Monthly Archives: November 2011

This years edition of Rolling Stone’s 100 greatest guitarists of all time

Posted on by
10

Let’s see…

Willy Nelson is on the list and Paul Gilbert is not.

Lou Reed made it and Eric Johnson didn’t.

David Howell Evans a.k.a. ‘The Edge’ is on the list and Joe Satriani is not.

Joni Mitchell….. JONI MITCHELL is on the list. An excerpt from her RS write up:

She had mastered the idea that she could tune the guitar any way she wanted, to get other inversions of the chords.

Wowwww… Alternate tuning a guitar. Joni Mitchel mastered alternate tuning and made the list and Steve Vai didn’t:

YouTube Preview Image

No Kirk Hammett, Kenny Wayne Shepherd, Steve Lukather, Brian Setzer, Tommy Emmanuel, Sonny Landreth, john 5 or Jennifer Batten. There are dozens of guitarists that could make the list and didn’t. But Paul Simon did.

Former chairman of Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers is working to repair his tarnished image

Posted on by
1

Austan Goolsbee, Obama’s former chairman of Obama’s Council of Economic Advisers was interviewed by Larry Kudlow back in August of this year. Thjey had this lengthy exchange about ‘green energy’ and the restrictions on developing our own domestic oil reserves.

GOOLSBEE: Look, we have to–we have to promote domestic energy consumption. We have to do that in a way that’s safe. We don’t want to have the biggest oil spill again that has ever been had. We don’t want to poison the ground water. But the president, as I’ve viewed it, the administration believes that we can do that in a safe way, and domestic production is ramping up quite dramatically. Now it seems like you’re making fun of some of the alternative energy stuff, but if you look at China, if you look at Europe and if you look at a lot of the faster growing regions of the world, they’re heavily investing in it.

KUDLOW: It’s been a dismal failure in Europe.

GOOLSBEE: (Unintelligible)…alternative energy.

KUDLOW: It’s been a dismal failure in Spain. It’s been a dismal failure in Europe. I say, Austan, if the market…

GOOLSBEE: It seems like in China and Brazil it’s been quite a success.

KUDLOW: If the market wants to produce clean energy, it’ll produce clean energy. Natural gas from shale is clean energy.

GOOLSBEE: Look, I agree with that.

KUDLOW: I just don’t see why we don’t…

GOOLSBEE: I agree with that.

KUDLOW: …call the EPA dogs off. That’s one of these regulatory issues. Call the National Labor Relation dogs off of Boeing, Austan. In other words, some of this stuff, there’s very little presidents can do. I get that.

GOOLSBEE: OK.

And, of course, Austan was misrepresenting the facts about China because they have determined that there is no profit producing electricity using ‘green energy.’ Also, we gave Brazil a large amount of money to for deep water oil drilling. Obama said, we will be their best customer.

Speaking of China, oil and best customers, if we don’t build the Keystone pipeline from the oils sands in Canada to the our refineries on the Gulf Cost China will become Canada’s best customer for crude oil.

Circling back to Austan Goolsbee; it seems he has really changed his tune about oil and economics now that he is not advising you know who:

People in the U.S. opposing TransCanada Corp. (TRP)’s Keystone XL pipeline are being “naïve,” said Austan Goolsbee, former chairman of the White House Council of Economic Advisers.

“It’s a bit naïve to think the tar sands would not be developed if they don’t build that pipeline,” said Goolsbee, speaking today in Toronto at the Economic Club of Canada. “Eventually, it’s going to be built. It may go to the Pacific, it may go through Nebraska, but it’s going to be built somewhere.”

TransCanada and Nebraska announced Nov. 14 they would collaborate on a new path for the $7 billion Keystone XL pipeline, intended to deliver crude from Alberta’s oil sands to refineries and ports on the Gulf of Mexico.

I guess, Mr. Goolsbee is working to repair his very tarnished image after his stint at the White House.

Video: Drag racing wreck that refuses to end

Posted on by
8

This is crazy:

According to people in attendance, both tires on the car’s driver’s side were torn off, and the impact ripped the master cylinder from the firewall. The throttle cable was attached to the cylinder, so when the cylinder fell, the throttle controlling a 1,500-plus-horsepower engine got stuck wide open for more than a minute. Worst of all, the initial impact knocked Peterson unconscious, so he wasn’t able to do anything to intervene.

And the video…

YouTube Preview Image

The driver came to after the medics cut him out of the car and is said to be at home and ok.

