Posts Tagged ‘datechguy's magnificent seven’

A Federal Government powerful enough to take our gas stoves was not the government created by our Constitution

Posted: January 19, 2023 by Jon Fournier in Uncategorized
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Last week the internet exploded with outrage over the federal government’s proposed banning of gas stoves.  The justification for this contemptible behavior is the same tired excuse all of the petty Coronavirus tyrants used to justify the trampling of everyone’s rights and freedoms. As you can see from this Chicago Tribune article, they claim to be doing this for our health.

Gas cooking in the home was linked to a 42% higher risk that children would have asthma, in a 2013 study published in the International Journal of Epidemiology. The study, a meta-analysis combining the results of 41 previous studies, also suggested a 24% increase in children’s lifetime risk of asthma.

A subsequent study found that longer use of gas stoves caused higher nitrogen dioxide levels, which in turn were linked to increased nighttime inhaler use in children with asthma.

Homes with gas stoves have nitrogen dioxide concentrations 50% — 400% higher than homes with electric stoves, according to a report by the clean energy nonprofit RMI.

A 2022 study in Environmental Science and Technology found hazardous air pollutants, including the carcinogen benzene, in natural gas used in Boston-area homes, and a 2020 report by RMI found that gas stoves often create indoor levels of nitrogen dioxide that exceed EPA standards for outdoor air.

Just as with climate change and the Coronavirus tyranny, the proposed gas stove ban is based on junk science.  The authors of the study used to justify this outrage are climate change fanatics.

Several listed coauthors are affiliated with groups pushing net-zero and decarbonization. Talor Gruenwald is a research associate with Rewiring America, a self-described “leading electrification nonprofit, focused on electrifying our homes, businesses, and communities.” Another listed author is Brady A. Seals, manager of the Rocky Mountain Institute’s Carbon-Free Buildings program (a backer of the study). Seals isn’t a scientist or health professional. Her RMI department advocates constructing zero-carbon buildings, retrofitting 5% of buildings each year, and ensuring “electric and efficient appliances.” 

The authors used fabricated data and dishonest methods such as this.

 another expert told a separate media outlet that the researchers had encased the kitchens in a Mylar tent to “trap and concentrate the emissions, and then measure the concentration. ” No one cooks in a kitchen like that! He said it would “incorrect” to draw any health conclusions from the paper.

Thankfully for us, the outrage generated by the proposed gas stove ban was so overwhelming that the ban was rescinded, for now.

The federal government created by the US Constitution was never granted the authority to regulate the commercial activity of businesses and individuals in any way.  It was never granted the power to ban any product, let alone gas stoves. 

In the 1940s the federal government granted itself the authority to micromanage all aspects of the United States economy by rewriting the plain meaning of the Commerce Clause.  As you can see from this excerpt from the Preface from the transcripts of the debates that occurred during the writing of the Constitution, the Interstate Commerce Clause was written only to prevent the States from imposing taxes and tariffs on the large-scale transportation of goods between the States.

The want of authy. in Congs. to regulate Commerce had produced in Foreign nations particularly G. B. a monopolizing policy injurious to the trade of the U. S. and destructive to their navigation; the imbecility and anticipated dissolution of the Confederacy extinguishg. all apprehensions of a Countervailing policy on the part of the U. States.

The same want of a general power over Commerce led to an exercise of this power separately, by the States, wch not only proved abortive, but engendered rival, conflicting and angry regulations. Besides the vain attempts to supply their respective treasuries by imposts, which turned their commerce into the neighbouring ports, and to co-erce a relaxation of the British monopoly of the W. Indn. navigation, which was attemted by Virga. the States having ports for foreign commerce, taxed & irritated the adjoining States, trading thro’ them, as N. Y. Pena. Virga. & S–Carolina. Some of the States, as Connecticut, taxed imports as from Massts higher than imports even from G. B. of wch Massts. complained to Virga. and doubtless to other States. In sundry instances of as N. Y. N. J. Pa. & Maryd. the navigation laws treated the Citizens of other States as aliens.

Report from Louisiana: Not MY Gas Stove

Posted: January 16, 2023 by Pat Austin in Uncategorized
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Photo by KWON JUNHO on Unsplash

 

By: Pat Austin

SHREVEPORT – What in the world was in the water in DC last week that the crazy “ban on gas stoves” got so much traction?!

Have we got nothing else to talk about?! To regulate?!

Incredible.

Apparently we are through talking about $6.00/dozen eggs and it’s a good thing because you won’t be able to fry those eggs on a gas stove if the internet is to be believed.

