Liveblogging "Ask the Speaker"

In the interest of finish my trip without having any unpleasant chats or encounters with security personnel, I have decided to take a seat in the back half of the room and observe and listen, and keep my damned mouth shut.

Whoa - Speaker Pelosi has agreed to accept an extended question session - but any disruptions and the program stops and the jackboots take our credentials and throw us out. Since Harold Ford got heckled, I can understand, but Harold Ford needs heckled - and there is a case to be made for heckling Pelosi, too, even though I won't engage in such activity.


9:05 Lloyd Doggett, local favorite and Democratic Congressman from Austin is kicking things off. I maybe shouldn't say this, but we could let him talk till 11:00 and I wouldn't be disappointed...

9:18 - She is taking the stage. I am neither standing nor clapping. But she does look fabulous. She is lauding Lloyd Doggett for his dedication to the Constitution - I think she could use a lesson or two from him in that regard.

9:25 - she knows everyone is tired of war - so why doesn't she do something about it? Oy - now she is quoting Hannah Arendt. I could hurl.

9:27 - it's all the 'publicans fault. Who knew they had the majority?

9:28 - First question is about Inherent Contempt and why is impeachment off the table still? "Given that the constitution calls for impeachment if high crimes or misdemeanors have been committed, and the current president has flouted constitutionally mandated checks and balances, why is impeachment off the table? How do you intend to not give him free reign if you remove one of the only constitutionally given ways of limiting a president's abuse of his authority?"

Um, I didn't hear much of an answer....

9:32 - Telecom Immunity - why did you fuckers cave??? She says she went to the House to protect civil liberties? She blames the Senate and the blue dogs, like that miserable PoS and bitter disappointment, Claire "Bond Girl" McCaskill. I see a trend emerging in her answers...it's the Senate's fault. It is always the Senate's fault. We passed a bill that wasn't as bad as theirs. Pathetic.

9:40 - She keeps repeating that it's only 107 days 'til the election (Impeachment could happen tomorrow, however, and we every one damned well know it.)

9:49 - Is a GM bailout coming? She doesn't think so, and instead of addressing the question she is yammering about how she got CAFE standards raised.

9:53 - A question on healthcare. Abstinence only wastes money, will you take steps to correct this misguided idiocy? "Yes." Abstinence only is not just bad policy, it is dangerous. Mindful of the health of young women. "So why are abstinence only earmarks holding their own?" We need more pro-choice congressmembers.

9:56 - back to telecoms...Article I Section 8...founders had in mind keeping us in touch with one another...can congress step in and put broadband access on a par with the post office? Communication and transportation used to be the same thing. Universal Broadband is a Democratic goal. Everyone needs to be connected.

10:01 - Why are soldiers forced to beg for care packages that contain toothpaste, protein bars and tampons - things that our government isn't providing for the troops in the field? "It isn't right but it is emblematic of other needs that aren't being met." WTF??? "Debt of gratitude" blah, blah blah. Just DO SOMETHING ABOUT IT. What is so hard to understand about that???

10:06 - Now I will stand and clap and stop snarling - Al Gore is on the stage.

10:14 - Okay, I am listening with rapt attention. More later...

10:20 - you can play along at home...stream it here.

10:30 - Questions: Would you accept a position in an Obama administration? Meat causes more emissions than cars. What should we do? West VA and mountaintop removal? Telecom immunity?

He is honored by the idea that we want him in th Obama administration, but he doesn't think that is how his talents will be best utilized. He is concerned with the climate. (He better hurry up with the answers, I am almost out of battery power...) Meat intensity is a problem for the environment. Mountaintop mining is an attrocity and an outrage. It is part and parcel of the same dysfunctional energy policies of this country. The idea of coal fueling our cars is insane...stream it, he explains why...

Out of battery. More later...

Another Run of Joementum?

William the Bloody Kristol decides to weigh in on who should run for Vice President on the Republican ticket:

William Kristol [from the issue dated] 11/19/2007:
If a senator gives a speech, and no major newspaper reports it, does it matter? Joe Lieberman spoke in Washington Thursday on "the politics of national security." The next day, the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Wall Street Journal, and USA Today ignored his talk. Most Democrats will ignore it. But five guys named Rudy, John, Fred, Mitt, and Mike will read it. So should you.

Think about that for a minute--Kristol is a fairly influential commenter. He probably has what some would call "influence" among the 23% of Americans who are "dead enders" and still think we can salvage victory after all of these years of being bled dry in Iraq. Kristol is suggesting that Republicans consider Senator Joe Lieberman for the VP slot next year.

