"And when they came for me..."

Government officials calling for suppression of dissent is not new. We've seen it happen over and over again in totalitarian states and theocracies throughout the world.

However, it appears we've turned some sort of horrific corner here in the U.S. since Senators John D. Rockefeller IV (D-Moron-WV) and Olympia Snowe (R-Idiot-VT) feel confident enough to send an open letter to ExxonMobil demanding the company end its support for climate change skeptics.

The entire letter is a disgusting attempt to suppress any debate on the issue. The letter's penultimate paragraph is particularly repulsive:

"In light of the adverse impacts still resulting from your corporations activities, we must request that ExxonMobil end any further financial assistance or other support to groups or individuals whose public advocacy has contributed to the small, but unfortunately effective, climate change denial myth. Further, we believe ExxonMobil should take additional steps to improve the public debate, and consequently the reputation of the United States. We would recommend that ExxonMobil publicly acknowledge both the reality of climate change and the role of humans in causing or exacerbating it. Second, ExxonMobil should repudiate its climate change denial campaign and make public its funding history. Finally, we believe that there would be a benefit to the United States if one of the world's largest carbon emitters headquartered here devoted at least some of the money it has invested in climate change denial pseudo-science to global remediation efforts. We believe this would be especially important in the developing world, where the disastrous effects of global climate change are likely to have their most immediate and calamitous impacts."

Full text of the letter can be found at either the Wall Street Journal site or Senator Snowe's site:
http://opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110009337

http://tinyurl.com/w887p

Regardless of where one stands on the climate change debate, we should all be disturbed by the fact that this is not the ranting of some half-baked, anarchist street protester, but rather a calculated, written and explicit threat against private citizens by two United States senators.

The Wall Street Journal has an op-ed that condemns the Senators' letter but which, in my opinion, lacks any tone of real outrage.

WSJ editorial at:
http://www.opinionjournal.com/editorial/feature.html?id=110009338

More to the point is a press release from the Ayn Rand Institute condemning the letter for what it is: an egregious attack on free speech. The Institute rightly denounces the Rockefeller/Snowe letter in no uncertain terms.

"Observe that the senators do not offer a single fact intended to convince ExxonMobil of the truth of their position. Their message is not 'agree with us because,' but 'agree with us or else.' That is a message appropriate to a dictator, not to the representatives of a free nation.

"Defenders of free speech must stand up against this vicious attempt to intimidate ExxonMobil into embracing the global warming cause, and declare that the government has no business telling Americans what they should think or say."

Full text of the ARI press release:
http://www.aynrand.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=13691&news_iv_ctrl=1221

Censorship of this sort is a more dangerous and immediate threat than any projected climate catastrophe.

Global Warming Is More B.S. Than We Thought

A 400-page U.N. report entitled Livestock's Long Shadow, states that cow "emissions" are more damaging to the planet than "cars, planes and all other forms of transport put together."

It turns out that cow flatulence and manure emit more than one third of planet's methane, a greenhouse gas which warms the world 20 times faster than carbon dioxide.

Our path is clear. We need a Kyoto Protocol to set the cow population back to pre-1990 levels. I'm thinking a massive barbeque ought to do it. You know, one last party before we all burst into flames.

Turns out Gary Larson was on to the devastating impact of cows way before Al Gore.

This is an exciting development for climate change advocates as they can now join forces with the obesity epidemic and PETA activists in a move to ban greenhouse-gas-producing cows, leather coats and Outback Steakhouses.

This should take some of the heat off SUV owners and put it squarely where it belongs - on all those smug, milk drinkers.

Link to the story here:

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article2062484.ece

P.S. - Glad to see the U.N. has gotten such a good handle on the whole world peace thing that they can take time to put out a 400 page report on cow shit. Thanks for the memories, Kofi.

In A Nutshell


DANGER! Potential common sense outbreak...

In an study published in Environmental Geology (Volume 50, Number 6 / August, 2006), L. F. Khilyuk and G. V. Chilingar two researchers from the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at USC, suggest that:

"identification and understanding of global forces of nature driving the Earth's climate is crucial for developing [an] adequate relationship between people and nature, and for developing and implementing a sound course of action aimed at survival and welfare of the human race.."

