Death knell for AGW
- Thread starter Walter
- Start date
how about that? A cold winter in one place and a heat wave somewhere else. What's the average? Is it higher than the same time last year? Last decade? Lower? Do averages indicate higher temps or cooler?
Let's not look at evidence. Let's be politic, choose a position, and dig our heels in. lmao
Let's not look at evidence. Let's be politic, choose a position, and dig our heels in. lmao
Hmmmm.... Good point.. Seeing how that 'the climate' is a new-fangled thing that has only existed for the last few 100 years or so, I guess that the 'record highs/lows' and the averages must be the basis of factual reality and anything outside of these simply never existed before.
Thanks for the insight.
Thanks for the insight.
21 04 2009
A QUIET SUN DOESN’T HAPPEN OVERNIGHT.
The Osgood File. I’m Charles Osgood.
I know you’ve already got a lot to worry about as it is, but something rather odd is going on — on the Sun.
The Sun normally undergoes an 11-year cycle of activity — and last year, it was supposed to have heated up — and, at its peak, would have a tumultuous boiling atmosphere, spitting out flares and huge chunks of super-hot gas.
Instead, it hit a 50-year low in solar wind pressure, a 55-year low in radio emissions, and a 100-year low in sunspot activity. Right now, the sun is the dimmest it’s been in nearly a century.
Did you know that? It’s true. Astronomers are baffled by it, but has the press covered the story? Hardly at all. Is the government doing anything about it? No, it’s not even in the Obama budget or any Congressional earmarks.
But, sooner or later, I bet it will turn out to be our fault — yours and mine. And in Washington, where everything is political, they’ll note that it began before President Obama took office — perhaps “another example of the failed policies of the Bush Administration.”
At an upcoming meeting of astronomers in the United Kingdom, they’ll be studying new pictures of the Sun taken from space, looking for any hint that the Sun will start heating up again and acting up again, the way it’s supposed to. But there is no sign of that, so far.
In the mid-17th Century, there was a quiet spell on the Sun — known as the Maunder Minimum — which lasted 70 years, and led to a mini-Ice Age here on Earth.
Right now, global warming is a given to so many, it raises the question: Could another minimum activity period on the Sun counteract, in any way, the effects of global warming?
Hush, child! You’re not even supposed to suggest that. The only thing that can change global warming is if we human beings — we Americans, especially — completely change our ways and our way of life.
I’m sure you’ll be hearing more about this solar dimming business, now that the story is out. Remember, you heard it here first…
The Osgood File. Transcripts, podcasts, and Mp3’s of all these programs can be found at theosgoodfile.com. I’m Charles Osgood on the CBS Radio Network.
A QUIET SUN DOESN’T HAPPEN OVERNIGHT.
The Osgood File. I’m Charles Osgood.
I know you’ve already got a lot to worry about as it is, but something rather odd is going on — on the Sun.
The Sun normally undergoes an 11-year cycle of activity — and last year, it was supposed to have heated up — and, at its peak, would have a tumultuous boiling atmosphere, spitting out flares and huge chunks of super-hot gas.
Instead, it hit a 50-year low in solar wind pressure, a 55-year low in radio emissions, and a 100-year low in sunspot activity. Right now, the sun is the dimmest it’s been in nearly a century.
Did you know that? It’s true. Astronomers are baffled by it, but has the press covered the story? Hardly at all. Is the government doing anything about it? No, it’s not even in the Obama budget or any Congressional earmarks.
But, sooner or later, I bet it will turn out to be our fault — yours and mine. And in Washington, where everything is political, they’ll note that it began before President Obama took office — perhaps “another example of the failed policies of the Bush Administration.”
At an upcoming meeting of astronomers in the United Kingdom, they’ll be studying new pictures of the Sun taken from space, looking for any hint that the Sun will start heating up again and acting up again, the way it’s supposed to. But there is no sign of that, so far.
In the mid-17th Century, there was a quiet spell on the Sun — known as the Maunder Minimum — which lasted 70 years, and led to a mini-Ice Age here on Earth.
Right now, global warming is a given to so many, it raises the question: Could another minimum activity period on the Sun counteract, in any way, the effects of global warming?
Hush, child! You’re not even supposed to suggest that. The only thing that can change global warming is if we human beings — we Americans, especially — completely change our ways and our way of life.
I’m sure you’ll be hearing more about this solar dimming business, now that the story is out. Remember, you heard it here first…
The Osgood File. Transcripts, podcasts, and Mp3’s of all these programs can be found at theosgoodfile.com. I’m Charles Osgood on the CBS Radio Network.
Lawrence Solomon: Australia becoming a Denier Nation
Posted: April 25, 2009, 2:00 AM by Ron Nurwisah A break from faith in Australia! The continent down under, which until recently adhered to a strict form of global warming dogma, is experiencing an enlightenment.
“Beware the climate of conformity,” warns the headline for a column on global warming in the Sydney Morning Herald.
