by Brian Kubicki
Landmark columnist

LAME DUCK CONGRESS IS LIKE FIRED EMPLOYEES HANGING AROUND

12/30/10

•As we watch the least popular U.S. Congress exit Washington while setting a fire trail behind them in unpopular liberal legislation, I must credit a talk radio caller for her characterization of this Lame Duck Congress as an employee that got fired, but got to stick around for two months at the company to wreak havoc. What in the world are we doing folks? This has to change.

•This one has really got me steamed!

The EPA is moving independent of Congress to try to limit greenhouse gases. They couldn't get Cap-and-Tax passed with a Democrat Congress, so the Obama administration is moving unilaterally to control greenhouse gas emissions, in announcing plans for new power plant and oil refinery emission standards.

EPA administrator Lisa Jackson said, “We are following through on our commitment to proceed in a measured and careful way to reduce GHG pollution that threatens the health and welfare of Americans."She said emissions from power plants and oil refineries constitute about 40 percent of the greenhouse gas pollution in this country.

She failed to mention that 97% of all GHG's in the atmosphere are from natural occurring water vapor, but why let facts get in the way when you are trying to hamstring a productive economy.

Remember President Obama said two days after the midterm elections tsunami that crushed his plans to tax carbon use by business that he was disappointed Congress hadn't acted on his climate legislation, and he said that “other options” were under consideration.

Now we know what he meant by that.

•The EPA was at the core of the battle in Congress over climate change policy, thanks to a 2007 Supreme Court ruling giving the agency the authority to regulate heat-trapping gases (our generation's Dred Scott Decision).

The EPA moved against climate change on another front earlier this year, issuing the first-ever federal guidelines for reducing greenhouse emissions from industrial sources.
On Nov. 10, the agency sent new guidelines to states. It suggested that dirty fuel used to power oil refineries be replaced with cleaner sources and it called for more efficient electricity and energy use with existing nuclear power plants.

In the announcement, Jackson said that under an agreement associated with the court suit, EPA will propose standards for power plants in July 2011 and refineries in December 2011 and will issue final standards in May and November 2012, respectively.

In this time, the agency will schedule "listening sessions" with representatives of business and local governments, ahead of the formal rule-making process.

New Congress? Time to get to work.

•Did you know that General Motors, A.K.A. Government Motors, they of massive taxpayer/government bailouts does not have to pay taxes on their next $40+ billion of income, as reported in the Wall Street Journal? The IRS recently declared that any company that received TARP money would be exempt from paying income taxes.
Suppose those same exemptions will apply to sales and property taxes for the buyers of those cars? Don't hold your breath on that one.

•In the head scratcher statistic of the week, the country with the world's highest suicide rate among all the countries in the entire world is….(drum roll…) Belarus. At 35.1 suicides per 100,000 people in their population, Belarus' people check-out at a little more than three times the rate that they do in the United States. Nobody knows why, though there are plenty of theories, ranging from the abrupt conversion of the country from under Communist control (back in U.S.S.R. days) to a pseudo market-driven economy that they are attempting today, to the theory that the country is dominated by males alone running failing farms throughout the country.

•Somewhat on that topic, since we are in the final days of 2010, I have been hearing lots of folks talking about the Mayan prediction that the world (at least as we know it today) would come to an end in 2012. I suppose the thought is we all have one more complete year ahead of us so make the most of it that you can; hit that Bucket List, if you will.
You know, if the world DOES end in 2012, you'd have to be honest in the declaration that if you really stepped back and looked at mankind in the perspective of his entire journey here on earth, we haven't amounted to anything. We've moved some dirt around, left some stuff on the moon, and sent some probes into deep space. Beyond that, bubkis.

We are going to keep going well past 2012….millions of years in my estimation. There are just too many steps yet to be taken.

Have a safe 2010 and hit 2011 with your feet in gear.

•Go Chiefs!

(Brian Kubicki always hits the ground running but can be reached at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

HERE'S HOPING THE LIBERAL SLAUGHTER CONTINUES

12/23/10

•Don't Ask Don't Tell has been stopped by Congress. I must admit that I don't know as much as I should about the military to be able to effectively and consistently sustain an argument either for or against the policy. However, as I recall, the policy itself was activated by Democrats when Clinton was President. All we are seeing now are Liberals wresting control of the Democrat Party from the moderate wing. Let them fight out an inherently erroneous policy.

Truthfully, the military ought to be able to exclude whomever they wish from the armed services. They have history on their side in their principal commitment toward enacting whatever policy is best for developing and maintaining the ready effectiveness of the United States military to perform their basic function to kill people and break things. If, as Democrats are in control of government, they aren't interested in allowing the military that freedom, I have no interest in compromising what is right at the cost of human life. You own this one, Democrats.

•By the way, Republicans…President Obama told us all that raising taxes on the middle class will cost America jobs and harm the U.S. economy. Somebody needs to ask him why raising taxes on small business owners is good for the economy since he admits that raising taxes on the middle class is not. What is it about taxing one group that is good, but taxing the other is not?

He gave you this, without realizing it, but somebody needs to pounce on this.

So cutting taxes should be on the Congressional agenda in January, folks.

•John Holdren, the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy (and respecter of a man who was influential in the establishment of the man-boy love organization, NAMBLA), issued a memorandum Friday to the heads of all federal departments and agencies calling for “…a clear prohibition on political interference in scientific processes and expanded assurances of transparency…”
Really? Politics has no business in science? O.K. Al Gore, and his insipid movie-- GONE. Cap-and-Trade--DEAD. Recycling--NADA. You want politics out of science? Let's do it. But we're going to do it EVERYWHERE.

As a matter of fact, I'll go one step further John. Let's prosecute Al Gore and James Hansen, and all the people behind the ClimateGate scandal to the fullest extent of the law. If any of those people are American citizens, prosecute them for Treason. They actively attempted to do economic harm to the United States on the world stage. Let's do it. I'm on board.

•So when Congress changes over to largely Republican control in a couple of weeks, can we assume all these liberal laws passed under the cover of night by the previous lame duck Congress are going to be undone? Why wouldn't they be? I'm going to be very angry if they aren't. I don't think the Tea Party is going to be very pleased either.

At the very least, I want my incandescent light bulbs back!

•It will be very interesting in the coming year watching how powerful and consistent the Tea Party remains on the political scene. The unofficial political party dragged and pushed and cajoled conservatism--true conservatism--back into the mainstream of thought in the Republican Party and led the charge to scrape-out the liberal Democrats that had grown throughout Congress like a fetid slime mold. Time will tell for sure, but I'm hoping the liberal slaughter continues.

If I know Obama like I believe I do, he is going to continue the liberal fight. He wants to be the first Marxist to win election in this country after coming out of the shadows. As he often says, he wants to re-make America.

•I can't let the week get away without recognizing the Chiefs for kicking all the doubters and haters all season long--the Casselnots, the Haleyhaters, the Piolicrats--those who spent all their time while the new Chiefs regime was working to develop their sea legs complaining and wailing about how bad the team and the new regime was. You've all been proven wrong dead wrong. The Chiefs are in all likelihood heading for the NFL Playoffs as the AFC West Champions. You all owe some people apologies.

•May the joy of Christmas infuse your family and self with the true joy that human interaction leaves in its wake. Thanks for staying with me for all these years and God bless you all.

(Brian Kubicki is the director of The Landmark Office of Science and Technology. Email him at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

TAXES NEED TO BE CUT, NOT REMAIN AT SAME LEVEL

12/17/10

The compromise between Obama and the soon-to-be-in-charge Republicans in Congress includes taking the Estate Tax from 0% to 35%, with an exemption for estates valued below $5 million for two years. So Megan Kelly is interviewing NY House Member Anthony Weiner about this measure and asks him, regardless of one's income, how is it fair to tax someone's estate after they die? After all, the income has already been taxed when it was made as income. Weiner said that the tax is fair because, you're dead.

No, I'm not joking. An actual sitting U.S. Congressman justified a Death Tax by stating you can't fight it because you are dead. Is it any wonder the Democrats are losing power in government like a one-legged duck in an alligator swamp?

How about this as a comeback? You can't tax my estate after I'm dead because I don't have similarly dead representation in government. You can come for my estate, Congressman, when you give up your life in order to claim it. That will stop these leeches dead in their tracks! Well, it will stop some of them.

•Did you notice that President Obama said that if his plan to stop himself and the Democrats from raising taxes on Jan. 1 (He is pushing a law to stop himself from raising taxes?) doesn't get passed, the economy would plunge into another recession and millions of jobs would be lost? Understand that they aren't cutting taxes. What they are proposing to do is keep the tax rates the same as they have been for several years.
Now think about this for a minute. The economy has been frozen, stagnant for months upon years. The status quo, tax-wise, has done nothing to improve the economy. So why should we keep the status quo going? Both sides admit that raising taxes now will hurt the economy.

Then why not cut taxes? I mean REALLY cut them. Reduce the rates. Eliminate idiotic taxes. Force government to live within its means, just like we are.

Republicans will run from this compromise if they know what is good for them.

•Incoming Republican Speaker of the House John Boehner has got to knock off the crying. Seriously. Hell, Nancy Pelosi didn't even cry--then again, her face has been so stretched, her tear ducts are probably wider than her eye openings and the tears just evaporate.

•Did you see the latest power grab this administration of one Barack Hussein Obama has snuck in under the door? Now they are taking over the feeding of our children. The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010 was signed into law Monday, as Obama said, before he was forced to sleep on the couch.

Read all 220 pages at: http://ag.senate.gov/site/ComLeg/s3307.pdf.

There's the usual amount of idiotic big government intrusion and I'm still reading through it all, but Section. 208 caught my eye. Entitled, “NUTRITION STANDARDS FOR ALL FOODS SOLD IN SCHOOL, it essentially allows HHS Chair Kathleen Sebelius to legislate Peanut M&M's and Hostess Ding-Dongs out of the vending machines. What in the name of William Howard Taft is going on here?! How much more do you want to give up America?

The bill, now law, is idiotic in its concept, but these justifications took the cake for me.
From Michelle Obama:

“And from military leaders who tell us that when more than one in four young people are unqualified for military service because of their weight, childhood obesity isn't just a public health threat, it's not just an economic threat, it's a national security threat as well.”

NATIONAL SECURITY THREAT?

o if our kids are too fat, they represent too big of a target for the enemy and thus place our country at risk? I think I've heard it all.

But this quote made my first clear decision on the Presidential race of 2012.

“Reversing the childhood obesity epidemic in a single generation--as first lady Michelle Obama has called upon our nation to do--won't be easy. ... The Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act makes great strides toward eliminating this threat to our children's health.”

--Mike Huckabee, Arkansas governor, 1996-2007

That's all I needed to hear from him. He's done in 2012. Don't even enter the race, Mike.

I need a drink!

(Email Brian Kubicki a drink at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

TIMES HAVE CHANGED: NOW, NOBODY TALKS GLOBAL WARMING

12/9/10

•I'm cold. I want my summer hot weather back.

•So the Obama Administration apparently has reached agreement with Congressional Republicans to halt the Democrats' plans to raise taxes effective Jan. 1, 2011. (Don't buy for a minute any of that rhetoric about “extending Bush tax cuts,” they were wanting to RAISE TAXES.)

