Infamous Sign at Auschwitz That Was Stolen Is Found
I reported last week that the infamous sign, Arbeit Macht Frei, which graced one of the entrances of the Nazi Death camp was stolen.
At least according to the New York Times
A police spokesman, Dariusz Nowak, said the sign had been cut into three pieces, each containing one of the words.
The police would not reveal any details about how the sign was found or speculate on the motive of those who took it.
Other reports say that
Swedish neo-Nazis stole Auschwitz death camp sign to fund terror plot
A Swedish neo-Nazi group and ghoulish collectors are among possible suspects behind the shocking theft of the "Arbeit Macht Frei" sign from the Auschwitz concentration camp, according to reports.
You know what?
All thieves deserve a rich punishment.
Friday, December 25, 2009
Tuesday, December 22, 2009
Success in Copenhagen?
Is the world getting warmer?
I'll check the thermometer tomorrow and get back with ya' all.
So for the sake of argument, it is getting warmer.
I don't care to get into an argument if global warming (if it is warming at all) is due to human activity. Seems to me the "scientific evidence" is way to much influenced by different political, philosophical agendas
With that said, I would rather deal with the facts at hand.
We just watched the fiasco in Copenhagen where
Gordan Brown today said a new global treaty on climate change had been "held to ransom" by some countries opposed to a deal in Copenhagen, and called for reform of the way such negotiations take place, including an international body to handle environmental stewardship.
Guardian.co.uk
How about this?
President Barack Obama on Saturday defended an international climate accord reached in Copenhagen as an "important breakthrough"
REUTERS
I don't know who is worse, or had the better lie.
One thing for sure, these guys don't talk to each other.
Gordan Brown playing the blame game
or
Barak Obama claiming some imaginary success.
What really bedevils my mind is just what it is either of them expected to accomplish?
Time for a Climate Change Plan B
The U.S. president is in deep denial.
By NIGEL LAWSON
The world's political leaders, not least President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Gordon Brown, are in a state of severe, almost clinical, denial. While acknowledging that the outcome of the United Nations climate-change conference in Copenhagen fell short of their demand for a legally binding, enforceable and verifiable global agreement on emissions reductions by developed and developing countries alike, they insist that what has been achieved is a breakthrough and a decisive step forward.
Just one more heave, just one more venue for the great climate-change traveling circus—Mexico City next year—and the job will be done.
Or so we are told. It is, of course, the purest nonsense. The only breakthrough was the political coup for China and India in concluding the anodyne communiqué with the United States behind closed doors, with Brazil and South Africa allowed in the room and Europe left to languish in the cold outside.
Far from achieving a major step forward, Copenhagen—predictably—achieved precisely nothing. The nearest thing to a commitment was the promise by the developed world to pay the developing world $30 billion of "climate aid" over the next three years, rising to $100 billion a year from 2020. Not only is that (perhaps fortunately) not legally binding, but there is no agreement whatsoever about which countries it will go to, in which amounts, and on what conditions.
The reasons for the complete and utter failure of Copenhagen are both fundamental and irresolvable. The first is that the economic cost of decarbonizing the world's economies is massive, and of at least the same order of magnitude as any benefits it may conceivably bring in terms of a cooler world in the next century.
The reason we use carbon-based energy is not the political power of the oil lobby or the coal industry. It is because it is far and away the cheapest source of energy at the present time and is likely to remain so, not forever, but for the foreseeable future.
Switching to much more expensive energy may be acceptable to us in the developed world (although I see no present evidence of this). But in the developing world, including the rapidly developing nations such as China and India, there are still tens if not hundreds of millions of people suffering from acute poverty, and from the consequences of such poverty, in the shape of malnutrition, preventable disease and premature death.
The overriding priority for the developing world has to be the fastest feasible rate of economic development, which means, inter alia, using the cheapest available source of energy: carbon energy.
Moreover, the argument that they should make this economic and human sacrifice to benefit future generations 100 years and more hence is all the less compelling, given that these future generations will, despite any problems caused by warming, be many times better off than the people of the developing world are today.
Or, at least, that is the assumption on which the climate scientists' warming projections are based. It is projected economic growth that determines projected carbon emissions, and projected carbon emissions that (according to the somewhat conjectural computer models on which they rely) determine projected warming (according to the same models).
