Welcome to a belated edition of the Worldview Web Roundup filled double full!
The Worldview Web Roundup is a collection of links to the news, commentary, and information I found interesting or useful over the past week or so. If you want to read more of what is found in this post, find links to my favorite news, commentary, and information sites at Dennis L Hitzeman’s News Reading List.
News
What the..? They Really Do What to Blot Out the Sun…– Fox News
Consider for a moment that, in spite of the media hyperventilation on the subject, there is no global consensus that global warming even exists at all. Consider that even among scientists who do believe that global warming exists; there is no consensus on the severity of this imagined phenomenon.
Yet, for those scientists are working feverishly on such shocking solutions to a problem they cannot prove such as blocking the light of the sun using orbiting solar shades and creating artificial volcanoes to spew unimaginable tons of sulfur into the atmosphere.
Now, if these scientists cannot agree on how if the phenomenon even exists and how severe it is, if these scientists cannot find ways to reduce the emission of ‘greenhouse gasses’ to halt or slow this perceived warming phenomenon, then why should we trust them to come up with solutions?
Just asking…
There Won’t Be a Democratic Contender If They All Beat the Crap Out of Each Other Before the Primary– Fox News
Ok, so maybe I agree with the contents of this particular commercial, but it is amazing to see the Democratic contenders pummel each other in a way that even Republicans would think twice about. At the rate they are all going, by the time we get to the general election, the general electorate will want to vote for anyone but a Democrat. I wonder if that makes the 2008 election one for the independents?
UPDATES
Fox News– Author revealed to be employee of PR firm linked to the Obama campaign.
Public Double Standard– Fox News
So let’s get this straight: A public school teacher goes on a ‘biblical’ diatribe linking evolution, Nazis, and Planned Parenthood gets fired for making those remarks. Probably just, given the circumstances, yet how often is the reverse true? When is the last time a teacher has used his classroom as a platform to bash President Bush, the military, or Christianity and been fired?
Free Speech is not a one way street, and whatever right one has to free speech, a public school classroom is not the place for personally motivated point making. Unfortunately, rampant Secular Humanism has taken hold of said classrooms, making open, honest discussion impossible and opening the door for such obvious extremism to take root instead.
Making Sure the Backup Works: Priceless– Fox News
A technician erasing the hard disk of a computer containing financial data is really not that much news. The fact that there was an archive of backups that did not work is. If you’re going to back the data up, make sure the backups work before you need to rely on them. Most backup software has built in integrity checking capability. One just needs to use it.
Why the War Against Fundamentalist Islam Matters– Fox News
While the US and the West hyperventilates about what is going in Iraq, recent events in Somalia prove why our actions there are just and need to continue. The brutal expansion of fundamentalist Islam in Somalia should stand as an example of what could happen in so many other parts of the world if we fail our missions there, and if we fail, what we could eventually expect to visit our own shores.
Math That Makes the Head Spin– Fox News
Now, I am not trying to brag, but I can handle thinking into five or six dimensions. On an inspired day, maybe seven. But 248? I don’t even know what that means…
Caught Red Handed– The Fayetteville Observer via The Mudville Gazette
This kind of institutional inaccuracy and bias happens everyday within the Mainstream Media, lead by the New York Times, however it is not often that it is so easily identified. Another example of this same bias and inaccuracy can be found here and here. Some of this problem comes from the fact that many reporters covering the US Military for the MSM actually know little or nothing about it. A lot more of this problem comes from the fact that, if the MSM told the accurate truth in an unbiased fashion, it would have to concede that most of its points about Iraq, Afghanistan, and the War on Terror are, in fact, lies.
Therein lies the reason that the best information available to the public today comes from sources well outside the MSM. Sources like Michael Yon Online, BlackFive, and the Mudville Gazette give the informed citizen access to both information and commentary that is far more complete, accurate, and neutrally biased than anything one can find in the MSM today. It is the informed citizen’s responsibility to seek this kind of information out. I hope everyone who reads this post takes that responsibility seriously.
The Good News From Iraq That the MSM Does Not Report– BlackFive
There are very good things happening in Iraq, in spite of what Catie Couric and her cohorts in the MSM report almost daily. Unfortunately, most people have to dig deeply to find any of it. Therein lies the real tragedy of the 2006 election and the Democratic attempt to hijack the President’s authority and withdraw from Iraq. Most of what the media reports about Iraq is either incomplete or essentially a lie because it is not reported in context. If Americans knew the truth, I suspect their attitude would be far, far different than it is now.
