I don't know how to get around the paywall ... But even so, fair enough I assume that the first paragraph is accurate. Does that say that global warming is no longer a threat?

The editorialising of the WSJ in the second paragraph certainly does, but given they haven't quoted the UN in their assertion that "global warming has stopped since shortly before this century began", I assume it is just that, unsubstantiated opinion from pundits who are not experts on the subject (and by stopped it's clear what they're implying is 'no longer a threat' not, a temporary pause).

Has the UN come out and said that they believe action against climate change is a waste of money? Have the many scientific organisations studying this, and surely aware of the latest developments changed their position? If not, then it's likely because in the long term, the prognosis hasn't changed.

It's a good segment. Socialists (many videosifters included, such as @ChaosEngine & @enoch) seem to be convinced that either they themselves know all the facts (i.e., narcissism?) or that the "rulers" know all the facts, or that the "majority of the people" know all the facts.

While it may be true that the masses, as a collective of course, are even more intelligent than any individual on his or her own, it is true only when individuals among the masses are acting and thinking independently of one another (i.e., pursuing their own interests as best that they themselves know how to do) and not when they are under the sway of one form of demagoguery or central planning or another.

Political democracy shows the masses in all their foolishness, while market democracy (i.e., anarchy) shows them in all their wisdom. I think it is this distinction that illuminates the discrepancy between the theory of democracy and the practice of democracy.

(Moreover, it seems that, when listening to Hayek -- or Milton Friedman or Rory Sutherland -- one gets the impression that one is listening to a highly intelligent individual. This is quite different from listening to someone like, say, Paul Krugman and other so-called "economists," who are in truth would-be pundits and polemicists and not at all cognizant of the underlying postulates that support their arguments.)

Do you have proof that every one of these instances of cops behaving badly were because of orders from high up in the chain of command? Because you know, that would be rather big.

That's what I mean by calculated intent. You have to prove all of this is by design, which has clearly never been demonstrated.

This video...and all the others are anecdotal. The Alex Jones nutbags of the world would have you believe that there is someone, or a cabal of people who are fiendishly steepling their fingers and cackling maniacally at the diabolicalness of their master plan. That's nice and all, but you need proof.

Until then, it's far far far more rational to believe that every single one of these situations can be traced back to very human things like poor training, poor judgement, fragile egos, over worked, underpaid. and actual complex psychological issues all of which are part of the human condition.

Sure, these things need to be addressed, but it's complex and not simple to implement. If it were, they'd have done it by now.

The pundits (aka the armchair quarterbacks) don't like complex issues, they like to try to reduce everything to sound bites. It's far easier to sell the "ZOMG FASCIST STATE THEY:RE OUT TO GET YOU" message than something that actually requires critical thought and tough questions to answer. It's easier to just lazily point the finger at a scapegoat.

So, I take it that you didn't click the link in my comment. If you had, you'd have seen the graph that shows an increase in the ice caps from May to October. (Psst: That's not wintertime, last I checked.)

Quoting: "“This modeled Antarctic sea ice decrease in the last three decades is at odds with observations, which show a small yet statistically significant increase in sea ice extent,” says the study, led by Colorado State University atmospheric scientist Elizabeth Barnes."

It measured an overall increase in the size of the icecaps over the last three decades. So while there may have been a decrease in the computer models, the ice caps have actually increased in size in reality.

Quoting again: "Sea ice in the Arctic Ocean underwent a sharp recovery this year from the record-low levels of 2012, with 50 percent more ice surviving the summer melt season, scientists said Friday. It is the largest one-year increase in Arctic ice since satellite tracking began in 1978."

I personally don't know if it is increasing or decreasing. But, suffice it to say, the science suggests that this is certainly not "obvious BS" as you seem to think it is...

But regardless, I needn't have to say it again: The folks at Bilderberg (or anywhere else) will do nothing to "stop" "climate change" one way or another. (And neither will you... And neither will the politicians.) For some, this "debate" is just a convenient way to justify the state's control over its citizens. Mr. Samsom was an employee of Greenpeace. Later, the CEO of a "green energy" company. Given his background and corporate connections, it is in his best interests (both politically and financially) to align himself within the "OMG! Climate Changed the weather!" camp. He probably ran for office on that platform, highlighting his "environmentalist" credentials. But he's a politician. Only politicians and videosifters seem to know what's "really going on." If there is any climate consensus at all, it is that most climate scientists have no opinion about it.