“What I am about to write questions much of what I have written in this space, in numerous columns, over the past five years,” starts the column by Paul Sheehan, one of Australia’s top authors. “Perhaps what I have written can withstand this questioning. Perhaps not. The greater question is, am I — and you — capable of questioning our own orthodoxies and intellectual habits?”
Sheehan closes by answering in the affirmative, with “a reminder to respect informed dissent and beware of ideology subverting evidence.”
“Wong is wrong on ETS,” runs an editorial in The Australian, criticizing Climate Change Minister Penny Wong for her proposal to introduce an Emissions Trading Scheme in the midst of a recession. Instead, the newspaper asks the government to listen to the Australian Coal Association and the Australian Industry Group and postpone any decision for at least a year, if not forever. Jobs and the economy should not be threatened, the paper declares, particularly when climate change is an unproven theory.
“Garnaut turns on Government’s greenhouse scheme,” reports the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, advising its audience that “The future of the Government’s greenhouse gas trading regime is under question again, this time from the man who helped to design it.
“Ross Garnaut — who headed the Government’s review of climate change policy — has told a Senate Committee that it might be better if the scheme in its current form is not passed into law.
“That adds to the growing uncertainty about emissions trading, which is due to be up and running by next year.”
Still more: “Climate change science isn’t settled,” announces an opinion piece in The Australian by Canadian geologist Jan Veizer of the University of Ottawa. Veizer mocks the notion that “the tiny — biologically controlled — carbon cycle drives the climate.”
And more: “Planet doomsayers need a cold shower,” writes Miranda Devine in the Sydney Morning Herald, in an extensive article that damns “the global warming scare campaign.” She cites at length a hugely influential new book by University of Adelaide geologist, Ian Plimer, Heaven And Earth (subtitled “Global Warming: The Missing Science”). It is “a comprehensive scientific refutation of the beliefs underpinning the idea of human-caused climate change,” she explains, pointedly noting that Plimer’s book was written “for those out there with an open mind wanting to know more about how the planet works. The mind is like a parachute. It only works when it is open.”
Plimer’s book could not have landed at a more opportune time. With Australia’s resource-based economy rocked by recession, large swathes of the public are for the first time asking themselves if the job losses and economic dislocations that would come of reducing carbon dioxide emissions are really necessary. At the same time, the Australian Senate Select Committee on Climate Policy is hearing testimony on the wisdom of an Emissions Trading Scheme. Not only have the politicians running the proceedings decided to allow climate sceptics to express themselves, much of the press has decided to report their views fairly.
Into this global warming glasnost that Australia is experiencing steps Plimer, with perspectives that would once have been derided and dismissed.
To those who claim it is economically prudent to curb greenhouse gases based on the information known to date, Plimer responds that the business world would never “make trillion-dollar decisions without a comprehensive and expensive due diligence.” To those who claim that an overwhelming consensus of scientists associated with the United Nations climate change report have concluded that man is responsible for bringing us to global warming catastrophe, Plimer points to the report’s chapter dealing with man’s role, which is “based on the opinions of just five independent scientists.”
Thanks to Plimer, the press and politicians, Australia is likely to become the developed world’s third Denier Nation, after the Czech Republic, where only 11% of the public blame humans for global warming, and the United States, where only 34% blame humans.
Posted: April 25, 2009, 2:00 AM by Ron Nurwisah A break from faith in Australia! The continent down under, which until recently adhered to a strict form of global warming dogma, is experiencing an enlightenment.
“Beware the climate of conformity,” warns the headline for a column on global warming in the Sydney Morning Herald.
“What I am about to write questions much of what I have written in this space, in numerous columns, over the past five years,” starts the column by Paul Sheehan, one of Australia’s top authors. “Perhaps what I have written can withstand this questioning. Perhaps not. The greater question is, am I — and you — capable of questioning our own orthodoxies and intellectual habits?”
Sheehan closes by answering in the affirmative, with “a reminder to respect informed dissent and beware of ideology subverting evidence.”
“Wong is wrong on ETS,” runs an editorial in The Australian, criticizing Climate Change Minister Penny Wong for her proposal to introduce an Emissions Trading Scheme in the midst of a recession. Instead, the newspaper asks the government to listen to the Australian Coal Association and the Australian Industry Group and postpone any decision for at least a year, if not forever. Jobs and the economy should not be threatened, the paper declares, particularly when climate change is an unproven theory.
“Garnaut turns on Government’s greenhouse scheme,” reports the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, advising its audience that “The future of the Government’s greenhouse gas trading regime is under question again, this time from the man who helped to design it.
“Ross Garnaut — who headed the Government’s review of climate change policy — has told a Senate Committee that it might be better if the scheme in its current form is not passed into law.
“That adds to the growing uncertainty about emissions trading, which is due to be up and running by next year.”
Still more: “Climate change science isn’t settled,” announces an opinion piece in The Australian by Canadian geologist Jan Veizer of the University of Ottawa. Veizer mocks the notion that “the tiny — biologically controlled — carbon cycle drives the climate.”
