#OCCUPYFAIL: Our movement became fascist, says an Occupier. Rand Simberg comments: “You don’t say. Actually, if you understood fascism, you’d realize it started that way.”

AUTISM: UNRAVELLING AN EPIDEMIC. “The U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention estimates that nearly 1% of children across the country have some form of autism — 20 times the prevailing figure in the 1980s. The increase has stirred fears of an epidemic and mobilized researchers to figure out what causes the brain disorder and why it appears to be affecting so many more children. Two decades into the boom, however, the balance of evidence suggests that it is more a surge in diagnosis than in disease.”

XENI JARDIN: “I have breast cancer.”

TODAY ONLY: Cuisinart Grind & Brew Coffeemaker only $49.99.

UPDATE: A reader whose name I’m omitting so as not to spoil a Christmas surprise emails: “Thanks for posting today’s Amazon coffee maker deal! This is exactly what my parents want for Christmas and I was just about to spend more money for one at another site. You saved me more than $20 bucks!” Glad to be of assistance! (Bumped).

CLIMATEGATE FALLOUT: The Brits Tune Out The Greens.

The long retreat of the global green movement continues, with new news about the collapse in public concern about climate in Britain.

In 2007 19 percent of those asked told British pollsters that climate change was one of the most important problems in the world. These days, despite unremitting green efforts to publicize the view that global warming is driving the world to catastrophe, the Economist informs us that just 4 percent of Brits polled still put it high on the list.

This is not wholly surprising. “Climategate” was widely covered in the British press. There has been a lot of snow. The financial crisis has given many British families something much closer to home to worry about.

Nevertheless the broad collapse of concern about climate in a nature-mad country which agonizes over the fate of its badgers and hedgehogs is not a good sign for the green climate agenda. If the Brits are tuning them out, what chances do the greens have to build powerful public support in countries like India and China?

Trust once lost is hard to regain.

FISHERMEN VS. SCIENTISTS: Are cod getting scarce, or not?

Federal regulators are considering the unthinkable in New England: severely restricting — maybe even shutting down — cod fishing in the Gulf of Maine, from north of Cape Cod clear up to Canada. New data suggest that the status of the humble fish that has sustained the region for centuries is much worse than previously thought. Fishermen insist that there are plenty of cod and that the real problem is fuzzy science. They say the data are grossly inconsistent, pointing to a 2008 federal report that concluded that Gulf of Maine cod, though historically overfished, were well on the way to recovery.

The news is causing high anxiety in Massachusetts, where a wooden “Sacred Cod” has hung in the State House for more than 200 years and the fishing industry, though struggling, still figures prominently in the state’s identity.

So what do you trust — reports of catches, or mathematical models of the overall population?

UPDATE: Reader Fred Butzen writes:

Please don’t be so fast to dismiss the math models based on stable or increased catches. The techology of commercial fishing has improved enormously over the last couple decades. Catches may be stable or
increasing even as the stock decreases, because fishermen are better able to find the fish and catch them than they were twenty or thirty years ago. This is not necessarily an either/or situation.

Oh, I wasn’t dismissing the models. It was a genuine question. It’s hard to know how many fish are out there.

GORDON CROVITZ: Dropped Call? Blame The FCC.

OMG ASAP. Heh.

PRIVACY: Startup Turns Your Cell-Phone Number into a Location Fix.

IT’S NOT JUST LIGHTSQUARED: Regulators could sanction Falcone over trading.

Philip Falcone, a hedge fund manager who became an overnight billionaire by betting on the collapse on the U.S. housing market, is now fighting to keep his career afloat.

The investor, who has since bet much of his Harbinger Capital Partners money on a cash-strapped wireless telecom company, said on Thursday that U.S. securities regulators are considering filing civil fraud charges against him and what is left of his once $26 billion hedge fund empire. . . . Harbinger now manages less than $4 billion and roughly half of the money is tied up in its investment in LightSquared LP, the upstart wireless telecom on which Falcone has bet the ranch. LightSquared is running low on cash and its outstanding debt trades at a steep discount as its fortunes have floundered due to a number of technical issues.

