Some Animals Need Killing

In a news story that proves that some endangered species should be endangered--by whatever means is available to their intended victims. This is the sort of silliness that happens when a private club of enthusiasts (the Audubon Society) manages to get its sometime dopey opinions written into law. See the story in the OC Register Local News here.

It should never happen. The Audubon Society can, at its own expense, advertise any sort of persuasion in favor of bird preservation it cares to, but wild animals are the property of no one, and we deal with them as a resource.

A flock of seagulls (are they still around?) attacked a couple near the Main Beach in Laguna, while they were enjoying ice cream as they walked. One bird hit Mrs Djuric on the head as he went for her ice cream. Shades of Hitchcock's great film, The Birds! Mr Djuric, who acquired a nasty mess 'pon his head during the fracas, began waving a stick, hitting a couple of the gulls. One suffered a broken wing, and had to be destroyed.

Mr Djuric was cited for animal cruelty and will likely be fined.

The Audubon Society claims the birds are a subspecies called Heermann's gulls, and declares them an endangered species. Having spent a relatively significant amount of time at and near beaches 'round the western world, my heart just bleeds for the laziest birds 'pon the planet.

These are birds that are supposed to dive into the water and catch fish for a living. Scavenging about for bits of garbage and unguarded food on the shores places them in the class: Nuisance Critters. Like flies, fleas, roaches and lice, gulls are critters whose extinction would make the world a better place for all.

Now, the opinions of a private club are fine, but like the edicts of your favorite religious organization, they should not be written into law.

That makes Mr Djuric, who was merely defending himself and his wife, after having failed at the attempt to enjoy the ice cream they purchased, yet another victim of a government run amok. Just about anyone else would've done the same thing--including many Audubon members, I'll wager.

Never go to the beach without a hat.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Socialist Scientists War on Christmas

Well, it wouldn't be fully accurate to call it a war on Christmas. It's a war on technology. It's a war on property rights. It's a war whose main justification is that they know better that your own self what you should be doing and how you ought to act.

Here in El Pueblo de Los Angeles, we're constantly told we ought to conserve energy, water, gasoline, even some foods.

Today, in Australia's CourierMail.com, I read that Dr Glenn Platt joins that lofty group that knows better than the rest of us, how we should live.

Electricity is a commodity, as is potable water, gasoline and food (of all kinds). We find them, we create them and/or we process them to usefulness. Despite the blathering of these so-called "scientists," who've probably devoted more time to the study of the followers of Karl Marx than to the discipline they're addressing, in meaningful terms none of these commodities are finite.

Years ago, there was a comedy duet that called themselves Burns & Schreiber. After the two comedians went their separate ways in 1972, Avery Schreiber appeared on various stages and variety shows, and in tv commercials. In what I believe was his highest-profile tv ad campaign, he was seen eating a well-known brand of corn chips from a bag, at which time he said (I don't remember the precise wording) "Eat all you want. We'll make more!"

That's the key thought, folks. It works for corn chips, and it works equally well with gasoline, electricity, food and potable water. Don't have enough? "We'll make more!"

Well, Antonio Vinaigrette, el alcalde, doesn't want to make more. El Alcalde, who uses more than twenty times the amount of potable water to irrigate his landscaping than does the average homeowner, is seriously invested in the proposition that the rest of us conserve water.

Water is processed to potability by LADWP (Dept of Water & Power), and the same government agency produces, buys and distributes electric power--which we are also admonished ad nauseum to conserve. Well, DWP, make more! All the water and power we each use, pay for. At that point, it belongs to each of us. It's my property.

Property means the ability to hold, use and dispose of at one's own will. To violate the property of another is to violate that individual's life. That's what disgusting individuals like Antonio Vinaigrette and Dr Glenn Platt should be shunned and their nutty ideas ignored.

Commodities should be produced by privately owned firms in competition with each other with the purpose of making a profit. Were that the case with the above-mentioned commodities, as with corn chips, there'd be plenty available--because when the producers realized there wasn't enough they'd make more.

If Dr Platt is worried that the use of coal-fired power plants cause pollution, he should advocate the building of nuclear power plants. Instead, he advocates turning off your Christmas lights. Or using led lights. Dr Platt, that's none of your business. I bought the power, it's mine, and I'll use it the way I want.

Remember: You can't trust any air you can't see!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

The Hottest Coldest October in Fifty Years

Telegraph.co.uk doesn't call the evil Dr James Hanson a complete bloody idiot (with an anti-life agenda), but it might as well have done so. According to a story written by Christopher Booker of that newspaper, after the algorian Dr Hanson declared this past October "the hottest October on record," and in spite of reports from the real world.

This was startling. Across the world there were reports of unseasonal snow and plummeting temperatures last month, from the American Great Plains to China, and from the Alps to New Zealand. China's official news agency reported that Tibet had suffered its "worst snowstorm ever". In the US, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration registered 63 local snowfall records and 115 lowest-ever temperatures for the month, and ranked it as only the 70th-warmest October in 114 years.

