Is the writing (finally) on the wall for the Global Warmists?

Via Doug Ross I came across an article on Global Warming that gives me hope that this nonsense is finally on its last legs.

Here's a small excerpt from American Thinker's article Time to Turn Up the Heat on the Warmists:

But the creature called man has the capacity to worry, and worry he does. He worried about global cooling in the 1970s and then later about global warming. Then it became "climate change." He worried about causing rising seas, even though we know that the ocean around Florida was once 300 feet lower and at another time 100 feet higher. He worried that CO2 -- a naturally occurring gas necessary for life and conducive to plant growth (which is why botanists pump it into greenhouses) -- would spell our end. Never mind how it's said that C02-level changes follow temperature changes, not the reverse. A hypothesis needed its data.

Then, oh, boy, did we hear about that data. First there was Climategate, with emails showing that "scientists" had schemed to suppress inconvenient truths and had refused to comply with the Freedom of Information Act. Then came the admission that the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was dead wrong about Himalayan ice melt. And other shoes have dropped as well. Remember the IPCC warning that climate change could cause the loss of 40 percent of the Amazon Rainforest? It was based on a report by an advocacy group, the World Wildlife Fund, that misrepresented a study. Then we learned of other notable IPCC sources as well, such as a student's Master's dissertation and a sporting magazine.

Next, notorious University of East Anglia head and central Climategate figure Phil Jones may not yet be starting to sing, but he is singing a different tune. He now admits that the Medieval Warm Period might have been toastier than today, meaning that current temperatures "would not be unprecedented." To those of us who vaguely remember stories about dinosaurs and Mesozoic CO2 levels 5 to 10 times today's and temperatures 11 to 22 degrees greater, this isn't exactly earth-shattering. Jones also admits that there has been no "statistically significant" warming since 1995, something that, when asserted mere months ago, got one branded a flat-earther. In addition, he now says that the Gorelesque view that "The debate is over" is "not my view." Interestingly, though, he never made this known until he was caught green-handed.

The Global Warming scam is falling apart faster than an under cooked soufflé.  The first hint that all was not well should have been when warmists felt the need to change their moniker to "Climate Change".  Switching to an all encompassing descriptor allowed the warmists to take an "everything including the kitchen sink" approach that they hoped would fuzzy up the facts.  Mainly they just succeeded in looking foolish. And desperate.

Back to American Thinker:

Yet, amidst this exposition of fact and exposure of fiction, one point never changes: We have been had. And one question remains: Will justice be done?

Let us be clear on the gravity of the Climateers' crime: They have used billions of our tax money to fund fraudulent science. And why?

For the purposes of promoting policies that would steal billions more.

Forgive me if  don't take being screwed over lightly  I do believe that there are a number of Global Warmists who have been innocently sucked in and duped.  I'm willing to give the run of the mill Chicken Little a pass.  But not the IPCC, not the scientists who racked in the grants under false pretenses and certainly not the truly insufferable Al Gore, the failed divinity student who took a bogus belief system and peddled it with the religious fervor of a PT Barnum.  Come comeuppance is a bitch and it is time that Gore learn the true meaning of the words "Hell hath no fury..."

Global warming: the only thing melting is the fake facade

A round up of the most recent Global Warming news:


The glaciers aren’t melting
The Earth isn’t heating
The rain forests aren’t disappearing
The Dutch and the poley bears aren’t drowning.

Did I leave anything out? Oh yeah, storms aren’t increasing in either frequency or strength.

In the blink of an eye we’ve gone from “the science is settled” to “I dunno”. Which leads us to one very important question-where the Hell is Al Gore? Has anybody seen or heard from him since the postponement of the end of the world?

I’d imagine that Big Al is hunkered down with his broker. He has a lot of divesting to do and moving millions and millions of dollars can’t be rushed. But I’m sure that sooner or later he’ll emerge teary eyed to proclaim that he too was a victim of the Global Warming scam. He’ll remind us, perhaps for the first time, that he is not a scientist, just a failed divinity student, and he trusted others because, well, he’s a humanitarian.

Don’t cry for Al. There’s a sucker born every minute and scams are a dime a dozen. Al will be back on his game in no time.
 
 
Image from FAPO.org

Dueling headlines

Back on January 19th there was this:

2000s warmest decade on record, government reports

But that was almost a month ago and in the rapidly evolving world of Global Warming anything can happen.  For instance, from today's Daily Mail:

Climategate U-turn as scientist at centre of row admits: There has been no global warming since 1995

Well, fancy that.  Bullet points from the article:

*  Data for vital 'hockey stick graph' has gone missing

*  There has been no global warming since 1995

*  Warming periods have happened before - but NOT due to man-made changes

This coming from Professor Phillip Jones who recently stepped down as director of the University of East Anglia's Climate Research Unit whose work was heavily relied on by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.  The problem with relying on Phillip's work is that he can't seem to remember where he put any of that darned data that backed up the claims that the Earth is in the midst of a man caused fever.  Seems Phillips keeps one very messy office and he just can't figure out where he put any of the data:

The academic at the centre of the ‘Climategate’ affair, whose raw data is crucial to the theory of climate change, has admitted that he has trouble ‘keeping track’ of the information.

