Homocon

"We don't need to worry about a big reduction from here, but this correction could continue for the next couple months," said Shinichi Ichikawa, an equity strategist with Credit Suisse in Tokyo.

And yet investors are already rushing back into the US market based on the "soothing" words of Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke -- which is like entering Club Vampire on the soothing reassurances of its doorman.

How about these not so soothing comments: "The selloff in equities cannot be blamed wholly on China. This is case of the market flying too close to the sun, and the hot money collapsing," said Torben Krogh Nielsen, an analyst with Saxobank. "It's a correction that's been seven months coming." . . . "If there's a larger message behind all this, it's that the era of cheap money is over and you can't blame China for that," concurred David Karsboel, head of market strategy for Saxobank in Copenhagen, Denmark.

While analysts are trumpeting that investors should be comforted by the fact that yesterday's global plunge wasn't triggered by any specific financial, political or economic crisis, it's my opinion that this is exactly why investors shouldn't be comforted, and should, instead, be cautious and skeptical of analysts and marketers beseeching them (and their cash) to return to the fold.

There's usually a flicker or two from the light bulb before it burns out altogether. Remember the market crash in 2000? It didn't just happen for no reason, and it took over two years to recover from that one, but no one seems to be mentioning it anywhere -- and the signs are suspiciously similar: overheated economies, overvalued companies, stock hucksters everywhere. My last flight on Jet Blue, I sat in my row 1 seat, listening to the airline attendants casually chatting about their latest stock purchases. It sent chills down my spine, bringing to mind the famous quote by Joseph Kennedy: "You know it's time to sell when the shoe-shine boy tries to give you stock tips."

Loosely translated, that means that when your airline attendants are dishing about their portfolios, then the stock market is overrun with speculators -- and we've seen what speculators can do to a housing market.

If there had been a specific catalyst for yesterday's global stock market shakeup, such as the 9/11 attack, then we could genuinely search for solutions and makes moves to correct the damage. But yesterday was a free-floating reaction to indicators across the board -- continuing housing slump, check; mortgage lender meltdown, check; global jihad jitters, check; congressional bickering and bitch-slapping, check; growing nuclear attack and crazy despot concerns, check; uncertain political landscape, check; creeping socialism, check; protectionist rhetoric on the rise, check; unstable emerging economies, check; illegal immigration impotence, check; windfall tax rhetoric, check; splintering historical alliances, check; corruption among worldwide governmental authorities, check; unwillingness to acknowledge the manipulation of trading markets by billion dollar hedge funds, check . . . and the list goes on and on.

So, yes, it wasn't one single crisis that triggered February 27th's downward spiral, but that's precisely why there should be alarm bells going off -- because, in the absence of a crisis, Tuesday's market drop reveals just how nervous, skittish and ready to freak the average investor truly is in response to our uncertain global environment.

The concepts of solid financials and long-term investment aren't even on the radar -- instead, it's all about Flip This Stock.

For some reason, I don't find that knowledge particularly soothing, despite Ben Bernanke's words to the contrary.

Posted by at 10:59 AM | Permalink

Stocks Have Worst Day Since 9/11 Attacks

Ever since the November elections, that marvelous roller-coaster ride of the DOW has been threatening to collapse at various moments. While 2006 saw incredible gains in the stock market nearly across the board, the election results ushered in a great deal of uncertainty in investors' minds -- will the US military stay in Iraq? Will large corporations face punishing taxes from the new congress? Will the new "championing of the green" force enormous restructuring and rebuilding costs? How ugly and bloody will the run-up to the '08 elections be? Combine these jitters with emerging economies that were overheating like your grandma's ancient oven and we've got a recipe.

For disaster.

The minimum wage was just hiked up even as the Federal Reserve was issuing cautious statements about the vigor of the US economy -- was this smart? Placing additional strain on small to medium businesses that employ the majority of unskilled, minimum wage labor while analysts have been whispering "recession" for months? Guess who gets laid off first?

Look to see the potential for a looming recession kick-start the illegal immigration debate into high gear. After all, when jobs looks like they might start to evaporate, it's tough enough to respect the legal competition for your slice of the pie.

And adding insult to injury, the housing market hasn't even begun to hit bottom.

