Free Republic

Thanks to Del. Kaye Kory for sending me this; I strongly agree! I’d add that anyone who thought it was a good idea to jam a bike/pedestrian right next to car and trucks on I-66 seriously needs to have their heads examined. WTF???COMMONWEALTH OF VIRGINIA GENERAL ASSEMBLY OF VIRGINIA RICHMONDAugust 11, 2017The Honorable Aubrey Layne Virginia Department of Transportation Patrick Henry Building, 3rd Floor 1111 East Broad Street Richmond, VA 23219Re: I-66 HOT Lanes Shared Use Trail ObjectionsSecretary Layne:We are writing to express our opposition to the current design of the shared use path on Interstate 66 (I-66 Trail) proposed...

“Nobody wants to buy something that was made by exploiting someone else,” Ben & Jerry’s and Fair Trade co-founder Jerry Greenfield likes to tell us. Let’s hope he doesn’t drive an electric vehicle, doesn’t use a laptop or cell phone, and doesn’t rely on wind or solar power. We’re constantly confronted with slogans and lectures about fair trade, human rights, sustainability, environmental and social justice, little people versus Big Corporations. Most of these terms reflect perspectives and agendas of the political left, and are intended to stifle discussion and advance those worldviews. But most of their self-avowed adherents never look...

THINGS WE HAVE NO CONTROL OVER: Nature Consider this update on the cottage-eating sand dune near Lake Michigan that I reported on last month.  The cottage the sand dune swallowed in April, left, the threatened cottage, right.Man may not be able to dictate to mother nature, but government sure can. From the Detroit Free Press: Now, the state of Michigan has ordered the Dresslers to stop their latest effort to save the remaining summer home from destruction: The sand is protected as a "critical dune area," so trucking it away is forbidden. "They're killing us," said David Dressler, 58. "I'm...

All three networks on Tuesday worried about Donald Trump’s “lack of curiosity” in the wake of a “startling” new climate change report. After discussing a draft report leaked to the New York Times, Good Morning America’s George Stephanopoulos sneered, “No word yet on whether they will suppress, dismiss, or endorse the report.” On CBS This Morning, Major Garrett offered a lecture: “The lack of comment from officials here and from those at some of the relevant federal agencies about this report's startling conclusions suggest not just skepticism but, at least initially, a lack of curiosity.” CBS Freaks Over Climate Study,...

Shifting to Tuesday, the man shown reverence by the likes of Don Lemon and Brian Stelter stated with glee: The Russia investigation has the potential to be the biggest scandal in American political history. But even if it ends up bringing down a presidency in spectacular fashion (and I think we are still a long, long, way from that happening), historians may look back at it as a blip compared to to a scandal that has the ability to damage our planet irrevocably - a process that is already well underway. Rather also brought up global warming following The New...

Like the road to Hell, liberal ideas are usually paved with good intentions. But, as Ronald Reagan once said, "The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they are ignorant, but that they know so much that isn't so." And all that vast “unknowledge” births monster government agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency. Today’s EPA is an agency gone-wild, filled with environmental extremists and deep state holdovers who have little accountability for their actions. They arrogantly create rules like the “Clean Power Plan” which the Institute for Energy Research [IER] said was filled with about as much junk as...

From the same people who declared that milk was a symbol of white supremacy comes this blisteringly-hot take: cheese is the most sexist food there is, cows are regularly raped on farms, and the act of eating cheese is failing to combat sexism. "Contrary to popular belief," explains PETA, cows only produce milk when they're pregnant or have just given birth. In order to keep producing milk, PETA describes how cows are "raped" to become pregnant again and again and how their calves are treated immediately after birth.

Pollution from illegal marijuana farms deep in California's national forests is far worse than previously thought, and has turned thousands of acres into waste dumps so toxic that simply touching plants has landed law enforcement officers in the hospital. The volume of banned or restricted pesticides and illegally applied fertilizers in the woods dwarfs estimates by the U.S. Forest Service in 2014, when a top enforcement official testified that the pollution was threatening forest land in California and other states. California accounts for more than 90 percent of illegal U.S. marijuana farming, with much of it exported to other states...

Derek Dalton the VP/General Manager said: "We made a very difficult strategic decision to opt out of the final year of Kevin's contract. We thank Kevin for the many years of service to WHEC-TV and the Rochester community"

America's beloved dogs and cats play a significant role in causing global warming, according to a new study by UCLA. Most cat or dog lovers would say they can't imagine living in a world without pets, but as the threat of global warming increases, environmentally conscious pet lovers may need to make some tough choices, according to the study. Pet ownership in the United States creates about 64 million tons of carbon dioxide a year, UCLA researchers found. That's the equivalent of driving 13.6 million cars for a year. The problem lies with the meat-filled diets of kitties and...

