The Tragedy in Japan and Nuclear Power

I WOULD do a post on the actual disaster in Japan, but it would be a little late, and there are many, many better places to read about it. Instead, I am going to criticize media reporting. You may have noticed that for every report on the actual tragedy, there are two or three screaming "NUCLEAR MELTDOWN!!!" I can guarantee you, this will be turned into an anti-nuclear crusade, even if (like at Three Mile Island) nobody is actually harmed by the plants. A "meltdown," even if by some freak chance one happened, would not harm anyone except people stupid enought to be literally inside the plant itself. That's what happened with Chernobyl - the only people killed died INSIDE the plant, and nobody died from "fallout" - in fact, nobody was even harmed.

Now, one thing I've seen claimed is that uranium fuel rods are dangerous because they have such a long half-life. This is both true and a flat out lie. It IS true that uranium has an extremely long half-life, but that is what makes it SAFE, except in obscenely high amounts, by which I mean being literally surrounded by it. Half-life is the amount of time it takes for 50% of a radioactive compound to "decay" - that is, emit radiation and cease to be radioactive. When a compound emits a particle of radiation, it ceases to be that compound, and thus no longer emits radiation. Something with a short half-life, such as radon gas, is quite dangerous, because a LOT of radiation is emitted in a short time. On the other hand, if you take the same amount of uranium, it will take FAR longer to emit the same amount of radiation. So yes, it is radioactive longer, but it emits very little radiation.

Please, news outlets, stop with your ridiculous crusade against safe, clean, affordable power! In fact, stop taking tragedies and using them as an excuse to condemn those you disagree with.

The Judge on the Oil Spill

Here's Judge Andrew Napolitano blowing up the statists again.



By the way, how many Congressmen does it take to stop the oil spill?

Only three or four, if they're wedged in just right.

The Gulf Oil Spill

I know, I know. This is fairly old news. I'd like to share my thoughts on it, though. First, I've noticed a disturbing tendency in articles about the spill. It's almost always in this vein: "Oh, no, the animals! Oh, no, the environment! Oil is evil! Oh yeah, some people got killed in the blast, too. But the ANIMALS!" Please tell me I'm not the only one who finds this disturbing. Why is the massive economic damage ignored? Why are the lost lives drowned out by cries of "OH MY GOSH, THERE ARE PELICANS GETTING COVERED IN OIL!" You know, those are some pretty stupid pelicans. Question: Does anyone actually care about a bird that's stupid enough to land on an oil spill? Natural selection at work.

By the way, I wouldn't be too concerned about the fish. They will be almost completely unharmed by the spill. Also, NOAA estimates that one third of the spill has already evaporated. Go figure.

Something else that bothers me: I have now seen several people attacking our use of oil. Okay, great! Now go get rid of your car and halt all electricity use. Geez. Oh, yeah, and Obama and co., in their infinite wisdom, have decided to halt all future coastal drilling indefinitely. I usually don't say things like this, but only an economic moron would do that. Dang it, there's oil reserves abounding in Alaska, and likely some in Antarctica, but drilling is not permitted in those areas. In fact, I've read that there's oil off the Carolina coast. Wouldn't more drilling provied more, um, JOBS? Yeah, aren't we trying to fix the unemployment problem? Halting expansion of an industry ain't gonna do that.

By the way, global warming caused the Iceland eruption.

Happy Earth Day!

Oh, wait, it's not Earth Day, it's Vladimir Lenin's birthday. Wait, no, it IS Earth Day. Hold on, it appears to be BOTH! Yes, folks, Earth Day is on Lenin's birthday. You know, Communist, mass-murderer, all that good stuff? If this wasn't so disturbing it would be hysterically funny. Apparently, when Earth Day was started, the ones who started it said, "What better day than Lenin's birthday, since capitalism destroys the environment?"

Riiiiiiight. And Communism has such a sterling track record. Frankly, I don't feel like going on a long rant (I know what you're thinking: "Drake doesn't feel like ranting?! Take cover, the world is ending!") so I'll just recommend a great book.

The Really Inconvenient Truths: Seven Environmental Catastrophes Liberals Don't Want You To Know About-Because They Helped Cause Them

If you just want quick proof of socialism's environmental record, Google "Aral Sea Dried Up."

This is supposed to be a good thing...?

Oh. My. Gosh. The freaks who made this commercial are portraying "green police" as a good thing. Yes, I called them freaks. That wasn't harsh enough. Fascist, Communist loopy environmentalist maniacs! There. I feel better now.



Yes, I am aware that this is a car commercial. That doesn't take away from the fact that they're freaks. Seriously, this is disturbing even as a joke. The fact that most Americans wouldn't be infuriated by the mere suggestion of "green police" scares the living daylights out of me.

