Ethanol and oil profits

Just two items... numbers I found about today:

• You know there haven't been any new gasoline refineries built in the US since the late '70s, right? This is the main cause for the high gas prices, because we have the oil, but we can't refine it. However.... in recent years, 119 ethanol refineries have been built and 77 are under construction! Can anybody get this? SO far, everybody I know puts gasoline in their cars. All my friends eat the corn. Could anybody find any logic in this?
• Oil companies make profits equal to about 10c/gallon. They have some of the smallest profit margins in our economy, however the liberals blame them for gas price gouging. At the same time, at the federal level, the US government makes about 18c/gallon from taxes. State taxes vary, but the highest is New York, which makes about 60c/gallon. So next time you blame oil companies profits for what you pay at the pump, think twice and blame the real profiteers of all this.

Thoughts about the environment after my Yosemite trip

A few random thoughts about the state of the planet, just went through my mind during my trip to the Yosemite, including the drive from the San Francisco airport:

• It was second half of June and I saw a lot of snow covered mountains during my flights. I have no idea what routes Al Gore flies in his private jet. EIther he makes a big detour, consumming extra fuel, or he just ignores it. I think it's the latter, since he proved that he doens't care about facts.
• Crossing the SF Bay, you can't see anything on the shores, everything being covered by thick pollution. Isn't it ironic that three of the most green, liberal and environmental cities in America (San Francisco, Los Angeles and New York) are the most polluted? Wanna see a clean city? Go to Houston, TX.
• Hiking the sequoia groves of Yosemite I learned about the effects of a hundred years of environmentalism in the park. Because of the special care these woods have received from the greens (the eco-equivalent of the Nanny state), sequoias are not seeding anymore and the ground is full of junk. Now they have to start controlled fires every year, until the natural balance of the forest returns to where it was before the enviro-wackos took over.
• For this, I credit Dennis Miller: Those hybrid car drivers in California don't care about the future of Mother Earth. Truth is that we won't come up with an alternative to oil until we actually run out of oil. That's why I drive an SUV: To deplete the oil reserves and force humanity to come up with something better. The hybrid owners just prolong this grueling ordeal...

More on Sicko: The Difference Between Health Care and Health Insurance

Dirty Harry at Libertas explains very clearly the biggest mistake Michael Moore is making in his latest movie, Sicko: not realizing the difference between health care and health insurance. Here's what he says:

No one in this country is without healthcare. No one in this country lacks healthcare. No one in this country is without access to healthcare. Anyone who wants healthcare in America can get it at any time. What people lack is health insurance. The difference between lacking healthcare and lacking health insurance is a profound one. If you don’t have insurance you can still get healthcare, you just have to pay for it yourself. If you can’t afford the $60,000 to have your finger re-attached, you can make payments.

I’ve had periods of my life where I’ve gone without health insurance. It was my own choice because I felt there was no way I would rack up yearly medical expenses that even came close to the policy costs. I’ve gone years with only a catastrophic insurance plan that had a $5,000 deductible and only cost $60 a month. It saved me a fortune but was there in the event the unforseen happened.

Contrary to popular belief Canada doesn’t have universal healthcare. What Canada has is universal health insurance. It can take years to get treated in Canada. That’s not healthcare. In Canada you’re insured by the state but can’t get treated. In America you can get treated but may have to pay yourself.

Which would you prefer?

Is the the end of the Duke lacrosse players story?

Now that the ordeal of the innocent Duke lacrosse players is over, questions still remain. Not only should prosecutor Mike Nifong be disbarred, indicted, and made to reimburse the players' families legal expenses, but Crystal Gail Mangum should be prosecuted and sent to jail. She was a cronic liar, who wanted to destroy innocent lives and, as John Podhoretz said today in NY Post, Let the Liar Be Named and Shamed!

But I heard a very interesting comparison today... After the Duke lacrosse players were smeared and falsely accused, the Duke faculty fired the coach and suspended the entire team. After the Rutgers basketball players were smeared and insultingly accused, the entire faculty stood by them, the entire country stood by them, and Hillary Clinton has already been invited to comfort them. So... where would you rather send your kids to? Duke or Rutgers? Which one is more probable of standing by your kids? Is this again a race issue? Well, it looks like the prediction that someone made when I became an American citizen is very true in America: the white American male is by far the most disadvantaged demographic...