President Donald Trump plans to use anti-terror law to avoid undergoing a years-long environmental impact study for a large section of a border wall that is expected to travel through a wildlife refuge, Reuters reported Friday night. Trump will use a 2005 anti-terror law created shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001 terrorist attack to sidestep an environmental impact study for a 32-mile portion of the border wall, sources told Reuters. The proposed section will pass through the 2,000-acre Santa Ana National Wildlife Refuge near the southern tip of Texas. The area is home to 400 species of birds as well...

Would you like to lose ten pounds of ugly fat? Great! Off with your head. This old chestnut came to mind as I was perusing the now-infamous new study from Lund University’s child-averse climate scientists, advising people to save the planet by giving up their cars, avoiding air travel, becoming vegetarians, and having fewer kids. The study got rave reviews from the Guardian and Jill Filipovic, perhaps because the last item is really the primary thing. It turns out that hamburgers and SUVs are smallish indulgences next to that gurgling bundle of CO2-emitting joy. The study’s authors, Seth Wynes...

Forget about allegations of Russian interference in U.S. presidential elections for a moment, or even “collusion” between Russian officials and Trump campaign operatives. The real action is in the European and U.S. energy markets, according to a letter from two Texas congressmen to Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin that details what they call “a covert anti-fracking campaign” with “little or no paper trail.” Smith and Weber quote sources saying the Russian government has been colluding with environmental groups to circulate “disinformation” and “propaganda” aimed at undermining hydraulic fracturing. Commonly called fracking, the process makes it possible to access natural gas deposits....

The widening of Interstate 66 outside the Capital Beltway is bringing HOT lanes to one of the region’s most congested corridors. It also will make room for bicyclists and pedestrians — putting them on a trail next to one of the region’s busiest and most congested highways. The bike path, part of the $2.3 billion interstate expansion project, has drawn cheers and criticism from biking aficionados who welcome the addition of the trail but say, if built as proposed, users will be too close to cars whizzing by on the interstate and exposed to toxic exhaust fumes. For about five...

A fifth of male fish are now transgender because of chemicals from the contraceptive pill being flushed down household drains, a study by has suggested.  Male river fish are displaying feminised traits and even producing eggs, the study found. Some have reduced sperm quality and display less aggressive and competitive behaviour, which makes them less likely to breed successfully.

RUSH: Here’s another thing. Do you remember the Gulf oil spill? What is the main thing you remember, aside from the actual spill in the news, what’s the main thing that you remember about the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico? That’s right, they couldn’t find the oil. It was the biggest oil spill in the history of oil spills — they couldn’t find the oil. Do you remember they even had field trips? They had little schoolkids from grade school, and they put ’em on buses and drove ’em down to the Gulf Coast and they gave...

LONDON — The rest of the planet bears a warning for President Trump’s plan to lean heavily on private business in conjuring a trillion dollars’ worth of American infrastructure: Handing profit-making companies responsibility for public works can produce trouble. In India, politically connected firms have captured contracts on the strength of relationships with officialdom, yielding defective engineering at bloated prices. When Britain handed control to private companies to upgrade London’s subway system more than a decade ago, the result was substandard, budget-busting work, prompting the government to step back in. Canada has suffered a string of excessive costs on public...

For over two years now, environmental activists and anti-industry groups have been raging against the U.S. government, the European Union, and practically anybody else that would listen about the herbicide glyphosate. Glyphosate is a weed killer and the main ingredient in RoundUp.  Weed killers are obviously a critical tool for American farmers and farmers around the world. The left-wingers are attacking weed killers despite the chemical receiving a clean bill of health from both the EPA and Europe’s main food safety and chemical authorities. PRI.org reported late last year that “in November 2015, the European Food Safety Authority, or EFSA,...

Title and link only, due to restrictions. Essentially about the crummy contracts certain truckers submit to. Many of these issues arise from CA's CARB law that essentially banned all trucks older than 2015 forcing drivers and industries to spend mega bucks on new equipment and updating equipment. A classic case of what Bastiat call the seen and the unseen and a good example of Leonard Read's, "I Pencil," in practice. http://www.econlib.org/library/Essays/rdPncl1.html

TAMPA — Hillsborough County leaders voted Tuesday to move forward with a plan to add 90 miles of toll lanes to Tampa Bay's interstates despite continued opposition from the people whose neighborhoods would be impacted the most by the project. The Hillsborough County Metropolitan Planning Organization — a 16-person board which approves transportation projects — listened to more than 3½- hours of public comment on its Transportation Improvement Program, which lists the county's priorities for the next five years. The TIP includes dozens of projects, from road maintenance to bike paths. But the evening's debate centered around only one project:...