Why The Culture Matters: U.S. Military Legacy Leaves Imprint On Iraqi Youth

Posted on by
Reply

FOX News has an interesting story on how the departing U.S. Military presence has left a big imprint on the youth of Iraq:

In other words, as the Dec. 31 deadline for completing their withdrawal approaches, U.S. troops are leaving behind the good, the bad and what “Lil Czar” Mohammed calls the “punky.”

Sporting baggy soldiers’ camouflage pants, high-top sneakers and a back-turned “N.Y.” baseball cap, the chubby 22-year-old was showing off his break-dancing moves on a sunny afternoon in a Baghdad park. A $ sign was shaved into his closely cropped hair.

“While others might stop being rappers after the Americans leave, I will go on (rapping) till I reach N.Y.,” said Mohammed, who teaches part-time at a primary school.

His forearm bore a tattoo of dice above the words “GANG STAR.” That was the tattooist’s mistake, he said; it was supposed to say “gangsta.”

GANG STAR… Too funny…

The FOX story illustrates how the American culture is not only a powerful force inside our borders it is powerful force outside our borders as well. And, unfortunately, its dominated by the left. A lot of the time, we are exporting the left’s entitlement mentality rather than American values of rugged individualism and self reliance.

“Lil Czar” Mohammed, a Shiite Muslim, says he was introduced to American culture by a Christian friend, Laith, who subsequently had to flee the anti-Christian violence that broke out in Baghdad. “I had nothing to help my friend, he left,” he said. “But when I get the money and become a rich boss, I will tell my friend Laith to come back.”

Meanwhile, he said, he is trying to record a rap song in Arabic and English. “It is about our situation. About no jobs for us.”

“It is about our situation. About no jobs for us.” Spoken like a true Occupy Whatever malcontent.

Adam Smith vs. Obama: Profits and Government Regulations

Posted on by
1

The statesman who should attempt to direct private people in what manner they ought to employ their capitals, would not only load himself with a most unnecessary attention, but assume an authority which could safely be trusted, not only to no single person, but to no council or senate whatever, and which would nowhere be so dangerous as in the hands of a man who had folly and presumption enough to fancy himself fit to exercise it.

Adam Smith - The Wealth Of Nations, Book IV, Chapter II, p. 456, para. 10.

Obama, Democrats in general, and the occupy whatever movement are endlessly screech about corporate greed and excessive profits. If the leftists bothered to study classic economics and not the incoherent blatherings of Paul Krugman or Thomas L. Friedman, they would discover something that would shock them to their core. ‘Excessive profits’ are fleeting due to Capitalism itself.

Via one of my favorite economists, Tim Worstall, at the ASI:

There’s a natural rate (or if you prefer, a general rate) of return to capital. Yet sometimes people find a new way of doing things. Might be a new technology, might be a new method of organization, a new strategy, new goods, but something different which offers a higher return upon capital. Those people that follow that new path make excess profits: no, not profits we consider excessive, just profits above that normal or general rate.

Other capitalists, being greedy and lustful for profits, filthy lucre, thus enter this trade that offers excess profits. More capital trying to exploit this opportunity brings down the return to that normal or general level for each unit of capital seeking to do the exploiting which is what we’re seeing above. The super-profits of hedge funds in US equities seem to be gone.

We could just leave it there: but we shouldn’t, for it’s one of the things that drives society forwards. We want places where excess profits can be made to be exploited: profits are only another way of saying value added and the accumulated value added is the wealth of us all, by definition, that’s what economic wealth is. It is the hunger for excess profits that leads capitalists to explore the crooks and crannies of technology to find those places where they might make them. And thus it’s that hunger which drives forward technology itself to the benefit of us all.

And, as Old Adam told us all those years ago, those excess profits will get competed away and the hunt will be on for the next opportunity.

This is a much different and accurate idea than what Obama and his henchmen believe.

YouTube Preview Image

Obama Regime: Hey, you can save money on energy while we make it more expensive

Posted on by
Reply

While driving around town today,  I caught a radio spot from our government extolling the virtues (and monetary savings) from using less energy. The spot was much like the following ‘helpful’ ad from the US Department of Energy:

YouTube Preview Image

The first two thoughts that came to mind listening to this nonsense was:

1. Stop wasting money producing and broadcasting these stupid ads. This will be an immediate savings for tax payers.

2. “Under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket. Even regardless of what I say about whether coal is good or bad. Because I’m capping greenhouse gases, coal power plants, you know, natural gas, you name it — whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was, uh, they would have to retrofit their operations. That will cost money. They will pass that money on to consumers.”

YouTube Preview Image

While our government nannies are trying to coerce us into saving energy, the Obama regime is doing everything in its power to block development of real energy resources in favor of his green energy scheme.