And more: “Planet doomsayers need a cold shower,” writes Miranda Devine in the Sydney Morning Herald, in an extensive article that damns “the global warming scare campaign.” She cites at length a hugely influential new book by University of Adelaide geologist, Ian Plimer, Heaven And Earth (subtitled “Global Warming: The Missing Science”). It is “a comprehensive scientific refutation of the beliefs underpinning the idea of human-caused climate change,” she explains, pointedly noting that Plimer’s book was written “for those out there with an open mind wanting to know more about how the planet works. The mind is like a parachute. It only works when it is open.”
Plimer’s book could not have landed at a more opportune time. With Australia’s resource-based economy rocked by recession, large swathes of the public are for the first time asking themselves if the job losses and economic dislocations that would come of reducing carbon dioxide emissions are really necessary. At the same time, the Australian Senate Select Committee on Climate Policy is hearing testimony on the wisdom of an Emissions Trading Scheme. Not only have the politicians running the proceedings decided to allow climate sceptics to express themselves, much of the press has decided to report their views fairly.
Into this global warming glasnost that Australia is experiencing steps Plimer, with perspectives that would once have been derided and dismissed.
To those who claim it is economically prudent to curb greenhouse gases based on the information known to date, Plimer responds that the business world would never “make trillion-dollar decisions without a comprehensive and expensive due diligence.” To those who claim that an overwhelming consensus of scientists associated with the United Nations climate change report have concluded that man is responsible for bringing us to global warming catastrophe, Plimer points to the report’s chapter dealing with man’s role, which is “based on the opinions of just five independent scientists.”
Thanks to Plimer, the press and politicians, Australia is likely to become the developed world’s third Denier Nation, after the Czech Republic, where only 11% of the public blame humans for global warming, and the United States, where only 34% blame humans.
Guest Post By William DiPuccio
Albert Einstein once said, “No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.” Einstein’s words express a foundational principle of science intoned by the logician, Karl Popper: Falsifiability. In order to verify a hypothesis there must be a test by which it can be proved false. A thousand observations may appear to verify a hypothesis, but one critical failure could result in its demise. The history of science is littered with such examples.
A hypothesis that cannot be falsified by empirical observations, is not science. The current hypothesis on anthropogenic global warming (AGW), presented by the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is no exception to this principle. Indeed, it is the job of scientists to expose the weaknesses of this hypothesis as it undergoes peer review. This paper will examine one key criterion for falsification: ocean heat
The Global Warming Hypothesis and Ocean Heat « Watts Up With That?http://climatesci.org/wp-content/uploads/dipuccio-2.jpg
Albert Einstein once said, “No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong.” Einstein’s words express a foundational principle of science intoned by the logician, Karl Popper: Falsifiability. In order to verify a hypothesis there must be a test by which it can be proved false. A thousand observations may appear to verify a hypothesis, but one critical failure could result in its demise. The history of science is littered with such examples.
A hypothesis that cannot be falsified by empirical observations, is not science. The current hypothesis on anthropogenic global warming (AGW), presented by the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), is no exception to this principle. Indeed, it is the job of scientists to expose the weaknesses of this hypothesis as it undergoes peer review. This paper will examine one key criterion for falsification: ocean heat
The Global Warming Hypothesis and Ocean Heat « Watts Up With That?http://climatesci.org/wp-content/uploads/dipuccio-2.jpg
Fickle Gods of Global Warming
REX MURPHY
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
May 9, 2009 at 12:00 AM EDT
I believe there's a God, and while it is legendarily difficult to pronounce on such questions, I believe he lives in Texas or Fort McMurray. It's one or the other.
I'm driven often to the Bible, both for its wisdom and its prose. Strange that the only text that seriously can be said to rival Shakespeare in trenchancy and power of expression should be a work primarily of religion, not literature, a compound book by many authors and, for English readers, a work of translation as well. The King James Bible is the only - as we say these days, though perhaps with some impiety considering my subject - standalone creation that can claim equal status, for its literary excellence, with the otherwise unmatchable harmonies of Shakespeare.
Apocalypse and end days are naturally powerful themes in biblical literature as they are in the traditions of most religious movements. The end of terrestrial or earthly history, the great summoning to judgment are urgent concerns of all religious minds as, for example, the quickest reference to modern-day environmentalism will very easily confirm. Not surprisingly, dramatic material produces the most vivid, electric prose. There is the Book of Revelation, with its many arresting images and surreal visions, but also other moments in the Bible, perhaps referencing post-apocalypse, the New Jerusalem, which address the end of all disharmonies, the mutual embrace of all that before was in conflict.
These passages almost always speak of a bringing together in harmony of prior opposites, conjure scenes of exemplary reconciliation. Perhaps the most famous is from Isaiah: "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox."
It is hauntingly arresting stuff: hunted and hunter, prey and predator, their differences resolved, the carnivorous lion going vegetarian, all with innocence their guide - the "little child."