If this doesn't completely discredit the "global warming" hoax for all time, it'll be because algorian government officials simply will refuse to let their socialist agandae be altered by...uh...facts.

NASA, the federal agency whose main mission seems to be to make sure no one gets into space, monitors the world's weather through its subagency, Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS). GISS' initial reports showed readings across a vast part of Russia up to 10 degrees higher than normal. Warmiong skeptics, analyzing the data, discovered that the Russia figures weren't from October at all, but from September(!).

GISS did a fast shuffle and stammered a lame excuse about not having adequate resources, and has since revised its figures.

Read the whole story, folks. It's a testament to the incompetence of the unaccountable government agency--just one of hundreds. Who can say the destructive laws and regulations that would have evolved from the socialist governments of the world in the next few years (and still might!), had no one been watching these bumbling idiots.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

....As Long As Only We Get To Use Them....

Yellowstone National Park is a huge place. Its footprint comprises a very large bite out or the northwest corner of Wyoming, along with appreciable bits of Montana and Idaho. It's a beautiful place, and one which very few people would not like to visit and spend some time.

It's even more beautiful in winter, in my opinion, but kind of hard to travel around in during that time of the year. Oh, I suppose they keep the paved roads open most of the time. Some people like to wander away from the paved roads.

Today, the Los Angeles Times, socialist-oriented little brother to the New York Times, has an editorial about this. Seems US Judge Emmet G Sullivan has unilaterally banned all snowmobile use within the borders of the park.

Both the Bush Administration and, more importantly, the state of Wyoming want access for up to 700 snowmobiles at a time within the park. I have no idea why the limit, but Judge Sullivan, who probably lives in Washington DC, has in his infinite wisdom, decided the number should be zero. For, you guessed it, environmental reasons.

A snowmobile leaves no footprint that won't disappear with the next snow, or with the spring thaw. Snowmobiles emit exhaust gasses, but then so do you. And so does your car as you zip along the highway. So do the bears, wolves, elk, squirrels and any other critters you can name that live there. For that matter, so do the trees and grasses, etc.

We could discuss the noise they make, but that too, is one more annoyance of many.

The overwhelming factor is that every one of us pays for the maintenance of that park. The park exists for the enjoyment of everyone. The park doesn't exist merely for the enjoyment of one Judge Sullivan--nor to satisfy the twisted sensibilities of a few pointy-headed algorians.

The solution, of course, is for the land to be sold in reasonable parcels to interested members of the public. It's well known that private owners take far better care of their own property than do government bureaucrats and the drones they employ to keep unapproved Americans off what is now their jointly-held land. It's also well known that the managers of the parks are not doing a job taking care of them. Too often, there are fires that are made far worse because heavy underbrush is allowed to remain to become fuel for wildfires. Private owners would not let that happen.

We need to get these lands out of the untrustworthy hands of an uncaring, incapable government, and out of the sway of corrupt officials like Judge Sullivan.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

I Can't Drive 55!

The 55mph national speed limit has once again reared its ugly head, and once again, it's leftists, in the guise of algorians, wearing their frightful mask. As one of the many unworkable plans to keep American oil companies from actually adding to the available petroleum supply, including solar power (which is still in its primitive stages,and will be for years to come) and windmill generators (which kill large numbers of birds and are too unsightly to be employed along the Massachusetts coastline) algorians now suggest that we "save" our existing, largely imported oil supplies by driving slower.

That's the "solution" the leftists of the day tried to apply to the government manufactured gasoline shortages of the Jimma Carter years--even more evidence that a B Hussein Obama Presidency will be Carter's second term.

There were many problems with the 55mph speed limit back then.

• The US Constitution has no language to allow a mandated national speed limit.
• No one observed that speed limit anyway.
• Cross-country driving took much longer than necessary.
• The cost of transporting goods by truck increased.
• State and local governments used the speed limit as a cash cow, stepping up enforcement to help fill government coffers.
• Commuters' drive time was increased, lengthening the time of their exposure to possible collisions and breakdowns.

It's an easily observable fact that Guber Schwarzengroper is looking for ways to lessen the state's deficit without actually cutting spending. CHP is already leaving non-injury collision victims to duke it out for themselves while they write citations. Thanks to a relatively new law allowing the doubling of fines for traffic violations in construction zones, virtually all of the Stalag has become a construction zone.

Two cities I spend a lot of time in, driving, are Culver City and El Pueblo de Los Angeles. There's no question that they've stepped up traffic enforcement. Parking enforcement is a growth industry, as well. Lovely Rita is working overtime.

LAPD sets up a ticket factory a couple of times a week near my work area, and CCPD has a truck checkpoint they set up, complete with portable scales, once or twice a month.

What's next? A 40 mph speed limit? Freeway bicycle lanes? Increased license fees for vehicles with engines of over a liter (61 cubic inches, in American) displacement? The algorians really want to see us looking under rocks for food.

Anything at all, to avoid the rational solution: Drill now, drill here and drill fast!

