Finaly ONE senator understands global warming (long, scroll button) - Tilted Forum Project Discussion Community

Ustwo · 09-26-2006, 11:55 AM

I have to put this full speech in as I didn't think any senator really had a clue about global warming beyond a few factoids. I don't know anything about this guy, but he even had stuff in there I didn't know and I was a kid in the early 80's and it came into vogue.

Being that you are mostly liberals and want 'all the facts' according the ratbastid I'm sure you will all read the whole thing. I've highlighted the important bits for conservatives. I will put it in italics and bold for neo-cons.

The speech

Quote:

Speeches & Statements

“Hot & Cold Media Spin: A Challenge To Journalists Who Cover Global Warming”
HOT & COLD MEDIA SPIN CYCLE: A CHALLENGE TO JOURNALISTS WHO COVER GLOBAL WARMING

SENATOR JAMES INHOFE CHAIRMAN, SENATE ENVIRONMENT AND PUBLIC WORKS COMMITTEE

Contact: Marc Morano (marc_morano@epw.senate.gov) Matt Dempsey (matthew_dempsey@epw.senate.gov)

Click here for highlights of the speech and to watch

SENATE FLOOR SPEECH DELIVERED MONDAY SEPTEMBER 25, 2006

I am going to speak today about the most media-hyped environmental issue of all time, global warming. I have spoken more about global warming than any other politician in Washington today. My speech will be a bit different from the previous seven floor speeches, as I focus not only on the science, but on the media’s coverage of climate change.

Global Warming -- just that term evokes many members in this chamber, the media, Hollywood elites and our pop culture to nod their heads and fret about an impending climate disaster. As the senator who has spent more time educating about the actual facts about global warming, I want to address some of the recent media coverage of global warming and Hollywood’s involvement in the issue. And of course I will also discuss former Vice President Al Gore’s movie “An Inconvenient Truth.”

Since 1895, the media has alternated between global cooling and warming scares during four separate and sometimes overlapping time periods. From 1895 until the 1930’s the media pedaled a coming ice age.

From the late 1920’s until the 1960’s they warned of global warming. From the 1950’s until the 1970’s they warned us again of a coming ice age. This makes modern global warming the fourth estate’s fourth attempt to promote opposing climate change fears during the last 100 years. Recently, advocates of alarmism have grown increasingly desperate to try to convince the public that global warming is the greatest moral issue of our generation. Just last week, the vice president of London’s Royal Society sent a chilling letter to the media encouraging them to stifle the voices of scientists skeptical of climate alarmism.

During the past year, the American people have been served up an unprecedented parade of environmental alarmism by the media and entertainment industry, which link every possible weather event to global warming. The year 2006 saw many major organs of the media dismiss any pretense of balance and objectivity on climate change coverage and instead crossed squarely into global warming advocacy.

SUMMARY OF LATEST DEVELOPMENTS OF MANMADE GLOBAL WARMING HOCKEY STICK

First, I would like to summarize some of the recent developments in the controversy over whether or not humans have created a climate catastrophe. One of the key aspects that the United Nations, environmental groups and the media have promoted as the “smoking gun” of proof of catastrophic global warming is the so-called ‘hockey stick’ temperature graph by climate scientist Michael Mann and his colleagues.

This graph purported to show that temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere remained relatively stable over 900 years, then spiked upward in the 20th century presumably due to human activity. Mann, who also co-publishes a global warming propaganda blog reportedly set up with the help of an environmental group, had his “Hockey Stick” come under severe scrutiny.

The “hockey stick” was completely and thoroughly broken once and for all in 2006. Several years ago, two Canadian researchers tore apart the statistical foundation for the hockey stick. In 2006, both the National Academy of Sciences and an independent researcher further refuted the foundation of the “hockey stick.” http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=257697

The National Academy of Sciences report reaffirmed the existence of the Medieval Warm Period from about 900 AD to 1300 AD and the Little Ice Age from about 1500 to 1850. Both of these periods occurred long before the invention of the SUV or human industrial activity could have possibly impacted the Earth’s climate. In fact, scientists believe the Earth was warmer than today during the Medieval Warm Period, when the Vikings grew crops in Greenland.

Climate alarmists have been attempting to erase the inconvenient Medieval Warm Period from the Earth’s climate history for at least a decade. David Deming, an assistant professor at the University of Oklahoma’s College of Geosciences, can testify first hand about this effort. Dr. Deming was welcomed into the close-knit group of global warming believers after he published a paper in 1995 that noted some warming in the 20th century. Deming says he was subsequently contacted by a prominent global warming alarmist and told point blank “We have to get rid of the Medieval Warm Period.” When the “Hockey Stick” first appeared in 1998, it did just that.

END OF LITTLE ICE AGE MEANS WARMING

The media have missed the big pieces of the puzzle when it comes to the Earth’s temperatures and mankind’s carbon dioxide (C02) emissions. It is very simplistic to feign horror and say the one degree Fahrenheit temperature increase during the 20th century means we are all doomed. First of all, the one degree Fahrenheit rise coincided with the greatest advancement of living standards, life expectancy, food production and human health in the history of our planet. So it is hard to argue that the global warming we experienced in the 20th century was somehow negative or part of a catastrophic trend.