Well, there are signs, for "those who have eyes to see them" that these days may be upon us. On April 19, an expedition team set out from Plymouth, England on a 5,000-mile carbon emission-free roundtrip to the Greenland ice cap. It was planned by an organization called Carbon Neutral Expeditions, one of whose founders explained the journey's focus, and very endearing it was: "The expedition will hopefully show how it is possible to explore some of the most beautiful places on Earth without contributing to their destruction." Their boat, the Fleur, was a 40-foot yacht fitted with solar panels and a wind turbine.
On arrival, they planned to trek to the highest point of the ice cap, then return to their boat and make the journey home, by sail. The return, they noted, was the most significant part: "Return journeys are in the true spirit of expeditions, and essential if this is to be carbon neutral."
Unfortunately even the most glassy-eyed idealism can be confronted by reality, and such was the case with Carbon Neutral's expedition. They hit a bad patch of weather. Their poor boat was thrice capsized. And the fickle Gods of Global Warming must have been taking a siesta, for in one of those incidents one of the team "hit his head and the wind generator and solar panels were ripped from the yacht." I can only imagine them at this moment, staring soulfully into the hurricane-whipped sky, and pleadingly imploring: "Al Gore, Al Gore, why has thou forsaken us? "
They were in a powerless pickle. Solar and sail had failed them and green intentions will not float your boat - they were not so much "carbon neutral" as carbon deprived. Bobbing around the North Atlantic in a gale without motor power of any kind is not the most soothing experience. Fortunately, Providence, in one of its most artful facsimiles, was on hand in the shape of the Overseas Yellowstone - a ship that was, to put it mildly, not relying on solar power or a wind turbine.
It was a 113,000-ton oil tanker, carrying 680,000 barrels of crude oil. We may reach for many adjectives to describe the Overseas Yellowstone but "carbon neutral" will not be among them. Indeed, the Overseas Yellowstone, looked at from a carbon-neutral perspective, is the Life Raft from Hell. Nonetheless the oil tanker picked up the eco-people.
They are now being taken to Maine, from whence presumably they will fly home. By jet. Not kite.
And verily, it is written, the carbon-spewing wolf shall lie down with the global-warming lamb ... the petroleum-devouring lion shall eat straw like the carbon-neutral ox, or something like that. And the Overseas Yellowstone shall lead them.
The voyage was followed by up to 40 schools across Britain to promote climate-change awareness. And how.
REX MURPHY
From Saturday's Globe and Mail
May 9, 2009 at 12:00 AM EDT
I believe there's a God, and while it is legendarily difficult to pronounce on such questions, I believe he lives in Texas or Fort McMurray. It's one or the other.
I'm driven often to the Bible, both for its wisdom and its prose. Strange that the only text that seriously can be said to rival Shakespeare in trenchancy and power of expression should be a work primarily of religion, not literature, a compound book by many authors and, for English readers, a work of translation as well. The King James Bible is the only - as we say these days, though perhaps with some impiety considering my subject - standalone creation that can claim equal status, for its literary excellence, with the otherwise unmatchable harmonies of Shakespeare.
Apocalypse and end days are naturally powerful themes in biblical literature as they are in the traditions of most religious movements. The end of terrestrial or earthly history, the great summoning to judgment are urgent concerns of all religious minds as, for example, the quickest reference to modern-day environmentalism will very easily confirm. Not surprisingly, dramatic material produces the most vivid, electric prose. There is the Book of Revelation, with its many arresting images and surreal visions, but also other moments in the Bible, perhaps referencing post-apocalypse, the New Jerusalem, which address the end of all disharmonies, the mutual embrace of all that before was in conflict.
These passages almost always speak of a bringing together in harmony of prior opposites, conjure scenes of exemplary reconciliation. Perhaps the most famous is from Isaiah: "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox."
It is hauntingly arresting stuff: hunted and hunter, prey and predator, their differences resolved, the carnivorous lion going vegetarian, all with innocence their guide - the "little child."
Well, there are signs, for "those who have eyes to see them" that these days may be upon us. On April 19, an expedition team set out from Plymouth, England on a 5,000-mile carbon emission-free roundtrip to the Greenland ice cap. It was planned by an organization called Carbon Neutral Expeditions, one of whose founders explained the journey's focus, and very endearing it was: "The expedition will hopefully show how it is possible to explore some of the most beautiful places on Earth without contributing to their destruction." Their boat, the Fleur, was a 40-foot yacht fitted with solar panels and a wind turbine.
On arrival, they planned to trek to the highest point of the ice cap, then return to their boat and make the journey home, by sail. The return, they noted, was the most significant part: "Return journeys are in the true spirit of expeditions, and essential if this is to be carbon neutral."
Unfortunately even the most glassy-eyed idealism can be confronted by reality, and such was the case with Carbon Neutral's expedition. They hit a bad patch of weather. Their poor boat was thrice capsized. And the fickle Gods of Global Warming must have been taking a siesta, for in one of those incidents one of the team "hit his head and the wind generator and solar panels were ripped from the yacht." I can only imagine them at this moment, staring soulfully into the hurricane-whipped sky, and pleadingly imploring: "Al Gore, Al Gore, why has thou forsaken us? "
They were in a powerless pickle. Solar and sail had failed them and green intentions will not float your boat - they were not so much "carbon neutral" as carbon deprived. Bobbing around the North Atlantic in a gale without motor power of any kind is not the most soothing experience. Fortunately, Providence, in one of its most artful facsimiles, was on hand in the shape of the Overseas Yellowstone - a ship that was, to put it mildly, not relying on solar power or a wind turbine.