So, no, the government isn’t coming for your gas stove but that doesn’t mean they wouldn’t like to. Full disclosure: I have a gas stove, I’ve always had a gas stove, my parents and both sets of grandparents had gas stoves. We are all part of the 35% of homes in the United States that use gas stoves. In fact, when the power grid went down in the last winter storm my gas stove stood by steadfastly ready to heat my water for coffee and we were still able to cook meals.

I have never been able to properly make a roux on an electric stove; I find them incredibly unreliable.

So yes, it concerns me a great deal to think the government has nothing else to do (or to regulate) than my gas stove.

They are “a health hazard,” proponents of this say, but my gas stove has never hurt me in over sixty years. I think I’m pretty safe. And in fact I don’t know a single person who has ever been attacked by their gas stove.

Oh, I know. They’re citing a “toxic stew” of chemical pollution and elevated cases of asthma in homes with gas stoves. Maybe we should all go back to cooking on campfires. Or will they regulate wood next?

I just can’t take this seriously and am sick to death of over regulation.

If they’re really running out of things to regulate I can give them some suggestions. Just saying.

Lightfoot moves on from vote buying to recruiting students to volunteer for her campaign in exchange for class credit

Posted: January 15, 2023 by John Ruberry in education, elections, News/opinion, politics
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By John Ruberry

America’s worst big city mayor, Lori Lightfoot of Chicago, finds herself in trouble again. 

Last week, Chicago’s PBS station, WTTW, reported that Lightfoot’s deputy campaign manager, Megan Crane, sent an email to Chicago Public Schools teachers and City Colleges of Chicago instructors, telling them the campaign was seeking students to volunteer as “externs” for Lightfoot’s reelection effort. “Lightfoot for Chicago is seeking resumes from any volunteer interested in campaign politics and eager to gain experience in the field,” the email read. Later in that message comes a quasi-bribe, “Externs are expected to devote 12hrs/wk to the campaign. Students are eligible to earn class credit through our volunteer program.”

When the email became public, the campaign quickly defended its call for volunteers, avowing in a statement that the request was done “to provide young people with the opportunity to engage with our campaign, learn more about the importance of civic engagement and participate in the most American of processes.”

But in a second statement, the campaign said it would “cease contact with CPS employees” citing an “abundance of caution.”

Finally, a couple of hours later, in a third statement, they finally surrendered. “All campaign staff have been reminded about the solid wall that must exist between campaign and official activities and that contacts with any city of Chicago, or other sister agency employees, including CPS employees,” the campaign said, “even through publicly available sources is off limits. Period.”

Last summer, after Willie Wilson, a gadfly candidate who is running for mayor, gathered a lot of attention for gasoline and grocery giveaways, Lightfoot followed suit with her giveaways. But unlike Wilson’s generosity, the mayor’s handouts were paid for by taxpayers.

Laura Washington, a liberal Chicago Tribune columnist, had this to say back in August in a behind-the-paywall op-ed:

Thanks to an “avalanche” of federal stimulus funds, Lightfoot is “running for reelection armed with a seemingly bottomless gift bag of giveaways that includes everything from gas cards, Ventra cards, bicycles, locks and helmets to more than $1,000-per-household in rebates to defray the cost of security cameras, outdoor motion sensor lighting, cloud storage and GPS trackers to hunt down vehicles in the event of an auto theft or carjacking,” the Chicago Sun-Times reported in June. 

Lightfoot’s “Chicago Moves,” is the city’s $12 million transit response to skyrocketing fuel costs and inflation. It will distribute up to 50,000 prepaid $150 gas cards and 100,000 prepaid $50 transit cards to Chicago residents. 

Earlier this year, Lightfoot pushed through a controversial guaranteed income program for low-income families. The pilot program will provide no-strings-attached $500 payments to 5,000 Chicago families per month for a year. The recipients were chosen through a lottery system.

“By coincidence,” Fox Chicago’s Mike Flannery sarcastically opined this morning on his Flannery Fired Up program, “each [gas and public transit] card had Mayor Lighfoot’s name emblazoned right on it.”

The ACLU of Illinois forcefully condemned the campaign’s call for student volunteers. “It is striking that Mayor Lightfoot presented herself four years ago as a candidate who would eschew the old corrupt patronage ways of Chicago politics,” the ACLU of Illinois said in a statement, “Now her campaign employs practices that harken back to the worst days of the Chicago political machine.”

And the ACLU of Illinois says the call-for-volunteers email may have violated federal law.

Crime has skyrocketed since Lightfoot took office. And it shouldn’t surprise you that Chicago’s population is declining. “The city is dying,” former Chicago Tribune columnist John Kass has said at least a couple of times in his Chicago Way podcast.

Lightfoot faces eight opponents in next month’s first round of voting for mayor. In the likely scenario that no candidate achieves a majority in the initial round, the top two candidates face the voters again in April.

