NEW YORK (Thomson Reuters Foundation) – Protecting the infrastructure of American cities from the effects of climate change is rising on the agenda of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, according to a top agency official.
“Increasingly, we’ve moved not only from a security focus to a resiliency focus,” said Caitlin Durkovich, assistant secretary for infrastructure protection at Homeland Security, an agency better known for its fight to curb terrorist threats.
Durkovich spoke Thursday on a panel at the Rising Seas Summit, a three-day conference organized by the U.S.-based Association of Climate Change Officers to discuss tools and ideas on building resiliency, particularly against rising sea levels.
In the aftermath of 2012’s Hurricane Sandy, which devastated large swathes of the Northeastern U.S and caused over $60 billion in damages, Durkovich said her department reviewed the task of rebuilding with a new focus on “how to think about baking in resilience from the get-go.”
To that end, she said, she has assembled a team of specialists, including city planners, in conjunction with the National Academy of Science to develop better tools for planning. The Department of Homeland Security already has launched regional efforts to assess resilience of infrastruction and judge where gaps in adaptation and preparedness may be, she said.
Full story here: http://www.reuters.com/article/2014/09/25/us-foundation-climate-security-idUSKCN0HK2PW20140925
It’s exactly what FDR did. He noticed that there were things the president could do during war time that would never be allowed during peace. Now thanks to Bush and Obama they have constant state of war with the DHS. They have powers they never thought permanent. The problem with DHS focusing on climate change, the citizens of the United States have become the intended targets.
One target may be thermostats. In the name of Carbon, the government may claim it is for the sake of humanity that they control the heat of your home.
I fear it is all about control, for certain people, and they are simply seeing how much they can get away with taking, before people howl.
Simples, trick the thermostat. Put it in a cold room or even outside.
Controlling the heat of your home – or turning it off via the Smart Meter if you exceed your CO2 allocation?
Indeed control of fear and sustained raising of new fear that’s what they do. The big businesses behind it supports its decisions (the massive amount of airport security equipment, made in USA, arms etc) and keeps it alive. Next, once this is up and running, all of us with second thoughts on Global Warming as presented to us, can be held under terrorist law. There you have it; all deniers now go to detention centres. The land of the free!
Control is what the smartmeters and “Internet of Things” are all about…lots of these controllers have loose security, if any at all (such as 1234 as a default password). Sometimes a little convenience becomes VERY inconvenient. (And no, I’m not using a tinfoil hat to keep me warm 🙂 )
There are interesting articles on the register, c’t (in German) and other “geek outlets” on this.
If you want a real fascist president read up on Woodrow Wilson and his progressives. He set the stage for presidents usurping executive power.
Very true. Read Modern Times by Paul Johnson.
he was a raging racist as well. He segregated the parts of the federal government that had been desegregated. He also openly pursued the idea of using the judiciary to change the constitution, primarily because he felt it was too difficult to push his agenda with constitutional amendments. His goal to turn the constitution from a strict enumeration of powers limiting the actions of the federal government into the “living, breathing document” that it has become today eventually took hold. He has much to answer for.
Wilson was putty in the hands of Col. House, Justice Brandeis, and Samuel Untermeyer.
Its part of the perpetual bureaucracy. Every terrorist on the planet could disappear tomorrow and DHS snd TSA are going nowhere. In fact then they would redouble their efforts on climate change. We’re pretty much screwed.
They never should have organized all those federal groups into DHS (http://www.dhs.gov/who-joined-dhs). This would have been under the purview of local Emergency responders and perhaps FEMA, but it’s not a “security” issue by any means. What a farce.
Very well put, Gregory.
A more “compliant” department for the little “o” to control, and perhaps easier to bury the expenses there?
Good Lord. I pray we are delivered in the next election from these idiots. Which I, to my ever-living regret, helped put into office in the first place.
You are forgiven Pam , just don’t let it happen again.
It’s too late. The damage to society is critical. Consider, the outcome of destroying America. All of planet earth will become a shooting gallery soon.
On the bright side though, all the useful fools that helped bring this condition about, all the poor people that just had to be helped will be barbecuing do-gooders over trash fires.
I compliment you for recognizing the error, but how many others are likely to do so? The majority of the population still believe that a politician who questions CAGW is a fool, a shill for big oil, or stupid. The libs are so proficient at portraying everyone else as stupid, and they really and truly believe in their own mental superiority. I’m rather tired of people thinking that moderation (or just a touch of conservative thinking) is a mental aberration or worse yet, criminal disregard of moral law.
I guess you didn’t do your homework beforehand. This outcome was entirely predictable.
+1
Did you put him into office a second time or was the lesson learnt?
From over here in the UK he always looked to be in the mould of Tony Blair, a blowhard of the first order
Tonyb
Sorry, but these people are idiots. Can’t think of anything positive or profound to say about the Dept. of Homeland Security.
I feel the battle has been lost. Our freedom will be usurped under the green flag of climate change.
It isn’t that governments at all levels shouldn’t think about resiliency. After all, Sandy did happen, and a whole bunch of things went wrong that in retrospect didn’t have to. If backup generators were 25 feet higher in buildings, for example. Hurricanes happen, it isn’t a sin to plan for how to weather big ones better, it’s a good thing, even if CO2 emissions had never changed, or even if the warming impact of CO2 emissions is small, as it very well might be.
But why Homeland Security? Isn’t their mission vastly different?