Oh, and if you think all this capping of ‘green house’ gasses and green energy is needed to save the ENTIRE planet from global warming, think again. Even hard core global warming fanatics are having to admit the so-called problem is not really as severe as first predicted.

Lead author Andreas Schmittner from Oregon State University, US, explained that by looking at surface temperatures during the most recent ice age – 21,000 years ago – when humans were having no impact on global temperatures, he, and his colleagues show that this period was not as cold as previous estimates suggest.

“This implies that the effect of CO2 on climate is less than previously thought,” he explained.

By incorporating this newly discovered “climate insensitivity” into their models, the international team was able to reduce uncertainty in its future climate projections.

The new models predict that given a doubling in CO2 levels from pre-industrial levels, the Earth’s surface temperatures will rise by 1.7C to 2.6C (3.1F to 4.7F).

That is a much tighter range than the one produced by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) 2007 report, which suggested a rise of between 2.0C to 4.5C

Of course, this still doesn’t explain why surface temperatures in my back yard have been slowly declining since the late 1930′s:

How can the mean temperature in my back yard drop at a rate of 0.0018 deg / year over the last 70+ years when the ENTIRE Planet is supposedly suffering from a catastrophic warming trend?

Thanksgiving Morning Links: The Funny Turkey Video Edition

Posted on by
21

I would like to wish all my friends in the right wing Blog-O-Sphere a wonderful Thanksgiving.

Can Turkey’s fly?

YouTube Preview Image

CS: PETA is out to lunch
Bunker: Mark Levin – A Neurosurgeon calls in about Death Panels, HHS
Conservative Hideout 2.0 (New Location, Same Great Content): The Story of the First Thanksgiving 2011
The Eye: Happy Thanksgiving
TBA: Support the Party, or Split the Vote?
‘Bot: #OccupyWallStreet Thugs Encouraging Violence – Audio Compilations via Glenn Beck

Fast Turkeys (A Mockumentary):

YouTube Preview Image

FCBZ: Best Thanksgiving Photoshop of the Day: VP Biden Pardons… What?
Pundette: Newtworld
SJ: Is it Time to Start Suing the Occupods?
Spellchek: Obama blocks Keystone pipeline – did climate change or big labor win?
RR: Dennis Miller on Tonight Show with Jay Leno Talking 2012, GOP Field
LaS: Meet the Teachers

It’s like the turkeys started stalking the kid on his bike:

YouTube Preview Image

Republican Mother: 35 Facts about the Gutting of Industrial America
TMGGB has a great idea: Sideline The MSM… GOP Debates On Conservative Blogs
theCL: Neoconservative Freedom 2012
Gator: Perry gets the endorsement of an American warrior and hero
WWTFT: The Founders on Liberty and Freedom
WyBlog: Thanksgiving Thursday: Lions, Cowboys, and 49ers, oh my! (You know where I’ll be around 12:30 eastern time).
Zilla of the Resistance: She Makes Her Momma So Proud

Be sure to say a prayer for Jim @ Conservatives on Fire who is battling serious eye problems.

What? There are no cows on Mars…

Posted on by
1


You don’t say…

There are no cows on Mars.

Of that, planetary scientists are certain, which leaves them puzzling over what could be producing methane gas detected in the thin Martian air. Methane molecules are easily blown apart by ultraviolet light from the Sun, so any methane around must have been released recently.

Could the gas be burbling from something alive? Cows, after all, burp methane on Earth. Other creatures, including a class of micro-organisms that live without oxygen, also produce methane.

Many scientist (and the goofball who wrote the NYT article) are so desperate to make the jump that if there is methane on Mars, then, obviously life must have been there at ‘one time’ as well.

One big problem with this so called hypothesis are planets in our solar system known as the gas giants. Both Neptune and Uranus contain significant amounts of methane in their respective atmospheres. Jupiter and Saturn also have some amounts of methane gas in their atmospheres as well.

And, if you are looking for methane (and other hydrocarbons) look no further than Titan, one of Saturn’s moons.

Instead of water, as on Earth, Titan’s cycles of precipitation, evaporation and cloud formation involve hydrocarbons such as methane and ethane, which at the extremes of cold on Titan pool as liquids in thousands of lakes around its north and south poles.

Indeed, scientists estimate that Titan holds hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than all the known oil and natural gas reserves on Earth.

I’m reasonably sure, there are no burping cows, decaying plant life (or rotting dinosaurs) on Titan, Saturn, Jupiter, Uranus, Neptune or Mars.

An extra big tip O’ the hat to Instapundit for pointing out the original article.