Drill, ye tarriers, drill!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Climate Wars: The Revenge of the Algorians

Yet another of the US federal government's paid shills for the global warming hoax is calling for imprisoning Americans for their opinions. According to a story--one of the many stories that the US news media fail to notice--in Guardian.co.uk, Dr Robert Stadler James Hansen, a pseudo-scientist for NASA, the government agency charged with the task of making sure no one else is able to make it into space, is sacrificing whatever professional reputation he might have, for whatever future bones he might be tossed by algorian politicians for his professional treason.

Additionally, he doubles as the evil Algore's science advisor (according to his Wikipedia page), so I guess that takes care of any bit of honesty and objectivity that was ever part of his makeup.

Well, he's going to speak before Congress where he's going to recommend that oil company executives be prosecuted for "spreading doubt about global warming." He also says he plans to work to unseat uncooperative Congressmen, as well. I'm sure that'll go over well in the committee room.

First, in the absence of any other information, that bit tells us that Mr Hansen is a leftist. Only leftists (well, not only leftists), would think that dissent is a criminal offense. This also in view of the fact that the algorians have never even begun to prove their case.

Of course, they've never proven that second-hand tobacco smoke, as encountered in normal situations is harmful either.

The Big Lie. If enough influential people tell a lie enough times over a long enough period of time, it will be believed by many.

Let them freeze in the dark.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

In Search of Clean Air

The first time I visited El Pueblo de Los Angeles was in 1961, which happened to be the same year I graduated High school. I had just finished boot camp in San Diego and came to LA to visit my grandparents, who had moved here several years earlier.

Gramp took me downtown one day, sightseeing. We also cruised through Hollywood and Beverly Hills. One of the most memorable things was the foulness of the air. It was a hot day, and it seemed like it was foggy. It wasn't fog. The smog was a palpable thing. It smelled, made my eyes water and caused occasional coughing jags.

Five years later, my new bride and I drove into LA on a rainy September day, to better our lives. A mere few days later, after the unseasonable rain cleared out and it became hot and sunny, the smog closed in once again.

I eventually got used to it, though from time to time it became too obvious to ignore. The sun was dull in the sky. From a window fourteen or so stories up, the ground couldn't be seen. Buildings looked like they grew out of fog. It wasn't fog. Once, I flew into LAX on a hot, sunny day. LA looked like a sea of fog with several dozen of its taller buildings sticking out.

Over the years since, the state has created many thousands of laws designed to fight smog. Most of them merely served to help impoverish the less well off in California, but some of them actually worked. The state faltered, stumbled and spent billions, most of it wasted, but in the past ten years the smog has been lessened to a degree that it isn't so much noticed anymore.

Oh, I won't say the air's clean. Not exactly. There's still noticeable smog, occasionally, in the east at the San Bernardino foothills, but nothing like it was.

One could say that we ought to stand pat. The free market (if it were allowed to work) would supply us with a cheap, clean replacement for the gasoline-powered engine, eventually.

The point of this little history lesson? Several years ago, in spite of the rational arguments of many, the evil and stupid California Air Resources Board (CARB), decided that raw gasoline, evaporating into the atmosphere, was a major cause of smog--the same smog that was even then a diminishing problem. After much experimentation, testing, bribery of CARB officials and state legislators, the state was divided into zones. One zone was the San Diego, LA, western San Bernardino and Riverside counties and the San Francisco area. The other, the rest of the state.

The urban areas were to use a very expensive fueling nozzle that picked up all the fuel vapors during pumping and stored them in the underground fuel tank. It was called a vapor recovery system. Fuel delivery trucks also had a complex, expensive dual-hose system that returned the vapors to the truck tank as the underground tank was filled.

All was again right with the world.

The rest of the state eventually was required to implement a fuel recovery system as well, but it remains far less ponderous and expensive than its urban counterpart.

CARB officials and state legislators were wearing Ace bandages on their wrists and elbows for months, from slapping each other on the back.

So, the war on smog is over, right? Not, as they say in Boulder City, Nevada, by a damsite.

As long as there is one molecule of a substance that can be called a pollutant, hovering over any part of the state of California, Sacramento will keep giving CARB tens (at least) of millions of dollars a year to chase it.

Meanwhile, they're ignoring the fact that their precious vapor recovery system doesn't work. It's worse than the old way--putting the bare hose nozzle into an open fuel tank and letting the vapors go where they will. Now, instead of a little vapor escaping into the air, the high-priced, overly-complex nozzles spit out the best part of a pint of liquid gasoline all over the rear of your car, and on the pavement underneath, where it's free to evaporate over the following few minutes. This, of course, is a pint of the four-dollar-a gallon gas that you pay for. They do this, just about invariably, when the stream clicks off as your tank fills. At times, the nozzle actually pops out of your car, falling 'pon the pavement and spilling even more liquid gasoline under the rear of your car.

CARB won't do anything about this, because to them, it's a done job. To them, no more gasoline vapor is escaping into the air. And so it goes.

