Oh my … they don’t love us anymore:

A new poll says the world thinks a lot less highly of Canada than last year, thanks in large part to our poor showing at the Copenhagen climate change conference and a problematic prime ministerial trip to China.
A BBC World Service poll of public opinion across 18 countries released this week found that people’s view of Canada’s influence has worsened during the last year, particularly in the U.S., Britain and China.
The poll of more than 20,000 people, which was conducted by international polling firm GlobeScan, showed a decline in Canada’s reputation around the world for the first time since tracking began in 2005.

Clearly, the negative vibes from the global community have some of our leaders shaking … but one needs to ask, how do we reconcile it all with THIS?

… a light comes on:

Addressing the Tea Party, Sarah Palin wrote three notes on her hand: “Energy, Taxes, Lift American Spirits.” Why? She already had notes in front of her on the podium. Surely she could remember three simple themes. Why write notes on her hand?
Here’s my take on why: she knew that they would be visible when she gave the speech. And she knew that she would be made fun of — as so stupid that she needs to write notes on her hand. And that’s one of her most effective tactics — to be made fun of. It’s an integral part of her strategy of standing in for hardworking, Middle Americans, derided by the condescending, know-it-all liberal elites.

… keep reading Huffpo.
ht: Horny Toad

VDH:

There is an unfocused but growing anger in this country — and it should come as no surprise. Nobody likes to be lectured by those claiming superior wisdom but often lacking common sense about everything from out-of-control spending and predicting the weather to dealing with enemies who are trying to kill us all.

Luboš Motl, Czech physicist, explains:

As Reuters and the Czech media noticed today, the Czech grid is overloaded and the company in charge of it, ČEPS, is finalizing its plans to solve the situation.
ČEPS urges the electricity distribution companies to halt the connecting of the new solar and wind plants. At the end of 2009, they were giving 600 MW to the grid. However, projects that would add a whopping extra 3,500 MW have already been approved! This is a genuine threat to the stability of the grid.
ČEPS has informed that if the rules won’t be changed to avoid the danger raised by these ludicrously subsidized and hugely irregular sources of energy, it will have to start to disconnect them. This could mean that the green investors could lose their money which would be great.
[…]
Needless to say, billions of dollars are flying and corrupt, green, or otherwise dirty politicians and bureaucrats have helped to distort the market, all the rules, and the stability of the grid, for ideological, irrational, and egotistic reasons (or simply to lick the buttocks of their bigger but even more idiotic EU colleagues), paying no attention to what their decisions would mean to the consumers and the economy at large.
The irresponsibility in the “renewable” electricity subsidies was particularly shocking in the Czech Republic. But I am sure that other countries face similar threats, too. It’s just that they don’t have any responsible people or companies who would dare to mention that the spontaneous explosion of these “renewable” sources is a fast path to hell.

Update:
Giant Fan Cost/Benefit Paper

Addressing the recent murders of two women, allegedly by Col. Russell Williams, Charlie Smith of the Georgia Straight has a couple of questions, one for the Canadian Armed Forces and one for Canadians in general:

Is (the Canadian Armed Forces) using the psychopathy checklist, which was pioneered by retired UBC psychology professor Bob Hare, to ferret out psychopaths? I emailed a question to the Department of National Defence, and I received a call back saying the inquiry couldn’t be answered this evening. However, someone will call back tomorrow.

In the meantime, perhaps we should ask ourselves if this is another cost of Prime Minister Stephen Harper’s decision to prorogue Parliament…

Honestly now…
(h/t blackash)

Elizabeth May on the hidden talents of Stephen Mesmer-Harper:

Murray Dobbin: “Do you think Harper has deliberately set out to discourage people from voting?”

Elizabeth May: “Absolutely. People thought that Harper had become more popular between the 2006 and 2008 elections but not so: 170,000 fewer people voted for a Conservative candidate in 2008 than in 2006. His larger seat count is a tribute to his ability to discourage people from voting.”

Apparently his special powers work best against potential Green Party voters.

