Friday, February 17, 2012

Left Coast Ecoweenie News

The left hand doesn’t know what the other left hand is doing in California. This past week, leftist multimillionaire Democratic contributor and “philanthropist” Susie Tompkins Buell of San Francisco decided to withhold her largess from the Obama administration since “the president has not been vocal enough on global warming.” Even though Buell is a close friend of Hillary Clinton’s, she didn’t think that the State Department’s current initiative on climate change was “enough.”

Yesterday, the State Department announced an international climate change initiative to reduce short-lived climate pollutants other than carbon dioxide. The initiative will initially cost $15 million. The United States will be joining Bangladesh, Mexico and Ghana in the effort, with moral support from Canada and Sweden. The US will provide $12 million, while the other five will make up the difference. Well, that’s nothing new. China, which is not a party to the initiative, will no doubt be glad to lend the money to the US to pay for the latest climate change fad. From the perspective of the other five, this sounds a lot like “we must do something right away, shouldn’t you?”

“Secretary Clinton today announces a climate and clean air initiative to reduce short-lived climate pollutants” read the State Department announcement. Which was quickly followed by Buell’s announcement that “I would just love to write my big check, or have a high-dollar dinner here on the president’s behalf, but I can’t. Mr. Obama has got to be a leader on the urgency of climate change.” Buell, who could afford to pay the combined share of Bangladesh, Mexico, and Ghana with bucks to spare for Canada and Sweden believes strongly that it is not her job. The money should be paid by the American government and paid for by extorting the taxpayers.

And then there’s that sovereignty thing. Buell doesn’t care who determines how much effort and money is needed to remedy the problem that most people have never heard of, as long as she doesn’t have to pay for it. And she does agree with Clinton about who the proper experts are to make these determinations. In Clinton’s words: “We will look to the United Nations. The UN Environmental Programme (UNEP) lists sixteen major actions that could either be taken on black carbon or methane which could have quite striking effects with respect to global warming.” How can you trust a group that can’t even spell “program?”

The State Department uses all the right obfuscations to avoid demonstrating that its troops don’t have a clue as to what they’re talking about. But it sounds so good. “The Initiative is going to be aimed at action, at attracting high-level public support (Buell excluded, I suppose), mobilizing resources, catalyzing and helping to drive the implementation of national action plans, and broadly raising public awareness about the impact of action in these areas.” How’s that for totally meaningless?

The Obama administration says it expects the initial group of six countries to rapidly expand. I would have chosen “metastasize,” but that’s just me. “We are starting with about $15 million of funding to get this effort up and running.” And in a fit of wishful thinking, the Clinton announcement also said “$12 million of that will come from the US over two years, and Canada, and there will be, I am sure, also some funding coming from Sweden, although they are not at a phase of their budget process that they have been able to put an exact number down, but they certainly will be contributing, as will new partners and others.”

Isn’t it comforting to know that the American budget is in such good shape that we can front the first $12 million without hesitation? In fact, it’s in such good shape that the Democrats insist we don’t even need a budget. Need money for “temporary pollutants?” Just authorize it and it will take care of itself.

On a somewhat related ecoweenie note, we bought our first home near the Altamont Pass, east of San Francisco. At the time, it was a raceway and was used for occasional rock concerts. The most notorious was the Rolling Stones concert at which the Hell’s Angels motorcycle club was used as security and bodyguards, resulting in a murder or two. Today, it is one of the largest wind farms in California. I now live in the Tehachapi Mountains, near a more modest wind farm in the Tehachapi Pass. Both places share something in common. Raptors such as hawks and eagles are being chopped up willy-nilly by the 200 mph spinning blades of the wind turbines.

The Los Angeles Times reports: “The toll makes the Pine Tree site in the Tehachapi Mountains among the deadliest in California's wind farm industry. Activists say birds' behavior should be studied before erecting more sites.” The report goes on to say: “Those deaths give Pine Tree one of the highest avian mortality rates in California's wind farm industry. The death rate per turbine at the $425-million facility is three times higher than at California's Altamont Pass Wind Resource Area, where about 67 golden eagles die each year. However, the Altamont Pass facility has 5,000 wind turbines — 55 times as many as Pine Tree.”

