NC Media Watch

Nanny government

Russ Steele

The Sacramento Bee has a long list of laws that go into effect on 1 January 2010. It is a clear indication how our political nannies have been spending you hard earned money.  Of the 26 laws listed which one did you find the most valuable and the most offensive. Please post in the comments.  Sac Bee

Here's an alphabet soup look at some bills that become law on Jan. 1, whether we like them or not:

A is for alligator. SB 609 will extend from 2010 until 2015 a law that allows the importation of products made with alligator and crocodile parts.

B is for bicycles. SB 527 allows the operation of bikes without seats on state roads, as long as the bike was built that way on purpose.

C is for cows. SB 135 makes it a misdemeanor to chop off a cow's tail, except for when it's medically necessary.

D is for dental assistants. AB 667 authorizes dental assistants to apply fluoride to the teeth of school kids, under the "general direction" of a dentist.

E is for elevators. SB 478 allows non-state-certified mechanics to provide "routine" inspection and maintenance services to elevators at agricultural complexes.

F is for fruits and nuts. AB 945 continues a 95-year-old program that sets minimum standards for fruits, nuts and vegetables sold in the state. The program had been set to expire at the end of the year.

G is for graffiti. AB 576 legally defines local agencies as "victims" when it comes to graffiti vandalism. That will allow the agencies to seek restitution for cleanup from convicted vandals.

Schwarzenegger - California needs an $8 billion Federal bail out

Russ Steele

Schwarzenegger wants $8 billion federal bailout. Details at HotAir

California got $7 billion in state grants from Porkulus, and an opportunity to catch their breath while they attacked a monstrous state budget that desperately needs pruning.  Congress has now begun to consider Porkulus II, with even more block grants for states, enabling them to paper over serious budget gaps.  But that’s not enough for Arnold Schwarzenegger, who wants an additional $8 billion from the feds in order to bail out a state that seems incapable of governing itself.

The questions are:

Is this bailout request an insult to the federalist model of state sovereignty?

Or, a political ploy better known as a Briar Patch Strategy. In a replay of Br’er Rabbit, Schwarzenegger wants Obama to throw him into the budget-cut briar patch rather than going there himself.

HotAir Bottom Line:

Whether by design or desperation, California’s political class is not likely to get another reprieve from doing its job properly.  Schwarzenegger can blame that on Obama or Congress, but either way, he’s going to have to make big cuts in the budget and quit using accounting tricks to hide the red ink.

Sarah Palin on Midnight Votes, Backroom Deals, and a Death Panel

Russ Steele

Sarah writes on her  Facebook Page:

Though Nancy Pelosi and friends have tried to call “death panels” the “lie of the year,” this type of rationing – what the CBO calls “reduc[ed] access to care” and “diminish[ed] quality of care” – is precisely what I meant when I used that metaphor.

This health care bill is one of the most far-reaching and expensive expansions of the role of government into our lives. We’re talking about putting one-seventh of our economy under the government’s thumb. We’re also talking about something as intimate to our personal well-being as medical care.

This bill is so unpopular that people on the right and the left hate it. So why go through with it? The Senate is planning to vote on this on Christmas Eve. Why the rush? Though we will begin paying for this bill immediately, we will see no benefits for years. (That’s the trick that allowed the CBO to state that the bill won’t grow the deficit for the next ten years.)

The administration’s promises of transparency and bipartisanship have been broken one by one. This entire process has been defined by midnight votes on weekends, closed-door meetings with industry lobbyists, and payoffs to politicians willing to sell their principles for sweetheart deals. Is it any wonder that Americans are so disillusioned with their leaders in Washington?

This is about politics, not health care. Americans don’t want this bill. Americans don’t like this bill. Washington has stopped listening to us. But we’re paying attention, and 2010 is coming.

Read the whole post here.

Small-business bankruptcies rise 81% in California

Russ Steele

More superior leadership by California. We lead the nation in bankruptcy. The Governor of California thinks the state should be the economic model for the rest of the nation in creating green jobs. It does not appear that we are doing such a great jobs keeping jobs of any kind.  This is a very disturbing report in the LA Times.

California has been particularly hard hit. The latest data show small-business bankruptcies up 81% in the state for the 12 months ended Sept. 30, compared with the previous year. Filings nationwide were up 44%, according to the credit analysis firm Equifax Inc. ...

Over the last year, the Los Angeles, Riverside/San Bernardino and Sacramento metropolitan areas have led the nation in small-business bankruptcy filings, said Tim Klein, a spokesman for Equifax.

About 19,000 small businesses filed for bankruptcy in California during the 12 months ended Sept. 2009, up from 10,500 the previous year.

