I was sitting in a hotel room watching an interview with Jesse Ventura (you know, the pro wrestler turned governor of Minnesota) recently, and of course the subject was the presidential election.

He made a comment that really intrigued me: Have the two presidential candidates on the ballot, but a third option for “none of the above”.

Essentially, that would represent the folks who are taking the time to do their duty to vote, but don’t have enough confidence in any of the candidates to vote for either of them.  I kind of like that.

To be honest, I don’t see anyone in the running I’m convinced would make a good leader of …

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 …

Read more…

An easy way to fix our political system? Vote more. Not for people, but for issues.

If we voted on issues at the federal level rather than just for people, would our government get more done? From my standpoint, people have become so removed from the political system due to the fact that we elect people to make decisions and vote on our behalf. The problem is that most people don’t trust that their elected officials will represent them based on their own beliefs. After all, when was the last time my representative called me up and said: “Hey Grant, what do you think about abortion? …

President Bush is dreaming up ways to “stimulate the economy” as you read this. He will present his grand ideas on January 28th at the annual State of the Union speech.

This desire to stimulate the economy goes beyond the Oval Office, however. On Friday, Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid wrote a letter to the President seeking cooperation in developing an economic stimulus plan.

As many of you know, I’m a big fan of letting a free market and free economy work. The last thing we want to do is watch the government try to stimulate the economy. Let the …

My good buddy MJ over at Dyslexic Research forwarded me an article on how President Bush signed a bill to increase fuel efficiency standards to 35 MPG by the year 2020. Also lumped into the bill was a required ramp-up of the use of ethanol at refineries from about 6 billion gallons a year this year to 36 billion gallons by 2022 and additional mandates that by then at least 21 billion gallons are to come from feedstocks other than corn.

I like the fact that we’re raising fuel efficiency standards, finally. However I don’t think we’re exactly pushing …

It seems that not everyone in the scientific community is so hip to the Global Warming movement. Yesterday a detailed report was released by the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee revealing that over 400 prominent scientists disputed man-made global warming claims in 2007, as embellished by former Vice President Al Gore in his movie “An Inconvenient Truth’.

It’s about time!

The scientists named in this report, who are from more than two dozen countries, recently voiced objections to major aspects of the so-called “consensus” on man-made global warming. These scientists, many of whom participated in the UN IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), spoke critically about …

I’ve always been skeptical of the true value of running a vehicle on ethanol. I feel that the next great propulsive fuel must have a net energy content greater than gasoline. Scientifically, this means that the energy content of a given amount of future fuel must be greater than gasoline. Currently, I believe the prime candidate for this is hydrogen.

But I digress. Back to the ethanol farce.

I came across a Consumer Reports revelation from 2006 presenting the results of their gasoline vs. ethanol tests. They ran a battery of tests on a new (2007) flex-fuel …

Iranian President Ahmadinejad came out Sunday at the end of a rare OPEC summit stating that OPEC’s members have expressed interest in converting their cash reserves into a currency other than the depreciating U.S. dollar, which he called a “worthless piece of paper.” (It later became clear that the “members” he is referring to is none other than Iran and Venezuela… go figure.)

He went on to blame President Bush’s policies for the decline of the dollar and its negative effect on other countries.

In an effort to tag-team the idea, Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez jumped in from the sidelines saying “the empire …

I received the following link through an email forward from a good friend.

I’m not really into politics much, and quite frankly, our political system has hyped itself to a point where quite few people really care about what goes on in Washington, which is unfortunate.

However, if you’re a political no-nothing like myself, this little 11 question poll will tell you which of the 500-some candidates share your same views on certain topics.

Select a Candidate 2008

Good luck.

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…