Khiluk and Chilingar have a couple of other interesting things to say in their peer-reviewed article...

"[We] identify and describe the following global forces of nature driving the Earth's climate: (1) solar radiation as a dominant external energy supplier to the Earth, (2) outgassing as a major supplier of gases to the World Ocean and the atmosphere, and, possibly, (3) microbial activities generating and consuming atmospheric gases at the interface of lithosphere and atmosphere."

The website CO2 Science (http://www.co2science.org) has as concise a summation as you can get so we'll go with it:

The take-home message of Khilyuk and Chilingar's analysis, as they describe it, is that "any attempts to mitigate undesirable climatic changes using restrictive regulations are condemned to failure, because the global natural forces are at least 4-5 orders of magnitude greater than available human controls." What is more, they indicate that "application of these controls will lead to catastrophic economic consequences," noting that "since its inception in February 2005, the Kyoto Protocol has cost about $50 billion supposedly averting about 0.0005°C of warming by the year 2050," and that "the Kyoto Protocol is a good example of how to achieve the minimum results with the maximum efforts (and sacrifices)." This being the case, they conclude that "attempts to alter the occurring global climatic changes have to be abandoned as meaningless and harmful," and that in their place the "moral and professional obligation of all responsible scientists and politicians is to minimize potential human misery resulting from oncoming global climatic change," hopefully by more immediate, rational and cost-effective means.
-from the CO2 Science website

[MJ note: It's easy to miss the implication of the term "order of magnitude" as a scientific estimation. To say that natural forces are "4-5 orders of magnitude greater than human controls" is to say that they are 10,000 to 100,000 times greater. Or a really lot. Thanks, Wikipedia.]

We're not sure this is what Al Gore was referring to when he said, "The debate on global warming is over" but maybe it should have been.

Just as important as the quantitative research in this article is the identification of the real moral issue involved in global warming: the efficacy of human life on Earth. Most of the time, the global warming debate elevates "nature" to the status of that-which-is-to-be-worshiped. Far too often, we're told conditions must be right for mosquitoes, polar bears and frogs or we are somehow being "immoral."

Identifying "man" as the rightful object of any drive to improve conditions for living on Earth is a major step forward.

Ain't No Glacier Wide Enough: Supremes to Hear Global Warming Case

The U.S. Supreme Court announced this past Monday that it will enter the global warming debate and consider a lawsuit that aims to require the federal government to regulate carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gas emissions from motor vehicles.

Climate change activists were quick to point out that this is indicative of how serious an issue global warming is.

Not to put too fine a point on it ...but the Court also agreed to hear the "Bong Hits 4 Jesus" case. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11767029/

If unsuccessful in their attempt before the nation's highest court, global warming lawyer's have vowed an appeal in the court watched by the nation's highest people.....

Stage Fright


There is a very comprehensive ...well, how should we put this ...uh, critique of Al Gore's sales presentation on global warming at the following link:
http://www.cei.org/pages/ait_response-book.cfm

The report does not address Gore's latest claim (shown here) that we will add 12 degrees C to the Earth's temperature over the next 20 years by focusing the spotlight on anyone but him.

Irony Alert

Marc Morano, director of communications for the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, appeared at a U.N. conference in Nairobi and said that scientific debate on the issue of global warming was being suppressed and that global warming skeptics were being demonized. Conference attendees didn't have to wait long for a couple of examples of what Morano was talking about.

U.N. Chief Kofi Annan, speaking at the same 189-nation meeting of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), equated global warming with the dangers faced from weapons of mass destruction and went on to cite global warming as the cause for everything except the Britney/K-Fed break-up. One day later Al Gore referred to Australia and the U.S. as the "Bonnie and Clyde" of the global warming crisis.

You don't have to be a rocket (or climate change) scientist to recognize Kofi Annan's claim as absurd on its face. Given the choice of being at Hiroshima or at the foot of Mt. Kilamanjaro as the glacier melts is a pretty easy pick for most of us.