During September alone, 2,229 small businesses filed for protection, up from 1,503 filings in September 2008, the firm reported.

The report does not say, but I have to ask the question. How many of these bankruptcies were the result of excessive regulations? California regulators are like rabid bats that suck the very blood from struggling business. When the blood is gone the target dies from a rabies infection. Regulators suck the life out of a business with fees, fines and hidden taxes, then the business dies from a declining economy. 

More lumps of coal for Christmas

Russ Steele

Here is the Chilling Effect's latest carton. Enjoy!

How is Hope and Change for you?

Russ Steele

It looks like Obama's Hope and Change approval rating is slipping away.  His Bush like Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech seems to be doing more harm than good for his approval rating.

Actions speak louder than words

Russ Steele

The Instapunit, Glenn Reynolds, have some thought on actions taken by Senator Dianne Feinstein to remove options for reducing carbon emissions.

HOW IMPORTANT IS CONTROLLING CARBON EMISSIONS? NOT VERY. Senator Dianne Feinstein introduced legislation in Congress on Monday to protect a million acres of the Mojave Desert in California by scuttling some 13 big solar plants and wind farms planned for the region. I’ll believe it’s a crisis when the people who keep telling me it’s a crisis start acting like a crisis.

The story is in the New York Times.

Is our suck up RINO Governor looking for an Obama Job?

Russ Steele

Obama gets an 'A' for effort from Schwarzenegger according to CNN.

Asked to give Obama a grade as the end of the president’s first year in office approaches, Arnold Schwarzenegger, California’s Republican governor, gave Obama high marks.

“When it comes to effort, [Obama] should get a straight A,” Schwarzenegger told CNN Chief National Correspondent John King in an interview that aired Sunday on State of the Union.

“He’s out there with tremendous energy and he’s selling his ideas. And he has great enthusiasm there. He’s a great speaker, a great communicator.”

Is Schwarzenegger looking for jobs as one of Obama's Czars, perhaps his Cap and Trade Czar, or CO2 Czar?

Fox News Global Warming ... or a Lot of Hot Air? - Update

Russ Steele

I watched the Fox News special last night and found it rather balanced, however the key players on the warmer side were absent, Fox had to settle for some proxy defenders of the warmers emails and actions to subvert the peer review process. As Anthony Watts writes the Phil Jones and Michael Mann ducked requests for interviews. Anthony has the video:

Video: McIntyre-McKittrick on Fox News Global Warming Special – Mann chickens out

All six parts of the hour-long special aired during prime time Sunday night on Fox News featuring Steve McIntyre and Ross McKittrick are now online below. Both Phil Jones and Michael Mann ducked requests for interviews. I can perhaps understand Jones situation, since he has not been giving other interviews, but in Mann’s case he’s been on a media blitz writing op-eds for the Washington Post and giving interviews to dozens more. His bias, (or perhaps cowardice) is showing. If his work is so “robust”, why not defend himself  in this venue?

The segments by Bjorn Lomborg were most interesting. Rather than spend trillions of dollars to try and control the climate, our money could be spent more effectively to improve peoples lives now, not in 20 to 50 years in a failed attempt to save the planet from a fake climate disaster.

I am interested readers views on the special. Please post a comment.

Global wealth distribution

Russ Steele

President Obama at Copenhagen, climate change is real and humans can stop it by distributing our wealth around the world. Really!

The question, then, before us is no longer the nature of the challenge -- the question is our capacity to meet it. For while the reality of climate change is not in doubt, I have to be honest, as the world watches us today, I think our ability to take collective action is in doubt right now, and it hangs in the balance.

ooo

Ladies and gentlemen, there is no time to waste. America has made our choice. We have
charted our course. We have made our commitments. We will do what we say. Now I
believe it's the time for the nations and the people of the world to come together behind a
common purpose.

Then consider this in the Heritage Foundation Morning Bell:

Yesterday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton pledged that the United States would help mobilize $100 billion a year in climate change aid for developing nations. A senior Obama administration aide tells The Washington Post that 20% - 30% of this fund is expected to come from the United States with one of the funding sources being revenues from a cap-and-trade energy tax scheme. Also in the Post today, a new poll shows that 57% of Americans oppose any treaty that would force the United States and other industrialized countries to pay developing countries $10 billion a year to reduce greenhouse gasses.

Americans do not like wealth distribution within their own nation. It should be no surprise that they look even less kindly on President Barack Obama’s efforts to redistribute our jobs and wealth over seas too.

What do you think!  Should we be sending our wealth to developing countries to fix the global warming hoax. The only human caused global warming is the temperature adjustments made at CRU, GISS and NOAA labs and computer models.