Unleaded Gasoline May Reduce Crime

April 28, 2013 by

Who would have thought that getting lead out of gasoline would have had such an apparently positive impact on reducing crime?

According to a WSJ article, rising levels of lead in the environment from the 1950s through 1970s, in large part due to leaded gasoline, was correlated with rising crime 20 years later. This is because toddlers, who often put their fingers in their mouths, ingested dirt contaminated by air pollution. By the time they were in their late teens and early twenties – the age when violence tends to peak – crime had risen.

Then in the 1970s came the prohibition of leaded gasoline. The article states, “As lead in the environment fell in the ’70s and ’80s—thanks in large part to the regulation of gasoline—violence fell correspondingly. No other single factor can account for both the inexplicable rise in violence in the U.S. until 1993 and the precipitous drop since then.”

It would be interesting to find out if the scientists and policymakers back then knew of the correlation between lead and crime. Probably not. Little did they know of the unintended positive effects of their actions.

Filed Under: Crime, Environment

Warmer Winters? Global Warming. Colder Winters? Global Warming.

December 30, 2011 by

Warmer-than-normal winters? Must be evidence of global warming. Colder-than-normal winters? Must be evidence of global warming.

So say the global warming alarmists.

An example of the first sentiment is an article in today’s Washington Post – lamenting the warmer-than-normal winter we’ve been having so far.

An example of the second sentiment is an article in the Washington Post from a few weeks ago. According to Washington Post weather blogger Andrew Freedman, global warming paradoxically is supposed to cause colder winters in mid-latitudes. With melted ice in the arctic resulting in open water, Freedman writes,

the dark ocean surface absorbs more incoming solar radiation than sea ice does ….warmer air leads to higher atmospheric pressure surfaces over the Arctic Ocean, and this can weaken the high-altitude winds that circle the North Pole from west to east, known as the ‘polar vortex.’ A weaker polar vortex can provide greater opportunities for Arctic air to flow southward, into areas like the U.S. and parts of Europe, while the Arctic experiences warmer-than-average conditions.

So based on the above observation, a warmer-than-normal winter here must mean a colder-than-normal winter in the arctic. But under the global warming theory, the arctic is supposed to be warming, resulting in colder winters here (because warm air up there pushes the cold air southward).

According to the above theory, our hitherto warmer-than-normal winter here is inconsistent with global warming. So maybe you can rest easy after all.

I say maybe because no one seems to have any definitive answers regarding man-made global warming. Even the scientists admit that there are huge unanswered questions; and most meteorologists only concern themselves with weather forecasts 10 days out. It’s incredible that so many non-scientists are so smugly sure of themselves on man-made global warming pro- and con. Yet they know know next to nothing about the science of weather. I bet if you asked them basic questions of weather, like what causes clouds, what causes precipitation, what causes storms, what causes wind, what causes dew, and even how a barometer predicts weather, nine out of ten wouldn’t know the answers. And if they don’t know answers to basic questions of weather, how can they be so smugly sure of themselves on a topic vastly more complicated – i.e. climate change?

Having said that, just from anecdotal evidence within my own narrow vantage point, I’d be inclined to think that winters in North America are a bit warmer than in the past. Back when I was a kid in northern Minnesota (Grand Rapids. No, not Michigan.), we were usually skating by Thanksgiving, i.e. the lakes were usually frozen by then. These days, however, my sister, who still lives there, tells me that they usually can’t skate by Thanksgiving. Then I looked to find out if there’s an official record of ice freezes and thaws in Northern Minnesota. I found this one – of Detroit Lake. (No, not Michigan. Minnesota.) It shows that in the 2000′s, the ice freezes have been only slightly later than in previous decades – although substantially later than in the early part of the 20th century (when it sometimes froze in October).

