Real Climate Science

We shouldn’t be here. This was a mistake. We can’t win. We never should have come here. After I get done sniping at our troops from behind, I’m going to negotiate our surrender with that guy with the little mustache over there. He looks really mean and scares me. Maybe he will give me three billion dollars to sell out the US.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BmzGuswNDhE]

Obama Calls for New Spirit of Cooperation in Washington – NYTimes.com

Twitter / algore: #Climate change is causing …

Here in Colorado, winters are getting much longer.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=J6_1Pw1xm9U]

Some data on education, religiosity, ideology, and science comprehension

identifying with the Tea Party correlates positively(r = 0.05, p = 0.05) with scores on the science comprehension measure:

I’ve got to confess, though, I found this result surprising. As I pushed the button to run the analysis on my computer, I fully expected I’d be shown a modest negative correlation between identifying with the Tea Party and science comprehension.

But then again, I don’t know a single person who identifies with the Tea Party.  All my impressions come from watching cable tv — & I don’t watch Fox News very often — and reading the “paper” (New York Times daily, plus a variety of politics-focused internet sites like Huffington Post & Politico).

I’m a little embarrassed, but mainly I’m just glad that I no longer hold this particular mistaken view.

www.culturalcognition.net – Cultural Cognition Blog – Some data on education, religiosity, ideology, and science comprehension

h/t to Marc Morano

“The deficit is getting smaller, not bigger,” Obama said.

That’s true. But, Sen. Marco Rubio, R-Fla., said

With budget ‘deal,’ national debt free to soar again | Fox News

The Republican leadership didn’t like Obama saying means things about them, so they folded and told Obama that they are personally too weak to stand up to him.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FO725Hbzfls]

You don’t like a particular policy, or a particular president? Then argue for your position. Go out and win an election. Push to change it. Don’t break it.

President Obama speaks as shutdown ends: ‘This town has to change’ – live | World news | theguardian.com

The Tea Party did win the congressional elections in 2010 and 2012, because of Obamacare and the debt. It is becoming abundantly clear that Obama does not consider the legislative branch of government to be relevant.

On the other hand, the Republican leadership are doing everything they can to make the legislative branch subservient to the executive branch.

COI | Centre for Ocean and Ice | Danmarks Meteorologiske Institut

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rwcBaG-S7UA]

It turns out that increasing the debt is the problem, not the solution.

A Chinese ratings agency downgraded its US sovereign credit rating Thursday despite Washington’s resolution of the debt ceiling deadlock, warning that fundamentals for a potential default remained “unchanged”.

Dagong lowered its ratings for US local and foreign currency credit from A to A-, maintaining a negative outlook, the agency said in a statement.

The announcement came after the US Congress passed and President Barack Obama signed a bill that extends the nation’s borrowing authority and ends a two-week government shutdown.

“The fundamental situation that the debt growth rate significantly outpaces that of fiscal income and gross domestic product remains unchanged,” Dagong said in the statement, adding Washington’s solvency was vulnerable as old debts were still repaid through raising new debts.

Chinese agency downgrades US credit rating – FRANCE 24