it rocked the Nation. But, nooooooo, that Paris thing (the mass murders, not the mass thuggery 2 weeks later) just blew the whole street creed Movement back a year.

Then, just as things were quieting down, I was waiting for The Bern to grap some headlines and the ensuring economic (in historical context) lessons from Brother Ben about some self avowed Socialist who choose to go to The Soviet Union for his honeymoon or some wacky rumor like that. But, noooooo. This San Burdo thing blew The Bern's message right off the first 6 pages as well. Poor guy, can't catch a break.
The last thing The Bern needs is the national attention to zero in foreign affairs and national security. But, Brother Ben did get The Bern's economic message out this fine morning. When there is a will, there is a way.

[Bill Tozer]

Jon, I was going to say that time period of middleclass prosperity that ended in 79/80 was when Jimmy the Peanut Farmer ruled the roost. But Dr. Rebane beat me to it.

Hey, those were good times! I bought a CD down at Wells Fargo for 10% interest locked in for 20 years, lol. That was just a measly safe and sound CD. People were glad to find a mortgage loan at 14% with points. Them were the days my friend, you thought they would never end. But they did. Oh, don't forget the year lag time it takes for things to filter through the whole economy. Jimmy was just before his time. That is why I voted for him in 76.

[Ben Emery]

Fish, Fish, Fish such a babe in the woods. The only way capitalism corrects itself is through innocent people being injured. Do you or a loved one want to be the victim of a drug that will kill or permanently maim? With market corrections we have to wait for innocent people to be injured unnecessarily. FDR saved capitalism from itself and we have reversed enough of FDR security precautions that capitalism is on the brink of destroying itself once again. Hopefully this time around we actually create a new model that protects us from such gross abuses.

[fish]

Posted by: Ben Emery | 15 December 2015 at 08:03 PM

Funny that in our discussion of FDR "saving capitalism from itself" you use as an example the FDA....this an enhancement of earlier legislation enacted by cousin Teddy....something that no economic historian or economist ever mentions when repeating the trope. I'm fascinated to know why you thought that the bank holiday, gold confiscation, and the whole host of programs (CCC, WPA, etc.) of questionable effect but can be used to at least advance the argument weren't cited?

[Gregory]

Master Ben's view also implies capitalists think killing customers is okey-dokey... even without liability law that can bankrupt companies and the fact that individuals within a company who, either wilfully or by negligence, do harm, remain civilly and criminally liable.

Then there's the even sillier notion that the motives of public bureaucrats are pure.

The fact remains that by raising costs and erecting barriers to new drugs and devices, the FDA also kills people. There is no free lunch.

[drivebyposter]

"No fixation on Bush Todd I just had to remind you that is was the bushman who first sent bailout bucks to the Auto industry not Obama. "

P. Emery.

I seem to remember that it was Jimmy Carter, my memory must be fading.

[Gregory]

It just occurred to me that besides the kneeslapper that Nevada County's economic woes would be fixed were we to become Boulder CO, they were also earlier claiming we should be Ashland OR... another college town that has earned its tourism with a well-earned reputation for live theater productions.

When I arrived in Nevada County 22 years ago there were 2,000 employees at the Grass Valley Group alone but it had already been bought by Tektronix nearly two decades earlier with its destiny in their hands; those days are gone and the current trend is for successful companies to sell out to foreign corporations that are less burdened by state and federal corporate taxes... and no matter how good the Nevada County operations are, if the headquarters are out of state or out of country, the well being of local to us offices will not be on their minds.

We do not have business friendly local governments and I don't see that being fixed anytime soon.

When I dropped out of Cisco to be a full time dad after my wife died, my plan A was to end up at the Group when our dust settled but when the Group got bought by Thomson, a company that screwed me out of the patent for pipeline MPEG decoders to give it to the French video engineering star at SGS-Thomson, I knew that was a losing proposition... as one GVG manager told a friend of mine... 'Thomson management will make Tek look good'.

Sierra College isn't a Ashland State and it's even less a CU at Boulder, which is arguably a peer to UC Berkeley.

"What a maroon! What an ignoranimus!". Bugs Bunny on Jeff Peeline.
[Note to Jeff, I prefer the period to follow the closing double quote as it better follows c/c++ grammar; feel free to choke on it again]

[Walt]

I do believe Driveby hit his target, as he rounded the corner. Carter bailed out Chrysler. Remember the disposable "K" car?
http://www.heritage.org/research/reports/1983/07/the-chrysler-bail-out-bust

[Gregory]

Give drive by a cigar... Lee Iacocca put on the kneepads to get a bailout for Chrylser in 1979. Obama then gave Chrysler to Italy's FIAT.