Recently the company’s technology was said to interfere with the global positioning system, the widely used technology involved in everything from navigation to managing irrigation. Some lawmakers have accused the Federal Communications Commission of fast-tracking LightSquared’s project, although the agency says its process has been engineering-based.

“Now the FCC is faced with the real possibility that it made a multibillion-dollar grant of valuable spectrum to someone who could be charged with violating securities laws,” said Iowa Senator Chuck Grassley. “The FCC chairman should lead the effort to provide documents and offer insight into how the agency decided to give Mr. Falcone, Harbinger Capital and LightSquared this multibillion-dollar grant.”

Indeed.

CHANGE: U.S. Shale Oil Seen Rising Fast. “The National Petroleum Council recently forecast that some 3 million barrels per day of shale oil could be produced in North America by 2035 if regulations were favorable to the industry. The shale oil surge in Bakken, North Dakota and other areas of the country are estimated to be about five years behind the natural gas shale boom. Rapid advancements in hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, and directional drilling have boosted output of both fuels. . . . The surge could threaten Saudi Arabia’s dominant role in world oil markets, and it also eases the urgency to develop the kingdom’s own reserves, its state energy company said last month. The US Energy Information Administration on Tuesday raised its forecast for 2012 liquid fuel output by 37% on faster growth from shale oil. . . . There are also 14 or 16 other shale oil fields in North America that are in the early stages of development.”

EUROPE: Eurozone leaders deluded if they think this ‘sticking plaster’ treaty can solve the debt crisis.

THOUGHTS ON LAST NIGHT’S DEBATE from Michael Barone.

WASHINGTON EXAMINER: Why Americans No Longer Trust Washington.

DEMOCRATS giving up on the “millionaire tax?”

SORRY, BUT I’M NOT BUYING THIS SECRET AFFAIR STORY. It’s not like it’s by somebody trustworthy, like the Star or the Enquirer. . . .

A STUDY IN CONTRASTS: “It is interesting to study the contrast between the handling of the Toyota accelerator problems, which turned out to be pretty much all driver error, and the Chevy Volt fire issues. . . . Demagoguing a non-problem in the first case, covering up a real problem in the second. Guess which one has a union that supported Obama’s election and which does not. Guess which one Obama bought equity in with taxpayer money?”

AL SHARPTON: Paying Taxes Is For The Little People.

FROM IRA STOLL, thoughts on last night’s debate. “From this vantage point, it seems like a highly fluid race.”

DUD IN DURBAN: Climate Conference Ends Without A Deal.

The developed nations typically make a lot of noise about cutting greenhouse gas emissions ahead of these United Nations climate conferences. It’s part of the script.

Even national leaders who harbor some doubt join the chorus. They’d rather play the game than be labeled as backward, anti-science deniers by the media, left-wing politicians and special interests.

President Bush refused to go along in 2001 and was summarily smeared by the London Guardian, which said he had performed a “Taliban-like act” in his “decision to trash the Kyoto global warming treaty.”

But reaching an actual agreement that will decrease carbon dioxide emissions? That’s where they draw the line.

Playing the game at its highest level is the European Union. It says it’s willing to sign onto a deal that requires five more years of greenhouse emissions cuts — but only if the U.S., China and India join the coalition.

The EU might be able to convince America to agree, but it will never get China, the world’s largest producer of greenhouse gases, and India on board. And it knows this.

Indeed. Especially with all that newfound Chinese shale gas.

WHO WILL FACT-CHECK the “Fact-Checkers?”

POPULAR NOW IN CHINA: Fake Pregnancy Bellies? “The products are made of skin-colored silica gel, which give the bellies realistic texture and appearance. Retailing for between 500 and 1600 yuan ($79 to $252), the bellies are available several sizes depicting different stages of pregnancy, People Daily reports.”

CHUCK SIMMINS: The Discouraging Unemployment Picture. “The graphs were built to show both the current record or near record ‘bad’ numbers as well as their opposites from the Clinton and Bush Administrations. Fewer people are working and more people have dropped out of the labor force. That is the tale of November 2011.”

SEXISM: Sen. Patty Murray says that if Congress had more women, there might be a plan in place to deal with the nation’s $15 trillion debt. Murray herself, of course, is the biggest argument against any claim that women are naturally less profligate than men.