All this overlaps with the second of the two fundamental reasons why Copenhagen failed, and why Mexico City (if our leaders insist on continuing this futile charade) will fail, too. That is the problem of burden-sharing, and in particular how much of the economic cost of decarbonization should be borne by the developed world, which accounts for the bulk of past emissions, and how much by the faster-growing developing world, which will account for the bulk of future emissions.
The 2006 Stern Review, quite the shoddiest pseudo-scientific and pseudo-economic document any British Government has ever produced, claims the overall burden is very small. If that were so, the problem of how to share the burden would be readily overcome—as indeed occurred with the phasing out of chorofluorocarbons (CFCs) under the 1987 Montreal Protocol. But the true cost of decarbonization is massive, and the distribution of the burden an insoluble problem.
Moreover, any assessment of the impact of any future warming that may occur is inevitably highly conjectural, depending as it does not only on the uncertainties of climate science but also on the uncertainties of future technological development. So what we are talking about is risk.
Not that the risk is all one way. The risk of a 1930s-style outbreak of protectionism—if the developed world were to abjure cheap energy and faced enhanced competition from China and other rapidly industrializing countries that declined to do so—is probably greater than any risk from warming.
But even without that, there is not even a theoretical (let alone a practical) basis for a global agreement on burden-sharing, since, so far as the risk of global warming is concerned (and probably in other areas too) risk aversion is not uniform throughout the world. Not only do different cultures embody very different degrees of risk aversion, but in general the richer countries will tend to be more risk-averse than the poorer countries, if only because we have more to lose.
The time has come to abandon the Kyoto-style folly that reached its apotheosis in Copenhagen last week, and move to plan B.
And the outlines of a credible plan B are clear. First and foremost, we must do what mankind has always done, and adapt to whatever changes in temperature may in the future arise.
This enables us to pocket the benefits of any warming (and there are many) while reducing the costs. None of the projected costs are new phenomena, but the possible exacerbation of problems our climate already throws at us. Addressing these problems directly is many times more cost-effective than anything discussed at Copenhagen. And adaptation does not require a global agreement, although we may well need to help the very poorest countries (not China) to adapt.
Beyond adaptation, plan B should involve a relatively modest, increased government investment in technological research and development—in energy, in adaptation and in geoengineering.
Despite the overwhelming evidence of the Copenhagen debacle, it is not going to be easy to get our leaders to move to plan B. There is no doubt that calling a halt to the high-profile climate-change traveling circus risks causing a severe conference-deprivation trauma among the participants. If there has to be a small public investment in counseling, it would be money well spent.
Plan B
I'll check the thermometer tomorrow and get back with ya' all.
So for the sake of argument, it is getting warmer.
I don't care to get into an argument if global warming (if it is warming at all) is due to human activity. Seems to me the "scientific evidence" is way to much influenced by different political, philosophical agendas
With that said, I would rather deal with the facts at hand.
We just watched the fiasco in Copenhagen where
Gordan Brown today said a new global treaty on climate change had been "held to ransom" by some countries opposed to a deal in Copenhagen, and called for reform of the way such negotiations take place, including an international body to handle environmental stewardship.
Guardian.co.uk
How about this?
President Barack Obama on Saturday defended an international climate accord reached in Copenhagen as an "important breakthrough"
REUTERS
I don't know who is worse, or had the better lie.
One thing for sure, these guys don't talk to each other.
Gordan Brown playing the blame game
or
Barak Obama claiming some imaginary success.
What really bedevils my mind is just what it is either of them expected to accomplish?
Time for a Climate Change Plan B
The U.S. president is in deep denial.
By NIGEL LAWSON
The world's political leaders, not least President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Gordon Brown, are in a state of severe, almost clinical, denial. While acknowledging that the outcome of the United Nations climate-change conference in Copenhagen fell short of their demand for a legally binding, enforceable and verifiable global agreement on emissions reductions by developed and developing countries alike, they insist that what has been achieved is a breakthrough and a decisive step forward.
Just one more heave, just one more venue for the great climate-change traveling circus—Mexico City next year—and the job will be done.