It smacks of the current Administration using Homeland Security for political purposes, to align in peoples’ minds the two different notions of horrible man made climate change and homeland security.
Perhaps even worse, maybe they REALLY THINK that human emissions are so horrific that it becomes a homeland security issue. Any White House can get insular, perhaps this one is more so than most. I actually would prefer the cynical political reason, as opposed to the OH MY GOD reason.
Just a step along the path of criminalizing dissent.
There is no technical solution. During Sandy I was responsible for a bunch of servers located in a datacenter in lower Manhattan. Before the storm we got lots of communication from the datacenter operator, saying all was well, there was nothing to worry about, they were prepared for all eventuality. And, in a purely technical sense, that was true.
The datacenter was located on the 25th store of a 40 story building, the backup generator was on the roof, it was fired up as soon as power went away due to exploding flooded transformers in the district, and UPS was sufficient to bridge the gap between power failure and backup. Although the building was flooded with salt water up to the first floor and the fuel tanks were located in the basement, fuel pumps were well designed and they kept working under 17 feet of water. Network connections were proven to be waterproof as well, so all looked good.
Until authorities arrived and ordered the generator to be shut down, that is. It turned out the equipment was not certified to work under such extreme conditions. That in fact it did, mattered little. Neither the fact the City never considered to issue such certificates, so even if the datacenter operator wanted one, it had not been available, for there was no department responsible for it.
Therefore the datacenter, with all the servers in it, was offline for a week, until a mobile generator could be brought in.
Of course being cynical, I would say that the “Authority” that shut down your working backup system was some how connected by blood or money or both, to the provider of that mobile generator.
@AussieBear
I belive the “authoriy” was the NYPD and I think it was plain stupidity. Mobile generators were in seriously short supply in those days, so it did not make sense to boost business that way. In fact the first mobile generator (a huge truck) arrived in a couple of days. Unfortunately it was broken, it worked for an hour or so, but then, for some reason, it refused to provide electricity any more. The second one was brought in from somewhere around Salt Lake City, that was the trip what took three or four days on jammed roads.
The police was worried about possible oil leakages in downtown Manhattan, so they were only acting responsibly or so they thought. They did not want the entire business district to go up in flames. The fact tons of diesel fuel was left untouched in tanks under water for weeks this way, escaped them somehow.
The Department of Homeland Security is at least partly a scam. Several years ago, my nephew told me he was going to have a career in HS. He interviewed and was given a hire date. He gave 2 weeks notice and quit his old job. When the appointed day came, he showed up at his new “workplace” and was told they weren’t ready for him and his workmates. Over a month later, he was called and finally told to come in. When he did, he found a bunch of offices where his entire crew was given some make-work tasks to do. They did this for several weeks and were then told that the “contract” was finished and that their jobs were done. It was obvious that the politically-connected guy with the contract made a killing and everybody else got shafted. This government is a farce.
R.M.S. Titanic comes to mind regarding HomeLand Security’s tallent and interest in … resiliency … aka, “The Band Played On.”
I had this funny feeling when G.W. created this beast that it wasn’t going to end well.
Yes, classic example of the problem of good intentions” G.W. was a straight shooter compared to the current yahoos operating Morodor on the Potomac. Bush failed to understand what a bitter, full of angst cult personality could do with such power.
I remember years ago reading about how DHS had shutdown a music filesharer. For the life of me, I couldn’t find a singe possibe relationship between swapping songs and terrorism, yet there they were, at the head of the line for busting some poor teenage bastard.
Out of control, period.
jb
Sure, be prepared for changing climate and extreme weather, that’s prudent.
Conjure human blame for climate change, that’s manipulative.
I realize that the way I wrote my comment at 7:30, that I might come across as a supporter of big government. So I need to, ah….clarify.
The federal government shouldn’t have a big role in planning for hurricanes, except in one way. The feds pay a lot of money when homes are flooded or destroyed by hurricanes. The feds also provide insurance for hurricane damages. Homes that have appropriate hurricane protections — if they are only a few feet above sea level, and near the sea, they should be jacked up about 8 feet, as so many homes now are on barrier islands, for example, and as existing homes are now being jacked up on the coast near Milford, CT, also due to Sandy. If they do have appropriate protections, they should pay a lot less for hurricane insurance. Feds can influence people to take appropriate measures this way, and reduce the amount of money taxpayers from the interior will pay for hurricane damages the next time a big one hits.
The feds can be useful here is to take examples of efforts that saved money, or will do so, when big ones hit — a clearinghouse for resiliency ideas. That is a very small role in terms of personnel. But because the feds paid so much money for Sandy’s damage, it would be a good thing to have better forward planning, so that taxpayers won’t have to pay as much.
No reason that both of these responsibilities shouldn’t be with FEMA. No reason to dilute Homeland Security’s mission.
Perhaps you can show where in the enumerated powers it states that the Federal Government is responsible for sensible building planning deciisions in the States. It certainly was not considered a federal responsibility by the drafters and approvers of The Tenth Amendment. Perhaps if the states involved had taken advice and built sea defenses, flood gates in tunnels and prevented subdivision development with frangible houses on flood plains – instead of getting cocerned with the size of sodas and other trivia; then a large but not particularly strong storm would have not have caused the damage it did. A similar storm in well prrepared Florida would have barely merited a mention except on weather bulletins.
