Interesting commentary in the Washington Times on Saturday. It seems a few “facts” are surfacing about the research conducted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on global warming.

Contributor Sterling Burnett is a senior fellow with the National Center for Policy Analysis (a nonpartisan, nonprofit research institute in Dallas) and made some interesting points about the IPCC’s “study of climate change”. I’ll print a few of those points here, but I encourage you to read the full article here.

In a 2001 report, the IPCC published an image commonly referred to as the “hockey stick.” This graph showed relatively stable temperatures from A.D. 1000 to 1900, with temperatures …

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I did a little surfing over at the Wall Street Journal, and while perusing the videos, came across a clip from on of my favorite comedians, Drew Carey. The title of the video was “The Middle Class is doing fine”, and it really touched on how bad we have it… err, how bad we think we have it… err, how bad we are led to believe we have it. Yeah, that’s it.

Our television sets force feed us stats and rhetoric about how tight our budgets have become, how fast we’re losing money, and how difficult it is to make ends meet. The truth is, we’re not that …

It seems not everyone loves Jim Cramer. It seems not everyone sees the value in his show, Mad Money.

It seems that Paul Ferrell, in particular, given a stage and a microphone, is more than willing to lob the opening volley that would not only spur an open retort from the mad man himself, but a frothy discussion on boards, blogs, and forums.

In case you missed it, Paul Ferrell’s column appeared on MarketWatch.com last week, and I really didn’t find anywhere in the piece where Ferrell held anything back. I even read between the lines…

“Last week I finally listened to the “Mad …

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The new Fox Business channel debuted a couple weeks ago, and at first I blew it off as another talking-heads show that did little for the common Joe’s Wall Street appetite.

However, the channel is starting to grow on me. Maybe it’s because it’s new, or maybe it’s because it’s just different.

I particularly like the Fox Business Happy Hour. It’s got a couple young hosts (Cody Willard and Rebecca Gomez) that a guy my age could identify with. They’re out in the open instead of being stuck behind a desk, and …

It’s been a busy last couple weeks. After spending a week away from home on business, and then recuperating and catching up with all that piled up during that week, I think I’m about back to normal. Or as close to normal as I’ve ever been.

I finally got the rent check from my tenants, it was only two weeks late, but as I suspected, the tenants didn’t account for the increase in postage last month, which landed their otherwise timely mail back on their door step.

Along those same lines, the tenants have agreed to renew their lease for an additional year, while adding a third roommate …

According to the LA Times, the House voted, 284-141, to pass a bill that would make gasoline price gouging a federal offense.

If that doesn’t make you feel good about the work our government is doing in Washington, you’re not alone…

Meanwhile, the Senate is working like mad to introduce a new energy bill, the first since they took control of the Congress and promised change in the first 100 hours. A committee also held a hearing on whether oil industry mergers had contributed to higher fuel prices.

If all else fails, blame capitalism. If anything it will make you feel good inside.

“I was at a funeral Saturday, and when the monsignor greeted me, he said, ‘My God, Bart, you have to do something about these gas prices!’ ” said Rep. Bart Stupak (D-Mich.), chief sponsor of the anti-gouging bill.

Rep. Sheila Jackson-Lee (D-Texas) told her colleagues: “I can’t go home, and I imagine none of you can, without saying we tried to do something.”-Source

What a bunch of baloney!

This worthless legislation allows the government to investigate and prosecute anyone selling fuel at a price deemed “excessive” during a Presidentially declared “energy emergency” or under the premise that the seller is taking advantage of unusual market conditions.

Let’s be vague, shall we?

First of all, define what constitutes an “energy emergency”. Then define how you will determine if someone is taking advantage of “unusual market conditions”. While you’re at it, tell the convenience store owner that he’s charging too much at his pump when the customers are fully willing to pay him for his product!

And I’m sure we’ll appoint a new “energy czar” to go around and enforce these new laws, which of course will require a new 25 cent gas tax to pay for the enforcement agency…

Al Gore was back in D.C. today to discus his bread-and-butter topic: global warming. As I’ve mentioned before, anytime you have data that suggests that you’ve come to a scientific “consensus”, you haven’t talked to enough scientists.

Even Katie Couric is jumping on the Gore-bal Warming bandwagon:

But today it was a triumphant return, this time as a private citizen, to declare that the world faces a “planetary emergency” over climate change. And now, a lot of his skeptics agree that Gore makes a powerful point.

The scientific consensus is clear, and Gore urged Congress to listen to scientists, not special interests. He pushed for an immediate freeze on greenhouse gases, as well …

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I’ve never been crazy about all the “global warming” hype that’s been running rampant over the last couple years.

While I don’t dispute the fact that the Earth, or at the very least the United States, is getting warmer, I think it’s still highly arguable that the root cause is mankind and the scale of the problem is related to his extravagant carbon lifestyle.

The underlying problem I have is the numerous claims that scientists have come to a “consensus” that the world is getting warmer, and humans are without a doubt responsible for the demise of life as we know it.

Call me an engineer, …

The end of 2006 is upon us, and hopefully looking back you’ve had a good year.

The end of the fiscal year marks the deadline for any tax maneuvers you may have had in place, and stocks that you’re planning on for tax purposes must have cleared by the end of business on Friday.

As for me, I wrote myself a check for reimbursements from my oil company, which will hopefully drive down the profit I’ll have to pay taxes on.

On that note, it’s important to start gathering all your receipts, collecting mileage logs and organizing all your financial information for your tax preparer. The more organized you are, …

After downing a cup of coffee last Thursday in an effort to counter the effects of tryptophan, I sat down to watch the Kansas City Chiefs take on the Denver Broncos.

During half time, I learned that my relatives half-way across the country could not enjoy the same past time. Why? Because in order to get the Thanksgiving Day football game, they had to have a subscription to NFL Network.

Over the past few years, we’ve seen the Dallas Cowboys take on some low caliber team-de-jur. The only hope would be that Terrell Owens would do something dumb (again) and we’d have something …