Colleagues say that the reason Professor Phil Jones has refused Freedom of Information requests is that he may have actually lost the relevant papers.

Professor Jones told the BBC yesterday there was truth in the observations of colleagues that he lacked organisational skills, that his office was swamped with piles of paper and that his record keeping is ‘not as good as it should be’.

Jones housekeeping skills aside, if the lost date ever existed in the first place then scientist should be able to return to the original sources and duplicate the results, right?  But an admission by Jones casts doubt:

Professor Jones also conceded the possibility that the world was warmer in medieval times than now – suggesting global warming may not be a man-made phenomenon.

And he said that for the past 15 years there has been no ‘statistically significant’ warming.

Let's face it, Global warming is unraveling quicker than a cheap sweater.  Investigations by academic panels are all well and good but it is time for a criminal investigation.  Proponents manufactured "evidence" out of thin air for the purpose of enriching themselves either professionally, monetarily or both.  It is handcuff time.

If you throw a rock at a pack of wild dogs, the one that yelps...

People are throwing stones at Rajendra Pachauri, head of the IPCC (which according to Doug Ross stands for International Panel on Climate Crime), is starting to get a might testy.  Note this from the Ace of Spades:

"Dr." Pachauri: Hey, Those Who Claim I Profited From IPCC Decisions Should Rub Asbestos on Their Faces (And Die of Cancer)

Rajendra Pachauri, the besieged head of the U.N.'s International Panel on Climate Change, told the Financial Times on Wednesday that he is the victim of a "carefully orchestrated" campaign to block climate change legislation.

"I would say [there are] nefarious designs behind people trying to attack me with lies, falsehoods," he told the paper, swatting away allegations that his India-based climate institute, TERI, has benefited from decisions made by the IPCC, which he also chairs.

Climate change skeptics "are people who deny the link between smoking and cancer; they are people who say that asbestos is as good as talcum powder," he said.

"I hope that they apply it (asbestos) to their faces every day."

Well, that is kinda mean.

Look, I barely made it through physics in college.  Science is not my thing.  However, I did manage to stay awake through a couple of my classes and I seem to remember that skepticism is crucial to good science.  Beyond that, when people start making ridiculous statements such as comparing Global Warming skeptics to Holocaust deniers or that skeptics believe that asbestos is as good as talcum powder then I know that the speaker is on shaky ground. 

The truth is, Global warming adherents don't want to talk about facts.  If you ask a disciple about previous warming periods they are likely to change the subject altogether.  A week ago I actually had someone respond to my question by launching into a weird ramble about our "illegal" invasion of Iraq.  Global warming/Iraq???  Um, wouldn't it have been just as easy to admit that he didn't have the answer rather than making an ass of himself by going off the deep end over something totally unrelated?

People have a perfect right to know what relationship exists between Pachauri's enormous wealth and his position as head of the IPCC.  Methinks that his answer belies a man with something to hide.

Gee, did it all have to end so soon?

Walter Russell Mead:

The Death of Global Warming

The global warming movement as we have known it is dead. Its health had been in steady decline during the last year as the once robust hopes for a strong and legally binding treaty to be agreed upon at the Copenhagen Summit faded away. By the time that summit opened, campaigners were reduced to hoping for a ‘politically binding’ agreement to be agreed that would set the stage for the rapid adoption of the legally binding treaty. After the failure of the summit to agree to even that much, the movement went into a rapid decline.

The movement died from two causes: bad science and bad politics.

After years in which global warming activists had lectured everyone about the overwhelming nature of the scientific evidence, it turned out that the most prestigious agencies in the global warming movement were breaking laws, hiding data, and making inflated, bogus claims resting on, in some cases, no scientific basis at all. This latest story in the London Times is yet another shocker; the IPCC’s claims that the rainforests were going to disappear as a result of global warming are as bogus and fraudulent as its claims that the Himalayan glaciers would melt by 2035. It seems as if a scare story could grab a headline, the IPCC simply didn’t care about whether it was reality-based.

Don't cry for fat Al Gore.  There really is a sucker born every minute and he'll be off the is next scam in the twinkle of an eye.  He'll proclaim his innocence in the Global Warming fraud-after all, he's not a scientist.  He only relied on what they told him.  He's the real victim here.  Sigh.