Not that I'm a gloom monger, but what happened today in the stock market was a worldwide slump, not some localized tremor. The Chinese market dropped harder than it has in 10 years. The United States market hasn't seen this kind of reaction since 9/11. Europe, Latin America, Australasia -- down like a dirty little club fag scrambling for his last snort of meth.

"It's not just a one-day drop,'' said Andy Mantel, managing director of Pacific Sun Investment Management in Hong Kong. "There's more room in the downside. My strategy is to increase in cash and shorts.''

And that, my friends, is the other shoe dropping.

In comparison to what happened in the markets in 1987, this wasn't as bad, but what makes the outlook rather bleak is that where most investors were hoping for China's economy to push the globe into productivity and wealth, today's bust takes a bit of the shine off that apple -- and the US certainly isn't poised to ride to the economic rescue anytime soon -- so while there will undoubtedly be a brief upsurge after a week or so due to reckless investors rushing in where angels fear to tread, the foundation for that house of dreams is a bit too rickety for my taste.

I got out of the market almost completely today. It looked ugly, and I think I'm going to wake up with it looking worse tomorrow. I'll stick my cash in something safe, that gives me a decent interest rate and where I don't have to worry about nuclear bombs, Barack Obama or overheated economies.

I could be wrong about the staying-power of all this economic carnage, but somehow I doubt it (especially when stock hucksters like Jim Cramer are beseeching their acolytes to buy buy buy!). That sound I hear when I put my ear to the ground is like distant hooves approaching.

NYSE? I hardly knew ye.

Now, where's my martini . . . ?

Posted by at 7:12 PM | Permalink

Just returned last night from a several day visit to New York City. I tagged along while the boyfriend was on business.

I received my new Nokia 8800 Sirocco edition right before we left for NYC, so I spent a good amount of time in the hotel room, in taxi cabs and in coffee shops figuring out all its little quirks. I ditched slim fashion phones for a Blackberry a couple of years ago, but while I love the Blackberry for its Instant Messaging and email functions, it's waaaaaay too boxy and bulky for me. I need something I can just slip into the pocket of my jeans. So, to compensate myself for the years of putting up with ugly functionality, I splurged on the 8800 Sirocco, and it's just as beautiful up close as it is in all its press photos. The Brian Eno composed ring-tones and alerts are definitely a bonus. It's now a pleasure, instead of an unwelcome intrusion, to hear my phone ring.

This is my first Nokia phone, and now I understand why Nokia has such ardent admirers. The quality and design are top-notch.

I snapped a few photos with its 2 megapixel camera. There's no flash, so the dark photos come out looking pretty bad, but daylight photos look great (and it's so nice to have a phone with a camera in it again, another negative about Blackberry, though I hear they're going to start adding cameras to their newer models).

We stayed at the Mandarin Oriental Hotel, located in the Time Warner building. It's a good hotel by New York standards, but it doesn't hold a candle to the Mandarin Oriental in Tokyo. Of course, the Tokyo hotel is brand new and their New York hotel is older and the worse for wear. The sheer amount of traffic that goes through its lobby and hallways seems to be beating it down in a type of "Luxury Fatigue" . . . it's difficult to remain perpetually desirable when you're so obviously and thoroughly used. Case in point: standing in the lobby, waiting for the elevators to take us down to the street level, I noticed a crumpled napkin that had been tossed onto the floor. No one had picked it up -- there were staff all around, and yet there it lay, trashily despoiling the marble tiles and hinting at the urban grime and exhaust covered rubbish waiting to greet us on the streets below.

In Tokyo, that napkin would have been caught before it even hit the floor . . . I think that pretty much sums up the difference between a new luxury hotel (Tokyo Mandarin Oriental Hotel) and one that's seen a few trips around the block (New York Mandarin Oriental).

Below are a couple of snaps from the inside of the shopping mall in the Time Warner building. The weather was fairly clear while we were there, but marred by bitingly cold winds that howled through the streets. I have to say that I much prefer the West Coast to the Northeast. The weather is so much less ferocious in the West.

I do love the restaurant scene in NYC, however, and we always take full advantage of the variety and skill on display. On Friday, we took some friends to Morimoto, a huge, glitzy shrine of a Japanese restaurant. The place was buzzing with conversation and hopping with energy. The upstairs dining area is bright, open and breezy, while the downstairs bar is its cool, moody and neon lit sister. The architectural style is what can only be referred to as Uber-Contemporary -- a mix of concrete, glass, steel and wood, accented with billowing fabrics and warmly glowing lights.

