Sorry. It's a cheap joke. I know. There's a difference between weather and climate, but you've got to know that poor Al is sweating out every cold snap. Every time it's not hot, it makes his scheme a harder sell.
"We're very close to that political tipping point," Gore said at the Society of Environmental Journalists annual conference at the Madison Concourse Hotel. "Never before in human history has a single generation been asked to make such difficult and consequential decisions."...Really? I would have thought that the economic slowdown was good for his cause. Less production, less carbon emissions, right? They just don't say that because it would make people mad. It's like the argument that cigarette smoking (with the consequent death from lung cancer) saves the government money. (Social Security payments and so forth.) That upsets people.
"I am optimistic," Gore said. "I think there has been a very powerful recognition, not only in this country, but in many countries, that there is a linkage between the climate crisis and the economic crisis and the national security crisis that is in part derivative of the world's ridiculous over-dependence on carbon-based fuels."
Conservative groups led by Collegians for a Constructive Tomorrow and Americans for Prosperity held a demonstration Downtown that drew about 200 people, including U.S. Rep. James Sensenbrenner, R-Menomonee Falls, who also participated in the conference's panel discussion following Gore's speech. The demonstrators worried Gore's policies would push American jobs overseas.200, in Madison?
In what organizers said was a rarity, Gore took half a dozen questions from journalists, including one from Phelim McAleer, an Irish filmmaker who asked Gore to address nine errors in his film identified by a British court in 2007.I love the name Phelim McAleer. It supports that theory that people go into careers suggested by their names. (All the dentists named Dennis.) How so, you ask? Phelim — that's how some people pronounce the word "film." My grandfather did. Dear old Pop.
Gore responded that the court ruling supported the showing of his film in British schools. When McAleer tried to debate further, his microphone was cut off by the moderators.Well, good for Al for opening himself up to debate for 2 seconds. Now, quick, let's all ruin the economy some more the way Al Gore wants us to. As Obama likes to say, the time for debate is over.
ADDED: Video of the McAleer confrontation:
"Treat Big Environment the way you treat Big Business," McAleer advises journalists. Why are environmental journalists protecting the politician and not asking probing questions?
AND: "Gore's claim that the judge found in favor of his movie is ridiculous. The case was brought by a parent who objected to the film being shown to British schoolchildren on the ground that it is propaganda, not science. The judge found that An Inconvenient Truth 'is a political film' that is riddled with scientific mistakes. He held that as such, it would be illegal for the government to require the film to be shown in schools unless it was accompanied by 'guidance' pointing out that the film contains a number of scientific errors." Wow. How weaselly of Gore to point to that decision as making his point for him!
Posts
87 comments:
"climate crisis"
WTF does that mean?
When the "solutions" proposed to a climate problem are all money transfers to the Government, the scam of AGW is revealed for what it is: A flimsy excuse to steal wealth.
Weather is not climate on one snowy day. Ten years of declining temperatures begins to look like climate.
Al Gore and his mere 50<> so called scientific minions took a page out of the scam artists hand book. They took the Book of Revelations from the Bible and rewrote it into a screen play and books.
Apocalypse, the end of the world, rapture, and all of that. It is the same thing that ditz did with the book/movie The Secret.
What Al Gore has done is scvam America and the world in his personal quest to make billions of dollars in profit from the Global Warming Hoax. He never mentions of offers the disclaimer that he is a partner in a VC firm that stands to profit mightily from Global Warming. He never mentions the boards he is paid to sit on. He never mentions all the money he is making promulgating this hoax.
Is there climate change? Yep. Has been since the earth was formed and it will be going on until the earth is finished. It is called nature.
Al Gore is no better than Bernie Madoff. Hopefully he will come to the same end.
@Seneca Thanks for repeating something that's already in the post. I'm sure you didn't mean to say that as if you were somehow correcting me.
What you're describing, Ann, is widely known as the Al Gore Effect.
Abstract
Recent research has shown that the mere presence of Al Gore is able to reduce ambient temperatures by approximately 27.6°C. This phenomenon is termed the "Al Gore Effect." Various theories about the physical mechanism of this phenomenon, its dangers, and its potential usefulness in fighting global warming are discussed.
Even the BBC is asking What Happened to Global Warming?. You see, for the last 11 years, there hasn't been any.
Gore is getting quite wealthy from his global warming swindle. That alone is enough to make anything he says on the matter quite suspect.
When the global warmists openly accept nuclear electric generation as a legitimate and necessary energy source and as a replacement for coal-fired electric power, I'll start taking them seriously. Not one second sooner. For them to do any less demonstrates they are total frauds.
AllenS --
climate crisis
"WTF does that mean?"
A phrase to stir up the shallow reader.
When he (Al) acts the part, I'll believe he believes.
The late Michael Crichton had it down best. Yes there is global increases of manmade CO2 that are causing some increase in temperature. No it is not the end of the world.
We have been in an ice age for millions of years. The norm is for glaciers extending to New York and for Madison to look like Greenland. Yes CO2 is an issue, but we have lots of issues more important and more pressing to deal with.
I have believed for a long time now, this is not about "global warming", "climate change" or whatever the currant term is. It is about control, the elite think that they can run everyone's life better that the individual can. In there perfect world, all monies earned would be turned over to the government, they would send back the goods/services that they think we should have.
Weather is not climate on one snowy day. Ten years of declining temperatures begins to look like climate.
And ten years of NOT declining is also a climate.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8299079.stm
Al Gore, may I ask a few questions before the mike is cut off? Thanks.