In the only opinion poll so far on this race, Lightfoot finished third.

John Ruberry regularly blogs at Marathon Pundit.

Recruitment and the Black Plague

Posted: January 14, 2023 by navygrade36bureaucrat in Uncomfortable Truths, war
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Image from Wikipedia

When the Black Plague hit Europe in 1350, it ravaged the area and killed millions of people, especially in the lower classes. But afterwards, the labor shortage caused a working class revival in the peasantry. Day laborers could demand more money for their goods and better working conditions. From the Medievalists:

After the ravages of the Black Death were finished in Europe, however, there were suddenly far fewer people to farm the lands. Egyptian scholar Ahmad Ibn Alī al-Maqrīzī, described what this looked like after the plague had passed through Egypt: “When the harvest time came, there remained only a very small number of ploughmen.” There were some who “attempted to hire workers, promising them half of the crop, but they could not find anyone to help them.” The same was true in Europe, and crops remained unharvested and great revenues were lost for the local landowners because they couldn’t get anyone to do the work.

Egyptian scholar Ahmad Ibn Alī al-Maqrīzī

Not surprisingly, some people didn’t like these uppity peasants not knowing their place.

Many and various attempts were made by local governments and officials to block this upward movement. An Ordinance from Castile in 1351 condemns those who “wander about idle and do not want to work” as well as those “demand such great prices and salaries and wages.” It orders all able to do so to work for a set, pre-plague price. Another from Sienna condemns those who “extort and receive great sums and salaries for the daily labor that they do every day” and sets a fixed price of six gold florins a year. …
The English poet John Gower lamented in his Mirour de l’Omme that labourers who were used to eating bread made of corn now were able to eat that made of wheat and that those who had previously drunk water were now enjoying luxuries like milk and cheese. He also complained about their new, fancier attire, and their choice to dress above their station. His attitude was common among some in the upper and middle classes who lamented the social improvements of the lives of peasants and the loss of the good-old-days before the plague when the world was “well-ordered,” and people knew their place (as Gower says).

The Medievalists

The similarities to today are interesting. While the COVID-19 pandemic didn’t kill nearly the same number of people (especially in the US), it did lead to a massive revolt in the working class. Now truck drivers for Walmart make $100K a year, and there are plenty of people wanting these modern day versions of “peasants” to remain in there place (typically by using mass illegal immigration and inflation to suppress wages). The hardest hit by far is the military, because it relies on a large number of cheap, easy to enlist, (mostly) men to fill its ranks. While it is somewhat of a stereotype (as analyzed in 2020), its not entirely false either.

Stuck between rising prices, a loss of patriotism, an increasingly smaller subset of the population it can recruit, the military is now in the same personnel crunch as 1370’s landlords. It even has its own versions of complaints against uppity peasants, which I call the “appeal to patriotism” and “suck it up,” and are best explained in an example.

A few years back, I sat on a panel discussing the manning problems related to a specific set of submarine Sailors. Because serving on submarines is voluntary, we didn’t have a lot of Sailors in one particular rating, and we had to put an OPHOLD on a Sailor. An OPHOLD basically means we canceled that Sailors orders to another duty station and kept them in their current job. It’s supposed to be a rare thing, so the fact that we had to do this to meet minimum manning was concerning.

On the panel I suggested that we authorize a special bonus for these Sailors of around $150 a month. While that doesn’t seem like a lot of money, I had seen bonuses of that size bump up volunteers before, and I figured we could easily raise it again in the future if needed. I had at least two civilians, both retired master chiefs, scoff at this notion. “These kids should be volunteering for submarine duty out of patriotism!” one said (yup, literally his words). Another lamented that kids these days couldn’t “take it” when it came to the hardships of submarine duty.

The senior most officer (a Captain) asked why we couldn’t just keep OPHOLDing Sailors. Frustrated, at this point I jumped in and said “Your OPHOLD means nothing if Sailors start saying they’ll commit suicide, which guarantees you can’t assign them to a submarine.” The room got pretty quiet, and eventually the Captain agreed we should pursue a bonus. Ultimately the bonus did help and got us out of the manning jam, although it took a while and put the Navy in a pretty risky position at the time.

If you wonder why I’m never surprised at the horrible conditions onboard the GEORGE WASHINGTON and why Sailors commit suicide, well, now you know. Retired senior enlisted and officers sitting in cushy desk jobs that feel their funding might get cut if they provide more morsels to our young Sailors doing the hard work are all too common in our force today. Sadly, this class of bureaucrat is so deeply entrenched I’m not sure the military will survive before they can be uprooted.

This post represents the views of the author and not those of the Department of Defense, Department of the Navy, or any other government agency.

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