The deal, which must receive Congressional approval, essentially keeps current tax rates in-place for another two years, re-instates a Republican-approved Estate Tax (What Republicans approved a rate of 35%? I want names!), and extends jobless benefits yet again.

White House officials now must try to persuade Democrats to back the agreement, but anger on the left suggests that President Obama might need to rely heavily on Republican support to move the legislation through Congress.

Republicans are praising the deal, and I have to largely concur, at least on the point that ALL Americans are shielded from tax increases.

I didn't hear anything about capital gains taxes, which Obama was set to double. Look at the stock market for evidence of what happens there--if the rate goes up, watch the markets dive as investors clamor to sell their assets now, before the hike kicks-in.

•Did you know that world climatologists were gathering in Mexico this week to further try to shove global warming down our throats? I didn't think so. Apparently nobody knows. Hotel rooms are apparently in good supply in Mexico.
A great column appeared in the Washington Times last week describing the death of the movement.

The global-warming caravan has lost all four of its wagon wheels. The United Nations is hosting the U.N.'s Framework Convention on Climate Change in Cancun, but nobody from Washington is making the trip. As mentioned in The Times article, “Nobody wants to get the smell of the corpse on their clothes.”

If you will recall, 45,000 delegates gathered in Copenhagen last year for the global-warming summit that essentially served more to enrage the conservative voting block in this country than it did toward moving their agenda toward any semblance of realty. This year, only 1,234 journalists registered for the Cancun event. The U.N. organizers actually conceded that Cancun won't amount to anything.

Rep. Henry A. Waxman of California, the moron behind cap-and-trade in Congress, says he's too busy with congressional business to go to Cancun. Last year, he and Speaker Nancy Pelosi took dozens of other congressmen and multitudes of staffers and spouses to Copenhagen. This year, they're all staying home.

The Senate's California Dynamic Duo of global-warming--Dianne Feinstein and Barbara Boxer--are nowhere to be seen near Cancun. Feinstein says she's not even thinking about the weather. "I haven't really thought about (Cancun), to be honest with you," she told Politico. Barbara Boxer, who made global warming her "signature" issue last year, says she would like to be in Cancun, but she's not even sending anyone from her staff. She's sending a statement to Cancun.

The best global-warming news coming out of the week was the announcement that the House Select Committee on Global Warming would die with the 111th Congress. Nancy Pelosi established the committee three years ago as a platform for nonstop prattle about the causes and effects of climate change.

Remember when global warming was THE issue on the world stage? They told us that the survival of the known world rested on controlling the planet's temperature. They were lying to us all along under the guise of enacting a global form of socialism in the United States. This was a case of monumental crime at all levels of government and deserves to have those behind it brought up on charges of fraud, malfeasance, and treason at the very least. Who wouldn't agree that knowingly trying to weaken America on the world economic stage is not a treasonous act?

•I am becoming a bit of a rabble-rouser in my little Shawnee burg. It seems that the city powers have decided that we city residents of Shawnee need to recycle more and pay for the amount of trash we throw away. Such actions will serve to extend the life of the landfill…that just so happens to reside within the city limits of Shawnee, Kansas…and it occurs to me that we residents of Shawnee shouldn't have to pay extra to try and fill-up the landfill (it is estimated to be filled-up and closed in 2027) that is restraining the appreciation of our property values. Hopefully my 250 word letter will appear in the Shawnee Dispatch in the coming week--you can watch for it at www.shawneedispatch.com.

If the issue interests you, my original 1300 word missive will be posted in the electronic version of my Parallax Look column at plattecountylandmark.com

(Brian was one of the leaders in the ‘kill the global warming’ lie movement. Send him your thanks at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

TALKING TRASH IN SHAWNEE, KANSAS (PAY AS YOU THROW)

Posted 12/8/10

I thought my loyal Landmark readers would be interested in my local bit of rabble-rousing.  This letter to the editor should be appearing (in an extremely condensed version) in an upcoming edition of The Shawnee Dispatch, which I think is owned by the same folks that run the Lawrence Journal World…yes, Hippie Town, Kansas.  They should LOVE this.

Dear Editor:
 
I am writing in response to the recent article, “City Beats County to the Punch with New Trash Ordinance,” by Sara Shepherd which appeared in the October 13, 2010 edition of the Shawnee Dispatch, and to recent mailers that have reached Shawnee residents from the City of Shawnee detailing the city’s new trash policy.  For the uninitiated, beginning January 1, 2011, Shawnee residents will be charged according to the amount of trash they place on the curb for collection.  The more trash a household generates on a weekly basis, the more the resident will be charged for collection and disposal.  In addition, recycling bins will be at least as large as your 65 gallon trash container. The stated goal behind this move is to “…be more sustainable and to increase recycling…”
 
As a relatively new Shawnee resident, I must admit to being somewhat behind the information curve regarding our city’s waste management history and future.  But the obvious and unmistakable monolith in the room around this issue is that we have a massive landfill within our city limits that appears to serve the entire county (and apparently beyond) and it has been there for quite a number of years. As a matter of fact, the Johnson County Landfill located just west of Interstate 435 at Holliday Drive and south of the Kansas River, has been in operation since 1967.  It started as a small quarrying operation and landfill at that time, but did not obtain a state operating permit until 1978. As of 2005, the facility received solid waste from eastern Kansas (Atchison, Doniphan, Johnson, Miami, Shawnee, and Wyandotte counties) and western Missouri in the Kansas City and St. Joseph metropolitan areas. It operates on 663 acres including 243 acres of disposal units. Over the past 37 years, it has grown into the largest solid waste landfill operation in the state.
 
During the past 12 months of operation, disposal at the facility has averaged 5,155 tons a day while operating 365 days a year, for a total of 1,881,704 tons. The operations at the landfill include the disposal of municipal solid waste, construction and demolition wastes, and special wastes (industrial and treated medical wastes). It also receives yard waste for composting, metals (white goods) for recycling, and medical wastes which are stored and then transferred off-site for treatment. Recent data indicates that the annual percentages of wastes disposed are 69 percent municipal, 11 percent construction and demolition, and 20 percent special waste.

Until 1995, all waste disposed of at this facility entered unlined cells. But the state upgraded the Kansas solid waste landfill regulations in October 1994 to be substantially equivalent to new federal regulations. One of the major provisions of the new regulations required that all wastes be placed in composite-lined cells. In accordance with this change, management at this facility installed their first composite clay and flexible membrane liner in 1995 in the area designated as Phase 3. This facility’s operating requirements are to some extent based upon the underlying geology of the site which consists of a layer-cake of limestones and shales. The shale layers restrict the flow of groundwater between limestone layers. Once the groundwater reaches the northern boundary of the landfill, it empties into the alluvium (loose bed sediment) of the Kansas River flood plain. There the water either flows underground to the Kansas River or into Hays or Mill Creeks to flow as surface water to the river.
 
More information and history on the landfill can be found at www.kdheks.gov, or simply conduct an internet search on the Johnson County Kansas Landfill History.
 
In the face of these new pay-as-you-throw trash ordinances, I (and hopefully, other Shawnee residents) am left with the following questions:
 

1. Given that Shawnee residents are the fortunate folks to serve as host for the county’s main (and the state’s largest) “trash can” (in the form of the Johnson County Landfill) within our city’s boundaries, and given that it is we Shawnee property owners that suffer the associated ills of restrained property appreciation, odor, and development blight that goes hand-in-hand with most any municipal, state, or county landfill; I submit that shouldn’t we, as tax paying and private property owning Shawnee residents, at least be compensated to SOME degree in return for the losses we suffer, with the freedom to throw as much trash into the landfill as we can manage to muster, at no additional cost?  It is, after all in OUR best interests to see the landfill filled-up and closed as soon as possible.

2. Recycling is currently a practice that is forced upon Shawnee residents, at least in terms of paying for the process.  We are told by our elected leaders that we must do so to extend the life of the landfill.  Isn’t it in our best interests, as Shawnee residents, to have the landfill filled-up and closed, as soon as possible?  Why are we being forced to pay for something that deliberately reduces our property values?  Where are the other cities in Johnson County stepping-up to take on planning for the next landfill? The article states that no new landfills are being planned. Shouldn’t that process have started already?  Where are our elected leaders on this?

3. I personally choose to not recycle, despite being forced to pay for it. Philosophically, such a practice makes no common sense, especially when considering that aluminum, glass, paper, and plastic are manufactured from the most abundant minerals and renewable natural resources in existence on this planet – resources that will easily last for thousands of years into the future.  There is a reason that national recycling rates have been, and remain low. However, if others wish to recycle, I’ll fight for their freedom to do so, as a citizen in a free society. But I harbor no will to force anyone to adhere to my philosophy.  Unfortunately, my way of thinking is not afforded that same liberty.

4. Does the flawed premise of sustainability that the political Left has celebrated as the clarion-call of the modern environmental movement also consider unnaturally extending the life of an existing landfill within the bounds of the concept?  One must wonder.

 
To the best of my knowledge, the Johnson County Landfill is projected to be filled to specified limits somewhere around 2027, and then it will be closed.  We Shawnee residents, taxpayers, and private property owners are being forced to extend the life of the landfill by recycling.  The benefits of such a sacrifice are certainly hard to envision, if any truly exist. We most certainly know what our costs are.
 
Truth be told, landfills are a fact of civilized human life.  One of the fundamental physical laws we learned long ago in school was that matter (and energy) can neither be created nor destroyed, just changed from one form to another.  We, as humans, are essentially just using energy to move matter around the surface of the earth, here-and-there, as we wade our way through life.

I knew where the Johnson County Landfill was located when I purchased my home in Shawnee.  I have been a good neighbor of it, and it has been for me, for the most part.  Shawnee’s growth alongside the Johnson County Landfill for the last 40+ years is testament to the fact that solid waste management is a science with predictable and verified results.  But how much better would Shawnee have become had the landfill not been located within our midst?  What do we get in return for absorbing these costs for the entire county and the state of Kansas for the next 17 years?

We all (and by “we,” I am referring to EVERYBODY in and around the Kansas City metropolitan area) are responsible for chipping-in to help keep solid waste effectively managed.  Shawnee residents have more than done their part of this duty over the last half-century. Must we give even more?
 
Sincerely,
 
Brian Kubicki
Shawnee, Kansas
bfkubicki@gmail.com

IF POLITICIANS DON'T GET THE MESSAGE, THEY'LL BE REPLACED

12/4/10

•My head is spinning after a frenetic holiday weekend filled with turkey, basketball, football, basketball, leftover turkey, and more basketball. Youth basketball leagues do like their holiday tournaments.
I missed politics.

•Well, it appears that the lame-duck session of Congress is not going to be able to muster the votes to push through anything close to the Cap and Tax bill, so that's a good thing. They also seem to be still trying to increase taxes via failing to stop the Bush tax cuts from expiring. The Democrats want taxes increased on the folks making more than $250,000 per year and are willing to allow others to avoid the tax increases.

Republicans, who are technically still in the minority on this session of Congress, want everyone to get the tax cuts.

Does it make any sense to increase anybody's taxes when the economy is as bad as it is?