How did you travel to Madison, and how will you travel to your next appearance from Madison? Was it aboard your usual Lear jet, or on a carbon-sparing public transport like a bus or train?
Have you demolished your 15,000 square foot home in Tennessee and moved into an 1800 square footer as a way of reducing your personal carbon footprint?
How many dollars, approximately, do you stand to make over the next ten years if Cap and Trade is signed into law?
Did you see how the weather was in my neighborhood yesterday, October 10? No? Here's a photo I took yesterday, October 10th.
Willie Soon is a physicist at the Solar and Stellar Physics Division of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics and an astronomer at the Mount Wilson Observatory. He thinks you are wrong about global warming. Why won't you debate him, prove him wrong?
Thank you, Mr. Gore. I am eager for your specific answers to my questions.
I'm sorry Mr. Gore, I forgot to ask one last question.
You are standing in a part of Wisconsin where there was a great glacier that began to melt some ten million years ago. Which make and model SUV caused the glacier to melt?
"Crisis" is the tipoff. The telltale tell of the political grifter.
"Phelim" is good, but it's nothing compared to the eminent neurologist, Lord Brain. That's right. He's not just Dr. Brain. He's Lord Brain, Baron Brain of Eynsham. The only way it could have been better is if he weren't the first Baron Brain.
"There's a difference between weather and climate"
No, there's only a difference between weather and climate when observed weather refutes global warming theory. When it supports the AGW religion, it's irrefutable proof of its validity.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/03/AR2006080301489.html
"Willie Soon" heh what a name....seems like it could be part of the horse race joke...and Bubble Gum is sticking to the rail while Toilet Paper is wiping up the rear and here comes Willie Soon.....
"He's Lord Brain, Baron Brain of Eynsham."
Years ago, the guy who ran the blood bank at the University of Chicago Hospitals was Dr. Fang.
Phrenology. Eugenics. The lyric insights of Marx and Freud described as hard, irrefutable scientific facts. The grand curiousity of intellectuals seldom extends to pondering the root causes of their stupidity. The fervor of their beliefs does more to express contempt for their antagonists than to establish the validity of their position.....I am not qualified to judge the pros and cons of global warming. However, we have sufficient evidence to judge the judges, and they have a poor track record.
My personal goal is to have no carbon footprint. Instead, I want to have a carbon impact crater.
Ann, as usual, takes the standard right wing cheap shot at Al Gore, throwing out the regular clump of wing nut chum to rile up the local idiots.
Anybody who's ever read anything of substance about global warming knows it has much more to do with unusual weather patterns than it getting "warmer" everywhere.
Maybe, instead of posting such drivel, she and some of the others here might want to listen to those who actually research and study such effects:
Meteorologists: Global Warming and Cold Weather Go Hand-In-Hand
By Lisa Schlein / Geneva / 1/14/09
The World Meteorological Organization says cold weather does not mean that global warming has abated. WMO says people should not confuse weather with climate.
People in Europe are shivering, while people in North Asia and parts of Australia are sweltering. Scientists say these weather extremes are to be expected and neither phenomenon can be used as a case for or against global warming.
Secretary-General of the World Meteorological Organization, Michel Jarraud, says people should not confuse local weather variability with climate change. (People like Ann)
Just because people in Geneva and elsewhere in Europe are shivering does not mean global warming has stopped. He says the trend toward global warming is still there.
"I think we have to be careful not to interpret any single event as a proof of either warming or the fact that warming has stopped," he said. "When scientists look at the global warming, they take into account many, many old possible available evidence. So, we cannot explain any single phenomenon by one single cause."
Jarraud says last year was cooler than the year before, but 2008 still ranks as the 10th warmest year on record.
Fred4Pres said..."The late Michael Crichton had it down best. Yes there is global increases of manmade CO2 that are causing some increase in temperature. No it is not the end of the world."
Michael Crichton was a global warming expert?
Based on what?
William - "However, we have sufficient evidence to judge the judges, and they have a poor track record."
Based on what?
Can you site facts that illustrate where their "track record" is poor?
There's a difference between weather and climate, but you've got to know that poor Al is sweating out every cold snap.
Cold snaps?
No, what Al Gore is sweating is the fact that not a single hurricane made landfall in the United States this season. In fact, for the Atlantic hurricane season thus far, there have been two - count 'em! - "major" hurricanes.
That movie that Al got the Oscar for? I thought the models showed that hurricanes were going to be wiping out the eastern and gulf coastal areas. Mean, vicious, brutal hurricanes!
Now, everyone will say that one season a trend does not make. Ok. Fine. But, AGW theories are based on computer models projecting future climate behavior, and policy is being dictated according to those models.
Why didn't the models predict this season?
Most people don't debate about infomercials.
Can you site facts that illustrate where their "track record" is poor?
People generally consider their track record poor because between WW2 and the late 70s -- when we were in a cooling spell -- they predicted that global cooling would be our doom. Then when we were in a warming trend -- between the late 1970s and 1998 -- they predicted global warming would be our doom. Now that global temperatures have been stable for over a decade, it's just "climate change." But no matter what it is, it's always the End of the World, Sinners Repent!
What always gets me, with climate and with flora and fauna, is why do all the environmentalists decide that "just now" is the snapshot that they all want to preserve.
Who is to say that "just now" is optimal?
What SUV or human actions rendered the Dodo bird extinct?
Isn't it possible that even now, some species of this animal or that plant are becoming extinct regardless of human action or inaction?
wv: redieseg
"Michael Crichton was a global warming expert?
