What Caught My Eye Today

Climate Change - Have you heard that the world is now cooling instead of warming? Actually--no, I haven't. You may have seen some news reports on the Internet or heard about it from a provocative new book. Only one problem: It's not true. Poopy gook. Since when did the truth matter? The case that the Earth might be cooling partly stems from recent weather. Last year was cooler than previous years. It's been a while since the super-hot years of 1998 and 2005. Global warming skeptics base their claims on an unusually hot year in 1998. Since then, they say, temperatures have dropped — thus, a cooling trend. But it's not that simple. Statistics rarely are--but that's what makes them so fascinating...well, to me, at least. Since 1998, temperatures have dipped, soared, fallen again and are now rising once more. Statisticians who analyzed the data found a distinct decades-long upward trend in the numbers, but could not find a significant drop in the past 10 years. The ups and downs during the last decade repeat random variability in data as far back as 1880. Saying there's a downward trend since 1998 is not scientifically legitimate. Of the 10 hottest years recorded by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), eight have occurred since 2000, and after this year it will be nine because this year is on track to be the sixth-warmest on record. Let's see the number crunchers refute that little gems, shall we? Yeah, I think I'm going to short the prospects of a new ice age. My money is on global warming.

India - Fred's Note: It occurs to me that I've been giving India more than its fair share of attention of late. Rest assured, I have nothing against India. In fact, I would go as far as to say this should be considered a compliment. Ten years ago, stories like this never would have made the wires. An Air India crew on a flight over Pakistan got into a brawl leaving horrified passengers wondering who was steering the plane. I'm guessing the auto-pilot. The scuffle apparently started after the pilot and co-pilot scolded a female flight attendant for some infraction, and a male flight attendant came to her defense. Witnesses said the pilot and male attendant began pushing and cursing each other at the doorway of the cockpit before slipping into the passenger gangway, where it became a fistfight. Now that's what I call in-flight entertainment. But seriously, here's what I find troubling. Let's say that some passengers got into an altercation that resulting in punches being thrown. Those poor bastards would be taken into custody and face some serious jail time. I smell a double standard here, and I don't like it. I don't like it at all. I say if the dude flying the plane can find the time to brawl with a co-worker, passengers should be given the same latitude. It's not like they're flying the plane.

Air Travel - Of course, India can try to outdo us Americans in doing stupid things, but they have a long, long way to go before they approach our levels of absurdity. Two Northwest Airlines pilots have told federal investigators that they were going over schedules using their laptop computers in violation of company policy while their plane overflew their Minneapolis destination by 150 miles. The pilots said in interviews that they were not fatigued and didn't fall asleep. Instead, they told investigators that they both had their laptops out while the first officer, who had more experience with scheduling, instructed the captain on monthly flight crew scheduling. Ah, well if they had a logical explanation for overshoot their destination by 150 miles, then I guess that makes the oversight okay. And another thing--though admittedly a trivial one--how complicated is that scheduling software that it took an hour for a rather intelligent individual (so I assume) to figure it out? The pilots were out of communication with air traffic controllers and their airline for more than an hour and didn't realize their mistake until contacted by a flight attendant. Many aviation safety experts had said it was more plausible that the pilots had fallen asleep during the cruise phase of their flight. Well, I suppose if you can fall asleep driving a car, then it is conceivable that you could do the same flying a passenger jet. And yet, somehow that doesn't make me feel any better. Air traffic controllers in Denver and Minneapolis repeatedly tried without success to raise the pilots of the San Diego-to-Minneapolis flight by radio. Other pilots in the vicinity tried reaching the plane on other radio frequencies. Their airline tried contacting them using a radio text message that chimes. Maybe someone should have tried "tweeting" them.

Healthcare - Lest you thought that the airline industry held a monopoly on "ridiculous beyond all comprehension" stories, I give you healthcare. The U.S. healthcare system is just as wasteful as President Barack Obama says it is, and proposed reforms could be paid for by fixing some of the most obvious inefficiencies, preventing mistakes and fighting fraud. No way. That would mean that we're wasting over $800 billion a year. That can't be true. According to a Thomson Reuters report, the U.S. healthcare system wastes between $505 billion and $850 billion every year. Oh come on. These guys must be exaggerating. Unnecessary care such as the overuse of antibiotics and lab tests to protect against malpractice exposure makes up 37% of healthcare waste or $200 to $300 billion a year. Really? Fraud makes up 22% of healthcare waste, or up to $200 billion a year in fraudulent Medicare claims, kickbacks for referrals for unnecessary services and other scams. Get out. Administrative inefficiency and redundant paperwork account for 18% of healthcare waste. No way. Medical mistakes account for $50 billion to $100 billion in unnecessary spending each year, or 11% of the total. Jeepers. Preventable conditions such as uncontrolled diabetes cost $30 billion to $50 billion a year. Okay, okay. We get point.

Like I said before, India can try to steal the headlines, but they're still in the minor leagues as far as I'm concerned. Those dudes are going to have to dig deep if they want to challenge the good ol' Stars and Stripes in the colossal blunder department.