•Earmarks are a hot topic right now. The Republicans in the coming wave want a ban on earmarks, which are essentially spending addendums put into new bills that are inserted to get the bill's support from a particular Congressman. Establishment Republicans (aka Rinos) want earmarking left in so that they can have a measure of control over spending bills sent to the President. Polls show the public heavily in favor of banning earmarks.

The point is, there can be no earmarks if you cut the department of government that is requesting the expenditure of resources. We need to start cutting government departments government programs. Return control of these issues to the states, where the founders intended them to be. What these folks don't get is, our federal government is more than $10 trillion in debt. Everyone else in this country is having to learn to do without in this tough economy. Our politicians need to learn to do the same. This revolution is about reducing the size and scope of government. If they don't get that message, then we will replace them with someone who does in the next election.

•Thank you Democrats, by the way, for returning Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi to head the minority party in the House and the majority party in the Senate. These two buffoons are the face of a failed Congress that got smashed in the last election. There is nobody better to remind Americans what the Democrat Party stands for. Pelosi and Reid are a gift that will just keep giving for Republicans.

•Get a comfortable seat and a thermal coozy for your frosty beverage for the Nebraska vs. Oklahoma matchup in the Big 12 Championship game Saturday night at 7 p.m. The main attraction isn't probably going to be the action on the field or the matchup of coaching wits between two of Youngstown Ohio's finest offspring (Bob Stoops and Bo Pelini). The main event will be occurring on the Nebraska sidelines, where the camera will point every time a play doesn't go Nebraska's way, or a flag goes up against the Huskers. The camera is fascinated with Nebraska head coach Bo Pelini because of his boorish and childish antics whenever something doesn't go his way on the field.

Pelini drew the ire of his bosses, University of Nebraska President Harvey Perlman and Athletic Director Tom Osborne, who both made definitive statements against their head coach after Pelini went ballistic on the sidelines a couple of weeks ago in a road loss at Texas A&M. That clownish exhibition was attenuated by an on-the-field incident after the game when the head coach's brother, Carl Pelini attacked a cameraman and smashed his video equipment--an incident that the head coach initially lied about and then was forced to reverse when video evidence of the exchange was distributed to the world via Youtube.

Last weekend, Pelini appeared to the untested viewer to be in complete control of his emotions on the sidelines at home against Colorado, in a game that Nebraska easily won. But if you watched closely, something easy to do because the camera zooms into Pelini's mug on almost every play, he looked like a pyromaniac lighting church candles. He almost looked psychotic.

If you mix that temperament and personality with a big game on the road with oodles of side emotion, you are going to get a show that cannot be missed. I don't really even care who wins. I just want something controversial to go against Nebraska.

(Parallax Look is a gift that keeps on giving. Email the giver at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

FAT GUYS ARE SAFER IN CAR CRASHES

11/28/10

•A wise caller to the Rush Limbaugh show Friday reminded me of an extremely salient point regarding global warming (One that I mentioned to all of you a long time ago, but forgot myself).The environmental crazies are all atwitter about our carbon dioxide output and its impact on the global climate, but they are ignoring the 300 lb gorilla in the room.

Think of two words: water vapor.

Recall when I pointed out that carbon dioxide consists of 0.038% of the global atmosphere, by volume. If you measured the total carbon dioxide output of mankind, you would find that we only muster 0.00114% of the planet's carbon dioxide. All the other carbon dioxide comes from natural sources (As though man is not natural?!? What about mankind is not natural?) But of all the global warming chemicals in the atmosphere, water vapor is the greatest by volume. Water vapor makes up 97% of all the global warming chemicals in the atmosphere. If we wanted to control the earth's climate, why wouldn't we try to do something about water vapor? Wouldn't that be more productive? Why waste our time trying to toy with carbon dioxide when it amounts to so little?

•When Sarah Palin warned about the potential for so-called “death panels” under ObamaCare that would make life and death medical decisions for patients, she was scoffed at and dismissed as an outright loon.

But an economist and columnist for the New York Times says death panels may be needed as a solution to fix the troubled economy. Huh?

Paul Krugman on ABC's “This Week with Christiane Amanpour” last week said during a roundtable discussion about the economy.

“Some years down the pike, we're going to get the real solution, which is going to be a combination of death panels and sales taxes. It's going to be that we're actually going to take Medicare under control, and we're going to have to get some additional revenue, probably from a VAT. But it's not going to happen now.”

•Did you catch the story about fat guys being safer in car crashes? Apparently, there is an advantage of extra cushioning when involved in a crash. However, the edge goes away if overweight men don't buckle up.

As we all know, obesity is at epidemic proportions in the United States -- the national Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (the CDC) estimates two-thirds of adults are too fat.

The study indicated that belted drivers with a body mass index, or BMI, of 35 to 50 have a 22% lower probability of being killed in a crash than belted drivers with a BMI between 15 and 18.4.

30 or more is considered obese. At 30 BMI, we're talking about someone who is 5 feet 9 and weighs at least 203 pounds. If your BMI is 45, you're hauling around more than 300 pounds at that height.

Well, I suppose it won't be long before we see a Hostess Twinkie car on the NASCAR circuit. Mark Mangino as a safety coach on the racing circuit?

Now before you big fellers start foregoing the seat belts, obese folk are at a disadvantage if they forgo the seat belts, according to the study. Unbelted fat men had a 10% higher probability of dying than skinny guys who weren't belted. There was no statistically significant difference among BMI categories for unbelted women, although for belted women, those with a normal BMI had the lowest risk of being killed.

Also, ladies: this does not apply to you. Although rotund fellows fare better than thinner men in serious accidents in which they are wearing seat belts, the same is not true for heavy women. Belted females with a BMI between 35 and 50 have a 10% higher probability of being killed in a crash than women with a BMI between 18.5 and 24.9, the study indicated. Underweight women had an 8% higher probability of death than women of normal weight. I'll guess that less muscle accounts for that, but what do I know?

•I have learned recently that Windows 7 is quite nice if you are one that spends a significant amount of time at a pc. Additionally, and I could have learned this prior to Windows 7's launch, changing your habits from double-clicking on your mouse to a single click is very empowering psychologically.

Though times are tough and have been all year economically and let's remember, we still have American troops in harm's way in two countries we DO still have much to be thankful for. Thanks in large part to the actions of those troops, we are largely safe from terrorism. We remain the most economically powerful country in the world, and that is a good thing. Despite what some might want you to believe, one must never apologize for being capable economically. Remember, power is progress.

A blessed Thanksgiving to all!

(Big or tall, fat or skinny it’s always a good idea to buckle your seat belt on your journey through a Parallax Look. Email the driver at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

REPUBLICANS NEED TO REMEMBER WHAT VOTERS WANT

11/18/10

Boy it has been fun watching the immediate metamorphosis of the Democrats in Congress and the White House in the aftermath of the midterm elections.

Before the Democrats were removed from power, they couldn't have been more non-compromising, obstinate, “my-way-or-the-highway” arrogant than they were when they passed Obamacare. Remember when Nancy Pelosi proudly pranced that massive mallet across the Capitol grounds in the faces of hundreds upon hundreds of angry Americans chanting, “Kill the Bill!”? Remember when Rev. Emmanuel Cleaver played-along with their attempt to make it look like he was spat upon as he climbed the Capitol steps amid the protesters goose-stepping behind Congressmen John Lewis and Jesse Jackson, Jr? That thing died like a cricket fart in a dust storm.

Since that time, Republicans are in the process of assuming control, and Democrats have changed their tune one hundred and eighty degrees. The loudest mouths from before are strangely silent (Pelosi seems to be particularly in denial), and the words that ARE coming from the Democrat side of the aisle are strangely conciliatory. They talk of compromise and finding middle ground.

Where was compromise talk when the Democrats were in power? Then it was “toe the line!” Bi-partisanship in their eyes back then meant that the Republicans had to give-in on their beliefs and go-along with the Democrats.

But before you respond, “Power will do that to you. See, the Republicans are doing the same thing now,” stop and look at what the Republicans have done thus far.

Sen. Mitch McConnell has already hardened his approach toward a tax increase in the coming year. Democrats wanted taxes increased across the board (They term it, “allowing the Bush tax cuts to expire,” but that's nonsense. It's a tax increase.).

Republicans wanted all tax rates to remain lower. At first, McConnell indicated that he would be open to putting a time limit of a year or two in place before increasing taxes on those making more than $250,000 per year. Now, McConnell says that he has listened to voters and would support no such time limits.

The difference here is McConnell and the Republicans are actually listening to the people that put them in office. The Democrats cared very little what the voters wanted. That was a CLEAR message picked-up over the last two years.

As long as the Republicans maintain that consistent approach, we're going to be in good shape.

•Did you catch where the FDA is requiring graphic picture warnings on packs of cigarettes? The pictures range from a shot of smokers' lungs to a guy smoking through a tracheotomy hole in his neck. Go onto the internet and check-out the photos, and tell me that guy featured in the 'trach' smoker ad doesn't look like Obama. Fitting, huh?

•Here's something I want government to do first now that Republicans are rejuvenated:
Repeal the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007. Remember that fiasco? They passed it as soon as the Democrats took power in Congress in 2006. A Compliant Pres. Bush signed it into law (Miss him yet? Not on issues like that one!). As I told you earlier, this is the bill which allows Congress to dictate what type of light bulbs we can have in our homes. The bill is phasing out incandescent bulbs. But they're not doing it because the bulbs are harmful to us in some way. They're doing it because they think making us use compact fluorescent bulbs instead of cheaper incandescent bulbs will save the planet in some way. The bill, and movement, is nonsense and needs to be repealed, as soon as possible.

•How about this one (It's crumbling around them before our very eyes!). Sen. Charles Schumer of New York is seeking a federal investigation after a newspaper's report of lead content in some reusable grocery bags. Apparently, many of the reusable cloth grocery bags (Notice how they are almost always green?) sold nationwide are manufactured in China, and painted with a lead-based paint. Last week, the Tampa Tribune found some bags had lead levels that concerned health officials.

"When our families go to the grocery store looking for safe and healthy foods to feed their kids, the last thing they should have to worry about are toxic bags," Schumer said in a statement. Schumer commended Wegmans supermarket company that operates in New York, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Virginia and Maryland for announcing in September that the groceries would stop selling certain reusable shopping bags because of the concern.

This poetry almost writes itself!

(Parallax Look almost writes itself, thanks to Brian Kubicki. Email him at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

NOW WAIT JUST A HOPEY CHANGEY

11/12/10

It has been rather interesting watching President Obama place his spin on the train wreck that the mid-term elections were on his liberal agenda for the country. If you watched 60 Minutes on CBS Sunday (and after watching the Chiefs blow one in overtime in Oakland, you were in a mindset for delusional fantasy), you saw the most mind-blowing part of his explanation.

After suffering what Obama termed “a shellacking” on Tuesday, he acknowledged one of his main failings--not marketing his policy clearly to the American people. It was just improperly sold. That's all. Oops moment, they'll be better at it next time.

To use his exact worlds, “I think that, over the course of two years we were so busy and so focused on getting a bunch of stuff done that we stopped paying attention to the fact that leadership isn't just legislation. That it's a matter of persuading people. And giving them confidence and bringing them together. And setting a tone.”

