Month: January 2012

Six former and current employees have sued the FDA agency under the Obama administration over its secret surveillance of their private emails.

3:25 pm

How Obama encourages transparency: Six former and current employees have sued the FDA agency under the Obama administration over its secret surveillance of their private emails.

According to a release by the law firm representing the group, the FDA targeted the employees with a “covert spying campaign” that lasted for two years after it learned they had written a letter to President-Elect Obama in early 2009. … The plaintiffs allege the agency used spyware to read the their personal emails and take screenshots while they used government computers. But whether such reconnaissance is illegal is not quite clear. According to the Washington Post, “the startup screen on FDA computers warns employees, ‘you have no reasonable expectation of privacy,’ ” including any communication accessed or sent from the machine.”

According to the law firm representing the current and former FDA employees, the monitoring continued even after the Health and Human Services Office of Inspector General “denied the FDA’s request to take any criminal and/or administrative action against the whistleblowers” and noted the whistleblowers’ communications with Congress were protected under law.

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Newt and Scientists: A Long, Complicated Love Affair

3:00 pm

Newt and scientists: A long, complicated love affair.

The article gives you the science community’s take on Gingrich. And since that community is almost entirely Democratic in make-up and routinely hostile and almost bigoted in their hatred of Republicans, it is not surprising that this take has a certain schizophrenic air about it. They want to like him because of his passionate interest and support of science, but how can they? He’s a Republican (whispered softly like one was saying a curse word.)

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It’s not about Newt

10:00 am

It’s not about Newt.

GOP voters are sending a clarion call to the party establishment, but it seems GOP leaders are not getting the message. The statement being sent to the GOP elite isn’t about Newt, and it goes beyond even Romney. It is about a deep dissatisfaction that has been building for years within the Republican rank and file.

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Global warming activists seek to purge ‘deniers’ among local weathermen.

9:51 am

The inquisition is alive and well: A campaign by global warming activists is seeking to purge ‘deniers’ among local weathermen.

So far, the campaign has identified 55 “deniers” in the meteorologist community and are looking for more. They define “deniers” as “anyone who expressly refutes the overwhelming scientific consensus about climate change: that it is real, largely caused by humans, and already having profound impacts on our world. … We track the views of meteorologists through their on-air statements, blog posts, social media activity, public appearances, interviews, and interactions with viewers,” the campaign explains.

In other words, they should be fired because of their opinions.

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Investigators now think that MF Global, the company run by Jon Corzine, Obama adviser and fundraiser, lost its customers’ money in “a labyrinth of shady trading and raids.”

9:42 am

Investigators now think that MF Global, the company run by former Democratic governor Jon Corzine, Obama adviser and fundraiser, lost $1.2 billion of its customers’ money in “a labyrinth of shady trading and raids.”

In the end, Jon Corzine faces the serious possibility of prison time for his part in this scandal. And he was the go-to guy of the Obama administration for economic advice.

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Data issued last week without fanfare by both the UK’s Met Office and the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit has confirmed that the rising trend in world temperatures ended in 1997.

9:11 am

Data issued last week without fanfare by both the UK’s Met Office and the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit has confirmed that the rising trend in world temperatures ended in 1997.

The article also discusses at great length the additional influence the sun and its sunspot cycle might have on the climate, something I have discussed here at great length. However, the above factoid is the article’s most important data point.

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Romney puts forth his space plans at a rally in Florida

9:35 pm

In a campaign rally Friday in Florida, Mitt Romney put forth his perspective on the state of the American space program, and what he plans to do about it.

The speech is about 16 minutes long. It is worth listening to it in its entirety.

In it, Romney outlined the reasons he thinks a robust space program is important: defense, innovation, exploration, and the ability to respond to potential natural threats from space. Having done so, however, he then refused to outline any specific actions he would take to address these issues, saying instead that once in office he will bring together the right kinds of space experts who will then advice him on the right kind of plan to achieve all these important goals.

I appreciate his refusal to pander. At the same time, his vagueness does not make me enthusiastic. Moreover, he is only offering us the same thing we have seen numerous times before, another blue ribbon panel study outlining a plan. It would make me far happier if he already understood better the problems of the space program, and could articulate the actions he wishes to take, as Gingrich did.
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“This re-entry capsule now cannot be used for manned spaceflight.”

4:34 pm

“This re-entry capsule now cannot be used for manned spaceflight.”

This postponement of the next two Russian manned missions to ISS looks like a serious problem. For cracks to form in a finished capsule when tested under pressure suggests significant production failures that had gone unnoticed during assembly. In fact, this problem is far more serious than the launch failure that occurred last year. The Russians have to not only find a capsule they can trust to use on the next flight, they have to track down the errors that allowed a capsule to be built that is so obviously flawed it cracked when put in use.

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Persecution for the sake of global warming

11:45 am

Persecution for the sake of global warming.

Although the number of publicly dissenting scientists is growing, many young scientists furtively say that while they also have serious doubts about the global-warming message, they are afraid to speak up for fear of not being promoted—or worse. They have good reason to worry. In 2003, Dr. Chris de Freitas, the editor of the journal Climate Research, dared to publish a peer-reviewed article with the politically incorrect (but factually correct) conclusion that the recent warming is not unusual in the context of climate changes over the past thousand years. The international warming establishment quickly mounted a determined campaign to have Dr. de Freitas removed from his editorial job and fired from his university position. Fortunately, Dr. de Freitas was able to keep his university job.

The quote is part of an op-ed signed by sixteen prominent scientists describing why there is no need to panic over global warming.

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