Gore is no doubt upset that Bonnie and Clyde didn't drive a hybrid car and is most likely looking to blame them for the rise in carbon dioxide prior to the 1960s. I think if we get to choose, we should opt for the U.S. to be Warren Beatty and let Australia be Faye Dunaway. (We'll enjoy some historical irony here since it was widely believed that Clyde Barrow was gay.)

On a broader point, it seems we've lost all ability to have a reasoned and nuanced discussion on the topic of global warming. Soundbites and absurd analogies have taken the place of any kind of rational discussion. If these two sides were your kids you'd have them take a timeout.

I think it's time for a TV show where you're not allowed to shout and anytime you make a patently ridiculous claim you're ejected from the studio. Sure it would be like being back in kindergarten, but that seems to be what's called for in the current debate.

I Feel Like ...Somebody's Watching Me

MSNBC reports today on a monster, hurricane-like storm on Saturn that is about about 5,000 miles across and has winds up to 350mph.

Climate change activists were quick to point out the storm proves their contention that there is a link between global warming and hurricane severity.

Driving an SUV just became an intergalactic moral crime. You're not only affecting the lives of your children and your children's children but also Klingon children and the children of Klingon children.

Time for one of our favorite climate change quotes from Michael Crichton:

"Earthquakes are continuous, a million and a half of them every year, or three every minute. A Richter 5 quake every six hours, a major quake every 3 weeks. A quake as destructive as the one in Pakistan every 8 months. It’s nothing new, it’s right on schedule.

At any moment there are 1,500 electrical storms on the planet. A tornado touches down every six hours. We have ninety hurricanes a year, or one every four days. Again, right on schedule. Violent, disruptive, chaotic activity is a constant feature of our globe.

Is this the end of the world? No: this is the world."

More on the Saturn storm story at: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/15641685/

The Man Who Would Be King

Sir Albert Gore. Has a nice ring to it don't you think?

The Guardian is reporting the British government has signed on Al Gore to sell climate change in the U.S. Sounds like a trip to London is on the horizon for the former next sore loser. Gore's carbon footprint is now bigger than ever - meaning even more sacrifices will be expected from the rest of us. You probably didn't want your thermostat above 45 degrees this winter anyway.

Gore's recruitment is in response to a report by a U.K. Treasury economist, Sir Nicholas Stern, that maintains inaction on climate change will cause a global economic catastrophe as bad as the 1930's Depression. A Stern warning, indeed.

Before you go converting all your mutual funds into gold bullion, consider the implications of an economist making predicitons based on weather forecasts. What could possibly go wrong?

Outside of Liza Minnelli's marriage counselor, is there an occupation that has a worse record of success in predicting the future than either economists or weathermen? Don't go out and buy an apple cart just yet.

Our favorite take on the story comes from former Late, Late Show writer, Julius Sharpe on his News As Gossip blog. (http://newsasgossip.blogspot.com/)

Here's Julius' take on the story:



British Government Hires Al Gore to Help Fight Global Warming in Pompous Way
The British Government has hired Al Gore as part of a plan to combat climate change using a combination of PowerPoint and pretension. Both Tories and whatever that other party is agree that Gore's unique mix of fake humility, intellectual superiority, and a put-on accent will appeal to British people, who all see themselves as much smarter than they actually are. Gore (pictured above making out with Hillary Clinton) said the first step in helping out will be to create some fancy transitions in between PowerPoint slides using a "whoosh" sound effect.
posted by julius at 9:56 AM

Maybe I'm being too optimistic, but I think we've made some progress on the global warming debate recently as both sides seem to have made some small concessions to reality.

One the anti-global warming side, it's always struck us as deliberately argumentative when people attempted to call into question whether there was some planetary warming going on. Whether you take atmospheric measures or attribute some of the warming to the urban heat island effect, it seems to me that disputing the fact the planetary temperatures have been trending warmer is not the place where you want to build your climate change Maginot line.

On the pro-global warming side, Newsweek acknowledged this week that the track record of forecasting climate change is not anything that is going to make the highlight film of Greatest Scientific Predictions of the Last 100 Years. Well, at least, they kind of tried. Sort of.

