This week brings the confirmation hearing of Judge Ketanji Brown Jackson to the Supreme Court. The GOP members in the Senate have vowed to vote against her, even though she is more qualified than most of the more junior members on the Court. At stake is her refusal to embrace 'originalism', a philosophy that we should do EXACTLY as the Founders said, not necessarily what they intended. In support of this onerous and odious idea, the conservatives repeatedly make up quotes by people such as Madison, and simply lie about the rest.
Via Heather Cox Richardson, US historian: A 2019 speech by then–attorney general William Barr at the University of Notre Dame offers an explanation.
In that speech, Barr presented a profound rewriting of the meaning of American democracy. He argued that by 'self-government' the Framers did not mean the ability of people to vote for representatives of their choice. Rather, he said, they meant individual morality: the ability to govern oneself. And, since people are inherently wicked, that self-government requires the authority of a religion: Christianity.
I have not been the only one to quote the phrase ‘never let a good crisis go unused’ or versions of, and I did mention how the Net Zero brigade had reinforced their objectives under the guise of Covid, two years in the formation and now being unleashed into the general narrative.
The video of the unprepared Nigel Farage being unable to counter Dale Vince on his own program was not a unique occasion but it was a relatively high profile one and a missed opportunity to debunk the whole push for Net Zero that Boris despite evident minor concessions is still pushing ahead with.
Even in a week when Ukraine naturally dominates the headlines the Greens are still issuing statements on how we should be looking to live in the not too distant future; some of it is trivial and unnecessary nonsense but it still keeps the whole Net Zero train on the tracks when it should be in a siding.
While taking the wife shopping this week to Waitrose, a bastion of all things Green, I picked up their free Weekender magazine; you may well ask why, but those that know are aware that I read anything, no catalogue that plops onto the mat goes unscanned and reading women's magazines in the dentists waiting room is de rigueur, all the while picking up snippets of useless and sometimes very interesting information on things that would normally pass me by.
In the aforementioned Weekender, after scanning pages of politically correct photos of various ethnic people dominating the images I saw an article on saving water. We have done this one and the fact that water companies have totally failed to increase capture and storage despite an ever-rising population; doubtless it is still all our fault for having the temerity to use the stuff in the first place. So we get a lifestyle change piece on how to save water and if possible not even use it.
But the article is not quite as innocent as it appears. Anna Shepard is the author ‘My Year of Living Sustainably’ and this is No. 11 in the series; I have not seen any of the others but would think this one is par for course. Anna also wrote for the Times under her Eco Worrier tag and has written books on green living plus naturally she is a go-to for the BBC radio and TV. I mention all this because this type of eco approach is everywhere: women's magazines (see, I told you it would come in useful) for some reason are full of articles on sustainability and green living.
Anyway in this piece, No. 11, she talks about her family's way of dealing with water usage. Water for some reason is no longer a basic necessity but a power-using commodity that should be used sparingly (see earlier note on water companies): heating water increases carbon emissions and the evil gas boiler is the culprit here.
Showers by nature are evil incarnate if you shower and actually use the thing more than the seven to eight minutes which we are told is standard, which I don’t actually believe; we should take a minute less and save the world. She supplies all sorts of tips like using a timer and a hardly-get-you-wet shower head, and turn it off if washing hair in shower whilst soaping; her husband, being a good boy, turns the temperature down, which evidently boosts his immune system - lucky him, no Covid in that house.
And finally she excuses her love of a long soak in the tub, for which she would normally lose brownie points for admitting such a heinous act, by sharing or leaving the water for someone else to get into; and finally, a gold star for having days when they don’t wash at all.
I am with Anna on this one, or would have been, though I doubt it would have saved any water - after all, who would want to leave the shower in a situation like that !
The detail from this one article is in line with the endless shelves in supermarkets that have pretend meat on them as the push to cut meat out entirely from diets goes full steam ahead. Meat of course is a prime (!) mover in producing emissions and so should be cut as rapidly as possible along with the inevitable removal of all dairy products as a natural consequence. Lab grown meat is already an item and will be with you soon; soya milk is a substitute for dairy milk - though soya production uses lots of water so cross that one off; strange how avocados are bad, needing lots of water in production, but soya is fine as indirectly it gets rid of meat.
The banning of the use of plastics continues apace, being a by product of oil which today is the devil itself, though no one has addressed how we will replace items like plastic piping and everything else which we take for granted in the modern age; the alternatives, should there be enough natural materials to make some of these items, are all very expensive which will in turn mean that the man on the Clapham omnibus (for that is all that there will be left to travel on) will be further impoverished, not only will he have to use less water, it will probably be rationed and a communal standpipe will be the local gathering point as in Africa, all those toxic plastic delivery pipes having been banned.
