Saturday, February 14, 2009

Stark raving insanity from James Hansen

James Hansen: Coal-fired power plants are death factories. Close them
A year ago, I wrote to Gordon Brown asking him to place a moratorium on new coal-fired power plants in Britain. I have asked the same of Angela Merkel, Barack Obama, Kevin Rudd and other leaders. The reason is this - coal is the single greatest threat to civilisation and all life on our planet.
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Clearly, if we burn all fossil fuels, we will destroy the planet we know. Carbon dioxide would increase to 500 ppm or more. We would set the planet on a course to the ice-free state, with sea level 75 metres higher. Climatic disasters would occur continually.
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The trains carrying coal to power plants are death trains. Coal-fired power plants are factories of death. When I testified against the proposed Kingsnorth power plant, I estimated that in its lifetime it would be responsible for the extermination of about 400 species - its proportionate contribution to the number that would be committed to extinction if carbon dioxide rose another 100 ppm.
More stunningly stupid stuff from an IPCC co-chair
Tropical forests may dry out and become vulnerable to devastating wildfires as global warming accelerates, a senior scientist said yesterday.

Soaring greenhouse gas emissions, driven by a surge in coal use in countries such as China and India, threaten temperature rises that will turn damp and humid forests into tinderboxes, said Chris Field, co-chair of the UN's Nobel prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Higher temperatures could see wildfires raging through the tropics and a large scale melting of the Arctic tundra, releasing billions of tonnes of carbon into the atmosphere that will accelerate warming even further, he claimed.

Field, director of global ecology at the Carnegie Institute, told the American Association for the Advancement of Science meeting in Chicago that the panel's report on climate change in 2007 had underestimated the severity of global warming this century...
Alarmist professor Peter Doran tries to "fix" record on global warming
"There is no debate," he said. "There are a few people on the fringes who make a living out of being contrarian, but you can't ignore the long-term trends.

"We need to get over this argument whether global warming is real or not. It is real. It's time to start arguing what to do about it."
Former President Clinton suggests that trace amounts of CO2 might kill us all
Asked to identify the biggest problem facing the world, Clinton offered a three-part answer:

In the short term, the economic downturn, fed in part by an underlying and growing gap between rich and poor.

In the medium term, terrorism, weapons of mass destruction and other security concerns.

In the long term, climate change. This is the biggie, the one that can wipe us out, he said.
Snow Storms, Ice Storms and Global Warming?
If nothing else, we should all keep in mind that every time we turn up the thermostat this winter to combat the cold, we are contributing to global warming by consuming more fossil fuel power. Until we can shift our economy over to greener energy sources, global warming will be a problem, regardless of how warm or cold it is outside.
Is global warming a hoax.....or just boring? | Jacksonville.com
Mingle at a party or gathering of any sort this time of year and it won't take long for someone to bring up the latest litany of arctic blasts affecting folks somewhere. And then you can count to about ten, if you're lucky, before a voice somewhere in the group drawls sarcastically, "So, where's all this GLOBAL WARMING that's going to wipe us all out, huh?" Followed by the requisite "Yuk, snort, yuk, yuk." The snickers ripple across the room in agreement, an example of adult peer pressure at work.
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It's actually an error in language. It should be referred to as climate change. There....does that make it easier to accept? Haven't we all commented on the changes we've seen in our climate, with extremes in both hot and cold, dry and wet? Remember not too long ago when our normal afternoon summer thunderstorms disappeared for a couple of years, only to return a few summers ago? Remember the summers of rampant wildfires, no rain in sight for months, here in our subtropical climate zone?

But no matter what we call it, it IS happening all around us, and it will destroy us unless we grasp the simple fact that how we behave has an impact now that is cumulative and that it will continue into the future. Try coastal cities being sucked under as the ocean levels rise each year because the glaciers are slowly but surely melting away?
Today's snicker
"We're facing major obstacles," said Jason McLachlan, assistant professor at Notre Dame's department of biological sciences.
McLachlan offered a simple yet powerful metaphor about the threat of global warming's impact and what needs to be addressed.
Climate change is like an oncoming train, he said.
On the train's tracks are babies in carriages, representing aspects of ecology that are in danger of being struck.
Twitter / betsymason
Sitting on floor in the overflowing overflow room listening to Al Gore talk about climate change #aaas. Guy next to me is snoring. Loudly.
Utterly bizarre stuff from J.D. Power and Associates: Which Internet are they reading?!
Online commentary among consumers who are considered “rejecters”–those who are skeptical or ambivalent about environmental concerns and do not make purchase decisions based on environmental factors–declined from a high of 22 percent in early 2007 to only three percent by the end of 2008.
GORE LIED: Al Gore to scientists: "Keep your day jobs, but get involved in the debate" What debate? Gore has been telling us for years "the debate is over"
I suppose Al Gore doesn't want to get involved in the debate, which is why he goes about his life in a heavily protected cocoon made up of people who agree with and worship him. He wants the scientists to do his dirty work.

Although Gore has been making pronouncements for years now that, "the debate is over", much to his chagrin the debate has raged on.
IndustryWeek : Just In Time -- A Breath of Hot Air
It never fails. Any time a politician schedules a speech to talk about how alternative energy can help us combat global warming, it ends up being the coldest day of the year. And so it was that on the last business day before his inauguration, Barack Obama braved the minus-12 degree temperatures of northeast Ohio to talk about new sources of clean energy in a manufacturing plant that relied on old-fashioned heat to keep the listeners from freezing.
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"The story of this company," he observed, "which began building wind turbine parts just two years ago and is now poised to make half its earnings that way, is that a renewable energy economy isn't some pie-in-the-sky, far-off future. It's happening all across America right now. It's providing alternatives to foreign oil now. It can create millions of additional jobs and entire new industries if we act right now."

....While he eloquently argued in favor of cleaner sources of energy, I was left thinking he failed to address an obvious question: If wind energy and other renewables are such, pardon the expression, hot technologies, why should it be necessary to artificially prop them up with governmental aid?
Pro Commerce: Did George Bush stop global warming?
2-14-george-bush-picture-1 2 I looked at the global warming data and noticed that the global temperature was low last year, 2008. Indeed, the global temperature was much lower than when George Bush took office in 2001.
Raving lunacy from some guy who's in charge of a 100 day action plan on climate change
Good luck to the scientists gathering next month to try to spur the world’s politicians into action. In his report four years ago, Dan Abbasi invoked the following words from the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King. They should be posted prominently on the walls of every legislative body with the power to address global warming:
We are now faced with the fact that tomorrow is today. We are confronted with the fierce urgency of now. In this unfolding conundrum of life and history there is such a thing as being too late. Procrastination is still the thief of time…We may cry out desperately for time to pause in her passage, but time is deaf to every plea and rushes on. Over the bleached bones and jumbled residue of numerous civilizations are written the pathetic words: “Too late…”
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William S. Becker is the Executive Director of the Presidential Climate Action Plan (PCAP), a project of the University of Colorado, Wirth Chair, charged with producing a 100 day action plan on climate change for the next President of the United States...
Code Blue: 10.7 centimeter solar radio flux is flatlining « Watts Up With That?
What is evident is that this minimum is quite different from the previous four in that the intra-monthly amplitude has died from June 2008. The monthly average low was July 2008 and the series has been in uptrend at 0.7 units/month thereafter. This is a very weak but very consistent uptrend, perhaps the first sign of a rising Solar Cycle 24. There is very little noise in this signal, suggesting a very weak Solar Cycle 24.