In fact, no more than 4% have come out with an opinion about what causes "global warming" or whether it is a "problem or not." And even this 4% has not been calling skepticism "BS" with the certainty that the online "pundits/scientists" like you seem to muster.

But I realize that this isn't really about "climate change." It's not even about Bilderberg. It's about "validation". Nothing more, nothing less. And so, for that, I wish you the best of luck in your attempts to "correct" those politicians (and/or "educating" those who "believe" or "pretend to believe" whatever you disagree with). Such is the condition of living in a "democracy" so you're going to need all the luck you can get!

...and reasonable people that have more 'faith' in facts and science than they do in some political pundit's propaganda.

To be sure, it does not take "studies" and "experts" to "prove" that smog turns healthy breathable air into unhealthy unbreathable air.

But, again, the consensus among proponents of man-made global warming pretty much all agree that the cause is greenhouse gases. And the consensus is also that cattle accounts for the main source of greenhouse gases. I honestly don't see how anyone concerned with man-made global warming can ignore this and, therefore, not be vegetarian (i.e., be congruent in their behaviors and beliefs).

I recommend reading "Hot Talk, Cold Science", endorsed by respected physicist the late Frederick Seitz, William Harper professor of Physics at Princeton, Richard Lindzen, meteorologist at MIT, written by physicist Fred Singer.

If you want to know where Prof. Singer is coming from, read this (and skeptics are not "deniers"- that's just a slur).

But before you freak out, let me restate, it matters not; clean air is good either way; do things that contribute to clean air (like end the state -- > good luck with that!).

(Better to read and have these discussions with actual working climate scientists than to bother with Internet pundits either way.)

There is also "consensus" as to the three types of "deniers." If anyone calls me a "denier," I'd be curious as to which of the three types of "deniers" you think I belong to (as indicated in the Singer article linked above). And you can then give me your scientific explanations as to why my stance is not valid.

This is something worth keeping in mind (from Singer):

"I have concluded that we can accomplish very little with convinced warmistas and probably even less with true deniers. So we just make our measurements, perfect our theories, publish our work, and hope that in time the truth will out."

The warmistas matter as much as the deniers. And the bottomline remains: what are you going to do about it anyway? As has been shown over and over, your "votes" don't count for much (or anything at all). So, what are you going to do about this (other than fume and get your panties in a twist on videosift)? The same is true with the "deniers." And the skeptics (i.e., true scientists).

Science also doesn't work by consensus. No real scientist will say otherwise. You either prove/falsify some hypothesis or you don't. You don't determine the truth in science by "consensus." Scientific consensus, as has been said, is itself unscientific.

There is no "consensus" on the acceleration speed of falling objects. There is no "consensus" on whether the Earth is orbiting the sun. There is no "consensus" on water being made up of H2O. These you can measure and find out for yourself. (In fact, Galileo had less than 5% "consensus" on whether the Earth orbits the sun at the time of his experiments. Facts matter. "Consensus?" Not so much.)

But,

“If the science were as certain as climate activists pretend, then there would be precisely one climate model, and it would be in agreement with measured data. As it happens, climate modelers have constructed literally dozens of climate models. What they all have in common is a failure to represent reality, and a failure to agree with the other models. As the models have increasingly diverged from the data, the climate clique have nevertheless grown increasingly confident—from cocky in 2001 (66% certainty in IPCC’s Third Assessment Report) to downright arrogant in 2013 (95% certainty in the Fifth Assessment Report).”

Still, this does not in any way equate "denial" of man-made global warming or whatever other "climate change." That is simply an unfounded conflation made up by the propagandists which so many here take on as gospel.

And it still does not let anyone "off the hook" about actually doing something that matters if you care about it so much.

Let me know if anyone finds any "errors" in the science of the NGIPCC articles and studies that I posted above.

@Jinx To me it's quite obvious that Phelps has had the opposite effect that he intended to have. People weren't willing to see themselves side with or compared to such an extremist and he gave ammo to those who said it's crazy to hate gays.

The Gay Rights movement is unprecedented in our countries history for how fast it is moving and achieving real results. You need to take a step back and recognize that fact, it's moving at a blistering pace. This is largely because of past movements which have laid the groundwork and the civilizing effect of the late 60s early 70s.