Anywho, all scams have a shelf life and this one's has expired.  Question is, what will the next one be?

Have you kicked a "greenie" today?

Tim Blair:

“There is no point in denying it,” wrote warmenist George Monbiot. “We’re losing.” And that was back in early November, before Climategate, before Copenhagen and before the IPCC catastrophe. The situation for our warmy pals is now even more hilarious:

A global deal to tackle climate change is all but impossible in 2010, leaving the scale and pace of action to slow global warming in coming decades uncertain, according to senior figures across the world involved in the negotiations.

So much for having only 50 days to save the world. It gets better:

“The forces trying to tackle climate change are in disarray, wandering in small groups around the battlefield like a beaten army,” said a senior British diplomat.

I say we keep fighting them. Just for the fun of it.

Oh, I don't know.  Usually I would be all for kicking the bastards while they're down but they are such a bunch of sissy losers it just doesn't sporting.  On the other hand, they're smug sissy losers so I say go for it.

Could GlacierGate lead to criminal charges?

Lets certainly hope so.

IPCC Head in Glaciergate Crime?

 The London Times continues to follow the glaciergate story–and it keeps getting worse.

The latest disclosure: Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the UN’s (formerly) prestigious Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (known as the IPCC), may have raised millions of dollars for his New Delhi institute on the basis of the totally bogus ‘glaciergate’ claim by the IPCC that the Himalayan glaciers would melt by 2035.

According the the London Times, Pachauri’s institute got money from the European Union and the US-based Carnegie Corporation to investigate a prediction that never had any scientific backing whatever, and one which all serious glacier scientists instantly recognized as impossible. The bogus claim was frequently repeated in the fundraising efforts — and reiterated as recently as January 15 when the IPCC was already under intense pressure to admit it had blundered.

This is now more than an example of eye-popping incompetence and gross neglect of elementary scientific standards by a body on whose authority the world is expected to make multi-trillion dollar decisions affecting every business and every person on the planet.

It is now, potentially, a criminal issue. If Pachauri knew the claim was bogus and allowed these grant applications to go forward, he could find himself facing criminal charges. (emphasis added)

Global Warming is the scam of the century and scammers belong in prison.  Pachauri should not be an exception.  The scam has cost untold billions to governments, and by extension taxpayers, all over the world.  Given the corrupt nature of the UN it is no surprise that it has played a central role in promoting the con game. 

It is past time to apply the brakes.  No more taxpayer money should line the pockets of Global Warming corruptocrats and Pachauri, Gore, et al., should suffer the same fate as Bernie Madoff.  In this country we should insist that our Congressmen permanently shelve Cap & Trade. 

I anything good comes out of this we can hope that in the future people will not be so gullible and will be more skeptical when "scientists" make fantastic and nonsensical pronouncements.  Follow the money.

h/t Instapundit

Its the end of the world! Oh, what? Never mind.

The TimesOnline:

World misled over Himalayan glacier meltdown

A WARNING that climate change will melt most of the Himalayan glaciers by 2035 is likely to be retracted after a series of scientific blunders by the United Nations body that issued it.

Two years ago the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) issued a benchmark report that was claimed to incorporate the latest and most detailed research into the impact of global warming. A central claim was the world's glaciers were melting so fast that those in the Himalayas could vanish by 2035.

In the past few days the scientists behind the warning have admitted that it was based on a news story in the New Scientist, a popular science journal, published eight years before the IPCC's 2007 report.

It has also emerged that the New Scientist report was itself based on a short telephone interview with Syed Hasnain, a little-known Indian scientist then based at Jawaharlal Nehru University in Delhi.

Hasnain has since admitted that the claim was "speculation" and was not supported by any formal research. If confirmed it would be one of the most serious failures yet seen in climate research. The IPCC was set up precisely to ensure that world leaders had the best possible scientific advice on climate change.

Professor Murari Lal, who oversaw the chapter on glaciers in the IPCC report, said he would recommend that the claim about glaciers be dropped: "If Hasnain says officially that he never asserted this, or that it is a wrong presumption, than I will recommend that the assertion about Himalayan glaciers be removed from future IPCC assessments."

So, in order for something, anything, to be accepted as scientific evidence it merely has to support the conclusions that scientists want to reach.  Gee, that seems about like a pretty low standard to me. 

We have long held that scientist are a breed of altruistic detectives following the evidence to wherever it leads.  We are learning that instead they follow whatever folly leads to the next grant  "Skeptic" has become a dirty word in the climate scientists and their supporters but science, good science, needs skepticism.  Nothing is more damaging to true scientific research than certainty.  Skepticism allows the inclusion of dissenting evidence while certainty leads to excluding evidence that is contrary to expected conclusion. 