I learned a long time ago from my father, “never build on a flood plane”. Good advice. Sea has been rising at about 7 inches per century – not an increase that couldn’t be adjusted to…
If the feds pay for a lot of the damage, they have a right to try to minimize future damage that they will also substantially pay for. Which saves the taxpayer money. The issue is whether they become a behemoth which grows far beyond the problem need, or keep their missions small, sized correctly to the problem.
@John
The real issue is, where does the federal government get off subsidizing private insurance for those who want to risk other people’s money by building in flood plains? I can’t find anything in the enumerated powers allowing this kind of wealth transfer. Way back when, Congress decided to vote some money for folks who suffered a fire in Georgetown. A constituant of Davey Crockett wrote a letter in protest, asking where the feds had gotten the OK to hand out money to purely private persons, however worthy the cause? Crockett wrote back, confessing that he couldn’t see any justification for their largesse. The money, however, still got paid out.
FEMA is part of DHS.
Yeah, I forget that DHS took in FEMA. Overreach. It shouldn’t be part of DHS.
Effective building codes are the responsibility of the states, but can be very effective in improving public safety, energy efficiency, etc. As usual, the “extreme weather” claim is assumed by the climate catastrphists, despite the IPCC advice to the contrary. Like the religious fundamentalists of all varieties, they can ignore their holy scripts as needed.
Local control also allows decisions that best suit the local situation. That is the heart of federalism. New York allowed people to build in flood plains. They flourished for centuries. A storm came along (again) and damaged a lot. Now, the Federal Government has decided that this expense (which they have no authority to spend), over powers any local interest in building controls. Local considerations must give way to Federal interests. The Federal interests are fabricated.
The Feds are jerks, insisting on picking up the tab, then complaining about the cost.
Gamecock, when the costs got too big, it was the local and state politicians that called in Federal disaster relief.
That doesn’t mean that a D admin with deep antipathy toward, say, Texas, might not be a little less inclined to declare a federal emergency for TX, vs. a less conservative state, if there is a borderline decision.
Cold in Wisconsin,
Fundamentalists are the ones who never ignore their holy scripts. You must have meant:”Like the religious of all varieties, they can ignore their holy scripts as needed.” In this case the holy script ignored by the DHS is the constitution.
It is the Feds providing insurance, when free enterprise says “no, I do not think so”, that causes extensive building in flood planes and areas prone to natural disaster.
To David A: Yes indeed, when private insurers don’t like the risk, the Feds did step in. How did that come about? My guess is that Congresspeople and Senators from coastal states subject to hurricanes got the feds to do it. Once that happened, developers got started. Of course, there might have been the odd campaign contribution from the developers to the Congresspeople and Senators.
From a national scale, fed flood insurance without strict requirements for building in ways that will preserve the structure in hurricanes is crazy. From the perspective of a local politician representing coastal parts of states from TX through N Carolina, it makes huge good sense to get the feds to take over insurance, and then build lots of unsafe houses.
The Association of Climate Change Officers held a Rising Seas Summit? Who the heck are these “officers?”
Googled them and it appears that anyone can be a Climate Change Officer if you just send the organization money. To be Gold it is around $20k a year. Nonrefundable.
Has Kenji joined yet?
Reading this “In the aftermath of 2012’s Hurricane Sandy, which devastated large swathes of the Northeastern U.S and caused over $60 billion in damages”, several red BS flags go flying.
First, Sandy was not a hurricane when it came ashore. It was a rather normal “nor’easter” storm along the Atlantic coast.
It’s effect was magnified by a high tide on top of the storm surge. Drainage systems should have been adequate to handle the high water, but >90% of the affected municipalities are run by Donkeys, who would rather spend tax money on buying votes with social programs than saving property with boring infrastructure projects.
The “$60 billion” damage figure is only a measure of how much “other people’s money” Congress was willing to throw on all this ignored/delayed maintenance work after the fact. Pimps and whores, that’s all they are.
For that kind of money, I’d have rather seen the entire population of western Long Island packed up and relocated to Oklahoma, high and dry and safe from floods
But not Tornados
Sandy wasn’t a hurricane, but it wasn’t a “rather normal ‘noreaster'”, either. It had a much larger circulation and, as an anomalously large Cat 1 Hurricane in extent, had an exceedingly long fetch that piled up much more water than a Rather Normal Northeaster.
It was much more like 1954 Hurricane Hazel by the time it got to Toronto–an extratropical cyclone, but one that still had a lot of power. After the iconic paper published on its transition, by the late, great climatologist Jerome Namias (one of the early and vocal skeptics on CAGW, also, and who personally encouraged me), it was clear that it was also no longer a hurricane when it caused all the damage there.
Sorry, but it was nothing like Hurricane Hazel when it got to Toronto – not even close – been there, survived that. I agree with the scale and fetch comments – ultimately, Sandy was primarily just a big sloppy storm by the time it hit landfall.
geologyjim , don’t wish harm on Oklahoma !!
I remember the big insurers said the damage was 20 billion. The spendthrifts
in DC pumped in 60 billion. You know where that went.
And where it came from.
No bureaucracy ever tries to downsize itself. Empires must grow, any excuse that might work is good.
Sandy was a baroclinic anamoly.
Note:
Not a hurricane at landfall.
Impacted mostly swamp infilled areas.
Played a role in electing Barry.
Just sayin……..
