For changed Crist, `it was a difficult time to govern'

Crist sums up term: 'it was a difficult time to govern'
He rode a wave of optimism into office four years ago, but Gov. Charlie Crist leaves behind a very different Florida when his term expires next week. Crist himself has changed, too. Long stripped of his once-sky high popularity and no longer a Republican, he departs as a failed United States Senate Candidate with his Political Career finished for now, his future uncertain. As Florida's 44th Governor, Crist goes down in history as the first who could have sought Reelection and didn't, a...

Sunday Reading
The Middle Class on the Silver Screen -- New York Times film critic A.O. Scott looks at how The Economy is reflected in what we see at the cineplex.The characters in, let’s say, a typical Romantic Comedy or family drama are blander, better-looking reflections of what the members of the audience are imagined to imagine themselves to be: hard workers and eager shoppers, neither greedy nor needy. Those airbrushed mirror images draw from a common well of (reasonable) aspirations and (mild) an...

Honolulu Dukes it out With Chicago for Obama Library
Here’s a David and Goliath story for you, which I predict that David will probably win in a walk. Honolulu — As President Barack Obama prepares to battle with Republicans for a Second Term, another fight is already brewing: where to enshrine his legacy once he leaves office. The effort to play host city to Obama’s Presidential Library is being complicated by the peripatetic life he has had. His diverse background — a fixture of his political brand — is now fueling a...

Hawaii Dukes it out With Chicago for Obama Library
By Proof Here's a David and Goliath story for you, which I predict that David will probably win in a walk. Honolulu — As President Barack Obama prepares to battle with Republicans for a Second Term, another fight is already brewing: where to enshrine his legacy once he leaves office. The effort to play host city to Obama’s Presidential Library is being complicated by the peripatetic life he has had. His diverse background — a fixture of his political brand — is now fue...

Global Warming delays NFL Sunday Night Football
What's that you say? Global Warming is responsible for delaying Sunday Night's Vikings-Eagles game? Yes, you heard that right. At least, if you are following the herd mentality. The go-along, get-along "everyone knows what the answer is" rote response that keeps global warming hysteria overhyped and overused. On Los Angeles' recently strange wet and cold weather: ""In general, as the globe warms, weather conditions tend to be more extreme and volatile." - climatologist Bill Patzert. So while the...

EPA presents plan on greenhouse gases. Can Congress stop it?
Setting the stage for a New Year battle royale between Congress and the White House over greenhouse Gas Emissions, the US Environmental Protection Agency Thursday laid out a timetable for the nation's largest carbon emitters -- Power Plants and refineries -- to begin curbing those pollutants. Republicans have said all year that they plan to pull out all the stops to keep the EPA from phasing in greenhouse gas (GHG) regulations beginning in 2011, saying they would damage the energy industry, rais...

Region's low-income households carry greatest cost-of-living burden
Homeowners in some of the area's poorest neighborhoods are spending nearly half of their income on housing, a percentage far higher than the 30 percent experts say should be spent on housing costs. The potentially dangerous levels of spending are occurring largely in Prince George's County, where mortgaged Homeowners in cities near the Capital Beltway give up between 35 percent and 45 percent of their incomes for housing-related bills, according to the Census Bureau's American Community Survey....

DC investigation halts sales of foreclosed homes
Image via Wikipedia Examiner: Sales of foreclosed houses in the District ground to a halt for months as the city's investigation into the Foreclosure process scared away title insurers who didn't want the risk associated with the property. ... Todd Ewing, president of Federal Title & Escrow Co., said the Attorney General's investigation into the filing process behind D.C. foreclosures led Insurance underwriters to believe the risk of insuring the title on a foreclosed home would be too hig...

The Wealth Tax II
As if on cue the Wall Street Journal observes that cities, faced with dwindling revenues and increasing costs, are raising property taxes: Cities across the nation are raising property taxes, largely citing rising Pension and health-care costs for their employees and Retirees. In Pennsylvania, the township of Upper Moreland is bumping up property taxes for residents by 13.6% in 2011. Next door the city of Philadelphia this year increased the tax 9.9%. In New York, Saratoga Springs will collect...

Conservative Republicans choose Ann Wagner to lead RNC
Current Republican National Committee Chairman, Michael Steele, says he has no intentions of stepping aside and will seek a Second Term as Chairman of the RNC.  Many Republican insiders have said that he should step down and let party members decide from a half dozen Candidates, who their next leader will be prior to the run up to the 2012 Elections.  Missourian, Ann Wagner, is leading this list of possible contenders to replace Steele, and negotiate the issues that...

Alex Sink seeks new role as moderate voice and party builder
Stung by a narrow defeat in a Governor's race she says she never expected to lose, Alex Sink is retiring from public office, but not from public view. The departure of the chief financial officer and Democrat, who lost to Republican Rick Scott by 62,000 votes, leaves Tallahassee with no Democratic statewide officeholder left standing. Dozens of Sink's employees must either leave government or seek work with Republicans, who control the Legislature and all three Cabinet posts. To fill a...

Indian politician Karunakaran dies at 93
THRISSUR, India, Dec. 25 (UPI) -- Kannoth Karunakaran, a Veteran of the fight for Indian independence and a political power in the state of Kerala, was cremated Saturday after his death at 93. Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh was one of the thousands of mourners paying his respects, the Press Trust of India reported. The cremation was held at Karunakaran's house in Thrissur. Karunakaran died Thursday in Thiruvananthapuram, the state capital. His body was returned home in a procession slowed ...