It was a 113,000-ton oil tanker, carrying 680,000 barrels of crude oil. We may reach for many adjectives to describe the Overseas Yellowstone but "carbon neutral" will not be among them. Indeed, the Overseas Yellowstone, looked at from a carbon-neutral perspective, is the Life Raft from Hell. Nonetheless the oil tanker picked up the eco-people.
They are now being taken to Maine, from whence presumably they will fly home. By jet. Not kite.
And verily, it is written, the carbon-spewing wolf shall lie down with the global-warming lamb ... the petroleum-devouring lion shall eat straw like the carbon-neutral ox, or something like that. And the Overseas Yellowstone shall lead them.
The voyage was followed by up to 40 schools across Britain to promote climate-change awareness. And how.
Copenhagen: Already dead?
Terence Corcoran, Financial Post
The great global policy push for massive climate control laws and big fat taxes on carbon appear to be heading into a brick wall. From Australia to British Columbia, from Washington to Copenhagen, there are growing signs that the much anticipated replacement for the Kyoto Accord will be as dead as Kyoto before it arrives.
If signed, it will be called something like the Copenhagen Accord, after meetings later this year in that Danish city. But the global and national divisions over a new climate pact to reduce carbon emissions, visible everywhere, suggest there is little ground for common cause. Public support, for the science of climate change and the policies offered as a response, is shaky.
The usual pattern for these international agreements is that at the 11th hour -- and sometimes many months after the 11th hour has passed--members of the United Nations emerge with a half-backed compromise that could not be implemented even if they tried. That outcome is probably the most likely possibility, but as events seem to be unfolding right now, the dash for a new agreement seems to be winding down into a laboured effort to keep the thing alive.
In Washington, without whose support no UN climate control scheme will get off the ground, President Obama faces an uphill battle to get his own Democratic Party on side. Reports yesterday said Congressional lawmakers would be meeting today to water down the existing Waxman-Markey draft legislation. The target for U. S. carbon reduction, now set at a mandatory cut of 20% below 2005 levels by 2020, could get trimmed back.
Last week, the U. S. Chamber of Commerce released an economic study projecting lost jobs, slower growth, higher energy costs and damaged vital energy sectors of the U. S. economy. Also coming under fire is the cap-and-trade energy pricing system proposed by President Obama. Charlie Munger, CEO of Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway, called the plan "monstrously stupid." In an interview with CNBC, Mr. Munger said: "It would be a huge shock to the economy and it wouldn't accomplish very much given the fact that the vast majority of the pollution, or rather the CO2, is coming from a place like China. And so I think it would be almost demented if we would rush into cap-and-trade right now in the middle of this economic crisis."
CNN's Lou Dobbs has been on a months-long campaign against climate science and efforts to impose a massive tax on carbon -- and therefore U. S. energy use -- on the grounds that such costs would unnecessarily cripple the American economy at a time when it is already suffering.
The more Americans learn of the proposed carbon control and pricing regimes, the less they like it. James Baker, former secretary of state under President George H.W. Bush, wrote in the Financial Times last week that the Obama administration should do nothing unilaterally. While supporting the idea that the United States should lead a global effort to fight climate change, he attached enough strings to his support to sink the plan.
Any U. S. legislation to bring in a "market-based" cap-andtrade regime must be accompanied by "an agreement with the rest of the world." Washington should also defer any implementation until a global treaty is signed. And just in case other countries might want to drag their feet on agreement, Mr. Baker proposed a radical solution:Mr. Obama should threaten a trade war. "To increase his leverage in negotiating with other countries, the President could be given the ability to bar from our carbon market any major emitting nation that fails to join and implement a global accord."
This doesn't sound like a chapter in "How to Win Friends and Influence Foreign Nations." Even Mr. Baker balks at his own suggestion. "The negative trade aspects of doing that would have to be carefully thought through, but the stakes are sufficiently high that it should be considered."
A potential for global trade wars over carbon content and prices is one of the more common topics for back-room discussions and elements in reports, including recent work by Canada's National Round Table on the Economy and the Environment. In Europe, China and Russia -- and among developing nations -- threats and concerns over trade wars and investment wars are frequently heard.
Some issues have yet to be fully aired, including the missing motivating element in climate policy: the explicit objective of moving money from rich countries to poor countries. Connie Hedegaard, Denmark's Climate and Energy Minister, said last week that prosperous nations must be ready to transfer large quantities of cash to the less-prosperous if a new climate accord is to be signed.
The idea of shipping vast sums from rich to poor has a long history in the climate debate. Maurice Strong once said that the main objective, the "overall goal," of climate policy is to create a "new economic basis for flows of money to the developing countries." How much enthusiasm will there be for cap-andtrade carbon taxes when energy consumers find out that their money will be shipped to promote investment and consumption around the world.