But in fact, the above-referenced ice freeze record is probably inconsistent with the man-caused theory. Based on the logic of the man-caused version of events, the 2000′s ice freezes should be substantially later than the 1950s, 1960s, 1970s and 1980s – i.e. the 2000′s should be substantially warmer than those decades – because during the second half of the 20th century so much of the third world industrialized. Much more carbon likely (I say likely because I don’t have time to research it right now – remember that this is just a think-out-loud blog) was pumped into the atmosphere during the second part of the the century than the first due to factories and cars proliferating everywhere around the world – like China and India and Mexico and Brazil – not just primarily North American and Europe. With accelerating levels of carbon going into the atmosphere in recent decades – much more so than in the pre-WWII era – you’d think that average temperatures should have likewise accelerated upward during the post-WWII timeframe. But they haven’t.

But who knows. There are tons of variables involved. Again, climate science is so inexact. Unanswered questions galore. As a nonscientist, any speculation from me on the matter is feeble. Same with other nonscientists – as well as scientists who don’t study long-term weather trends (which means most scientists). Even the conclusions of some weather scientists should be suspect – e.g. those with an agenda and/or who get global warming funding.

In any case the earth – or at least North America – may well be warming, but the big question is whether it’s man-caused. After all, there was the medieval warming period, which definitely wasn’t caused by industrial emissions.

If there’s one thing that’s certain, it’s that the earth’s climate sometimes warms, sometimes cools, regardless of the influence of mankind.

And a History Channel special, How the Earth Was Made, points out that in the end, the ice always wins out. I.e., even if the earth is warming now, it’s only temporary. We’re living during an interglacial period, which are said to last around 10,000 years whereas ice ages are said to last around 100,000 years. (And evidently it’s been around 10,000 years since the last ice age.) Someday the climate will be so cold that the northern part of what’s now the United States will be covered in ice two miles thick.

But that’s way beyond any of our lifetimes. Probably hundreds or, more likely, thousands of years hence.

Filed Under: Global Warming Tagged With: , Leave a Comment

You’re To Blame for the Gulf Oil Spill Disaster

May 9, 2010 by

There’s a lot of blame going around for the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, and of course BP is getting most of it.

Who else should get a lot of the blame?

Look at yourself in the mirror – i.e. you, me and anyone else who chooses to consume oil and oil-derived products.

We all love oil – even those who profess to hate it and the companies that produce it. They love oil too, or else they wouldn’t keep choosing to consume it all the time.

We the consumers of oil rely on other people to extract it from the ground for us. While we expect them to extract it flawlessly, that’s not always realistic. With such vast and sophisticated extraction operations, fraught with methane and other flammable liquids and gases at every turn, there are bound to be occasional accidents and oil spills. Without you generating the demand for oil, there would be no oil wells. And no oil spills. So the ultimate responsibility for the Gulf of Mexico oil spill disaster lies with you.

Yes, that includes Prius-driving, Big-Oil condemning, snowmobile-loathing people who call themselves environmentalists. Chances are, they’re among big oil’s best, most loyal, and most dedicated customers as well. They’re constantly using their product – every day, many times a day; every time they drive their car, grease their bike, turn on their oil heater, moisten their lips with Vaseline, ride the bus, fly to their destinations, and buy their food that was transported to the grocery store in oil-consuming trucks. They hate Big Oil but love its product. Without it, their well-being, comfort level, and happiness would be severely compromised. They’d be living in abject poverty.

So you think that driving a Prius will reduce the demand for oil and thus help prevent oil spills? Nonsense – driving a Prius will help prolong our supplies of oil. We’ll keep extracting it for a longer time than we otherwise would have. So driving a Prius may even increase the potential for oil spills in the long run.

BTW, I’ve got nothing against buying a Prius at all. I’m all for prolonging our supplies of oil and saving people money.

In fact for my next car I’m thinking of a Civic hybrid (Priuses to me look nerdy). But because it’s about $5,000 more expensive than a regular Civic, I calculated that, assuming $2.80/gal. gas, I’d have to drive it for about 10 years in order for it to pay off in terms of money saved thanks to the higher gas mileage. That’s a let-down. And there’s no tax credit for Civic hybrids anymore.

Filed Under: Big Oil, Environment Tagged With: , , , Leave a Comment

Prius is the New Volvo

April 11, 2010 by

 

Assumption: Prius drivers disproportionately lean to the left, just as Volvo drivers lean left – or at least used to. I don’t have statistics verifying that but it seems to be the case.

