California Supreme Court: No Right to In-Person Cross-Examination of Accuser During Campus Sexual Assault Proceedings

Study Retractions Up 13,650% in 22 Years

“…The number of scientific papers retracted annually rose from just 40 in 2000 to almost 5,500 in 2022, representing a whopping 13,650% change over the past 22 years, with researchers estimating an astonishing 100,000 would have to be withdrawn every year with more thorough vetting.

Delivering a blow to the “trust the science” cheerleaders, Retraction Watch’s co-founders Ivan Oransky and Adam Marcus detail the alarming issues with modern science for the left-wing Guardian newspaper.

The surge in bogus papers is driven in part by the fact that scientists are often “required… to publish papers in order to earn and keep jobs or to be promoted,” which leads to some turning to so-called “paper mills” that “sell everything from authorships to entire manuscripts to researchers who need to publish lest they perish.”

Only around a fifth of retractions are a result of “honest error,” Oransky and Marcus note, highlighting serious misconduct cases such as that of Joachim Boldt, a German anesthesiologist whose falsified data on an ineffective blood substitute was once widely cited and led to many people being harmed.

A related issue is the so-called replication crisis. It has become increasingly apparent that the results found in many scientific papers – possibly a majority of them – cannot be reproduced by other researchers. In 2015, for example, efforts to reproduce psychology studies published in supposedly high-quality journals failed 61 out of 100 times, with similar results in 2018.

The issue is also present in the hard sciences, with efforts by the University of Virginia to reproduce five “landmark” cancer studies failing in one case and producing inconclusive results in two others – hinting that “the science” may be mostly wrong across the board…”

Listen to Feynman on pseudoscience:

Why do the hard work of actually figuring out things when pseudoscience has become socially acceptable pic.twitter.com/QKf5wdQdK2

— There's no "I" in craftmanship (@6851cf3c) December 25, 2021

State of Emergency: Massachusetts Governor Calls On Residents to Open Homes to Illegal Immigrants

Democrats.

EPA TRIES TO DESTROY THE GRID

“…The Environmental Protection Agency is proposing a new rule limiting CO2 emissions from fossil fuel-fired (coal and natural gas) power plants. As you might expect, given the ideological bent of EPA, the rule is a Trojan horse, the real purpose of which is to induce the nation’s coal plants and some natural gas power generation to shut down under the increasing weight of federal regulations.

Center of the American Experiment is sounding the alarm on EPA’s rule. Our energy team was hired by the State of North Dakota to model the EPA proposal to determine whether it could supply reliable electricity to the 15 states on the MISO (Midcontinent Independent System Operator) grid. Our team found that the grid implied by the EPA rule, heavily dependent on sporadic wind and solar power, would result in devastating blackouts. They further calculated that if the grid were to be made mostly (but not entirely) immune to blackouts, while still complying with the EPA rule, another $246 billion would have to be spent within the MISO system alone…

…EPA’s power plant regulations will devastate ordinary people–those who rely on electricity and want affordable transportation–while enriching a handful of well-connected industries that have curried the favor of the current administration…”

The Doctor Can’t See You Right Now, Would You Like to Kill Yourself Instead?

“…Maids clean up messes around the house, but in Canada, MAID cleans up after that country’s mess of a health care system. Just ask 37-year-old Vancouver resident Kathrin Mentler, who was offered the chance to kill herself because there weren’t any psychiatrists available to treat her chronic depression.

There are slippery slopes and then there are elevator shafts going straight down to immediate doom — and that seems to be exactly where Canada’s Medical Assistance in Dying (MAID) is leading increasing numbers of reasonably healthy Canadians…

…Stage Four lung cancer? MAID. Permanently disabled and unable to care for yourself? MAID. Chronic pain? MAID. Down in the dumps? MAID. Are you one of those icky poor people? MAID…”

Attrition shrinks Los Angeles Police Department below below 1990s levels

This is directly attributable to Democrat policy preferences.

What could go wrong?

Andrew McCabe blames Trump for Utah FBI shooting

‘Strong-arming:’ Appeals court judges compare Biden social media pressure to mafia

“…Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Jennifer Walker Elrod declared in court that the Biden administration’s efforts to persuade social media companies to remove, throttle and suppress purported misinformation on COVID-19, Hunter Biden’s laptop and elections reminded her of a mafia movie.

That was just one of the most memorable examples of the frosty reception Justice Department Civil Division lawyer Daniel Tenny received Thursday from the three-judge panel considering whether to lift or modify last month’s ban on several forms of contact between the feds and companies — currently stayed by the 5th Circuit — as the First Amendment lawsuit led by Missouri and Louisiana proceeds.

The back-and-forth at Thursday’s hearing resembled that between 6th Circuit judges and DOJ’s lawyer at a June hearing in a related social media censorship lawsuit against federal officials by users of X, formerly known as Twitter. Both panels were appointed by Republican presidents.

