Kristin Davis calls on New York Senators Schumer and Gillibrand to oppose Mosque at Ground Zero

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BREAKING NEWS... LR EXCLUSIVE...

From Eric Dondero:

Kristin Davis is the Anti-Prohibition Party candidate for Governor of New York. She is a Libertarian. She is a follower of individual liberty philosopher Ayn Rand and a devotee of free market economics. She is a staunch supporter of drug legalization. She is also pro-defense and a patriot.

At her Birthday bash in New York City Saturday night, surrounded by celebrity invitees and supporters, Davis told the crowd she opposes the Mosque proposed near Ground Zero:

"this isn't about religious freedom this is about a monument to the attacks on America on 9-11."

Davis continued:

"If I can ask you to be serious for one minute in a night which is supposed to be a party I want to talk about something I feel very, very strongly about- I do not want a Mosque built near the 9/11 sight. I think it is wrong and would be held up as an important propaganda victory by radical extremist Islamics. The people of New York, the families of those murdered oppose this monument to the attack on this country."

Davis called on US Senators Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand to pass federal legislation to block the Mosques construction.

Davis is currently in the middle of her statewide petition drive. If you'd like to help or offer a $$ donation visit KristinDavis2010.com

Rick Perry to Jan Brewer – Texas will support you

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From Eric Dondero:

Texas Governor Rick Perry unequivocally stated his support for Arizona and Governor Jan Brewer in their fight against the Feds over illegal immigration. Perry has decided to pull out of a border states conference with governors from 6 Mexican states. New Mexico Gov. Bill Richardson, and California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger have said they will attend. Indeed, Richardson will host the conference, which was originally set for Phoenix, until the 6 Mexican governors threatened a boycott.

Texas Tea Party supporters have been urging Perry to take a more definitive stance in favor of Arizona.

Appearing on Fox News, Perry was asked by Neal Cavuto if he'd be attending. He said without flinching, "I won't be there."

He further stated:

"I talked to Jan [Brewer] early on and I said, ‘Listen, we’re not going to be coming to the meeting. Regardless of what anybody else is saying … we’re going to support you."

Taxes on Beer, Guns and Smokes have increased 41% under Obama

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From Eric Dondero:

Smokers, gun owners, beer drinkers, don't have a friend in Obama. So-called sin taxes have gone up an astounding 41% since Obama was elected.

From Reuters "U.S. pockets $20.6 bln in sin taxes in FY'09" July 16:

The U.S. federal government collected $20.6 billion in taxes on alcohol, tobacco, firearms and ammunition in fiscal year 2009, up 41 percent from the previous fiscal year, according to the annual report of the Alcohol and Tobacco Tax and Trade Bureau.

Part of the U.S. Treasury Department, the TTB credited most of the $6 billion rise in revenues collected to the increased taxes on the tobacco industry as a result of the Children's Health Insurance Reauthorization Act passed in February 2009.

(H/t Drudge)

Paton pulls ahead of Democrat Gabrielle Giffords in Arizona – Tuscon-area District

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Witnessed the Fall of the Berlin Wall 1989, and the end of Soviet domination

Jonathan Paton is now running slightly ahead of incumbent Democrat Rep. Gabrielle Giffords in the race for Congress AZ CD-8. The District includes Tucson and a huge area of the border region.

Via Hedgehog:

US HOUSE – ARIZONA – CD8 (Tarrance)
Jonathan Paton (R) 45%
Gabrielle Giffords (D-inc) 44%

Paton is a libertarian-leaning conservative. His background includes small business, world travel and a stint in the Army Reserves. From his Bio:

As a student at Sabino High School, Jonathan worked at Marie Callender’s as a busboy and dishwasher, saving up the funds to go to Germany as a Rotary exchange student. His year abroad in 1989 was an important time in Germany’s history. He watched the Berlin Wall fall and took with him the images of people experiencing freedom for the first time.

After graduating from the University of Arizona summa cum laude and with honors in German and Russian, Jonathan enlisted in the U.S. Army Reserve and was promptly named Soldier of the Year.

Participated in the Liberation of the Iraqi people from Saddam Hussein

In the State Senate Paton has been something of a crusader against coruption, particularly in state government. He went up against ex-Gov. Janet Napolitano on welfare, and transparency on child protection services. He is currently Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman.

On issues of great interest to Pro-Defense Libertarians and Rightwing Human Rights advocates:

•Jonathan wrote the nation’s first law to crack down on human smuggling -- a law that has already locked up more than 1,000 human smugglers.

•Jonathan wrote the law to divest state investments from Iran after seeing first hand in Iraq the IEDs manufactured in that country to kill American soldiers.

•Jonathan eliminated the state income tax for active duty military personnel, a $10 million tax cut for military families.

A Republican win over Giffords would be a major upset, and add greatly to the chances of GOP control of the House. The Giffords seat, although targetted, originally was not high on the list of "likely" Republican pick-ups.

