Nov 13

Self-driving cars are already safer than human-driven cars

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On a per-mile basis, the automobile is the safest form of land transportation ever invented. See here. It is often said that planes are safer than cars; but on a per-trip or per-hour basis, cars are even safer than planes.

Yet governments, for a century, have burdened car travel with reams of unnecessary rules and regulations. Untold thousands if not millions of people have been violently pulled over while driving by government police.

Today, several private companies are developing driverless cars. These cars will almost certainly be safer than human-driven cars.

No one knows precisely; but there may be hundreds of such cars already on roadways in California, Michigan and elsewhere.

Here is a story out of San Jose, California of a driverless car being pulled over by a cop for driving too slow. (In fact, the car was moving at an entirely legal and proper speed; the nosy cop had nothing better to do than interrupt the car’s travel.)

No ticket was given, and the Google Self-Driving Car Project said that “After 1.2 million miles of autonomous driving (that’s the human equivalent of 90 years of driving experience), we’re proud to say we’ve never been ticketed!”

Nov 12

DID EXXON DIRECTORS SPEND MONEY ON CLIMATE SKEPTIC RESEARCH? IF THEY DIDN’T, IT WOULD HAVE BEEN IRRESPONSIBLE

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By Roger I. Roots, J.D., Ph.D.,
Founder, Lysanderspooneruniversity.com

Those who promote manmade-global-warming hysteria cheered last week when the attorney general of New York announced that he was investigating Exxon to determine if Exxon has spent money to fund research by climate-change skeptics. The move followed a trendy notion that there is something improper about energy companies scrutinizing a scientific agenda explicitly aimed at bankrupting and abolishing them.

In fact, given the high-stakes war being waged over climate policy, it would be utterly irresponsible for an energy company NOT to independently investigate the science behind the issue. The vast majority of all money spent on the science of global warming is spent by governments seeking more power to regulate the energy industry. It has been said that university climate scientists are flush with government grant money if they side with the government; broke if they don’t. They get tenure if they promote the government’s agenda, and risk being denied tenure if they don’t.

Even so, climate-change alarmists are increasingly desperate. NASA recently admitted that south-polar ice is at its highest level ever recorded by satellite. Ice at the North Pole has expanded by hundreds of miles. Satellites have measured no global warming whatsoever in 18 years, and weather-related natural disasters are down 80 percent from a decade ago.

The only ‘science’ bolstering the alarmists’ view are (1) government-funded computer models which are known to overestimate global warming by an average of two to five times, and (2) government-funded SURFACE temp data which are constantly “adjusted” by government-funded scientists to suit the government.

The alarmists behind the global-warming scare are desperate to prove a link between fossil fuel money and climate-change skepticism. But because direct links are difficult to find, the alarmists must stack inference upon inference. An easily-debunked “study” supposedly proving a link between fossil-fuel barons and climate skepticism shows only that such investors have spent money on conservative think tanks, which occasionally delve into skepticism of climate hysteria.

How could it ever be ‘illegal’ to support scientific research or skepticism? Apparently, the New York Attorney General is acting on a theory that that ‘Exxon knew’ that only one position (the government-approved position) was correct during the 1970s or 1980s. (Note that the “internal documents” which supposedly provide the “smoking gun” evidence for this proposition are mostly just memos or emails in which energy-firm employees merely discussed various dimensions of the issue. See here, and here.) According to this government theory, after being alerted to speculation that CO2 may cause global warming, Exxon was not allowed to investigate further.

Even today, after decades of discussion, the role of greenhouse gasses in the atmosphere is a matter of controversy among Ph.D.-holding scientists. Indeed, several high-profile scientists have changed their opinions to become more skeptical of the manmade-global-warming theory over time.

Exxon could actually be sued by its own shareholders for breach of fiduciary duties if the corporation failed to inquire into the government’s claims. The Wrigley gum corporation was sued by shareholders in the 1960s for refusing to install lights at Wrigley Field, and thus failing to maximize profits. Other corporations have been sued by their shareholders for foolish spending decisions, or failing to perform due diligence regarding potential threats to profitability.

UPDATE: John Stossel has a new column on the New York AG: This AG is waging war on liberty on a variety of fronts. He is seeking to ban fantasy sports betting, mixed martial arts, ridesharing and apartment sharing. Mostly to appease government licensees and labor unions. See here.

Nov 12

Dinosaur Era had 5 times the CO2 Levels of Today

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Everyone is aware that the fossil record indicates that untold thousands if not millions of species have gone extinct.

A 2014 study in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences finds that dinosaurs in the Jurassic Period lived in an atmosphere that had FIVE TIMES HIGHER GREENHOUSE GAS CONCENTRATIONS than today’s atmosphere.

There were many active volcanoes. Plant and animal life thrived in amazing diversity.

Greenery COVERED the earth.

It seems that the long dormancy of the volcanoes (and the subsequent lowering of CO2 levels) caused MASSIVE DIE-OFF of plant and animal life.

Nov 12

Obamacare has led to fewer insurance options, fewer firms, higher costs and a need for another bailout

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Just as in other heavily-regulated industries (think meatpacking), the new regulations in healthcare are causing consolidation, fewer but larger insurance companies, and much higher premium costs.

