Amusing crap about IQ

A murder in your area lowers your IQ -- even if you don't know about the murder concerned? It's totally implausible but Leftists never give up in their hatred of around 100 years of IQ research that show IQ to be mostly genetic.

The author below found that people living in areas where a crime had occurred recently have lower IQs. But what sort of area is likely to have experienced a crime recently? A area that has high rates of crime generally and an area where anybody with brains would NOT live. Note that criminals have long been known to have generally low IQs and very low levels of educational attainment.

So all that the author below in fact found was that people living in high crime areas tend to be dumb, which is no surprise to anyone. The journal article is The acute effect of local homicides on children's cognitive performance.

The statement below to the effect that "The effects wear off after a week to nine days" is simply not supportable from the data available. It is just another perverse guess. You would need before-and-after data on the same person to substantiate that claim and the author simply did not have such data.

A murder in the neighborhood can significantly knock down a child's score on an IQ test, even if the child did not directly witness the killing or know the victim, U.S. researchers reported on Monday....

Sharkey compared data on crimes broken down to within a few blocks in a neighborhood with school test scores.

He collected details of more than 6,000 murders in the Chicago area and the results of two surveys of children and families in Chicago neighborhoods. The surveys included scores from tests that are used to determine a child's IQ.

If a murder occurred in a child's neighborhood -- an area of roughly six to 10 square blocks as denoted by the U.S. Census -- the children's test scores fell by an average of half a standard deviation, Sharkey reported.

On an IQ test using 100 as the average or norm, one standard deviation is 15 points. So if a child took the test within a week of a local murder, his or her score was 7-8 points lower on average than the score of a similar child in a similar neighborhood where there was no murder.

This fits in with what is known about the effects of post traumatic stress, Sharkey said. "The results suggest that children may carry the burden of violence with them as they take part in daily life within the neighborhood or school settings," he said.

The effects wear off after a week to nine days, Sharkey found. But in areas with a lot of crime, this does not provide much relief.

More HERE

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Obamafraud

Deepwater-Gate: Administration Modifies Peer-Reviewed Report After it was Reviewed by Scientists

In the days following the Gulf oil spill, President Obama requested that the Secretary of the Interior conduct a 30-day review of the offshore drilling program in the United States and issue a report with recommendations. This report was to be “peer reviewed” by a team of seven engineers recommended by the National Academy of Engineering.

The team of engineers reviewed, approved and signed off on a version of the 30-day review that was presented to them by the Administration. However, after they signed their names to this document, a significant change was made – a change that led to the 6-month suspension of deepwater exploratory drilling.

The eight panel members said they disagree with the moratorium on all exploratory drilling.” In justifying its broad moratorium on deepwater drilling, the Obama administration emphasized that the measure was recommended by an Interior Department report prepared in consultation with scientists and industry experts.

The May 27 report to President Barack Obama said the experts “peer reviewed” its recommendations, including the six-month moratorium and 22 safety measures. But eight of the 15 members of the review panel are charging that the administration misrepresented their position by suggesting they supported a blanket moratorium that they actually oppose. Their criticism, and the administration’s response, are evidence that the six-month stoppage is based on politics rather than on science.

More HERE

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Obama Blocked Clean-Up of BP Oil Spill by Friendly Countries

Is this another crisis Obama doesn't want to waste?

Crucial offers to help clean up BP’s oil spill “have come from Belgian, Dutch, and Norwegian firms that . . . possess some of the world’s most advanced oil skimming ships.” But the Obama Administration wouldn’t accept the help, because doing so would require it to do something past presidents have routinely done: waive rules imposed by the Jones Act, a law backed by unions.

“The BP clean-up effort in the Gulf of Mexico is hampered by the Jones Act. This is a piece of 1920s protectionist legislation, that requires all vessels working in U.S. waters to be American-built, and American-crewed. So the U.S. Coast Guard" cannot "accept, and therefore don’t ask for, the assistance of high-tech European vessels specifically designed for the task in hand.”

The law itself permits the President to waive these requirements, and such waivers were “granted, promptly, by the Bush administration,” in the aftermath of hurricanes and other emergencies. But Obama has refused to do so, notes David Warren in the Ottawa Citizen.

“After the Obama administration refused help from the Netherlands, Geert Visser, the consul general for the Netherlands in Houston, told Loren Steffy: ‘Let’s forget about politics; let’s get it done.’” But for Obama, politics always comes first: “The explanation of Obama’s reluctance to seek this remedy is his cozy relationship with labor unions. . . ‘The unions see it [not waiving the act] as … protecting jobs. They hate when the Jones Act gets waived.’”

Ironically, even the staunchest supporters of the Jones Act are now distancing themselves from refusals to accept foreign help, saying they have “not and will not stand in the way of the use of these well-established waiver procedures to address this crisis.” Obama is being more intransigently pro-union than the unions themselves. Never mind that "each day our European allies are prevented from helping us speed up the clean up is another day that Gulf fishing and tourism jobs die.”

In April 2009, the Obama administration granted BP, a big supporter of Obama, a waiver of environmental regulations. But after the oil spill, it blocked Louisiana from protecting its coastline against the oil spill by delaying rather than expediting regulatory approval of essential protective measures. It has also chosen not to use what has been described as “the most effective method” of fighting the spill, a method successfully used in other oil spills. Democratic strategist James Carville called Obama’s handling of the oil spill “lackadaisical” and “unbelievable” in its “stupidity.”