Good god. WTF? Truly we have no leaders. Just a bunch of demagogues thursting for more power no matter the consequences. John Kerry and Hilary Clinton calling climate change a larger and more immediate than ISIS. Words fail. Really. The incompetence, the stupidity is truly unbelievable. This asshat said he wanted to transform America. Can’t say he didn’t keep his promise. Transformed into a fledgling third world nation.
Interesting coincidence – ASCE’s publication on Flood Risk Management was released today. In the publication, sustainability (32 times) and resiliency (25) are the bywords. Climate change (7) and sea level rise (4) figure prominently. However, “global warming” is nowhere in the document.
http://ascelibrary.org/doi/pdf/10.1061/9780784478585?utm_campaign=Comm-20140926-ASCEnews%20Weekly&utm_medium=email&utm_source=Eloqua&
America needs a flood risk management strategy, ASCE urges in new report
The nation must develop and implement a collaborative, comprehensive flood risk management strategy, an ASCE committee announced this week in Philadelphia, summarizing the recommendations of its detailed new report probing how well the lessons learned from Hurricane Katrina have been applied in the nine years since the disaster. Download a free copy of Flood Risk Management: Call for a National Strategy by ASCE’s Task Committee on Flood Safety Policies and Practices. The release event drew a great deal of media interest, including coverage in The Associated Press, CBS Philadelphia, and The Times-Picayune of New Orleans. Read statement>>
Why do you think it coincidental that a society of “Civil Engineers” (Translation, Engineers who work for the government) think that the government should do more.
The apparent coincidence was coming out with a resilience and sustainability document at the same time as DHS did.
Fretting about Climate Change allowing Islamic State terrorists to sneak in under the Radar and attack the US . The build up to 9 11 all over again.
Divert funds away from border security to flood defence and environmental projects.
Like Detroit?
A bankrupted civilian society has very little resilience to drastic change of any kind.
As the kleptocracy, demonstrated by the UN and useful idiots in our bureaucracies, wastes and destroys our collective wealth, we are naked before any storm.
So if Homeland Security was doing the preventative work they claim, they would be actively investigating every promoter of the CAGW meme, as this scheme is treason by their own standards.
ossqss
Correct, Sandy was not a Hurricane when it made landfall in NJ.
Yes, it was an anomaly since the NE coast was already being pounded by a lingering NE storm super high tides and flooding already in play.
As I recall, the in place NE storm actually slowed down Sandy causing the storm to linger an unusually long period which when combined with the existing NE storm caused massive flooding along sections of the coast.
I find it somewhat incomplete that many ignore the fact that Sandy piled on top a NE Storm.
…which combined with natural high tides.
Ah, yes…. DHSS protects der Fatherland from the terroristic CO2 molecules….
While DHSS completely abrogates its responsibility of protecting America’s Southern border from being flooded by 1,000,000 illeagal aliens per year, DHSS is devoting time and resources to fight 0.06 inches per year of sea level rise that’s “flooding” our coastlines….
Got it…
I believe that is the definition of Mission Creep.
Not Mission Creep, it’s Mission Abuse.
Once upon a time, I ordered a medication, Voltaren for topical use (a miracle drug for moderate chronic pain that gets around the nasty cardiovascular and gastrointestinal problems with oral Voltaren), available without prescription in Europe, but not here (at the time, even with prescription), and it didn’t show up. What did show up was a letter informing me that I had done this, that it was not legal, and that I could go to jail if I did it again.
Did this letter come from Customs?
Did this letter come from the FDA or the DEA?
No, no and no. It came from Homeland Security.
Are starting to understand about the DHS? They have run out of terrorists and what to do? How to sustain this huge sprawling bureaucracy?
…”as large and well funded as the US Military.”
Family in Europe sent my kids Easter Bunnies. The Easter Bunnies were decapitated in the best jihadist style and a note included that baskets were not allowed to be imported. However, the (potentially) disease carrying remnants of the basket were still in the box along with a note about importation being prohibited and penalties related thereto. A couple of days later I went to a dollar store that had large quantities of almost identical baskets imported from China. Agriculture – part of DHS. No more Easter Bunnies since then.
It’s almost like the Obama administration has a plan to fundamentally change the country. It seems that every federal agency has a new mission, and that is climate change.I would bet most kids don’t even learn the chicken little story any more as a life lesson. Used to be if you were the boy who called wolf you got called on it, but now you see climate scientists getting away with the same thing for years with nothing being said. Thanks to WUWT, we can smash this modeled world they have created.
Spot on! They’ve learned to use the federal agencies to impose their philosophies and beliefs. They’ve even stated this. Check out Stanley Kurtz.
Golly, I’m glad they aren’t letting anything distract them from their primary mission
EBOLA!
This is what happens when you eye climate change for money and keep your eyes off more immediate threats. Keep up the good work chaps.
Homeland Security is clearly confused. Their target is supposed to be the black flag of IS not their own green flag of climate change. It is time to sent in the men in white coats to carry them away before they do real damage.
It’s not Homeland Security. It’s the President. The agencies operate under his direction.
Typical civil service job spec. creep. Give them an inch and they’ll take a mile. Job creep gives them the excuse to multiply their numbers like the cockroaches they are.