Echoing the injunction issued by U.S. District Judge Terry Doughty, the 5th Circuit judges repeatedly cited specific conversations from the factual record that suggest social media companies feared legal consequences for not complying with White House and agency requests to censor or diminish the reach of websites or social media postings of which the Biden administration disapproved.

When Tenny claimed the injunction’s wording was so broad and vague it could ban the government from alerting the public about “untrue statements” about a natural disaster, Judge Don Willett countered that documented private conversations were the issue.

Federal officials appeared to practice “fairly unsubtle strong-arming” and make “not-so-veiled threats” in the vein of “this is a really nice social media platform you’ve got there, would be a shame if something happened to it,” Willett said…”

Democrats Say It’ll Take A Lot More Than Eyewitness Testimony, Bank Records, Audio, Video, Complete Confessions For Them To Believe Biden Did Anything Wrong https://t.co/HElkfdINTI pic.twitter.com/vEFvaPbs5J

— The Babylon Bee (@TheBabylonBee) August 10, 2023

AZ Gov. Hobbs: No Restrictions on Abortion, Even After Viability

Federal Court Declares Trump a Flight Risk in Secret Subpoena Decision

“…The disclosure of a subpoena of Twitter by Special Counsel Jack Smith was surprising in a number of respects, including the hefty $350,000 fine imposed by U.S. District Court Beryl Howell (left) for a three-day delay as the company sought to address the demand. However, the two most surprising, and concerning, elements were that the subpoena was secret and Howell justified it, in part, on Trump being a flight risk. Neither seems warranted in this case even assuming that the subpoena was in other respects warranted.

Special counsel Jack Smith subpoenaed and obtained a search warrant related to former President Trump’s account on Twitter, now X. However, he also sought the information with a nondisclosure order that prohibited X from disclosing the existence or contents of the search warrant to Trump or anyone else. However, Trump already knew he was under investigation, so why was there a need for nondisclosure?

The court found that Trump might change his course of conduct but that seems unlikely. If anything Trump has been most consistent in his social media practices. Indeed, while some of us have criticized him for his posting, he has remained entirely undeterred.

The lower court stated that “The district court found that there were ‘reasonable grounds to believe’ that disclosing the warrant to former President Trump ‘would seriously jeopardize the ongoing investigation’ by giving him ‘an opportunity to destroy evidence, change patterns of behavior, [or] notify confederates.’”

It is not clear how Trump would destroy the evidence in possession of Twitter, particularly after the company is informed that it must preserve and disclose the meta data.

Then there was the added rational that was tucked into footnote 2 of the D.C. Circuit opinion: Trump might flee.

Judge Howell actually agreed that the former President was a flight risk.

Process that for a second. Trump has 24/7 security. So Howell agreed that he might shake his sizable security detail, evade them, and go on the lam. He is one of the most recognized figures in the world. He would have to go to Mars to live incognito.

It is facially absurd. Trump has been sued and criminally charged across the country. He has never made a break for it. Where would he go? Cuba?

The finding of a flight risk undermines the credibility of the court’s order. This is not to question the ability to force the release of the information. However, the need for secrecy is far from evident. Rather it succeeded in preventing any challenge…”

There’s far more scientific fraud than anyone wants to admit

‘Best Buy manager training program not open to whites’

New National Monument will block mining on 1 million acres of uranium-rich Arizona land

Larson makes a nice diesel EV charger. May look at bootlegging some of these into California in the next few years as the grid continues to fail. pic.twitter.com/fEGzTCLosS

— Dr. Platimus (@SWGaspar) August 26, 2022

Related:

In Soviet California, Electric Vehicle Charges Grid

“…Terence West reported Wednesday for EnergyPortal that “PG&E, is exploring the potential of electric vehicles (EVs) to support the state’s fragile power grid.” What that means in practice is that CEO Patti Poppe wants a future where “EVs can feed excess power back to the grid during peak demand, helping to prevent blackouts.”

That electricity PG&E sold you yesterday? Yeah, they’re going to need some of that back because they didn’t produce enough today. Personally, I can’t help but think of PG&E’s proposal as “vampire charging.”

The concept, known as “vehicle-to-grid” charging, involves sending power from an EV’s battery back to the grid while the car is parked and plugged in. This technology is still in its early stages and faces significant costs, hindering widespread adoption. However, EVs could play a crucial role in ensuring grid stability during periods of high energy demand and solar power shortages…”

NYT — China secretly funding Democrat dark money groups

Related:

Rubio Asks DOJ To Investigate Chinese Funding of Left-Wing Activists

China is probably funding Garland’s family business selling woke school books.

Native American Group Threatens National Boycott If Washington Football Team Doesn’t Change Name Back To ‘Redskins’

For the Second Time, U.S. Scientists Have Achieved Fusion Ignition