I say, go for it. I say, run, Joe, run! Nothing would drag the Republican ticket down more than a healthy dose of the same "Joementum" that failed to gain any traction at all in the 2004 Democratic Presidential primaries. Nothing would solidify the break that is long overdue between Lieberman and the Democratic Party. I know he has this "Independent" tag thing going--please. The man's career exists as a Democratic Party politician. Without them, he's nothing.

Are they any Democrats who want to hang on to Joe? And try to bring him back into the fold? I say, hell no. Joe, you gotta go. If you go and it makes for a Republican Senate, so be it. (Of course, if the Republicans ever do take back the Senate, they'll go back to whining about filibusters, won't they?)

Here's what Joe said the other day:

Iraq has become the singular litmus test for Democratic candidates. No Democratic presidential primary candidate today speaks of America's moral or strategic responsibility to stand with the Iraqi people against the totalitarian forces of radical Islam, or of the consequences of handing a victory in Iraq to al Qaeda and Iran. And if they did, their campaign would be as unsuccessful as mine was in 2006. Even as evidence has mounted that General Petraeus' new counterinsurgency strategy is succeeding, Democrats have remained emotionally invested in a narrative of defeat and retreat in Iraq, reluctant to acknowledge the progress we are now achieving. . . .

Well, where to start?

1. Ending the war is essential for preserving America's military
2. The Iraqi people have either fled the country or are acquiescing to full blown civil war
3. al Qaeda in Iraq is a figment of someone's feverish imagination as a credible threat
4. Iran has already gotten more than they ever could have hoped from this war
5. General Petraeus' actual strategy was to wait until the ethnic cleansing was complete because that would be followed by a drop in violence AND to give money and guns to Sunni leaders to get them to stop killing our troops
6. Democrats are "emotionally invested" in doing the right thing by stopping the war
7. We are pounding sand, not making any real progress
8. So long as the Mahdi Army stands down, the violence in Iraq will appear to be lessening
9. 2007 is the bloodiest year of the war
10. Even when he says "and" and "the" in a sentence, he's wrong


'Bye, Joe. Keep giving speeches that reveal your true affiliation--for Karl Rove, George Bush, Dick Cheney, and a failed war that you are clueless and confused about, from the strategic sense to the essential details. Keep telling us what you really think--which can't hide the fact that if the American people ever figure out why this war was started and why it was kept going and what your part was in the effort to ensure that the Republican Party could use a war, and use the troops who would have to fight that war, as a wedge issue against the Democratic Party to hold on to the power of the purse and to enrich wealthy donors to the Republican Party, well, would you ever be man enough to admit your guilt? Would you ever be man enough to admit you were party to a crime of monstrous proportions? Would you have the decency to admit that you shouldn't be considered for any post of responsibility?

Yes, enthusiastically, do I say, pick Lieberman. Run him as your VP, Republicans. He will serve as a reminder of just how insane your party really is. He would wrap himself and the Iraq War around your necks and drag you down. Lieberman has been a national candidate twice now, and both times, he was a barely competent disaster in the making. He failed to even win the endorsement of Al Gore in 2004 after serving as Gore's pick for VP in 2000. Gore picked Dean, and while Dean didn't get the nomination, Dean was a huge part of the resurrection of the Democratic Party. Lieberman's 2004 run is a study in self-delusion. "Joementum" turned into the turd no one wanted to find in their swimming pool.

If you want, you can let the door hit you on the ass on your way out...

Al Gore Awarded Nobel Peace Prize

I awoke this morning to the news that the man we actually elected President in 2000 had been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for his tireless efforts on behalf of the planet to raise awareness of the impending climate crisis.

He shares the award with the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Mr. Gore “is probably the single individual who has done most to create greater worldwide understanding of the measures that need to be adopted,” the Nobel citation said, referring to the issue of climate change. The United Nations committee, a network of 2,000 scientists that was organized in 1988 by the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations Environment Program, has produced two decades of scientific reports that have “created an ever-broader informed consensus about the connection between human activities and global warming,” the citation said.

Mr. Gore, who was traveling in San Francisco, said in a statement that he was deeply honored to receive the prize and planned to donate his half of the prize to the Alliance for Climate Protection, a nonprofit climate group where he is chairman of the board.

“We face a true planetary emergency,” Mr. Gore said in his statement. “The climate crisis is not a political issue; it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity. It is also our greatest opportunity to lift global consciousness to a higher level.”

Congratulations Mr. President. You truly deserve the award. The Nobel committee has given the award to some specious recipients in the past. Giving it to you and the IPCC this year, following last year's award to Mohammed Yunnis goes a ways toward atoning for Kissinger and Arrafat.

That seizures, strokes and apoplexy are occurring all over right Blogistan is just gravy. Pass the popcorn, K-Lo is due to spontaneously combust in 5...4...3...2...1...