You can't trust any air you can't see.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Drill, Ye Tarriers, Drill!

Ok, so I'm a hot rodder. I like old cars; I like fast cars. I'm also a fan of NHRA drag racing and, to a lesser extent, other kinds of auto racing.

Fast cars need a lot of gas. America has, contrary to what the algorians will have you believe, plenty of oil available within the areas US oil companies can search. More than we'll ever need--because we will, in spite of all the wheel spinning with stupid and costly stuff like highlt subsidized ethanol from corn and those idiotic, unsightly and expensive windmills we see here and there (but not in the Kennedys' back yard).

We've had a number of "oil crises" over the past thirty or so years, each one seemingly more serious than those previous. These past five or six years, we've been in a continual oil crisis, largely because of the disingenuously-named "War on Terror." And our own politicians' propensity toward following suicidal policies.

Leftist environmentalism, or algorianism, is deliberately designed to destroy capitalism and individual freedom--not to mention the free world's industrial and technological capabilities. Algorians don't actually care a whit about the environment except as it serves their agenda.

Ten years ago roughly, the question of drilling for the oil under the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge (ANWR) became a political football. It had been a question for a long while before, but oil from OPEC member nations became more problematical and a few sensible voices suggested that the federal government get out of the way of American petroleum production. Screams from the left were both shrill and without any rational arguments at all.

The arguments ranged from unprovable fears of destruction of animal habitat to the arguable notion that it would take ten years until any meaningful production would come from ANWR.

A very few brave advocates even suggested that exploring and drilling be authorized in offshore areas in the Caribbean, the Gulf of Mexico and the Pacific. They were again shouted down by emotion-laden voices that claimed unavoidable environmental damage. Baloney.

Planet Earth is self-cleaning. Whatever happened to the millions of gallons of oil spilled from the ships of the world's navies and merchant fleets destroyed during WWII? Microcritters ate it. Same with the oft whined about Exxon Valdez spill. One might be able to find traces of that oil today, but he'd have to search. A few years along, even that won't be possible.

Well, ten years have passed. Had we begun working the ANWR oil pools ten years ago, we'd be able to tell the Mideast countries to pump their oil where the sun don't shine. The crisis would be over for decades to come, giving entrepreneurs time to develop personal nuclear generators for the home, the factory and for personal aircars.

But that's not what the algorians want. They want to see us looking under rocks for bugs to eat. They want us killing each other for food.

And I would happily give up my hot rod for my own aircar, if there were no worries about tree huggers bringing back another Dark Age.

We've seen the enemy and he is Algore.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Ghoulish Algore Revels in Burma Destruction

It certainly was predictable. He's been telegraphing his intentions for some time--claiming that global warming will cause more and more hurricanes in the southern and eastern states. I can imagine that he was tearing his hair out, waiting for the high-body-count disasters that would help regenerate flagging interest in his nefarious agenda.

Finally, huzzah, a cyclone! Algore's jelly belly is just quivering with glee! Tens of thousands killed or missing. More to die from disease and unavailability of medical care over the upcoming weeks.

On the very day following the end of the storm, Algore finds a microphone and trumpets his "I told you so" as expected (and probably scheduled. As told in this story in the Business and Media Institute website, Algore leaprd to the NPR microphone to shout his mantra, "the cyclone is a consequence of global warming!" Truth be known, he has probably been sitting in front of that mike for weeks, waiting for something, anything, to happen that he could use.

Myanmar, traditionally known as Burma, having been renamed by an agency of one of its recent dictators-for-life is, and as a socialist republic will remain, a third world dictatorship, awash in squalor whenever it's not awash in flood waters. Philosopher Tibor Machan has recently written a short article on the reasons why, here.

Now, any event like that which happened in Burma is saddening beyond words, for the (mostly needless) loss of life. I say "mostly needless" because the socialist dictatorship in Burma has squelched technological advancement and left the country's millions vulnerable to the elements.

These are the kind of living conditions the algorians idealize for all the peoples of the world. This is the sort of world to which Algore's policies will ultimately lead us. Several algorians, past and present (most recently the evil and stupid Ted Turner), suggest that the ideal human population of planet Earth should be a few million naked savages, surviving as cannibals.

What more do you need?

Let them freeze to death in the dark.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Stunning Insult to WWII Vets

In one of its more amazing efforts to carry algorian water in the advancement of the global warming hoax, Time magazine has reached a new low in its disregard for American veterans. An article by Jeff Poor on the Business and Media Institute website shows the cover of the current issue of Time magazine, which parodies the raising of the flag over Mount Surabachi (in which about 7000 Allied troops were killed and over 20,000 wounded) following the fierce and costly Battle of Iwo Jima.

We can say what we want about the discourse or lack of it by the Roosevelt Administration, in the opening moments that lead to the Pearl Harbor attack by the Japanese Navy, but the US Marines, as well as all the other soldiers, sailors and fliers involved in the war in the Pacific acted with extreme competence and valor throughout.

