RUTHFULLY YOURS

More than a man of science, the man whose testimony helped persuade a British court that Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” is a fusion of error, lies and propaganda was that genuinely rare specimen, a good-natured crusader with the gift for leading the benighted into the light
Bob Carter’s passing is a great loss to those on the side of the angels — and to the noble cause pure, non-politicised science — in the debate on climate change. In contrast to the rent-seekers and opportunists aboard the global warming gravy train, he was a real scientist dedicated to truth. In his tribute, former radio host and one-time global warming believer Michael Smith highlighted his approach:

I’d made the error of asking Bob for his opinion after my perfect opening monologue. Bob said, “I don’t have an opinion. I am a scientist. I don’t deal in opinion. I deal in facts. Observable, proven facts. I deal with the scientific method, making observations, doing experiments and arriving at conclusions. Your starting point seems to be an unproven hypothesis based on computer projections. Do you have any facts to back up your claims about global warming?

Carter’s book, Climate: the Counter Consensus, which came out in 2011, demonstrated this approach, as did his many presentations on climate issues over the years. Days before the mainstream media got around to reporting his passing, the internet was alive with tributes from around the world.
Bob Carter: Lysenkoism and Climate Science

Here are just a few that I found most striking. The first is from the great slayer of Michael Mann’s fabricated hockey stick graph, Steve McIntyre, who wrote:

He was one of the few people in this field that I regarded as a friend. He was only a few years older than me and we got along well personally.

I will not attempt to comment on his work as that is covered elsewhere, but do wish to mention something personal. In 2003, when I was unknown to anyone other than my friends and family, I had been posting comments on climate reconstructions at a chatline. Bob emailed me out of the blue with encouragement, saying that I was looking at the data differently than anyone else and that I should definitely follow it through. Without his specific encouragement, it is not for sure that I ever would have bothered trying to write up what became McIntyre and McKitrick (2003) or anything else.

A British jihadist well-known for writing missives about rude Arabs and bossy Chechens in the Islamic State warns would-be jihadis that it’s “catastrophic” to let on one’s intentions too early out of love for one’s parents.

Omar Hussain, a 27-year-old former grocery store security guard from southern England, goes by Abu Sa’eed Al-Britani since running off to join ISIS. He frequently writes PR, including an appeal for doctors to come to the Islamic State, and also answers Q&A.

One segment from his “Message of a Mujahid” video has been circulating anew on social media this month: how to tell one’s family that you’ve run off to jihad.

It comes as ISIS recruitment efforts are trying to bulk up numbers in the Islamic State, including fighters, civil servants, jihadi wives and kids trained as ISIS “cubs.”

“One thing which every Muhājir will eventually face will be informing one’s parents about one’s hijrah,” Hussain said. “Depending on how close you are with your parents will affect how hard this will be, both for you and for them. Generally speaking the father-daughter relationship is the strongest bond as every father sees his daughter as his little angel, so sisters need to pay heed to how to go about in informing their parents of their whereabouts.”

WASHINGTON – Lawmakers are becoming increasingly frustrated over the federal government’s failure to implement a biometric exit tracking system to determine whether foreign nationals entering the country on a visa have departed on schedule.

The percentage of those remaining in the United States beyond the expiration of their visas remains relatively small. The Department of Homeland Security issued a report this week showing that of the nation’s nearly 45 million non-immigrant visitors in fiscal year 2015, only 1.17 percent, or 527,127 individuals, overstayed their visas.

So 98.83 percent of those holding visas left the U. S. on time and abided by the terms of their admission, according to DHS. But some members of the Senate Subcommittee on Immigration and the National Interest, which conducted a hearing on the issue this week, maintain the current system doesn’t go far enough in assuring compliance.

Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-Ala.), the subcommittee chairman and a strong critic of the Obama administration’s immigration policies, asserted that that the figures released by DHS prove that visa expiration dates under the current system “have become optional.”

“The administration does not believe that violating the terms of your visa should result in deportation,” Sessions said. “What we are witnessing is tantamount to an open border. Millions are free to come on temporary visas and no one is required to leave.”