More locally, in Australia, the government of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd appears to be balking at plans to bring in cap-andtrade carbon emissions programs. In British Columbia, Liberal leader Gordon Campbell found himself fighting a tighter-than-expected election race when the left-wing New Democratic Party attacked his carbon tax. Mr. Campbell might still win, but one wonders how he might have fared if the NDP had not also supported a cap-and-trade scheme as an alternative.
It's all part of a global trend that seems to be building against next UN effort to control carbon and the climate. Is Copenhagen already dead?
Terence Corcoran, Financial Post
The great global policy push for massive climate control laws and big fat taxes on carbon appear to be heading into a brick wall. From Australia to British Columbia, from Washington to Copenhagen, there are growing signs that the much anticipated replacement for the Kyoto Accord will be as dead as Kyoto before it arrives.
If signed, it will be called something like the Copenhagen Accord, after meetings later this year in that Danish city. But the global and national divisions over a new climate pact to reduce carbon emissions, visible everywhere, suggest there is little ground for common cause. Public support, for the science of climate change and the policies offered as a response, is shaky.
The usual pattern for these international agreements is that at the 11th hour -- and sometimes many months after the 11th hour has passed--members of the United Nations emerge with a half-backed compromise that could not be implemented even if they tried. That outcome is probably the most likely possibility, but as events seem to be unfolding right now, the dash for a new agreement seems to be winding down into a laboured effort to keep the thing alive.
In Washington, without whose support no UN climate control scheme will get off the ground, President Obama faces an uphill battle to get his own Democratic Party on side. Reports yesterday said Congressional lawmakers would be meeting today to water down the existing Waxman-Markey draft legislation. The target for U. S. carbon reduction, now set at a mandatory cut of 20% below 2005 levels by 2020, could get trimmed back.
Last week, the U. S. Chamber of Commerce released an economic study projecting lost jobs, slower growth, higher energy costs and damaged vital energy sectors of the U. S. economy. Also coming under fire is the cap-and-trade energy pricing system proposed by President Obama. Charlie Munger, CEO of Warren Buffet's Berkshire Hathaway, called the plan "monstrously stupid." In an interview with CNBC, Mr. Munger said: "It would be a huge shock to the economy and it wouldn't accomplish very much given the fact that the vast majority of the pollution, or rather the CO2, is coming from a place like China. And so I think it would be almost demented if we would rush into cap-and-trade right now in the middle of this economic crisis."
CNN's Lou Dobbs has been on a months-long campaign against climate science and efforts to impose a massive tax on carbon -- and therefore U. S. energy use -- on the grounds that such costs would unnecessarily cripple the American economy at a time when it is already suffering.
The more Americans learn of the proposed carbon control and pricing regimes, the less they like it. James Baker, former secretary of state under President George H.W. Bush, wrote in the Financial Times last week that the Obama administration should do nothing unilaterally. While supporting the idea that the United States should lead a global effort to fight climate change, he attached enough strings to his support to sink the plan.
Any U. S. legislation to bring in a "market-based" cap-andtrade regime must be accompanied by "an agreement with the rest of the world." Washington should also defer any implementation until a global treaty is signed. And just in case other countries might want to drag their feet on agreement, Mr. Baker proposed a radical solution:Mr. Obama should threaten a trade war. "To increase his leverage in negotiating with other countries, the President could be given the ability to bar from our carbon market any major emitting nation that fails to join and implement a global accord."
This doesn't sound like a chapter in "How to Win Friends and Influence Foreign Nations." Even Mr. Baker balks at his own suggestion. "The negative trade aspects of doing that would have to be carefully thought through, but the stakes are sufficiently high that it should be considered."
A potential for global trade wars over carbon content and prices is one of the more common topics for back-room discussions and elements in reports, including recent work by Canada's National Round Table on the Economy and the Environment. In Europe, China and Russia -- and among developing nations -- threats and concerns over trade wars and investment wars are frequently heard.
Some issues have yet to be fully aired, including the missing motivating element in climate policy: the explicit objective of moving money from rich countries to poor countries. Connie Hedegaard, Denmark's Climate and Energy Minister, said last week that prosperous nations must be ready to transfer large quantities of cash to the less-prosperous if a new climate accord is to be signed.
The idea of shipping vast sums from rich to poor has a long history in the climate debate. Maurice Strong once said that the main objective, the "overall goal," of climate policy is to create a "new economic basis for flows of money to the developing countries." How much enthusiasm will there be for cap-andtrade carbon taxes when energy consumers find out that their money will be shipped to promote investment and consumption around the world.
More locally, in Australia, the government of Prime Minister Kevin Rudd appears to be balking at plans to bring in cap-andtrade carbon emissions programs. In British Columbia, Liberal leader Gordon Campbell found himself fighting a tighter-than-expected election race when the left-wing New Democratic Party attacked his carbon tax. Mr. Campbell might still win, but one wonders how he might have fared if the NDP had not also supported a cap-and-trade scheme as an alternative.