Why? I think it has just as much to do with the body style than it does with the gas mileage. The Prius body style to me looks nerdy. Likewise, Volvo body styles, with their boxy look, used to be nerdy (now they’re more mainstream). And for some reason, people who like the nerdy look tend to lean left.

As far as the high gas mileage aspect of the Prius, righties should be just a likely as lefties to be attracted to that. Granted, lefties more than righties likely would be attracted to hybrid cars because they think* they’re helping the environment. But righties would be more likely than lefties to be attracted to hybrid cars based on the reason that they think they’re saving money in the long run (assuming the purchase price isn’t overwhelmingly higher than a non-hybrid equivalent). Savers tend to be righties and spenders tend to be lefties, both when it comes to personal finances and national finances.

So in the end, the reason you saw more Obama bumper stickers than McCain bumper stickers on Priuses has got to be the nerdy body style.

 

* “Think” is the operative word. They may think they’re helping the environment, but they’re harming it. Anytime you drive around a half-ton machine that requires the laying of thousands of square miles of pavement and associated destruction of trees and natural habitat, that requires the construction of habitat-destroying and energy-consuming automotive factories, that requires the extraction and distribution of oil and other natural resources, that emits pollutants into the air, that generates a bit of noise pollution, and that to some observers generates sight pollution (i.e., the nerdy look), you’re not helping the environment at all. While you may be harming it a little less than, say, an SUV, it’s microscopically less. And you’re destroying the environment much more than the ever-hated (by lefties) snowmobiles and four-wheelers, which don’t require the paving over of natural habitat.

If you really want to help the environment, then don’t buy a Prius. Or any car.

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Bill Nye: PG, or Perhaps PG-13?

March 7, 2010 by

What a hassle it’s going to be. Bill Nye the Science Guy now requires parental guidance! Whoda thunk that the guy has had an agenda all this time, foisting it on his impressionable young viewers.

Believe me, if you allow yourself to appear on the far left’s Rachel Maddow’s TV show, and you call anyone who questions man-caused global warming unpatriotic, as Bill did the other day, then you have an axe to grind.

This means that whenever your kids watch reruns of his show (the PBS series ended) or more recent presentations, try to watch with them in order to provide commentary in response to any claptrap that ole’ Bill Nye spews.

Now hopefully he talks about noncontroversial things most of the time, like how magnets work or what not, but when he treads on hot political topics of the day like global warming, then you’d better be there to present to your kids the opposing point of view. And if you can’t watch with them, then talk about opposing viewpoints with them when you can. Have them check out websites like the Cassiopia Project including their video on global warming. They seem to really know their stuff when it comes to science – certainly more so than Bill.

I’m not saying I know for sure whether global warming exists and if so, whether man is causing it, but when it comes to something as controversial as that, be wary of guys like Bill; his opting to appear on Rachel’s show, and spew what he spewed, just blew away any appearance of objectivity on his part.

Filed Under: Global Warming Tagged With: Leave a Comment

Global Cooling Caused by Global Warming?

January 5, 2010 by

You know it had to be coming. Blame cold weather on – what else? – global warming.

That’s what they did in an article on Peru’s mountain people, who reportedly are fighting for survival amid a bitterly cold winter. The reporter cites rapidly melting glaciers, which “may” be the reason for the cold.

A surprising statement like that deserves a lot of back-up. But none was given. That should make any reader skeptical of such a claim, especially given that it was coming from the left-wing, global-warming-agenda-driven Guardian newspaper.

At the time of this writing, there are record low temperatures throughout the Northern Hemisphere. It even hit 32 degrees in Miami.

Another ice age coming on? Whatever is causing these low temps doesn’t have anything to do with the alleged ultimate cause of ice ages: variations in the tilt of the earth’s axis. While the tilt is decreasing, causing the Northern Hemisphere to be a bit farther from the sun during summer (it’s said that ice ages happen when snow fails to melt during summer), that decrease is happening too gradually for any one person to notice changes that result from it during his or her lifetime. The tilt variations happen in 40,000 year cycles.