If the Global Warming scam has taught us anything, it is that good science needs skeptics.

Fads

Mark Steyn writing in McCleans:

According to the CIA’s analysis, “detrimental global climatic change” threatens “the stability of most nations.” And, alas, for a global phenomenon, Canada will be hardest hit. The entire Dominion from the Arctic to the 49th parallel will be under 150 feet of ice.

"Climate change" was all the rage back in the seventies. We were told that if we didn't act, and act soon, we were all going to freeze to death. As memory serves me, we pretty much ignored all the hysteria, we didn't freeze to death and the scientists moved on to the next crisis.


I have reached the age where I don't pay much attention to fads. I didn't pay that much attention to the predictions of the impending Ice Age back in the seventies because quite frankly, I was more worried that Gary liked Rene more than me. (He did. They married)


That is the thing about fads. They come and go. And we forget about them. But there are fads and there fads. When Nehru jackets were the craze, I just had to have one. But the only thing that suffered due to the purchase of my tan leather Nehru jacket, that went out of style the day after it was bought, was my parent's bank account.

Back to Steyn:

The man with the sandwich board announcing the end of the world on Jan. 7 is usually unfazed when he wakes up on the morning of Jan. 8. He realigns the runes, repaints the sign, and reschedules Armageddon for May 23. The rest of us, on the other hand, scoff.


The fact is that Global Warming is no different than the hula hoop and the slinky. It is a fad that has made it's inventors a boat load of money but the fad will pass. The difference is that with this fad it isn't just individual Moms and Dads getting suckered out of their hard earned money by their pleading children. If this fad doesn't pass soon everyone is going to pay and pay and pay.


The true believers in the Church of Global Warming are unfazed by ClimateGate or any other evidence that comes down the pike. Fortunately, the ObamaCare debacle has our esteemed Congressmen gun shy and battle weary, as well they should be, and thus Cap and Trade is being "put on ice", pun intended, for the time being. And with time, all fads pass.


I look at the picture of myself in flowered bell-bottoms and matching floppy hat and feel silly. I predict that long before the north polar cap melts, Al Gore and the entire Global Warming crowd will be looking pretty silly, too.

Liars, Scammers and Frauds (and Hillary Clinton), Oh, My!

Hillary Clinton went to Copenhagen and as my Mom would say, talked out of her ass:

"In the context of a strong accord in which all major economies pledge meaningful mitigation actions and provide full transparency as to those actions, the U.S. is prepared to work with other countries towards a goal of mobilising $100bn a year to address the needs of developing countries," Sec. of State Hillary Clinton said, according to BBC.

As Darlene Click said at Protein Wisdom said, It’s not like, you know, it will be coming out of Hillary Clinton’s own bank account. It's also not like Hillary has the authority to commit the United States to anything, but in this case, it is the thought that counts.

Clinton's pledge feeds the notion that we owe the world. But were we to give all that we have "the world" would demand more while still insisting that we hadn't done enough. Those gathered in Copenhagen care little about our exceptionalism. If they think at all of the innovations born in the USA that have benefited the world as whole it is to complain we are destroying the planet. On one hand they insist that as a "rich" nation we have a duty to the world but then they cheer wildly when Hugo Chavez claims that "capitalism is the road to Hell."

This is a summit of liars, scammers and frauds and soon our president will be among them. The Apology Tour continues...

We Don't Need No Stinkin Facts

It appears quite clear since the advent of ClimateGate that those who worship at the alter Global Warming are uninterested in facts. And don't even try to talk common sense to them-not their forte. So, the European Foundation's 100 reasons why climate change is natural and not man-made won't sway the AGW lemmings but for those who aren't anti-science or common sense impaired, the list is an excellent read. My ten favorites:

7) The 0.7C increase in the average global temperature over the last hundred years is entirely consistent with well-established, long-term, natural climate trends.

8) The IPCC theory is driven by just 60 scientists and favourable reviewers not the 4,000 usually cited.

16) A Harvard University astrophysicist and geophysicist, Willie Soon, said he is “embarrassed and puzzled” by the shallow science in papers that support the proposition that the earth faces a climate crisis caused by global warming.

19) A petition by scientists trying to tell the world that the political and media portrayal of global warming is false was put forward in the Heidelberg Appeal in 1992. Today, more than 4,000 signatories, including 72 Nobel Prize winners, from 106 countries have signed it.

35) It is a myth that computer models verify that CO2 increases will cause significant global warming because computer models can be made to “verify” anything

55) The argument that climate change is a of result of global warming caused by human activity is the argument of flat Earthers.