Newsweek described a 1975 article they published like this: "Citing 'ominous signs that the earth's weather patterns have begun to change dramatically,' the magazine warned of an impending 'drastic decline in food production.' Political disruptions stemming from food shortages could affect 'just about every nation on earth.' Scientists urged governments to consider emergency action ..." Some people might have considered this as a sincere, if somewhat belated, retraction by Newsweek.

Unfortunately, it was not to be. In the very next paragraph Newsweek asserts "the story wasn't 'wrong' in the journalistic sense of 'inaccurate.'"

I didn't major in journalism, so I can't profess to knowing what constitutes being "wrong" in a "journalistic sense," but it seems to me that if something you predicted "didn't happen" then you were pretty much "wrong" in whatever sense you want to use that word.

Clearer than anything, this illustrates the chasm between science and crisis journalism.

In science, if you predict that when you drop a rock it will float in the air and it subsequently doesn't, you are pronounced "wrong."

In journalism, this was simply a case where you had a good theory but the theory is being falsely maligned by special interests beholden to powerful corporations that have vested agenda in promoting the continual belief in gravity.

Okay, you're right. I was being too optimistic....

Link to the story is here: http://msnbc.msn.com/id/15391426/site/newsweek

An article by Steven Milloy (Junk Science.com) notes there's been an inexplicable silence about recent studies that go a long way toward suggesting a strong causal link between cosmic radiation and global warming.

With all the hot air directed toward businessmen and SUV owners, it seems the majority of global warming is caused by ...wait for it ...the sun. Who woulda thunk it?

You can read the article here:
http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,220341,00.html


Unsubscribe Update Profile Confirm Complain Forward

Earlier this year, a group of scientists sent a letter to the Canadian prime minister urging a reasonable and rational approach to climate change. Three selected excerpts pretty much sum up the gist of the letter:

1) "Observational evidence does not support today's computer climate models, so there is little reason to trust model predictions of the future. "

2) "While the confident pronouncements of scientifically unqualified environmental groups may provide for sensational headlines, they are no basis for mature policy formulation."

3) "'Climate change is real' is a meaningless phrase used repeatedly by activists to convince the public that a climate catastrophe is looming and humanity is the cause. Neither of these fears is justified. Global climate changes all the time due to natural causes and the human impact still remains impossible to distinguish from this natural 'noise.' The new Canadian government's commitment to reducing air, land and water pollution is commendable, but allocating funds to 'stopping climate change' would be irrational."

Pretty simple, eh? (as the Canadians might say)

Just in case you were wondering...the roster of scientists and professors who signed the letter:

Dr. Ian D. Clark, professor, isotope hydrogeology and paleoclimatology, Dept. of Earth Sciences, University of Ottawa

Dr. Tad Murty, former senior research scientist, Dept. of Fisheries and Oceans, former director of Australia's National Tidal Facility and professor of earth sciences, Flinders University, Adelaide; currently adjunct professor, Departments of Civil Engineering and Earth Sciences, University of Ottawa

Dr. R. Timothy Patterson, professor, Dept. of Earth Sciences (paleoclimatology), Carleton University, Ottawa

Dr. Fred Michel, director, Institute of Environmental Science and associate professor, Dept. of Earth Sciences, Carleton University, Ottawa

Dr. Madhav Khandekar, former research scientist, Environment Canada. Member of editorial board of Climate Research and Natural Hazards

Dr. Paul Copper, FRSC, professor emeritus, Dept. of Earth Sciences, Laurentian University, Sudbury, Ont.

Dr. Ross McKitrick, associate professor, Dept. of Economics, University of Guelph, Ont.

Dr. Tim Ball, former professor of climatology, University of Winnipeg; environmental consultant

Dr. Andreas Prokoph, adjunct professor of earth sciences, University of Ottawa; consultant in statistics and geology

Mr. David Nowell, M.Sc. (Meteorology), fellow of the Royal Meteorological Society, Canadian member and past chairman of the NATO Meteorological Group, Ottawa

Dr. Christopher Essex, professor of applied mathematics and associate director of the Program in Theoretical Physics, University of Western Ontario, London, Ont.

Dr. Gordon E. Swaters, professor of applied mathematics, Dept. of Mathematical Sciences, and member, Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Research Group, University of Alberta

Dr. L. Graham Smith, associate professor, Dept. of Geography, University of Western Ontario, London, Ont.