It's all part of a global trend that seems to be building against next UN effort to control carbon and the climate. Is Copenhagen already dead?
Climate Revolt: World's Largest Science Group 'Startled' By Outpouring of Scientists Rejecting Man-Made Climate Fears! Clamor for Editor to Be Removed!
Scientists seek to remove climate fear promoting editor and 'trade him to New York Times or Washington Post'
Wednesday, July 29, 2009By Marc Morano – Climate Depot
The editorial claimed the "consensus" view was growing "increasingly difficult to challenge, despite the efforts of diehard climate-change deniers.” The editor now admits he is "startled" by the negative reaction from the group's scientific members. The American Chemical Society bills itself as the "world's largest scientific society."
The June 22, 2009 editorial in Chemical and Engineering News by editor in chief Rudy Baum, is facing widespread blowback and condemnation from American Chemical Society member scientists. Baum concluded his editorial by stating that “deniers” are attempting to “derail meaningful efforts to respond to global climate change.”
Dozens of letters from ACS members were published on July 27, 2009 castigating Baum, with some scientists calling for his replacement as editor-in-chief.
The editorial was met with a swift, passionate and scientific rebuke from Baum's colleagues. Virtually all of the letters published on July 27 in castigated Baum's climate science views. Scientists rebuked Baum's use of the word “deniers” because of the terms “association with Holocaust deniers.” In addition, the scientists called Baum's editorial: “disgusting”; “a disgrace”; “filled with misinformation”; “unworthy of a scientific periodical” and “pap.”
One outraged ACS member wrote to Baum: "When all is said and done, and you and your kind are proven wrong (again), you will have moved on to be an unthinking urn for another rat pleading catastrophe. You will be removed. I promise."
Baum 'startled' by scientists reaction
Baum wrote on July 27, that he was "startled" and "surprised" by the "contempt" and "vehemence" of the ACS scientists to his view of the global warming "consensus."
"Some of the letters I received are not fit to print. Many of the letters we have printed are, I think it is fair to say, outraged by my position on global warming," Baum wrote.
Complete article: Climate Revolt: World's Largest Science Group 'Startled' By Outpouring of Scientists Rejecting Man-Made Climate Fears! Clamor for Editor to Be Removed! | Climate Depot
Scientists seek to remove climate fear promoting editor and 'trade him to New York Times or Washington Post'
Wednesday, July 29, 2009By Marc Morano – Climate Depot
Climate Depot Exclusive
An outpouring of skeptical scientists who are members of the American Chemical Society (ACS) are revolting against the group's editor-in-chief -- with some demanding he be removed -- after an editorial appeared claiming “the science of anthropogenic climate change is becoming increasingly well established.” The editorial claimed the "consensus" view was growing "increasingly difficult to challenge, despite the efforts of diehard climate-change deniers.” The editor now admits he is "startled" by the negative reaction from the group's scientific members. The American Chemical Society bills itself as the "world's largest scientific society."
The June 22, 2009 editorial in Chemical and Engineering News by editor in chief Rudy Baum, is facing widespread blowback and condemnation from American Chemical Society member scientists. Baum concluded his editorial by stating that “deniers” are attempting to “derail meaningful efforts to respond to global climate change.”
Dozens of letters from ACS members were published on July 27, 2009 castigating Baum, with some scientists calling for his replacement as editor-in-chief.
The editorial was met with a swift, passionate and scientific rebuke from Baum's colleagues. Virtually all of the letters published on July 27 in castigated Baum's climate science views. Scientists rebuked Baum's use of the word “deniers” because of the terms “association with Holocaust deniers.” In addition, the scientists called Baum's editorial: “disgusting”; “a disgrace”; “filled with misinformation”; “unworthy of a scientific periodical” and “pap.”
One outraged ACS member wrote to Baum: "When all is said and done, and you and your kind are proven wrong (again), you will have moved on to be an unthinking urn for another rat pleading catastrophe. You will be removed. I promise."
Baum 'startled' by scientists reaction
Baum wrote on July 27, that he was "startled" and "surprised" by the "contempt" and "vehemence" of the ACS scientists to his view of the global warming "consensus."
"Some of the letters I received are not fit to print. Many of the letters we have printed are, I think it is fair to say, outraged by my position on global warming," Baum wrote.
Complete article: Climate Revolt: World's Largest Science Group 'Startled' By Outpouring of Scientists Rejecting Man-Made Climate Fears! Clamor for Editor to Be Removed! | Climate Depot
Climate change deniers claim they're censored. What hypocrites
Anthony Watts, sceptic and scourge of climate change science, has used copyright laws to censor an opponent
YouTube - The Video Climate Deniers Tried to Ban - Climate Denial Crock of the Week
One of the allegations made repeatedly by climate change deniers is that they are being censored. There's just one problem with this claim: they have yet to produce a single valid example. On the other hand, there are hundreds of examples of direct attempts to censor climate scientists.
Most were the work of the Bush administration. In 2007 the Union of Concerned Scientists collated 435 instances of political interference in the work of climate researchers in the US.