Bring on the mockery, it is richly deserved

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Oh good lord. They really are bringing out the d-string players here, everyone with three firing neurons having already retreated to lick their wounds and regroup, leaving the imbeciles standing sentry.

They are down to…Emily Yoffe – the “Human Guinea Pig” from Slate and “Day to Day” – whose claim to fame is humiliating herself for the amusement of others, and writing a book about a neurotic beagle. (So sure, I'll trust her expertise on matters of climate science...)

Not.

Why the fuck should I take this twit seriously on anything? Much less something so serious as Global Warming? What are her credentials that the Washington Post would give her a column to address a topic so serious as global climate change in the first damned place? (For the record, I don’t listen to Leonardo DiCaprio’s or Sheryl Crow's scientific pretensions either.)

She is just too precious. I fear I might have to spend a bit of time on this, so rich is the mock-worthy material. Let the fun commence!

It was a mild January evening, and people had filled the restaurant's outdoor patio. As our group walked past the tables, one of my friends said, "This terrifies me." I don't know if she was reassured later by the chilly April, but we are all supposed to be terrified of the weather now.

Hell, she shows her stupidity (ignorance can be helped, but stupidity is organic) when she doesn’t know the difference between climate and weather (hint: the former is an aggregate of the latter). It’s like expecting me to take a stem cell research opponent seriously when they can’t tell me what the hell a telomere is. I have already snorted.

In "An Inconvenient Truth," Al Gore tells us that unless drastic global changes are made, our cities will be inundated and those of us who haven't drowned will face a world wracked by cataclysmic weather and swarming with pestilence. One of his devotees, actor Leonardo DiCaprio, is coming out with his own environmental horror movie warning of human extinction if we continue living as we are. This would have a negative effect on the box office, but extinction might be preferable to the future Gore envisions.

See? What did I tell you! She is just precious! Let me explain this for you sweet-pea. When the sea ice started melting, it took on a snowball rolling down the mountain quality. Its simple physics – dark colors (water) absorb energy (heat) that white (ice) reflected back to space. This raises temperatures. This melts more ice, and raises the temperature further. Besides the fact that melting sea ice kinda totally jacks the polar and aquatic eco systems, the rising temperatures cause ice sheets and glaciers on land to increase their melt rate, and that raises sea levels. It all boils down to four little words: No Ice, No Us. Silly girl – she only needs to think about a glass of tea…when the ice melts, you still have roughly the same volume. But you can’t add more tea to a full glass. Ice melting on land has that effect. Frankly, anyone too stupid to get this by now should make sure they are wearing a helmet before they leave the house. What size are you Emily? About a 6 ¾? Or smaller? (The picture is of the arctic ice cap, the top shot taken in 1979 and the bottom one taken in 2003.)

I, however, refuse to see the apocalypse in every balmy day. And I think it's wrong to let our children believe they'll be swept away before they get a chance to fret about college admissions. An article in The Post this spring described children anxious, sleepless and tearful about the end; one 9-year-old said she worried about global warming "because I don't want to die."

Hmmm. Remember the Cold War? I do. People like me, who crawled under our desks at school on a regular basis grew up and worked for a nuclear freeze. I don’t know if there will be a correlation in ten years like there was with us, but I would be willing to bet the kids who are scared today do something tomorrow. God knows the Emily Yoffe’s are worthless in that regard.

Usually we want to protect our children from awful events, adjusting the message to suit their age. Certainly we tried to do that after Sept. 11. But an essential part of the global warming awareness movement is the belief that scaring us to death is the best way to spur massive change. Gore explicitly compares warming to the Nazis of the last century and terrorists of this one.

Again, air raid drills. Like wooden school desks would protect us from a nuclear blast. She acts like this is new. It isn’t. And while that was a possibility, or a potential, the probability of catastrophic damage because of climate change approaches 1.

That is worth getting excited about.

They sure seem to have a double standard for fear - if it can be used to whip up a military frenzy, they are all for it - but let it address something that can't have a gun pointed at it and it's just hysterical. I grew up in fear of nuclear holocaust. I grew up and did something about it, because my parents generation were not able to see the folly of their ways from their vantage point in history. And shutting up because it might upset the kiddies is a piss-poor excuse anyway.

And a recent New York Times profile of Gore tells that we are to be flooded with "An Inconvenient Truth." It is going to be shown in schools; book versions for children and young adults and a children's television show are planned. The global Live Earth concerts scheduled for July 7 are expected to raise millions, going to a three-year public relations effort, headed by Gore, to deluge us with bad news.

Maybe, just maybe, that is because it presents a message that is scientifically sound and presented in a format that is accessible and easily understood by anyone with an I.Q. above that of burnt toast.