- David Archibald
Students plunge into frigid river to fight alleged warming
Under a cloudless blue sky, St. Mary’s College of Maryland students, faculty, and staff braved bloody feet and gusts over 30 miles an hour to plunge into the 39 degree St. Mary’s River during this year’s Third Polar Bear Plunge on Feb. 12.
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This year, SEAC raised thousands of dollars in donations to send SMCM students to PowerShift ’09 in Washington, D.C., the second national youth summit committed to solving the climate crisis. PowerShift ’09 aims to bring together more than ten thousand youth leaders from across the country in order to share ideas, learn new skills, make connections, and establish a national voice for our generation. Last year, over fifty St. Mary's students attended Powershift.
To fight trace amounts of natural atmospheric gas, let's deliberately dump tons of ferrous sulphate into the ocean
The experiment, codenamed Lohafex, is continuing aboard a German ship, the Polarstern, until mid-March. The ship mixed 10 tons of ferrous sulphate (FeSO4) with seawater and pumped it out into the South Atlantic.
Climate Observations: What Causes Sea Surface Temperature (SST) To Rise?
The ultimate source of energy necessary to raise SSTs would be an increase in solar irradiance, regardless of whether the increase in solar irradiance resulted from variations in the solar cycle, or from changes in cloud cover, or from a reduction in stratospheric volcanic aerosols.
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There are other natural processes that can raise and lower SSTs, including Thermohaline Circulation/Meridional Overturning Circulation, upwelling, and…ENSO EVENTS
Windpower: Yet Another Texas-sized Problem (Hurricane Risk) — MasterResource
The new problem has surfaced in regard to two projects in Kenedy Country that need coverage from the Texas Windstorm Insurance Association. TWIA does not want to provide this given all the problems it is going through from Ike and may go through again with the next hurricane. The problem: the $3.5 million turbines will partially or completely destruct in a Category 4 or Category 5 hurricane (around 120–130 miles per hour winds and higher).

The annual insurance premium for the coastal wind parks structures is estimated to be between $125,000 and $350,000 per turbine, the article goes on to state.

Yet another reason why windpower is unsuited for the modern energy economy…. it is dispersed and fragile.
Stimulus bill chock-full of green pork for Minnesota - $55 million just to promote renewable energy and efficiency efforts?!
"I think everybody is just reeling from the size of this," said Linda Taylor, the clean-energy director for Fresh Energy, a St. Paul-based advocacy group.
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Minnesota also could get $120 million more money for home weatherization for low-income families over the next 18 to 24 months, on top of the $20 million it already has received, said Janet Streff, manager for the state Energy Office.

Minnesota also should get about $47 million through a new block grant program for energy efficiency and conservation, with the lion's share going to large cities, she said.

Finally, the state program to promote renewable energy and efficiency efforts, which got $716,000 this year, could be in line for a infusion of $55 million from the stimulus package, Streff said. All the estimates are rough, she emphasized.

At AAAS, Al Gore urges scientists to get involved in climate change debate: Scientific American Blog
Gore used a dramatic video of scientist Katey Walter lighting a plume of methane gas bubbling up from a frozen Alaskan lake to introduce the idea of methane as a potent greenhouse gas. Methane emissions from such lakes is thought by many scientists to be increasing as the permafrost thaws, allowing organic material trapped in the ice to be converted by the lake's bacteria into the gas.

(But Gore didn't stick only to climate change. He also revealed that he's an iPhone fan. A few minutes into his talk, he had to turn the phone off. As he did, he told the crowd: "Anyone who hasn't switched to one, you really should.")

Gore--who didn't take questions after the talk, citing his schedule--seemed optimistic about the Obama administration's appointments to the Cabinet and other senior posts. "This is a moment in our history as a nation and in the history of the world's population that is without precedent," he said. A few minutes later, he said, "We as a species need to make a decision."
Alleged "expert" from IPCC: As per usual, next assessment to be even more CO2-hysteric than the last one
Stanford, CA— Greenhouse gases in the atmosphere are rising more rapidly than expected, increasing the danger that without aggressive action to reduce emissions the climate system could cross a critical threshold by the end of the century, warns a leading member of the Nobel Prize-winning Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Studies indicate that greenhouse warming could trigger a vicious cycle of feedback, in which carbon dioxide released from thawing tundra and increasingly fire-prone forests drives global temperatures even higher.

Chris Field, director of the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology and co-chair of the IPCC Working Group 2, will address these issues at a symposium titled "What Is New and Surprising since the IPCC Fourth Assessment?" at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) in Chicago. The IPCC Fourth Assessment, for which Field was a coordinating author, was published in 2007. As co-chair, Field will oversee the Working Group 2 Report on the predicted impacts of climate change for the IPCC Fifth assessment, scheduled to be published in 2014. The Fifth Assessment will incorporate the results of new studies that predict more severe changes than did previous assessments.
Global Warming: No time to hesitate
SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD

Global warming will act locally. As a new report documents, Washington faces serious troubles that must move state leaders to act quickly and aggressively.

This is no time for hesitation. Without concerted action at every level, climate change will only worsen.
Students defiant as Wilson's stance on advert clarified - Belfast Today
Mr Wilson labelled it as “insidious propaganda” and claimed the ads were “giving people the impression that by turning off the standby light on their TV they could save the world from melting glaciers and being submerged in 40ft of water”.
Statement by Former Vice President Al Gore, Chairman of the Alliance for Climate Protection, on Final Congressional Passage of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009: This is all about me and my heroic fight against natural atmospheric gas
The recovery bill reaffirms that the solutions to our economic and climate crises go hand in hand. Congress has demonstrated a commitment to create jobs and Repower America by providing critical investments in energy efficiency, renewable energy and a unified national smart grid.
George F. Will - Dark Green Doomsayers - washingtonpost.com
A corollary of Murphy's Law ("If something can go wrong, it will") is: "Things are worse than they can possibly be." Energy Secretary Steven Chu, an atomic physicist, seems to embrace that corollary but ignores Gregg Easterbrook's "Law of Doomsaying": Predict catastrophe no sooner than five years hence but no later than 10 years away, soon enough to terrify but distant enough that people will forget if you are wrong.
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Because of today's economy, another law -- call it the Law of Clarifying Calamities -- is being (redundantly) confirmed. On graphs tracking public opinion, two lines are moving in tandem and inversely: The sharply rising line charts public concern about the economy, the plunging line follows concern about the environment. A recent Pew Research Center poll asked which of 20 issues should be the government's top priorities. Climate change ranked 20th.

Real calamities take our minds off hypothetical ones. Besides, according to the U.N. World Meteorological Organization, there has been no recorded global warming for more than a decade, or one-third of the span since the global cooling scare.
Ice a major threat to planes - The Whig Standard - Ontario, CA
Ice. it is the bane of pilots everywhere.
Letter: Global warming expert isn't really credible | mansfieldnewsjournal.com | Mansfield News Journal
In the News Journal's recent global warming column, Steve Goble writes that we should look beyond Al Gore and get our science from James Hansen. This is like saying if you don't believe me, talk to my press secretary.
EU sees US 'sea change' on climate talks
The top EU climate negotiator said Friday he saw a "sea change" in the United States under President Barack Obama, saying it showed a willingness to engage on global warming in their first meeting.
Nike on whether we should blow trillions on the greatest scam in history: Just do it
Nike Inc. has joined with several retail heavyweights, including Starbucks Corp. and Levi Strauss & Co. to make an aggressive push for federal action on climate change.
Save the planet. Endanger the people | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog
Nillumbik Shire, one of the areas that suffered the worst casualties in these fires, last year explained why it wasn’t keen on burning off the fuel piling up so lethally in its forests:
Council believes there should be consideration of greenhouse gas pollution produced from undertaking such burns and the possible contributions to climate change. There may be alternative methods for reducing fire risk to assets such as sensitive slashing or fine fuel removal in firebreak areas.
Edinburgh shivers during one of the coldest-ever Februarys - Edinburgh Evening News
IT'S official – Edinburgh is in the midst of one of the coldest Februarys on record, and the icy conditions are set to stay with us for up to a month.
CD’s Best of the Web / Climate Change Pollyannas :Global Warming For Dummies, by Elizabeth May and ZoĆ« Caron
“The more you know about both climate change and energy, the less moderate you are.” Joseph Romm, Editor, climateprogress.org
Carbon tax or cap-and-trade? The debate we never had « BraveNewClimate.com
At the outset, when State and Federal Governments were considering which approach would best deliver National emissions reductions, they should have explained the basic advantages and disadvantages in of the two likely contenders being a carbon emissions tax (carbon tax) or the cap and trade approach, in an open and transparent manner. At the end of this post I provide a ‘pros and cons’ table comparing these two alternatives.
YouTube video: Al Gore's alarmism is making him a national punchline: "Everybody thinks Al Gore's an idiot"
WARNING this is heavy sarcasm
Why yes, Mr Alarmist:  If your side had solid science and logic behind you, it would indeed be helpful
Now, it’ll certainly be useful if global warming activists also have a way to spread good pieces of writing on climate science, climate policy, science and logic, etc. to ensure wider circulation among the public...
California Republicans on stimulus bill passage - Political Blotter - Politics in the Bay Area and beyond
[California Republican Party vice chairman Tom Del Beccaro of Lafayette] Most of this bill is a Christmas tree of handouts to unions and other Left leaning causes. Remember, this is the first time the Dems have had control of Congress and the Presidency in 15 years – they went for it all because they know in 21 months, they may not have the House. That is why it is packed with items that will advance socialized medicine, global warming rescues and the rest. They also know that it is easier to create a government program than it is to end it. Hence their haste.
THE JOSEPH EFFECT by Professor Will Alexander « An Honest Climate Debate
How can any sane person believe that all these characteristics required for advanced water resource analyses can be determined by applying global climate models? They even deny the periodicity in the data that has been reported ever since biblical times and is clearly illustrated in this figure. Their claims that climate change will ‘intensify the hydrological cycle’ and increase damaging floods and droughts are complete nonsense. How do they get away with it?
NY Governor Paterson makes an alarmist joke; reporter Lynn Collier seems skeptical
“We need renewable energy and we need it badly,” he said and spoke of the problems of generating power with oil and coal.