Based on what?"
Al Gore is a global warming expert?
Based on what?
"climate crisis"? What climate crisis? Winter?
The global warming enthusiasts should really hold all their events between 1 July and the middle of September to avoid things like this.
There was also a big anti-global warming rally scheduled for early March in Washington DC that was snowed out. The jokes just write themselves.
Good point kimsch, I understand that Greenlanders have been enjoying the more moderate temperatures. Kind of relative.
wv: "relitio", you would know the meaning if you attended Hogwarts
Oh, and Chicago's Fox News meteorologist is Amy Freeze.
wv: disom
What SUV or human actions rendered the Dodo bird extinct?
Uh, that one's easy. We ate them into extinction is the old theory. The newer one is that the rats and other little beasts we brought with us, when we landed on their islands, competed them out of existence and ate their eggs and so on. Either way, there's reason to believe that humans were instrumental in bringing about the extinction of the dodo.
Why didn't the models predict this season?
I know of no meteorologist who expected an above-normal season in the Atlantic basin this year.
The Pacific basin has been quite active. Do not make the common mistake of thinking that your local neck of the woods is the Globe.
You can always count on Jeremy to throw shit on our parade.
Mad Man- seek and you shall find. Below is the first link I found when I googled "2009 huuricane season predictions":
From CNN on 12/8/2008...
"Next year is predicted to bring 14 named storms to the Atlantic Ocean, with seven of them becoming hurricanes, according to a university report that forecasts an "above average" 2009 hurricane season…..Hurricane Ike, one of 2007's "major" hurricanes, laid waste to coastal Texas. The annual report was released Wednesday by Colorado State University forecasters Philip Klotzback and William Gray -- six months before the Atlantic hurricane season starts………
The CSU report predicted that three of the season's seven hurricanes will develop into intense or major storms, meaning Category 3 or higher on the Saffir-Simpson scale. Category 3 storms have sustained winds of at least 111 mph."
Ann, as usual, takes the standard right wing cheap shot at Al Gore, throwing out the regular clump of wing nut chum to rile up the local idiots.
Jeremy, many thanks for the your totally unpredictable initial post on this thread. It caught me quite by surprise.
While you're here, maybe you could shed some light on why the glaciers in North America melted ten thousand years ago. Coal-fired electric power stations? GMC Suburbans? Really big bonfires? Dinosaur farts? What, because I'd really like to know.
I'll check back later for your answer. I don't keep my computer on all day because it uses way too much electricity. Besides, I'm winterizing the fishing boat out in the garage because it got cold earlier than usual this year.
Later, Dude.
@madison man -
The Atlantic season isn't even close to normal, let alone above normal. Out of the last 109 years, there have only been 19 years that have not seen a hurricane hit the US mainland, so one one have to say that this year is extraordinary for that reason alone
Your comment misses the point. We're supposed to trust and make far reaching policy on models projecting years into the future, but they can't accurately predict the current hurricane season.
AJ Lynch -- the state of El Nino as not well known last December, ergo the poor forecast. When things clarified, the predictions nosedived. I suspect there was some reluctance to make a drastic change as warranted by observations. So my sentence was incomplete: I should have included the phrase when all the observations were in. Note that the two hurricanes that have developed were both Major. I don't recall such a weird season as this: All or nothin'. You get a major hurricane, or a sheared-apart tropical storm. Odd.
El Nino in the Pacific means death to the Atlantic Hurricane Season. Always. But the shear that El nino generates over the Atlantic relaxed just enough, at times, to allow two big storms.
Chef Mojo, I'd say this season was unusual because a storm formed so far to the east -- Grace was the second farthest east-forming storm on record. I am confident when I say that no one uses current climate models to predict hurricane seasons. A pertinent question might be: are the actual tracks of the hurricanes relevant to climate prediction? (I don't know the answer to that question).
Michael Hasenstab: The reasons for climate variability on Earth are really well known. Google Milankovitch cycle.
William - "However, we have sufficient evidence to judge the judges, and they have a poor track record."
Based on what?
Can you site facts that illustrate where their "track record" is poor?
How about the fact that none of the models the global warming Chicken Littles used accurately predicted the last 11 years of no warming, and in fact predicted a constantly increasing warming over the past decade?
Althouse said:
Really? I would have thought that the economic slowdown was good for his cause. Less production, less carbon emissions, right?
Silly, mindless snark. Despite Althouse’s and conservatives’ retarded belief that Gore et al are pro-unhealthy economy, we’re not. Even if an unhealthy economy counteracts AGW in the immediate term, maintaining an unhealthy economy is a major problem, too. Duh. Clearly Gore thinks (as do clear-thinking people in general) that it’s possible to have both a healthy economy and counteract AGW at the same time. Closed-minded conservatives like Althouse are unable to believe this concept.
"Now, quick, let's all ruin the economy some more the way Al Gore wants us to"
I hope the Republican speechwriters use this soundbite. It's pretty excellent.
wv = deneuss = Dr. Seuss deniers?
Now, for something Althouse doesn't know and most others won't tell you, AFP is closely linked to Koch (link), the largest priv. co. in the U.S. They're involved in the... energy field.
AFP is also involved in the tea parties. Instead of concentrating on fundamental things that actually matter - such as imm. - those "parties" concentrate on taxes. Oddly enough, lower taxes would mean more profit for corporations (it's just a coincidence!)
Don't take from the above that I'm a Gore fan; I made this video after all. The take-away is that people need to stop being useful idiots for those who have an not-so-hidden agenda.