“Making an argument that people can understand,” Obama continued, “I think that we haven't always been successful at that. And I take personal responsibility for that. And it's something that I've got to examine carefully … as I go forward.”

Now wait just a “hopey-changey” (I just added that word/phrase to my dictionary!) minute there. I thought Obama's communication skills--his “gift,” as he described it to Harry Reid (and how in the name of the land of holy rollers did Reid get his Senate seat back?!? Nevadans, I have no sympathy for you), was communication skills; his ability to convey an idea and concept to the American people.

If Obama does what he is supposed to be best at so very poorly, just how bad could he be at all the other elements of being a president--like leadership, executive skills, communication through all kinds of media, use of the bully pulpit, etc? How bad is this going to get?

•Those “Tiny Football League” segments they keep cutting in to the halftime of the NBC Sunday Night Football games with are completely misguided and worthless. I would also like to point out, though, that the Fed-Ex commercials with the guy posing as an exchange student in China living with an unknowing host family to facilitate business opportunities is TV commercial gold. They could make a decent comedy series with that concept.

•Not to underplay the results of last week's elections (could I EVER be accused of that?) Republicans enjoyed huge victories last Tuesday, especially across the state of Kansas (where every major office representing the state was carried by a Republican), and in Missouri as well. I hope Ike Skelton enjoys a well-earned retirement. The liberal talking heads in the big traditional media like to say that the election results were the expressed voice of an electorate tired and angry about high unemployment rates and a generally poor economy.

That may be the easy argument, and the one preferred by the left, but it isn't the truth.
The truth is actually quite simple. This election was the first time since World War II that the Democrat Party made its case for re-election based solely on the logic of their case of liberalism, and that argument failed and caused voters to reject it in favor of traditional conservatism.

If you want to dispute it, look back for yourself. Truman didn't have modern liberalism to have to defend. JFK never won re-election. LBJ took a grieving nation and sold a nation afraid of the atomic bomb that his opponent (Goldwater) would blow up America. Carter won because he wasn't Ford or Nixon. Clinton won because of the sheer power of his personality. Obama won in 2008 because of a similar appeal--he was actually crafted as a centrist moderate that would try to bring both sides together (if you voted for him based on a belief of that, I want to sell you fortified Jello that will supplant your Viagra prescription).

Conservatism defeated liberalism last Tuesday, pure and simple.

•As for the Chiefs, relax folks. It was a road game, in the Division, against a team that shellacked Denver, and the Chiefs took the game to overtime, should have been able to win the game outright with all that the Raiders were handing them in the first half, and they are still in first place in the division.

Bring on the Denver Broncos next week!

(Get your weekly Parallax Look right here. Email the columnist at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

NECESSITY, NOT POLITICS, IS THE MOTHER OF INVENTION

11/5/10

•By the time you read this, the mid-term elections will be over (Well, at least the races that finished more than 6 points apart --expect the Democrats to flood the system with lawyers and uncounted convicted felon ballots if the margin between candidates is almost anything less than that), and we will either be enjoying a re-birth of That Shining City on a Hill or a looming dark and gloomy gray cloud of Socialism forever squelching the ever waning breaths of freedom and liberty.

I'm hoping for the former. I have had about enough of the latter.

•I've been catching up on all the liberal tripe that has been foisted upon us over the last several years in hopeful preparation for what we need to start concentrating on in terms of legislative roll-backs, and were you aware that they are going to start taking away incandescent light bulbs in the next few years?

Yes, I'm talking about those little spherical glass devices that we have been lighting our darkness with for more than 100 years.

For starters, California will phase out the use of incandescent bulbs by 2018. New Jersey introduced a bill in February 2007 that calls for the state to switch to fluorescent lighting in government buildings over the next three years. They're SO enlightened on the coasts!

Not to be outdone, the federal government tried to exert its self-perceived superiority when they enacted the Energy Independence and Security Act of 2007 (Yes, President Bush signed it--see what moderates do for you?). That bill requires all general-purpose light bulbs that produce 3102600 lumens of light be 30% more energy efficient than current incandescent bulbs by 2012 to 2014. The efficiency standards will start with 100-watt bulbs in January 2012 and end with 40-watt bulbs in January 2014.

Light bulbs outside of this range are exempt from the restrictions. So you can figure that there is going to be demand for 39 and 101 Watt incandescent bulbs in the coming years.

What right do these buffoons think they have to tell us what kind of bulb we use to light our darkness? Necessity is the mother of invention, not politics.

Republicans? If you are indeed in power, THIS is one of the things we want you to overturn. Get to that ASAP please.

•I love landfills. Did you know that rats don't have a chance to survive in a pile of trash? One informal study recently done showed three of four rats set loose in a landfill were buried under the pile within an hour.

A great article in Forbes magazine recently shined a bright incandescent light on landfills. Anybody that has looked out the window as they fly across the country has to comprehend that much of American soil remains a vast wilderness with plenty of nooks and crannies to accommodate the $50 billion annual business of burying the waste matter of modern human life.

Flushing toilets, sending food down the garbage disposal, tossing stuff in a trash can, construction waste, restaurant dumpsters, edited columns, clean-scraped chicken bones, etc. everything left after we're finished doing something gets placed somewhere. People like to think “out of sight, out of mind,” but it has to go somewhere.

That somewhere is one of America's hundreds of active landfills. But these aren't toxic cesspools of disease and death as the media would like you to believe. Sixty-ton bulldozers with studded steel wheels compact freshly dumped trash in small 1-acre "cells" that are covered over daily with a layer of dirt. Vermin like rats aren't much of an issue: At the giant Puente Hills landfill in the City of Industry, Calif., engineers fastened radio collars on four rats and set them loose. Three of them didn't last an hour, likely crushed or buried. The fourth was a goner in less than a day.

Think of a landfill as a giant digester. Like in a cow's stomach, anaerobic bacteria feeding on waste in a landfill create a lot of gas. This gas, roughly half methane, half carbon dioxide, percolates up through the landfill. In the past the gas would pass into the atmosphere.

Puente Hills, which absorbs a third of Los Angeles County's garbage, is the second-largest active landfill in the country, with 3.15 million tons received in 2008. Compacted trash is 500 feet deep in some spots.

Five hundred feet? The earth's crust is between 5 and 45 MILES deep. That's 25,000 to almost a quarter of a million FEET DEEP. We aren't even scratching the surface, folks. Lighten up on throwing stuff away, will ya?

(Parallax Look is barely scratching the surface just yet. Come back for more next week and in the meantime shoot an email to bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

IT’S ABOUT
GETTING A VETO-PROOF
MAJORITY

10/29/10

•Advance voting by mail in Kansas is just about the coolest thing invented since self-service checkout lanes at the supermarket and the building materials store. To be able to mail in your epic sweeping-out of a horrendously bad government is an empowering feeling that strikes one to the core of the American soul.

I am reducing the size of my government footprint, and I'm doing it from home!

•Here in Kansas, the 3rd District of the United States House of Representatives has been occupied for what seems like forever by a truly horrible politician and representative, Dennis Moore. Moore is retiring, so he has foisted his wife upon the good people of the 3rd District to run in his place. She goes by the name of, Mrs. Moore, I think. (Why they didn't use that in a campaign ad I will never understand!) Her opponent is a state representative named Kevin Yoder. Now, if this was a race of photogenicity, Mrs. Moore would win hands down. She is kind of attractive in a naughty school teacher sort of way. Yoder looks kind of like Yoda. He's kind of creepy-looking if you study him closely.

But my vote went to Yoder and not the hot school teacher, because this isn't a race over who looks better on camera. His positions are in congruence with the United States Constitution. Her positions are not. It is as simple as that.

This is what elections are supposed to be about.

•When you hear the liberal media telling you that the Tea Party movement and the Republicans are not steadfast enough to take control of both Houses of Congress and that we are only headed for gridlock since President Obama can just veto every bill that comes to his desk trying to repeal his health care takeover or any of the TARP's, only three words need to come to mind as we head for the voting booths or sit down to our ballots at home: VETO PROOF MAJORITY.

•I am sure you have noticed that President Obama seems hell-bent to avoid attributing the natural rights we currently possess as provided to us by our Creator. In several speeches, he has removed the word "Creator" from the language of the Declaration of Independence when he cites the rights we are endowed with, as the Declaration tells us. From his teleprompter:

“As wonderful as the land is here in the United States, as much as we have been blessed by the bounty of this magnificent continent that stretches from the Atlantic to the Pacific, what makes this place special is not something physical. It has to do with this idea that was started by 13 colonies that decided to throw off the yoke of an empire, and said, 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that each of us are endowed with certain inalienable rights, that among these are life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.'”
After he says "created equal,“ he inserts a long pause during which he kind of frowns and blinks several times. Maybe he is actually opting to not read something on the teleprompter?

Every time that he has committed these omissions, he was speaking before political groups of supporters.

We used to say that once could be a mistake, but twice is a pattern. Acknowledging that our rights come from a power higher than government (or Obama himself) seems to genuinely irk him.

Well, recently in speeches before more supporters in Las Vegas, President Obama suddenly began inserting the word, “Creator” back into his speeches. Has he learned? Perhaps he has learned that he can say almost anything, even when he doesn't believe it, and there are still a number of people out there that will buy what he is selling.

I'm no longer a great NBA fan. Michael Jordan ruined the game for my purist tastes. But unless you worship soccer, you can't have missed that the Miami Heat are being touted to brush past everyone toward the NBA Title in 2011. Truth be told, they will be lucky to even make the NBA Playoffs this season, much less win an NBA Title. When exactly did Dwyane Wade make the Heat a playoff caliber team from the get-go in his first season? He didn't win a title until they added Shaquille O'Neill (Same as Kobe Bryant). And what exactly did LeBron do to make the Cavs immediately better and championship caliber? What did he have…seven years in Cleveland? Bird and Magic did it in their first seasons.

(A Parallax Look needs no teleprompter. Email our man Brian at bkubiki@kc.rr.com)

WERE THOSE TRAPPED MINERS KIND TO MOTHER EARTH?

10/2/10

•I am absolutely ecstatic that they have rescued all 33 of the trapped Chilean miners after their 70 day ordeal 2000 feet underground. I've never been either that far underground or out in space like the Apollo 13 spacecraft was. But the similarities which can be drawn between these two separate-but-related incidents are spooky. How did they manage air and food and waste management and exercise and social interaction?
Did they recycle? Were they sensitive to their environment? Did they try not to injure Mother Earth?

Seriously, how long will it be before we have a feature movie or a sitcom involving what zany antics trapped miners encounter while waiting months for rescue? It's coming. Just don't let Ron Howard direct it.

They should be able to mine this thing for years!

•I was amazed to learn that an American mining company was pivotal in the rescue operation. Rescuers ferried the miners one by one in a metal capsule which rode through a 2,000-foot hole bored by drill bits made by Center Rock Inc. of Berlin, Pa.

I heard an interview with one of the drillers that indicated they started by following a 5” diameter pilot hole that had already existed down to the area where the trapped miners were holed-up, and they blindly drilled along that 5” diameter hole to create a 12” diameter hole. There apparently was a considerable amount of uncertainty as to whether they could maintain that drilling path after all, they ARE working 2000 feet underground! If they had lost that pilot hole, they would have been literally drilling blind with absolutely no guide. North-South-East-West doesn't exist 2000 feet underground!