It’s affecting the atmosphere so badly that some people who breathe it actually believe that there is no global warming,” Paterson said, drawing some laughter, though scientific evidence indicates otherwise to him.
Barking CO2 madness in Seattle
"Climate refugees."

It's a term we should get used to, researchers warned on Thursday, predicting a flood of new residents driven north by heat waves, fires and other calamitous effects of global warming.

With one speaker raising the specter of a new migration on the scale of the Great Depression, state and county officials admitted they have barely started getting ready.

The warnings came at a conference of planners, scientists and government officials drilling into the results of a study released this week examining what Washington faces -- for our food supply, our forests, our drinking-water supplies and public health, among other fronts -- as the globe warms in coming decades.

"We're going to have an influx of climate refugees," said Richard Hoskins, an epidemiologist with the Washington Health Department. "This is going to have a tremendous impact on our public health (system). Local public health has a very full plate as it is."
Bravo, Justin Berk: 2009 International Conference on Climate Change
The science is not settled, and the debate is definitely not over. Do you wonder if this Global Warming thing has been spun out of control by the media and now politicians? Are you a skeptic about the human influence on something you believe is a natural process? Or for that matter, perhaps Earth's climate might actually be cooling?

Over 31,000 American scientist have signed a treaty saying, "Global warming poses no crisis to Earth".
About Justin Berk
Justin has been doing weather on Baltimore TV since 1997. His degree is from Cornell, he has the CBM- the highest certification from the AMS, and he taught college for 5 years.
NY Governor Paterson makes an alarmist joke; reporter Lynn Collier seems skeptical
“We need renewable energy and we need it badly,” he said and spoke of the problems of generating power with oil and coal.

It’s affecting the atmosphere so badly that some people who breathe it actually believe that there is no global warming,” Paterson said, drawing some laughter, though scientific evidence indicates otherwise to him.
Barking CO2 madness in Seattle
"Climate refugees."

It's a term we should get used to, researchers warned on Thursday, predicting a flood of new residents driven north by heat waves, fires and other calamitous effects of global warming.

With one speaker raising the specter of a new migration on the scale of the Great Depression, state and county officials admitted they have barely started getting ready.

The warnings came at a conference of planners, scientists and government officials drilling into the results of a study released this week examining what Washington faces -- for our food supply, our forests, our drinking-water supplies and public health, among other fronts -- as the globe warms in coming decades.

"We're going to have an influx of climate refugees," said Richard Hoskins, an epidemiologist with the Washington Health Department. "This is going to have a tremendous impact on our public health (system). Local public health has a very full plate as it is."
Bravo, Justin Berk: 2009 International Conference on Climate Change
The science is not settled, and the debate is definitely not over. Do you wonder if this Global Warming thing has been spun out of control by the media and now politicians? Are you a skeptic about the human influence on something you believe is a natural process? Or for that matter, perhaps Earth's climate might actually be cooling?

Over 31,000 American scientist have signed a treaty saying, "Global warming poses no crisis to Earth".
Al Gore calls on all scientists to fight against global warming (Tech Talk)
"This is no time to sit back," he said. "We as a species must make a decision..... Continuing on our present course will threaten human civilization."
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Gore got a standing ovation from the scientists present.
Watertown Daily Times | Gregg withdrawal
On Thursday, Sen. Gregg cited "irresolvable conflicts" with the president over his $789 billion stimulus bill before Congress as well as the 2010 Census, which emerged after the nomination. He did not vote on the stimulus plan earlier this week. However, the senator also cited differences on health care, global warming and taxes.
AAAS, Chicago: Al Gore asked for my help tonight!
...Scientists have to speak up. The time has come for us to take the lead in the debate. We can be those leaders. We should be those leaders! The political will of the country has changed in 30 years, as is now reflective in our new President, and it is now time for the political will to also push to reverse global warming and climate change. The students we are educating will grow up to be the individuals who can and will be the innovators of change.

At the end of tonight's speech, Al said that he wished he was better at communicating and a better politician if only he could convey his passion and urgency directly to us. He was very quiet and nearly rendered speechless from emotion...
Level of climate change 'without precedent' - Gore - The Irish Times - Sat, Feb 14, 2009
There was a need for urgent action given the dangers faced by low-lying regions as sea level rises, he said. "For every one metre of sea level rise 100 million climate refugees are put on the move."
Al Gore urges scientists to exert influence on climate crisis
In one video recorded in the Arctic, a researcher screamed when a colleague ignited a large cloud of methane gas that Gore said was bubbling up as a result of the melting ice cap. Another photo, pictured just a few days ago in Australia, showed a volunteer watering a koala after the great fire.
Twitter / Jacob Diggle
Jacob cannot believe that the NZ government have established a Parliamentary Select Committee to question the science of climate change!
12/9/08, New Zealand - Climate change select committee established
...identify the central/benchmark projections which are being used as the motivation for international agreements to combat climate change; and consider the uncertainties and risks surrounding those projections
BBC NEWS | UK | Northern Ireland | Wilson's post 'not under threat'
There is no threat to Sammy Wilson's position as environment minister over his views on climate change, DUP colleague Nigel Dodds has said.
BBC NEWS | Americas | 'Ice build-up' on crashed plane
The crew of a plane that crashed in New York state killing 50 people noticed "significant ice build-up" on its wings before it crashed, investigators say.
1998: Review of Deadly Plane Crash Faults F.A.A. on Rules for De-Icing - New York Times
Turboprops are not as safe as jets, primarily because of susceptibility to ice, top safety-board officials said today.
Icy Road Safety .com :: Statistics
# This winter, at least 387 people have died in icy road accidents in the USA (since October 2008)...

# 70 percent of winter weather deaths in the USA are caused by icy road accidents. [2]

# If the current pace continues, icy road accident deaths in the USA this winter could approach 600.

# Compare that number to the average annual US deaths from tornadoes (62), lightning (70), floods (128), and hurricanes (22). [3]
Icy Road Safety .com :: Site Mission
As a storm chaser/photojournalist covering all types of extreme weather across the USA, I have seen my share of dangerous conditions. Out of all the phenomena I've witnessed and documented, it is icy roads during the winter that have by far been the worst in terms of the danger presented to the average person. Tornadoes, floods, hurricanes and lightning are the 'stars' of TV documentaries and safety talks, but rarely do icy roads get the same attention.

