September 16, 2023

Continuing Manipulation Of Poverty Statistics

September 16, 2023/ Francis Menton

As I have written many times, I don’t think that the federal measure of “poverty” in the United States was originally created with fraudulent intent to deceive the voters.
However, as the measure of poverty has evolved over the years, the thing deemed “poverty” by the statistics no longer bears any meaningful resemblance to what normal people think of as poverty. Rather than measuring anything that might resemble actual physical deprivation, the statistics have evolved into an artifact to manipulate the voters. In a post about a year ago I described what I call the “poverty scam” as follows:
[T]he government cynically manipulates the poverty statistics so that the official measured rate of poverty never goes meaningfully down, no matter how much taxpayer money is spent, thus manufacturing a fake basis to hit up the people for ever increasing funding at regular intervals.
Over the past week or so we have just been treated to the umpteenth iteration of this poverty scam.

September 13, 2023

New York Urgently Needs To Confront the Contradiction of Trying To Electrify Everything While Also Eliminating Fossil Fuels

September 13, 2023/ Francis Menton

In New York, politicians are selling the public a narrative that electricity is going to be the solution to climate change.
We will eliminate all CO2 emissions by banning gasoline-powered cars, banning natural gas infrastructure, banning gas heat in buildings, and banning gas for cooking. All of these are to be replaced with supposedly “green,” emissions-free, alternatives – which in practice consist of only one thing, electricity. We’ve been told that this is how we are going to protect the planet for future generations.
But there is nothing emissions-free about the way electricity is currently generated in New York. About half of our electricity comes now, as it traditionally has, from burning fossil fuels.
New York has announced plans to eliminate those from electricity generation by 2030, but as of now has no realistic plan to replace them. Meanwhile, it is forcing its citizens to convert essential systems like heating to electricity, with no basis to believe that the electricity will be available to prevent people from freezing in the winter only a few years from now.
This is a glaring contradiction, that needs urgently to be addressed before we suffer a self-inflicted catastrophe.

September 10, 2023

September 10, 2023/ Francis Menton

Does the federal government do anything noticeable these days other than use its vast taxpayer-supplied resources to grind down and persecute its political enemies?
You already know more that you want to about things like: unprecedented criminal prosecutions against the former President; a Censorship Industrial Complex to bully social media platforms into silencing opponents; and wildly disproportionate prosecutions of J6 protesters.
Here are a couple of examples for today that you may have paid less attention to:

September 06, 2023

September 06, 2023/ Francis Menton

We are on our way to Net Zero by 2050. It must be true because everybody says so.
The entire $6+ trillion per year federal government is committed to the project, which obviously would not be the case if the whole thing were impossible. Equally fully committed are essentially all of the colleges and universities, where all of the smartest people are to be found. As well as every other elite institution of every kind and sort.
Take the World Economic Forum. If there is a number one elitest among all elite institutions, this has to be it. At their annual confab in Davos, Switzerland, they gather the greatest of geniuses to instruct the very top government and business leaders how to run the world. Would you like to go? It will cost you $52,000 to join the organization, and then an additional $19,000 to attend the conference. Chartering a private jet to get you there will cost a few more thousand. Once there, you can hear the very smartest people imparting their thoughts on the most important topics of the day, like “The Great Reset,” “Emerging Technologies,” “Diversity and Inclusions,” and, of course, “The Net Zero Transition.”
Is it possible that these people are completely incompetent and have no idea what they are doing?

September 04, 2023

September 04, 2023/ Francis Menton

As recently as a year ago, the UK appeared to have unstoppable momentum on the march to “net zero” CO2 emissions.
By the Climate Change Act of 2008, adopted under Labour Prime Minister Gordon Brown, the country legally committed itself to reduce carbon emissions by 80% (from the 1990 level) by 2050. In 2019, during a Conservative government headed by Prime Minister Theresa May, Parliament amended the Act (by unanimous vote!) to make the emissions reduction/net zero mandate 100%. The next Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, also a Tory, proved to be unequalled in his zealotry for the climate campaign. The net zero mandate had both energetic support at the top of government, and the backing of an all-party consensus in Parliament.
Today, Net Zero Watch issued a press release describing the UK government as “hopelessly divided” over climate issues. (Full disclosure: Net Zero Watch is an affiliate of the Global Warming Policy Foundation, where I am a board member of the sister affiliate American Friends of the GWPF.).
What has happened?

September 02, 2023

September 02, 2023/ Francis Menton

Perhaps it is a little early for another update here on the “homelessness” situation in San Francisco. (My last update was about six months ago in March 2023.).
But there is a good reason for an update now: At least a few people seem finally to be catching on that the basic idea behind “homelessness” advocacy is to exploit an issue that brings forth great human empathy to generate vast taxpayer funds and then to not solve the problem. The spending continues and increases without limit.
There is way too much money — for advocates — in “homelessness” for the problem ever to get solved, or even to decrease materially.