Typical impacts of La Niña on U.S. winter temperature and precipitation. Such
impacts have been associated with past episodes, but all impactsaren't seen
with every episode. Drawing by Fiona Martin, NOAA, for Climate.gov.
In regional climate outlooks for the Great Lakes, Missouri basin, and the Midwest, forecasters from NOAA’s Climate Prediction Center expect several potential impacts this winter from the current La Niña pattern in the Pacific Ocean.
From now until early spring, forecasters anticipate La Niña could
affect precipitation and temperatures across several central states. The
forecasts address the potential for impacts on agriculture, the
economy, and ecosystems.
Each region is subject to different repercussions from La Niña. The
polar jet stream, which can vary based on La Niña conditions, tends to
cut through the Missouri basin, making it the U.S. dividing line between
cold and warm air masses. Colder, wetter conditions could be in store
for the northern portions of the basin, while the southern Great Plains
could be warmer and drier.
Precipitation and temperatures could possibly breakdown as such:
The northern Rockies, Wyoming, the Dakotas, and Great Lakes may
experience above-normal precipitation and below-normal temperatures.
Southern areas of Colorado, Wyoming, and Kansas may see slightly
increased chances for below-normal precipitation and above-normal
temperatures.
La Niña Impacts
Dry soil conditions in the Missouri River basin have already
challenged winter wheat, particularly in western Kansas and parts of
Wyoming. Lower crop yields and overwintering of pests may develop if
predictions for warmer, drier conditions hold true.
Colder spells in the Great Lakes, where a wetter, more frigid winter
may develop, could be negative for livestock, driving up farming costs
and commodity prices. These factors may contribute to more ice cover as
well. Similar conditions could have consequences in the Midwest, where
La Niña has the potential to negatively impact fall seeded crops or
perennials, such as alfalfa or fruit orchards. Increased costs for
heating fuel, snow removal, and transportation are also possible. The
northern Rockies could experience above-normal snowpack, which is
normally good for water supply later in the year.
Because the La Niña phase is predicted to be weaker and shorter this
winter than in previous years, forecasters are assessing the winter with
a conservative outlook. It’s likely La Niña’s influence may wane by
early spring.
A La Niña develops when temperatures in the equatorial Pacific Ocean
are cooler than average for an extended period. This year, the cooling
is slight, so there remains a chance the La Niña may not persist. Also,
forecasts depend on many variables, such as short-term weather or
long-term climate events, that can overshadow the typical La Niña
pattern and lessen the reliability of predictions.
To help you better understand how the current La Niña may impact the
Midwest and surrounding areas, NOAA releases regional La Niña Outlooks:
Like clockwork, it happens twice year. No, not just Daylight Saving Time—the kvetching about it.
The facts: DST does not actually reduce electric demand, as it was created to do. Additionally, it shatters delicate sleep schedules, leading to upwards of $400 million in economic losses each year. DST has also been linked to traffic accidents, heart attacks, Seasonal Affective Disorder, commuting snafus, and in my house, general unpleasantness and fist shaking. But what would the country really look like without Daylight Saving Time? As Axis Maps cartographer Andy Woodruff points out in a recent blog post,
its effects are not consistent across the United States. But even so,
the time-turning phenomenon looks pretty horrifying for those who arise
at the reasonable hour of 7 a.m. Woodruff’s maps also assume you prefer a sunset after 5 p.m. Where should you live? The maps below may give you a hint. Andy WoodruffAndy WoodruffAndy WoodruffThe
takeaway may be that if you love the sun, Hawaii is calling. The sun
rises and falls before 7 a.m. and after 5 p.m. every single day. Those
who do not want to flee across the Pacific might instead consider a move
to the southeastern-most point of your local time zone.
But as with all things, moving for the sun comes with tradeoffs.
“[M]aybe you could cut your coffee budget if you live on the western
side of your time zone,” Woodruff writes. “Just remember you’d be giving
up those wonderful summer evenings.”
Head over to Woodruff’s blog
to play with an interactive version of the map and emerge with the
largest lesson: Limited winter sun is miserable, no matter what the
clock says.
Global land temperatures have plummeted by one degree Celsius since the middle of this year – the biggest and steepest fall on record.
But the news has been greeted with an eerie silence by the world’s
alarmist community. You’d almost imagine that when temperatures shoot up
it’s catastrophic climate change which requires dramatic headlines
across the mainstream media and demands for urgent action. But that when
they fall even more precipitously it’s just a case of “nothing to see
here”.
The cause of the fall is a La Nina event following in the wake of an unusual strong El Nino.
As David Rose reports:
Big El Ninos always have an immense impact
on world weather, triggering higher than normal temperatures over huge
swathes of the world. The 2015-16 El Nino was probably the strongest
since accurate measurements began, with the water up to 3C warmer than
usual.
It has now been replaced by a La Nina event – when the water in the same Pacific region turns colder than normal.
This also has worldwide impacts, driving temperatures down rather than up.
The satellite measurements over land
respond quickly to El Nino and La Nina. Temperatures over the sea are
also falling, but not as fast, because the sea retains heat for longer.
This means it is possible that by some
yardsticks, 2016 will be declared as hot as 2015 or even slightly hotter
– because El Nino did not vanish until the middle of the year.
But it is almost certain that next year,
large falls will also be measured over the oceans, and by weather
station thermometers on the surface of the planet – exactly as happened
after the end of the last very strong El Nino in 1998. If so, some
experts will be forced to eat their words.
