One thing that hasn't fared well with the now almost constant melting has been our roads. While I have mentioned that the extended below average temperatures were playing havoc with the roads due to frost heaves, the melting has now opened numerous potholes and other voids that make traveling the roads quite hazardous. Both the state and local highway departments have been trying their best to fill them temporarily, they haven't been able to keep up because of the sheer volume needing attention.
I have to say that this is probably one of the worst years I can remember in regards to frost heaves and potholes, and it isn't over yet.
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In a follow up to my post yesterday about Charles Koch's WSJ opinion piece, I present to you a piece by Larry Kudlow which asks “Is Atlas Shrugging?” in regards to Koch's warning about how collectivism is seriously affecting job growth.In my opinion both Koch and Kudlow are dead on.
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This is no surprise to me.It appears a study has found that vegetarians are less healthy than their meat-eating counterparts.
A new study from the Medical University of Graz in Austria finds that vegetarians are more physically active, drink less alcohol and smoke less tobacco than those who consume meat in their diets. Vegetarians also have a higher socioeconomic status and a lower body mass index. But the vegetarian diet — characterized by a low consumption of saturated fats and cholesterol that includes increased intake of fruits, vegetables and whole-grain products — carries elevated risks of cancer, allergies and mental health disorders.I've known more than a few vegetarians, some of whom were totally vegan, and I found they tended to be sick more often and required a lot more visits to the doctor's office.
One of the more personal examples of this is Horse Girl, BeezleBub's girl friend. She is vegetarian and has suffered a number of maladies directly related to her diet. Her physician has also told her than when the time comes when she wants to have kids her vegetarian diet may make it difficult to conceive (her BMI is low and that has ended up affecting her menstrual cycle, meaning there have been stretches of months where she hasn't had one) and if she should be able to conceive she would have a difficult time carrying to term because her diet wouldn't provide enough of the nutrients required.
This subject brings to mind a comedy routine by a stand-up comic whose name escapes me at the moment, where he made the observation that all the people you see in the health food stores look like death warmed over while the people eating normal food look to be in great health.
When ever I hear someone tell me that humans weren't meant to be meat-eaters I respond by telling them that their teeth give lie to that claim as humans have the teeth of omnivores, meaning they can eat a wide range of foods, including meat.
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I've covered this in one way or another before, but it bears repeating:The EPA is proposing burdensome regulations on wood stoves.
Should the EPA follow through a lot of people are going to find themselves either freezing to death because they can't afford expensive new stoves that meet the regulations, going bankrupt to pay for expensive fossil fuel heating, or thwarting the regulations and leaving themselves open to fines and arrest.
Some aspects of the proposed regulations sound like a wood stove version of the infamous Cash for Clunkers debacle, where old wood stoves will have to be scrapped rather than resold.
This crap has got to stop. I think a number of EPA administrators need to go to prison. After all the EPA has ignored court rulings and federal law and gone rogue, writing themselves all kinds of new rules and regulations that are far outside their charter.
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This piece from Daniel J. Mitchell shows the combined state and local tax burden experienced by each of the 57..err...50 states, from Wyoming (the lowest) to New York (the highest). Mitchell gets his figures from the Tax Foundation and, as he says, since economic and finance numbers tend to lag the figures used are for 2011.My home state of New Hampshire comes in at #44, just 6 steps behind Wyoming.
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It seems the #RapeCulture narrative is falling apart.As the number of male teachers in our public education system declines because of the automatic suspicion that they are barely under control rapists preying upon our children, it appears female are stepping in to fill in that role.
Story after story after story of female teachers “who can't seem to be happy unless they've got a high school boy's penis in their mouth” fills the media.
It seems the men have been driven out to make room for the women who prey upon their students. I guess they didn't want the competition.
But does any of this poke huge holes onto the #RapeCulture narrative of the feminazis? Nope. Not one bit. It's still “Women are being oppressed by the patriarchy! Now, excuse me while I suck this teenage boy’s penis . . .
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It finally happened.The cell phone I've used over the past 3+ years bit it.
Three times in the past month I have dropped my trusty LG phone, with each drop degrading the performance of the displays on the lid. The third time was the charm as neither display would light up, though the phone still functioned. No amount of poking around after carefully dismantling the phone restored its displays. It was time to give up on this otherwise reliable phone and get a new one.
I didn't go crazy and get one of the newer smart phones. I don't need a phone that smart. I just need one that allows me to make phone calls and text, nothing more. I don't need web access. I don't need e-mail. I don't need to be able to watch videos or TV.
So I ended up with a Samsung phone that is a bit tougher than my old LG phone and has a better display to boot.
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Rather than reiterate what someone else has written about climate change and how things just aren't going the way of the Warmists, I'll just point to what Tom Bowler has written about the subject.It all boils down to this: There has been no warming for over 17 years, something not a single climate model predicted, but we're still gonna die anyways because global warming is happening even though it's not, or something.