Or so we are told. It is, of course, the purest nonsense. The only breakthrough was the political coup for China and India in concluding the anodyne communiqué with the United States behind closed doors, with Brazil and South Africa allowed in the room and Europe left to languish in the cold outside.
Far from achieving a major step forward, Copenhagen—predictably—achieved precisely nothing. The nearest thing to a commitment was the promise by the developed world to pay the developing world $30 billion of "climate aid" over the next three years, rising to $100 billion a year from 2020. Not only is that (perhaps fortunately) not legally binding, but there is no agreement whatsoever about which countries it will go to, in which amounts, and on what conditions.
The reasons for the complete and utter failure of Copenhagen are both fundamental and irresolvable. The first is that the economic cost of decarbonizing the world's economies is massive, and of at least the same order of magnitude as any benefits it may conceivably bring in terms of a cooler world in the next century.
The reason we use carbon-based energy is not the political power of the oil lobby or the coal industry. It is because it is far and away the cheapest source of energy at the present time and is likely to remain so, not forever, but for the foreseeable future.
Switching to much more expensive energy may be acceptable to us in the developed world (although I see no present evidence of this). But in the developing world, including the rapidly developing nations such as China and India, there are still tens if not hundreds of millions of people suffering from acute poverty, and from the consequences of such poverty, in the shape of malnutrition, preventable disease and premature death.
The overriding priority for the developing world has to be the fastest feasible rate of economic development, which means, inter alia, using the cheapest available source of energy: carbon energy.
Moreover, the argument that they should make this economic and human sacrifice to benefit future generations 100 years and more hence is all the less compelling, given that these future generations will, despite any problems caused by warming, be many times better off than the people of the developing world are today.
Or, at least, that is the assumption on which the climate scientists' warming projections are based. It is projected economic growth that determines projected carbon emissions, and projected carbon emissions that (according to the somewhat conjectural computer models on which they rely) determine projected warming (according to the same models).
All this overlaps with the second of the two fundamental reasons why Copenhagen failed, and why Mexico City (if our leaders insist on continuing this futile charade) will fail, too. That is the problem of burden-sharing, and in particular how much of the economic cost of decarbonization should be borne by the developed world, which accounts for the bulk of past emissions, and how much by the faster-growing developing world, which will account for the bulk of future emissions.
The 2006 Stern Review, quite the shoddiest pseudo-scientific and pseudo-economic document any British Government has ever produced, claims the overall burden is very small. If that were so, the problem of how to share the burden would be readily overcome—as indeed occurred with the phasing out of chorofluorocarbons (CFCs) under the 1987 Montreal Protocol. But the true cost of decarbonization is massive, and the distribution of the burden an insoluble problem.
Moreover, any assessment of the impact of any future warming that may occur is inevitably highly conjectural, depending as it does not only on the uncertainties of climate science but also on the uncertainties of future technological development. So what we are talking about is risk.
Not that the risk is all one way. The risk of a 1930s-style outbreak of protectionism—if the developed world were to abjure cheap energy and faced enhanced competition from China and other rapidly industrializing countries that declined to do so—is probably greater than any risk from warming.
But even without that, there is not even a theoretical (let alone a practical) basis for a global agreement on burden-sharing, since, so far as the risk of global warming is concerned (and probably in other areas too) risk aversion is not uniform throughout the world. Not only do different cultures embody very different degrees of risk aversion, but in general the richer countries will tend to be more risk-averse than the poorer countries, if only because we have more to lose.
The time has come to abandon the Kyoto-style folly that reached its apotheosis in Copenhagen last week, and move to plan B.
And the outlines of a credible plan B are clear. First and foremost, we must do what mankind has always done, and adapt to whatever changes in temperature may in the future arise.
This enables us to pocket the benefits of any warming (and there are many) while reducing the costs. None of the projected costs are new phenomena, but the possible exacerbation of problems our climate already throws at us. Addressing these problems directly is many times more cost-effective than anything discussed at Copenhagen. And adaptation does not require a global agreement, although we may well need to help the very poorest countries (not China) to adapt.
Beyond adaptation, plan B should involve a relatively modest, increased government investment in technological research and development—in energy, in adaptation and in geoengineering.