Dr. G. Cornelis van Kooten, professor and Canada Research Chair in environmental studies and climate change, Dept. of Economics, University of Victoria

Dr. Petr Chylek, adjunct professor, Dept. of Physics and Atmospheric Science, Dalhousie University, Halifax

Dr./Cdr. M. R. Morgan, FRMS, climate consultant, former meteorology advisor to the World Meteorological Organization. Previously research scientist in climatology at University of Exeter, U.K.

Dr. Keith D. Hage, climate consultant and professor emeritus of Meteorology, University of Alberta

Dr. David E. Wojick, P.Eng., energy consultant, Star Tannery, Va., and Sioux Lookout, Ont.
Rob Scagel, M.Sc., forest microclimate specialist, principal consultant, Pacific Phytometric Consultants, Surrey, B.C.

Dr. Douglas Leahey, meteorologist and air-quality consultant, Calgary Paavo Siitam, M.Sc., agronomist, chemist, Cobourg, Ont.

Dr. Chris de Freitas, climate scientist, associate professor, The University of Auckland, N.Z.

Dr. Richard S. Lindzen, Alfred P. Sloan professor of meteorology, Dept. of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Dr. Freeman J. Dyson, emeritus professor of physics, Institute for Advanced Studies, Princeton, N.J.

Mr. George Taylor, Dept. of Meteorology, Oregon State University; Oregon State climatologist; past president, American Association of State Climatologists

Dr. Ian Plimer, professor of geology, School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, University of Adelaide; emeritus professor of earth sciences, University of Melbourne, Australia

Dr. R.M. Carter, professor, Marine Geophysical Laboratory, James Cook University, Townsville, Australia
Mr. William Kininmonth, Australasian Climate Research, former Head National Climate Centre, Australian Bureau of Meteorology; former Australian delegate to World Meteorological Organization Commission for Climatology, Scientific and Technical Review

Dr. Hendrik Tennekes, former director of research, Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute

Dr. Gerrit J. van der Lingen, geologist/paleoclimatologist, Climate Change Consultant, Geoscience Research and Investigations, New Zealand

Dr. Patrick J. Michaels, professor of environmental sciences, University of Virginia

Dr. Nils-Axel Morner, emeritus professor of paleogeophysics & geodynamics, Stockholm University, Stockholm, Sweden

Dr. Gary D. Sharp, Center for Climate/Ocean Resources Study, Salinas, Calif.

Dr. Roy W. Spencer, principal research scientist, Earth System Science Center, The University of Alabama, Huntsville

Dr. Al Pekarek, associate professor of geology, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences Dept., St. Cloud State University, St. Cloud, Minn.

Dr. Marcel Leroux, professor emeritus of climatology, University of Lyon, France; former director of Laboratory of Climatology, Risks and Environment, CNRS

Dr. Paul Reiter, professor, Institut Pasteur, Unit of Insects and Infectious Diseases, Paris, France. Expert reviewer, IPCC Working group II, chapter 8 (human health)

Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski, physicist and chairman, Scientific Council of Central Laboratory for Radiological Protection, Warsaw, Poland

Dr. Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen, reader, Dept. of Geography, University of Hull, U.K.; editor, Energy & Environment

Dr. Hans H.J. Labohm, former advisor to the executive board, Clingendael Institute (The Netherlands Institute of International Relations) and an economist who has focused on climate change

Dr. Lee C. Gerhard, senior scientist emeritus, University of Kansas, past director and state geologist, Kansas Geological Survey

Dr. Asmunn Moene, past head of the Forecasting Centre, Meteorological Institute, Norway

Dr. August H. Auer, past professor of atmospheric science, University of Wyoming; previously chief meteorologist, Meteorological Service (MetService) of New Zealand

Dr. Vincent Gray, expert reviewer for the IPCC and author of The Greenhouse Delusion: A Critique of 'Climate Change 2001,' Wellington, N.Z.

Dr. Howard Hayden, emeritus professor of physics, University of Connecticut

Dr Benny Peiser, professor of social anthropology, Faculty of Science, Liverpool John Moores University, U.K.