A common term used in online left-wing discourses is ‘tankie’. It has been used to describe those who are self-identified Marxist-Leninists and those who defend ‘actually existing socialism’ in its various guises (such as the Soviet Union, the People’s Republic of China, the Eastern Bloc, Cuba, Vietnam and North Korea). As an extension of this, ‘tankie’ has also been used to describe people who defend regimes in alliance with Russia and China in the twenty-first century, primarily concerning the Assad government in Syria nowadays.

The connotation of the term alludes to the Soviet invasions of Hungary in 1956, Czechoslovakia in 1968 and Afghanistan in 1979 (as well as martial law Poland in 1980), suggesting that those who supported the Soviet Union in these incursions were endorsing the use of tanks to crush their opposition (supposed counter-revolutionaries, the bourgeoisie, imperialists, etc). Although China opposed both the invasion of Czechoslovakia in 1968

Funadhoo Airport set to open on February 1 | Corporate Maldives

“Action must be powerful and wide-ranging.
After all, the climate crisis is not just about the environment.
It is a crisis of human rights, of justice, and of political will.
Colonial, racist, and patriarchal systems of oppression have created and fueled it.
We need to dismantle them all.”
–– GretaThunberg™️

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Hat tip @yota_berlin

IN 1988, environmental ‘authorities’ and the United Nations predicted that the Maldives’ 1,196 islands would be underwater by 2018.

‘Sea level is threatening to completely cover’ Maldives’ 1,196 islands within 30 years…

Missed It By That Much | Real Climate Science

*

TWO years on from the drowning of the Maldives, the situation is dire…

Maldives to open four new airports in 2020 – Maldives Insider

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ALARMISM PAYS

THE Maldivian government, along with other “disappearing” (cash-strapped) coral island nations have a well…

I’ve been dipping into the official New Zealand Pandemic Action Plan  –  all 193 pages of it –  a bit in the last few days.  The document has evolved over the years and now describes itself as

This edition of the New Zealand Influenza Pandemic Plan reflects the sophistication of a third generation, risk-based plan that promotes collaboration across all levels of government, agencies and organisations when planning for, responding to and recovery form a pandemic event.

and

Pandemics by their nature are unpredictable in terms of timing, severity and the population groups that are most affected. This version of the New Zealand Influenza Pandemic Plan establishes a framework for action that can readily be adopted and applied to any pandemic, irrespective of the nature of the virus and its severity.

It isn’t really clear what status the document has at present.  It was finalised late in the term…

(Ranbaxy plant in Mohali, India)

The other day I was chatting with my doctor and I mentioned to him that he should consider reading Katherine Eban’s recent book, BOTTLE OF LIES: THE INSIDE STORY OF THE GENERIC DRUG BOOM.  He was not familiar with the title but as we chatted about the role of India and China in reverse engineering American brand name medications his eyes lit up.  My physician is of Indian descent and he described to me what he witnessed when visiting India and the practices pursued by Indian generic drug manufacturers, particularly Ranbaxy.  He described disingenuous practices, fraud, corruption, the lack of government oversight and a myriad of illegal practices pursued by companies that went against the FDA’s best practices protocols.  Since 40% of all generic drugs are produced in India and 80% of the active ingredients in all drugs are produced in India and China his…

The Sad Irony Of Affirmative Action

Introduction

Author of “The Sad Irony of Affirmative Action”, Gail Heriot, is a Professor of Law at the University of San Diego School of Law. She has also been a member of the United States Commission on Civil Rights since 2007. She is the author of numerous academic and professional papers, and over thirty of them have been featured on the Social Science Research Network. She also is a columnist for National Review Magazine.

In “The Sad Irony of Affirmative Action”, Heriot delves into the consequences and shortcomings of Affirmative Action, specifically in the college admissions process.

Summary

Introducing her argument, Heriot states a few facts showing the apparent ineffectiveness of affirmative action– “If this evidence is correct, we now have fewer African-American physicians, scientists, and engineers than we would have had using race-neutral admissions policies. We have fewer college professors…

Carbon Dioxide Scrubber

Ross McKitrick says Jeff Bezos has put enough money on the table to vanish climate change concerns, except for those who won’t let go. He writes at Financial Post: It’s never enough with climate activists — even a staggering $10 billion from Jeff Bezos. Excerpts in italics with my bolds.

Observers might conclude activists don’t care about the climate per se but instead want to impose a big-government central planning regime

Jeff Bezos, the mega-billionaire founder/owner of Amazon, just announced he will give US$10 billion to “fight climate change.” According to CNN, this followed immense pressure from his employees to take action. And, as is inevitable with this issue, as soon as he made the announcement his activist employees declared it wasn’t enough.

“We applaud Jeff Bezos’s philanthropy, but one hand cannot give what the other is taking away,” their group sniffed. “Will Jeff Bezos show us…

They are up against it. Governments are now finding themselves increasingly boxed in by their own climate ideology. From the report below:
Richard Tol, professor of the economics of climate change at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, said it is “highly unlikely” that the Netherlands will rise to the challenge, saying a [extra] 10% emissions reduction by the end of 2020 would “require shutting down a substantial part of the economy”.

But what options are there? Nuclear power is unpopular and can’t be built quickly anyway, while wind and solar power are part-time, intermittent, and relatively expensive. No viable ‘off-the-shelf’ way exists to store electricity on a massive scale. Awkward.
– – –
The Netherlands is under pressure to slash emissions in sectors such as power generation and agriculture in 2020 after a ruling by a top court made the government a reluctant ‘test case’ for tougher global climate policies, says…