•If you needed any further evidence that the women of The View on ABC denigrates women by doing what the show was designed to do let dummies talk for them, you got it last week. The ladies of The View and FOX News' Bill O'Reilly bantered about the Ground Zero Mosque and it is on that basis where the fireworks were ignited.

During a discussion about building the controversial mosque at Ground Zero, Whoopi Goldberg asks O'Reilly why he thinks it would be inappropriate. His response: "Because Muslims killed us on 9/11." This angered Goldberg, who let an expletive fly before adding that it was religious extremists rather than Muslims at fault. Goldberg then got up and walked off the set behind Joy Behar, in an apparent show of, “Well, we'll just show him!”

Really? This advances the status of women in the exchange of ideas? Walking off the set?

The show's creator and chief, Barbara Walters, apologized for her colleagues' swift departure, and O'Reilly rushed to clarify things by saying, "If anybody thought I was demeaning all Muslims," he said, "I apologize." Goldberg and Behar later returned and the discussion continued.

If I was a woman, I would urge all fellow women to boycott that booger of a show.

•Unemployment, as measured by Gallup without seasonal adjustment, is at 10.0% in mid-October. Remember when the Obama Administration promised that the then 7% unemployment would not go above 8% if we let our Congressmen pass the Federal stimulus bill?

Certain groups continue to fare worse than the national average. For example, 14.2% of Americans aged 18 to 29 and 13.8% of those with no college education were unemployed in mid-October. So, we can conclude that federal government policies are actually harder on the lower income folks than they are on the higher income people? Where did we hear that warning before?

Remember folks, November is almost here.

•Did you ever wonder why we recycle glass? The most prevalent type of glass, used since centuries for windows and drinking vessels, is soda-lime glass, made of about 75% silica (A.K.A. sand) plus several minor additives. We're nowhere near running out of sand on this planet, and on the day we do, I know where we can find more landfills, where I throw all my used glass.

Think before you recycle.

•Have you heard all the attention the NFL is giving to concussions lately? I heard of it being rampant at the high school level as well. Something is wrong if we have to address these serious medical conditions consistently in the sport. There is one solution --STOP encouraging and rewarding thunderous hits. No, I'm not talking about at the legislative level or even at the league administrative level. I'm talking at the fan level. You've seen it at all levels of the game. Stop cheering and encouraging bone crushing hits on other players in the sport. Coaches and parents, teach solid blocking and tackling fundamentals. Old school is the answer.

•Welcome back to earth, all you Husker fans. I'm sorry you were never able to beat Texas. We're truly sorry to see you leave the Big 12 conference. But, just look on the bright side--you don't have to face Texas ever again.

(You get to face another Parallax Look again next week. In the meantime, email Brian at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

DOESN'T ANYBODY SEND CANDY AND FLOWERS ANYMORE?

From 10/13/10 issue

•In case you need any kind of reminder, Election Day is fast approaching. This is our chance to begin to right the ship that has been trying to grow government beyond its Constitutional bounds. The first step is to send Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid packing. Remember when Pelosi told us we needed to let them pass the ObamaCare bill, “…so that we could see what is in it…”? Remember when Harry Reid told us that the War in Iraq “…was lost…” after the President Bush ordered troop surge? Remember when Reid told us that tourists to the Capitol building, “…smelled…”?

I'll be sending you these friendly reminders of what we've had to endure over the following several weeks leading up to Nov. 2.

•Can someone tell me why is CNN the prevalent and seemingly only news network allowed on airport waiting area TVs? Fox News is by far the most watched cable news network nationwide, and has been for a long time. What gives?

•So if I understand the facts of this story correctly, Brett Favre sends a few suggestive, “…let's get together…” voice messages to a young woman working for the NY Jets media department and a few days later caps his end of the “courtship” with photos of his “…short interpretation of Longfellow…” (to phrase what he did discreetly) and then the messages and pics make their way across the world via the internet.

What was he thinking? Do professional athletes think this kind of thing won't rise and get noticed? I can understand a rookie getting caught with his hand in the cookie jar like this, but isn't Favre 40? That's a man, at least according to Mike Gundy. And what man sends pictures of his “self” as an initial means of acquaintance? What…was he short on Topps trading cards?

I have to applaud my wife's initial reaction when I showed her Favre's photos, “Doesn't anyone send candy and flowers anymore?”

•Bob Woodward admitted in an NPR interview last week that he is a Democrat (could have knocked me over with that one!), indicating that he is essentially forced to do so because he lives in heavily Democrat Washington D.C. But the real kicker is that he also admitted in the interview that he has repeatedly taken his daughter, since she was four years old, into the voting booth with him and allowed her to cast his vote. Who does that?

Shouldn't he be arrested for committing voter fraud? Don't hold your breath on that one.

•So I'm perusing an airline in-flight magazine while traveling for business, and I come across this article about the Chevy Volt, GM's first electric car, and throughout the interview there was no mention of the relative short range of the vehicle compared to traditional gas-powered vehicles. There was no answer offered (nor question asked) about where one goes on a highway to recharge their electric vehicle and how long exactly that process takes compared to what one does now to “re-charge” their gas car. There was no mention of the concerns with charging such a large battery on a standard household electrical outlet in their home. Once again, all we get is fluff and P.R., and no answers from Government Motors.

I cannot wait for the Chevy Volt to fail miserably.

•A point of clarification is necessary regarding my Nebraska-Kansas State score prediction. You will note that my prediction for the score of 35-7 Kansas State was due homage to the last time Kansas State faced an opponent that was projected by most media soothsayers as unbeatable, the 2003 Oklahoma Sooners in the Big 12 Championship Game. My prediction was purely facetious, as are most of my score predictions. I'm traditionally so bad at score prediction, your time is better spent trying to decipher why I predicted the score I did rather than heading to Vegas with the information.

•So while we were watching my Wildcats get dismembered by the Cornhuskers last week, we were being serenaded by a red-clad jerk of tremendous proportions sitting behind us with various insults ranging from the age of our head coach, the faint Heisman Trophy aspirations of our starting running back, and the need for a stretcher for one of our injured players. After we turned around to object, we found out from one of his adjacent Husker friends that he wasn't even a real Nebraska fan--he was an Iowa Hawkeye fan. The other Huskers admonished the Hawkeye/Husker to shut-up because he was making them look bad. So kudos to the REAL Huskers out there, but on the whole, they were a rude bunch that were in no way reticent to burn a fire trail behind them as they left Manhattan, Kansas for the last time.

They're still largely a dumb fan base though. I submit the following as evidence…
Http://thescoopmanhattan.com/news/ksus-revenge-courtesy-of-the-scoop-manhattan/?ref=nf

(Take a weekly Parallax Look at the universe right here. Email Brian at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

IT'S TIME TO GET RID OF SOME WHINY RINOS

From 10/6/10 issue

•Have you had about enough of all the whiny RINO's yet? Lisa Murkowski in Alaska is running a write-in candidacy after losing to the Tea Party favorite Joe Miller. Mike Castle in Delaware has reportedly still not publicly endorsed Christine O'Donnell, who whipped him in the Delaware special election for Biden's vacant Senate seat. Charlie Crist saw he was going to lose to Marco Rubio in the Republican Primary for the U.S. Senate in Florida, bailed from the race, and is running as an Independent. Arlen Specter tried the same thing in Pennsylvania and lost that too.

Why should anyone feel sorry for these loser clowns? They epitomize everything that is currently wrong with politics and what has been wrong with the Republican Party. If you win, win with grace. If you lose, lose with dignity. Enough of the whining already.
Even if we lose a few seats to liberal Democrats, I will be pleased to be rid of whiny RINO's.

•Have you bought a bag of Sun Chips recently? The environmental whackos have influenced the makers of the reportedly healthy snack chip sufficiently to get them to repackage their product in a biodegradable bag that they claim with decompose on a compost pile in 14 days.

The bad part though is the crinkling noise of the bag as you handle it is noisier than all get-out. Think of the sound caused by chewing on a big sheet of aluminum foil with big metal teeth. It's downright obnoxious.

I hate those chips anyway, but if they are going to insist on polluting my commerce with enviro-nuttiness, I am going to counter them by making sure that the empty bag is tightly sealed in a really thick plastic trash bag so the 14 day count doesn't start for about 1000 years.

So there!

•By the way, did you catch this? (Almost nobody else did. Hat tip to Michael Savage.) When President Obama was climbing over fences intruding on family backyard BBQ's (Did anybody even remotely buy into that premise? Do they REALLY think we are that stupid?) to tout his economic plans a week or so ago, he said that he only became a Christian later in life. So, by his own admission, Obama was not raised as a Christian.
So what religion was he raised in? His fatherthe one who was essentially a sperm donor but apparently was around enough to inspire his son to write a novel about what he believes in--was a Muslim. His mother was apparently either an agnostic or an atheist. His step-father was a Muslim. What do you suppose was the religion he was brought up in?

•Jackass 3 is coming. This one looks good, and I can't even see things on the screen in #-D.

•Have you had a chance to catch “Man Woman Wild” on the Discovery Channel? I'm not sure why, but the show rocks! A special forces guy married to a hot news anchor traipses into the wilderness to survive various encounters with nature and teach the viewer what to do to survive should their parachute malfunction and deposit them onto a Pacific desert island.

I'm not sure if the information presented is all that relevant for most of us, 'cause if I was stranded with my wife in such a manner, she would kill me in my sleep and eat me within the first couple of days.

•Get a load of this one…half of all the humans who have ever lived, yes, I said WHO HAVE EVER LIVED, as many as 45 billion people, have been killed by female mosquitoes.

Forget the low fat ice cream…get me some Off!

•Nebraska at K-State football is on the national stage tonight (well, as you are reading this on Thursday) and much rides on this game.

A big step-up in the Big 12 North race.

Perhaps a big step in the Big 12 race since the South doesn't seem to be as near as strong as they were predicted to be before the season.

Nebraska kicks off its gauntlet through the Big 12 that they will have to face after cutting and running from Texas' financial and on-field (well, at least of Nebraska) dominance of the conference. Manhattan is their first stop. Don't imagine that it will be pretty.

The Husker fans have traditionally been very classy, as long as they win which they have done in some abundance in way past years (not so much recently). But Head Coach Bo Pellini is really easy to develop a dislike for. Imagine the Richard Cranium high school coach/gym teacher you were tormented by--he's that bad.

I can't pick this one objectively because there is too much emotion involved. But I'm feeling the same way I did when the 2003 Kansas State team took on the greatest college football team in college football history at Arrowhead Stadium, and the last time EVER that we get to kick the Red out of Manhattan has got some oomph behind it this time.

Oh what the hay…KSU 35 NU 7!

(Email your non-objective college football picks to bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

WOULD A LAME-DUCK CONGRESS PUSH CAP-AND-TAX?

From 9/29/10 issue

•Remember when we heard all the hubbub last week over the Democrats' failure to repeal the Don't Ask Don't Tell policy practiced by the military? Apparently, the Democrats can't muster the 60 votes necessary to overturn the policy.

