Let me share my current thoughts on the blockade of Gaza by Egypt and Israel - by Dennis Miller For those of you who don't like Dennis Miller, who is not Jewish, you may want to reconsider after reading his brilliant comments that follow. Please pass it on to your friends. For those who don't know, Dennis Miller is a comedian who has a show called Dennis Miller Live on HBO. Plus a nightly talk show on radio. Although he is not Jewish, he is very intellectual in his approach and has deep insights into many issues. He recently had the following to say about the Middle East situation: A brief overview of the situation is always valuable, so as a service to all Americans who still don't get it, I now offer you the story of the Middle East in just a few paragraphs, which is all you really need. Here we go: The Palestinians want their own country. There's just one thing about that: There are no Palestinians . It's a made up word.  Israel was called Palestine for the last two thousand years. Like 'Wiccan,' 'Palestinian' sounds ancient but is really a modern invention. Before the Israelis won the land in the 1967 war, Gaza was owned by Egypt , the West Bank was owned by Jordan, and there were no 'Palestinians.' As soon as the Jews took over and started growing oranges as big as basketballs, what do you know, say hello to the 'Palestinians,' weeping for their deep bond with their lost 'land' and 'nation.' So for the sake of honesty, let's not use the word 'Palestinian' any more to describe these delightful folks, who dance for joy at our deaths until someone points out they're being taped. Instead, let's call them what they are:  'Other Arabs Who Can't Accomplish Anything In Life And Would Rather Wrap Themselves In The Seductive Melodrama Of Eternal Struggle And Death.  ' I know that's a bit unwieldy to expect to see on CNN. How about this, then:  'Adjacent Jew-Haters.' Okay, so the Adjacent Jew-Haters want their own country. Oops, just one more thing: No, they really don't. They could've had their own country any time in the last thirty years, especially several years ago at Camp David . But If you have your own country, you have to have your own traffic lights and garbage trucks. And Chambers of Commerce, and, worse, you actually have to figure out some way to make a living. That's no fun. No, they want what all the other Jew-Haters in the region want:  Israel.  They also want a big pile of dead Jews, of course that's where the real fun is -- but mostly they want Israel. Why? For one thing, trying to destroy Israel - or 'The Zionist Entity' as their textbooks call it - for the last fifty years has allowed the rulers of Arab countries to divert the attention of their own people away from the fact that they're the blue-ribbon most illiterate, poorest, and tribally backward on God's Earth, and if you've ever been around God's Earth, you know that's really saying something. It makes me roll my eyes every time one of our pundits waxes poetic about the great history and culture of the Muslim Mideast. Unless I'm missing something, the Arabs haven't given anything to the world since Algebra, and, by the way, thanks a hell of a lot for that one. Chew this around and spit it out: Five hundred million Arabs; five Million Jews. Think of all the Arab countries as a football field, and Israel as a pack of matches sitting in the middle of it. And now these same folks swear that if Israel gives them half of that pack of matches, everyone will be pals. Really? Wow, what neat news. Hey, but what about the string of wars to obliterate the tiny country and the constant din of rabid blood oaths to drive every Jew into the sea? Oh, that? We were just kidding. My friend, Kevin Rooney, made a gorgeous point the other day: Just reverse the numbers. Imagine five hundred million Jews and five million Arabs. I was stunned at the simple brilliance of it. Can anyone picture the Jews strapping belts of razor blades and dynamite to themselves?  Of course not. Or marshaling every fiber and force at their disposal for generations to drive a tiny  Arab  State into the sea? Nonsense. Or dancing for joy at the murder of Innocents? Impossible. Or spreading and believing horrible lies about the Arabs baking their bread with the blood of children? Disgusting. No, as you know, left to themselves in a world of peace, the worst Jews would ever do to people is debate them to death. However, in any big-picture strategy, there's always a danger of losing moral weight. We've already lost some. After September 11th our president told us and the world he was going to root out all terrorists and the countries that supported them. Beautiful. Then the Israelis, after months and months of having the equivalent of an Oklahoma City every week (and then every day) start to do the same thing we did, and we tell them to show restraint. If  America were being attacked with an Oklahoma City every day, we would all very shortly be screaming for the administration to just be done with it and kill everything south of the Mediterranean and east of the Jordan.   Harry When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; When the government fears the people, there is liberty." T. Jefferson

 

A short lesson in how data can be manipulated for political ends. This is from Power Line, one of my favorite blogs.

"Was 2012 the Hottest Year On Record In the US?
by John Hinderaker

You’ve certainly seen the news stories trumpeting data from the National Climatic Data Center purporting to show that 2012 was the warmest year on record in the continental United States. This AP story, to note just one example, is headlined “US roasts to hottest year on record by landslide.” And news reports invariably try to link this claim with human-induced global warming, even though the U.S. represents only 2% of the Earth’s surface area. No doubt the Russians, who have endured record-smashing cold in recent months, wish they could have enjoyed a little of our warmth last year.

But was 2012 really the warmest year on record in the U.S.? It may have been, but the truth is that we don’t know. There are two reasons for this. First, the historical data sets published by NCDC and NOAA lack integrity. Those organizations, which receive many millions of government dollars to promote global warming theory, do not publish raw data. Rather, as we explained here, they first adjust the data. How do they adjust it? They depress the temperatures that were actually recorded in past decades, in order to make today’s temperatures look warmer by comparison:

Below is a copy of the national weather data summary for February 1934. If we look at, say Arizona, for the month we see that the state average temperature for that month was 52.0°F. [Ed.: This is the paper version that was published at the time.]

However, if we look at the current NCDC temperature analysis (which runs from 1895-present) we see that for Arizona in February 1934 they have a state average of 48.9°F, not the 52.0°F that was originally published.

Why do they do this? Follow the money. In another universe–a universe without Democratic Party-controlled media–this would be a major scandal.

Then there is the fact that weather stations in the U.S. are generally sited in areas that are getting warmer for reasons having nothing to do with global warming, i.e., urbanization. Moreover, Anthony Watts’s research found that no less than 89% of weather stations in the U.S. fail to comply with the National Weather Service’s own siting requirements because they are located too close to heat sources.

So, was 2012 really the warmest year on record in the U.S.? Maybe so; but we will probably never know, because our government provides massive financial incentives to the people who create, maintain, “adjust” and publish the data to promote global warming hysteria rather than engage in objective science. As a result, the data are corrupt."