PatonforCongress.com

Rick Perry expands lead over Democrat Bill White – Texas Governors race

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50 to 41%

From Eric Dondero:

In a previous poll Perry had 48% to ex-Houston Mayor Bill White's 43%. Now the libertarian-leaning Governor has widened his lead to 9%.

From Rasmussen July 15:

The latest Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Voters in the Lone Star State shows Perry with 50% support. White, a former mayor of Houston, picks up 41% of the vote. Two percent (2%) like another candidate in the race, and seven percent (7%) are undecided.

In mid-June, Perry held a 48% to 40% lead over White.

NASA’s WISE Mission to Complete Extensive Sky Survey

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This image shows the famous Pleiades cluster of stars as seen through the eyes of WISE, or NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer. The mosaic contains a few hundred image frames -- just a fraction of the more than one million WISE has captured so far as it completes its first survey of the entire sky in infrared light. Image credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/UCLA - Larger Image

NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer, or WISE, will complete its first study of the entire sky on July 17, 2010. The mission has generated more than one million images so far, of everything from asteroids to distant galaxies.

"Like a globe-trotting shutterbug, WISE has completed a world tour with 1.3 million slides casing the whole sky," said Edward Wright, the principal investigator of the mission at the University of California, Los Angeles.

Some of these images have been processed and stitched together into a novel picture being released today. It shows the Pleiades cluster of stars, also known as the Seven Sisters, resting in a tangled bed of wispy dust. The pictured region covers seven square degrees, or an area equal to 35 full moons, highlighting the telescope's ability to take wide shots of vast regions of space.

The new picture was taken in February. It shows infrared light from WISE's four detectors in a range of wavelengths. This infrared vision highlights the region's expansive dust cloud, through which the Seven Sisters and other stars in the cluster are passing. Infrared light also reveals the smaller and cooler stars of the family.

"The WISE all-sky survey is helping us sift through the huge and diverse population of celestial objects," said Hashima Hasan, WISE Program scientist at NASA Headquarters in Washington. "It's a great example of the high impact science that's likely from NASA's Explorer Program."

The first release of WISE data, covering about 80 percent of the sky, will be delivered to the astronomical community in May of next year. The mission scanned strips of the sky as it orbited around the Earth's poles since its launch last December. WISE always stays over the Earth's day-night line. As the Earth moves around the sun, innovative slices of sky come into the telescope's field of view. It has taken six months, or the amount of time for Earth to travel halfway around the sun, for the mission to complete one full scan of the entire sky.

For the next three months, the mission will map half of the sky again. This will improve the telescope's data, revealing more hidden asteroids, stars and galaxies. The mapping will give astronomers a look at what's changed in the sky. The mission will end when the instrument's block of solid hydrogen coolant, desirable to chill its infrared detectors, runs out.

"The eyes of WISE have not blinked since launch," said William Irace, the mission's project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. "Both our telescope and spacecraft have performed flawlessly and have imaged every corner of our universe, just as we planned."

So far, WISE has observed more than 100,000 asteroids, both known and formerly unseen. Most of these space rocks are in the main belt between Mars and Jupiter. However, some are near-Earth objects, asteroids and comets with orbits that pass relatively close to Earth. WISE has discovered more than 90 of these new near-Earth objects. The infrared telescope is also good at spotting comets that orbit far from Earth and has discovered more than a dozen of these so far.

WISE's infrared vision also gives it a exceptional ability to pick up the glow of cool stars, called brown dwarfs, in addition to distant galaxies bursting with light and energy. These galaxies are called ultra-luminous infrared galaxies. WISE can see the brightest of them.

"WISE is filling in the blanks on the infrared properties of everything in the universe from nearby asteroids to distant quasars," said Peter Eisenhardt of JPL, project scientist for WISE. "But the most thrilling discoveries may well be objects we haven't yet imagined exist."

JPL manages the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer for NASA's Science Mission Directorate in Washington. The mission was selected under NASA's Explorers Program managed by the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. The science instrument was built by the Space Dynamics Laboratory in Logan, Utah, and the spacecraft was built by Ball Aerospace & Technologies Corp., in Boulder, Colo. Science operations and data processing take place at the Infrared Processing and Analysis Center at the California Institute of Technology in Pasadena. Caltech manages JPL for NASA.

For More information visit http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2010-238

Calling on Californians: West Coast Represent! | The Intersection

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Nishanta Rajakaruna, a professor of botany at College of the Atlantic, sent me UC Davis geologist Eldridge M. Moores’s list on why serpentine should remain the State Rock of California (background here). Why should you care? It’s simple:

When politicians make so-called “scientific” decisions based on nonsense, it’s our collective responsibility to call them out on it!