Yes indeed. I recommend this sober
assessment of the situation written earlier this month by Dr. David
Whitehouse, science editor of the Global Warming Policy Foundation.
With 2016 being predicted as a record warm
year it is interesting to speculate on what the El Nino’s contribution
will be, which is, in a word, everything. It can be argued that without
the El Nino (and the so-called “Pacific Blob”) 2014-2016 would not have
been record warm years.
He calls the cooling a “reality check”, noting:
Many think that 2017 will be cooler than
previous years. Myles Allen of Oxford University says that by the time
of the next big United Nations climate conference global temperatures are likely to be no warmer
than the Paris COP in 2015. This would be a strange thing to happen if,
as some climate scientists have claimed, recent years would have been a
record even without the El Nino.
The last three years may eventually come
to be seen as the final death rattle of the global warming scare. Thanks
what’s now recognised as an unusually strong El Nino, global
temperatures were driven to sufficiently high levels to revive the
alarmist narrative – after an unhelpful pause period of nearly 20 years –
that the world had got hotter than ever before.
It resulted in a slew of “Hottest Year Evah” stories from the usual suspects. As I patiently explained at the time – here, here, and here –
this wasn’t science but propaganda. If you’re a reader of Breitbart or
one of the sceptical websites this will hardly have come as news to you.
But, of course, across much of the mainstream media – and, of course,
on all the left-leaning websites – these “Hottest Year Evah” stories
were relayed as fact. And, inevitably, were often cited by a host of
experts on Twitter as proof that evil deniers are, like, anti-science
and totally evil and really should be thrown in prison for sacrificing
the future of the world’s children by promoting Big-Oil-funded
denialism.
This is why there is such an ideological divide regarding climate
change between those on the left and those on the right. The lefties get
their climate information from unreliable fake news sites like
Buzzfeed.
Just recently, I had to school my former Telegraph colleague Tom Chivers, now of Buzzfeed, with a piece titled Debunked: Another Buzzfeed ‘Hottest Year Evah’ Story.
Perhaps
I’m wrong: I don’t actually look at Buzzfeed, except when they’re doing
something worthwhile like “Five Deadliest Killer Sharks” or “Ten Cutest
Kitten Photos”. But I’ve a strong suspicion they haven’t yet covered
this 1 degree C temperature fall because, well why would they? It just
wouldn’t suit their alarmist narrative.
At
a press conference in Greece one week after the American voters
rejected his legacy at the polls by picking Donald Trump over Hillary
Clinton, President Obama defended his record, saying that people think he “did a pretty good job” as president.
“The president said the U.S. ‘is indisputably better off’ because of
him, and those who voted for Trump “are better off than they were when I
came into office for the most part,” CNS News reported.
Breitbart News put President Obama’s claim to the test using eight
key metrics of economic health: the federal debt, the gross domestic
product annual growth rate, the unemployment rate, labor participation
rates, median annual income, home ownership rates, health care costs,
and reliance upon food stamps.
Six of these eight metrics show that Americans are demonstrably worse
off in November 2016 than they were in January 2009, when President
Obama was inaugurated.
The two metrics which show nominal improvement–the unemployment rate and median annual income–come with significant caveats.
While the measured unemployment rate has declined under Obama, the
dramatic increase in the number of those not participating in the labor
force, and stagnant median household annual income in real terms,
suggest that those two economic metrics represent illusory gains. Measuring President Obama’s Eight Years Using Eight Key Metrics of Economic Health
1. The federal debt has doubled from $9.99 trillion at the end of FY
2008 (September 30, 2008) to $19.95 trillion at the end of FY 2016
(September 30, 2016), according
to usgovernmentspending.com. That $9.96 trillion increase in Obama’s
eight years is about equal to the $9.99 trillion in debt racked up in
the 219 years from the founding of the republic in 1789 to 2008.
2. President Obama has overseen the worst economic growth of any
President since Herbert Hoover. He’s the only President since Hoover who
has not had a single year that saw an annual growth of GDP (Gross
Domestic Product) that reached or exceed three percent, as CNS News reported:
Barack Obama has served since January 2009 and will be
in office until this coming January. During Obama’s time in office so
far, annual growth in real GDP peaked at 2.6 percent in 2015.
The last year that real GDP grew by 3.0 percent or more, according to
BEA, was in 2005, when it grew by 3.3 percent. Since then, the United
States has gone a record ten straight years (2006-2015) without a year
in which the growth in real GDP was at least 3.0 percent.
In October, the Bureau of Economic analysis reported, “Real
gross domestic product increased at an annual rate of 2.9 percent in
the third quarter of 2016…In the second quarter, real GDP increased 1.4
percent,” and in the first quarter it increased less than one percent.
All of Obama’s predecessors since John F. Kennedy, whose administration saw annual growth of real GDP peak
“at 6.1 percent in 1962,” have seen far more robust economic growth.
Even the relatively poor economies of the Jimmy Carter administration,
which saw annual growth in real GDP peak “at 5.6 percent in 1978,” and George W. Bush’s administration, which saw annual growth in real GDP peak “at 3.8 percent in 2004,” did better.
Obama’s eight years pale in comparison to Ronald Reagan’s eight years
between 1981 and 1989, where “annual growth in real GDP peaked at 7.3
percent in 1984.”
3. The unemployment rate declined from 7.6 percent in January 2009 to 4.9 percent in October 2016.
While the number of employed increased by 9.8 million and the number
of unemployed decreased by 3.8 million, the number of Americans not in
the labor force increased by 13.5 million while the civilian
non-institutional population increased by 19.8 million.