I think it is planned. How else to you explain the primary mission of NASA being to make those from the “religion of peace” feel good about themselves?
really, I mean primary mission…http://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2014/09/27/nasas-administrator-explains-their-primary-mission/
I believe this is all part of attempting to force Coastal communities to make laws and regulations based on unrealistic, wildly exaggerated climate models predicting up to a meter of sea level rise by 2100. The goal being to take away prime, private property from the average American.
“To that end, she said, she has assembled a team of specialists, including city planners, in conjunction with the National Academy of Science to develop better tools for planning.”
National Academy of Science? Wasn’t that first known as the State Sciences Institute?
“The Department of Homeland Security already has launched regional efforts to assess resilience of infrastruction and judge where gaps in adaptation and preparedness may be, she said.” ”
Let me rephrase…. “Liberty…. you don’t need no stinkin’ liberty.’
Hmmmm… Are Homeland Security also testing for resiliency against renewable energy blackouts?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_1965
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_2003
Long-term blackouts represent the greatest threat to any technological nation that there could possibly be. Nations like the US would go back to the Dark Ages (literally) inside a week. And yet this piece on the 2003 blackout, from the Huffington Post, considers cyber-hacking a greater threat to the electrical grid than renewable energy. Is anyone taking this problem seriously?
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/08/12/northeast-blackout_n_3741203.html
.
I propose a serious WUWT risk analysis question.
Ok, you are living in New York or Washington, and the electrical supply goes off for a week or ten days. Never mind what would NOT be working, we would be here all day. Instead, please give us a list of what civic and commercial systems would still be working, during a long-term electricity outage.
Answers on the back of a postcard (as children’s TV used to say) ……….
Ralph
I guess they must be running short of terrorists. The main national security threat from global warming is solely due to an unhealthy obsession with it when there are other real problems in the world.
Many on this site claim that the readers here believe in evidence and logic. In many ways this is indeed true, but many seem to have a real blind spot when it comes to certain topics. Politics is one of those topics.
The history of the US Empire is one of a continual expansion of power in the center. The central government has taken over and the States are no longer the entities they were in the beginning. We live in a time where even the phrase “state’s rights” is not to be mentioned in polite company. So give up on the idea that you have a representative republic — that is a dead letter.
What you must realize is that the Nation-State itself (hereafter referred to as “the state”) is not what you think it is. Murray Rothbard described the anatomy of the state many years ago in an essay that is well worth your time today to read — and re-read.
Anatomy of the State
Politics is all about control and making you slave for the benefit of those in power. And so, there is nothing “odd” about the homeland security department’s actions at all. It is just more movement toward the total police state that is being built all around you.
In my essay The State answers Winston Smith I quote from 1984 where an official of the “inner party” tells Winston Smith the true aim of the state:
I have to say that the block quotes in this theme are horrid. Work of the devil I say. 🙁
The drop shadow effect is too pronounced; should be about 50% smaller and lighter.
I see planners should always plan for extreme weather caused by climate change. Remember that cool period?
[Transcribed by me from an image – advanced apologies for any errors]
More reports, letters and planning. Why don’t these fools just wait a bit longer and see? Don’t they know that the climate does in fact change?
History repeats itself.
In all fairness, Jimbo, I’ve often wondered if the White House wasn’t on a bit of a hair-trigger about climate issues during the Cold War. Open air nuclear tests, and who-knows-what other stuff that was done, much of which could very well have had bigger effects than intended.
Just a thought.
Then again, it’s also difficult to explain to the younger generation that back in the 70s, we knew that an ice age was coming, just as we knew that our chances of dying in a nuclear war were probably higher than any other way. Because they’re too busy knowing that man-made climate change will kill them and destroy the planet.
The primary concern that faced the framers of the constitution was how to limit the powers of the central government. The entire document is one of restraints, restrictions and specific, enumerated powers. The framers intended to have the states in charge of the federal government. Not the other way around. Then the supreme court got ahold of the commerce clause and decided that the power to regulate commerce between states and with foreign powers meant that they could tell farmers how much wheat they could grow. Even if the wheat was not to be used for interstate commerce, because the threat of the farmer selling it hung over the marketplace and might affect the price. This expanded into other commodities and soon the feds were telling companies what ingredients they could put in their products, how it was to be packaged etc.
. Today, because of the commerce clause, the federal government regulates just about everything in your home. It regulates what kind of car you can drive and the gas you put in it. It regulates your mortgage, provides student loans, regulates the kind of lightbulb you can use. Ask yourself what the government doesn’t regulate. Now they want to regulate co2. Where does it end?
It ends in an oppressive monarchy – which is precisely what the Framers of the Constitution wanted to avoid. But we have people in power to whom the phrase ‘checks and balances’ must be something about finance. And don’t realize that a Congress that is not doing anything is precisely what the Framers intended.
I’ve got a pen. And I’ve got a phone.
Tom J, I understand where you are coming from but has anyone suggested shoving the pen down his throat and the phone up his ….
I’m having trouble trying to decide if I should hit the post comment button. It’s just a thought. Should I do it or not? The world will see my comment. Should I do it? Homeland Security may put me on the watch list. It could be considered disrespectful to the “emperor.”
Ene mene mine mo. I think I just hit the “post comment” button.
To understand what is happening to our society in the area of ‘security’, you need to go back in history to WW2.
Before WW2 governments in the West were small, and mainly ‘outward-looking’ – they mediated relations with foreign states. Then came an era of ‘total war’, and governments everywhere started to take control of their countries’ economies, in order to direct war production. In particular, the concept of ‘extra-judicial’ security services grew – when your country is fighting for its life you can’t afford to go through the ‘usual procedures’ if you see a threat. So you develop ‘inward-looking’ control processes.