Friday, February 13, 2009

Twitter / go2pinnacle
Hypocrisy. Dem Sen. being flown from Ohio to DC to cast vote for porkulous & then flying back to OH for church. Global warming? Nah!
Flashback to 1/14/09: I have seen your future, America, and it doesn’t work
On the eve of Barack Obama’s inauguration, James Delingpole says that the President-elect is horribly reminiscent of Tony Blair in 1997. He may be a fantastic guy, and look great, but he will bring a ragbag of scuzzballs, communists and eco-loons to power with him
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It’s the naivety of this last group which I find most worrying because it’s sadly indicative of the critical response Obama can expect when he starts screwing up: i.e. no kind of critical response at all. We’ve had a glimpse of this already in the way the press has responded to his frankly terrifying announcements on the environment, in which he has endorsed every one of the extreme — and since mostly discredited — claims made by Al Gore in his eco-scare movie An Inconvenient Truth. With the honourable exception of the Sunday Telegraph (Christopher Booker’s column in particular), no newspaper would seem to have noticed that by falling for this grotesquely misinformed claptrap President Obama will be costing the hard-pressed US economy billions of dollars for schemes that will hamstring American heavy industry but alter the world’s ever-shifting temperatures barely one jot.
#AAAS09 - Twitter Search - check out the Gore/AAAS tweets here
sciam: Gore closes slideshow with Lincoln, likening climate change struggle to abolitionism. #AAAS09
Check out The EPA Climate Change Kids Site
SchansBlog: "science by consensus"
A great closing line in a letter to the editor by Ed Pacht in the May issue of Touchstone in response to Phillip Johnson's March article...

Science by consensus is no more than an inadequately grounded faith.

Pacht means to apply it to the Evolution/evolution debate. But the same could easily be said for many global warming adherents.
Australian Climate Madness: Climate nonsense from The Age
Anyone is entitled to plug the alarmist agenda in The Age, even war historians. When reading this, keep in mind that there has been no global warming since 2001...
Weather News - Where did Sydney's summer go?
About one week after western suburbs endured its hottest four-day heatwave in 37 years; Sydney is likely to be heading for it coolest February period in more than 50 years.

The city is in the middle of at least a week where the temperature stays below 25 degrees. The likely number of days is nine, with next Wednesday being the first day warmer than 25 since last Sunday.

This will make it the longest February stretch below 25 degrees since the 1950s.
But couldn't this divert money and attention from his carbon dioxide scam?: Hunger Activists Want Al Gore to Make Another Movie - TIME
By collecting enough signatures through www.askalgore.org , an international NGO called Action Against Hunger hopes to persuade the former Vice President turned climate-change activist to take on the issue of acute malnutrition: a remediable problem, the organization says, that each year kills 5 million children in the developing world.
AFP: Dell awards technology education grants in India, Brazil and Mexico
Grant objectives include improving skills of school teachers, providing students with computer labs, and educating children about climate change and recycling.
Detailed info: IPCC AR4 Working Group 1 Authors
These are the 619 contributing authors of Working Group I of the the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report. This group's section covers the scientific basis, and lays the foundation for the rest of the report. Authors are listed in order of most highly cited.
BBC NEWS | UK | 'CO2 reduction treaties useless'
A new report says treaties aimed at reducing CO2 emissions are useless.
Masdar “Zero Carbon” Super City Breaks Ground This Month in Abu Dhabi | Green Prophet
Taking God-Knows-How-Much of the world’s non-renewable energy sources to build, developers of the world’s first zero carbon city, Masdar City, proclaim that the historic groundbreaking in Abu Dhabi will take place this month.

While I think the concept is definately thought-provoking — as the rest of the world, well the western world at least, reels on its heals from the financial crisis — execs representing Masdar City are full steam ahead in building the $22 billion project, which translates to “the source” in Arabic.

There are many people with lots of opinions, but I think it’s downright anti-green to spend so much money, so much capital and resources, on building an “eco” project.
Does Stimulus Package Keep Green Goals In Sight? : NPR
President Obama has said the stimulus package will move America toward a greener future. The package will pump billions of dollars into environmentally friendly programs, but it won't forge the major changes necessary to fight climate change and wean the U.S. from imported oil. And some provisions could make it harder to reach those goals.
Coffee, Tea Or Carbon Credits? : NPR
While most airlines are skimping on basics like food and pillows, one carrier is going in a different direction. Virgin America is selling environmentally conscious passengers the chance to fly guilt free. It's the first domestic airline to sell carbon-offset credits in-flight. Passengers concerned about their carbon footprint on a cross-country flight can buy the credits from their seatback screens. Virgin America directs the money to one of two green projects in California. So far, 1 percent of the airline's passengers have used the service.
John W. Delicath: Snow Job: Media Figures Point to Weather Events to Cast Doubt on Reality of Climate Change
While we probably can't expect Beck, Hannity, and the rest of the fine folks at Fox News to behave differently, Blitzer, Matthews, and others in the mainstream media should know better and should resist the temptation to use a cold or snowy day to suggest that such conditions call into question the fact that our planet is facing a climate crisis. It's factually incorrect. It's not witty. And it perpetuates the falsehood that the science on global warming is not settled, which undermines the incentive to begin acting to address the problem.
Lots of Seattle Post-Intelligencer readers scoff at another alarmist article
State not ready for 'climate refugees'
"Climate refugees" is a term we should get used to, researchers warned on Thursday, predicting a flood of new residents driven north by heat waves, fires and other calamitous effects of global warming.
What do you think?
Someone's seeing the writing on the wall: Press release about DC meeting of certified CO2-hysterics is almost devoid of references to global warming
WASHINGTON - (Business Wire) The Center for American Progress Action Fund today released the formal agenda and the participants in “National Clean Energy Project: Building the New Economy” forum on Monday, February 23, 2009 at the Newseum in Washington, DC. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, a longtime champion of building a clean energy economy, is honorary chair.

California: Lawyers to save us from reliable electricity

Center for Biological Diversity Declares Legal War on Global Warming
SAN FRANCISCO, California, February 13, 2009 (ENS) - To fight climate change, the nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity Thursday opened a new law institute in San Francisco and announced the dedication of an initial $17 million to the project.

The Climate Law Institute will use existing laws and work to establish new state and federal laws that will eliminate energy generation by the burning of fossil fuels - particularly coal and oil shale.

Burning these materials emits greenhouse gases into the atmosphere that have already raised the planetary temperature, threatening the widespread extinction of species, sea level rise and ocean acidity, food and water scarcity, heatwaves, wildfires and floods.

"Global warming is the greatest challenge humanity has ever faced. It is the defining issue of our time," said Kieran Suckling, executive director of the Center.
...
The institute will be directed by attorney Kassie Siegel, the current director of the Center's Climate, Air, and Energy program.
'Crazy ideas ' to fight global warming revealed by scientists - Telegraph
Dr Jason Box, a glaciologist from Ohio State University, proposes wrapping Greenland in a blanket. By covering the valleys that form darker areas, therefore attracting the sun's heat, he hopes to significantly slow the melting of the glacier.
The picture's worth a click- Be Our Birthday Valentine - Edward John Craig - Planet Gore on National Review Online
Our anniversary is an appropriate time to express Planet Gore’s profound thanks and,
well . . . love . . . for our loyal readers.
Prince Charles and Camilla to fly 16,000 miles in private jet on 'absurd' global GREEN crusade | Mail Online
Prince Charles was branded 'absurd' last night after announcing he is to go on a tour of South America as part of his global crusade to save the environment.....travelling on a private jet.

He will use a luxury 134-seater Airbus to fly himself, his wife, the Duchess of Cornwall, and a 14-strong entourage to Chile, Brazil and Ecuador next month on a 16,400 mile round trip.
Grey whale migration: Should we get all excited about data that doesn't even span one PDO cycle?
The scientists at the centre have observed the whales for more than 20 years as they pass through Monterey Bay. Compared to two decades ago, Perryman said, the animals are reaching the bay a week later.

"This isn't trivial," Perryman said. "It's a significant change."
Richard Ternullo, a boat captain for Monterey Bay Whale Watch in Monterey, California, said the whales' yearly arrival in the bay fluctuates, but he has noticed on average it has drifted about 10 days later into the year.