Clearly Gore thinks...
You're out on a limb there.
Oddly enough, lower taxes would mean more profit for corporations (it's just a coincidence!)
That would be lower corporate taxes, like they have in Europe (look at Table II.1 -- US and Japan are clear outliers with unusually high corporate tax rates).
Unless you mean that lower personal income taxes mean people have more money to spend => a better performing economy => bigger corporate profits, in which case you've clearly bought into the whole trickle-down theory.
Al Gore has a direct financial interest in the promotion of "green technologies."
He is not, by any means, a disinterested observer.
Rather, he is the pitch man used to swing public perception towards policies that will directly benefit his and his partner's investments.
I'm just waiting for that bloating pig to say something like, "The Sun is evil, it's playing on our fears!!!"
"Seneca the Younger said...
Weather is not climate on one snowy day. Ten years of declining temperatures begins to look like climate.
- "Ann Althouse said...
@Seneca Thanks for repeating something that's already in the post. I'm sure you didn't mean to say that as if you were somehow correcting me."
I don't think Seneco was repeating you, Ann. He was taking your observation that one's days cold weather does not rebut AGW...and saying in turn while that may be true, 10 years of such days of cooler than normal weather strung together DOES make for a small climatological trend.
NOt enough to say "Global Warming is Bunk" the way some ideologues do...but enough to question the URGENCY of needing to cripple the US citizen's standard of living (while certain Ruling Elites stand to make hundreds of millions off the "green solution" miseries imposed).
=================
"I am optimistic," Gore said. "I think there has been a very powerful recognition, not only in this country, but in many countries, that there is a linkage between the climate crisis and the economic crisis and the national security crisis that is in part derivative of the world's ridiculous over-dependence on carbon-based fuels."
Althouse - Really? I would have thought that the economic slowdown was good for his cause. Less production, less carbon emissions, right? They just don't say that because it would make people mad.
That is one key area Greenies and Obama seek to block debate on "because the discussion is over!"
THe other one is the fixation on "moral per capita carbon consumption.....that talks of the immorality of people in nations with Zero population growth using more carbon than people who live in countries where they are breeding like rats.
Overpopulation and illegal immigration (as a 'safety valve' for nations that use the US as a dumping ground for their surplus population.) Even legal immigration of whole villages here on family ties or millions of 'noble refugees' admitted?
That can't be discussed either...because the Greenies and the Left decided long ago that such discussions would be "racist!".
And because powerful people paying not just DEmocrats but the Republican pimps like George W Bush and John McCain stand to make a mint off flooding the US with 3rd world people and collapsing wage levels.
Even though population growth and mass immigration drive up NET carbon use. Americans use 80% less carbon Per Capita than in 1973. But we use far more NET because immigration drove 90% of the increase in 'carbon users' from 225 million in 1973 to 308 million now. With 363 million then 438 million projected to be the US population in 2030 then 2050 by the US Census Bureau.
tonejunkie - Despite Althouse’s and conservatives’ retarded belief that Gore et al are pro-unhealthy economy, we’re not. Even if an unhealthy economy counteracts AGW in the immediate term, maintaining an unhealthy economy is a major problem, too. Duh. Clearly Gore thinks (as do clear-thinking people in general) that it’s possible to have both a healthy economy and counteract AGW at the same time. Closed-minded conservatives like Althouse are unable to believe this concept.
No, it is just looking at the economic effects of what Obama, the Grenie nuts in Congress, and the Religion of Algore - have planned.
Blocking all offshore drilling planned and relying on foreign oil is Not good for the US economy.
Blocking 40 oil and gas drilling leases approved in Utah is not good for the American economy.
Adding 1100 dollars to Americans net household costs by an energy tax imposed indirectly by cap and trade on what they buy, have to pay added local taxes for, and household utility costs is bad for the economy.
Losing 2.4 jobs good paying jobs in the industrial sector for every "exciting green job" created - (the Spanish experience) is not good for the economy.
The idea that 400 years of coal and natural gas reserves are making for an "unsustainable economy" and coupled with quasi-religious Green positions that nuclear power and hydroelectric dams are implicitly evil and must be eliminated - to then go to an economy based on "windmills, solar power, and MIRACLE!! ethanol....is not only not good for the economy, it is a fantasy.
The idea of "high tech, exciting green jobs" cannot be good for the economy if the top two makers of solar panels announce that manufacturing of them is all going to China...and Wind Turbine steel is not coming out of closed US steel plants but coal-fired Indian and Chinese steel mills.
THe idea of setting a moral example to India and China is not much good if they praise our moral example, announce they find alternative energy "exciting and worth studying", then state they will increase coal burning by 30% by 2030 to handle the making of materials of production and the electricity needed to do all the work of manufacturing being handed to them from "moral example nations."
Power Line has video of Phelim McAleer's question at the conference, and a quick rundown of what actually happened in the suit that Gore said was decided "in favor of the movie."
"I am not qualified to judge the pros and cons of global warming. However, we have sufficient evidence to judge the judges, and they have a poor track record"
I'm not qualified either, so I have to use other behaviors to assess the truthfulness of the actors. Scientists questioning global warming analyze the data and offer arguments to refute the theory (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/10/why-the-continued-interest/#more-1192, for example). Proponents of the theory demand that funding be eliminated to groups that question AGW (http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2006/sep/20/oilandpetrol.business), that scientists who question it be professionally sanctioned (http://www.weather.com/blog/weather/8_11392.html) and conflate 3 separate issues into one (is GW happening, is it due to humans, is it worth doing anything about it).