As Tradingeconomics.com reported:
US unemployment rate fell to 4.9 percent in October 2016
from 5 percent in the previous month and in line with market
expectations. The number of unemployed persons was almost unchanged at
7.9 million while the labor force participation rate decreased by 0.1
percentage point to 62.8 percent.
Among the major worker groups, the unemployment rate for Hispanics
declined to 5.7 percent in October, while the rates for adult men (4.6
percent), adult women (4.3 percent), teenagers (15.6 percent), Whites
(4.3 percent), Blacks (8.6 percent), and Asians (3.4 percent) showed
little change.
The number of job losers and persons who completed temporary jobs
declined by 218,000 over the month to 3.7 million. The number of
long-term unemployed (those jobless for 27 weeks or more) was unchanged
at 2.0 million in October and accounted for 25.2 percent of the
unemployed.
Both the labor force participation rate, at 62.8 percent, and the
employment-population ratio, at 59.7 percent, changed little. These
measures have shown little movement in recent months, although both are
up over the year.
4. The labor participation rate has declined from 65.8 percent in February 2009, according to tradingeconomics.com, to 62.8 percent in October 2016, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics.
As CNS News reported:
94,333,000 Americans were not in the labor force in July,
a slightly better showing than June’s 94,517,000; and the labor force
participation rate improved slightly, increasing a tenth of a point to
62.8 percent from June’s 62.7 percent, the Labor Department’s Bureau of
Labor Statistics reorted on Friday.
In September 2015, the labor force participation rate dropped to 62.4
percent, its lowest point since 1977. The best it’s been since Barack
Obama took office is 65.8 percent in February 2009, the month after
Obama was sworn in amid a recession.
The labor force participation rate is the percentage of people in the
civilian noninstitutionalized population, age 16 or older, who are
either working or actively seeking work.
As noted by the Congressional Budget Office, the labor force
participation rate reflects people’s decisions about the attractiveness
of working or looking for work compared with alternatives such as
attending school, caring for family members, or retiring.
5. Median household annual income has remained stagnant in real terms under Obama.
When President Obama took office in January 2009, median household income, in nominal terms, was slightly above $50,000. According
to Sentier Research, median household annual income in September, 2016,
the most recent period for which data is available, was $57,616.
While that shows an increase of about $7,000 in median household
annual income in nominal terms during President Obama’s administration,
when adjusted for the Consumer Price Index, real seasonally adjusted
median household income (in September 2016 dollars) was about $57,500 in
January 2009, virtually the same as it is almost eight years later.
“In real dollar terms, the median annual income is 1.5% lower (-$884)
than its interim high in January 2008 but well off its low in August
2011,” Sentier Research found.
6. The home ownership rate declined from 67.3 percent in the first
quarter of 2009 to 63.5 percent in the third quarter of 2016, according to the U.S. Bureau of the Census.
7. Health insurance rates, both for employer-sponsored programs and
Obamacare, increased significantly between January 2009 and November
2016.
“In 2008, the average employer-sponsored family plan cost a total of
$12,680, with employees footing $3,354 of the bill, according to Kaiser
data. By 2016, the cost of the average employer family plan was up to
$18,142 for the year, with workers picking up $5,277 of the tab,” as
Time.com reported.
“In 2008, high deductibles were the minority: 18% of covered workers
had deductibles of at least $1,000, per the Kaiser Family Foundation . .
.Fast-forward to 2016, and high-deductible plans have become standard:
51% of all covered workers, and 65% of workers in small firms, face
deductibles of at least $1,000,” Time.com added. According to CNN Money:
Obamacare premiums are set to skyrocket an average of 22%
for the benchmark silver plan in 2017, according to a government report
released Monday.
The price hike is the latest blow to Obamacare. Insurers are raising
prices and downsizing their presence on the exchanges as they try to
stem losses from sicker-than-anticipated customers. Enrollment for 2017
will be closely watched since insurers want to see younger and healthier
consumers enroll.
The benchmark silver plan — upon which federal subsidies are based —
will cost an average of $296 a month next year. That figure is based on
prices for a 27-year-old enrollee in the 39 states that use the federal
healthcare.gov exchange, plus the four states and Washington D.C. that
have their own exchanges.
For 2016, the benchmark plan’s premium rose only 7.2%, on average, for the states that use healthcare.gov.
8. The number of individuals receiving food stamps increased from 32 million in January 2009, according to trivisonno.com, to 43.6 million in August 2016, according to the Food Research and Action Center, an increase of 11.6 million.
The food stamp participation rate has, however, come down slightly
since December 2012, when the number of recipients hit their peak of
47.8 million, as the Washington Timesreported:
Enrollment in the food stamp program — officially the
Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program — has soared by 70 percent in
the years since President Obama first took office, a new report finds.
The government said the recession ended in 2009, The Wall Street
Journal reports, but enrollment in the food stamp program didn’t wane,
as would be expected in an improving economy. Since 2008, it’s been on a
steady rise, The Journal reports.
A record 47.8 million people participate in the program, as of December 2012.
Summary
With six of these eight economic metrics lower in 2016 than they were
in January 2009, and with the two improved metrics qualified at best,
it is hard to conclude that America is “indisputably better off”
economically today–compared to January 2009.
President Obama’s approval ratings continue to remain above 50
percent less than two months before he leaves office, a reflection of
public sentiment concerning his personal style more than his performance
on his job.