"Last year, they were considerably late," Ternullo said. "But this year they seem to be on time."
Twitter / Chris Rackley
I just got an email asking me to "help STOP Climate Change." Dude, the climate has "changed" for thousands of years. You want ME to stop it?
2/13/09: Climate realist Joe Bastardi on the Dennis Prager radio show
Dennis: "I wouldn’t care about this…except policy is being shaped [to fight global warming]. A half billion dollars is being spent on global warming [research the new stimulus bill]. This belief which I believe is untrue and is politically and panicly inspired, is causing massive changes. There are consequences to the belief in Global Warming."

Joe: "California gets more rain when the earth is warming. When the earth is cooling it is cooling because of cooling in the Pacific which we are having now and will have for the next 20 or 30 years…"

Dennis: "Please understand the astonishing ability of the Left to corrupt the science. Global Warming tends to be a liberal-conservative issue. One of us should lose a lot of credibility. The world economy rides on whether or not we take the Kyoto Protocols seriously. There have been beliefs about the end of the world throughout history." MP3 here.
Marc Morano vs alarmist Tom Yulsman in the comment section here
[Morano] Your question has the arrogance of assuming that the UN or the promoters of man-made global warming are the sum total of all the “experts.” This is clearly not the case.
Yet another idiotic AP story: Experts worry about climate refugees to Washington
Some health experts speaking at a climate change conference in Seattle are concerned about what they're calling "climate refugees."

Those are people who could be driven north by global warming.

An epidemiologist with the state Health Department, Richard Hoskins, says an influx of climate refugees would have a tremendous impact on the public health system. A department assistant secretary for environmental health, Gregg Grunenfelder, says the state is not prepared.

The Seattle Post-Intelligencer reports the warnings came Thursday at the Washington Climate Change Impacts Conference in Seattle.
Flashback: Transcript of U.S. Senate Climate hearing from Dec 2006.
Full Committee
Hearing on Climate Change and the Media
Wednesday, December 6, 2006

With a name like ClimateSmart, you know it must not be tremendously stupid

Bakersfield, California: Fully one of every 50 PG&E customers care enough about alleged global warming to fork over $5 per month!
Feb. 13--As part of its ClimateSmart program, Pacific Gas and Electric is seeking proposals from local dairies, landfill operators, governments and educational campuses for projects that reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

To qualify, a project must reduce emissions through methane capture at a dairy or landfill, or through tree planting. If selected, PG&E will enter into a contract to pay for each ton of emissions the project eliminates from the atmosphere.

Funding for the projects comes from ClimateSmart customers who choose to pay an additional fee on their monthly bill to offset the global warming impacts caused by their power consumption.

A typical household pays $5 a month. One hundred percent of the fee goes to carbon-reduction projects.
...
More than 30,000 PG&E customers have enrolled in ClimateSmart since it started in June 2007. Bakersfield ranks among the Top 10 cities for customer enrollment, with 2.1 percent of customers opting in. Along with residential customers, participants include the city of Taft and the Greater Bakersfield Chamber of Commerce.
YouTube - Sammy Wilson comments on the events of the past week
Sammy speaks about the furor surrounding his decision not to show a CO2 ad.
Tom Friedman wins over a high school student
Record snowfall in the Portland metro area is nothing compared to the looming disaster that is global warming. Wouldn’t it be great if we could learn to live as though it were snowing year-round? Portland, and the rest of the country, needs to be covered with a metaphorical blanket of snow.

Last year, when gas prices hovered around $4 a gallon, there was talk about keeping them there. In a May 2008 New York Times opinion piece, Thomas Friedman noted that “$4-a-gallon gasoline is really starting to impact driving behavior (in a) way that $3-a-gallon gas did not.” He called for a nationwide price floor for gas at $4.

Friedman’s argument is compelling...
Paterson Admits Obesity Tax Plan Has Failed - wcbstv.com
MORRISVILLE, N.Y. (CBS) ―

It's strange, but true. In his annual state budget, Gov. David Paterson proposed an obesity tax, charging New Yorkers 15 percent more for buying regular soda.
...
New York Gov. David Paterson admitted Thursday one of his most talked-about tax proposals, an obesity tax on sugary drinks, is fizzling.
Alarmist headline of the day: "Climate Change Finals - CO2: 392 Human Chances: 0"
Monitoring Temperature Anomaly Updates | The Blackboard
Figure 1: Leprechauns propagated changes back to 1881.

It’s interesting to see how far back this months temperature changes propagated. The changes are small– about 0.01 C for Feb 1881, 0.03C for Jan 1990.
Alleged eco-hero PELOSI: LET'S VOTE, I AM OFF TO ROME!
Rep. John Culberson, TX claims the "stimulus" bill must be urgently voted on today -- because Speaker Nancy Pelosi is leaving at 6:00 PM for an 8 day trip to Europe!
Media Advisory: Climate Change Skeptic to Speak at The University of Texas at Austin | The University of Texas at Austin
EVENT: "Nature—Not Human Activity—Rules the Climate," a talk by environmental scientist S. Fred Singer, president of The Science & Environmental Policy Project.

WHEN: Thursday, Feb. 19, at 3:45 p.m.
Mass media not alarmist enough, claims alarmist climate researcher
"Business managers of media organizations, you are screwing up your responsibility by firing science and environment reporters who are frankly the only ones competent to do this," said climate researcher and policy analyst Stephen Schneider, in assessing the current state of media coverage of global warming and related issues.

Schneider, a coordinating lead author of chapter 19 in the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change published in 2007, is calling for the news media to employ trained reporters in covering global warming. He will be discussing this and other issues in the symposium "Hot and Hotter: Media Coverage of Climate-Change Impacts, Policies, and Politics," which runs from 10:30 a.m. to 12:00 p.m. CT Friday, Feb. 13, 2009 at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in Chicago.

A bit more on Rutu Dave

LA Ecopolitics Examiner: Nuke Global Warming
In this time of global recession, it’s high time that the green axis of antagonism stop its obsessive obstructions of future growth and prosperity. Big green nonprofit groups routinely invest massive idle assets in offshore hedge funds and private equity. Green groups grew from 2,000 to over 4,000 during the 1990s. According to The Chronicle of Philanthropy in 2007, eco-nonprofits in the US received about $1.5 billion in untaxed revenues to spew global warming propaganda. Environmentalists' fascination with unproven and inadequate alternative energies must give way to massive expansion in nuclear power plants. Today’s solar and wind power operate at 25% efficiency on an annual basis, while nuclear power operates at 85% efficiency.
Harsh winter in northern Minnesota
The winter severity index for the International Falls area was 102 on Feb. 8, according to Frank Swendsen, Department of Natural Resources area wildlife manager.

The WSI was 60 last year at this time, ad 37 two years ago, he reported. The average WSI for this date is about 67, according to Swendsen.

The snow depth across Koochiching County is 21 to 24 inches, reported Swendsen.
Al Gore- Causing More Damage than Good? | Nixxd
There is a fear if it is truly revealed as the hoax it is, people may no longer work towards noble causes such as green energy.
...
To be honest here, if Gore was as concerned about the environment as he claims, would he have actually rendered his own ‘Carbon Concert’ moot? Either the man is a brutal con artist, or honestly is that stupid (and there is a hard time doubting his intelligence).

The turn of phase used Climate Change is in and of itself a misnomer. The climate has always and will always change. Why did they change the name from global warming? We’re actually have more ice now in the polar regions that we have since the 1970’s. Sadly, I have yet to hear Gore mention any of that though. It’s seeming that he is blind to anything that does not support his own unfounded conclusions.

His own version of the ‘tobacco lobby’ in the pseudo-intellectuals he has chosen for the ’scientific evidence’ is nothing more than a scare tactic. It’s sad when a man who at one point had so much respect seems to be in reality nothing more than your common crook.

A common crook who will be doing far more damage than good.

A common crook who may set back any positive advancements when people see the fraud he is committing.

The busy travel schedule of an alleged eco-hero

Last night: Gore in Los Angeles receiving NAACP award
Black Eyed Peas singer Will.i.am performed a song with a choir and African drummers honoring former vp Al Gore and his commitment to global warming; Gore received the chairman's award along with Dr. Wangari Maathai, also a Nobel Laureate.

Gore said that it would take political will to solve the global warming crisis. But he added: "In the United States of America, political will is a renewable resource."
Tonight - Gore in Chicago pitching the greatest scam of all time to scientists at AAAS meeting
...the Honorable Albert Arnold Gore, Jr. will address the world's largest general scientific conference Friday, 13 February, in Chicago, Illinois.