The lack of cost benefit analysis is bad enough, but I cannot recall an instance when people trying to suppress debate about something didn't turn out to be (to put it charitably) wrong. And don't get on me about the industry funding nonsense (both sides need to drop that line of argument). As the 9-11 hijackers could explain, if they were still alive, ideology is an exponentially more powerful motivator than financial gain. People who rabidly hate western culture or capitalism will say and do anything to destroy both.
The question of why smart people are so damned stupid has puzzled ordinary people for centuries. I have applied for a grant from the Guggenheim Foundation to subsidize the dissection of the living brains of all MacArthur genius award winners to explore this riddle. Following completion of my clinical research, I submit the following hypothesis: Smart people are attracted to ideas that are repugnant to productive members of society and vice versa. The formula for their attraction can be mathematically expressed as the inverse proportion squared. This formula is not an explanation but it does give us a predictor of the intellectuals' response to child rape, Big Macs, and victory in Afghanistan. Global warming is, or course, part of this phenomenon. Further work must be done in order to isolate the clinical causes of this stupidity, but my hypothesis does, I think, go a long way in making this a predictable phenomenon.
dissection of the living brains of all MacArthur genius award winners . . .
It's vivisection if they're living.
(the other kev)
Personally, I love the phrase 'wing nut chum.' It's about the only clever thing I've ever seen come from Jeremy, and a great blog name.
As for Gore, his hysteria is a little too similar to that of a car salesman who is trying to get the sucker to sign on the dotted line before checking the Carfax. He says we're 'ridiculously' over-dependent on carbon-based fuels? Those fuels provide heat, light, sanitation, communication and medicine for most of the world's people, Mr. Gore. If you want those people to give them up - right now! - you had better have something on the shelf to replace them with.
The other Kev,
Gore wants to take what we have away now so we'll be forced to come up with the alternatives.
Because if we have relatively cheap, relatively plentiful fuel now, there's no real reason to come up with alternatives.
wv: plipsant
Seneca the Younger said...
Weather is not climate on one snowy day. Ten years of declining temperatures begins to look like climate.
10 years of cooler temps is a trend. Particularly when the models didn't predict it and the climate gurus said there was no mechanism other than CO2 that would account for temp changes. Well CO2 has been going up (course it was much higher in prehistoric times) and yet, while CO2 is higher, temps are lower. So now the climate gurus have discovered that other things are at play and are claiming that their corrected models now predict disaster once again.
the curent models are crap. Until a model can both replicate the last 200 years and predict accurately future trends it is unverified crap.
currently all you have is FAITH that Gore is right and world is coming to an end in 50 years.
Diddling about 10 years, 200 years makes me laugh. Start talking geologic time(10^6 - 10 ^8) years and you're talking!
Acceptable question: What has enchanted you about bring in charge of the climate crisis?
I'll start to worry about global warming when we're no longer having baseball playoff games snowed out.
By the way, what happened in Boston today? I hope Lem is OK...
One of my goals is to live long enough to see the day that the world admits Al Gore and AGW is bullshit.
Does this make me a bad person?
What's this comment thread doing here? All science Gore Science IS SETTLED at the UN and deniers are therefore willfully plotting mass murder. I hereby make a citizen's arrest of everybody with a question. Don't you people understand Gore Science?
Phelim has such a refreshing outlook! Treat Big Anything the same. Jeez that would make life way easier for the MSM and its editors.
My local paper trots out green energy stories with regularity. The reporter never questions the cost benefit, the wisdom of making these enormous capital investments or even the basic common sense in making huge financial commitments to green energy tech which is not fully proven.
I smell a John Edwards type of C-Section faked science and that of the other great American Trial Lawyers that learned that they can easily pay for the creation of a Faux Science with treatises and faked test results generated from the Infallible Computer Program (like a Pope), and spread its study thru out worldwide academia by cash grants for faked expert opinions. They simply sold these magnificant skills to the UN boys for a cut of the loot. Any politician that supports this Hornswoggle con job called Carbon Footprint Reduction is a criminal per se, and that includes today's Democrats.
Phelim is making a name for himself asking hard questions of global warming alarmists that the press doesn't seem interested in asking.
Link
This is him getting thrown out of a movie premiere for asking tough questions of the director. Okay, they weren't actually that tough. Just mighty inconvenient.
Not to toot my own horn, but I consider myself very trustworthy on the topics that I cover in depth, in that I acknowledge the other side's arguments, I show how they're wrong, and I don't try to ignore things that are inconvenient. The vast majority of people who run sites/blogs are not like that at all. Is there even one single person who's published comments about this issue that's trustworthy? I'm going to guess no: all of them ignore aspects of the other side's argument, have hidden agendas, questionable funding sources, and so on.
Cedarford said:
Blocking all offshore drilling planned and relying on foreign oil is Not good for the US economy.
Ugh. Big Oil unzips its fly and conservatives drop to their knees eager to please. Drill, baby, drill indeed.
Yawn. That slave-to-the-status-quo mentality lost the election.
See: “Can Offshore Drilling Really Make the U.S. Oil Independent?”
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=can-offshore-drilling-make-us-independent
Hint: no.
Adding 1100 dollars to Americans net household costs by an energy tax imposed indirectly by cap and trade on what they buy, have to pay added local taxes for, and household utility costs is bad for the economy.
Your source is a Heritage Foundation estimation (shock) which is conservatively biased.