Why the fuck did the Washington Post give this twit any ink on this matter? Says a lot about how Mrs. Graham's paper has lost it's way under Fred-the-Feckless Hiatt.

All this is not to say that it's not getting warmer and that curbing our profligate environmental ways is not a commendable and necessary goal. But perhaps this movement is sowing the seeds of its own destruction -- even as it believes the human species has sown its own. There must be a limit to how many calamitous films, books and television shows we, and our children, can absorb.

Objection. Assertion not in evidence. I seem to recall a couple of TV movies having a hell of an impact on the nuclear disarmament movement in the wake of Reagan scaring the shit out of everyone by saying something so patently absurd as “winnable nuclear war.” (Amiable dunce was too kind by half.) The Day After and Threads were broadcast in 1983 and 1984 respectively, and the Freeze movement moved into the mainstream. I lived on Davis-Monthan AFB at that time. I used to ride my bike around the plane graveyard, and I saw the crews taking the wings off the mothballed bombers for photographing by the Soviet satellites with my own eyes. I lived that part of recent history in the first person. Frankly, you get results when you reach ordinary people. Why are the deniers so fearful of education?

It doesn't seem sustainable to expect people to remain terrified by such a disinterested, often benign -- it was so nice eating out on the patio! -- and even unpredictable enemy. (I understand we're the enemy, but the executioner is the weather.) Recall that the experts told us last year would be a record-setting hurricane season, but the series of Katrinas never materialized.

It doesn’t have to be perpetually sustainable. It just has to get the attention of most for a while and keep the attention of enough. Been involved in any political movements ever? My question is, is she really this obtuse, or is she playing at it? and just because last year wasn't worse than 2005 for hurricanes brings on a shrug and a "So? Do you have a point?"

Since I hate the heat, even I was alarmed by the recent headline: "NASA Warns of 110-Degrees for Atlanta, Chicago, DC in Summer." But I regained my cool when I realized the forecast was for close to the end of the century. Thanks to all the heat-mongering, it's supposed to be a sign I'm in denial because I refuse to trust a weather prediction for August 2080, when no one can offer me one for August 2008 (or 2007 for that matter).

Well, pardon me, but she is quite literally a joke for a living, and I am more inclined to take the findings of this study by the National Research Council, or this heavily sourced article available at RealClimate, or anything posted at Gristmill, or any position espoused by my peers at the Union of Concerned Scientists - than her “hunch" and a pinch of wishful thinking.

There is so much hubris in the certainty about the models of the future that I'm oddly reassured. We've seen how hubristic predictions about complicated, unpredictable events have a way of bringing the predictors low.

What the hell is she talking about? Examples, please. And cite your sources. I’m not saying she wouldn’t be able find any, I am saying it is incumbent upon her to do so, having made the allegation and I am not doing her homework for her.

It's also hard to believe assertions that the science on the future of our climate is settled when climate scientists can't agree about the present -- or the past (there is contention about the dates, causes and even the existence of the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age that followed). Now, Gore and others say that Katrina was a product of global warming and that we can expect more and bigger storms. But there is actually brisk scientific debate over the role global warming plays -- if any -- in the creation of hurricanes.

Who asserts this controversy, what are the sources of this claim? What are the credentials of the sources she elides to (but does not reference) that I should take them seriously? Where does the funding come from to conduct the studies she doesn't cite?

A study from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution last month, looking at 5,000 years of Atlantic hurricanes, found "large and dramatic fluctuations in hurricane activity, with long stretches of frequent strikes punctuated by lulls that lasted many centuries" -- with the stormier periods occurring during cooler ocean temperatures. But talking about Earth's constant, and still inexplicable, climate changes and cycles is not useful if you're trying to shock.

Does she have a point? Of course fluctuations have always happened. (El Niño ring any bells?) Thermodynamics, Darlin' - when we achieve equilibrium, it's over. The simple, inconvenient truth is that the pendulum has already swung farther than it has ever been known to go before, and it is showing no sign of reaching the breaking point and heading back.

Of the last twenty years, nineteen of them have set high temperature records.

In his new book, "The Assault on Reason," Gore denounces what he sees as today's politics of fear. Yet his own campaign of mass persuasion -- any such campaign -- is not amenable to contradiction and uncertainty. It's about fright and absolutes. But just because something can be plotted on an X and Y axis does not make it the whole truth.

WHAT??? You will have to pardon me for a moment while I collect myself. I am educated, and I am scientifically literate. That last sentence? I can not get my brain to dumb down to a level of stupid to even mock that absurdity of this idiot child in so far over her head. That little polar bear only thought he was out of his depth.