Despite the overwhelming evidence of the Copenhagen debacle, it is not going to be easy to get our leaders to move to plan B. There is no doubt that calling a halt to the high-profile climate-change traveling circus risks causing a severe conference-deprivation trauma among the participants. If there has to be a small public investment in counseling, it would be money well spent.
Plan B
In days of old, Pakistan, , ,
Most of my life, I never really knew much about Pakistan.
I was always aware of its geographical location, and differences with India.
Personally, never had a dog in that fight, between India and Pakistan, but things have changed.
In the past few years, Pakistan has become a very important place.
A nation with nuclear bombs, delivery systems and under attack by radical Muslims, i.e. Taliban, Pakistan deserves close attention.
PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Three people were killed Tuesday in a suicide bombing outside a club for Pakistani journalists in this northwestern city, as Islamic militants continued a two-month spree of violence that has further destabilized this politically fragile nation.
Dollars to donuts, a measure of a nations prosperity and freedom of press is directly connected.
Militants have called the string of attacks a response to a military operation against the Pakistani Taliban in a mountainous region near the Afghan border. No area of the country has been hit harder than Peshawar, the volatile capital of the province edging that region. Though most attacks have targeted security forces, militants have also struck a market, a mosque and now -- for the first time, authorities said -- reporters in the city.
Pakistani journalists are "facing the wrath of terrorists" because they publicize militants' bad deeds, said Mian Iftikhar Hussain, a government spokesman for the Northwest Frontier Province, who spoke to reporters on the scene.
The attack on Monday sent shock waves through Pakistan's media community, though journalists in Peshawar said they were not surprised they were targeted. The press club, a popular gathering spot for journalists in the restive city, had received recent threats and boosted its security in response, Shahid said
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/22/AR2009122200219.html?hpid=artslot
It is impossible for me to know what it is like to live in fear for just expressing my views.
After all, I am also a journalist.
I was always aware of its geographical location, and differences with India.
Personally, never had a dog in that fight, between India and Pakistan, but things have changed.
In the past few years, Pakistan has become a very important place.
A nation with nuclear bombs, delivery systems and under attack by radical Muslims, i.e. Taliban, Pakistan deserves close attention.
PESHAWAR, Pakistan -- Three people were killed Tuesday in a suicide bombing outside a club for Pakistani journalists in this northwestern city, as Islamic militants continued a two-month spree of violence that has further destabilized this politically fragile nation.
Dollars to donuts, a measure of a nations prosperity and freedom of press is directly connected.
Militants have called the string of attacks a response to a military operation against the Pakistani Taliban in a mountainous region near the Afghan border. No area of the country has been hit harder than Peshawar, the volatile capital of the province edging that region. Though most attacks have targeted security forces, militants have also struck a market, a mosque and now -- for the first time, authorities said -- reporters in the city. Pakistani journalists are "facing the wrath of terrorists" because they publicize militants' bad deeds, said Mian Iftikhar Hussain, a government spokesman for the Northwest Frontier Province, who spoke to reporters on the scene.
The attack on Monday sent shock waves through Pakistan's media community, though journalists in Peshawar said they were not surprised they were targeted. The press club, a popular gathering spot for journalists in the restive city, had received recent threats and boosted its security in response, Shahid said
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/22/AR2009122200219.html?hpid=artslot
It is impossible for me to know what it is like to live in fear for just expressing my views.
After all, I am also a journalist.
Sunday, December 20, 2009
President Obama the the Democratic goons should hang their heads low. It is cruel the dishonorable way they favor Big Money Union over the education of our youth.
'Duplicitous and Shameful'
The waiting is finally over for some of the District of Columbia's most ambitious school children and their parents. Democrats in Congress voted to kill the District's Opportunity Scholarship Program, which provides 1,700 disadvantaged kids with vouchers worth up to $7,500 per year to attend a private school.
I have seen this same story repeated over and over. Union Hacks sole purpose for existence is raping the public troth and have zero concern for what parents and taxpayers want, education for our children.