57) William Kininmonth, a former head of the National Climate Centre and a consultant to the World Meteorological Organisation, wrote “the likely extent of global temperature rise from a doubling of CO2 is less than 1C. Such warming is well within the envelope of variation experienced during the past 10,000 years and insignificant in the context of glacial cycles during the past million years, when Earth has been predominantly very cold and covered by extensive ice sheets.”

64) Michael Mann of Penn State University has actually shown that the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age did in fact exist, which contrasts with his earlier work which produced the “hockey stick graph” which showed a constant temperature over the past thousand years or so followed by a recent dramatic upturn.

67) Global temperatures have not risen in any statistically-significant sense for 15 years and have actually been falling for nine years. The “Climate-gate” scandal revealed a scientific team had expressed dismay at the fact global warming was contrary to their predictions and admitted their inability to explain it was “a travesty”.

70) Richard Lindzen, Professor of Atmospheric Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, wrote: “The notion of a static, unchanging climate is foreign to the history of the Earth or any other planet with a fluid envelope. Such hysteria (over global warming) simply represents the scientific illiteracy of much of the public, the susceptibility of the public to the substitution of repetition for truth.”

Read the entire list.

h/t Cold Fury

Now That EPA is Threatening to Regulate Carbon Dioxide, are We Still Allowed to Exhale?

If the EPA has the power to regulate carbon dioxide, what human activity doesn't the EPA have the power to regulate?

Who Would Benefit From Capping Carbon?

Self interest is a powerful thing. There is nothing unusual, or necessarily wrong, with a "what's in it for me" attitude. I have no doubt that there are people who sincerely believe that Al Gore is a humanitarian who is selflessly working to save the world. In their estimation the fact that "global warming" has changed Gore from a wealthy man to a WEALTHY man doesn't speak to his motivation. We call these people "dupes."

But let's face it, Gore isn't alone in benefiting from the global fraud being promoted in Copenhagan. In Forbes, Joel Kotkin discusses the "what's in it for me" factor:

So why do leaders like Barack Obama and British Prime Minister Gordon Brown continue identifying themselves with the climate change agenda and policies like cap and trade? Perhaps it's best to see this as a clash of classes. Today's environmental movement reflects the values of a large portion of the post-industrial upper class. The big money behind the warming industry includes many powerful corporate interests that would benefit from a super-regulated environment that would all but eliminate potential upstarts.

These people generally also do not fear the loss of millions of factory, truck, construction and agriculture-related jobs slated to be "de-developed." These tasks can shift to China, India or Vietnam--where the net emissions would no doubt be higher--at little immediate cost to tenured professors, nonprofit executives or investment bankers. The endowments and the investment funds can just as happily mint their profits in Chongqing as in Chicago.

Global warming-driven land-use legislation possesses a similarly pro-gentry slant. Suburban single family homes need to be sacrificed in the name of climate change, but this will not threaten the large Park Avenue apartments and private retreats of media superstars, financial tycoons and the scions of former carbon-spewing fortunes. After all, you can always pay for your pleasure with "carbon offsets."

Global warming is very much a class issue. Cap and Trade schemes give the political class control; the wizards of Wall Street gain wealth; the self absorbed hedonists in Hollywood get to feel like they are doing something noble. But it is we schmucks on the bottom of pile who will pay the price.

Rev. Gore likes to say, as he passes the collection plate, that this is the fight of his life. Nothing could be further from the truth. Gore's lavish lifestyle is chiseled in stone whether anything comes out of Copenhagen or not. The same doesn't hold true for the rest us. Carbon schemes will severely curtail our lifestyle. And ten years from now the charlatans will move on to their next scam.

More at Memeorandum

What Makes Someone an "Environmentalist"?

Every day, no matter the weather, I eat my lunch at a picnic table next to the lake. Yesterday was absolutely beautiful, as most Florida days are, and I was joined by two companions.


Every evening I sit on my porch and enjoy the breeze off the bay. I love manatees. Nothing is more glorious than dolphins playing at sunset. I know it sounds silly, but I love to watch lizards chasing each other.

I feel blessed to have a very simple lifestyle that for the most part centers around nature. So does that make me an environmentalist? I imagine that many people would say "no."


I was recently told by an acquaintance that I only think that I care about the environment but that I am either fooling myself or being insincere because I don't believe in global warming. Now let me be clear, I believe that the globe warms and I believe that the globe cools. That is the "change" in climate change. I also hope that future generations will enjoy the ocean just as I do today. But I am not willing to ruin the economy for future generations based on a risky and unproven scheme.

Nobody can explain the medieval warming period to me. How is that we had period that was much warmer than today but there were far fewer people and no cars, no jets, no factories. Yet, I am to believe that warming is caused by over population, inefficient cars and industrialization.

The medieval warming period ended without Cap and Trade. Nobody met in Copenhagen and there were no carbon offsets. But it ended anyway.