To see a great video animation describing this tilt and other fascinating characteristics of the earth’s position vis-a-vis the sun, click here.

The producer of that video, the Cassiopia Project, also has an interesting video on global warming. They say variations in the amount of radiation coming from the sun have been the main cause of the colder temps over the past decade.

They also attempt to demonstrate that global warming isn’t caused by humans.

Based on their dozens of other videos, they seem to know a helluva lot about science, so you certainly can’t dismiss their claims.

That’s the thing about global warming. We laymen only can rely on what the scientists tell us, because without a science background, never in a million years would any of us know what’s causing global warming, or whether it’s happening at all. It’s amusing to see folks like Al Gore project themselves as some sort of authority on global warming. As a layman, he’s no more qualified to pontificate on global warming than any other of us laymen. Even the scientists have profound disagreements on the causes. If you research the subject a little, you see why: there are so many factors, so many variables that determine the climate, many of which are unknown or unmeasurable, that even modern science can’t get a handle on it. Chaos theory galore.

So you just have to look at all the evidence and do your best to come up with your own judgment. And lately, in the wake of Climategate and the freezing cold temps, it seems the global warming “skeptics” are getting the upper hand.

Filed Under: Global Warming Tagged With: Leave a Comment

Global Warming Alarmists’ True Motive?

December 17, 2009 by

The most outrageous story of the week: the cheers, applause, and ovations that Hugo Chavez received at the Copenhagen climate change conference, during his capitalism-bashing speech. On the surface it shows that global warming alarmists are ultimately motivated by a desire to overthrow or impede capitalism. In my mind it’s a huge blow to the global warming movement; is it possible that the movement is nothing more than a disguised attempt to squelch capitalism?

I say “on the surface,” because before reaching such a conclusion I’d have to find out the composition of the audience, and whether the cheers and applause came from all of the audience or just a vocal minority. If it was a general audience composed of the participating countries’ main delegates, and if most of them applauded, then we have reason to worry.

If on the other hand the audience was mainly composed of a minority of delegates from countries in Africa and other third world locales where radical leftism is par for the course, then there’s less reason to worry.

Unfortunately, the news report gave no indication of the composition of the audience. If you have any information on that, please contact me.

Filed Under: Global Warming, Socialism Tagged With: , , Leave a Comment

New Rule for E-mail

December 3, 2009 by

There’s a rule of thumb that says, “Never write anything in an e-mail that you wouldn’t want to show up on the front page of the New York Times.”

Well that’s obsolete. It should now be, “Never write anything in an e-mail that you wouldn’t want to show up on the Drudge Report.”

In other words, when they have their hands on a juicy news story, there’s a good chance that the New York Times and other organs of the “mainstream media” won’t run with it or feature it prominently – if that news story is embarrassing to their ideological agenda.

Case in point: Climategate. The treasure trove of embarrassing e-mails hasn’t yet landed on the New York Times’ front page. Instead it’s been buried in its environment or science section.

And as of this writing – 12 days after the story broke – the main TV networks ABC, CBS and NBC apparently still haven’t uttered a peep about Climategate, one of the biggest science and public policy scandals in history.

So writers of juicy e-mails from a left-of-center perspective had better beware: you’re not safe anymore. Though the “mainstream media” may let you off the hook as they’ve done in the past, the “new media” won’t.

Filed Under: Global Warming, Media Bias Tagged With: , Leave a Comment

Enviros’ Deafening Silence on the Estate Tax

October 22, 2009 by

(A previous version of this article appeared in The Christian Science Monitor.)

The Obama administration aims to prevent the demise of an institution that encourages the destruction of wildlife habitat and open space. And in this legislative battle, the major environmental organizations are nowhere to be found.

At issue is the notoriously perverse incentive that forces people to sell their pristine land to developers: the estate tax.