By most objective measurements, most Americans are not “indisputably
better off” economically after eight years of Barack Obama’s presidency.
If most Americans really thought they were “indisputably better off”
today than in January 2009, the media might be writing stories about
President-elect Clinton rather than President-elect Trump in the final
days of 2016.
Dakota Access Pipeline Project near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation
I was
extremely privileged in the last several days to have the opportunity
to travel to North Dakota as President of the National Sheriffs'
Association to see firsthand the protest and the response thereto to the
Dakota Access Pipeline Project near the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation
about 25 miles south of Bismarck. I learned first that the pipeline
project, which has been in the works for several years, will traverse
four states including North Dakota, South Dakota, Iowa and Illinois
carrying crude oil. I was surprised to learn that a natural gas pipeline
is already underground on the same right of way. The DAP has received
all federal approvals over several years and, litigation which attempted
to stop it in the federal courts has been resolved. Despite this
project being very "federal" in nature and clearly in interstate
commerce, the Obama administration has refused to provide any law
enforcement or other support to North Dakota state and local law
enforcement that has placed them in the position of having to enforce
the rule of law. As usual, law enforcement is put between the rock and
hard place due to various political agendas. Based upon sensational
news reports, I had the wrong impression that this pipeline was to run
directly through the Standing Rock Reservation and would disturb ancient
burial grounds of the Sioux Tribes. The argument has evolved now that
this pipeline will jeopardize the water supply of the Missouri River
(despite the fact that the pipeline will pass under other rivers
including the Mississippi throughout its entire route). Also, the
Cannonball River which runs throughout the Standing Rock Reservation is
actually “upstream” from the pipeline crossing. This false narrative has
understandably generated a great deal of sympathy and support from many
quarters for the Standing Rock Sioux People. I quickly learned and saw
for myself that this was untrue. The pipeline passes about two miles
north of the reservation and that years of archeological study uncovered
no significant native historical sites. It is difficult to believe that
a single modern pipeline would be more environmentally risky than
transporting crude oil by rail or truck through the same territory.
The Dakota Access Pipeline is 95% complete and the construction work
near Standing Rock is the last phase which will tie the pipeline
together. It is a 3.7 Billion Dollar Project. This past Thursday,
October 27th, steps were taken the morning before I arrived which
evicted protestors from private property directly in the path of the
pipeline. This "northern" camp was erected just days before and the
occupants had been warned repeatedly for several days that their
presence there was unlawful and that eviction was imminent. These
warnings went unheeded. Despite the statements coming from the media
and protesters that they were completely peaceful and prayerful, it has
been a fact that more militant protestors (terrorists) have destroyed
property and physically beaten employees of the company in recent weeks.
I personally witnessed and photographed what I estimate to be at least a
half of a million dollars in damage to bulldozers and excavators. I
further learned that many protestors other than Native American groups
have descended upon the area such as anarchists and eco-terrorists who
are hell bent on committing violence and damage. The police presence in
the area to protect farmers, ranchers and other private property
interests have been costing the state of North Dakota millions of
dollars. The Sheriffs of several states have contributed manpower
over the last several weeks to help preserve order and protect property.
On October 27th, law enforcement evicted the trespassers form the
north camp on private property about three miles north of the Cannonball
River. While pleading with the trespassers for a peaceful move, law
enforcement officers were met with Molotov cocktails and various
missiles such as rocks and logs being thrown at them causing numerous
injuries to the officers. The only discharge of a firearm occurred when a
protestor fired at the line of officers. Miraculously, none were hit by
the bullets. When the protestors were moved south of the bridge, two
trucks used to blockade the roadway were set on fire by the protestors.
This action now has very possibly jeopardized the integrity of that
bridge. News accounts ironically then decried the use of defensive
equipment such as “riot gear” and armored vehicles by law enforcement.
Many media sites reported only that "heavy handed" police tactics were
used upon the protestors who were only praying and "peacefully"
protesting. These same outlets failed to mention the shooting, Molotov
cocktails, and extensive property and equipment damage produced by some
of the protestors. The protestors even cut fences and attempted to
induce a domesticated buffalo herd to stampede through the area. The
owners of the herd, whom I spoke with personally indicated that at least
of dozen of their buffalo were killed by protestors. The next morning, I was present as law enforcement leaders including
Sheriff Paul Laney met with leaders of the tribe. The tribal
representatives lamented the violent and destructive behavior of
"outsiders" who had come in only to commit violence. They indicated
that they would encourage these violent agitators to leave the camp and
protest. While the entire situation seemed to be de-escalating upon
my departure on Sunday October 30th, it remains to be seen if the
violence and illegal acts are truly over. I must commend the
professionalism and patience of law enforcement officers under the
leadership of sheriffs such as Cass County Sheriff and National
Sheriffs' Association Board member Paul Laney, Morton County Sheriff
Kyle Kirchmeier, and Burleigh County Sheriff Paul Heinert. The North
Dakota State Police as well as several area Police Departments also
played essential roles. The operation evicting trespassers, some of
which became violent was carried out with professionalism and restraint
despite liberal press stories to the contrary. I must also commend the
numerous sheriffs’ office throughout the multi-state area including NSA
Executive Committee Member Rich Stanek of Hennepin County, Minnesota who
sent personnel to assist with protecting lives and property. I
certainly feel empathy for the Native American peoples of America and
especially the Sioux due to the treatment they received at the hands of
the U.S. Government in the latter part of the 19th Century. These
Native American Cultures are and should be a proud people for whom we
should all have concern. However, the law and facts simply do not weigh
in their favor in this case from everything I seen. This project went
through an extensive approval process over many years and court
challenges in Federal Court have failed to be successful. We are a
nation of laws. Emotion and empathy cannot carry the day. It just seems
that opposition to this pipeline is not reasonably based upon
legitimate environmental concerns. Energy independence has been one of
the major goals of this country for decades. In my home state of
Louisiana, we are surrounded by gas and oil pipelines and safely so. In
another ironic twist, it is widely known that the Standing Rock Tribal
Chairman owns a convenience store and gasoline station on the
reservation. It's time for everyone to move on in reference to The
Dakota Access Pipeline and stop putting further strain on the citizens
and law enforcement officers of North Dakota and surrounding states.