I get that I sound simplistic. I readily admit that I don't understand the science. But from a common sense point of view, Global Warming just doesn't pass the smell test.

We are a pretty smart bunch of people. We can, without sacrificing our market based economy, preserve and protect our environment. Technology improves and evolves when the market is allowed to function. Instead of putting our faith on the alter of questionable science, let's take a step back and put our faith in ourselves.

Is Wiping Out Black Babies a Viable Green Policy?

Think you’ve heard it all? Don’t be silly! Seems there’s group of hoity toity environmentalists in Jolly Ol’ Great Britain who are doing “carbon credits” one better when it comes to assuaging their guilt over their lavish lifestyles: people credits. How they can possibly feel guilty when they obviously have no shame is beyond me, but here’s the deal-they pay women in third world countries to not have children as a means of mitigating their “carbon footprint.” Stacy writes in Politically correct genocide:

Rushing to the front of the race for the prize of Most Vomit-Inducing Environmental Initiative Ever Devised, the UK's Optimum Population Trust -- which counts such grandees as David Attenborough and Jonathon Porritt among its supporters -- has just launched PopOffsets. This quirkily named campaign is actually deeply sinister: It invites well-off Westerners to offset their carbon emissions by paying for poor people in the Third World to stop procreating.In short, if you feel bad about your CO2-emitting jaunt to Barbados, or the new Ferrari you just splurged on, then simply give some money to a charity which helps to "convince" Third World women not to have children, and -- presto! -- the carbon saved by having one less black child in the world will put your guilt-ridden mind at rest.

The Optimum Population Trust is a creepy Malthusian outfit made up of Lords, Ladies, and Sirs who all believe that the world's problems are caused by "too many people." It recently carried out a cost-benefit analysis of the best way to tackle global warming and "discovered" (I prefer the word "decided") that every £4 spent on contraception saves one ton of CO2 from being added to the environment, whereas you would need to spend £8 on tree-planting, £15 on wind power, £31 on solar energy, and £56 on hybrid vehicle technology to realize the same carbon savings.

If memory serves me, we used to refer to schemes like this as “eugenics.”

Let’s face it, “people offsets” are not only, as Stacy says, “creepy”, on the surface, they don’t seem very well thought out. Consider the average life expectancy in these third world countries: Malawi-48.3 years, Burkina Faso-52.2 years, Congo-46.4 years, Dijbouti-54.8 years and Guinea Bissau-48 years. The Lords and Ladies of the Optimum Population Trust aren’t getting much bang for the buck. Afterall, the average kid in Guinea Bissau probably doesn’t spend its short life tooling around in daddy’s Escalade. If they want to use their money to pay women not to have children wouldn’t they be better off paying for Paris Hilton’s tubal ligation? Now that would benefit society.

Look, I am all for environmentalists not having children. The fewer of them the better. But when they start paying women in third world countries not to bear children they are simply showing themselves to be racist hypocrites. There is much that can be done to improve the lives of children in third world countries-wiping them out should not be anyone’s goal.

ClimateGate Denialists Screech, Fling Poop

Via Memeorandum:

ClimateGate denialist Brad Johnson at Think Progress is frothing at the mouth:

As the United States — led by President Barack Obama — prepares to join the world in the fight against global warming, the opponents of reform are resorting to criminal desperation, harkening back to the amoral extremes of Richard Nixon. The release of the hacked emails from CRU was praised as the act of a “whistleblower” by conservatives. “The timing couldn’t be better,” chortled Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK). The original Watergate scandal began when right-wing operatives burglarized the offices of their political opponents during a presidential election. “Climategate” is turning out to be worse — now the criminals are turning on scientists as the world burns.

Brad, obviously not given to open mindedness, tolerance or simple, clear thought processes, doesn't like it when his religion is attacked. Considering that the files at the CRU were more likely leaked than hacked, the Watergate analogy is a bit misplaced. No matter. I can almost imagine Brad orgasmic with righteous indignation as his belief system is exposed as the scam of the century.

There is one way that Watergate is similar to ClimateGate-in both cases the guilty parties destroyed evidence in an attempt to cover up their crimes. In ClimateGate, it is the "scientists" who behaved in a Nixonian manner.

ClimateGate: Starting Over

Seen over at Doug Ross:

Jonah Goldberg, writing in The National Review, makes the case that although nothing will come out significance will come out of Copenhagen or Cap and Trade, ClimateGate will not be the reason. Goldberg is much more generous to the scientist at the center of the ClimateGate scandal:

The e-mails don’t show that the scientists don’t believe global warming is real. Rather, they show that the scientists believe in global warming so much, they think they’re justified in doing anything to fight it. To paraphrase Bob Dylan, you never ask questions when Gaia’s on your side.