Boldly Going Where Nothing Manmade Has Gone Before… More Slowly Than One Might Expect– Fox News
Scientists are now engaged in studying one of the great mysteries of infantile astrophysics: why the Pioneer space probes are moving more slowly than physics predicts they should. The answer could be something completely explicable, or it could be something new and revolutionary. Either way, it is cool and a worthwhile investment of scientific effort.
Why We Have the Best Fighting Force in the World– Fox News
When talking about the modern US Military, it is often described as the best trained, best equipped, and most powerful. One description that is sometimes missed is most dedicated.
Army Chief Warrant Officer Robert Rangel recently retired after 40 years of active duty service in the US Army, one of the last Vietnam War era draftees remaining in the service. People like CWO Rangel are part of the reason that the US Military continues to succeed and excel in spite of political idiocy at home and international apathy. CWO Rangel acts as an inspiration for the hope that we might just be able to win our current fight out of sheer determination and love for the country we serve.
Commentary
Telling It Like It Is– Senator Lieberman Website via Pajamas Media
I disagree with Senator Joseph Lieberman on all kinds of issues. He is a liberal in a way that I find sometimes hard to stomach. Yet, he is also one of the few people that I would seriously consider voting for if he were to run for President. Why? Because Joe Lieberman, unlike so many politicians on both sides of the aisle, understands that, whatever one’s domestic agenda, there can be no domestic agenda without security, and that security begins with directly facing and, when needed, eliminating America’s enemies.
If we had more politicians like Lieberman, whatever their political ideologies otherwise, we would be done with Afghanistan and Iraq and taking care of Somalia and Sudan simply because we had the political will to do what needs to be done, whatever the cost. Then we could turn to the debate over domestic issues, a debate that could be held honestly and without distraction because our nation is secure.
Even the Russians Knew Unchecked, Biased Liberal Media Was Dangerous- Auspundits via Pajamas Media
Certainly, I do not argue for state control of the media in the former Soviet or modern Putin-esk fashion, however at some point Americans have to consider that their media regularly, blatantly lies to them, and not just about issues like Iraq. As powerful of a tool as free speech is, it is a tool that comes with powerful responsibility. Free speech does not give someone freedom to lie, but rather to tell the truth even when that truth is unpopular or painful.
The only way, however, for someone to identify that truth is to have access to unbiased and complete information. Because so much of the modern media provides neither, too many Americans can no longer identify the truth when they see it. As a result, we no longer have the will to fight the war that needs to be fought because we do not understand that this war is real and necessary.
The solution to this problem is simple. In keeping with America’s free market, libertarian ideals, if the Mainstream Media is not providing what it should, fire them. Granted, at first, new, reliable sources of information may be more difficult to find and use, but they do exist, and once they become more common, the MSM will be forced to follow in order to survive.
A Person of Consequence, a Person Against Fundamentalist Islam– TCS Daily
It is sometimes far too easy to lament the seemingly unchecked rise of fundamentalist Islam in many countries, however the story of Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a native Somali and now naturalized Dutch reformer, shows that there are voices against that rise.
The Virtual and the Real Collide in Court– TCS Daily
Who would have thought the day would come when “property rights†in an online massive multiplayer online role playing game (MMORPG) would become a property rights issue in real courts? Welcome to the 21st Century and the advent of Virtual Society.
Distributed Computing and the Next Age of Human Exploration– TCS Daily
While the author focuses tangentially on this subject, distributed computing will be the next great advancement in information technology in the near future.
One Man’s Opinion– Michael Yon Online
I am not sure that I buy everything that this review says, not because I believe it is biased or some how incorrect, but because it focuses so powerfully on such a small section of the immensely complex problem that is the situation in Iraq. Such a focus, especially on the events in and around the major cities of Baghdad and al Anbar provinces, can paint a picture bleaker than the whole country warrants.
That being said, the overall review on the situation in Iraq does point out what we all know: success or failure in Iraq is balanced on the knife’s edge. What will ultimately decide this conflict is the will of the American people to win.
For Your Reading Enjoyment
Milblogs is a subsite of the Mudville Gazette that catalogues milblog postings from some of the most influential milblogs on the net today. Unfortunately, it does not have an RSS feed that I have been able to discover, however it does have plenty of useful information that makes it worth the visit.