Greg Champagne, President National Sheriffs’ Association
While there are nuances to the claim made in this headline, it is technically true since Tesla announced that it turned a profit of $22 million last quarter
while the US oil industry managed to lose $67 billion last year due to
its inability to stomach lower gas prices, according to the U.S. Energy
Information Administration (EIA).
I think it’s something to consider in this new political climate following the election of Donald Trump.
Notwithstanding any potential ulterior motives to favor fossil fuels
or the fact that Trump doesn’t believe in man-made climate change, it’s
important for the upcoming new Trump administration and
GOP-controlled Washington to start looking at Tesla and other upcoming
cleantech ventures as important middle-class American job creators and
sustainable businesses.
One of Trump’s main actions to create American jobs is to “lift the
restrictions on the production of $50 trillion dollars’ worth of
job-producing American energy reserves, including shale, oil, natural
gas and clean coal,” according to his own “contract with American
voters” and as part of his plan for his first 100 days in office.
Again, we are not going into the impact it will have on the climate
in part because of how scary it is. Try to get the amount of CO2 that
those fossil-fuel reserves will release in the atmosphere out of your
head (if you can) and focus on the jobs. That’s supposedly how he won
the election in the rust belt and coal country after all.
While Trump’s deregulation of the oil and gas industry could
certainly recreate jobs, we have to keep in mind that more investments
don’t represent a guarantee that the companies will be able to handle
price slumps like the one we saw last year and continues now without
more government subsidies.
Coal and Natural Gas are rapidly becoming less cost competitive to Wind and Solar power.
But deregulation is not all Trump plans to do for the oil and gas
industry – again with the goal of creating jobs. He also plans to slow
down the competition from renewable energy by slashing federal research
and development, subsidies for solar and wind, and any other climate
programs. He also plans to gut the EPA and head it with a climate
science denier.
When the US oil industry lost $67 billion in 2015, it also slashed close to 100,000 jobs during the same period. All the while, more Americans now work in the solar industry than the extraction of oil, gas, or coal.
One of the main examples Trump has been using is Ford moving jobs
from Michigan to Mexico in order to be more competitive. Since his
election, GM also announced job cuts.
On the other hand, Tesla has been adding jobs with now over 18,000
employees worldwide and the majority are in the US. At the Fremont
factory alone, Tesla employs over 6,000 people and it plans to bring that number up to 9,000 to support its latest expansion plans.
The electric automaker is also investing in the Gigafactory in Nevada, where it plans to employ over 6,000 workers.
If job creation (and not just rewarding fossil fuel political donors)
is really the true goal of the new US political leadership, maybe they
should think twice about introducing new policies that could slow the
momentum of clean technologies in favor of fossil fuels. Instead, they
should focus on introducing a level playing field.
We could argue about the best way to do that (and please let’s do it
in the comment section below), but in my opinion, the most simple one is
to put an end to all subsidies, including the trillions of dollars worth of subsidies going to the fossil fuel industry.
A graduate of Harvard University, Steven Kest began working as an organizer for the now-defunct community group ACORN
in 1975. He later served as ACORN's national campaign director
before ultimately becoming executive director, a post he held from 1990
through 2009.
In the very early 1990s, Kest was present at the initial strategic meetings—held in Joel Rogers's Wisconsin home—where the founding agendas of the pro-socialist New Party
were first spelled out. To view a list of others who were also present
at that meeting, and a list of additional key founders of the New Party,
click here.
In a 2003 City Journalarticle, Manhattan Institute senior fellow Sol Stern quoted Kest as having said, vis a vis welfare-reform initiatives designed to move people off the welfare rolls and into paying jobs:
"There’s an emerging consensus that for those who can work,
it should be encouraged. [But work] should come with adequate supports,
such as day care and transportation, to get people out of poverty.... We
also still believe that, for a lot of people, it’s not right to force
them to work. There should be some type of income support for those who
still won’t be able to join the work force."
"In other words," Stern summarized, Kest's prescription was for "perpetual dependency."
Under Kest’s guidance, ACORN was a resolute advocate of raising the minimum wage. In 2012, Kest lauded
ACORN's "minimum-wage campaign" as an initiative that had "increase[d]
the living standards of people who are poor by putting more money in
their pockets," while simultaneously "tak[ing] money out of other
people's pockets"—namely, those of "stock shareholders" and "people who
run corporations." "We picked some very powerful pockets," Kest boasted.
When ACORN dissolved amid massive scandal in early 2010, Kest became a senior fellow at the Center for American Progress (CAP). He shared this honor with self-described “communist” and 9/11 truther Van Jones, also a senior fellow at CAP.