Former Vice President Gore's special invited address, hosted by AAAS President James J. McCarthy and the AAAS Board of Directors, will take place at 6:30 p.m.
Transcript of Vitter/Holdren available here : Did the President's Nominee for Science Advisor Say He Thinks [trace amounts of CO2 will kill a billion people in the next decade]?
Vitter:
Dr. Holdren, one of the lines in the President's Inaugural Address which I most appreciated was his comment about science, and honoring that, and not having it overtaken by ideology. My concern is that as one of his top science advisors, that many statements you've made in the past don't meet that test, and so I wanted to explore that. One is from 1971, an article with Paul Ehrlich, titled Global Ecology, in which you predicted that, "some form of eco-catastrophe, if not thermonuclear war, seems almost certain to overtake us before the end of the century." Do you think that was a responsible prediction?...
Bravo, Gary Hoover - Tulsa World: Beware climate alarmists, pseudo-scientists
In the name of scientific integrity and the effective use of our resources we should demand examination of the scientific bases and motives of climate change alarms and make sure that our support for energy programs is in the best interests of ourselves, our descendents and the world in general. A mixture of pseudoscience, emotion and politics is very dangerous.
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Gary M. Hoover, of Bartlesville, is a physicist and a consultant with research and operational experience in atmospheric energy absorption, nuclear reactor operations and exploration geophysics.
COMMENTARY: Let's sue Dems for snow removal funds - Hingham, MA - The Hingham Journal
It’s amazing any Massachusetts town planned for snow removal at all! The Democratic Party and the Obama campaign are flush with cash (Massachusetts gave over $18 million to the Obama campaign), and Hingham must have relied on official Democratic Party and Obama campaign statements on global warming when crafting the snow removal budgets, so let’s get our cash. They may claim we were naĆÆve and outline minor facts such as 2008 was the coolest year since 1997 and some 31,000 scientists signed an Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine declaration in 2007/2008 that “global warming” is not a global crisis and human activities have very little impact on the climate (The Petition Project). But who were we supposed to believe, those guys or Al Gore? After all, he won an Oscar!

Col Ed Barr USMCR of 11 Beal’s Cove Road, Hingham, is finishing his tour as senior HUMINT intelligence officer for US Central Command and plans to return to Hingham this summer.
YouTube - Glenn Beck - 02-05-2009 - Global Warming Indoctrination with Bernard Goldberg
Al Gore tells 3000 school kids, they know more about some things than their parents. Gore tells kids that RACIST LAWS changed when their parents questioned their parents, so they could do the same for Global warming.
Miranda Devine: Unafraid of greenies, killjoys and pies | smh.com.au
The British version of Top Gear, which attracts as many as 1million Australian viewers each week, is an exuberant thumbing of noses at climate alarmists and safety Nazis. It is a relief valve from a politically correct world full of admonitions and tongue-biting.
AIG Withdraws From US Climate Action Partnership
WASHINGTON -(Dow Jones)- American International Group (AIG), the beleaguered insurance giant rescued from an imminent failure by federal tax dollars, has withdrawn its membership from the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, the company said Friday.

The move follows queries from U.S. lawmakers about why the firm was funneling taxpayer money into the influential organization that's lobbying Congress to pass legislation that would ax greenhouse gas emissions.

"It is entirely appropriate for AIG to withdraw from USCAP," said Rep. Joe Barton, R-Texas, who initiated the inquiry. "American taxpayers now own 80% of AIG and they should not have to fund its lobbying efforts to make cap-and-trade a reality," he told Dow Jones Newswires in an email.
The Myth Of Global Warming
A brief list of arguments that each refute the notion that the community should be scared by the idea of global warming.
Twitter / Lilymom
My daughter brought home a Scholastic paper that is teaching Global Warming as fact. Not happy here.
Wishful Thinking on Energy (Who Wants Downgrades Anyway?) — MasterResource
One of the major problems in policy-making is wishful thinking, in particular a tendency to assume that people will act the way the policy-maker wants. (Military and even corporate planners also suffer from this weakness, and it is arguably the principle weakness in socialist economics.) This presumption is particularly evidentwhen issues of morality—real or perceived—are involved, as in the case of many environmental policies.

Examples include the frequent assertion that the lesser capabilities of electric cars are not important, that consumers don’t need a car with an extended range or that requires a lengthy downtime for recharging.

Or the belief that local people will put up with large, low-density energy installations such as for wind or concentrated solar power in areas that they otherwise would wish to keep pristine or at least non-industrial.

But reality tends to intrude.
Can't Congress pass legislation to make Moore's law apply to engines?
[Q] Is there a Moore’s law for energy efficiency inside an engine?

[A] I don’t think so. But we’ve looked at the data on how engines have improved. Typically, in terms of the power you get out of a given-sized engine, or its efficiency, you are gaining about 1% a year. So over ten years, you pick up 10% or so.

[Q] Will the internal combustion engine survive indefinitely with constant improvements or will it be put out to pasture in the next couple decades?

[A] It depends on the application. It is very good in long-haul trucks and big ships, because you need a long range. You want an efficient propulsion system. You have to carry a lot of fuel. Liquid hydrocarbons are terrific for that. So those are areas where it will be really hard to displace the internal combustion engine. Around the fringes, yes, other things may come in. Certainly, over the next 30 years, it is going to be our dominant propulsion system. But other may start to nibble away at that market in increasing amounts.
ANALYSIS-Low carbon price to cut renewables investment | Markets | Reuters
LONDON, Feb 12 (Reuters) - Record low carbon prices have cut the attractiveness of investments in renewable energy and may even favour the construction of new, high-carbon coal plants, conflicting with the aims of Europe's carbon market.
Twitter / Chad
I'm starting to blame everything on the economy. I used to blame stuff on El Nino and global warming, but those have lost their luster now.
Thin Air Meets Hot Air: Monetary Policy and Climate Policy Collapse Together by Floy Lilley
Beyond mere corruption, bamboozlement’s popularity is also waning. As crazy as it is to brand any carbon – the stuff of life – a "pollutant," think how crazy it is to create "money" out of carbon dioxide. But that’s what the current carbon markets have tried to do. They initially soared. Counting on monopoly position and privileged green-energy projects, managers and investors jumped onto the gravy train of carbon markets and cap-and-trade restrictions in a future ruled by men who would ration energy, deciding who dies and who thrives. But, Enron and Lehman Brothers have been casualties of this inflated carbon market now taking its deserved deep economic hits.

On top of the green carbon market tanking, all of those green energy projects which boast that they do not emit carbon dioxide are behaving just like other bubble-induced poor investments. Think housing boom. All have gone begging. Renewable projects expanded quickly because of subsidies and mandates, but have shriveled just as quickly in the economic realism that the projects were not financed by any savings, just thin air credit.
Guest Opinion: Global Warming Twenty Years Later | CO2sceptics
In June of 2008, Dr. Nicholas Drapela of the faculty of Oregon State University Chemistry Department expressed his outrage at Hansen and referred to him as “an apocalyptic prophet.”

“My dear colleague Professor Hansen, I believe, has finally gone off the deep end. When you have dedicated the bulk of your career to a cause, and it turns out the cause has been proven false, most people cannot bring themselves to admit the truth,” Drapela wrote on April 21, 2008. Drapela wrote that Hansen’s recent claims “contain neither reason nor truth when compared to the volumes of daily literature being published in scientific journals today on climate change. It is not difficult to refute the words of Professor Hansen. On the contrary, one feels it is almost unfair.” “The global warming ‘time bomb’, the ‘present, dangerous situation’, ‘the perfect storm’, ‘global cataclysm’, ‘disastrous climate changes that spiral dynamically out of humanity's control.’ These are the words of an apocalyptic prophet, not a rational scientist,” Drapela added.
"States Recruit Worried Californians"
The Wall Street Journal surveys the efforts by other states to recruit Golden Staters shocked by Arnold's and the state legislature's almost unimaginable indifference to basic economics. The size of the tax hikes being proposed by Sacramento's "leaders" will wipe out any relief being sent to individuals by the massive spending plan emerging from Congress, and the billions in direct relief to the state will just vanish into the vast crevice that is the state's budget.