Survivors of the battle, and of the war wherever they fought, justifiably feel very insulted. Those of us who are sons and daughters of the veterans, and who've heard all the stories first hand, are equally so.

Global warming is going to be on the list of the world's greatest hoaxes, in future history books, and the generation now known as the "Baby Boom" in the US are going to be known as gullible, as well as a generation of spoiled brats. Time magazine, already on a downward slide because of an outrageously flawed editorial point of view, is on its way to insolvency.

“I think since I’ve been back at the magazine, I have felt that one of the things that’s needed in journalism is that you have to have a point of view about things,” [Time managing editor Richard] Stengel said. “You can’t always just say ‘on the one hand, on the other’ and you decide. People trust us to make decisions. We’re experts in what we do. So I thought, you know what, if we really feel strongly about something let's just say so.”

Well, Mr Stengel, no one will criticize you for having a point of view, unless it's stupid to the point of insult.

I think many mistakes were made at the political level during the period, but for which our involvement might have been far different, but nothing can be said to lessen the valor of the troops, once mobilized. Time magazine's cover should be taken as an insult, not only by the survivors of WWII, but by all veterans. There is no excuse for trivializing the loss of a great part of a generation by trying to equate it with a hot summer.

Last summer wasn't even particularly hot.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Forget Global Warming: Welcome to the New Ice Age

This is the headline in today's Canadian National Post. In a story under the byline of Lorne Gunter, the "(s)now cover over North America and much of Siberia, Mongolia and China is greater than at any time since 1966." After making points about the severity of this winter around the northern hemisphere, he goes on to state that "(i)n just the first two weeks of February, Toronto received 70 cm of snow, smashing the record of 66.6 cm for the entire month set back in the pre-SUV, pre-Kyoto, pre-carbon footprint days of 1950."

This is undoubtedly coming as distressing news to algorians of every stripe, especially to the Canada government, who've pinned many of their capitalism-destroying policies 'pon their ability to uphold their phony global warming "snow job" and keep its shaky foundations from showing.

Apparently, the world will remain cool enough for hockey at least one more year.

The news story continues:

"OK, so one winter does not a climate make. It would be premature to claim an Ice Age is looming just because we have had one of our most brutal winters in decades.

"But if environmentalists and environment reporters can run around shrieking about the manmade destruction of the natural order every time a robin shows up on Georgian Bay two weeks early, then it is at least fair game to use this winter's weather stories to wonder whether the alarmist are being a tad premature."

The discriminating analyst can determine the falsehoods of the algorians by simple observing the false hysteria in their arguments, the nature of their proposed solutions and the blind anger in their denouncing of those who dare deny their points. But, it's nice to see nature take its course.

"Oleg Sorokhtin, a fellow of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, shrugged off manmade climate change as 'a drop in the bucket.' Showing that solar activity has entered an inactive phase, Prof. Sorokhtin advised people to 'stock up on fur coats.'"

Not that I'd exactly welcome another "Little Ice Age," like the one that ended around 1850,
but the point is, these variations are caused by solar activity (or inactivity) not 4x4 pickups and suv's.

Just like I've been writing for years.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,
Col. Hogan

Behold! A True Believer....

Again, my brother, the Texan, has provided welcome fodder for this virtual pamphleteer, in the form of a link to a column in his local newspaper, the Amarillo Globe-News. 'Twas in response to my most recent entry about the algorian religion. The columnist, whose name is Marie Fisher. Her byline refers to her as an accountant.

Ms Fisher bases her comments 'pon information gleaned from such august sources as The Weather Channel and the Discovery Channel. I don't think I'd bet the farm on, for example, the blathering of Dr Heidi Cullen, an agenda-driven climate reporter who is clearly a foot soldier for the algorians, and probably carries their membership card in her "No Animal Products Used To Manufacture This Product" handbag.

Now I didn't, at first regard Michael Crichton an unimpeachable source for information about climate change--even though I'd believe him well ahead of Dr Cullen--but he is a well published novelist with an extensive background in the sciences. But I do trust source material he provides with State of Fear--that because I find that his source material is a good fit with source material from other studies to which I've been referred.

That material also fits well with common sense--not to mention with the nature of the planet as it's been understood through history.

Finding a crisis in natural climate change (and there exists no other) is to ignore everything we know about the ability of this resilient planet to repair and remake itself. For example, where are the millions of gallons of petroleum products spilled by ships, planes and other war machines during World War II? Earth repairs itself. Had no one conducted a massive cleanup effort after the wreck of the Exxon Valdez, that oil would be pretty much gone by now by action of the flora and fauna.

Well, the algorians depend 'pon the Marie Fishers of the world to hear the loudest voices, know nothing of history before their own birth, and find crises and adopt causes offered by charismatic charlatans to fill voids in their own unfulfilled lives. Sorry. I ought not psychologize about individuals about whom I know little, but I've bumped into so many like Ms Fisher.....