In November 2010, Kest spoke
at a CAP-sponsored event on “the history and the future of community
organizing” with John Atlas, president of the National Housing
Institute. Soon after that event, Kest’s name disappeared from the list of “experts” on the CAP website.
In October 2012, Kest participated in a National Radio Project program, sponsored by Demos, on “The Life, Death and Rebirth of ACORN.” During the program, he stated
that ACORN’s “major accomplishment” had been “to organize poor people
so that they would have more power in America, in the economy and in the
electoral system.” Kest noted, for instance, that in 2008 ACORN had
“registered over a million new low-income voters, almost all of them of
color.” It was ACORN's effectiveness, said Kest, that ultimately caused
“those who had the power” to become “pissed off enough to go after us.”
For additional information on Steven Kest, click here.
The Justice Department announced on Tuesday it is suing
Bernards Township, N.J., because it denied zoning approval for the
Islamic Society of Basking Ridge to build a mosque on land it owns.
The township in December unanimously voted down the Islamic
Society's application to build a mosque, which the Justice Department
says violates the Religious Land Use and Institutionalized Persons Act.
In the complaint, filed in the U.S. District Court for the
District of New Jersey, the department said the denial was
discriminatory based on the Islamic Society's members' religion. The
denial imposed a substantial burden on the Islamic Society's religious
exercise, according to the complaint, it said.
The complaint also alleged that the township violated the law
"by amending its zoning ordinance in a manner that imposes unreasonable
limitations on all religious assemblies."
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According to Justice Department officials, the land where the
Islamic Society wanted to build the mosque is located in a zone that
permitted construction of places of worship as a matter of right at the
time of the zoning request.
"As alleged in the complaint, Bernards Township has treated the
Islamic Society of Basking Ridge differently than other houses of
worship," said U.S. Attorney for New Jersey Paul Fishman in a statement.
"RLUIPA ensures that municipalities must treat religious land use
applications like any other land use application. But here, township
officials kept moving the goalposts by using ever-changing local
requirements to effectively deny this religious community the same
access as other faiths."
Bernards Township is a township of roughly 25,000 people located in less than 40 miles southwest of New York City.
According
to the former head of the Vatican’s highest court, Cardinal Raymond
Burke (pictured), Muslims and Christians do not worship the same God,
since Allah is a “governor,” whereas Christianity was “founded on love.”
The modern belief that Islam and Christianity are fundamentally the
same “is very much influenced by a relativism of a religious order,” the
Cardinal said at a recent press conference.
“I hear people saying to me, well, we’re all worshipping the same
God. We all believe in love. But I say stop a minute, and let’s examine
carefully what Islam is, and what our Christian faith teaches us.”
“I don’t believe it’s true that we’re all worshipping the same God,
because the God of Islam is a governor,” Burke said. “Sharia is their
law, and that law, which comes from Allah, must dominate every man
eventually.”
The Cardinal said that unlike Christianity, sharia is “not a law
that’s founded on love. To say that we all believe in love is simply not
correct.”
Not only do Christianity and Islam differ in the nature of their
laws, Burke proposed, but also in their approach to proselytism and
winning over converts.
In
the end, he said, we have to understand that “what they believe most
deeply, that to which they ascribe in their hearts, demands that they
govern the world.”
The Cardinal’s words echoed recent remarks by a senior Catholic
prelate in Hungary, who warned that the enormous waves of migrants
rolling into Europe are due in no small part to a Muslim “will to
conquer.”
“Jihad is a principle for Muslims that means they must expand,” said Archbishop Gyula Marfi in an August interview. “The earth must become dar al-Islam, that is, Islamic territory, by introducing Sharia—Islamic law.”
Both prelates’ words, in fact, find confirmation in recent assertions
by the Islamic State itself in the latest issue of its propaganda magazine, Dabiq.
“Indeed, waging jihad – spreading the rule of Allah by the sword – is
an obligation found in the Quran, the word of our Lord,” the text
reads.
The Islamic State was specifically reacting to Pope Francis’ claims
that the war being waged by Islamic terrorists is not religious in
nature, assuring the pontiff that their sole motivation is religious and
sanctioned by Allah in the Qur’an.
“This is a divinely-warranted war between the Muslim nation and the
nations of disbelief,” the authors state in an article titled “By the
Sword.”
ISIS attacked Francis for his claim that “authentic Islam and the
proper reading of the Quran are opposed to every form of violence.”
Pope Francis “has struggled against reality” in his efforts to
portray Islam as a religion of peace, the article insists, before going
on to urge all Muslims to take up the sword of jihad, the “greatest
obligation” of a true Muslim.
In a July press conference, Pope Francis told journalists that the world is at war, but that is not a religious war.
“Every religion wants peace,” he said.
In his press conference, Cardinal Burke insisted that “what’s most
important for us today is to understand Islam from its own documents and
not to presume that we know already what we’re talking about.”
The Left has been quick to ridicule Donald Trump for a tweet he made Sunday, claiming he might have won the popular vote if it weren’t for illegal voters.
“Trump could be referencing a series of fake stories on conspiracy
websites that said he actually beat Clinton in the popular vote count,”
CNN dismissed. “Trump’s transition team did not return requests for comment Sunday afternoon.”
But rather than dismiss the claim outright, let’s look at this claim.
Over at The Conservative Treehouse, they cite a paper in the scholarly journal “Electoral Studies” that suggests as many as 2.8 million illegal immigrants may have voted in the 2008 election.
“How many non-citizen votes were likely cast in 2008?