As discussed on yesterday's show, the state has been pushing people towards the exits for a very long time. Colorado, Arizona and other attractive places to live won't find recruiting hard at all if the sacramento brain trust continues to torture its private sector.
Unstoppable Global Warming
In another part of the world, the International Geological Congress meeting held in Norway in August 2008 found that “skeptical scientists overwhelmed the meeting with two-thirds of the presenters and question-askers hostile to, even dismissive of, the UN’s IPCC report.”

There is daily evidence that the support for the global warming concept is dwindling. A canvass of more than 51,000 Canadian scientists revealed that 68 percent disagree that global warming science is “settled.” An international team of scientists countered the UN IPCC report, declaring, “Nature, not human activity, rules the climate.”

As more evidence accumulates, relating to any possibility that global warming may be caused by the activity of human beings, the closer the Nation comes to the realization that global warming is “unstoppable” and must run its course as it has over the last 1,500 years.
Caught between Paraskavedekatriaphobia and Cryophobia [akin.blog-city.com]
The Carbon “Nazis” have hijacked the 13th of February 2009 and named it Warme Truiendag [4] this translates to Warm Pullover Day.

It is 0ĀŗC in Amsterdam and -1ĀŗC in Arnhem [It is snowing, in fact] where I am working today and some smart climate change advocate has come up with the idea that I should wear something warmer so that the office can be converted into mini tundra.

Really, if I wanted live in Scandinavia and cavort with Santa Claus and his reindeers, I would go up there to freeze my crown jewels but spare me the Eskimo fashion in the Netherlands.

Indeed, we all have to do our bit for climate change but not at the risk of hypothermia that shivers my timbers to the point that life is stilled as if I were in cryogenic repose.
3rd December-(Poznan Diaries cont.) - What's With The Climate?
8.45 am:Launch of the Green Finger campaign.’What do you want to protect from climate change?’ By Copenhagen,500,000 people will have sent in their responses with a picture of themselves with a ‘green finger’.
...
“The highlight of the day: the Indian youth delegation had a 30 minute meeting with Yvo de Boer in which he asked them why India scored the lowest in a survey conducted by UNEP of Indian youth about how much action is needed on climate change.”
Global Warming and the Endangered Species Act
This story highlights how environmental activists are using the Endangered Species Act to force wide-spread regulation of emissions that contribute to global warming. The push to list the American pika is the first step towards forcing all businesses that produce emissions that can be argued to affect the Sierra habitat in which the mammal lives to mitigate for harm done to the pika's habitat.
Investor's Business Daily -- Ethanol's Backers Get Gassed
Energy: A fortune was spent on ethanol development last year when gas prices were in the stratosphere. Now a lesson has been learned: Worshiping the false god of ethanol carries a high price.
Michael Reagan: Requiem for a Republic
Jefferson would have refused to believe that a free people would allow their government to saddle them and their children and grandchildren with a debt so enormous they could not even begin to comprehend.

Nor would he have even dreamt of the government wasting money on projects noted by former Georgia Rep. Bob Barr, such as a billion dollars to subsidize money-losing Amtrak, $20 billion to expand the already-bloated food stamp program, about $2 billion diverted from the wallets of hard-working Americans to subsidize childcare, and $2.8 billion to fund advocacy programs studying the global-warming hoax.
wildsingapore news: Top Airlines Want Aviation Emissions In Climate Pact
SINGAPORE - Four leading airlines called on Thursday for aviation emissions to be included in a broader climate pact, after growing criticism from green groups that the sector was not doing enough to fight global warming.
No Right Turn: Climate change: extended II (see the post for links)
So what was behind the government's decision to extend the deadline for submissions to its climate change review at the last minute? According to CarbonNews, it was because several of New Zealand's biggest carbon polluters were in danger of not meeting the deadline and so grovelled for special treatment. In the interests of fairness, it was then extended for everybody.

Meanwhile, people who struggled to make the deadline have begun posting about their submissions. Morgue discusses his here, while Hot Topic's Gareth Renowden has posted his entire submission online [PDF]. You can read the highlights here.
Activists accuse Climate Change Secretary of 'hypocracy' | Plane Stupid - bringing the aviation industry back down to earth!
The Plane Stupid activists dressed in t-shirts reading 'Ed's Popular Mobilisation Team' in reference to Miliband's call late last year for popular mobilisation on climate change. They handed out flyers listing the 34 airports planned for expansion within the UK to the audience, demonstrating the apparent lack of government resolve for tackling the environmental issues that are crucial for safe-guarding our future. Demonstrating their disapproval of the government's pandering to corporate interests, many of the audience made paper aeroplanes, which took flight towards the Secretary of State.
Australian Climate Madness: Krudd & Co "in disarray" on ETS
It certainly looks that way. One minute it's a new enquiry, and the next it's full steam ahead as planned. If it's the latter, what's the point of the former?
Chicago 2009: Hyundai CEO says Green is Good, Greed is Bad - AutoblogGreen
There's really no point in arguing about the veracity of climate change when you stop to consider the finite supply of oil, and the turmoil that our present consumption habit is fueling in the Middle East.
But is oil the only fossil fuel?
Broken Hearts: How Valentine's Day allegedly causes global warming
The talk given at Ignite Boston 5. How people buy a lot of stuff that have a bigger energy footprint than they have themselves.
Don't suffer biofuels gladly | Gristmill: The environmental news blog | Grist
Well, that's what a coalition of green NGOs -- Environmental Working Group, Friends of the Earth, Network for New Energy Choices, the Clean Air Task Force, and New York Public Interest Research Group -- are calling for with regard to the nation's biofuel policy.

They charge that the U.S. biofuel program actually "exacerbates global warming" because of greenhouse gas emissions from nitrogen fertilizers and the conversion of grasslands and rainforest to cropland. Further, the mass production of monocropped fuel feedstocks like corn, soy, and palm degrades soils, increases water pollution, drives out biodiversity, and endangers the food security of vulnerable populations. In the process of creating these lamentable side effects, biofuels are offsetting a relatively small amount of conventional fuel use -- and are grabbing the lion's share of federal support for alternative energy. In short, biofuels have been an abject failure.
...
After all, as Dennis Keeney, emeritus professor of agronomy at Iowa State, recently wrote, "money, not science, has driven ethanol fuel policy." Keeney's assessment applies to U.S. biofuel policy since its inception under Jimmy Carter.
Radiant Cities: Waterworld | Gristmill: The environmental news blog | Grist
A floating city takes shape in NYC
Best of the Web Today: Four More Years - WSJ.com
Let's see, four years: That would mean that we are all doomed if nothing changes by January or February 2013. And we have at least two prominent scientists saying the same thing, and as we've all learned "scientific consensus" is always right.

Or is it? We have some questions: From what data did McCarthy and Hansen derive this deadline? How long have scientists "known" that the beginning of 2013 was the point of no return? Can anyone find an example of a scientist in, say, 2007 saying we have six years to act, or in 2002 saying we have 11 years? Is it a mere coincidence that the deadline is almost exactly the same as the end of the term of a new president who gives indications that he may be both gullible enough to swallow global warmism and egomaniacal enough to believe he can save the world?

It looks to us as if these predictions are no more than political punditry pretending to be science. [Via Gore Lied]
Subject to Change » Blog Archive » Global Warming: is There Anything it Can’t Do?
With the impending apocalypse is it any wonder that I don’t have time to give my son the proper upbringing he deserves? Bottles need to be sorted green, brown, and clear, for crying out loud! I haven’t got the energy left over after that to prepare three square meals, with home grown organic veggies.

My son is just going to have to suck it up for the sake of the planet. Gosh, I hope he turns out ok.
Global warming is dead. An inconvenient opera??? - allvoices.com
La Scala officials appear to have completely lost their marbles.