Actually, I do occasionally watch the educational tv stations recommended by Ms Fisher but, they're tv stations. They're bought and paid for. They're superficial. All they're good for is to spark one's interest and to offer clues about where to begin.

So, Ms Fisher, the polar ice caps will be around for a long time. Should the world flip over on its other side, the ice caps will simply reform wherever the new poles find themselves. And there won't be a bloody thing we can do about it.

World without end, amen.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

If At First You Can't Fool 'Em, Make The Lie Bigger

The algorians have not yet left the building. According to a Breitbart story, Algore is now claiming that, in the face of one of the coldest winters in the past twenty or so years, global warming is "significantly worse and unfolding more rapidly than those on the pessimistic side of the IPCC projections had warned us...."

Of course there is climate change. It's part of the nature of the planet and the solar system. We get periods of relative warmth and periods of relative cold, along with all the weather phenomena that are involved. These changes have to do with the relationships between Earth, the Sun and the other planets. These relationships, far too complex for a dopey politician like Algore to understand--or any of us, for that matter--cause a continually changing climate pattern that can't be altered significantly by anything mankind can do (short of destroying the planet by means of global nuclear war), and wouldn't matter much if it did.

The algorians are after political power; they're perpetrating this hoax for no other reason.

A far more healthy perspective on the state of the Earth is presented by Michael Crichton, author of many science-smart novels, including Andromeda Strain and Next. One of the best novels I've read in the past three or four years, is State of Fear, by Crichton. The novel, chuck full of references to real scientific, peer reviewed studies, tells a tale that illustrates the falsity of algorian claims quite thoroughly--one of the characters in the book could even be Algore.

Environmentalism As Religion is a speech given by Crichton, apparently derived to expound 'pon the issues raised in Fear.

While I disagree that government should create a "super EPA" to replace the current very political, very corrupt EPA, I agree with the facts Crichton uses to come to that conclusion. I'd see it as sufficient to trust land owners to find incentive in the ownership of their property, to keep it "clean." For those few who would ignore the long-term self interest of a clean property in favor of short term profit, I'd think tort lawsuits, brought by injured neighbors, to take care of these individuals by force of court decisions.

Algore, your time is up. While any number of deluded followers mouth your gospel, your group of true believers has assaulted the truth far too long, and the seams of your religion are splitting, along with those of your shirts. You know you're lying and the world's power-mad leaders know you're lying. The masses of overburdened taxpayers are beginning to realize it.

Not all men are "rational animals."

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Algorians' Game

A friend of mine, the Philosophical Detective, has linked and article by Orson Scott Card, a science fiction and fantasy author. The article can be found in Meridian Magazine, a publication catering to members of the Church of Latter Day Saints.

The article is fairly long, but very easy to read. It describes the genesis of the climate change religion, nee "global warming." I won't attempt to analyze or criticize the article, but to say that it flows parallel with the evidence and the assumptions I've made about the algorians and the Global Warming Hoax from the early days of its announcement.

I highly recommend reading this work, if you're interested in fighting the further diminishment of our liberty that is the only thing this trend offers.

Tip of the old gray fedora: Philosophical Detective

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Reporter Ignores Facts, Shows Bias

We're becoming so accustomed to "news reporters" writing opinion pieces and editors placing them on news pages, that the above headline (mine) seems bland.

I haven't read the LA Times for,well, somewhat over ten years, but some leftist at my office brings them in and leaves sections in the "reading room." Since I've recently heard from Larry Elder's show that they've actually had a few un- or less-biased stories lately, I checked it out.

I stumbled into this story in the California section from the 18th of October, this year: "Gov. ignores gun lobby, and condors get lift." George Skelton, writer of the piece, ought to be thrown out on his kiester for having written such a piece of trash--or the editor should be given a mop and told he was hired into the wrong department. Or both.

While I wish none of earth's critters ill, I honestly can't work up a huge amount of sympathy for the California condor. While they look ever so majestic soaring above, even Mr Skelton admits they're ugly when seen up close. And they are. Even the babies are ugly--I saw one once at the San Diego Zoo. They look like vultures on steroids.

Our neo-socialist, neo-conservative Guber, Arnold Schwarzeneggar (a far better action movie star than politician), has signed legislation banning the use of lead bullets for hunting, in favor of copper. Since the Times didn't cite any studies proving that lead is the thing that's causing the low condor population, I'm very skeptical. Also, I'm wondering if they just aren't suited for life in today's world. Even Mr Skelton admits that they seem prehistoric.

If California condors as a species will be saved, it'll be by the efforts of men working very hard at it--not by government edicts. The condors don't seem to care very much. Honestly, I don't either.

I'm not a hunter, being a city boy and all, and so I don't know what might be lost by replacing the lead in bullets with copper. Copper is soft (but not as soft as lead, and copper is heavy, but not as heavy as lead. I do know that government has no business legislating the content of bullets.