Taking the most conservative estimate (those who both said they voted
and cast a verified vote) yields a confidence interval based on sampling
error between 0.2% and 2.8% for the portion of non-citizens
participating in elections.
Taking the least conservative measure e at least one indicator showed
that the respondent voted yields an estimate that between 7.9% and
14.7% percent of non-citizens voted in 2008.
Since the adult noncitizen population of the United States was
roughly 19.4 million (CPS, 2011), the number of non-citizen voters
(including both uncertainty based on normally distributed sampling
error, and the various combinations of verified and reported voting)
could range from just over 38,000 at the very minimum to nearly 2.8
million at the maximum”…
So while the press can deride Trump for his claim, it’s almost certain that there were illegal immigrants who voted in the election and I’m willing to bet you they didn’t vote for Donald Trump.
Was it more than 2 million? Who knows? Would it have tipped the
election? Again, that’s an unknown, but for the press to dismiss Trump’s
claim outright is intellectually dishonest at best.
Angelino Alfano. He plans to take your house and give it to Muslims and arrest you if you say no.
We covered a few days ago how the Italian government seized a hotel
from its elderly owner to house Muslims, but thanks to the assistance of
the local Carabinieri and Catholic League helped him get the
order revoked. Now the Head of the Italian Interior Ministry, Angelino
Alfano has released they will be confiscating real estate from ordinary
Italians by eminent domain and creating enforcement agents to seize the property, arrest, prosecute, and jail anybody who opposes it:
According to sources in the Interior Ministry, the
Viminale Plan foresees (enforcement) agents and detention measures for
those who resist requisition of their premises for migrants.
The Interior Ministry in the figure of Angelino Alfano, is preparing
to requisition the real estate of Italians to place migrants.
It will be done, explains Il Giornale beginning only December 4, or
after a consultation referendum in order to avoid protests by citizens
that could influence the outcome of the vote.
Because it is indeed the protests that worry Alfano. The barricades
of Goro and Gorino against the requisition of a hotel in order to place
15 refugees for days has occupied the front pages of newspapers and
embarrassed the government. The secret services have already made a
filing of the cities where it is possible for the citizens to organize
in committees to resist the refugees.
The requisitions in fact, will go forward and according to
l’Opinione, which cites sources in the Interior Ministry, the executive
would be ready to take drastic measures against those citizens who would
resist the consignment of private real estate to the migrants.
Jail for Those who oppose Migrants
“The secret services”, writes the daily (news), seem to have already
alerted the government about eventual violent protests on the part of
Italians not disposed to have their property requisitioned. What does it
mean? According to l’Opinione, the plan “given the exceptionality of
the issue and the reluctance of the Italians to collaborate in the
reception” would be to send at least 2,000 policemen, carabinieri,
Guardia di Finanza and soldiers. Not just that: The Justice Ministry
would be prepared to outright guarantee rapid trials and detention space
for those who resist the Viminale Plan. In substance-jail for those who
don’t agree.
It appears the requisitions would not be compensated.
This is because the Interior Ministry doesn’t have the funds to pay
the owners of the homes, given that the money is already committed for
the reception of the migrants in the centers operated by Coop and Onlus.
In addition, the owner would have to continue to pay IMU and Tasi. In
theory they could resort to the courts to obtain compensation/damages,
but in this case, the course of justice would be long and with
undiscounted outcome. Also according to the source cited from the
Interior Ministry, Alfano’s measure would be “temporary”, but could lead
to expropriation, if the property owner took measures in “damage to the
State”. Indeed, whoever resists risks losing their house forever.
According to indiscretions on the part of Viminale employees, the
requisition plan would begin at Pescara, a city that would be a sort of
test case for the rest of Italy. The objective is to reduce the use of
the COOP reception centers because they are more costly and less
transparent in respect to the system than (those of) Sprar. To be
affected, second homes would have to be vacant. (source)
These government ministers are traitors. They are destroying Italy and Europe, and in the words of another famous Italian,
A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious.
But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is less
formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the
traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers
rustling through all the alleys, heard in the very halls of government
itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor; he speaks in accents
familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments, he
appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all men. He
rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night to
undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politic so that
it can no longer resist. A murderer is less to fear.” -Marcus Tullius
Cicero
Andrew Breitbart knew about the pedophilia and sex slaves
Nov, 27 2016 @ 05:16 PM
Below is a twitter post that Breitbart made
to Podesta in 2011 filled with vile regarding this. If you look down
further on the link you will see
another post to Podesta referencing Acorn with from 2010
It is hard to tell if he is accusing Podesta of the acts or accusing him for helping someone in acorn who was. Maybe both
If you recall Acorn came down in 2009 when leaders were charged with
Fraud. Podesta later appointed Steve Kest to some position at Center
for
American Progress. Kest helped cover up the Fraud. Add this because I
don't know exactly who Breitbart was targeting at Acorn.
WARNING: Crude Language
I'm only posting these links for others to verify the information they
contain. This is about the ACORN scandal and whether or not the hidden
camera
tapes and the interactions filmed, indicate that there is something
going on behind the scenes. Immigrants were being flown in, many
underage and
ACORN was cool knowing that they were being used for prostitution.
The Tides
Foundation, George Soros, American Center for Progress are all Open
Borders pushers. Do they really care so much for the poor and
angry immigrants they import—my answer is NO! Immigrants are pawns.