If you own land, a business, or other high-value assets, when you die the government may take a substantial portion of that for itself, depending on the total dollar amount the assets. In the past, the government would allow one’s heirs to keep up to $600,000 of the assets, and slap a 55 percent tax on anything above that amount. Beginning in 1998 the exemption started to rise with each new year; currently it is $3.5 million.

It is scheduled to be completely phased out in 2010 and then permanently reinstated at the $1 million exemption level in 2011 when the Bush tax cuts are due to expire. Supporters of death-tax repeal are hoping that a zero death tax in 2010 would result in political support for permanent repeal. But if the Obama administration gets its way, those hopes will be dashed.

The administration has proposed not completely phasing it out in 2010 after all, which would quash any political momentum for repeal. Instead, the $3.5 million exemption level would be maintained in 2010 and thereafter. Congress still needs to act on this – expected by the end of 2009.

One of the most sinister effects of the estate tax is the needless loss of millions of acres of farmland, forestland, and wildlife habitat. When a landowner dies, his or her heirs are often shocked to find out that they must pay huge sums to the government within nine months of the death, based on the value of the land. To pay the money, they are typically forced to sell the land – often to developers.

A particular problem is the breakup of contiguous tracks of land, which are necessary for larger animals to forage and roam.

A 2000 study by the U.S. Forest Service’s Southern Research Station found that about 1.3 million acres per year of forestland had to be sold to pay the estate tax, and of the land sold, 29 percent was developed or converted to other uses. And 2.6 million acres of trees are chopped down each year to pay the estate tax. To be sure, those acreage numbers now could be lower because of the gradual phase-out of the estate tax, but in 2011 if the estate tax is reinstated, the numbers will likely shoot up again.

One would think the major environmental organizations would be clamoring for the permanent repeal of the estate tax.

But this is not the case. Most such organizations are silent on the issue. Some, such as Friends of the Earth, even support the estate tax. A spokesperson there told me that heirs would sell their land to developers anyway, even if there were no estate tax.

While some selling still would take place, the question is, would more selling be going on with the estate tax, or without it? It’s the former. After all, the tax gives most families no option but to sell. Without the tax, a large percentage of those families undoubtedly would choose to keep and preserve their land.

The FoE spokesperson also noted, presumably with a straight face (we spoke over the phone), that the estate tax encourages conservation (!) through conservation easements. These are where landowners get some tax relief in exchange for preserving their land. It is certainly plausible that an easement could induce some heirs to preserve their land, who otherwise would have sold it if there were no estate tax. But conservation easements are complex undertakings; most landowners and heirs do not go through the time and expense of setting them up. The result: far more land subject to the estate tax is sold than placed into easements.

In 1998 – the latest year for which I found statistics – the Office of Management and Budget estimated that deductions for conservation easements over the ensuing five years (1999-2003) would reduce estate tax revenue by less than two-tenths of one percentage point (0.18 percent).

Two New York Democratic members of Congress certainly seem to believe the estate tax is taking a toll on the environment. Concerned about dwindling open space on Long Island, Senator Charles Schumer and Congressman Tim Bishop put forward a bill several years ago that would defer the estate tax for those who agree to not sell their land to developers.

I suspect that a big reason for environmental groups’ support for or silence on the issue has to do with other factors. Most employees of and donors to major environmental groups hail from the left side of the political spectrum, where anything that reeks of tax cuts for the rich is anathema. Even for those organizations sympathetic to repealing the estate tax, publicly supporting that could alienate much of their donor base.

R.J. Smith of the Competitive Enterprise Institute said that in the 1970s, environmental organizations began to get captured by the left. Convinced that the source of environmental degradation was a free-market society based on private property rights, young radicals migrated into traditional conservation organizations like the National Audubon Society. He said they eventually took them over and moved their basic philosophy toward a hostility toward free markets.

And slapping huge tax on what a rich person owns when he dies is certainly being hostile to free markets.

The estate tax flap amply demonstrates that the major environmental groups and their donors are redistributionists before they’re environmentalists. If they truly were serious about helping the environment, they wouldn’t let their desire to sock it to the rich get the better of their desire to help the environment.

Patrick Chisholm is editor of PolicyDynamics.

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