Obama is now using BP’s oil spill to push the global-warming legislation that BP had lobbied for. Obama’s global warming legislation expands ethanol subsidies, which cause famine, starvation, and food riots in poor countries by shrinking the food supply. Ethanol makes gasoline costlier and dirtier, increases ozone pollution, and increases the death toll from smog and air pollution. Ethanol production also results in deforestation, soil erosion, and water pollution. Subsidies for biofuels like ethanol are a big source of corporate welfare: “BP has lobbied for and profited from subsidies for biofuels . . . that cannot break even without government support.”

SOURCE

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BrookesNews Update

Is the US economy heading for the rocks? : If the public had — or at least the country's economic pundits — had a far better understanding of how the economy functioned Obama's destructive economic policies would never have got of the ground
Is the US economy facing deflation?: A sharp fall in commodity prices has raised the spectre of deflation in the US. But so long as the rate of monetary expansion remains positive there can be no deflation. And monetary pumping by the Fed has kept monetary growth in positive territory. Moreover, there is the distinct possibility that stagflation will emerge
Rudd's disastrous resource rent tax: how the right let the country down again : What is truly bizarre about the present situation is not a single member of our rightwing has come out against the theoretical basis of Rudd's tax. Equally bizarre is their refusal to acknowledge that the theory of economic rent has been effectively debunked, even though they are stridently attacking the tax
The Gaza flotilla's organisors' terrorist links : The 'charity' that organised the Gaza flotilla is in fact a terrorist front with strong links to the Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan. Evidence is emerging that suggests Erdogan collaborated with these terrorists in an effort to score a propaganda victory against Israel, a victory that the willing collaboration of the Western media guaranteed, making Erdogan a sponsor of international terrorism
CNBC is collaborating with Castro's KGB-trained secret police : CNBC has decided to partner itself with Castro's secret police. In a hit job on the rescue of more than 14,000 children from Castro's vicious regime it brought in Maria Torres, neglecting to mention that she is an agent of influence for the Castro regime and is a also a member of the Antonio Maceo Brigade, an organization that is run by Castro's KGB-trained DGI. CNBC has once again revealed itself as a deeply corrupt, even treasonous, phony news outlet
Friends of Israel take a stand : The goal is to fight the web war against Israel by blogging and using social networks like Facebook, Twitter, and YouTube, and posting talkbacks on a range of media sites
A shrink asks: what's wrong with Obama? : Obama will not learn from his mistakes. He will not grow and mature from on-the-job experience. Over time he will become a more ferocious version of who he is today. Why? Because this is a damaged person. Obama's fate was sealed years ago growing up in his strange and poisonous family

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ELSEWHERE

On Henry Ford and his $5 a day: "It's a fairly common trope in US lefty land that Henry Ford and his $5 a day wages back in 1913 marked a huge change in labour relations. He was moved to raise wages so high (approximately double the prevailing wage) so as to help create a market for his own products. This is an interesting thought, certainly, but not one that stands much examination. That year his establishment of workers was some 14,000 head: his sales some 170,000 and that's just the year that he started ramping up production through the moving assembly line (reaching 500,000 in a couple of years and near a million within a decade). The spending power of his workforce was entirely marginal."

How can America’s “War on Drugs” succeed if alcohol Prohibition failed?: "America’s Prohibition laws were meant to cut crime and boost morality — they failed on both fronts. So how can the ‘War on Drugs’ ever succeed? It can’t.”

Views from abroad: "Having spent almost six years living in various parts of Asia and traveling to over 50 cities, I always made a deliberate effort to absorb as much of the local sentiment as possible. Sometimes this is very difficult given time constraints, language barriers, etc.; however, certain aspects of my travels were very clearly spelled out and remain very vivid to this day. When I found myself engaged in meaningful discussions with people who understood their society and seemed genuinely connected to their society, I would always ask ‘what do you think is the biggest problem in society?’ From my time spent in places like Philippines, India, Vietnam and China, the overwhelming majority of times, I received a similar response — ‘Government.’”

Bailing out politicians now?: "Obama calls it an ‘emergency’ measure to prevent ‘massive layoffs of teachers, police and firefighters.’ Yet, none of the 20 million state, county or municipal workers can lose their job unless an elected legislature and a chief executive agree that they should go. Obama is calling for a taxpayer rescue of the political class to which he belongs, to spare it the painful duty tens of thousands of business executives have had to perform. Private employees — 25 million of whom are out of work, underemployed or have given up looking for jobs — may be expendable, but government workers are not.”

My Twitter.com identity: jonjayray. My Facebook page is also accessible as jonjayray (In full: http://www.facebook.com/jonjayray). For more blog postings from me, see TONGUE-TIED, EDUCATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, GREENIE WATCH, POLITICAL CORRECTNESS WATCH, GUN WATCH, SOCIALIZED MEDICINE, FOOD & HEALTH SKEPTIC, AUSTRALIAN POLITICS, IMMIGRATION WATCH INTERNATIONAL, EYE ON BRITAIN and Paralipomena

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The Big Lie of the late 20th century was that Nazism was Rightist. It was in fact typical of the Leftism of its day. It was only to the Right of Stalin's Communism. The very word "Nazi" is a German abbreviation for "National Socialist" (Nationalsozialist) and the full name of Hitler's political party (translated) was "The National Socialist German Workers' Party" (In German: Nationalsozialistische Deutsche Arbeiterpartei)

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