A lot of people were involved in these jobs, and they made a good living out of them. A big bureaucracy arose to direct war production – an easy job with no chance of being sacked for inefficiency. Similarly, if you worked in ‘government security’ all the way through the ‘Cold War’ you weren’t even going to be audited, let alone sacked for failure. Compared to the external world, these jobs positively encouraged laziness and concealment of the truth – a mark of bureaucracy everywhere.
Eisenhower warned us. Northcote Smith warned us. Lots of people have pointed the issue out. But when half your population depend on these jobs, no one is going to rock the boat. For ‘security’, the biggest boat rocking came with the end of the Cold War, and the collapse of the justification for the whole secret defence infrastructure.
Ever since then, the US and UK ‘secret security industries’ have been looking for, and frantically trying to encourage, a replacement for the Cold War justification for their existence. They have pushed politicians into continuous destabilisation of the Middle East, at a cost of millions of lives. Amazingly, they are trying to claim that ANY big money-spending craze, such as Global Warming, has a ‘security’ dimension. ‘Wars’ on drugs, on terror, all are justifications for the retention of the budget they have been defending since 1945.
This is NOT an ‘evil government’ trying to take control of our lives. It is worse. It is a cancer of our society – a group of people noticing that they can have a better life by not producing and living off others instead. This group has now become huge and powerful, and, just like a tumour, it will bring the whole body of society down unless it is removed….
This is not new. French revolution would be a good example.
This is the road to disaster…
Mission creep and empire building upon what is already a huge sprawling bureaucracy…
The only hope is every theory associated with any catastrophe or disaster from climate change is soundly disproved… And then future scholars will gaze back at this as a period of collective insanity.
But if it warms, even a little bit, over coming decades… We are doomed to some form of slavery to the bureaucrats, and worse, to security organisations dedicated ti saving us.
DoD has been badgered into listing clmate change as a “threat” for some time. Consider this report from 2007 from the War College:
http://strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/events/details.cfm?q=82
And then don’t forget this:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=121352495
Once the camel’s nose is under the tent…
With the observed and forecast radical slumping solar output, I sincerely hope that they also consider a cooling scenario as threat.
During a heavy rain, a combination of twigs and leaves blocked the gutter causing water to cascade down the back of my house and cause some flooding in the cellar. I had not realized that this required Homeland Security intervention due to it being a national security threat. Next time I’ll call Homeland Security.
Yes, sounds silly, but just as silly as natural catatophies being managed by the same organization created to fight what has become a perpetual war with various nations and groups from the middle east.
Our federal government has become a bureaucracy without bounds and uncontrolled growth, this becomes especially problematic when certain of those bureaucracies have rationalized themselves to be able to circumvent the rule of law due to being at a war.
DHS fulfilling it’s primary mission—protecting it’s budget from harm.
Obama’s goal will be to grab as much “climate fund” money as possible then dish it out to all the party faithful ; city councils, green groups, religious organisations etc. as possible, with the idea of bolstering support and buying votes for the party at the next elections. If climate change falters as an important issue which it seems it may do, he can suddenly discover that there were certain scientific bodies and scientists that misled government and ramped it up beyond reality. I don’t think I’d like to be sitting in an EPA seat right now?
We really like this blog – keep up the great work!
Would you consider a reciprocal link exchange with Common Cents??
You can find us at http://www.commoncts.blogspot.com
THANKS!
“Rising Seas Summit, a three-day conference organized by the U.S.-based Association of Climate Change Officers to discuss tools and ideas on building resiliency, particularly against rising sea levels.”
What a waste of money. They need 3 days to talk about preparing for 3 cm sea rise in next 10 years? How about preparing for 60 cm sea rise in next 12 hours? It’s called high tide.
“Odd – Dept. of Homeland Security testing programs for climate change as ‘national threat’”
Odd?? Someone should make more of an effort to keep up!
Are they making an effort to deal with trolls, I wonder?
Initially, Adolf Hitler had his Brownshirts; now we will have our Blueshirts. The good news is that if DHS will allow TSA to execute the strategy it will take a very long time to implement and enforce.
The barbarians are literally at the gate, and “Homeland” is talking “climate change”.
The fruits of progressivism are ripening.
I wonder how a dirty bomb in Los Angeles or New York affects the climate.
Don Quijote de Obama obviously hasn’t realized that climate is your friend and not your enemy if you are willing to adapt. So he orders his churl Sancho Homeland to prepare for him the ground for another attack on the sails of the ever turning windmills of change. Yet another battlefield without the slightest chance of victory. Stupidity has a name and is in office….
Not really surprising. Homeland Security is an agency in turmoil, suffering from senior staff departures, endless intramural fights with older federal agencies, and generally low morale. Bureaucracies with huge budgets who can’t find a unifying vision and mission simply go looking for new issues to justify their existence. The same thing happened in the ’80s when the federal purse opened up in response to AIDS. Suddenly everyone was justifying their budget as somehow relevant to AIDS.
This is not unique to US government or even government at all. On the Tonight Show the week of the first Apollo moon landing, Johnny Carson went through the newspaper and showed some ads attempting to link their featured product to that stunning successful event. The only one I remember was for a mattress company, depicting a US Navy ship and stating:
(I may have the company wrong; it’s been a while).