On Sunday the Senate approved a spending bill that phases out funding for the five-year-old program. Several prominent Senators this week sent a letter to Majority Leader Harry Reid pleading for a reconsideration. Signed by Independent-Democrat Joe Lieberman, Democrats Robert Byrd and Dianne Feinstein, and Republicans Susan Collins and John Ensign, it asked to save a program that has "provided a lifeline to many low-income students in the District of Columbia." President Obama signed the bill Thursday.
The program's popularity has generated long waiting lists. A federal evaluation earlier this year said the mostly black and Hispanic participants are making significant academic gains and narrowing the achievement gap. But for the teachers unions, this just can't happen. The National Education Association instructed Democratic lawmakers to kill it.
Democrats shaft Poor Students
But hey, once in a while, on the local level the bastards can be beaten.
Editorial: Better than expected
Getting there wasn't pretty, and some of it was pure nonsense. But finally, the Legislature finished the job of preparing Michigan schools for a leap in quality and accountability.
Michigan's Race to the Top legislation, months overdue and needed so the state can compete for more than $400 million in federal dollars, came to fruition on Saturday -- nothing less than a holiday miracle for a bitterly divided Lansing.
TEXT
That editorial is a good read. a lesson on how in Michigan the deceitful and monied Union Gangsters will stoop to no low in chasing the almighty dollar.
'Duplicitous and Shameful'
The waiting is finally over for some of the District of Columbia's most ambitious school children and their parents. Democrats in Congress voted to kill the District's Opportunity Scholarship Program, which provides 1,700 disadvantaged kids with vouchers worth up to $7,500 per year to attend a private school.
I have seen this same story repeated over and over. Union Hacks sole purpose for existence is raping the public troth and have zero concern for what parents and taxpayers want, education for our children.
On Sunday the Senate approved a spending bill that phases out funding for the five-year-old program. Several prominent Senators this week sent a letter to Majority Leader Harry Reid pleading for a reconsideration. Signed by Independent-Democrat Joe Lieberman, Democrats Robert Byrd and Dianne Feinstein, and Republicans Susan Collins and John Ensign, it asked to save a program that has "provided a lifeline to many low-income students in the District of Columbia." President Obama signed the bill Thursday.
The program's popularity has generated long waiting lists. A federal evaluation earlier this year said the mostly black and Hispanic participants are making significant academic gains and narrowing the achievement gap. But for the teachers unions, this just can't happen. The National Education Association instructed Democratic lawmakers to kill it.
Democrats shaft Poor Students
But hey, once in a while, on the local level the bastards can be beaten.
Editorial: Better than expected
Getting there wasn't pretty, and some of it was pure nonsense. But finally, the Legislature finished the job of preparing Michigan schools for a leap in quality and accountability.
Michigan's Race to the Top legislation, months overdue and needed so the state can compete for more than $400 million in federal dollars, came to fruition on Saturday -- nothing less than a holiday miracle for a bitterly divided Lansing.
TEXT
That editorial is a good read. a lesson on how in Michigan the deceitful and monied Union Gangsters will stoop to no low in chasing the almighty dollar.
Auschwitz sign stolen
For as much I hate thieves, I haven't given enough attention to the subject of theft.
Bad enough when personal property has been taken, but something of historical significance is a loss of greater magnitude.
Thieves in Poland stole a famous Nazi sign from the gates of the Auschwitz concentration camp that reads "Work Will Set You Free," authorities said Friday.
The sign at the death camp's entrance became a symbol of the horrors of the Holocaust, implying that hard work was the way imprisoned Jews could get out of the camp. More than a million people died at Auschwitz, most of whom were condemned to gas chambers.
The theft - which police said may have been ordered by a private collector or a group of individuals - sparked widespread outrage.
Bad enough when personal property has been taken, but something of historical significance is a loss of greater magnitude.
Thieves in Poland stole a famous Nazi sign from the gates of the Auschwitz concentration camp that reads "Work Will Set You Free," authorities said Friday.
The sign at the death camp's entrance became a symbol of the horrors of the Holocaust, implying that hard work was the way imprisoned Jews could get out of the camp. More than a million people died at Auschwitz, most of whom were condemned to gas chambers.
The theft - which police said may have been ordered by a private collector or a group of individuals - sparked widespread outrage.I am dumbfounded as to who would want to possess this.
It would be a real shame is the scumbags who took this already sold it for scrap and it is melted down.
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