The most notable victims are the golden eagles, which are a protected species and one of two symbols of America (the other is the bald eagle). So why aren’t those ecoweenies getting massive federal help under the federal Endangered Species Act? Simple. Eagles don’t deliver votes. Eagles don’t community organize. Eagles don’t own wind farms, or any other federally-subsidized Obama-friendly project. Eagles don’t sit on corporate boards, voting to accept federal funds and tax-breaks while giving large contributions to the perpetual Obama campaign. And if eagles could reason and vote, they might just vote for their own self-preservation over inefficient but deadly green schemes.

31 comments:

T-Rav said...

Can someone remind me why we're even listening to the green people again? The greens wanted to send millions of barrels of Canadian oil to China rather than America. The greens forced us to subsidize a hybrid car that tends to catch on fire (which I understand is bad for the environment). Now they don't have a problem chopping up the majestic eagles for their wind farms? The question isn't why Obama continues to be their friend; it's why these people still command such support that politicians feel the need to kowtow to them.

BevfromNYC said...

But don't golden eagles eat delta smelt?

And of course the obvious problem - the golden eagle is a symbol of the USA, therefore it must be destroyed. And who better to destroy it than those whose sacred mandate it is to protect it - the environweenies.

The Bald Eagle said...

What am I, chopped liver?

The Chopped Liver said...

What am I, chopped eagle?

AndrewPrice said...

Typical environmentalists to create a dozen new problems trying to solve an imaginary problem.

Joel Farnham said...

Whenever Liberalism is followed, people die, or in this case birds. Seriously, this should be the Conservative Mantra. When asked, point out all the things that Liberalism kills. It kills birds with following enviromentalism

Tehachapi Tom said...

Hawk
A vertical axis wind turbine won't kill birds, it looks like a large barrel, but is usually some what less efficient. Since wind needs to be preserved the wind generation industry opted for the propeller design. Another thought is possibly the wind mills are cleaning the bird gene pool of the unaware.
We need some event to clean the gene pool of the greenies and their extreme liberal associates, for the benefit of the majority of course.

Unknown said...

T-Rav: I don't understand the paranoid liberal mind, so I can't be much help answering that question. But I can say it's part of the liberal concept of deciding who should live, who should die, who should prosper, who should fail, which species is worth protecting, which is not. Their world view requires that everything be regulated, and if someone or something gets in the way of the "big picture," well, tough.

Unknown said...

Bev: If only they did. I'd be out there with a commando group, pulling down the wind turbines.

I don't think they're specifically out to kill the symbol of America, they just don't care.

I would look out from the deck at my new home every morning to see the golden eagles in the area. The second day I lived here, a bald eagle swept right past my back door between the house and the bill behind us. That was the only bald eagle I've seen, but the golden eagles were around from spring to mid-winter. I haven't seen one in months. That may be coincidental to this article, but maybe not.

Unknown said...

Bald Eagle: Chopped liver will be prohibited by PETA as soon as they find out the restaurants are capturing bald eagles and force-feeding them to produce eagle pate. The wind turbines are just a coverup for the nefarious plan.

Unknown said...

Chopped Eagle: Depends on where you fly and which ecoweenie group is in charge of your habitat.

Unknown said...

Andrew: That's so true. Most of their solutions are worse than the problems they puport to cure. This goes back a long way. I lived in L.A. when the smog was so thick you could see it wafting past you like yellow smoke. "Must fix this," said the environmentalists. So they worked hard to get rid of the huge quantities of ozone produced by the automobile. It worked, except that now, fifty or sixty years later, we're all supposed to stay out of the sun because of the UV rays that cause skin cancer which were previously blocked by our now-thin ozone layer.

Unknown said...

Joel: Maybe we could do a twist on the Vietnam-era peacenik mantra: "Environmentalism is dangerous to children and other living things."

Unknown said...

Tehachapi Tom: It doesn't matter what kind of turbine doesn't kill raptors, it only matters that the ones now up and running do kill them. The birds focus on and dive at their prey, unaware of the nearly-invisible spinning blades in their way, and it's all over. The high numbers of eagles and hawks being killed every year by the turbines indicate that they are all pretty much unaware of the danger. They don't get killed by resting or slow-moving blades. They get killed by the ones turning at high speed when the turbines are producing the maximum amount of power (which still ain't much). Any mitigation that would make the blades more visible to the raptors would make the structures even uglier than they already are. Imagine a scenic desert or mountain scene destroyed by hundreds or thousands of wind turbines painted fluorescent orange. It would look like a nightmare Las Vegas.

And I'm not so sure I'd be thrilled by the sight of "safe" turbines covering scenic areas with what look like gigantic discarded beer barrels.

Koshcat said...

