Clipmarks | n2sooners's clips

Why can't Obama admit the obvious

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 20:33:58 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners
clipper's remarks: Even USAToday (who thinks the world would be a better and safer place if Saddam was still in charge of Iraq) is baffled by Obama's reluctance to admit the truth.

Clip Source: minx.cc

I don't want to knock USAToday too much for an editorial I agree with, but it is ironic that USAToday is bashing Obama for not admitting the surge worked, when, as far as I know, this is the very first time USAToday admitted it themselves.

Why then can't Obama bring himself to acknowledge the surge worked better than he and other skeptics, including this page, thought it would? What does that stubbornness say about the kind of president he'd be?

The great irony, of course, is that the success of the surge has made Obama's plan to withdraw combat troops in 16 months far more plausible than when he proposed it. Another irony is that while Obama downplays the effectiveness of the surge in Iraq, he is urging a similar tactic now in Afghanistan.

Perhaps it's too much to ask that Obama risk being taunted by headlines such as "Obama says Bush was right." But for the nation to move forward on its single most vexing debate, it would help if the next president could admit the obvious

Tags: usatoday, msm, media, obama, iraq, surge, war on terror, success, politics

Majority sees US winning war on terror

Thu, 24 Jul 2008 16:13:56 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: headingright.com

Over half of American voters (51%) now believe the United States and its allies are winning the war on terror, the highest figure recorded in nearly four years by Rasmussen Reports in a nationwide survey.

Only 16% now think the terrorists are on top, while 27% view it as a stalemate. Prior to this week’s survey, the number who believe the terrorists are winning had never fallen below 20%.

Last July, just 36% thought the U.S. and its allies were winning. At that time, an equal number—36%–thought the terrorists were ahead … Only 23% now expect things to get worse in Iraq, down from 49% last July.

Appears those on the left may be losing their primary source of criticism. UH-OH. So when the polling was down he was a loser and wasn’t listening to the American Public. So I can only assume that now the left will pat him on the back and say good going, keep it up.

I AM WAITING LEFTIES!!!

Tags: war on terror, iraq, politics, success

Obama is wrong

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:53:16 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners
clipper's remarks:

While the United States has an interest in preventing the resurgence of the Afghan Taliban, the country's strategic importance pales beside that of Iraq, which lies at the geopolitical center of the Middle East and contains some of the world's largest oil reserves. If Mr. Obama's antiwar stance has blinded him to those realities, that could prove far more debilitating to him as president than any particular timetable.

Clip Source: www.washingtonpost.com

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who has a history of tailoring his public statements for political purposes, made headlines by saying he would support a withdrawal of American forces by 2010. But an Iraqi government statement made clear that Mr. Maliki's timetable would extend at least seven months beyond Mr. Obama's. More significant, it would be "a timetable which Iraqis set" -- not the Washington-imposed schedule that Mr. Obama has in mind. It would also be conditioned on the readiness of Iraqi forces, the same linkage that Gen. Petraeus seeks.

Mr. Obama's account of his strategic vision remains eccentric. He insists that Afghanistan is "the central front" for the United States, along with the border areas of Pakistan. But there are no known al-Qaeda bases in Afghanistan, and any additional U.S. forces sent there would not be able to operate in the Pakistani territories where Osama bin Laden is headquartered.

Tags: obama, iraq, war on terror, afghanistan, pakistan, al qaeda, politics

NASA: 70% of climate change due to Pacific oscillations, not CO2

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 19:47:55 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners
clipper's remarks:

What this means is no matter how much you change your CO2 footprint, how much you try to be CO2 green, no matter how much liberal governments tax you - you cannot save the planet from its natural cycles.

Say they reduced the CO2 25%. Say the CO2 is the driver for the remaining 30% of Global Warming (which it cannot be, but let’s just be only half as ridiculous as the IPCC), then all that effort would only impact 7.5% of the forces driving the global climate. The other 92.5% would roll on, impervious to the effort. And since CO2 is not 100% of the remaining 30% of the equation (more like 10%), a more realistic expectation is that all the suffering that would go into dropping CO2 levels by 25% would result in a less than 1% change in the forces driving our climate.

Clip Source: strata-sphere.com

It has been scientifically demonstrated that 70% of the Global Warming in the last century (and cooling in the last decade) is due to the Pacific Ocean Oscillations, not CO2:

One necessary result of low climate sensitivity is that the radiative forcing from greenhouse gas emissions in the last century is not nearly enough to explain the upward trend of 0.7 deg. C in the last 100 years.

On this issue, it can be shown with a simple climate model that small cloud fluctuations assumed to occur with two modes of natural climate variability — the El Nino/La Nina phenomenon (Southern Oscillation), and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation — can explain 70% of the warming trend since 1900, as well as the nature of that trend: warming until the 1940s, no warming until the 1970s, and resumed warming since then.