See: “EPA analysis estimates the average cost per household to be between $98 and $140 per year.”
http://factcheck.org/2009/05/cap-and-trade-cost-inflation/
Losing 2.4 jobs good paying jobs in the industrial sector for every "exciting green job" created - (the Spanish experience) is not good for the economy
Assuming that’s even true, that you think the U.S. can’t improve upon Spain shows how little pride you actually have in our country.
The idea that 400 years of coal and natural gas reserves…
Typical conservative, dinosaur thinking. Geez. Must progressives always lead the way with conservatives kicking and screaming clinging to the past? Embrace the 21st century, please.
The idea of “high tech, exciting green jobs” cannot be good for the economy…
See: “It's Getting Easier to Be Green: Jobs in Green Science -- Green jobs are red hot. The list of green science jobs is as endless as the approaches.”
http://sciencecareers.sciencemag.org/career_magazine/previous_issues/articles/2009_04_03/science.opms.r0900069
THe idea of setting a moral example to India and China is not much good…
“But, Maaaaa, China and India are doing it! Why can’t we?”
See: “Green Shoots from Brown Fields -- These [4,100 contaminated] sites have the potential to produce 950,000 megawatts--more than the country's total power needs in 2007, according to EPA data.”
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=can-offshore-drilling-make-us-independent
Drill SGT - the curent models are crap. Until a model can both replicate the last 200 years and predict accurately future trends it is unverified crap.
THe current overall models may be crap in "divining" how climate will shift, since human pollution and exploitation of resources are one variable....but there are some very worrisome FACTS in the "human" part of the data.
Contrary to "Pro-Growth" deniers of ANY man-made problem...who say the Earth's capacity to absorb infinite pollution or infnite demand on resources....can always be met. Or if one resource runs out "miracle high technology" will always solve matters....
Contrary to them, as human population has gone from perhaps 25 million in AD 100 to 1.2 billion in 1900 to 7.4 billion today to an anticipated 12.7 billion in 2050 - we HAVE seen large and smaller local disasters from pollution and overexploitation of resources. By far smaller populations that did not - depite being as smart as we are today, just as innovate in their way - did not find a way to get out of pollution killing people, technologically finessing their ways out of population collapses caused by pollution, drought&famine, plagues....nor of whole ecosystems collapsing on overexploitation of resources for a given population..
We have seen accumulating pollutants end civilizations like Mesopotamia (salinification from excess water use). We have seen fisheries destroyed and lands over-harvested of timber becoming deserts.
So to me, Global Warming deniers who say the Earth can accept unlimited populations and somehow handle any resource use or pollution with "no harm, really" are as much off the farm as those predicting Polar Bear Doom and nations inudated with rising water levels in the next 10 years unless "Americans suffer to set a moral example in fighting evil Carbon Use - to others."
Correction... That last link was a repeat of an earlier one. Here's the actual one.
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=green-shoots-from-brown
"Anybody who's ever read anything of substance about global warming..."
Nothing of substance has been written by any legitimate scientist. A lot of science fiction has been written. Remember, Al Gore et al have received no science awards; not even a Nobel science award.
Of course some here would state that the Oscar is a science award as Hollywood is an expert on everything.
Personally, I think it's great when I hear denialists pissing about AGW by saying that the earth's climate has seen many changes over the billions of years it has existed.
To me, it shows that they don't understand or care that the stable climate achieved 10,000 years ago, at the advent of the agricultural revolution, was the key milestone that allowed for human civilization.
Personally, I think it's great when denialists piss about how a strong economy precludes the development of markets for energy production that do not generate CO2, or the market for inventions that make energy use more efficient.
It shows that they are more interested in protecting certain industries than in allowing the market to accommodate the development of new industries.
Personally, I think it's great when people use fear of AGW as an argument for its inherent falsity.
It shows that they believe science, evidence and knowledge should be in the service of the human ego, rather than a search for objective truth.
Personally, I think it's great when denialists bitch and moan about how unacceptable it is that any changes to their lifestyle, no matter how short-term, might result from effectively dealing with AGW.
It shows that they care more about their own pocketbooks than in the welfare of the entire human race.
It shows that they think less of people who either have less money than they do or who are not so psychologically limited as to use it as the only measurement for their success and happiness.
Personally, I love it when AGW is attacked as a giant scheme to bring about socialism, weaken America, or destroy the American way of life.
It shows that they are so ignorant of American history and the many precedents we have of coming together to solve great challenges, that they would call Benjamin Franklin, the Founding father and famous scientist who uttered the following words, a threat to American initiative and individualism:
"Gentlemen, we must all hang together, or assuredly we shall all hang separately."
They are showing themselves to be less American by the day.
Why do conservatives hate America?
Surely you do not hate America more than you love your luxury car, Ann. Do you?
Tone Junkie:
Your plan to use 5 million acres for solar panels would cost about $4 Trillion or $52,000 per household. I am basing that on a project in PA that is spending $78 Million on 100 acres.
Is your plan a realy good and really sensible investment in your opinion? Keep in mind $4 Trillion is double what we spent in 2001 on the federal budget and is almost $14,000 for every man, woman and child in the country.
MUL:
Your comment is so laced with emotion, it could be construed as evidence that Global Warming is, in fact, your religion and you are trying to force your beliefs on other.
Ben Franklin would have laughed in your face with this argument [I believe he was not religious at all]. If you correct and the situation is dire, why don't these wealthy globe-trotting, global-warming zealots walk the walk?