Carson’s point was the specific virtues of these products, whatever they might be, had no actual contribution to the successful moon landing, but the companies wanted to create that association anyway.
Global Warming is a proven winner in budget allocations and the limited attention span of our current President, so Homeland Security is just trying to ride a proven issue to get them out of their present morass.
From Al Gore’s book, ‘Earth in the Balance’ there is this well known quote; “Adopting a central organizing principle – one agreed to voluntarily- means embarking on an all-out effort to use every policy and program, every law and institution, every treaty and alliance, every tactic and strategy, every plan and course of action – to use, in short, every means to halt the destruction of the environment…”
Take out the word ‘voluntarily’ and I think the foregoing is an accurate description of what’s going on here.
What? You don’t think Obama is doing this ‘voluntarily’ ?
While this administration wastes billions, focusing on global warming and human caused climate change that is not happening, we should be doing the complete opposite to prepare for what really is happening……….colder and snowier Winters.
http://www.wallstreetdaily.com/2014/09/02/coal-burning-power-plants/
http://www.emergencymgmt.com/disaster/Snow-Plowing-Punish-State-Budgets.html
http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Articles/2014/04/16/Hazardous-Roads-Ahead-US-Highways
Oblivious to the reality staring us in the face from the natural cycle shift a decade ago, which will likely bring more brutal Winters over the next 2 decades, the actions of our government, bring to mind the “blood letting” treatment by ancient doctors.
The treatment for a sick patient, weakens and kills them because the doctor is ignorant of the actual illness and the doctor attacks their body, not the invader.
https://www.princeton.edu/~achaney/tmve/wiki100k/docs/Bloodletting.html
You sound like you really believe this is just an error in judgement. Please make no mistake.The president and his administration leaders know where these policies will lead our country. This is not a wrong track. It is the fundamental change Obama campaigned on. Those of us who bothered to look into what he said and took him at his word are not surprised. Disappointed, yes. But, not surprised. Don’t forget he’s still building his civilian army just as big and well equipped. I don’t recall what his purpose was for that civilian army.
Concur. Your statements mirror my own perspectives and conclusions concerning Our Dear Leader and his agenda.
Josh seems to have homed in on Homeland Securities concerns with this cartoon.
http://climateequilibrium.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/josh-knobs.jpg
What if it falls into the wrong hands?
It’s ironic that DHS is proposing just the kind of infrastructure improvements that the current congress has steadfastly refused to fund on their own merits – $40 billion for bridge repairs? No way Jose. Oh wait, bombing Syria? We’ll just go on vacation, don’t worry about the money.
This move by DHS is not much different than Mussolini “making the trains run on time.”
The U.S. is being drained by the twin cancers of the military industrial complex and the health industrial complex. Modern bridges, roads, sea walls, nuclear power plants and such are the ugly stepchildren ignored in favor of glittery baubles like a trillion dollar F-35 fighter program.
The 800 pound infrastructure gorilla in the room is the decrepit electric grid. If DHS wanted to do something useful to protect “the homeland” from natural disaster, they could undertake the job of planning resilience from the inevitable arrival of the next Carrington Event, which could cause more damage in a few hours than climate change ever will, at least within our lifetimes.
Markopanama, you’re making the assumption that $40 billion for bridge repairs would actually go to bridge repairs. Congress gave Obama an $800 billion stimulus, a large part of which was supposed to go to things like infrastructure repair to create jobs. In 2010 President Obama claimed that he had used the stimulus money to make needed upgrades to our national infrastructure:
“Now, let me tell you, another thing we’ve done is to make long-overdue investments in upgrading our outdated, our inefficient national infrastructure. We’re talking roads. We’re talking bridges. We’re talking dams, levees. …”
But after his re-election, Obama contradicted himself by demanding another stimulus to make long overdue repairs to the country’s “neglected” infrastructure. That’s the problem. The money gets diverted elsewhere. The stimulus money was used to shore up union pension funds and enrich Democrat cronies rather than make much if any needed infrastructure improvements. The stimulus also became part of the baseline budget for all future years, so it should have provided plenty of money for continued upgrading of infrastructure. But it’s being spend elsewhere. Please explain why you think increasing the deficit to spend additional money would change any of that.
Bigger budgets.
Precisely. More money wasted beyond the $800 billion mostly wasted thus far.
“To help communities develop resilience, Alex said, California is part of a pilot program under which AmeriCorps, the Corporation for National and Community Service, will dispatch 50 young people to educate local communities about climate adaptation and resilience. If successful, he said, the program could become national.”
—
Really? Local communities are going to listen to young people from AmeriCorps educate them on climate adaptation and resilience? What makes these “young people” climate experts? What could they actually teach anyone, other than the political propaganda they memorize just before being dispatched? I have a feeling climate is just being used as an excuse for Pres. Obama to create his “army” of volunteers to go out and organize communities. It’s really about politics, not climate.
I’m British so feel free to ignore me but
HAVE YOU LOST YOUR MINDS???
If the defence of the free world is now in the hands of arsewits who refuse to see that the world is cooling, then we’re screwed.
Goodbye, and thanks for all the fish.
LOL from Canada. Yes, Mark, THEY HAVE LOST THEIR MINDS. We ARE screwed.