You can cite Russia all you want I don't care about Russia. I'm talking about the United States because this post is about a United States pundit/politician. If you want to discuss Russia fine but it should be on a video about Gay Rights in Russia.

If the poor have it so good, why aren't the rich people throwing away their fortunes?

oh wait..that's because the poor don't have it so good.

If Fox news and their pundits want to fix fraud, that's great..more power to them, but it just seems like they could care less about that...they'd rather just demonize the poor even though a number of those poor probably do vote republican.

so hey, way to expand that big tent GOP.

It always cracks me up at how the right might make a genuine observation like fraud in a system, but instead of coming up with a way to fix that fraud, they either come up with a solution that is completely worse or more expensive than the problem (requiring drug tests for food stamps...drug tests aren't cheap yo) or they just demonize anyone who might use that system regardless.

news flash, demonizing an entire class of people isn't a great way to get them to vote for you. more poor people than rich people dumbasses

And Just to be perfectly clear, secession predated the Lincoln administration! To ask, why didn't he do this or that is to ignore the situation he faced before he was even sworn in.

"On December 20, 1860, shortly after Abraham Lincoln's victory in the presidential election of 1860, South Carolina adopted an ordinance declaring its secession from the United States of America."

War to preserve the Union, not a Lincoln crusade to end slavery. Get it?

This is what happens when you get your history from political pundits like Thomas Wood Jr.

Try reading a real historical text on the period.

I recommend "Battle Cry of Freedom" by James McPherson.

Hey look, I guess I'm a free university!

ok, so you have a peaceful revolt...




...then what?

saying you're pissed is easy. Saying there is a problem is easy.

But where is your solution to address these ills. How do you plan to stop it from happening again?

I find it interesting that you seem to imply that violence is a tool of a state. That's rather disingenuous, don't you think? As if the state is more predisposed to use violence than other groups? the state, like every organization, is made up of people. so if the state is violent, it's because people are violent and we really haven't solved that problem yet, have we. Violence is still part of the human condition and not an inherent part of the state...or playing video games, etc.

I would argue that many of the conflicts we are currently in are because of monied interests and their influence on gov't. remove that influence as I suggested and I'd wager that we've have a less violent gov't.

and I'm sorry, I must have missed something, but are you implying that Obama personally shut down Occupy Wall Street? gonna need you to provide a citation for that. Speaking for my city. The local occupy group was evicted from it's spot by our governor, a republican, but not that it matters because the whole Occupy movement was poorly thought out to begin with. very few people want to camp out 24/7 on with college hipsters and homeless people. It was just a badly implemented idea....period. It was one of the few times I genuinely agreed with our governor. While I might have agreed with Occupy's intentions, they were absolutely ineffective at conveying any meaningful message and an absolute nuisance to the area.

Bottom line, is that as that Japanese general alluded to, America is a sleeping giant. For all the rhetoric and for all these ills you have mentioned, the average American citizen is still largely insulated from it. American life has not fundamentally changed during the administration of Bush and/or Obama despite what the pundits on either side try to cry wolf about. Because we have an all-volunteer military, even the average american citizen is largely insulated from our wars as well.

When those things change, then maybe you'll see something happen.

And yes, I know my view is optimistic. But optimism works. Wasn't that long ago that many things we take for granted today was viewed as optimistic but niave or unrealistic.

I think that's part of what happened. I think democrats thought the same thing back in 2004 with Kerry v Bush. They couldn't conceive that Bush would remain elected so they didn't bother to vote.

I think the main thing though is just the implosion of the Republican party. They've gone so far far far right that they're losing moderate republicans.

The most delicious part is how Nate Silver got lambasted as a political pundit by the right even though he correctly predicted every single state of the union race outcome

It just perfectly illustrates the right being so out of touch with reality.

Silver: The data says this
The Right: we don't care! Hey Romney, don't bother writing a concession speech, you won't need it!

There is a pretty easy cure for confirmation bias; Skepticism.

"Be your own light, your own refuge. Believe only that which you test for yourself. Do not accept authority merely because it comes from a great man, or is written in a sacred book, for truth is different for each man and woman." ~Siddhartha Gautama

Granted, that quote wasn't really meant with pundits in mind but I think it applies to all aspects of life and information absorption.

Also, kill your heroes.