Can Rick Scott Govern Florida?
Time Magazine reports: Florida has some of the broadest open-government laws in the country. So when Governor-elect Rick Scott held a number of behind-closed-doors meetings with business leaders earlier this month during a five-day jobs tour, many political observers fretted that he might not fully appreciate the Sunshine State’s sunshine rules. “It would have been a nice gesture on his part to hold those meetings more in the open,” says Ben Wilcox, Florida director of the go...

Obama gives coal to polar bears for Christmas, activists say
Stumble This! WASHINGTON - Environmental groups on Thursday accused US President Barack Obama's administration of failing to ensure the survival of Polar Bears after it stopped short of listing the animals as endangered. Kassie Siegel of the Center for Biological Diversity, who has led legal efforts to protect the polar bear, said that the Obama Administration "sacrificed sound science for political expediency." "The Obama Administration delivered a lump of coal to the polar bear for Christmas,...

EPA Acts Unilaterally on Climate Change
Frustrated that it couldn't achieve desired environmental Legislation despite huge majorities in both Houses of Congress, the Obama Administration has decided to govern by executive fiat....

Small Beetles Massacre The Rockies' Whitebark Pines
The Whitebark pine trees in the high-elevation areas of America's Northern Rockies have stood for centuries. But these formerly lush evergreen forests are disappearing at an alarmingly fast rate; what remains are eerie stands of red and gray snags. Warmer climates have sparked an outbreak of a voracious mountain pine beetle that is having devastating consequences for whitebarks and the wildlife that depend on them. Gallery: The Plight Of Yellowstone's Whitebark Pines Around Yellowstone National ...

The Ghost of Climate Yet to Come - Irreversible does not mean unstoppable: Why show me this, if I am past all hope?
Unlike Scrooge, we don’t get a spirit to show us what the future holds if we don’t change our ways.   We did get the tiniest glimpse this year of climate gone wild (see “Masters: “The stunning extremes we witnessed gives me concern that our climate is showing the early signs of instability”).  And we did get dozens of scientific papers warning us of what is to come (see A stunning year in Climate Science reveals that human civilization is on the precipice). Yes

Moral Equivalence of War Alert
“India is set to have the world’s first climate army, an exclusive force of nearly half a million ‘Soldiers’ trained to fight Global Warming,” Tom Nelson notes: India is set to have the world’s first climate army, an exclusive force of nearly half a million ‘Soldiers’ trained to fight global warming. A unique strategy to set up this climate army is being launched from Vedaranyam in Tamil Nadu on Sunday. Flashback [to 2008]: Gore to recruit 10m-strong green a

Weather not following climate change forecast
Image via Wikipedia Christopher Booker: By far the biggest story of recent days, of course, has been the astonishing chaos inflicted, to a greater or lesser extent, on all of our lives by the fact that we are not only enjoying what is predicted to be the Coldest December since records began in 1659, but also the harshest of three freezing winters in a row. We all know the disaster stories - thousands of motorists trapped for hours on paralysed motorways, days of misery at Heathrow, rail ...

EPA Moving Unilaterally To Limit Greenhouse Gases
Stymied in Congress, the Obama Administration is moving unilaterally to clamp down on Power Plant and Oil Refinery greenhouse emissions, announcing plans for developing new standards over the next year. In a statement posted on the agency's website late Thursday, Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson said the aim was to better cope with Pollution contributing to Climate Change. "We are following through on our commitment to proceed in a measured and careful way to reduce GHG...

Things we dont know about climate
This is a guest post by Paul Murphy - and I’d like to thank Mr. Watts for giving me this opportunity to present it here. This is a very long post by WUWT standards - nearly 3,000 words all driving toward the basic conclusion that what we know about Global Warming is pretty much nothing: we’ve no baseline, so don’t know if it’s happening; we’ve no cost/benefit evaluation so don’t know whether it would be net positive or net negative; if it is happe...

Global warming is causing severe coldness and snowy snowness
 Thousands stranded in airports.  Record Snowfall in Europe.  Even the rocky mountains are getting more snow than they can handle.  Does it debunk Global Warming?  Well, it shouldn't because it's just weather and climate is long term so if it's cold outside or really snowy, don't worry, it's actually getting warmer in the long term.    However the warmists, a great bunch of people really, can't help but differentiate between weather and climate.  They want...

EPA moving unilaterally to limit greenhouse gases
WASHINGTON — Stymied in Congress, the Obama Administration is moving unilaterally to clamp down on Power Plant and Oil Refinery greenhouse emissions, announcing plans for developing new standards over the next year. In a statement posted on the agency’s website late Thursday, Environmental Protection Agency administrator Lisa Jackson said the aim was to better cope with Pollution contributing to Climate Change. "We are following through on our commitment to proceed in a measured and...

EPA moving unilaterally to limit greenhouse gases
FILE - In this Oct. 21, 2010 file photo, Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) Administrator Lisa Jackson, listens during a news conference at the National Press Club in Washington. The Obama Administration is moving through regulatory channels to clamp down on greenhouse Gas Emissions after Congress failed to act on new Legislation. WASHINGTON—Stymied in Congress, the Obama Administration is moving unilaterally to clamp down on Power Plant and Oil Refinery greenhouse emissions, announcin...

Global Warming Brings Lot’s Of Snow To Raleigh And East Coast
Good morning! How was everyone's Christmas? I was going to attempt to write something pithy and poignant, but, just too tired, even though I just woke up. I drove to New Jersey the night of the 23rd to see the parent for Christmas, and, because of the potential weather, drove back yesterday after an early dinner, leaving at 4pm. I was wondering if it was going to be worth it leaving the 25th instead of today, and, yeah, I'd say it was That's my back deck as of 9:15am. The road out front was comp...