Again and again, blogs are not only scooping the MSM, but are in some cases months ahead in research and investigative reporting.
Dr. Richard North:

… on the state of the media. We started pumping stuff into the system in mid -December yet, even though our stories have been replicated in whole or part, thousands of times, it really is quite remarkable how few journalists bring anything new to the table.
Most of the stuff seems to be recycled, very often poorly understood and most often incomplete and behind the curve – and very rarely acknowledging the source. And it came full circle yesterday, with the New York Times finally broaching a story about Pachauri and the IPCC, two months are we started the hare running.

… case in point …Pajamas way out front:

Who is Achim Steiner? A German, born in Brazil, he is a longtime environmentalist, former head from 2001-2006 of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, or IUCN. (Sample of UN climate networking — take a deep breath, don’t even try to follow this, just roll with it: The IUCN has been phenomenally intertwined over the years with the UN cast of climate characters. When Steiner left the IUCN in 2006, he was succeeded there by a sister-in-law of a former U.S. ambassador to the UN, Richard Holbrooke. This Holbrooke in-law, Julia Marton-Lefevre , in turn, had just finished serving as rector of the UN University for Peace, in Costa Rica, which had been greatly beefed up in the years prior to her arrival by the so-called godfather of the Kyoto Treaty, Maurice Strong – first head of the same UNEP that Achim Steiner now runs).

What is it with conservative women, they clearly know who the enemy is, and aren’t afraid to say so:

More Palinism:

Suppose a director general (roughly colonel equivalent) in the federal public service–say in the high-stress finance department–were arrested and so charged. Would our media be engaging in the full-court press they are now putting on the case of Col. Russ Williams?
Would they be asking questions about psychological evaluations (‘The generals hand the air force chief a list of recommendations after an “extensive file review.” That review does not typically include a psychological assessment…’)? Do they think Air Force transport pilots (the official biography stupidly deleted here) are somehow trained killers just waiting to explode?
It’s a helluva story. But f…… upchuck with our media’s anti-military, hurl-making, stinking, AGENDA.
Update: The agenda, Globeite in this case, in action:

Murder charges may unfairly tarnish military’s reputation
Canadians must differentiate between actions of one senior official [er, officer, you idjit] and Canadian Forces as a whole, observers say
…
“This is what Canadians will be watching for: will the military close ranks around this, as perhaps we’ve seen in the past, or will they openly co-operate” with the investigation, said Steven Staples, president of the Rideau Institute, an Ottawa think-tank that examines, among other things, the military and defence policy…

That John Ibbitson, the Globe and Mail’s (“Canada’s National Newspaper”) Ottawa news bureau chief and at the same strange time a columnist, can write such a thing without any honest characterization of St. Steve is flipping dishonest, er, journalism. But who’s a real journalist these days?
Perhaps the Globe might just cease fire (Mr Staples’ true love) on the Canadian Forces. Mr Ibbitson’s piece concludes with true, unqualified, crap from Mr Staples:

“This man was part of the elite, the inner circle,” Mr. Staples observed. That elite is exposed and vulnerable, too.

Count the colonels (and Navy captains, to repeat). Some “inner circle”.

Here’s Phil Jones, who recently stood aside as director of the Climatic Research Unit in East Anglia, gravid with data in a 1996 email:

In our maximum latewood density reconstruction from the polar Urals to AD 914, the most anomalous summer is AD 1032. A lot of other volcano
years are there with summers of -3 to -4 sigma such as 1816,1601,1783 and
1453 (I think this later one is Kuwae that is being found in the Ice Cores
in the Antarctic. However 1032 is 6 sigma and it may be the Baitoushan
event which you say is 1010 +/- 50 years or the Billy Mitchell event.

Jones nine years later in a 2005 email:

(McKitrick and McIntyre) have been after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a freedom of Information act now in the UK, I think I’ll delete the file rather than send to anyone.

Jones three days ago:

We interpret data. We don’t create or collect it. It’s all available from other sources.

***

Taliban = “farmers in the wrong place at the wrong time”