Here are a few pics snapped discreetly from the downstairs bar area -- a place I would most likely be calling my home away from home were I to live in NYC. Notice the glittering wall composed of thousands of plastic water bottles lit up from behind:

Again, the 8800 takes far better photos in broad daylight. For example, here's the staircase of the Apple store on Fifth Avenue:

The store is far more interesting from the outside than it is from the inside -- after all, it's just a store selling a bunch of products, but from the outside, it promises to be an experience. This is the "experience" once you get inside:

Just people and products. Nothing to see here. Move along.

Posted by at 7:53 AM | Permalink

No, silly, it's not Dennis Kucinich's new presidential campaign slogan, it's the title of a PR ad produced in Britain:

"At a time of rampant anti-Americanism, this ad - produced with BritainAndAmerica.com - aims to remind the world of the great economic, technological and political benefits that the US has brought to the world."

And there's more where that came from . . . innovation, progress and vision, I mean.

ADDENDUM:
Examples of "rampant anti-Americanism" in the headlines:

1. Italy protesters threaten to block work at US base: "Protesters yesterday threatened to block construction work to enlarge a US military base in the northern Italian city of Vicenza that has divided the centre-left government . . . “If no one will listen to us and the bulldozers arrive, we will put ourselves before them to block them,” said Cinzia Bottene, leader of a group opposed to the expansion . . . Former prime minister Silvio Berlusconi, who leads the centre-right opposition, also waded into the debate, saying the demonstration was an expression of anti-US sentiment. “Anti-American feelings now dictate the government’s policies,” Berlusconi, a staunch US ally, told Il Mattino newspaper."

2. Japan leftists own up to blast near US base: "A Japanese extreme left-wing group claimed responsibility yesterday (02/17/07) for a small explosion near a US army base outside Tokyo ahead of US Vice-President Dick Cheney’s visit to Japan . . . “It is an preemptive attack to stop Vice-President Cheney’s visit to Japan,” the statement added, attacking moves to strengthen the US-Japan military alliance."

3. Cheney Starts Japan Trip Amid Criticism of Iraq War: "Cheney, 66, arrived in Tokyo late today, less than three weeks after Japanese Foreign Minister Taro Aso called U.S. policy in Iraq ``naive.'' Last month, Defense Minister Fumio Kyuma said President George W. Bush made a ``mistake'' in starting the war . . . Outside Mr Cheney's hotel last night, a van with loudspeakers caused a brief disturbance as nationalists shouted slogans such as "Yankee go home".

4. Protecting the Wall against marchers: "Some veterans are up in arms over plans by anti-Iraq-war demonstrators to assemble next month at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial . . . The Military Order of the Purple Heart, Rolling Thunder and other veterans groups are promising to form a protective ring around the Wall, which they consider "hallowed" ground. Purple Heart national commander Tom Poulter said his members are outraged that the protesters would "even consider gathering near the Wall." . . . One fear is that someone may try to spray-paint the memorial as protesters did to the U.S. Capitol last month."

Posted by at 4:14 PM | Permalink

From: Research papers under-report evolution

"With rare exceptions, papers in biomedical journals actually got evolutionary concepts right; they simply refused to refer to them by name. It was so pronounced that the paper's title used "the E-word" to refer to evolution."

Are we less concerned than we should be about the evolution of viruses because the information isn't being communicated properly, or is it really about public misconceptions regarding the theory of evolution itself? As one commenter to the article states: "In this context, does the language of evolution include natural selection? In my experience, the general public doesn't really consider something like a strain of microbes becoming drug resistant to be an example of evolution. If you tell most people a microbe has evolved, they'll think it's changed into a fish or a snail or something like that."

Perhaps this is the problem -- that "evolution" now means, in our collective consciousness, a transformation into something else entirely, rather than the process of adaptation (or Natural Selection) which the term, as applied to species development, originally appeared to convey. While an author begs to differ here, it seems quite clear to me that trans-species mutation is merely a more extreme version of adaptation, like adaptation on steroids.

And viruses, with their ability to both progress and mutate, would most certainly qualify as prime examples of evolutionary adaptation at work. Though they remain, in the end, still viruses . . . or do they become us?

OFF TOPIC:

"You cannot protect kids from rudeness. And you probably shouldn't, unless you want them to grow up to be fragile milquetoasts."