The gentlemen making this claim is the lead investigator one of NASA’s flagship Earth Observing Observatories

Tags: climate change, global warming, science, religion, politics

Obama Love

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 00:06:30 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: www.youtube.com

[Video]

Tags: obama, media, msm, bias, politics, election

Media dragging economy down

Wed, 23 Jul 2008 00:03:21 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: www.rasmussenreports.com

Only 34% of Americans believe the United States has the world’s best economy, but 50% believe the media makes economic conditions appear worse than they really are, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.

Only a quarter (25%) think reporters and media outlets present an accurate picture of the economy and 18% believe they actually portray it as better than it is. Just 34% trust reporters more when it comes to news on the economy, and 32% see stockbrokers as more reliable.

A plurality of Americans (41%) similarly believe that the media has tried to make the war in Iraq appear worse that it really is, while 26% say reporters have made it look better than reality and 25% think they’ve portrayed it accurately.

Over half of unaffiliated voters (55%) share this negative assessment of the media’s economic reporting.

Tags: economy, politics, media, msm, bias

Media in Obama camp

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 23:51:46 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: www.rasmussenreports.com

The idea that reporters are trying to help Obama win in November has grown by five percentage points over the past month. The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey, taken just before the new controversy involving the New York Times erupted, found that 49% of voters believe most reporters will try to help the Democrat with their coverage, up from 44% a month ago.

Just 14% believe most reporters will try to help McCain win, little changed from 13% a month ago. Just one voter in four (24%) believes that most reporters will try to offer unbiased coverage.

for unaffiliated voters, 50% see a pro-Obama bias

45% say that most reporters would hide information if it hurt the candidate they wanted to win

The New York Times’ refusal to run an op-ed piece by John McCain challenging an article in the paper less than a week ago by Barack Obama is sure to further fuel the belief that much of the major media is biased in favor of the Democratic candidate

Tags: obama, mccain, media, election, bias, msm, poll

Bodypaint

Tue, 22 Jul 2008 18:11:38 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: abduzeedo.com

Tags: painting, photography, art, bodypaint

Yellow

Fri, 18 Jul 2008 06:23:20 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: abduzeedo.com

Tags: photography, photographs, art, yellow

AP sinks to new low

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 23:23:46 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: newsbusters.org

The AP's story (saved here for future reference in case the wire service is embarrassed into revising it; you might consider saving it too as Exhibit A on how far over the cliff the dinosaur media has driven itself) by Douglass K. Daniel, with Jennifer Loven contributing (I might have known), gets in at least three cheap, fundamentally untrue, and totally uncalled-for shots at Tony Snow, who died earlier this morning.

With a quick-from-the-lip repartee, broadcaster's good looks and a relentlessly bright outlook — if not always a command of the facts — he became a popular figure around the country to the delight of his White House bosses.

..... During daily briefings, he challenged reporters, scolded them and questioned their motives as if he were starring in a TV show broadcast live from the West Wing.

Critics suggested that Snow was turning the traditionally informational daily briefing into a personality-driven media event short on facts and long on confrontation.

Tags: ap, media, msm, bias, politics

adgoodness

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 23:10:13 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: www.frederiksamuel.com

Tags: advertising

Great Beach HDR Pictures

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 06:39:22 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: abduzeedo.com

Summertime is long gone here in Brazil, and most of us are sick by this time of the year. It's a hard life living in south Brazil, where beaches are terrible. So I was just taking a look at some beach pictures, to remind me that in about 5 months it will be summer once more. :)

So I ran into these cool HDR pictures... they remind a lot of how good summer is. Oh boy. I'm feeling sad right now. =p

Tags: hdr, photography, beach, art

Iran's latest missile test

Sat, 12 Jul 2008 05:01:38 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: farm4.static.flickr.com

Tags: iran, missile, humor, photoshop

AP hops on Saint Obama bandwagon

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 04:29:20 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: newsbusters.org

My colleague Warner Todd Huston was first to report the wire service Reuters publishing a picture of a saintly Barack Obama surrounded by a halo.

Now, the Associated Press has gotten into the act (h/t NBer Roger the Shrubber):

Is this an accident? Have you seen any pictures of St. McCain?

Tags: ap, obama, media, bias, msm, politics

Congressional Democrats Aim to Censor Twitter and Qik

Wed, 09 Jul 2008 04:07:17 GMT

clipped by: n2sooners

Clip Source: mashable.com

I’ve seen some discussion around the blogosphere that has correlated with an email I got this morning from the office of Representative John Culberson (the US House GOP leader) talking about a Democrat plan hatched to curtail free speech from members of Congress on the Internet’s various social media websites.

As Robert Scoble and Andrew Feinberg unmasked to us in the Web 2.0 crowd, there are a couple of members of congress who actually do get social media, and use it personally. John Culberson is one of those folks, and has actively used Twitter and Qik in the past to communicate not only with his constiuency but the general wilds of the web.

Rep. Michael Capuano, Chairman of the Congressional Commission on Mailing Standards, seeks to end this.

The upshot is that Michael Capuano for some reason is uneasy or afraid of the shift towards openness in access to our nations legislators made possible by social media, and rather than encourage the change, he aims to have it cut off at the head.

Tags: congress, politics, free speech, twitter