The Bigsibling Blog

When I read this article (EPA ‘Cow Tax’ Could Charge $175 per Dairy Cow to Curb Greenhouse Gases), I had to double check the URL I was at….several times. I was certain I was at some lampoon site, such as The Onion. But no, sadly, this appears to be legit.

…one of the suggestions offered by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) in its Advance Notice of Proposed Rulemaking (ANPR) for regulating greenhouse gas emissions under the Clean Air Act is to levy a tax on livestock.

Seriously? Taxing cows, and pigs because they cause green house emissions? Seriously? This is some kind of pre-pre-pre April Fool’s joke,…right?

The EPA has this to say about the evil and vile livestock:

“If GHG emissions from agricultural sources are regulated under the CAA, numerous farming operations that currently are not subject to the costly and time-consuming Title V permitting process would, for the first time, become covered entities. Even very small agricultural operations would meet a 100-tons-per-year emissions threshold. For example, dairy facilities with over 25 cows, beef cattle operations of over 50 cattle, swine operations with over 200 hogs, and farms with over 500 acres of corn may need to get a Title V permit. It is neither efficient nor practical to require permitting and reporting of GHG emissions from farms of this size. Excluding only the 200,000 largest commercial farms, our agricultural landscape is comprised of 1.9 million farms with an average value of production of $25,589 on 271 acres. These operations simply could not bear the regulatory compliance costs that would be involved.”

Sheesh…and you thought it would be better under Barak Hussein Obama.

Suck-kers.

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It seems that there are some celebrities that are not so full of themselves that they are going to run around telling other people how to live, regardless of their own lifestyles. Case in point are the Arctic Monkeys. Who refused to participate in the Live Earth event because as drummer Matt Helders puts it:

“It’s a bit patronising for us 21 year olds to try to start to change the world….
Especially when we’re using enough power for 10 houses just for (stage) lighting. It’d be a bit hypocritical,”

Al Gore’s upcoming “Live Earth” is a multi-continent giant concert extravaganza which promises big stars giving a continuous 24 hour concert in 7 countries (it was going to be 8, but Brazil backed out due to security concerns). For those not in the know, Live Earth is a benefit for Global Warming. Yes, that is correct, Global Warming. See, apparently making a movie about it, and flying all over the world telling everyone they need to leave a smaller carbon footprint just isn’t getting everyone as riled up as they should be. So in his infinite wisdom Al Gore is staging these gigantic concert events all over the world. Getting super star bands to fly (no word if on private jets or commercial airliners) to remote locations to spend hours and hours consuming vast quantities of resources and fossil fuels to tell the rest of the world they need to cut back on these things.

But the event organizers did state they are going to calculate the carbon emissions output by the concerts and do things like make donations to renewable energy projects and plant trees and what not to offset their extravagant creation of emissions during the concert. Hey, here’s an idea, why don’t they just plant the trees and make the donations, and not do the concerts? That way there is actually a net-gain from the planting and donations, instead of a zero gain/loss total.

Bigsibling is going to have to buy an Arctic Monkeys CD just to support people with their heads firmly attached to terra firma like these folks!

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Technorati Tags: Live Earth, Al Gore, Carbon Offsetting, Arctic Monkeys

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It seems that humans are on the verge of creating yet another catastrophe. We have waged wars, polluted lands and seas, remain the sole cause for rising temperatures, and now we are using up way more of the sun’s energy than we have the right to. That is according to a report published in the journal of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. Special mention was made of the utilization of biofuels such as ethanol and canola. It would seem that the use of these alternative, clean burning non-foreign supplied sources of energy are actually harmful to…well…they never really said. The study doesn’t report what the affect of our over-use of the sun’s energy might lead to. Perhaps it makes the sun send down more energy, and raise the world’s temperatures. Or perhaps it…oh heck I can’t even think up something smart-alecky to say about it.

So here is how it stands. We can’t use oil or coal because that causes global warming. We can’t use biofuels because that uses too much of the sun’s energy. We can’t use solar powered energy because, again, uses too much of the sun’s energy. We can’t use wind energy because stupid and blind birds might fly into the giant windmills and get a boo-boo.

I’m tell you, the only way these idiots are going to be happy is if we all go back to the horse and buggy. But wait, gaseous discharges from farm animals contribute to global warming too. Which means we can’t use them. Crap, I guess we all just sit at home in the fracking dark!

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Technorati Tags: global woarming, sun, energy, biofuels

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More on government trying to run private businesses. kowtowing to special interests to the detriment of industry – and all of us. The senate has recently passed a bill mandating a 40% increase in mileage for all cars, SUVs and trucks by 2020, and requiring huge increases in the production of ethanol.