I just pointed out the solar panel business model costs $52,000 per household!! That makes no sense does it?
If the GW crowd was truly worried about energy use, they would be clamoring for the govt to spend $3,000-$5,000 to reinforce every home's insulation. But they have not done that?
Why not? Because there is no BIG MONEY in that for the Gores and GE and Soros, etc.
Use your head and follow the big money. These so-called solutions are nothing more than a money-grab for some very well-connected people.
AJ Lynch said:
Your plan to use 5 million acres for solar panels would cost about $4 Trillion or $52,000 per household.
My plan? Why in your mind does that have to be the only plan? There's that conservative closed-mindedness rearing its ugly head again. That's merely one example I tossed out there.
M U L...What is the proof of rising co2 causing a HotHouse effect? It is a harmless gas that is so small a part of the Atmosphere that it can have no effect even if it goes up 10 times as much as it composes of the air today. Every theory huckstered by the Anti-CO2 Religion assumes that the opposite is true. So where is their proof. We all know that the global air temperatures are cooling faster as more of the the CO2 HotHouse effect kicks in? I do not have to deny what is obviously a falsehood. The Al Gore Criminal conspiracy to rob Americans of their free use of their resources has to present some proof that HotHouse effect theory is not Phony. That's how Science works, and you are intelligent enough to know that.
Tone Junkie:
It's the plan you offered to us as a good one! That makes it your plan.
How am I close-minded? I took the time to look at your plan and then asked you if the exorbitant cost was worth it?
AJ Lynch said...
It's the plan you offered to us as a good one! That makes it your plan.
That was one of five points I addressed in that post: offshore drilling, cap and trade, green job viability, coal and natural gas reserves, leading by example to India and China. You're just a typical conservative who thinks the environment should never, ever take precedence over maximum profit.
"Your source is a Heritage Foundation estimation (shock) which is conservatively biased.
See: “EPA analysis estimates the average cost per household to be between $98 and $140 per year.”
http://factcheck.org/2009/05/cap-and-trade-cost-inflation/"
Your source is the EPA, which has a left wing bias and an exceptionally powerful motivation to expand its authority. I agree Heritage has a right wing bias, but why would it be any less credible than the EPA?
Al Gore+Global Warming=Bernie Madoff.
Tone:
Be careful - I think you are are in danger of overdosing on The Kool Aid.
Cap & trade is another name for big tax program. Green jobs is a myth. I am actually reading Van Jones's book and he is clueless throughout. Worst book I ever bought. Read it yourself if you have the guts to learn the green movement is a money grab.
A few months ago I heard conservative radio host Dennis Prager wondering aloud to his audience why it is there's a liberal/conservative divide on AGW. He really thought it was a good question. He had no idea. I would've called his show, but it's not broadcast live here. I wrote him an email instead:
Dennis,
Reasons for liberal/conservative divide on AGW:
1) Conservatives associate environmentalists with hippies whom they hate, so whatever environmentalists say conservatives are against it by default.
2) Conservatives are so capitalistic they don't like anything to hamper profit, including "setbacks" to protect the environment.
3) Conservatives are less scientifically-minded. Case in point: evolution denial. If you're intellectually honest, you'll admit evolution deniers/skeptics are overwhelmingly conservative. This is not coincidental. Conservatives are quite simply more dogmatically-minded and less scientifically-minded. These two concepts are indeed mutually exclusive because the purer the scientific method, the less contaminated it is with dogma, and vice versa. Evolution deniers/skeptics (conservatives, let's face it) fail this test glaringly and this mentality carries over to the AGW issue, as well as all others.
Substantiation: a recent Pew poll showed only 9% of scientists self-identify as conservative whereas the majority self-identify as liberal or very liberal.
Pew poll July 9, 2009 http://people-press.org/report/?pageid=1549
4) Conservatives are more reluctant to accept facts that counter their beliefs than liberals are. Studies have shown this as well. Here's one for example:
http://www.nature.com/neuro/journal/v10/n10/abs/nn1979.html
Hope that helps.
Since AJ Lynch cites not one piece of evidence regarding the science of climatology, the history of human civilization and agriculture, or whether Ben Franklin's interest in collective action had nothing to do with furthering certain parochial moneyed interests or socialism, I'll take that as evidence that conspiracy theories are the religion that he is trying to force on others.
As for my own emotions, I fully admit to having a soft side for human civilization, drought-free agriculture, and erring on the side of caution when it comes to altering the composition of systems that are responsible for maintaining life as we know it on this planet.
Dear TG,
M U L...What is the proof of rising co2 causing a HotHouse effect?
If you want absolute proof you will never have it because we cannot know the results of subjecting the planet to the giant science experiment until the experiment is concluded.
Who gets to decide when that point is reached is, I suppose, I rather subjective, and political consideration.
Further, we cannot control for all known variables. We are probably altering the systems of the planet in a number of ways.
However, we do know that CO2 is a heat-retaining gas and that if you increase its composition in smaller, controlled systems, there will be an effect on temperature.
Therefore, the conservative course of action is to avoid messing around with it.
It is a harmless gas that is so small a part of the Atmosphere that it can have no effect even if it goes up 10 times as much as it composes of the air today.
Haven't we been over this before? What does its alleged harmlessness
(I presume you mean in terms of human toxicology) have to do with its effects on retaining heat? And where do you produce these numbers from? Just because a number sounds small doesn't mean it lacks effects on biological or chemical systems. Are you aware of buffers? They can resist changes in pH to a a system at very small amounts. And yet, if you mess with the pH of human blood by a "small" number, you can make a patient acidotic or alkylotic and kill him. Why does your subjective interpretation of how small or large a number of something is have anything to do with how much of an objective effect it has on something else? That's not a very scientific way of thinking.
