Utopia, you are standing in it!

In 1973 due to the Yom Kippur War involving Israel, Egypt and Syria the world found itself caught in the midst of a global energy crisis as the Arab states employed OPEC to impose an oil embargo. The result in the United States was long lines at gas stations, odd and even numbered license plates recognized to allow the purchase of gas, and a retraction of the American economy as oil prices spiraled and along with it the price of gasoline. The US was tied to Saudi Arabia importing between 25-40% of its oil needs. This situation reemerged in 1979 when the Shah of Iran, an American ally was overthrown by Islamists producing another oil crunch. The history of these events and their impact on the world economy were delineated by Daniel Yergin in his Pulitzer Prize winning history of oil, THE PRIZE: THE EPIC QUEST FOR OIL, MONEY, AND…

Anti-Hunt diversionists in Great Britain were the subjects of a surprise. According to KentOnline, their vehicle was hoisted off the ground after attempting to disrupt bird hunters. The animal rights hoodlums with the group South Coast Hunt Saboteurs believed the hunt was illegal, but James Attwood, the property owner where hunt took place, denied any such insinuation.

Attwood stated that that not only was the hunt legal but he told the thugs to leave twice in which even tried to instigate a fight with him. He said the Land Rover they used was being driven aggressively and, consequently, Attwood’s employees utilized a crane to lift the thug’s vehicle off the ground to prevent any potential harm.

This is the lack of regard so-called animal rights criminals have, not only for private property rights, but for the lives of others. One of the thugs with South Coast Hunt Saboteurs even…

Americans largely support and benefit from a political/legal environment conducive to individual freedom and active entrepreneurship. However, within that broad consensus, views vary over how large and prescriptive the role of government and mandatory bodies should be. Should only doctors, lawyers, plumbers and hairdressers licensed by the state be allowed to provide their services? Few things capture this difference more clearly and dramatically than whether cab drivers must be employees of the cab company or can work as little or as much as they chose as independent contractors– company employees or gig workers (uber drivers).

Licensed professionals, like union members, can help promote and certify a minimum standard of training and confidence. But historically they have also sheltered their members from competition. Unions provide a number of services to their members, but their overriding purpose is to confront employers with a united front from workers on wages and working conditions…

Joel Fitzgibbon: Labor’s lonely voice for industry and workers’ jobs.

Australia’s Labor Party was started in 1891 by QLD sheepshearers on strike, fighting for better wages and conditions; over a Century it became the party of ideas. Nowadays, it is unrecognizable, on either score.

A hard-green left intelligentsia hijacked the party, long ago; pushing nonsensical CO2 emissions and renewable energy targets, and an anti-mining agenda that have cost it dearly. Not least the unloseable Federal election in May 2019, when it was shellacked in the regions which depend upon reliable and affordable energy, such as mining and mineral processing.

The modern ALP treats its former base with derision and contempt. Characters like shadow energy spokesman, Mark Butler, function in a parallel universe; his perverse obsession with wind and solar and carbon dioxide gas emissions has helped drive a wedge between those ALP MPs safely ensconced in inner-city seats, plagued with…

For Whom The Bell Tolls is the novel that was supposed to win Ernest Hemingway his first Pulitzer Prize in 1941. However, like Sinclair Lewis before him, Hemingway was denied the prize by the President of Columbia University. As the story goes, the 1941 Novel Jury recommended several books for the Pulitzer Prize including, but not primarily, For Whom The Bell Tolls, but the Pulitzer Advisory Board overrode their other recommendations in favor of the critic’s choice, For Whom The Bell Tolls. Before the Board could complete the vote they were blocked by one man: the President of Columbia University, Nicholas Butler Murray. He was ex-officio Chairman of the Pulitzer also Advisory Board and he objected to the ‘lascivious’ content in the novel (Sound familiar? Nicholas Butler Murray also blocked the Pulitzer Prize from being bestowed upon Sinclair Lewis in 1921 for his novel Main Street. Instead…

by Judith Curry

“Avoid unwarranted certainty, neat narratives and partisan presentation; strive to inform, not persuade.”

Piper delivers lament for Scotland.

Scotland’s wind power scam is positively criminal: foreign-owned wind power outfits have pocket tens of £billions in subsidies; working-class Scots struggle to pay crippling power bills – plenty of them have no hope of powering their homes ever again.

A further obscenity is the fact that wind farms in Scotland are routinely paid hundreds of £millions each year to NOT produce any electricity, at all: World’s Biggest Scams: Scotland’s Wind Farms Paid £650,000,000 To NOT Produce Power

The cost of wind power subsidies to Scottish power consumers is staggering, and it continues to mount. As Gareth Rose outlines below.

It’s the SNP’s green dream, yet firms are handed millions every year to run Scotland’s wind farms… and YOU are paying for it
The Scottish Mail on Sunday
Gareth Rose
1 November 2020

Wind farms are being handed record subsidies in a move that is driving up…

A Bronx Zoo elephant named Happy was the center of attention in court Thursday when a New York appellate court deliberated granting the mammal personhood.

According to UPI, the Nonhuman Rights Project (NhRP) asked the Appellate Division of New York State Supreme Court to grant the mammal personhood rights alleging Happy is living in solitary confinement since being placed there 14 years ago. Once done, Happy would to be transferred to an animal sanctuary so as to allegedly avoid the coming New York winter weather.

The appeals court took up the case after the NhRP lost their initial attempt in the Bronx Supreme Court. While the Bronx judge in the group’s first court challenge found the NhRP’s arguments persuasive, the New York Post states appellate court judges seemed skeptical.

Animal rights philosophy is based on an erroneous assumption made by French philosopher Rene Descartes’ that says: I feel…