Polyester clothing will follow the route of extinction, we will return to use of pure cotton - no, that's out, its links to slavery make it a no-no; so wool will return to the top of the clothing tree, except that sheep have by then been eliminated as meat is also a no-no, banished to the past as when we were hunter-gatherers. Are there enough silk worms in the world to take up the slack?
Anna even manages to get in on another article on the following page, following the well-worn path of 'cars are bad so don’t use them.' This time she manages to find a fellow eco convert in Emma, who is stressed by driving and the bus is relaxing and convenient (not round here, on the reduced services of one an hour), but still Emma has joined the carless society. The reduction in petrol driven vehicles as EVs take over is to be applauded, but wait a minute, Sandra from We Are Possible! says EVs only ‘lower’ emissions and that is not enough: we need to reduce all cars on the road. Emma is a rent fanatic, she believes renting cars plus everything else will save the world, and the lockdowns showed the way with emissions being down by around 50%; Emma would like that figure to remain: people working, travelling etc. is such a dated concept, the magic money tree will take care of any problems arising.
As Emma so succinctly puts when signing off, ‘Do I need to do so much?’ even though it appears she is doing very little now.
No doubt Emma will be delighted when all cars are finally banned and we take to public transport; could this be the future?...
On the same page Matthew McNulty, actor, has a question and answer session. If you could eat anywhere in the world today where would you go? Now a decent modern progressive would say ‘my local Chinese’ as we can walk there and cut emissions, but McNulty makes a statement that will turn Greta apoplectic should she read it, how dare you indeed, by declaring ‘The Arctic. I’d catch fish then cook and eat it in the cold, appreciating hot food in a cold place is the ideal.' I have news for McNulty: appreciating hot food in any climate may soon be a luxury at home, never mind the Arctic.
The Weekender as with all newspapers and journals knows which side its bread is buttered when it comes to advertising: no anti Covid items when the NHS (us) was paying for the non stop advertising and no irony in having articles on sustainability on the page before the travel section starts with exotic holidays in all points of the globe being pushed - it’s funny how they have to accept advertising which goes against their eco agendas as a means to survive, but the little people will have to choose to heat or eat!
So there it is in a nutshell, actually Waitrose's Weekender: we have the current viewpoint on all things eco. All these sage words are apparently uttered by people who not only have no concept of what it is like to not be able to put the heating on but actively encourage it. Another cashmere jumper, an extra duvet, take the dog for a walk several times a day (naturally the dog will be fed with one of the new non meat pet foods) and light small fires in the living room with non-emission-emitting copies of Weekender - as they say, today’s newspaper is tomorrow's fish and chip wrapper, or in this case firelighter; it’s all we have.
I am not convinced that dogs really want a vegan diet, this chap certainly has reservations:
I am not totally without sympathy to the cause, we all have to make an effort however small to save the planet. I have already gone out on a limb and got rid of all my petrol-engined mowers and strimmers and replaced with an eco version I found in the local paper; it may just be a way of saving livestock from their impending demise at the same time:
An addendum:
Dale Vince, mentioned in my piece last week on Nigel Farage, is another who does not want the truth about himself made any more public than necessary. He denied he had made a fortune when asked on Nigel’s program and claimed his company is a not for profit organisation, yet for all that he is a major shareholder and chairman at Forest Green Rovers, who are about to make it into the football league (even small football clubs do not come cheap), and he settled an old divorce case with a payment of half a million pounds in court costs. He is a vegan, naturally, and supports the Green Party (ditto) and donated to the Greens and the Labour party; he also endorsed Caroline Lucas. The gory details are all here:
As can be seen he is a full on eco zealot, something that Nigel could have found out by clicking the same link as I did. As with so many of these people, give them the smallest opportunity and they will force their ideals on you without asking - note he has banned all meat products at the football ground and all his players are vegan.
So I think we can take his rather biased view on wind and solar power with a pinch of salt as he is no different from anyone else jumping on the eco wagon. He is fully entitled to his view but his answers were not quite the full story when he appeared on Talk Radio on Thursday giving more biased reasons for not following any other route other than wind and solar (despite the obvious shortcomings and the costly need for a parallel back up system or the lights go out.)
And once again the presenter was not on the ball with the questions and answers.
They should have let those who commented from the public afterwards interview him, they had most of the facts about this scam.
"Whether traveling to gigs on horseback or by tour bus, Americana mavens The Brothers Comatose forge their own path with raucous West Coast renderings of traditional bluegrass, country and rock ‘n’ roll music. The five-piece string band is anything but a traditional acoustic outfit with their fierce musicianship and rowdy, rock concert-like shows.
"The Brothers Comatose is comprised of brothers Ben Morrison (guitar, vocals) and Alex Morrison (banjo, vocals), Steve Height (bass), Philip Brezina (violin), and Greg Fleischut (mandolin, vocals). When they’re not headlining The Fillmore for a sold-out show or appearing at Hardly Strictly Bluegrass Festival, the band is out on the road performing across America, Canada, Australia, and hosting their very own music festival, Comatopia, in the Sierra foothills."