Every theory huckstered by the Anti-CO2 Religion assumes that the opposite is true. So where is their proof.
I already told you what I know, what is known, and that I prefer to err on the side of caution. If you want to continue subjecting the planet to this giant experiment, then at least take responsibility for the fact that the effects on everyone else can be worse than you care to predict.
It's this irresponsible attitude that industries take, of suppressing science, of not caring to err on the side of caution, of not caring about the effects on human welfare over the bottom line, that caused everything from the thalidomide phenomenon all the way through Avandia's suppressed evidence in contributing to heart failure. And these are human pharmaceuticals! Can you imagine the harms that industries not devoted to making money off of the ostensible goal of protecting human health have done? I can. What about phthalates? There are countless instances of industries showing that they care more about money than about preventing all sorts of harms to human health, including birth defects, and you want me to buy into some industry-sponsored ideology that says screw science and caution in its application to human welfare? Why? I think you can forget about that!
We all know that the global air temperatures are cooling faster as more of the the CO2 HotHouse effect kicks in?
I don't even know what you are trying to say here.
I do not have to deny what is obviously a falsehood. The Al Gore Criminal conspiracy to rob Americans of their free use of their resources has to present some proof that HotHouse effect theory is not Phony.
This doesn't sound well-reasoned, and frankly, more like the type of talk that AJ Lynch would decry above if he were being fair.
That's how Science works, and you are intelligent enough to know that.
Well, thanks. I'd like to think I'm intelligent enough and experienced enough to know how science works. But frankly, I don't see where in the above statements you addressed the science in a comprehensive or relevant way. I saw some cherry-picking about some phenomenon that I've never heard about before, as if that alone is supposed to obviate the simple correlation between CO2 and heat retention. But I haven't seen any reference to any numbers, statistics or any of the metrics that actually matter to science.
Listen. I'm not just trained in science. I work as a clinician and I work in a didactic capacity. Plus, I work in a capacity where I have to review the claims and findings behind the newest pharmaceuticals and health treatments and whether or not they have any value to our patients beyond what all the marketing hype says. I have an ethical obligation to all these people, and by professional extension, to any interested portion of humanity who is curious to know about the effects of the interventions of many types of human technology on their health - not just medicines. Does the power industry have the same obligation? Of course they don't. But despite not acknowledging that, you make this incredible leap that presumes dispassionate, disinterested scientific researchers are, by a margin of 10 to 1, in collusion with some ideological conspiracy led by Al Gore - (nevermind the fact that Gore followed the science before scientists somehow decided, as you might have us believe, to propel the career and reputation of Al Gore).
Of course, you don't have to trust what I have to say. You can claim that my training in the basic sciences, while admittedly limited when it comes to addressing climate issues, is somehow still not advanced enough to understand the simple relationship between CO2 or gas composition and temperature. And you can even claim that my training in a capacity to advance human health and inform people of the pros and cons of the medical technology used to better it, or detract from it, makes me less objective, a bad candidate for understanding how the powerful power industry somehow has 100% wonderful intentions and would never contribute to all the disinformation that somehow seems to fit the preferred conservative narrative of making sure people can make money in whatever way they see fit. But you can't honestly claim to do that while having seriously gone through the arguments that cut just as powerfully, in the same fashion, against your perspective and Althouse's perspective and AJ Lynch's perspective and the perspective of everyone else who is blatantly not objective about this matter. That's just not being intellectually honest.
MUL...You just gave an eloquent closing argument as good as John Edwards' closing arguements to juries in the C-section fetal distress cases based 100% upon new consensus science upon the subject that happened to disagree with the reality that real expert Ob/Gyns lived by. This disaster was empowered by the FALSE arguements the MDs were uncaring money grubbers that needed to be Punished out of business. Since the "Science" testimony and academic credentials seemed real, the rest of the illusion fed to juries made Edwards super wealthy while he incidentally destroyed most obstetrical medical practice for the foreseeable future. We now know it was all a carefully crafted Sting operation by a ring of professional liars for money.So what is the reality about CO2 as a HotHouse Gas? If you trust the new Science that Gore relies upon then you are trusting them for no reason except a hunch, like all of John Edwards' marks on juries did.
Well, as long as you believe that "reality" and constructs like "false" have any meaning to a scientist beyond what data can show, then we really don't have any use for science in this discussion now whatsoever. Do we?
I don't see any instance where data was falsified in showing that CO2 is a heat-retaining gas. This has been known for over a century. No slick lobbyist was needed to find that out. However, the oil, coal and gas lobbies sure do seem to require a lot of lobbyists and think tanks to get people to believe them and what they have to say about all this. And why shouldn't they? Just like trial lawyers, that's how they make their money.
It's interesting that you will take a "follow the money" argument to every place it leads except for when it takes you to Exxon Mobil, Shell, BP, all their think tanks, and... and, well, who else am I missing?
Adding 1100 dollars to Americans net household costs by an energy tax imposed indirectly by cap and trade on what they buy, have to pay added local taxes for, and household utility costs is bad for the economy.
Your source is a Heritage Foundation estimation (shock) which is conservatively biased.
Seriously. You are objecting to the $1100 number? (I believe I have seen it predicted elsewhere at closer to $1700)
Have you ever seen a tax that was overestimated by its proponents?
Ha ha.
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