Chrysler had earned failure fair and square by 1979 and the country would have been better off had it been allowed to be reorganized under bankruptcy law (perhaps into oblivion) then.

I recall a Carson joke when the K-car was premiered... something like 'Lee Iacocca showed off the first k-car today... if they manage to sell it they'll build another one'.

[Paul Emery]

Driveby

It was Bush in 2008, as I documented earlier, who bailed out Auto as part of TARP.

[Gregory]

Paul, I realize you like to portray presidents as if they were kings when it suits you but Bush in his last term had Pelosi and Reid in control of the legislature and was in no position to hold his breath until the legislature turned blue.

that, like the Carter era help for Chrysler, were loan guarantees not actual takeovers like the Obama effort... which bailed out union pensions and health insurance more than anything else, screwing creditors and stockholders... including the widow McGillicuddy down the street.

[Jon]

"Sierra College isn't a Ashland State" Gregory 12:09

Ashland State? Never heard of it. The college in Ashland is Southern Oregon University.

thanks.

[Gregory]

close enough Jon. now do a new culpa on your claim it's never 65 in NYC in December.

[Gregory]

mea culpa... damn autocorrect

[Gregory]

BTW both the sensitivity over the proper name of ashland state and the insincere "thanks" is very reminiscent of the long absent Michael P. Anderson who I've pegged as the one fisting "Jon" on multiple occasions.

[Don Bessee]

Yes, a lot of the 'jons' hereabout suddenly.

[George Rebane]

A massive point of error and also a litmus test for progressive membership. As witnessed above, capitalism is just another economic system to socialists who don't understand human nature, and have subsequently created the most murderous governments in human history. Not so, capitalism is not just another centrally planned economic order, but a strong attractant for commercial activity to which societies naturally migrate when given the freedom to do so.

[Account Deleted]

Paul - if you're going to act like a snotty little know-it-all, it might be helpful to get your facts straight.
You claim you 'had' to remind us of something that wasn't even true.
The govt had (and has) no business picking winners and losers in private business.
It doesn't matter who is the pres when it happens - it's wrong.
And you might at some point between tokes look up the difference between loaning money and giving it away.
There's a slight difference.

[George Rebane]

Here's how absolutely unaware the national Left is. "Islam is not our adversary. Muslims are a peaceful and tolerant people and have nothing whatsoever to do with terrorism." - Hillary Clinton, 19 November 2015. This idiot wants to be our next president, and untold others will vote for her. Sarah Palin accomplished more in a partial term as Alaska's governor than Hillary Clinton has in her entire public life. Go figger.

[Bonnie McGuire]

Scott and George R. I really enjoy your common sense opinions. What's your take on Ann Coulters latest article? I'm inclined to think that America's problems aren't much different than with our neighbors who may live next door. If the couple can't get along, booze, fight and spend themselves into bankruptcy, but instead of changing their ways they each blame the other. If you stick your nose into their business you become the enemy they resent for not minding your own business. Meanwhile you're so involved in their delinquency problems that you don't take care of your own at home. Here's what Ann's article says about the last Republican debate: http://humanevents.com/2015/12/16/its-time-for-the-other-13-candidates-to-drop-out/?utm_source=coulterdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl

[Todd Juvinall]

Islam has been around for 1500 years. It accomplishes its goals of land ownership in the name of Allah. They used force. Believe or die. The Islamic nations are still living in the 6th century. And their tactics of believe or die are still their mainstay.

America started in 1776. We allow all religions even the head chopper religion. We live in the now. Our country has saved millions around the world and we rejected colonies. Capitalism has allowed the creation of millions of inventions helping people in their daily lives. We have sent trillions in aid money to other countries. Our parents defeated fascism and our distant relatives fought to free the slaves at a cost of a million young men.

And the readers of this blog and the comments of the libnuts like Paul Emery and "jon" and others would never even credit the sacrifices of those long dead fighting for us to have the rights we have. They have to be mentally ill.

[George Rebane]

BonnieM 546pm - Coulter makes the good point that Trump has tapped into what Americans think and are concerned about. I believe in the next part of the campaign he has to demonstrate to the electorate that he has the details and the temperament to effectively address those concerns. Then he'll be a shoo-in.

Here's what Peggy Noonan wrote about the situation -
http://www.wsj.com/articles/primary-preview-the-brawl-vs-the-blob-1450399034