Alright, so what can you do? Judgment on the bill in question (SB624) happens this week, so if you live in CA, please email/call:

1. Senator Feinstein

2. Senator Boxer

3. The Governor

4. Gloria Romero who is naively pushing for this (and we’re not sure why)

5. Your state assembly person

Let them know that sound science must play a role in the policy-making process. Here are Eldridge’s talking points:

  • Serpentine is closely associated with gold deposits in the foothills, with the California Gold Rush, and California’s history;
  • Serpentine is formed by hydration of rocks (peridotite) that come from the Earth’s mantle, the layer beneath the Earth’s crust.
  • Principally, serpentines and associated rocks are part of rock suites called ophiolites that are fragments of ocean crust and mantle emplaced in continents;
  • Ophiolites are widespread in California–in the Coast Ranges, the Klamath Mountains, the Sierra Nevada, along other parts of the western margin of North America, in the Appalachians, and in Latin America, Eurasia, and elsewhere. Thus these rocks are important for a full understanding of the complex evolution of the California landscape and our planet.
  • Serpentines are fairly easy to identify, being mostly shiny black or green. Many serpentines are also weak rocks and prone to landslide. Having serpentine as California’s State Rock calls attention to these issues in many places; and provides a “teaching moment.”
  • The asbestos in serpentine is mostly the less-harmful form, chrysotile, rather than the more dangerous form – amphibole. The latter forms by different geologic processes from a variety of rock-types;
  • Having children possess samples of serpentine should not endanger their health any more than samples of many other rocks;
  • Many rare species of plants grow only on serpentines, including special trees, shrubs, and non-woody plants. California is world-famous for these plants: indeed many grow only in California. These plants also provide a “teaching moment”.
  • Serpentines and their original mineral, olivine are increasingly viewed as an ideal repository of carbon dioxide (CO2), because they chemically combine to fix the CO2 in the solid mineral magnesite (magnesium carbonate). This possibility is important for the future of California serpentines, for the US’s efforts to control its greenhouse emissions, and provides an additional “teaching moment” for all of us.
  • Serpentine plays an important role in small movements (creep) where serpentine is present along active faults, reducing the hazard of large earthquakes.
  • “Defrocking” serpentine as the California State Rock is not going to make any of these issues go away. It will, however, make it more difficult to communicate the many issues, both bad and good, to the public in California.

Related, there’s now a Serpentine Protest Song.

Update: Helpful links

The Law Against Serpentine: The Attorneys’ Arena

Geotripper

Highly Allochthonous

Twitter: #CAserpentine

Serpentine: A Group of Minerals

Throwing the Baby Out with the Bathwater: The Serpentine Issue in California

Asbestos in California’s State Rock? Not Really


Geert Wilders’ social tolerance side confuses International Leftists

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Wilders and his Freedom Party are "willing to fight for libertarian social values"

From Eric Dondero:

David Warren a traditionalist Catholic columnist for the Ottawa Citizen penned an incredibly open and frank editorial about Dutch Member of Parliament Geert Wilders. Titled, "A breach in the Islamist-leftist alliance," Warren admits those on the Left don't know what to make of Wilders.

The views of his Freedom Party are Pro-Free Enterprise on economics, Pro-civil liberties and tolerance on social matters, yet stridently Pro-Defense on National Security. These positions don't fit traditional political labels.

From the Ottawa Citizen, July 17:

Geert Wilders is a little too liberal for my taste. His Freedom Party, which made huge strides in the recent Dutch general election -- leaving Wilders only about two heartbeats short of their prime minister's office -- is the very opposite of socially conservative.

The more straitlaced sort of North American visitor, who almost involuntarily compares parts of Amsterdam with Sodom and/or Gomorrah, will get no sympathy from the Freedom Party.

This creates an interesting challenge for our progressive types. They would like to think of Wilders as a "fascist," or better, some kind of fundamentalist Christian crazy. They have observed that his movement is catching populist fire, and may be spreading across Europe at Tea-Party speed.

Half-naked Euro Babes in Amsterdam in stark contrast to drab, gloomy Muslim immigrants

Warren continues:

Indeed, such a visitor may find that his only allies, in calling down the wrath of the heavens upon the antinomianism of the contemporary urban Dutch, are preaching in the local Islamist mosque.

Given the contrast between the modest demeanour of many young immigrant Muslim women, with their heads covered and their strollers full of babies -- and that of so many "native" young western women, childless but provocatively half-naked under the summer sun -- I have sometimes myself wondered which side I am on.

Warren then goes on to point out that in many social respects, traditional religionism in Europe, is closer to that of the strident social conservatism of Islam instead of the libertinism of modern Euros.

The Roman Catholic religion to which I subscribe also requires modesty in female dress... It also requires chastity, and constant acknowledgement of God.

The point here is that freedom has undergone redefinition, since the so-called "Enlightenment" in the West, and has been confused with licence in our post-modern era.

The Freedom Party of Geert Wilders takes this post-modern notion of freedom more or less for granted. It is hardly a Christian political force. It is "rationalist" in the Enlightenment tradition, and it is rational insofar as it detects a conflict between libertarian social values, and the strictures of even conventional Islam (let alone radical Islamists and terrorists). It is willing to fight for the preservation of these post-modern values, even if this requires banning mass Muslim immigration.