Personally, I believe that these scientists are a bunch of hacks who figured out that they could rake in the grant money and recognition by peddling junk science and were willing to go to any lengths to keep the money flowing. That's just me. However, Goldberg makes a very good point-there is no way in Hell to convince oil producing countries to leave their oil in the ground. Why should they? What has Saudi Arabia have going for it except its oil?

Being against Cap and Trade, I am, and believing that Global Warming is a scam, I do, doesn't mean that we should give up on energy independence. Energy independence is central to our national security. Make no mistake, every time you or I fill our gas tanks we put money in to the pockets who wish to see us dead.

What ClimateGate shows us is that we need honest scientists working on solutions to the very real energy problems that this country faces. But that will never happen so long as the very powerful environmental lobby is pulling the strings.

You will never see clean wind power being generated off our coasts because the environmental groups would rather worry about migrating birds than real solutions. Why aren't they promoting underwater turbines as a source of clean energy? Why aren't they promoting drilling to insure our energy independence? The environmentalists, and the scientists and politicians who are riding around in their pockets, have no interest in solutions except those that trade our dependence on foreign despots for dependence on one world fascists.

Goldberg says that it’s time to start over, beginning with the science. True enough, but this time around let's insist on honesty and transparency. We've seen what happens when the debate, and science, is left to those with hidden agendas.

Politico Plays a Games of Wiffleball With Al Gore

Some things just boggle the mind and Politico’s Q and A with Al Gore is a boggler. In light of ClimateGate, why would anyone interview The Goreacle and not ask one question about what is being called the worst scientific scandal of our time? Pundit:

I've been curious to find out what Al Gore has to say about the scandal, so instead of ignoring his blather I scanned John F. Harris and Mike Allen's Politico interview with him. You'd think they'd ask him about the emails, the recriminations, the UN's plan to "investigate" the scandal, his recent change in schedule, or maybe even the suggestions that he ought to give back his Oscar.

Yeah, you’d think. Did Politico agree upfront not to ask Gore about ClimateGate? Some tough journalism that.

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Rasmussen: Majority of American Don't Buy the Global Warming Shtick UPDATED

Ed Morrissey brings word of the latest Rasmussen poll:

The fallout of the University of East Anglia CRU e-mails threatens to smother the credibility of anthropogenic global-warming advocates — and the UN along with them. In a new survey conducted after the exposure of UEA-CRU’s behind-the-scenes chicanery, the Rasmussen poll indicates that a majority of respondents think AGW scientists have lied about their data. Only 26% think that such dishonesty and fraud is either not very likely or not at all likely:

Most Americans (52%) believe that there continues to be significant disagreement within the scientific community over global warming.

While many advocates of aggressive policy responses to global warming say a consensus exists, the latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 25% of adults think most scientists agree on the topic. Twenty-three percent (23%) are not sure. …

Fifty-nine percent (59%) of Americans say it’s at least somewhat likely that some scientists have falsified research data to support their own theories and beliefs about global warming. Thirty-five percent (35%) say it’s Very Likely. Just 26% say it’s not very or not at all likely that some scientists falsified data.

I don't find the results of the poll surprising. I consider my fellow citizens to be thoughtful and not easily swayed by illogical arguments that don't pass the smell test. But there is one segment of the poll that bugs the beans out of me:

Despite the protestations of “consensus” from the Obama administration — reiterated by Robert Gibbs yesterday — only a quarter of Americans actually believe that a global consensus exists among scientists. Only 22% believe that the UN, which sponsored the IPCC report based in large part of UEA-CRU findings, is a credible resource for AGW. And only 15% of all respondents think AGW is a higher priority than rebuilding the economy and creating jobs, against 71% who believe jobs and the economy should take priority.

Who are these people who believe dealing with the non-existent Global Warming should take priority over getting the economy straightened out and putting people back to work? I can only imagine that we are talking about: a) spoiled brat college students who are still living on Mommy and Daddy's dime and b) people who are wealthy enough that they don't have to worry about Cap and Trade sending their electric bills through the roof. Does anybody think that "climate crusader" Leonardo DiCaprio gives a rat's ass what his utility bill is? What are the chances he even knows what is utility bill is?

I doubt that people who believe in Global Warming have any understanding of the unintended consequences of their good(?) intentions. Currently this issue is being driven by people who do not have a dog in the fight. I don't want this economy further damaged by people who will be unaffected or worse, profit, from decisions based on junk science.

Morrissey believes that Cap and Trade is dead:

This makes the job-killing cap-and-trade bill a political nightmare for Democrats, especially once the CRU scandal really captures the public imagination. No one will support higher energy prices and the economic handicaps they will impose for a cause rife with perceived falsehoods, misrepresentations, and flat-out fraud. The cap-and-trade bill has already been considered close to dead, thanks to Harry Reid’s rescheduling of it to the spring of an election year. This should convince all but the most radical Democrats on Capitol Hill to give up the effort entirely.