Here is a summary of the situation. Dr. Mandy Cohen of the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services recently testified that almost 700,000 Americans have lost their health coverage because the insurance co-ops formed under ObamaCare couldn’t compete with major insurance companies.

[T]he insurance industry lobby is quietly advocating for prescription drug price controls, while simultaneously seeking 20% – 40% premium rate increases in 2016.

[And while drug companies are simultaneously lobbying against the insurance industry. –Lysander]

As ObamaCare relies on a dwindling number of insurance companies to administer the U.S. healthcare system, . . . The federal government seems perfectly willing to pour money into its failed ObamaCare experiment. The co-op collapse alone will likely cost the American taxpayer over $2 trillion.

Nov 12

TSA Security Fails 95 Percent of the Time

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After 9/11/2001, Congress deprivatized airport screening and created the Transportation Security Administration.

The TSA is 10 times more expensive than the private-contract screening in place before. Yet it provides no greater level of security.

Recent undercover attempts to smuggle weapons or breach TSA security checkpoints found that undercover agents were able to get weapons past TSA checkpoints 95 PERCENT OF THE TIME. See here.

Nov 11

Daily Newspapers Continue to Dwindle

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Those seeking knowledge are increasingly avoiding the nation’s pro-government, state-controlled daily newspapers.

Daily newspapers now number fewer than 400 nationwide. (There were 1,800 just decades ago.)

Per capita newspaper consumption is now below 15 percent.

Overall, the newspaper industry is down nearly 80 percent.

See here.

Nov 11

Pro-Government Professors Intimidate Reporters at University of Missouri

melissa click

Every time one walks onto a typical government-supported college campus, he enters a world of less freedom, more intimidation, and higher costs.

Parking is entirely free almost everywhere in Montana or Wyoming. Except on government college campuses.

The entirety of government funding of higher education is based on a notion that such funding helps “the poor.” But in fact, the system forces the true poor to support the children of the middle class and subsidize the luxurious lifestyles of free-market-hating neo-Stalinists.

Here is a Washington Post story (with videos) regarding recent extremist pro-government demonstrations on the campus of the University of Missouri. When a student reporter seeks to film the public spaces of the campus, government university staffpeople and faculty threaten him with physical violence.

When the student reporter–knowing his rights–invokes the First Amendment freedom of the press, one government professor visibly mocks him and calls upon students to assault the reporter.

UPDATE: Daily Caller confirms that the professor seen calling for “muscle” to violently remove the journalist is (like hundreds of other professors around the country) a committed anti-capitalist “intellectual.”

Nov 11

The NATION Turns: Leftist Magazine Prints its first Climate Skeptic Article: Could this be a Signal?

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The climate-change hysteria promoted by worldwide governments is about to bust. Hard.

The false predictions and outrageous claims of the climate-change socialists simply cannot withstand open sunlight. Already one-third of Americans regard the climate-change hysteria as a “total hoax.” Almost no one on “the right” regards global warming as anything other than a leftist push for more big government.

Many are asking: when will the climate-change boom go bust?

Does this article in THE NATION–a premier magazine of the socialist left–signal that socialists are preparing to acknowledge that the end is near for their outrageous claims?

The article, by Sam Khoury, lays out well-known sources of skepticism regarding the government’s warmist hysteria. What is remarkable is the venue for the article: one of the most hard-left, pro-socialist magazines in the western world.

Nov 11

New Study Suggests that Peer-Review Process may Prevail in the End regarding Climate Change.

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William N. Butos and Thomas J. McQuade are scholars of the tragic role of government funding in scientific scholarship. They have authored a study entitled, “Causes and Consequences of the Climate Science Boom,” which appears in the Fall 2015 issue of The Independent Review. See here.

Butos and McQuade find that the domineering role of government funding of “climate change science”–all of which is aimed at gaining more control for government over energy–has created an inflated “boom” in such science. This boom–just as any boom in a financial sector–must ultimately go bust.

The climate realities do not reflect the claims of the government-funded science boom. NASA recently admitted that south-polar ice is at its highest level ever recorded by satellite. Ice at the North Pole has expanded by hundreds of miles. Satellites have measured no global warming whatsoever in 18 years, and weather-related natural disasters are down 80 percent from a decade ago.

The only ‘science’ bolstering the alarmists’ view are (1) government-funded computer models which are known to overestimate global warming by an average of two to five times, and (2) government-funded SURFACE temp data which are constantly “adjusted” by government-funded scientists to suit the government.

But although Butos and McQuade are highly critical of the peer review process generated by the boom, they suggest that the process may yet prevail. It may take decades, however.

Nov 10

Another Government University Discriminates against Governmentally-Incorrect Thought: Cal State Professor Punished After Sending Students to Event at Reagan Library

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America’s government-funded and supported universities are dens of extremist pro-government thought control and discrimination. Now an English professor at Cal State Northridge (a public institution subject to the equal protection and free-speech provisions of the Bill of Rights) has been subjected to Star Chamber Disciplinary proceedings for . . . (wait for it!) . . . having students attend an event at the nearby Ronald Reagan Library.

Extremist pro-government students complained that panelists at the event didn’t provide sufficiently governmentally correct responses to questions about gay adoption. (The questions were initiated by the pro-government students themselves and reportedly not even pertinent to the panel discussion.) See here.