Do you remember what party passed the policy in the first place? Bill Clinton was the president and he was supported by a Democrat-led Congress.

You have to appreciate the subtle irony in Republicans going to the rail to defend a program started by a liberal Democrat president and Democrat Congress and currently being attacked, 18 years later, by a liberal Democrat president backed by a Democrat Congress. Make up your minds, people!

Democrats!

•So, the Chiefs are 3-0 heading in to the bye week. I have not made my mind up yet about the Haley Era, Matt Cassell, or (naturally) Scott Pioli. Apparently, based on the pre-season, a large number of Chiefs fans have, and are of the opinion, that Cassell sucks. I think these are the same folks that said Trent Green wouldn't be successful in Kansas City under Dick Vermeil, and we know for a fact that they were proven wrong.
Be that as it may, Cassell has some good qualities and we saw those on display Sunday against the 49'ers. But one person that has taken the abuse over defense of Cassell has been Chiefs' play-by-play voice Mitch Holthus, who has been in the Chiefs' QB's corner since Day 1 and hasn't faltered a bit in his belief in the former New England backup. It has been rather amusing listening to Holthus take a healthy, “I told you so!” Victory Lap much to the angry chagrin of Cassell haters everywhere in the city.

•85% of our electrical needs are provided by coal-fired generation. I thought you needed to be reminded of that.

•I like the NFL. I like football in general, but watching little kids play the game feels wrong because the strategy of the game doesn't work when little tykes are playing the game for what is supposed to be fun and exercise. When the game is being played by adults, you have to appreciate the logic and strategy and gamesmanship on display, especially the kind of offensive inventiveness shown by the Chiefs last Sunday.

What I don't understand is the fascination with a defender delivering a vicious hit on an unprotected offensive player. Whenever that occurs, the media, fans in the stands and in front of video displays everywhere cheer with some kind of apparent bloodlust when a player takes a violent hit like that. You don't see that kind of reaction when a freight train running back slams into a charging linebacker. I can understand appreciating that kind of hit. But cheering the other just seems kind of morbid and cruel, especially when you consider that they are studying NFL players' brains to try and get a handle on the long term medical effects of concussions on these players.

This observation reached a new low this fall when I witnessed parents and other family members high-fiving each other in a weekend football game after their kid delivered a massive hit on an unsuspecting player. Really!?!

•Did you know that after Conservative Republicans take over the Congress in November, Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are going to try to enact Cap and Tax as part of a Lame-Duck Congress? They want to be able to tax your use of carbon. Every beer you drink, every soda, every egg you eat, every slice of bread, every slice of cheese, every ice cube cooling your glass, every pickle, every ounce of gas you use going out to run an errand, every car repair you pay for, and on and on and on. Carbon is in everything we do.

Those bloodthirsty Democrats will stop at nothing!

•Big 12 football is ready to get after it this week. Some summary pre-conclusions:
Texas is not as good as advertised. Oklahoma isn't either. Texas Tech is still trying to figure Tommy Tuberville out. Texas A&M and Okie State are perhaps on the verge of something. Baylor is better, but they're still Baylor.

In the North, the champion is likely coming from the scrum between Nebraska, Missouri and Kansas State. Nebraska and Missouri aren't as good as their pre-season hype and Kansas State is probably better, but only because they had no pre-season hype. Iowa State seems to be still trying to make themselves an identity. Colorado is hiding their flank until they run for the Pac10 Conference. Kansas seems to have accomplished the initial task of learning how to beat an under-matched opponent.

I don't think we are going to see a national champion out of this group, but then again, you never know.

(Parallax Look is always fun. Email bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

KARL ROVE IS MAKING AN ASS OF HIMSELF

From 9/22/10 issue

•Alright Parallax readers, it's once again time to update your Official White House Endorsed Technical Jargon Manual. The administration that brought you "man-caused disaster" and "overseas contingency operation," wants the public to start using the term "global climate disruption" in place of "global warming." Apparently, they fear that the latter term “oversimplifies” the problem and makes it sound less dangerous than it really is (purported to be--my clarification).

•White House science adviser John Holdren (Yes, THAT guy who co-authored a book that advocated forced sterilization for population control) urged people to start using the phrase during a speech last week in Oslo. The explanation he gave was that the impact from greenhouse gas emissions covers a broad "disruption" of climate patterns ranging from precipitation to storms to hot and cold temperatures. Those changes, he said, affect the availability of water, productivity of farms, spread of disease and other factors.
Do they seriously think we are going to buy any more into this farce than we did when they called it, “global warming” or than we did when they referred to it as, “climate change?” This is getting downright laughable.

•The Chiefs are 2-0. They have already matched half of their win total from all of last season and they are only one-eighth of their way into the season. It is what it is. Enjoy.

•What has gotten into Karl Rove? If you've been under a rock, The Architect has been ripping into Christine O'Donnell, the Republican primary winner for the U.S. Senate in Delaware, at every turn. Rove apparently sides with the “Republican establishment” in believing that a moderate Republican (A.K.A. a RINO) is the only candidate that can win Joe Biden's old seat.

One of Rove's main talking points of criticism of O'Donnell went like this, “How come it took nearly two decades to pay her college bills so she could get her college degree? How did she make a living?”

Are you serious? Working hard to pay off a college education is something to be looked down upon? Really?

Well, here you go, libs. Here is concrete proof that we will turn on our own when they make complete asses of themselves. Now, about Obama…

•Don't buy into the hype folks. Nebraska football stinks worse than a dead possum nestled in a bloated yak carcass at noon on a deserted Texas panhandle plain. Washington was a bad team that won only five games in 2009. The Huskers haven't tasted pain like the version they will endure when they march into a Big 12 stadium for a road game.

•Colon Powell started doing a Michael Jackson moonwalk on Monday this week after declaring on the NBC Sunday talk show, Meet The Press, that "illegal immigrants do essential work in the U.S…” and, “…They're all over my house…and I'm sure you've seen them at your house.”

I don't think it's very wise to refer to Mexicans in the same way that one refers to cockroaches. He continues with his foot insertion, “We've got to find a way to bring these people out of the darkness and give them some kind of status."

This morning, however, comes word from Powell's office that he "misspoke." (Don't they always, “misspeak?”)

"I don't hire illegal immigrants," Powell said in a statement Monday.

"On Meet the Press yesterday, I referred to illegal immigrants working around my house. I was referring to the many service contractors who work in my neighborhood, using mostly immigrant workers, who do good work. Some may well be 'illegal.' There are 11 million illegal immigrants in this country and most are working somewhere in our economy."

You know, it's hard to find good help these days. Obama needs to dig into the left-most side of the Republican Party, and you can never really trust what you often hear from that group.

•There are a number of you that like the pig on the Geico commercial that goes, “We-we-we-we-we…” all the way home. I realize that the notion of the commercial is clever, and I will give them that. The annoying part is by design. I get that too. Then give us a palate cleanser, like the pig is living with a really hot woman in a bikini that waves at him from the porch.

•And this capper from Obama's speech Sunday to the Congressional Black Caucus should effectively close my rant for this week:

President Obama read from the Declaration of Independence:

"We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men are created equal, and that they are endowed…(he paused here)…with certain inalienable rights..."

Now, here is what the document actually says:

“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights,”

So why did he leave out the words, “by their Creator?” Excuse me…why did his teleprompter leave out those words?

Get a Parallax Look from Brian every week. Email him at bkubicki@kc.rr.com

MEASURING OBAMA'S IMPACT ON THE NATIONAL DEBT

From 9/15/10 issue

•Did you catch the stat coming across the waves last week claiming that Obama has added more to the national debt in his first 19 months in office than all presidents COMBINED from Washington through Reagan?

Since January of 2008, the federal debt held by the public increased by $2.5260 trillion, which is more than the cumulative total of the national debt held by the public that was amassed by all U.S. presidents from George Washington through Ronald Reagan.

At the end of fiscal year 1989, eight months after President Reagan left office after his second term, the total federal debt was $2.1907 trillion. That means all U.S. presidents from George Washington through Ronald Reagan had accumulated only that much publicly held debt on behalf of American taxpayers. That is $335.3 billion less than the $2.5260 trillion added to the federal debt just between Jan. 20, 2009 and Aug. 20, 2010.

Comparing the administrations of Obama and Reagan, in the nine-fiscal-year period of 1980-89 with Reagan, the federal debt held by the public increased $1.4788 trillion. That is more than a trillion dollars less than the $2.5260 increase in the debt held by the public during Obama's first 19 months.

Now, what has happened to unemployment and the economy in general during the Reagan years as opposed to the Obama years? In the Reagan years, the first 19 months saw unemployment rise, then start to fall sharply in May of Reagan's second year. We have seen no similar kind of fall in Obama's second year.

Just dealing in the facts.

•Good to see Jets coach Rex Ryan lose his first game of the season. I don't get all the hyperbole over Rex Ryan. Does the NFL really need another arrogant blowhard? Give me the Ravens' head coach Harbaugh's style of quiet competence any day.

•Have you noticed whenever you get a Democrat in the White House, we soon get inundated with all sorts of public service announcements about old, tired liberal issues? Solar power, wind power, that inclusiveness in the workplace spot on TV with the lady who rolls around an office in a wheelchair and refuses to learn how to make good coffee?

Now it's lead paint. You've heard the ads playing on the radio, blaming lead poisoning on any number of maladies affecting young children.

Well, once again, you can come here for the facts. Lead based paint is paint containing lead, a heavy metal that is used as pigment. Lead is also added to paint to speed drying, increase durability, retain a fresh appearance, and resist moisture that causes corrosion. Paint with significant lead content is still used in industry and by the military. For example, leaded paint is sometimes used to paint roadways and parking lot lines.
So, while lead improves paint performance, it is a dangerous substance if you eat it. It is especially damaging to children under age six whose bodies are still developing. Lead causes nervous system damage, stunted growth, and delayed development. It can cause kidney damage and affects every organ system of the body. It also is dangerous to adults, and can cause reproductive problems for both men and women. Lead paint is particularly dangerous because it tastes sweet therefore encouraging children to put lead chips and toys with lead dust in their mouths.

So, I can understand getting toys to not be painted with leaded paint, though I'm not sure we need the government to do that task for us. What incentive is there for toy companies to poison their customers?

Can't we see to it that our children don't eat the paint that may chip off the walls and window frames? Is that asking too much?

•Now this next story just has me plain mad.

In cities across the U.S., local governments are placing computer chips in recycling bins to collect data on refuse disposal, and then fining residents who don't participate in recycling efforts and forcing others into educational programs meant to instill respect for the environment.

In Dayton, Ohio, chips placed in recycle bins transmit information to garbage trucks to keep track of whether residents are recycling, and to top it off, a half a million dollars in stimulus money was spent making it happen.

In Charlotte, N.C., the trash tags gather similar information. The city uses the data from the tags to find which areas aren't recycling as often and to start education initiatives where numbers aren't being met.

•Why are we worrying about recycling aluminum?

As you know, bauxite is a naturally occurring aluminum ore. In 2007, Australia was one of the top producers of bauxite with almost one-third of the world's production, followed by China, Brazil, Guinea, and India. Although aluminum demand is rapidly increasing, known reserves of its bauxite ore are sufficient to meet the worldwide demands for aluminum for many centuries.