Look to the people who have everything to gain from remaining hidden who are orchestrating this bleak future of surveillance, control, and thought-crime?
How can people do anything but do nothing with 'eyes wide shut' without freeing themselves from the programming that makes each generation more willing to accept anything that may come in exchange for creature comforts from a vending machine or television and an illusory hope of a future?

I got yer point, but the answer is in asking the sensible questions, the simple ones that any journalist knows and fails to press: Who, what, why, when, and where only work if you have no ulterior motives for gathering and transferring information.

Who wants drones everywhere and whom are they to be deployed against, what do they want drones for, why do they want to use them, when, where, you get the gyst?

To answer your inquiry, the only way they can implement this surveillance/domination/fascist future is to create the environment ripe for it, that being a world full of humans unable to think clearly, practically, and critically. In case you are unaware, the stage is being prepared through the same brand of disinformation and misdirection the goddamn Nazis used to dupe Germany, it's simply more sophisticated and polished nowadays.

The world is fast becoming a collection of easily manipulated and controlled idiots, morons, imbeciles and dysfunctional humans...easily convinced of anything they are fed.

Thank God the pep-rally for political pundits and fans of the next big election have died down on the Videosift for it means to me that the far 'left' and 'right' are beginning to realize they have been hoodwinked. Apolitical extremism gives me hope and scares the shit outta me at the same time, because the puppet-masters mean business and have an agenda, and you and I... HUMANITY, are not in their buddy-club.

You seem to be relying on quite a few assumptions yourself, and this doesn't really deserve a reply (and you probably don't want one anyway), but nonethless -- I've a few minutes to kill:

None of what you say explains how you justify the stupid assumption that we need a monopoly of law enforcement in order to enforce the law.

Another assumption is in thinking that people are "evil" but somehow the politicians and the bureaucrats are somehow "good" and are what maintain law and order. (Maybe you think of yourself as evil. But in any case that is irrelevant.)

The "60's hippies" comment sounds like a Faux Noise pundit!

"What EXACTLY prevents me from taking everything someone has, by force? Private security? If you can afford it? If you can't?"

Go ahead, try it. And I can afford it. If you can't, then you should maybe look into that and your own finances instead of ranting about libertarians. Seems like a better strategy.

Do you actually think police services now currently "free?" Even if you happen to be a nonproductive tax consumer, you are still paying for it in other ways.

Competing private security or insurance would be cheaper and more efficient than the police force, since it would not be the monopoly we have now. And there are also those willing and able to defend themselves on top of that.

"All of Europe was effectively ungoverned when Rome fell."

Learn your history; there was never a time where all of Europe was "effectively ungoverned" when Rome fell.

"3. The appropriate information will be available to make rational decisions."

Obviously you're making the erroneous assumption that individuals don't have the info needed to make their own decisions and yet government/central planners somehow do. This is, in fact, the opposite of what Hayek demonstrated (not to mention what common sense indicates). (Maybe you feel incompetent, but that's another issue.)

Bemoaning the end of the Roman empire is like bemoaning the end of the Nazi regime; with its constant wars, the destruction of the 2nd Jewish Temple (an earlier holocaust), its intolerances, etc. Any problems with the "dark ages" (a label that historians are increasingly abandoning as it is glaringly inaccurate) reveal what happens when a poorly run state collapses due to war and bad economics. A lesson on where we are heading, whatever you might think. Good luck to you.

Edit: "You really act as though government is the root of all evil."
Which of my actions do you mean? Posting my thoughts? Are you the thought police?

now that I am watching the video, I will say he didn't respond very well to the that one pundit. The biggest thing he ignored is the huge strawman the pundit constructed where labor makes everything and there is no profit. Bullshit. At no time did he argue that companies will be making no profit and labor will get everything. Huge strawman.

You could probably triple or quadruple the minimum wage and a lot of these companies would still be making money hand over fist.

they keep ignoring the fundamental issue. You give poor people more money...THEY WILL SPEND IT!! = huge boost to the economy. If you give rich people more money that they don't even need, THEY HOARD IT AND TAKE IT OUT OF THE ECONOMY!!. The republicans have it backwards, it's not trickle down economics, it's trickle UP economics. Where do you think businesses get their money in the first place.....the people at the bottom buying their products.

If you fuck over the poor, you interrupt the cycle and you've got no one buying your shit.