National Geographic... Again

Wow, National Geographic has lately been giving me lots to talk about. In this issue, there are two, no, three articles I want to discuss. First, there's a great article on bionics. It's really cool, the advances in artificial limbs. Second, there's the article on illegal wildlife trafficking. It goes through the usual, "People are -gasp- using endangered species! Even worse, they're making a profit! How horrible!" It then talks with dread about the possibility of raising tigers for profit, farming basically. Personally, I would prefer having a huge range in Africa for the tigers to breed in, but also allow adventurers and thrill seekers to go on safari and hunt the beasts, then selling the product. For a price, of course. But no, farming tigers is somehow horrible, despite the fact that it would save the species from extinction. As one book put it, the environmentalist thinks, "Tigers going extinct: bad. Capitalism: worse." That about sums it up.
The last article I want to talk about is their article on Singapore. You know, the tiny little country off the coast of Southeast Asia that is unbelievably prosperous compared to its neighbors? Well, the folks at NatGeo attribute its success to the tight regulations on personal liberties. Obviously, they think that the prosperity of Singapore is thanks to socialism. Minor problem: The article mentions not one economic regulation, and Singapore is actually more capitalistic and economically free than the USA. The lack of personal liberty is wrong, of course, but as far as economics goes, Singapore is a shining example of capitalism run wild. Not as scary as some people would have you think, is it?

Whale Wars

Animal Planet has started a new series known as "Whale Wars." I had seen something about environmentalists boarding a Japanese whaling ship on Youtube, so I suspected that they may be the same thing. Unfortunately, I was right. The story goes something like this: The co-founder of Greenpeace apparently also helped start a group to protect whales from, well, whalers. So far, so good. The group called themselves the Sea Shepherds, and have several ships operating in different areas, at least that's what they imply on the show. All I've seen is about the Antarctic unit, ship named the Steve Irwin. Here's where things go illegal. They desperately want to stop Japanese whaling, which is currently being done under the title "scientific research", which makes it legal, even if no one believes them. However, the Sea Shepherds wanted to stop it by less-than-legal means. All the following can be seen on the show. The Steve Irwin chased down one of the Japs' ships. They then launched a small boat equipped with lots of small packets filled with a type of acid powder and a huge coil of rope. The boat came up alongside the ship,and the goons started throwing the packets onto the ship. ILLEGAL. One type of the powder makes it too slippery to walk, and the other leaves an awful reek for days. The boat then pulled in front of the ship, and dropped the rope with the intention of fouling the ship's propeller and stopping it. ILLEGAL. The fouler missed, so they performed their next stunt with the ship moving. They launched the boat again, and two of the people on board actually BOARDED the Japanese ship. They didn't ahve weapons, but boarding a ship is always illegal. Of course, they're saving whales, so Animal Planet's portraying them as heroes, leaving out the fact that next to nothing they're doing is legal.

National Geaographic and the E.S.A.

You know how in my post about Reader's Digest and National Geaographic I said that N.G. gained a lot of respect from me? Well, they just lost it. Every last bit, and then some. E.S.A. stands for Endangered Species Act, but it should be called the Endangering Species Act. In this issue of N.G., they dedicate one section to the glorification of the worthless Act. They claim that it helped save several different species, including the American alligator and grizzly bear. However, the alligator was saved by a drop in the demand for its skins, which took place BEFORE the E.S.A. was passed, while the grizzly bear that was supposedly saved was only ONE POPULATION. N.G. also says that polar bears are endangered by habitat loss, which they most certainly are not, despite being on the endangered list. They have a picture of one with the number 3500 beside it, which implies there are only 3500 left. However, if you looked closely at one of the little tiny notes, you would see the words "in Alaska." The notes really are tiny, and located so that the average reader wouldn't look at them, since the picture and number are all that most folks care about. The environmentalist argument is that loss of sea ice threatens them, but they happen to be perfectly capable of living on land, and are common in northern Canada. 11 out of 13 populations are stable or rising. Wow, funny how easy it is to go off-subject. Anyhow, the ESA actually encourages elimination of species. Here's how it works: When the government finds out about an endangered species on your land, they essentially take it from you, by not allowing you to do anything
with it. In California for instance, you're not allowed to build a firebreak to protect your home from a wildfire. Why? It might disturb the kangaroo rat! What? You would rather save your house than avoid harming a kangaroo rat?! Get your priorities right! This idea causes harm to the rat by not allowing development for protection, which does two things: either the owner wishes to protect his/her home, so they kill the critter before the Feds find out, or the Feds find out, regulate the land, and a fire kills the things. Same with a certain tree farmer. The gov. discovered a rare type of woodpecker on a section of his land, and, of course, regulated it. He understandably wanted to use the rest of his land (which NG villifies) and promptly clear-cut the rest of his land. I would probably do the same thing.