We aren't running out of aluminum for a long, long time.

So, why are we recycling it?

(Give Brian a parallax look via email to bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

OBAMA SHOULD TRY NOT SPEAKING LIKE A MUSLIM

From 9/8/10 issue

•President Obama was in Milwaukee Monday stumping for yet another stimulus plan (Are they tone deaf? ANOTHER federal government spending increase?), and he made the statement in decrying his Republican critics of all the exorbitant government spending that he is pushing, “…they talk to me like a dog…” Then he made the statement/disclaimer that his observation was not in his prepared remarks--yes, the president was OFF his teleprompter.

Why would he think it important to mention aloud his thought that his political opponents talk to him as though he were a dog are not present on the speech prepared for the president to deliver that day? Did he want to excuse his speech writers for not being responsible if there was any backlash? Why would that be the case? He never showed concern for his speechwriters when he made the pro-Ground Zero mosque comments at the Ramadan dinner that got him into trouble. We don't know his speech writers, and besides, isn't Obama responsible for the words coming out of his mouth, regardless of whether he wrote them or not?

On another note, a responsible speech writer or advisor would have reminded the president that referring to the manner in which one communicates with a dog is a description of degrading talk in Islamic countries, where dogs are looked upon as low-status animals. In America, most people talk to their dogs better than they converse with their family members. If the president is truly interested in separating himself from Islam, perhaps he should try not speaking like a Muslim.

Here we have yet another example of this not-too-bright president illustrating his lack of foresight when going away from remarks prepared for him in advance.

•I sense that my hot weather running days are soon coming to an end for the year. I have been blessed to cover at least 2 miles on each and every day where the temperature rose above 90, and it has been wonderful for the psyche.

Now I have seen it all. The U.S. commander in Afghanistan, Gen. David Petraeus, said a planned organized burning of Qurans on Sept. 11 by a Florida church could put the lives of American troops in danger and damage the war effort.

Florida pastor Terry Jones has said he will burn copies of Islam's holy book to mark the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks. Gen. Petraeus warned that the Taliban would exploit the demonstration for propaganda purposes, swirling anger toward the U.S. of A. and making it harder for allied troops to carry out their mission of protecting Afghan civilians.

I won't debate whether the General is correct in his observations or not. What I would like to know is, what business does an American military commander have dictating freedom of speech issues in his home country? The Obama Administration has clearly exerted their influence on Gen. Petraeus and he is playing the role of duty-bound soldier. Military leaders have enough on their plate without having to monitor the meanderings of private citizens.

Liberals just don't get it.

•Have you buried your electoral hatchet yet? I'm talking about the August primaries we had. Some of us voted for candidates in the primary that did not win their election. So we now must put aside our differences and put the greater needs of conservatism ahead of our personal disappointment. Vote for the nominee of your party. Do not vote for a third party candidate. None of them have enough power to be influential and when you do such a thing, you end up supporting the incumbent. Focus on the bigger picture. Back your party. Hold your party nominee's feet to the fire. Make them be the candidate they said they were in the primary election. It starts now. Let's stay together.

•That Geico commercial with the wailing pig in the car is about as annoying a commercial as has ever been committed to ad lore. I am making an active effort to not buy anything from Geico because of that commercial.

They had me with the Abe Lincoln ad…but they dropped the punt on the next one.

•I took particular note during President Obama's speech to the nation last week about the end of combat operations in Iraq that he never once mentioned the word, “victory.” Victory is the central tenet of every military effort. It was part of WWI, WWII, Korea, Vietnam, Grenada, Panama, Desert Storm, and Desert Shield.

Is victory part of what he is doing in Afghanistan? It was in Operation Anaconda. I don't recall President Obama ever mentioning victory in any of his Afghanistan speeches surrounding the reduced troop deployment he finally approved.

If we aren't about victory in our military efforts, shouldn't we get out of war in that country? The designed function of the military is to kill people and break things in conjunction with protecting American interests.

If that's not what we're about, we need to stop.

(Never stop enjoying a Parallax Look. Email Brian at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

THE REASON THE DEMS DON'T HAVE A SARAH PALIN

From 9/1/10 issue

•Did you catch where President Obama spoke Saturday in his regular weekly address on an issue that he would conceivably be able to show congruence with his predecessor, George Bush? That would certainly be a step forward toward diplomacy for Obama, who thus far in his short reign has not let an opportunity pass to foist blame for his own missteps on the conditions he was left by President Bush.

Obama spoke to the coming close of combat operations in Iraq in his Saturday address, and is administering the implementation of a plan to draw down American troops in Iraq that was written by the Bush Administration. If you will recall, back during the campaign, Obama promised an all-out 16 month drop-your-guns-and-run plan back in 2007. Yet another example of this president's commitment to promise whatever he needs to get your vote, then do whatever he wants.

The really pathetic part in the address was how often Obama used the word, “I.” Here is one of the more telling parts:

“On Tuesday, after more than seven years, the United States of America will end its combat mission in Iraq and take an important step forward in responsibly ending the Iraq war. As a candidate for this office, I pledged I would end this war. As president, that is what I am doing. We have brought home more than 90,000 troops since I took office. We have closed or turned over to Iraq hundreds of bases. In many parts of the country, Iraqis have already taken the lead for security. In the months ahead, our troops will continue to support and train Iraqi forces, partner with Iraqis in counterterrorism missions, and protect our civilian and military efforts. But the bottom line is this: the war is ending. Like any sovereign, independent nation, Iraq is free to chart its own course. And by the end of next year, all of our troops will be home.”

Total mentions of President Bush: zero. Total mentions of victory: zero. Total mentions of “I” in speech: six, including the three in the above portion.

What a leader!

•An op-ed in the New York Times last weekend bemoaned that the Democrats don't have a Sarah Palin of their own.

I would imagine it would be difficult to be inspired by a woman that divorces her husband in order to pursue a career, aborts her Down's Syndrome child, pays for her pregnant teen daughter to abort her child, and sends her male son to Canada to avoid honoring his commitment to the military.

Remember…they hate Palin because she lives the life that liberals claim is too hard to do.

•I read this weekend where “green” products buying has jumped from $200 billion to over $400 billion in less than 10 years. People are sheep. There is absolutely no reason to buy anything marketed as “green.” Avoid “green.”

I've noticed that Best Buy and Save supermarket products are not affiliated in any way, shape, or form with “green” propaganda. They are every bit as good I will personally vouch for that fact.

•I've heard it claimed many times by those on the left that Franklin Roosevelt brought the U.S. out of the Great Depression with his progressive policies (they actually prolonged the dire circumstances if you look at the facts). They also like to argue against those that claim World War II was in reality the impetus for the economic growth out of the Depression, because, they theorize, the massive government spending on the war was, in effect, a government stimulus.

The sobering truth is, however, that the war removed a significant number of people from the workforce that had to be replaced. Looking at the numbers...because we know that they never lie, the U.S. lost 418,500 people in World War II. The U.S. population was about 130,000,000 when the rate of population growth began to slow due to the war. The civilian workforce was about 60-70% of the population in 1940. About 25% of the workforce was women. That means that the number of casualties from the war represented 20-25% of the full employment statistic of 4-5% unemployment. The today equivalent of those figures would be a war casualty rate within five years of six million men.

Think that would have an impact on our economy today?

•By the way, I hope you were able to catch “The Green Swindle” on Fox News Sunday night. It is an excellent summary of all the facts we have been talking about over the past several years about what is really behind the left's environmental craze. You can catch it online at:

Http://video.foxnews.com/v/4323259/the-green-swindle

(For a personal Parallax Look, email Brian at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

JASON WHITLOCK IS A BLACK MALE DRAMA QUEEN

From 8/25/10 issue

•Can we take a breath for a minute on the Salmonella outbreaks? Do you realize how many eggs we eat in one form or another in this country? We consume 80,000,000,000 (Yes, that's 80 BILLION!) eggs in various forms every single day. The latest recall only involves 228 million. That is only 3/10 of 1 percent of a single day's production.

Figuring-in that the eggs are only volatile if they are not completely cooked (to about 150 degrees Fahrenheit) and then are threats only to the very young, the very old, or those with weak immune systems, all-in-all, you the Average Joe has a better chance of getting hit by lightning, twice, while dancing the Lambada on a church roof.
Relax. Enjoy your eggs.

•The Jason Whitlock public bridge burning that occurred last week between he and the Kansas City Star newspaper was sad, predictable, boring, and apparently riveting for some. I guess the TV version was preferable to the radio version because it's not every day you get to see a 300 lb. black male drama queen.

Anybody that has followed Whitlock's career over the years knows that when his employer doesn't see things his way, eventually he will turn the tables on them and try to find something out about them that they may not wish be shared in public. Whitlock did this at AM 810 WHB, AM 610 KCSP, at ESPN, and has now done it at The Star. I'm no psychoanalyst, but my experience as an employee and an employer has taught me that people that do bridge burnings in this way are either overly full of themselves professionally or they are simply not smart enough to understand the importance of nested networking to a productive work career.

•If you get the email telling about free cell phones being provided to welfare recipients paid for by taxpayers, A.K.A. Obama Phones, be wary of the snopes.com and factchecker.org denials that say the phones, which are indeed made available to welfare recipients, are not actually paid for by taxpayers. Here's the truth:

Is it accurate to say that taxpayer money is being 'redistributed' to provide these services?

Basically yes, though not in the sense one might assume. Apart from being administered by the FCC (the Federal Communications Commission), it's not a federally-funded program. Since its inception, the program has been financed via the pooled contributions of commercial phone service providers, which in turn impose small monthly fees on their regular customers to recoup the cost. So the FCC pays with tax dollars to administrate the program and then they also charge paying cell phone customers for the free phones for welfare recipients. How exactly is that not a tax?

Always come here for the truth.

•Did you catch where Titanic and Avatar director James Cameron challenged climate skeptics to a debate and then chickened out at the last minute?

From www.ClimateDepot.com, Cameron challenged three well-regarded global warming skeptics to a public debate last Saturday at a global warming and energy conference in Aspen, CO, but he backed out at the last moment after environuts warned him to avoid the fray in true Al Gore fashion.

Cameron had challenged Andrew Breitbart, Climate Depot's Marc Morano and filmmaker Ann McElhinney of the recent film, “Not Evil Just Wrong.” The debate was already in the program for the Aspen American Renewable Energy Day (AREDAY) summit. The website program described the agreed to debate as “AREDAY Climate Change Debate: Reality or Fiction?"

After setting up the public debate, Cameron and his negotiator suddenly changed formats multiple times, and initially said it would be open to the media and then said there could be no recording devices. The skeptics agreed to all the changes. He still cancelled.

Cameron's cancellation of the debate didn't happen until one participant (Morano) was already in transit to the debate site on Saturday.

I'm sorry he bailed. That would have been a bloodbath. I love it when Hollywood types try to actually discuss things with real people, as though their opinions somehow have merit above those of the average American.

•My predicted order of finish in the Big 12 this season is finished:

North
Missouri
Kansas State
Iowa State
Nebraska
Colorado
Kansas

South
Oklahoma
Texas
Texas A&M
Oklahoma State
Baylor
Texas Tech

The Sooners smack the Tigers again for the Big 12 title.