What I am seeing here is, “it doesn’t matter what the consequences are to industry or the individual, we are going to make theses requirements.” Other than using diesel, I don’t see how a 1 ton dually is going to get the mandated 35 MPG and still have enough power and torque to do what it needs to do.

The other part is what bothers me the most; that is the requirement for increases in ethanol production. Who are they requiring to produce it? And does it matter whether the companies forced into this production can profit from it? I don’t think the Dems care whether anyone can profit from it. As long as it satisfies the special interests and kowtows to faithful follower of the Church of AlGoreism and their global warming brouhaha.

By what right? By what right to people who have not financial stake in whether a company lives or dies, make decisions on how that company should be run or what it should produce? Is that some innate right that people have? To be able to force industry to bend to their will, not by supporting or rejecting what that industry produces, but by sheer force of want or need?

When did this happen in America? When is it that the needs of someone outweighed reason and common sense? Just because one needs ethanol, why is it that a company is obligated to make it for them? Why can’t they make their own ethanol? Why is it that they must force another to supply their needs? Whatever happened to fulfilling one’s own needs? Where did that go? If I need a glass of water, I get up and get myself a glass of water. I don’t call the police or the fire department to come over and get me a glass of water. They are there to fulfill needs, why can’t they fulfill this need of mine? It is utterly ridiculous what is happening.

Thanks for visiting, I really do appreciate it. And I apologize for being gone the last 10 days or so. But you know…

Technorati Tags: Socialism, Congress, Gas Mileage, MPG, legislation

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Stinking polluting SUVs. They are destroying our environment (for reference, see “An Inconvenient Truth” et. al.). Not only are they ruining OUR planet, now they are ruining Mars. That is a whole other planet! We can’t just keep our filthy emissions to ourselves now can we? Between SUVs and smoking and cattle emissions because of those evil and vile (hey, those are almost palindromes!) meat-eaters, we have spread our dire case of global warming across the galaxy.

Scientists from Nasa say that Mars has warmed by about 0.5C since the
1970s. This is similar to the warming experienced on Earth over
approximately the same period….Fenton’s team unearthed heat maps of the Martian surface from Nasa’s
Viking mission in the 1970s and compared them with maps gathered more
than two decades later by Mars Global Surveyor. They found there had
been widespread changes, with some areas becoming darker.

I suppose it should now be called ‘galactic warming.’ Just google global warming and anyone with a computer can see that the accepted cause of global warming is man-made (or at least caused) emissions. If there can be no natural cause for global warming on Earth, why should that be allowed on Mars? No, the reason has GOT to be humans.

If only we would turn off our refrigerators, perhaps we can save the Martian polar ice caps. According to Al Gore and the experts, it is far too late for Earth, but maybe, just maybe, if we all started living as we did in the 19th century, it might be possible to save the Martian ice caps. In addition, we MUST stop sending vehicles and such to Mars. It is a possibility that emissions from the Mars rovers sent up there have created a hole in the Martian ozone, much like they have here! And what if some of the ships we sent into space to observe created any emissions that may have fallen to the planet? How many other planets are we destroying by our forays into space?

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Technorati Tags: Global Warming, Mars, Polar Ice Caps Melting, Martian Warming, NASA, SUVs, An Inconvenient Truth, Al Gore

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Our dear friend Viscount Monckton of Brenchley is at it again. If you remember I did a post about him here. At that time he was calling for a couple of US senators to resign.

Now he is challenging our beloved (ex) Vice President, Al Gore. It seems that Monckton does not believe that humans are having such a terrible effect on the planet’s climate. That weather cycles and other natural happenings are causing all of these climate problems.

To that end, Monckton has issued a challenge to Gore. To what Monckton calls the “Second Great Debate.” He wants it to be televised and broadcast from the Oxford Museum of Natural History.

<HISTORY LESSON> – The Oxford Museum of Natural History was the setting for what has become the “Great Debate” between Bishop Wilberforce and scientist T.H. Huxley regarding evolution vs. creationism.</HISTORY LESSON>

One may read the story on Breitbart here - also the actual challenge as it was mailed to Gore’s Tennessee compound (which uses more energy in one month than most people use in an entire year) may be read here.

Oh, yeah, one can find definitions for words used in the story like foofaraw at dictionary.com.

Thanks for visiting!

Technorati Tags: Climate Change, Global Warming, Viscount, Monckton, Al Gore, Brenchly, challenge, gauntlet, debate, science

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