Bottom line-our elected officials won't walk away from Cap and Trade because of concerns about the economy, but they will run away from it out of concerns for their political careers.

UPDATE I

The Daley Gator has a report on the hypocrisy of the United Nations Climate Change Conference which begins this Monday in Copenhagen. It looks like the delegates to the conference need to buy a butt load of "offsets" from Al Gore to make up for the carbon they are going to pump into the environment while "saving the Earth."

UPDATE II

From Instapundit: CLIMATEGATE FALLOUT? Al Gore “Abruptly” Cancels Personal Appearance In Copenhagen.

Apparently 3,000 schmucks paid upwards of $1,200 for a picture with Big Al and a "light snack." The reasons for the cancellation aren't clear but maybe it has something to do with this:

Pajamas Media founder Roger L. Simon and independent filmmaker Lionel Chetwynd -- both members of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and Oscar nominees -- have called on the academy to rescind Mr. Gore's Oscars in light of the Climategate revelations.

"In the history of the academy, not to my knowledge has an Oscar ever been rescinded. I think they should rescind this one," Mr. Simon said Thursday.

Maybe the Academy could replace Gore's Oscar with a fictional award to honor Gore's peddling of the fictional Global Warming.

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That Was Then, It is Also Now

I've decided to re-post a piece that I originally wrote on June 28, 2009. I am adding some current thoughts at the end.

Shutting Down Scientists Who Oppose Global Warming

What happens to experts whose scientific opinions contradict Global Warming or Climate Change, or whatever the latest incantation is? According to the Telegraph, their more politically correct brethren shut them out:

Dr Taylor was told that his views running "counter to human-induced climate change are extremely unhelpful". His signing of the Manhattan Declaration – a statement by 500 scientists that the causes of climate change are not CO2 but natural, such as changes in the radiation of the sun and ocean currents – was "inconsistent with the position taken by the PBSG".

Dr. Mitchell Taylor has been studying polar bears for over thirty years. Unfortunately for Dr. Taylor, he cares more about honesty than being the messenger of a flawed political, quasi-scientific assumption. The “science of Global Warming is settled” only because opposing views have been silenced.

Dr Taylor agrees that the Arctic has been warming over the last 30 years. But he ascribes this not to rising levels of CO2 – as is dictated by the computer models of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and believed by his PBSG colleagues – but to currents bringing warm water into the Arctic from the Pacific and the effect of winds blowing in from the Bering Sea.

He has also observed, however, how the melting of Arctic ice, supposedly threatening the survival of the bears, has rocketed to the top of the warmists' agenda as their most iconic single cause. The famous photograph of two bears standing forlornly on a melting iceberg was produced thousands of times by Al Gore, the WWF and others as an emblem of how the bears faced extinction – until last year the photographer, Amanda Byrd, revealed that the bears, just off the Alaska coast, were in no danger. Her picture had nothing to do with global warming and was only taken because the wind-sculpted ice they were standing on made such a striking image.

Over 700 of the world’s top scientists disagree with the theory of climate change. In fact, far more oppose the current theory than support it. If those who favor the theory that global warming is man made are so confident in their position, why are they so opposed to debate? I say follow the money. There are those who stand to profit greatly and those who wish to see our free market destroyed. These two factions have joined forces and unless we take a strong stand against this farce the consequences will be the devastation of our economy.

UPDATE: E-mails indicate EPA suppressed report skeptical of global warming.

From Power Line: The Competitive Enterprise Institute has obtained an EPA study of the "endangerment" to human well-being ostensibly caused by carbon dioxide emissions, together with a set of EPA emails indicating that the study, which concludes that carbon dioxide is not a significant cause of climate change, was suppressed by the EPA for political reasons.The Administration is suppressing the truth. Surprise, surprise. Read the entire post.

There has always been ample evidence that Global Warming is a crock. Granted, the hacked emails lend credence because they were written by the hucksters themselves but despite the proof of fraud, nothing too much has changed. Robert Gibbs, "the science is settled." Carol Browning, "the science is settled." Barbara Boxer wants a criminal probe of the hackers. Obama is still going to Copenhagen and no, I don't think he'll be making any bold statements about the Global Warming scam. While I certainly appreciate Sen. Inhofe's stance on ClimateGate, where is his backup in the Senate? Where is Sen. Lindsey Graham?

It is, to say the least, deeply disappointing that so few of our representatives are willing to stand up and say that in light of the emails that the entire "science" of climate change should be be re-evaluated. Is there a politician in Washington still in possession of a spine?