GOP Senator Mike Braun of Indiana was questioned by reporters today, and expressed his opinion that rights to abortion, interracial marriage and contraception should be left up to each state, to avoid the homogeneity that Roe v. Wade produced.
Attacking the LGBT population is clearly the next step, but why stop there? How about we go back to slavery, which has been proposed by groups such as the Dominionists, who want the US to be ruled by the Old Testament rules?
In other news:
Responding to the high gas prices, GOP politicians are blaming the Biden administration for cutting US oil production, and the cancellation of the Keystone pipeline extension. These cries are echoed by their supporters, based on the feeding of the fires by Newsmax, Fox and other right-wing sources.
The fact that the Trump administration stated that the pipeline in question would do nothing to change the price of gas, and that the Biden administration has sold lots of drilling permits is, of course, not considered.
Meanwhile, Democratic politicians in Ohio are pushing to suspend the state and federal gas tax for a period to bring down the price and increase their chances of election. There is, of course, no way to guarantee that such a price decrease would make its way to consumers.
Quietly buried is an item reported by the Wall Street Journal that several oil companies have announced to their shareholders that they are restricting production to keep the prices elevated.
Inflation steals from the people, and they would still be
robbed even if annual inflation-linked increases worked perfectly.
The State Pension from 14 April this year will rise by 3.1%,
in line with the Consumer Price Index (CPI). The ‘triple lock’ promise made to
pensioners in 2010 said that increases would reflect the highest of three
measures: 2.5%, CPI or National Average Earnings (NAEI).
The Bank of England has a general inflation target
of 2% p.a. as measured by CPI https://www.bankofengland.co.uk/monetary-policy/inflation
, so clearly price inflation is getting a little out of hand. If we were on
track at 2% then pensioners would benefit in real terms from the minimum 2.5% element
of the triple lock.
Last year, the Government suspended the NAEI
part of the guarantee for 2022-23, which would otherwise have triggered a
pension increase of some 8% following a higher rise in wage inflation owing to
the pandemic. https://www.thetimes.co.uk/money-mentor/article/pensions-triple-lock/
Darby and Joan would have been drinking champagne and doing an arthritic dance
in the street.
So CPI it is, oldies. Setting aside quibbles about
exactly how CPI is calculated, and whether RPI would be a more appropriate yardstick
(the switchover of measures came in 2011, affecting social security benefits
and public sector pensions), we note that the Government measures CPI in
September but does not apply increases to pensions until the following April; a
lot can happen between those dates. For example, we now read that the latest
CPI figure for the last twelve months is 6.2%, exactly double what we are to
get from the Pensions Service. https://www.theguardian.com/business/2022/mar/23/uk-inflation-highest-level-in-three-decades
Yet even in an ideal world, where inflation was absolutely fairly
and accurately calculated once a year and pension increases applied
immediately, our bank accounts would still spring a leak.
The full rate of new State Pension will increase to £185.15
per week in April. For a couple each qualifying for that, the total income works
out at £19,255:60 p.a. or a shade over £1,600 per month; let’s work with that
round figure.
Now let’s assume that our couple spends every penny of their
pension, but that prices go up another 6% over the year, jumping suddenly by 0.5%
per month simple. Darby and Joan cope okay for April, but outgoings exceed
income by £8 in May, £16 in June and so on. At that rate, it’s easy to show
that they end the tax year £528 behind the line. Either they will borrow to
meet the shortfall (and pay interest – credit cards are charging something like
35%) or, more realistically, they will manage with less and/or lower quality in
the way of goods and services.
The following April, under this fantasy arrangement, inflation
indexing sets them straight again; but that £528 is never recouped; and they
face another year of the same process of gradual immiseration; and it goes on
forever.
The Bank of England tries to justify this theft:
‘If inflation is too low, or
negative, then some people may put off spending because they expect prices to
fall. Although lower prices sounds like a good thing, if everybody reduced
their spending then companies could fail and people might lose their jobs.’
However, the same calculator says that the cost of goods and
services worth £10 in 1915 soared to £1,093.82 last year; even an apparently
low average inflation rate of 4.5% a year still rots one’s wealth.
Debasing the currency by coin-clipping or forgery used to be
high treason: the last woman to be burned at the stake for it was Catherine
Murphy, at Newgate Prison in 1789. It is high time we tackled this official fraud,
the monetary disease of the twentieth century.
ClassicFM's news reported yesterday that President Biden had revealed a plan by Russia to mount a 'false flag' attack on itself.
It could signal a new US Government policy of publicising secret military intelligence, which would be a refreshing change, though at the risk of revealing its sources and resources to the enemy.
But it might also be a public relations technique known as 'getting ahead of the story': taking control of the narrative so that we are primed in advance to discount the enemy's version of events.
What form will this attack take, and who will be mounting it? Maybe we will be allowed to know the truth in thirty years' time.