UPDATE TO OFF TOPIC:

For the antidote to Fragile Milquetoast Syndrome, go here.

Posted by at 4:37 PM | Permalink

This looks like an interesting idea: Gay Service Member Launches Free Blogging Platform

Anonymous Soldier, the site's founder, states that "Serving in Unsilence has one of the strongest privacy policies on the internet, and strongly urges its members who are currently in the military not to divulge any personal information on their blogs."

Which then begs the question -- if you don't divulge any personal information on your blog, is it really a blog? And how do you write about your life in the military while skirting any information and/or series of events than can be used to identify you?

In the site's FAQ page, Anonymous Soldier responds to the question:
Q: "Aren’t you worried about getting kicked out (of the military)?"
A: "Not really; I’ve taken sufficient measures to prevent my identity from being discovered, and it’s a bit of a thrill to post anonymously."

Ah, the wild wild anonymous west of the Internet.

Posted by at 1:53 PM | Permalink

The Malcontent aims true and shoots straight: The Grievance Gays

"What to make of the new definition of homophobia now concretely embedded in gay thought? No longer do we ask for amorphous tolerance and equality before the law. Now we seek not mere acceptance, but affirmation and security in all areas of politics, media, sports, entertainment, and advertising. A grimace from the face of an NFL player and an odd throwaway comment, and soon organizations like the HRC speak of violence against gay youth in response. Straight men must now always be comfortable with displays of same-sex affection, and if they are not, they must be hidden, silenced, scrubbed clean of public record. Anything less is harm against gays. You will do nothing less than celebrate and accept every aspect of our lives, or you will learn to shut up."

Me? I thought the Snickers commercial was entirely unnoteworthy. That anyone could even find something homophobic and offensive about what is so clearly a mocking of the traditional notion of guyhood is beyond me . . . and yeah yeah yeah, the website had NFL football players reacting in a kind of "Wha? Oh, no, that's just wrong!" fashion as they were shown the commercial. But c'mon -- what is it that Grievance Gays expect? 100% thumbs up from 100% of the population? The Jews would kill for those kind of approval numbers, and they've had thousands of years to work at it.

Being gay used to mean being able to withstand a certain amount of criticism and social disapproval in the understanding that deliberately choosing the road less travelled necessarily entails a bit of personal struggle. But now all we seem to have are a bunch of shallow, silly queens all huffed up about a candy bar commercial that takes a riff on Disney's famous "Lady and the Tramp" spaghetti-romance scene, albeit with two greasy male mechanics in a garage. Honestly, is this the worst that it gets? Are things now so easy for gay Americans that we have to manufacture bigotry where it doesn't actually exist?

I looked upon the whole thing as visible progress rather than a slight. I mean, two guys got face time during a Super Bowl commercial. When was the last time that ever happened? In thirty seconds, a Super Bowl candy bar commercial managed to completely brush aside the notion of the gay man as cultural victim while simultaneously sending up Disneyesque notions of romance, masculinity and social mores. This should have been the commercial that queer advocates embraced, but the Grievance Gays decided to get all up in arms about it, instead.

They chose poorly.

Where the Grievance Gays see homophobia, I see the tacit recognition that romantic same-sex relationships are now an established part of our mainstream culture -- two knuckle-head mechanics are shown to be completely and absolutely aware of the potential social implications of their inadvertent physical contact, so much so that they resort to deliberately nonsensical macho stereotypes, as if manhood is defined as the ability to suffer pain or gulp toxic substances. And it's played for laughs, not because the commercial is making fun of gays, but because it's making fun of faux macho guys who are completely adrift in what were once considered clearly defined roles of manhood and virility.

Like the Super Bowl itself, for instance.

Only the thinnest of skins could find this commercial (or anyone's allegedly homophobic reaction to it) offensive. Grievance Gays -- grow a pair. If you found this commercial terribly offensive and injurious to your delicate sensibilities, perhaps you should look in the mirror a little less often. The truth is that the Snickers commercial disparages heterosexual males for their generally recognized aversions to emotional intimacy. Period. For angry gays to read anything personally insulting into it is just an exercise in Narcissism, not to mention an excuse to get some more sound-bites tossed off on 24 hour cable new shows about the oppressive, bigoted American culture in which homosexuality presently thrives.