The travesty of Justice in America

So the Duke lacrosse players' ordeal is over. Almost two years of disgracing the idea of justice by that scumbag called Mike Nifong. There was abolsutely no supporting evidence for continuing the case, even more, all evidence was against it, however he continued to pursue this liberal fantasy of rich smart white kids abusing the eternal black victim. Now that the case is over, not only should Nifong be disbarred and indicted for racketeering and intimidation charges, but the accuser should be arrested right away. Remember the Libby case? He was convicted for not remembering the details of one discussion. This girl gave 7 completely different testimonies, and they were all plain lies... and it was not just about a forgotten discussion, but they were all severe accusations made under oath. She said she was raped, then that she wasn't, she mentioned 20 guys, then only 3, she knew their names very well but was unable to pick them from a lineup, she said it was half an hour, then it was only 2 minutes, and so on. And who's gonna pay the families of the innocent students for the millions they spent fighting an unjust judicial process?

This says a lot about the state of Justice in America. These are our prosecutors... Nifong pursuing a losing case, Fitzgerald accusing Libby of a crime that wasn't committed and even if it were, he knew exactly who committed it (liberal darling Richard Armitage). Oh, and that loser who was investigating Tom Delay while making a film about his heroism. So when is Bush going to fire the other 80 attorneys?? What is he waiting for?? He should replace them with some real prosecutors, not the scumbags who apply the MoveOn.org agenda.

Why was no prosecutor to investigate Harry Reid's shady land deals? Or New York Times repeated leaks which endangered the national security? Or Sandy Berger for stealing and destroying classified documents? Or Patrick Kennedy for driving while impaired and destruction of property? Or Hussein Obama for using Senate office space for campaign activities, against federal law? Or Mary Mapes and Dan Rather for falsifying national guard documents? Or Michael Isikoff of Newsweek for a deliberate lie which resulted in 15 deaths (it's called inciting to mass murder)? Who's gonna indict Nigong? Why are all those US attorneys still being paid with our tax money?

The Problem with Firing the Prosecutors

I don't know how long I can stand the media anymore. I get sick at looking at all this coverage about the firing of the 8 attorneys. It's just mind-boggling, I can't understand it. So people, you mentally disabled losers at NY Times, CNN, CBS, LA Times and so on: US attorneys are named by the President, they are employee of the federal government, and they can be fired at will! Bill Clinton fired ALL 95 US Attorneys in 1993 (the reason? one attorney was investigating a crook, good friend of the Clintons) ! So the only 2 problems I see here are:

1. Why only 8?
2. Why so late, in the 6th year of his presidency??

The US attorneys have been a disgrace since Bush took over the White House. THEY SHOULD ALL GO!

Is 300 a Conservative Movie? No. Illiberal? Yes

There were some discussions about whether the new movie 300 is an attack on Bush's militarism? Or is it in support of it? So why do every war movie have to have a political message? Maybe it's just a simple historical movie with awesome CG graphics. The answer to "Is it a conservative movie"? is a simple NO. Why? Because if it were, it couldn't have been made in Hollywood. But what it is for sure, it's an illiberal movie. Our friends at Libertas clearly explained why it is illiberal: 300 is about bravery, freedom, honor, and country. These are universal themes. But universal themes that will offend liberals because they’re not defended in a PC fashion. Liberals believe bravery is being brave enough to kiss despot hiney in the corrupt UN. Liberals believe freedom is porn in school libraries. Liberals believe honor is leaking national security secrets to the New York Times. Liberals believe ”country” is about everybodys counry but ours, so it’s okay to give mass murderers autographed basketballs and ask them to dance. The men in 300 believe they are good, their families are good, their country is good, and worth dying and fighting for. Now, that is not a conservative value. But it is an illiberal one.

Now the best take on 300 that I found is the article on National Review. David Kahane hits a lot of right notes about the movie. Among them: When, early in the film, a sneering Persian emissary insults King Leonidas’s wife, threatens the kingdom, and rages about blasphemy, the king kicks him down a bottomless well. And yet nobody in Sparta asks, “Why do they hate us?” and seeks to find common ground with the Persians on their doorstep. The Spartans mock the god-king Xerxes (whose traveling throne resembles a particularly louche Brazilian gay-pride carnival float), mow down his armored “immortal” holy warriors and generally give their last full measure to defend Greek civilization against superstition and tyranny. Where are the liberal Spartan voices raised in protest against this blatant homophobia, xenophobia, and racism?

After seeing the movie, I found out it has a lot of other anti-liberal themes. Mocking the metrosexual fags, like Mr. Kahane said, is one of them. Going to a pre-emptive war to face the enemy away from home is another one. Reminds me of a team sports principle, that offense is the best defense. But aside from this, it was a great movie, and anybody who liked Lord of the Rings, Gladiator or even Kill Bill should like it.