Our ONLY HOPE is that they display enough sanity in November 2014 and again in November 2016 to remove the arsewits from the levers of power. I used to have faith in the common sense of the American electorate – until 2006, 2008 and 2012. Now, not so much.
The degree of polarization in USA politics is extreme and destructive – it appears both the far-left and far-right are insane.
In Canada we have a far-left that is as crazy as the US version – Thomas Mulcair and Justin Trudeau are doctrinaire imbeciles that have a reasonable chance of seizing power from the first competent government we’ve had in generations. Mulcair and Trudeau rely upon the George Carlin principle: “You know how stupid the average person is, right? Well half of them are stupider than that.”
Our Canadian government is centre-right and our Prime Minister actually puts the country first. Amazing, and rare.
As I see it, the USA has an opportunity to revitalize its economy through cheap energy from shale fracking, but Obama is so beholden to global warming fanatics and other imbeciles that he is incapable of leading this initiative. Better luck next time, my American friends…
Regards to all, Allan
I have an idea: don’t rebuild New Orleans or only allow construction 2 meters above the height of the high tide.
The power companies are already using “Homeland Security” to bully their way through legitimate disputes about easements for their power lines. Locally we had a farmer who was questioning the work done on some power lines crossing his land. When he tried to tell the crew that they were encroaching he was told that he was making “terroristic threats” and that he was subject criminal prosecution if he didn’t back down.
Homeland Security merely an incipient Gestapo that should be abolished.
Tell that to the relatives of the people killed in the Twin Towers.Then try telling them that Climate Change is more dangerous than terrorism.
meanwhile… DHS ignores the Islam and Muslims in general even though the normal doctrine of Islam is perpetual Jihad.
This is beyond stupidity having bureaucratic agencies like DHS (or its incompetent cousin FEMA) that have no understanding of Global Climate be put in charge of directive that the legitimate branch of Government (US Congress) refuses to pass? Never mind that it is now a proven Myth. I blame Congress for failing to restore proper role of President & Admin and ending backdoor legal maneuver that is illegal.
How can a discredited myth like (Man caused) Global Warming which morphed to Climate Change (caused by man) and still got its Liberal butt kicked by true Climatologist who proved the temperature hasn’t changed in 20 years (as predicted by GW/CC models – made by Mathematician in NASA masquerading as climatologist & whose model no one else can duplicate results because they wont make such stupid assumptions). Now since Climate-gate showed/proved the level of data cherry-picking, false assumptions and outright lies it took to propose this nonsense – Countries have Canceled the UN Kyoto treaty in 2012 (except for exempt nations like China and other 200 developing countries that got pollute unfettered and are now the world leaders like China/India/Russia). UN sees Carbon Tax/Climate Change as path to World governance and increased revenue, Liberals see it as path to Wealth Re-Distribution and Conservatives see it for nonsense it is. Premier of Australia has ended Carbon Tax in his country (some $248Billion/yr over $1 trillion year-to-date) which put Europe Carbon traders & EU program in tailspin (half Carbon traders already left their jobs) – just like with Kyoto the countries like Canada/Japan/Uk are lined up like planes on runway to cancel this stupidity. Only Obama and his Liberal Dictatorship is forcing this failed program forward despite that US is now only 6% of Global emissions while China/India are some 47% of them). They refuse to even go to WTO discussions on emission reductions and even the Obama’s UN talks on them.
It is a great wonder that so many people on our planet imagined myself freaking out, thinking that climate change is a consequence of abnormal human behavior. It is true that increasing concentrations of CO2 cause pollution of the atmosphere, but in any case it does not affect climate change. Climate change is caused by many factors, the nature stronger than many people think. Should be lowered to a much lower altitude observations of the behavior of nature and everything will be clear. The whole world science stupefy themselves, thinking that the various models on the PC, to discover the secrets of nature, like the PC, a huge pile of hidden data to which we have come. All the data from these models have brought people and “polluted” in them a sense of nature and its laws.
The time will come soon, and you get real familiar with the laws of nature, and they will give you the real cause of all these phenomena related to climate change as well as any changes in the sun, which are indicators of the first changes. I’m working on it and see if it all went in the wrong direction. Trillions of dollars are spent in vain, without any effect.
How is it true that increasing concentrations of CO2 cause pollution of the atmosphere?,
Try it in your room to kindle charcoal or wood, but without the chimney, you’ll probably feel the difference when breathing air and one in the second figure!
The question was about the atmosphere, not an enclosed space. Where is there any evidence that 400 ppm, or several times that, is pollution?
You are confusing carbon MONOxide with carbon DIoxide. First is BAD, second is GOOD.
If they would only do reasonable things, this would be good.
If NY City had possessed accurate GPS altitudes for tunnel and subway entrances (and entrances for vents etc), the National Guard could have sandbagged these adequately to prevent flooding. Low lying neighborhoods could have been alerted well in advance — they knew the storm would hit at a peak high tide and would be pushing a huge storm surge. Flood controls devices could have been opened to allow floodwater to harmlessly enter the great marshlands of NJ.
Why Homeland Security should be involved, I don’t know. You’d think that cities like NY would move on this on their own.
This is simply about control and that’s it!!. control of the weather, control what you eat, control on how you travel from a to b etc etc etc. Every aspect of your life… and it was all made possible because they kept you scared and dumb the whole time.
they figure, hey what are you going to do about… right? go home pay your bills, tax what have you and curl up into a ball and wish things were better.