(Get a Parallax Look from Brian via email to bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

WHERE'S THE EVIDENCE OF OBAMA'S INTELLIGENCE?

From 8/18/2010 issue

•Has it occurred to anyone--with regard to this issue of a mosque being built within a stone's throw (Now THERE's irony for you!) of Ground Zero in New York City--that it is yet another example of Obama's lack of intelligence?

We were basted with the idea during the campaign that this guy was the smartest President ever to hold the seat, and he still writes like he's crippled in his signature arm because he was unable to figure out the secret mythology of left handed cursive, he opened his mouth like a neighborhood busybody in the Cambridge Police-Gates controversy that led to the atrociously awkward Beer Summit, he drags his kids into the Gulf oil saga telling the nation that one of the pressures on him was that his daughter came to him one morning and asked, “Did you plug the hole yet Daddy?” My personal favorite was his barking like Spike Lee's dog to “kick (someone's) ass” after Lee told the President via another interview to, “Go off…”

And now, when Democrats need dearly to be able to avoid the issue of a mosque going up near Ground Zero, up steps President Big Mouth to inject himself into the issue, and naturally, Obama's opinion is right in-line with barely one-third of the country on an issue that the American people had no problem unifying behind in opposition.

And note that these weren't off-the-cuff remarks by Obama. He weighed his words carefully last Friday, saying that Muslims have the right to build a mosque near New York's Ground Zero. Where exactly is that right enumerated in the Constitution?

The backlash has gotten so bad, even Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid de-laminated himself from the President on the issue, declaring on Monday that he believes that the mosque should not be built on this site.

Where is the evidence of Obama's purportedly superior intellect? These issues aren't the well considered and thoughtful ruminations of even a thoughtful person. They're more like the verbal vomit of an arrogant busybody who doesn't know when to speak and when to hold his tongue for proper effect.

•I will say on the issue of the New York mosque that it really isn't a freedom of religion issue. Nobody is arguing that they cannot practice their religion. There are plenty of mosques in New York City. New Yorkers (and now the President and just about everybody on the Democrat side of the aisle across the nation) are arguing whether this particular location is the best place, all-things-considered. Governments, state and local as well as federal seem to have lots to say about location of strip clubs and other adult entertainment venues. Why can't they have a say on the location of a proposed mosque near the site where thousands of free people were ruthlessly murdered only nine years ago?

•I heard on the Rush Limbaugh Show last week that the entire volume of the Gulf oil spill was the equivalent of spilling a 12 oz. glass of beer in the New Orleans Superdome, which, if true, is really kind of silly if you think about all the fuss that has been made. So I figured I would check it out for myself. Did you know that the entire volume of the Gulf oil spill was the equivalent of spilling a 12 oz. glass of beer in the New Orleans Superdome? The government claims that 4.2 million gallons of oil leaked into the Gulf PER DAY during the spill - 180,000,000 gallons total. The Gulf basin holds 6.43x10 to the 17th power gallons of water. That results in a ratio of 2.79x10 to the -10th power. Applying that ratio to a 12 oz. glass of beer yields a volume of the Superdome of about 350 million gallons, which is about right.

So why all the fuss? Do you realize how much beer is spilled in football stadiums in every game? Why has the media not mentioned this in all their ridiculously overblown coverage?

•Theoretical physicist Stephen Hawking recently offered some advice for the people of Earth, "I believe that the long-term future of the human race must be in space…It will be difficult enough to avoid disaster on planet Earth in the next hundred years, let alone the next thousand, or million. The human race shouldn't have all its eggs in one basket, or on one planet. Let's hope we can avoid dropping the basket until we have spread the load."
Didn't I tell you all this long ago? So there you go.

But easy there on the travel plans. Remember that I also told you that we needed to start pursuing some more high power energy sources. It's not so easy to just zip off to another planet. The closest star to Earth is 4.2 light years away, which means man could reach the star in 4.2 years - if man could travel at the speed of light. But of course, we can't travel nearly that fast. At this point in technology, man travels at about one ten thousandth of light speed, which would make that journey about 50,000 years long
Live long and prosper!

(Email Brian at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

DO THE OBAMAS BELIEVE THEY ARE AMERICAN ROYALTY?

From 8/11/2010 issue

•To all of you that voted in the primaries last week, THANK YOU! If your candidate won their race, great. Stay behind them in the general election in November. If your candidate did not win the primary, bury the hatchet, get behind your party in the general election, and if your party's candidate wins, hold their feet to the fire once they get in office. Make sure they represent you as rock-ribbed conservatively as they portrayed themselves in the campaign for the primary election. This is how tyranny is checked in a representative republic. Let's make it happen.

If you are a Liberal or a Democrat, shade your eyes come November. It isn't going to be pretty for you.

•Five million barrels of oil supposedly “leaked” into the Gulf of Mexico, claims the Obama Administration--well, at least according to Carol Browner, Obama's Climate Czar. How exactly did they measure that? Did they stick a flow hood over the well? It took them 70-some-odd days to even cap the flow of oil 5000 feet below the surface of the Gulf. Somehow, I don't see the government's claim as to the amount of oil that leaked holding up in court --well, unless Elena Kagan hears the case.

For those out there rubbing their hands together in anticipation of the Obama Administration “putting the screws” to yet another “evil” capitalist corporation when the federal government announces that they are fining BP some exorbitant sum as reparations for the oil leak, first consider this: BP's gross revenues are between $40-55 billion annually. Their shareholders are not going to absorb the cost in terms of reduced profits. They are going to pass those costs off to their customers, in the form of higher energy prices. Be careful what you wish for America.

•Did you see where the mainstream news cycle was all over the story that an ice chunk (they called it an “island”) four times the size of Manhattan broke off from one of Greenland's glaciers, claiming it to be the biggest such event in the Arctic in 50 years.
Experts had expected an ice chunk to break off from the glacier because it had been growing in size for seven or eight years but they did not expect it to be so large. (You mean climate projections can be wrong?)

Here's the kicker: Scientists also said it was hard to judge whether the event occurred due to global warming because records on the sea water around the glacier have only been kept since 2003. "Nobody can claim this was caused by global warming. On the other hand nobody can claim that it wasn't." Wow! Such precision! So we were supposed to allow the federal government to add a tax onto every gram of carbon used in the economy, based solely on their climate forecasts?

Really?

•Got your blood boiling yet? Try this one on for size. The state of Kansas is getting its financial reward for adopting a tougher seat belt law. I know you Missourians heard those ‘Click It Or Ticket’ ad campaigns on the radio waves these past months that bled over from Kansas into your own state. Well, a check for nearly $11.2 million will be presented Tuesday to Kansas Gov. Mark Parkinson by an official of the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. It was the federal incentive payment for passage of primary seat-belt legislation.

Parkinson signed the measure into law May 27. It requires every occupant of a passenger car to wear a safety belt. It also allows law enforcement officers to stop a vehicle solely for a seat-belt violation.

Tuesday's check presentation is scheduled for 10 a.m. at the Kansas Department of Transportation's Gage Maintenance Complex in Topeka.

Do you think John Adams, Ben Franklin, Thomas Jefferson and James Madison would approve of such an intrusion of the federal government into the operations of state governments?

•This will likely be old news by the time you read this, but Michelle Obama's vacation trip to Spain last week was a horrible example to a nation that is tightening its belt for yet another month. But I did wonder why she/they made such an enormous misstep. They're not stupid. There's only two possibilities in my view--they know it looks bad and don't care because they believe they can do no wrong, or they truly do not care because they believe they truly are American royalty and the Marie Antoinette “Let them eat cake!” attitude is a true representation of their beliefs.

Wouldn't it be cool for a camera to be trained on her when somebody asks Michelle Obama herself to defend the extravagance of such a foreign trip? She would go absolutely ballistic. Don't hold your breath on seeing or hearing that one though.

(Reach Brian, our own climatologist, at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)

IT'S TIME TO RELOAD CONGRESS

8/4/2010

•I am spending some family time in the bosom of our republic’s foundation, Boston, Massachusetts.

It is awakening to the spirit to read so many historical documents that declare that a people who find themselves being led by an entity that takes excessive liberties with the powers entrusted to them by the Creator have a right and duty to dissolve those bonds and seek new governance.

No, I’m not recognizing a call-to-arms to overthrow the federal government. But I am calling for us all to go to the polls and reload Congress with folks who recognize that the way of the Democrat Party is not the way that the Constitution and the founders intended us to be led. Let the Libertarians and Republicans fight it out for a hundred years or so.

Is there anything the liberal wing of the Democrat Party supports that is endorsed by the United States Constitution?

•Maybe it’s being awash amidst all these elitist blue-blood liberals out here, but it hit me that somebody on the side of liberty and freedom should be putting this acronym on a bumper sticker: OPR – Obama, Pelosi, Reid….Oppose, Purge, Replace. Works for me.

•I’m not much enamored with political endorsements, but I love advance voting. Here in Kansas, I am allowed the opportunity to vote weeks in advance of election day and it is a grand way to vote your voice the constitutional way we have long enjoyed for centuries in this grand republic.

I don’t miss ignoring the last minute verbal flotsam we are encumbered with in the airways of the media the final days of the election campaign.

But whatever your preference, just vote.

•Did you catch where the long-anticipated General Motors’ electric car, the Chevrolet Volt, will cost $41,000? GM announced last week the news, leaving us consumers to decide whether “environmental appeal” is equal to a cost way beyond similarly sized gas-powered cars.

Electric-cars have been around for years; like 1911 when the New York Times called them the “wave of the future.” GM is counting on a $7,500 federal tax credit for buyers of electric vehicles to offset some of the exorbitant price tag, hoping that their novel power source will make up the difference.

There was no mention that the car requires a 240 volt charging station. That’s the same infrastructure accommodation homes require for a clothes dryer. There was no mention about the additional coal needed to provide the necessary electrical power. I guess they’re holding that information for the time that they start up their campaign against the coal industry for all the “evil” that they burden mankind with.

I’m just preparing you for what is coming. It’s all nonsense.

•We toured the Basketball Hall of Fame in Springfield, Massachusetts today, and it was a nirvana to behold for basketball junkies like me, especially in the off-season. But what in the world are they doing with an entire wing of the facility devoted to Michael Jordan? Has the sport of John Wooden, Adolph Rupp, Hank Iba, Magic Johnson, Larry Bird, and Red Auerbach sunk so low that we have to be lambasted with the esoteric exploits of a great one-on-one player as though they are to be remembered as though they are sport-defining in retrospect? I avoided that part of the exhibit purposely.

•Is anybody missing Jason Whitlock in The Star? I’m more than satisfied with the comprehensive coverage provided by www.kcconfidential.com and www.plattecountylandmark.com sports reporter Greg Hall, who more than adequately offers us information on what the new Chiefs’ training camp location and all that is going on with the team includes.
Who is Jason Whitlock?

•I’m a little short this week, but it’s not because I don’t love you all and what I provide for you every week. I do. I just need a vacation occasionally. Mine is only about 100 words long.

See you next week back in my usual 800 word voluminosity.

(Length isn’t everything. Check Brian’s length next week right here in this spot. In the meantime, email him at bkubicki@kc.rr.com)