Time Immortal

In 1997, in New Orleans, a blind woman tried to enter a taxi with her seeing eye dog. The Muslim taxi driver physically attacked her and further injured an already-broken wrist. At trial, the judge described the driver’s behavior as a “total disgrace” and sentenced him to 120 days of community service at the Lighthouse for the Blind.

In 1999, a Muslim taxi driver in Cinncinati refused to transport a blind female passenger with a seeing eye dog. The woman complained; CAIR defended him as having acted in accordance with his religious beliefs. (dogs are considered impure and contact with them is considered to render a Muslim ritually unfit for prayer.)

In 2000, in Edmonton, Canada, a blind woman tried to enter a cab with her seeing eye dog. The driver first claimed ‘allergies,’ but then stated that “taking a dog conflicted with his Religion.” At trial, he failed to produce the necessary proof from an allergist. However, the case against him was dismissed because it had been improperly filed.

We also know that in 2005 and 2006, some Muslim taxi drivers in Minneapolis refused to pick up airport fares whom they suspected of transporting alcohol or pork. In 2007 the Metropolitan Airport Commission of Minnesota then unanimously voted to crack down on such drivers who “declined to transport passengers with alcohol or pork.”

What next? Will Muslim taxi drivers refuse to transport “naked” women? “Naked” as in with their faces showing?

But, what’s true of some Muslim taxi drivers is also true of some Muslim convenience store owners.

For example, in 2003, in Edmonton, Canada, a blind woman tried to enter a convenience store owned by a Muslim and was forcibly ejected by the owner who stated that, “this store is also my church because I pray and eat here and my religion will not allow dogs or any animal to come in here.” In 2004, at trial, she stated that he started yelling at her and did not allow her to explain why she needed the dog, what the dog meant to her, or to enunciate her legal rights.

In 2005, a blind man in Brooksville, Florida, who tried to enter a store with his seeing eye dog, was similarly thrown out by a raging Muslim.

Other correlates of “raging Muslim” behavior also exist: Poverty, a limited education, (but this is not always so), dim prospects for a brighter future — coupled with a very specific cultural and religious zero-frustration tolerance, hostility towards non-Muslims, and paranoia when non-Muslims are in control. However, “male” and “Muslim” are also correlates of this behavior.

Please understand: Nothing that I am saying has anything to do with “race.” Muslims come in all colors and ethnicities.

Some people have already hit the “last straw” point — some of the bloggers I read have vowed to request, from any cab company they patronize in the future, a non-Muslim driver. Others will not patronize businesses obviously run by Muslims.

I’m not at that stage yet, but I think it’s fair to say this much: there’s one strike left. One more incident, like any of the above, within the greater Edmonton area and I will never again patronize any cab, nor any business, operated by an adherent of the Islamic faith. I would strongly encourage what few readers I have to consider doing the same.

(In Soviet Russia, hat tips you: Kathy Shaidle)

Update: Welcome, Steynians!

The basic thesis of Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth is, if I understand it correctly from the cover art, that global warming — and then, global warming directly attributable to carbon emissions from industry (anthropogenic global warming, AGW) — is causing an increased number of hurricanes, and that these hurricanes are on average more violent. If true, it’s a damning condemnation of mankind’s contribution to climate change, and the impacts thereof.

Okay.

Except that a new study suggests that the real truth might be inconvenient for Mr. Gore and his thesis:

The study, produced by two respected South Florida researchers, found that the planet’s oceans have been warming for more than a century. No surprise there, but this may be:

Those warmer oceans are producing stronger crosswinds that tend to suppress the development and growth of hurricanes, according to the scientists.

“We found a gentle decrease in the trend of U.S. landfalling hurricanes as global oceans warmed up,” said Chunzai Wang, an oceanographer and climate scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s research facility on Virginia Key.

Some previous studies found that global warming was increasing the number and intensity of hurricanes, a conclusion that supported the conventional wisdom that warmer seas automatically turbocharge hurricane development.

This latest study, conducted by Wang and Sang-Ki Lee of the University of Miami, will be published Wednesday in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

Though it is still early in the process, the study raises questions about how the insurance industry, which sets rates based on risk models, will respond to reports that appear to contradict each other.

Many other studies have used computerized statistical models to predict the future consequences of global warming, but Wang and Lee conducted a rigorous “observational” examination of records reaching back to 1854.

WIND SHEAR

They found that nearly every ocean on Earth has warmed since then, producing a variety of effects including stronger crosswinds, a phenomenon called wind shear. When they matched those findings with records of hurricanes that have struck the United States, they discovered a correlation that illustrates the danger of making assumptions about the climate and challenges some previous findings and predictions.

“The increased wind shear coincides with a weak but [consistent] downward trend in U.S. landfalling hurricanes, a reliable measure of hurricanes over the long term,” the report found.

See, this is one of the reasons why I don’t buy in to the climate change alarmism that seems to permeate public discussion about the environment, because the studies contradict the living heck out of each other. One group of scientists, using such and such a method, claims that global warming is causing a particular trend (glacial melting, more violent hurricanes, what have you). But another group of scientists, using a different but seemingly no-less-valid method, claims that the opposite is taking place — that a particular trend is happening in the reverse direction (glacial formation, less violent hurricanes, what have you).

Obviously, both conclusions can’t be true, and I suspect that the real truth is to be found somewhere in between. The Earth’s climate is in a state of flux that, by and large, humanity has no control over (and almost no impact on), and we’re bound to see cyclical patterns to everything ranging from hurricane frequency and violence to glaciation. That’s just the way of the world on which we live. And to me, at least, there seems to be no cause for alarm.

(In Soviet Russia, hat tips you: The Jawa Report)