And don't even get me started on the frickin' suicide robot commercial. At least GM had the good sense to tell the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention to take a hike . . .

UPDATE:
Apparently, I spoke too soon. GM has no balls, either.

Western culture is doomed.

Posted by at 8:40 AM | Permalink

"Hey, thanks capitalism! Now that I've made it, the rest of y'all enjoy socialism. Love, John Edwards."

Posted by at 10:21 PM | Permalink

Dr. Tim Ball, Chairman of the Natural Resources Stewardship Project, is a Victoria-based environmental consultant and former climatology professor at the University of Winnipeg. He published an op-ed in today's Canada Free Press, entitled Global Warming: The Cold, Hard Facts? Below are some choice excerpts.

"Believe it or not, Global Warming is not due to human contribution of Carbon Dioxide (CO2). This in fact is the greatest deception in the history of science. We are wasting time, energy and trillions of dollars while creating unnecessary fear and consternation over an issue with no scientific justification . . . The world has warmed since 1680, the nadir of a cool period called the Little Ice Age (LIA) that has generally continued to the present. These climate changes are well within natural variability and explained quite easily by changes in the sun. But there is nothing unusual going on . . . I am not alone in this journey against the prevalent myth. Several well-known names have also raised their voices. Michael Crichton, the scientist, writer and filmmaker is one of them. In his latest book, "State of Fear" he takes time to explain, often in surprising detail, the flawed science behind Global Warming and other imagined environmental crises . . . Another cry in the wildenerness is Richard Lindzen's. He is an atmospheric physicist and a professor of meteorology at MIT, renowned for his research in dynamic meteorology - especially atmospheric waves. He is also a member of the National Academy of Sciences and has held positions at the University of Chicago, Harvard University and MIT. Linzen frequently speaks out against the notion that significant Global Warming is caused by humans. Yet nobody seems to listen."

In just April of 2006, an open letter was published to Canadian Prime Minister Stephen Harper. It was signed by SIXTY scientists who urged that climate-science be kept open for debate. "Observational evidence does not support today's computer climate models, so there is little reason to trust model predictions of the future. Yet this is precisely what the United Nations did in creating and promoting Kyoto and still does in the alarmist forecasts on which Canada's climate policies are based . . . While the confident pronouncements of scientifically unqualified environmental groups may provide for sensational headlines, they are no basis for mature policy formulation. The study of global climate change is, as you have said, an "emerging science," one that is perhaps the most complex ever tackled. It may be many years yet before we properly understand the Earth's climate system. Nevertheless, significant advances have been made since the protocol was created, many of which are taking us away from a concern about increasing greenhouse gases. If, back in the mid-1990s, we knew what we know today about climate, Kyoto would almost certainly not exist, because we would have concluded it was not necessary."

Richard Posner has decided (for all of us, apparently) that the debate on primary human causation of global warming is over because we're hearing less and less resistance to the idea from the scientific community -- "a scientific consensus" he calls it, as if the scientific method is akin to a voting booth and the the majority opinion rules! Yay!

Yet we've seen throughout history how facts are stubbornly resistant to consensus. In Dr. Ball's op-ed, he declares that we're hearing less and less scientific resistance to human causation of climate change, not because of an overwhelming preponderance of fact that can no longer be ignored, but because many scientists are afraid of what they'll encounter should they question the prevailing wisdom. They're cowed into silence over what they might lose -- jobs, grants, friends, reputations.

"Well, good, then," I can hear some people saying. "Anyone who denies global warming is a fool, and he/she is no longer fit to be a scientist." Because, like, we all possess every jot of data recorded, and are all experts at interpreting it correctly, infallibly and indubitably. I mean, we may as well hash out String Theory in blog comment sections while we're at it, cuz science is so EASY! Where's that plasma drive, anyway? I heard that a consortium of high-school teachers worked out the bugs just last week . . .

It seems that people are forgetting that there are very big actors with a lot of very big agendas behind the Climate Change curtain, and that when science becomes politics, we can all kiss any semblance of objectivity goodbye. What? You think the oil companies are the only ones with money? Add to that the weird "Denier" label (with its deathly and holocaustic connotations) that's being slapped on anyone who voices skepticism that humans have more of an impact on the global climate than nature does itself, and we have all the makings of a modern inquisition, replete with mob hysteria and arguments that stress emotional appeal over rational thought.

Heretics beware.