Scientists working for the government were pressured by officials to remove the words "climate change" and "global warming" from their publications; their reports were edited to change the meaning of their findings, others never saw the light of day. Scientists at the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration and the US Fish and Wildlife Service were forbidden to speak to the media; James Hansen at Nasa was told by public relations officials that there would be "dire consequences" if he continued to call for big cuts in greenhouse gases.
Philip Cooney, a senior White House aide who previously worked at the American Petroleum Institute, admitted to Congress that he had made hundreds of changes to government reports about climate change on behalf of the Bush government.
Among other changes, he had struck out evidence that glaciers were retreating and inserted phrases suggesting that there was serious scientific doubt about global warming. In the UK, both Viscount Monckton and Martin Durkin, the director of Channel 4's The Great Global Warming Swindle, have threatened to sue people who have criticised the claims they've made about the science.
Where, on the other hand, is a single verifiable instance of a climate denier being silenced by the authorities? They have yet to produce one. But it suits them to cry wolf. They love to imagine that they are important enough to censor. The claim chimes with their paranoid invocation of a great conspiracy – involving most of the world's scientists, most of the world's governments, most of the world's media and a few hundred million others – to suppress the truth about global warming.
Now we have another marvellous instance of this hypocrisy. Anthony Watts spends much of his time maligning climate scientists and environmentalists on his blog Wattsupwiththat. But while he can dole it out, he can't take it. As Kevin Grandia of desmogblog shows, Watts has just used US copyright laws to take down a YouTube video which exposes his claims. Grandia has since reposted the video (see above) so you can see for yourself what all the fuss is about.
It is not clear how his copyright was infringed by the video, but the US laws have been widely used by other people to block material that they don't like. Websites are obliged to remove any video which is subject to a takedown request, and they can put it back up only if they win an appeal. I charge Watts with the accusation he unjustly levels at other people: this looks to me like an attempt to silence his critics.
Monbiot in the Guardian
What a coward.
He and his bloggers still haven't figured out that comparing different temperature records and their raw anomalies must first be compensated for the different base periods ...otherwise you get very different numbers indeed! LMAO
Anthony Watts, sceptic and scourge of climate change science, has used copyright laws to censor an opponent
YouTube - The Video Climate Deniers Tried to Ban - Climate Denial Crock of the Week
One of the allegations made repeatedly by climate change deniers is that they are being censored. There's just one problem with this claim: they have yet to produce a single valid example. On the other hand, there are hundreds of examples of direct attempts to censor climate scientists.
Most were the work of the Bush administration. In 2007 the Union of Concerned Scientists collated 435 instances of political interference in the work of climate researchers in the US.
Scientists working for the government were pressured by officials to remove the words "climate change" and "global warming" from their publications; their reports were edited to change the meaning of their findings, others never saw the light of day. Scientists at the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration and the US Fish and Wildlife Service were forbidden to speak to the media; James Hansen at Nasa was told by public relations officials that there would be "dire consequences" if he continued to call for big cuts in greenhouse gases.
Philip Cooney, a senior White House aide who previously worked at the American Petroleum Institute, admitted to Congress that he had made hundreds of changes to government reports about climate change on behalf of the Bush government.
Among other changes, he had struck out evidence that glaciers were retreating and inserted phrases suggesting that there was serious scientific doubt about global warming. In the UK, both Viscount Monckton and Martin Durkin, the director of Channel 4's The Great Global Warming Swindle, have threatened to sue people who have criticised the claims they've made about the science.
Where, on the other hand, is a single verifiable instance of a climate denier being silenced by the authorities? They have yet to produce one. But it suits them to cry wolf. They love to imagine that they are important enough to censor. The claim chimes with their paranoid invocation of a great conspiracy – involving most of the world's scientists, most of the world's governments, most of the world's media and a few hundred million others – to suppress the truth about global warming.
Now we have another marvellous instance of this hypocrisy. Anthony Watts spends much of his time maligning climate scientists and environmentalists on his blog Wattsupwiththat. But while he can dole it out, he can't take it. As Kevin Grandia of desmogblog shows, Watts has just used US copyright laws to take down a YouTube video which exposes his claims. Grandia has since reposted the video (see above) so you can see for yourself what all the fuss is about.
It is not clear how his copyright was infringed by the video, but the US laws have been widely used by other people to block material that they don't like. Websites are obliged to remove any video which is subject to a takedown request, and they can put it back up only if they win an appeal. I charge Watts with the accusation he unjustly levels at other people: this looks to me like an attempt to silence his critics.
Monbiot in the Guardian
What a coward.
He and his bloggers still haven't figured out that comparing different temperature records and their raw anomalies must first be compensated for the different base periods ...otherwise you get very different numbers indeed! LMAO
It's getting colder, we can burn the global warming studies and make all the eggheads on the take do the snow shoveling, all of it with teeny weeny spoons.
Ohhhhhh really?
I thought we weren't supposed to look at local weather. :lol:
I guess we only point out local weather when it suits.