Our idiot Guber also signed a bill requiring that semi-automatic handguns must have their chambers stamped with the make, model and serial number of the weapon, so that each shell casing expelled will be stamped with these markings. To help police solve crimes, they say....as if the criminals actually use guns registered to themselves!

Back to new bias: throughout the story, as you can readily see by reading through it, we can readily see the writers opinion. "The gun lobby ranted...." "Schwarzeneggar would have been hammered--and justifiably--if he had vetoed these two bills." (italics mine) "He (Schwarzeneggar) was pandering...." "....22 caliber lead bullets....should be the next step."

The guy might have a point, regarding the lead poisoning of carrion eating birds, but what we need is the facts.....just the facts.

We report. We decide. You shut up, turn off your mind, and absorb.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag california

Giving Thieves a Free Hour To Work Their Magic

In a useless gesture designed to make parasitic politicians (but, I repeat myself) feel useful, algorians around the Stalag are calling for residents of Los Pueblos de Los Angeles, Santa Barbara and San Francisco to turn out their lights between 8 and 9PM today to save enough electricity to light 2500 residences for an entire year. So far, I've not been contacted to be one of those who is to receive a year's free power.

According to a Reuters story, lights in Alcatraz, the Los Angeles International Airport and the Golden Gate Bridge, along with most lights in city buildings (all with exceptions for safety considerations) will be turned off for this hour. Imagine how much more money we'd save if they did this during what the city sniggeringly refers to as "working hours."

This gives thieves and burglars an entire hour to work their magic in a more nearly ideal environment, and one can only imagine what sorts of things might go on during this hour in San Francisco!

El Pueblo de Los Angeles runs its own power operation, which was founded under the proposition that a city-owned power company, divorced from the profit motive, will cost consumers less and be more responsive to consumer demands. Of course, we all know how that worked out. Power is every bit as expensive in LA as it is anywhere else, and more expensive than most localities, and you can't get anyone on the phone. Power transmission is still done by means of unsightly and dangerous overhead wires instead of underground, as has been done in most surrounding areas for decades.

The real answer? Privatize.

Unfortunately, because of state and federal regulation, competition is not only nonexistent, but prohibited by law. Were the industry privatized and deregulated (truly deregulated), each household would be capable of picking and choosing among several power suppliers. We could shop price, or service, or even set up our own individual home power plant (as long as it doesn't disturb the neighbors).

Senor Antonio Vinaigrette, el Alcalde del Pueblo de Los Angeles, still maintains that a cure for all our power shortages is that we should replace out incandescent bulbs with rotini light fixtures, and just limit our use of electricity 'twixt the hours of 3PM and 7PM (or something like that). As we say in the Valley, "Like, I'm sure!"

It's now a little after 9PM and I still haven't been notified about my year of free power.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

We're In A Drought, and The Glaciers Are Melting--Disaster or Opportunity?

I first became aware of Dr. Walter E Williams by having viewed the 1980 PBS documentary series, Free to Choose, by Dr. Milton Friedman. Dr. Friedman would give an economics "lesson" for the first half-hour of each episode, which was followed by a discussion with Dr. Friedman and a number of other intellectuals of the left and right. Dr. Williams was one of these people. Throughout the length of the series, Dr. Williams seemed consistently one of the more articulate members of a very prestigious group.

Since then, I've followed Dr. Williams' career as best I can. When I found out he writes a column, I started reading it. When I learned he occasionally subbed for Rush Limbaugh, when he takes a day off, and I learn that Dr. Williams is subbing, I make plans to listen.

Williams is almost always right on the money on most subjects, and his take on the global warming hoax. His latest statement on the subject can be found here.

I highly recommend the pamphlet "A Global Warming Primer," to which Dr. Williams refers, as it's a quick read, yet it's packed with facts that can be analyzed rationally (as opposed to the algorians' religious emotionalism).

Every month the algorians look more and more stupid.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Who Cares About A Few Miners Compared To The Reindeer?

We're not drilling for oil in ANWR because it might disturb Santa's reindeer? A few polar bears? Some caribou?

Baloney!

The algorians don't give a whit about Arctic wildlife. If they did, they'd have to admit that wildlife does better in the presence of man, these days. Deer, antelope and bison and other game animals are far more healthy and plentiful today, than they were in past centuries. Awareness on the part of hunters and conservationists in the past hundred years or so have reversed trends established by earlier hunters.

Meanwhile, today's algorian environazis are clearly in lockstep against any improvements in technology at all, whether it harms the "environment" or not. What they really want is simple, brutish control over productive individuals.

Witness the fact that algorians oppose the use of petroleum on the grounds that it harms the atmosphere, yet are also opposed to the use of nuclear power generators even though they are very clean and harm the atmosphere not at all. They seem to approve grudgingly of the use of coal, even though it burns with a fair degree of emission, yet former President Clinton closed and nationalized a vast area of Utah known to contain a very clean-burning variety of coal.

All of which brings me to my point.

We've all heard the sad story about the miners who died in the collapsed mine in Utah. We've also heard of other coal mine disasters in other areas in recent decades.