We've gone from a hokey slide-show, to mock-umentary, to books and world tours on private jets. And now these upper class-ites, want to create an actual opera on the subject. This must truly signal the end of global warming. (One can only hope.) I suppose this can be likened to that aging actress desperate to show the movie world 'she still has star-power.' Right before she signs the contract to do ten consecutive 'Depends' commercials.
UPDATE 1-Australia’s emissions plan wavers as carbon price falls | Forex Fundas
While the government set no lower limit on the price of carbon credits when it detailed its CPRS in December, it estimated an initial price of about A$25 ($16.41) per tonne, about 17 percent below the price CERs were trading at in early December.

This European market is falling like a stone. There’s nothing in Australian dollar terms over A$17 a tonne so it does chuck out the door anything you might have considered you were going to sell at A$25 come auction time, and it does raise some considerable issues over just how effective the government’s plans are,” said Cox.
...
In Europe, carbon prices have closed at record-low levels for five straight days. On Thursday, the benchmark CER closed at 7.66 euros (A$15.05, US$9.86). The last announced trade in Australian emission units went through on Feb. 2 at A$21 per unit.
Don't miss these: Environment, Eugenics quotes « infowars
“Isn’t the only hope for the planet that the industrialized civilizations collapse? Isn’t it our responsibility to bring that about?”
- Maurice Strong, founder of the UN Environment Programme
Science not settled?: Aerosols may Have Greater Impact on Climate Change Than Thought So Far
Aerosols may have a greater impact on patterns of Australian rainfall and future climate change than previously thought, says Dr Leon Rotstayn of the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO).
Vital Climate Change Warnings Are Being Ignored, Says Alleged Expert
Schindler and his co-authors also analyze a study involving carbon emissions. "Recent studies show that lakes release very high releases of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere, in many cases higher than the surrounding forests in the same watersheds. This has been missed in climate modeling to date."
Flaunt your fear of CO2 by wearing an expensive outfit made of seaweed!
Looking to make a statement about global warming? Want to show the world that you care about the future of our world? Thanks to Linda Loudermilk, men and women can embrace the eco-trend without sacrificing quality and style. Specializing in the couture world, Linda molds sustainability and luxury into an initiative called Luxury Eco. Her website refers to it as “an emergency survival plan, fueled by design.” The line reflects Linda’s passion for respecting and protecting the earth.

For Spring 2009, she incorporated sustainable fabrics like seaweed, bamboo, and natural linens.
Using the Ap Magnetic Index prediction for Solar Cycle 24 amplitude prediction « Watts Up With That?
First this news: The Ap Index continues to fall. While the January 2009 data is not out yet, the December 2008 data is and is an Ap value of 2 according to SWPC. While this number may be lower than other sources (Leif will fill us in I’m sure), I’m plotting it for consistency since I’ve been following the SWPC data set for well over a year now.

I’ve pointed out several times the incident of the abrupt and sustained lowering of the Ap Index which occurred in October 2005. The sun has been running at a lower plateau of the Ap index after that event and has not recovered. It is an anomaly worth investigating.
Obama’s Energy Secretary: Get Ready for Carbon Taxes
Congress under the Democrats, however, was able to pass the largest tax and spend bill in U.S. history with relatively little opposition. In the months ahead, with the help of the corporate media, they will crank up the propaganda about climate change and eventually impose punitive carbon taxes on the American people, a scheme that may eventually lead to the near complete reversal of hundreds of years of technological progress and man’s return to the stone age.
Brussels, Belgium job: Climate Change and EU Development Policy Adviser at Oxfarm
The post-holder will ensure Oxfam’s influence in Brussels and (working closely with other affiliates where these exist) other EU member states via lobbying, intelligence gathering and representational work
Africa: Yet another CO2-hysteria summit next month
As participation in the Climate Change Summit 2009 proper is limited to 600 climate change response stakeholders, unfortunately, the participation of mandated representatives of government bodies, organised labour (e.g. trade unions), business and industry associations, public interest groups (e.g. NGOs and CBOs) and academia will be prioritised.
We don't understand solar fluctuations, clouds, ocean fluctuations, etc etc etc, but computer model allegedly predicts conditions on Earth in the year 3000
Temperatures would continue to rise. By the year 3000 there would be little left of Greenland's ice sheets and the circulation of the Atlantic ocean would be fundamentally altered.
Australian Climate Madness: The true price of Kyoto
Remember Kevin Rudd, jetting off to Bali in the first blush of his term of office, to ratify the Kyoto Protocol? Remember that Howard was the great climate change denier who, like George W Bush, had refused to ratify it? Remember how the liberal media raved about the decision?

Well, far from being just a pointless political gesture (which it still is), it is also potentially a huge burden on Australia's weakened economy. The Australian reports that the UN has imposed a new target on cutting greenhouse emissions - and if Australia fails to meet it, could cost the Government $870 million in carbon credits...
Alarmist Charles Clover: When alleged evidence battles with belief - Telegraph
So when Sammy Wilson, interestingly enough also a member of the low-church Protestant tradition, prefers to act on what he believes, rather than the balance of the evidence, we recognise where he is coming from, but he looks daft.
Doubt banned | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog
Laura was going to look into matters. The next thing I knew, the
poll was removed from the website without explanation.

So I rang back and spoke to Dianne, who was (she said) in close
touch with the producer in charge of the poll. She told me the
poll was taken down because the numbers didn’t add up. Normally
they get 200 respondents on a poll. This one had drawn 17,000 by
Monday. They decided it had been hijacked and they even knew the
website responsible for directing people to vote.

I told her maybe they’d touched a raw nerve with the question
about global warming being a myth and the poll had aroused
interest. She hadn’t thought of that, she said. Then I asked her
when the poll was hijacked. She said over the weekend. I said
well that doesn’t add up because by Friday night the website of
the journalist Andrew Bolt was reporting the poll was already
showing 90.4% voting global warming a myth. She became flustered.
She said it was hijacked Friday night. I asked was it Andrew
Bolt’s website that hijacked the poll? She said yes.


I think I can leave it to you to draw the appropriate
conclusions.

Thursday, February 12, 2009

Select Global Warming Solutions That Won’t Launch a Depression – Barton | CO2sceptics
If the choice is wash your clothes in the ditch or put in electricity that’s generated by a coal-fired power plant so that you can actually buy a washing machine, most people are going to build the coal-fired power plant’
Hansen's GISS: Lots of data mysteriously changes again | The Blackboard
I sometimes try to write a narrative describing all other changes in monthly values revealed by comparing the cached record to the current record. This month, words cannot describe …. I just tried to circle all the past temperature anomalies that changed this month. Feel free to find any mistakes in the figure above.

I will note that the Jan-Dec annual average temperature anomalies for 2006 and 2007 fell.

Why so many changes? Who knows.
AAAS: CO2 allegedly causing fish to be 25 miles further from penguin nests - Telegraph
The Punta Tombo colony in Argentina has declined more than 20 percent in the last 22 years, leaving just 200,000 breeding pairs, Professor Boersma said.
Pauliophonic.com - To everybody complaining about the cold weather in Los Angeles: Just enjoy the two-week respite from severe kidney stones and dengue fever
You are lucky enough to live in Los Angeles, one of the most awesome and fun cities that I [and probably you] have ever been. This “cold” weather happens for about two weeks out of the entire year, while the rest is sunny and nice — which becomes almost sickening at times.
Updates « DarcKnyt
I just found out last night that WordWeb, the electronic dictionary I’ve touted so loudly here on my blog, is run by a militant tree-hugging POS who’s pushing a ridiculous anti-global-warming agenda. A nag screen showed up when I used it last indicating I’d been using it for a year, and if I wanted to continue to use it I’d have to answer a couple of questions. It asked if I’ve taken two or more commercial flights in the last twelve months. When I answered no, the screen took me to WordWeb’s page and informed me that carbon emissions had to be reduced worldwide by 80% and if I flew on two or more commercial flights I wasn’t eligible to use the free version, and some other preachy bullshit. For the record, I don’t believe in AGW, and there is a lot of good evidence against it. Period. And I won’t have my actions dictated by some dumbass software developer in some rathole corner of the world who’s too soft-skulled to see a lie for the religion it is. I’ll keep using the product, but I’m on the look-out for a replacement and when I find one, he’s done here. Oh, and if you’re the developer of the software, just so you know – I lied. AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAA!!!