Yet heretics are precisely what we need at this point in time. We rarely get it completely right when it comes to science, especially when it's a very recent scientific endeavor, such as climate science. Answers generally emerge over centuries of patient, dedicated study, with one group disproving selected notions of the group that came before. So when I hear CLIMATE CHANGE IS REAL shouted from blogs and newspaper headlines and television talk shows, each bristling with its own expert panel, I realize that we're in the midst of a pop-culture movement rather than a true scientific debate.

The scientific debate is not over, for how can a scientific debate be "over" when our scientists don't have even an approaching understanding of all the variables involved? "While researchers argue whether Earth is getting warmer and if humans are contributing . . . (a) confusing array of new and recent studies reveals that scientists know very little about how much sunlight is absorbed by Earth versus how much the planet reflects, how all this alters temperatures, and why any of it changes from one decade to the next."

The debate is over? Hardly. The climate may be changing, but as oceanographer Kevin Vranes wrote: "Where we go from here is anybody's guess, but I tend to agree with the Oracle in the second Matrix movie: we already know the answer to that question, our task is to understand why we are going to do what we are going to do."

Heretics -- please apply.

Posted by at 4:33 PM | Permalink

Instapundit offers the sanest response to Global Warming hysterics I've read since the United Nations came out with its politically motivated hatchet job on U.S. economic productivi -- er, I mean, its Global Warming report.

While luddites, er, liberals the world over have been crowing over the alleged science in a report that employs the words "probable", "possible" and "potentially" more often than a room full of Quantum Physicists, it's been vastly entertaining to note that the very same people who believe it's impossible to bring democracy to Iraq are droolingly insistent that if we just pull together we have the means to put the brakes on Mother Nature.

Right, whatever. *rolls eyes*

But I'm fully in the Instapundit camp on this one, in that while I don't believe we have more than the slimmest, most coincidental of evidence to bolster the idea that humanity is the culprit behind any global climate change, it's still a good idea to switch away from burning fossil fuels and into utilizing cleaner energy sources anyway. His money quote:

"Regardless of what you think of the above, burning carbon is a lousy idea. Coal and oil are, over the long term, far more valuable as chemical feedstocks than as fuels anyway, and burning them is unacceptably filthy regardless of greenhouse issues. We should replace them as soon as possible with nice, clean, greenhouse-friendly nuclear plants and other environmentally friendly power technologies. Burning less carbon is good planetary hygiene, and good practice generally, regardless of what you think of global warming. So, I suppose, in a way we should be pursuing global warming remedies regardless of what you think about global warming."

Hear hear.

But expect to hear plenty of hyperbole about melting ice-caps and flooded coastlines from the neo-hippies for the next several years or so, at least until a Democrat is elected as President, and then suddenly Global Warming won't seem so urgent an issue anymore.

Tax oil companies into oblivion as punishment for being profitable businesses -- check. Hand out taxpayer funded subsidies to alternative energy groups without requiring any tangible results -- check. Finally become signatories to the Kyoto Treaty -- whoa, hold on a minute there, fella! You think I'm aiming for political suicide as a career option? Al Gore I aint.

The Becker-Posner Blog offers additional sage advice: "I should add that throughout history, there has been a tendency to underestimate the potential for technological developments that greatly reduce the predicted doom from various natural and manmade disasters, such as claims during the past several centuries that the world is running out of wood, coal, or oil. One glaring and instructive example is the 1865 book The Coal Question by the great economist, W. Stanley Jevons, which predicted disastrous coal shortages by the end of that century. The lesson for warming is that new technologies may arrive much sooner than expected, technologies that not only effectively reduce the emission of greenhouse gases, but also help take them out of the atmosphere."

Does any Global Warming disciple remember the 1970's and the massive amounts of pollution spewed across Europe and the Americas at the time? Oh, right -- no, they don't, because we've made rapid and massive changes to our industrial sectors already, changes which have cleaned up our waters, our air and our cities. The big joke when I was growing up in Michigan was that you didn't have to be Jesus to walk on the water when you had Lake Erie, a body of water so thick with pollutants that it was pronounced all but dead only thirty years ago. Now, Lake Erie is seen as a success story, almost a model of a recovered ecosystem with scientists more concerned about the proliferation of introduced species than the extinction of them all.

I think there's a lesson in there for our Climate Change hysterics.

Posted by at 7:35 PM | Permalink