We can add that to the toll of the disingenuously misnamed "War on Terror." All of these losses could have been--and still could be--lessened were we to extract the oil about which existence we already know, from the ground and use it.

Government should get out of the way and allow our oil companies to supply us with petroleum from locations already under these same oil companies' control, and thus could both lessen our dependence 'pon both coal and oil from pre-civilized parts of the world.

Rather than depend 'pon coal to generate much of America's electric power, government should get out of the way, to allow America's power companies to build nuclear power generators, as fast as they can.

As for the "environmentally friendly" alternative fuels the algorians are promising that government drones will soon develop, well....that'll happen. Ask your self, when has government ever developed anything? Other than new and more destructive ways to relieve the productive of a good deal of their production?

New, cleaner and more efficient fuels will be developed by scientists funded by entrepreneurs when they're needed. Then, or when these scientists find a way to develop fuels that are substantially less expensive than those we know now. Even then, it will only happen if Americans have enough money to invest to allow the research to happen. Government should get out of the way, so that these discoveries can be made.

This will only happen if government can be returned its proper functions, operating according to the letter and spirit of the Constitution, and without the ability to initiate force against Americans.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Barbara Bouncer's Ice Cube Melts in Her Drink: "Global Warming," She Cries!

I've always thought Senator Bouncer was kind of stupid. She earned her "name" by having been caught up in the House check-kiting scandal of about 8-10 years ago when she was a Congressfool. She, and several other then-Congressfools, had a slush-fund, to which they voted plenty of cash from the general fund. They wrote checks on the fund for quick cash (like an ATM, I guess). A certain several, including now-Senator Bouncer, wrote checks for cash and never covered them.

As one might expect from a Bay Area politician, she's a complete loon (moonbat, in Australian) and is so out of touch with reality that she's actually been observed bumping into things, being unsure whether they actually exist.

This weekend, according to a story in the Orange County Register, the Honorable Ms Bouncer led a bipartisan (aren't they always?) group of ten colleagues, on a flight over Kangia Ice Fjord, a 500-mile-long glacier in Greenland, considered to be the fastest moving glacier on Earth. The fact that this glacier moves (relatively) quickly southward to where it begins to melt is somehow supposed to prove not only that the Earth's climate is warming, but that American SUV's are causing it. How do we know all this by simply flying over this 500-mile-long ice rink?

The news story gives us all the answers, from the Bouncer's mouth: Reports from (government funded) scientists and Algore's movie. I wonder how many scientific reports she has actually read.....I wonder how many times she's watched Algore's hokey movie.

Rush Limbaugh says, and I agree that in many cases, the world's history begins on the day one is born. Yet, the Honorable Ms Bouncer would have to be even more stupid that I think she is, to really not know that Greenland was far warmer during the centuries of its occupation by the early Vikings than it is now, or will likely be if I drive my hot rod all around LA for the rest of my life. But, she and the other algorians will never admit this, or they'll find trained scientists to prove that those selfsame Vikings each drove around in two Hummers, one for each foot.

The story also states that the hapless Greenlanders kneel and bow before Her Worship and beg that she will make us stop.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid says that if the House sends him a Hunter-Gatherer Society Creation bill, they'll be sure to find time to debate it.

Since the Republicans seem not to want to do anything to endear themselves to their constituents and remember their past pro-property rights tradition (such as it was), the Hunter-Gatherer Bill might very well be passed in 2009 by a heavily algorian Congress.

All in the name of a hoax, begun on the muddy foundation of another hoax--the politically-inspired "pollution crisis."

There is no man-made global warming.

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California

Tangerines Are On The No-Fly List

The global warming insaniacs are raising the bar a mite, trying to outdo each other listing the many things we all do that are anti-algorian. According to Ben Smith, Elizabeth Edwards believes that tangerines are the new heroin--but not in quite the same way. No one claims that tangerines are un-nutritious or that they create homicidal maniacs of their aficionados, but rather that they have to be transported in carbon producing planes, trains, ships and trucks.

She says that she will "probably never eat a tangerine again," because they aren't grown locally and must be shipped. Note that she inserted the word "probably." Yet another case of the inability of politicians to make an absolute statement. Note here, where John Edwards did the same thing about a hamburger restaurant.

Well, according to Mrs. Edwards' "logic," a lot of individuals will have to severely change not only their their eating habits, but many habits. No more bananas. No more pineapples (except for Hawaiians). Very little rice (unless you live in the deep south). No more Hondas or Lexi. Or BMW's, Mercedes. No more Italian shoes. No more French wine. No more salmon unless you live in the Pacific northwest. No more caviar, fer cryin' out loud.

The list could go on for pages and pages.

Of course, what the Edwards family, and the rest of the wealthy, hypocritical algorians will do is take one of their private planes to Russia when they want caviar, and to Hawaii when they want pineapple.

Life is good when you don't have to live with the consequences of your actions.

They've killed Freedom! Those bastards!

Warm regards,

Col. Hogan
Stalag California