So, we have to suffer through bed bugs because we can't use DDT because it might hurt the eagles but we can't get rid of the windmills that definitely do hurt the eagles because "green" energy is too important. I'm dizzy.

This arrangment sounds like a treaty, or is it? Doesn't it have to go through the senate?

Tehachapi Tom said...

Hawk
I suspect the bird mortality is not a major issue.The newer larger wind mills blades rotate at 15 rpm or less which creates a blade tip speed of approximately 120 Mph. That speed is below most raptors diving speed, a Peregrin Falcon can exceed 200 mph in a stoop. That of course means the closer to the hub the slower the speed is. Small birds would equate the blade as a predator while the large birds would most likely be hunting elsewhere. These creatures are equipt with an on board computer,carbon based, that coupled with their superb eye sight makes them keenly aware of what is in their vicinity both near and far .

rlaWTX said...

Kosh - you are trying to apply logic to liberal rationalizations... which is kind of like running with scissors - eventually it will hurt!

Unknown said...

Koshcat: You're thinking much too logically. LOL

Unknown said...

Tehachapi Tom: The avian experts who did this study said that the birds noticed changes in the natural environment during their dives, but not the artificial mechanical ones (like the blades). They simply don't take them into account. As for speed, I won't get hurt by a car moving 25 mph, unless I'm distracted by something else and walk right in front of one. And at least the car can swerve. The blades just keep on a turnin'. If the birds (prey or raptor) were as scientifically conscious of what is going on as we are, there wouldn't be any losses. But there are. Maybe the birds are processing information as poorly as humans involved in texting while driving and walking.

Unknown said...

rlaWTX: Or driving while texting (see my comment above). You got there ahead of me.

tryanmax said...

You people inspire me: LINK

Unknown said...

tryanmax: Thanks for sharing (I think). If I had found that, I would have used it for the headline photo for the article. Very funny (and tragic, at the same time).

tryanmax said...

LawHawk, you couldn't have found it on account of the fact that I just did it. A tryanmax original. Thanks for the compliment (I think). :)

Unknown said...

tryanmax: VERY cool.

Koshcat said...

Mmmmmm...eagle sandwich...

Unknown said...

Koshcat: It's what's for dinner.

Now the next question becomes, "does it taste like chicken?"

Joel Farnham said...

I interrupt this thread for this late-breaking story.

Obama wins election! 303 electoral votes to 235 Republican. I saw it on Yahoo! News. According to the "Yahoo! Scientists" it is all over except for the counting. ;-)

You can go back to your regular gnashing of teeth. ;-)

Individualist said...

Tyranmax

The leftists are always touting Darwin's theory of evolution as settled science but I have read that Darwinian evolution has been replaced by a theory that states evolution is more "static".

According to Darwin's theory changes in animals occur very minutely from generation to generation and over time (several hundreds of generations) the changes begin to mount to the point that the species has evolved into something else.

According to the static theory, evolutionay changes are more dramatic. Static theory states that when a species experiences an environmental change that threatens its existence most of the members will die off. The ones that survive will be the mutants and freaks that had traits that were beneficial. These creatures will populate the next generations and within a few generation you can have changes in the species radical enough to have invloived into another one.

The article I read was talking about Kangaroos that got relocated to one of tghe Hawaiian Islands around the late 1800's. Within a period of 80 years the surviving Kangaroos were much smaller than the Austrailian counterparts. They had immunity to poisonous plant indigineous to Hawaii their cousins did not and other changes that reclassed them as a new species.

Thus if you wish to put spinning blades in the air and you want to protect the hawks and eagles you do nothing. The birds that survive will be those with eyes able to detect the movement and they will evolve form the threat you created.

This is also true for higher levels of pollution, cars and roads and any other man made hazard. Evolution is a response to changes in the environment even ones made by man. So the hysteria of wiping out life forms is misplaced.

tryanmax said...

Indie, did you mean to address me? Very interesting in any case.

Unknown said...

Joel: Well, I guess we can all go back to our regular routines now. LOL

Unknown said...

Indi: I think that's the theory Tehachapi Tom was suggesting. It may very well be true, though there's no proof of that in this particular instance (remember that I mentioned that the studies they have done indicate that the raptors don't seem to notice the artificial dangers of the propellers the way they might if it were some sort of natural phenomenon or something as apparent as a moving automobile). The evolutionary theorists may turn out to be right, but meanwhile we lose beautiful creatures of nature in exchange for ugly windmills which are expensive and inefficient.

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