Those ACORN tapes and the attitude of ACORN workers toward the idea of
bringing young girls across the border illegally tells us that. It’s all
about their political agenda and about winning. With perfect timing I
just got an e-mail from reader B.L. with this quote from Clinton about a
Vast
Right-wing conspiracy.
Yesterday, Clinton was asked on ‘Meet the Press’ (Limbaugh calls it
‘Meet the Depressed’) if he feared a Republican takeover of Congress in
2010 and he confidently said no:
“There’s no way” that could happen, Clinton said, adding that “the country is more diverse….”
Get it! Immigrants=diversity=Democratic voters.
Back to Breitbart who is morally outraged, as most of us are, at the
idea of ACORN workers not batting an eyelash at the part of the scam
involving
underaged girls from El Salvador illegally entering the US. Here he
suggests Mr. Fix-it Podesta may have a harder time with this scandal.
Plus, unlike Mr. Clinton’s war-room blame-the-messenger excuse – “it’s
just about the sex” – this year’s ACORN scandal won’t be pushed
aside, because this time it includes 13-year-old sex slaves from El
Salvador.
I hope he is right, but I wouldn’t be so sure. Thirteen-year-old girls
from El Salvador are a twofer for some Democrats. Think about it!
Useful
now, but in 5 years they could be counted on as reliable Democratic
party voters.
In July and
August 2009, Giles and O'Keefe visited ACORN offices in Baltimore,
Washington, D.C., Brooklyn, San Bernardino, San Diego,
Philadelphia, Los Angeles, and Miami. Giles dressed as a prostitute,
while O'Keefe wore white khakis with a blue dress shirt and/or tie and
claimed to
be her boyfriend. Giles and O'Keefe recorded the encounters using hidden
cameras and pretended to be seeking advice on how to run an illegal
business
that included the use of underage girls in the sex trade.
The outcome of their little experiment caused quite the stir...
The edited
videos were released on Fox News and the website BigGovernment.com from
September into November 2009, generating extensive, negative
publicity for ACORN, and leading to the U.S. Census Bureau and the IRS
ending their contracts with ACORN, the U.S. Congress suspending its
funding -
and ACORN losing most of its private funding, despite several
independent investigations that by December 2009 began to reveal no
criminal activity by
ACORN staff had taken place.
ACORN filed for Chapter 7 liquidation on November 2, 2010, effectively closing the organization.
The connection? Podesta may have intentionally covered it all up.
The next
day, Clinton Chief of Staff John Podesta, the Democratic Party’s top
fix-it guy with control over much of the left’s well-funded
vast attack machinery (think George Soros, the Tides Foundation, et
al.), was among a small advisory group placed in charge of investigating
the
matter.
With the mainstream media continuing to ignore the evidence on the
tapes, Mr. Podesta is now clearly in charge of feeding them information
about his
well-structured investigation into the investigators. The ACORN internal
probe is a “war room” aimed at destroying the messengers and is not
meant
to clean up major corruption.
Since Mr. Podesta was appointed to investigate ACORN, the only thing
investigated has been the investigators, Mr. O’Keefe, Ms. Giles and the
publisher of the journalism behind it, yours truly.
Michael
Cormier, 61, passed away on April 20, the Los Angeles Times reports this
week. Although Cormier’s death is only being publicized now,
the timing of actual passing actually came within hours of the release
of the preliminary autopsy report of Breitbart.
No wonder the elites are afraid of Breitbart News. There seems to be some loose ends that need tying up.
...or a body bag.
edit on 27-11-2016 by eisegesis because: (no reason given)
Thank you for the addition. I recall the video's but I didn't recall underage girls.
So is that the reason the gov has left the border gates open? Is that
why the US lets Central America know they can come seeking asylum?
I have no reason that this doesn't reach higher levels.
Oh, yes, I don't forget things easily, and that was one of the first
things that came to mind with Pizzagate was the sting on ACORN. It
didn't take
much digging to turn up that Podesta was the one who did their internal
investigation, too.
Then I remembered that flood of unaccompanied illegal minors.
Thank you. I didn't read them earlier. From the tweets he knew of
others involved. Maybe something that will take us somewhere...esp any
organizations they may have been involved in.
We have always been told to 'follow the money' and CF, yet we are following Pizza places.
Thank you. I didn't read them earlier. From the tweets he knew of
others involved. Maybe something that will take us somewhere...esp any
organizations they may have been involved in.
We have always been told to 'follow the money' and CF, yet we are following Pizza places.
Your welcome.
This keeps getting better... (or worse)...
The coroner was poisoned... er... died with poison in his system that
might or might not have killed him THE DAY HE RELEASED the autopsy of
Breitbart.
Given Bretibart was going after Podesta and indirectly Hilary and Bill....
After Breitbart died suddenly of heart failure on March 1, it didn’t
take long for Internet conspiracy theorists to accuse President Barack
Obama of
murdering him.
Now, the recent Los Angeles Times report that Michael Cormier, an LA
County forensic technician, may have died due to arsenic poisoning has
reignited
conspiratorial fire, given that Cormier died on April 20, the same day
as the release of Breibart’s autopsy.
Law enforcement sources told the Times that the presence of poison in
Cormier does not necessarily point to a homicide as the substance may
have
entered his system by accident. However, the police haven’t ruled out
foul play, and Cormier’s cause of death has been deferred pending
further
tests.
I rhought he died because he uncovered obama wasemt american, its hard to follow who killed who these days.
Don't know exactly what it was but it was apparently about Obama. Some
videos I have read. None the less, there were certainly many reasons of
off
him.