Second, what the climate alarmists and their advocates in the media have continued to ignore is the fact that the Little Ice Age, which resulted in harsh winters which froze New York Harbor and caused untold deaths, ended about 1850. So trying to prove man-made global warming by comparing the well-known fact that today's temperatures are warmer than during the Little Ice Age is akin to comparing summer to winter to show a catastrophic temperature trend.

In addition, something that the media almost never addresses are the holes in the theory that C02 has been the driving force in global warming. Alarmists fail to adequately explain why temperatures began warming at the end of the Little Ice Age in about 1850, long before man-made CO2 emissions could have impacted the climate. Then about 1940, just as man-made CO2 emissions rose sharply, the temperatures began a decline that lasted until the 1970’s, prompting the media and many scientists to fear a coming ice age. Let me repeat, temperatures got colder after C02 emissions exploded. If C02 is the driving force of global climate change, why do so many in the media ignore the many skeptical scientists who cite these rather obvious inconvenient truths?

SIXTY SCIENTISTS

My skeptical views on man-made catastrophic global warming have only strengthened as new science comes in. There have been recent findings in peer-reviewed literature over the last few years showing that the Antarctic is getting colder and the ice is growing and a new study in Geophysical Research Letters found that the sun was responsible for 50% of 20th century warming. Recently, many scientists, including a leading member of the Russian Academy of Sciences, predicted long-term global cooling may be on the horizon due to a projected decrease in the sun’s output.

A letter sent to the Canadian Prime Minister on April 6 of this year by 60 prominent scientists who question the basis for climate alarmism, clearly explains the current state of scientific knowledge on global warming.

The 60 scientists wrote:

http://www.canada.com/nationalpost/f...e-4db87559d605

“If, back in the mid-1990s, we knew what we know today about climate, Kyoto would almost certainly not exist, because we would have concluded it was not necessary.” The letter also noted:

“‘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 occur all the time due to natural causes and the human impact still remains impossible to distinguish from this natural ‘noise.’”

COMPUTER MODELS THREATEN EARTH

One of the ways alarmists have pounded this mantra of “consensus” on global warming into our pop culture is through the use of computer models which project future calamity. But the science is simply not there to place so much faith in scary computer model scenarios which extrapolate the current and projected buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and conclude that the planet faces certain doom.

Dr. Vincent Gray, a research scientist and a 2001 reviewer with the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has noted, “The effects of aerosols, and their uncertainties, are such as to nullify completely the reliability of any of the climate models.”

Earlier this year, the director of the International Arctic Research Center in Fairbanks Alaska, testified to Congress that highly publicized climate models showing a disappearing Arctic were nothing more than “science fiction.” In fact, after years of hearing about the computer generated scary scenarios about the future of our planet, I now believe that the greatest climate threat we face may be coming from alarmist computer models.

This threat is originating from the software installed on the hard drives of the publicity seeking climate modelers.

It is long past the time for us to separate climate change fact from hysteria.

KYOTO: ECONOMIC PAIN FOR NO CLIMATE GAIN

One final point on the science of climate change: I am approached by many in the media and others who ask, “What if you are wrong to doubt the dire global warming predictions? Will you be able to live with yourself for opposing the Kyoto Protocol?”

My answer is blunt. The history of the modern environmental movement is chock full of predictions of doom that never came true. We have all heard the dire predictions about the threat of overpopulation, resource scarcity, mass starvation, and the projected death of our oceans. None of these predictions came true, yet it never stopped the doomsayers from continuing to predict a dire environmental future.

The more the eco-doomsayers’ predictions fail, the more the eco-doomsayers predict. These failed predictions are just one reason I respect the serious scientists out there today debunking the latest scaremongering on climate change. Scientists like MIT’s Richard Lindzen, former Colorado State climatologist Roger Pielke, Sr., the University of Alabama’s Roy Spencer and John Christy, Virginia State Climatologist Patrick Michaels, Colorado State University’s William Gray, atmospheric physicist S. Fred Singer, Willie Soon of the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Oregon State climatologist George Taylor and astrophysicist Sallie Baliunas, to name a few.

But more importantly, it is the global warming alarmists who should be asked the question -- “What if they are correct about man-made catastrophic global warming?” -- because they have come up with no meaningful solution to their supposed climate crisis in the two decades that they have been hyping this issue.

If the alarmists truly believe that man-made greenhouse gas emissions are dooming the planet, then they must face up to the fact that symbolism does not solve a supposed climate crisis. The alarmists freely concede that the Kyoto Protocol, even if fully ratified and complied with, would not have any meaningful impact on global temperatures. And keep in mind that Kyoto is not even close to being complied with by many of the nations that ratified it, including 13 of the EU-15 nations that are not going to meet their emission reduction promises.

Many of the nations that ratified Kyoto are now realizing what I have been saying all along: The Kyoto Protocol is a lot of economic pain for no climate gain.

Legislation that has been proposed in this chamber would have even less of a temperature effect than Kyoto’s undetectable impact. And more recently, global warming alarmists and the media have been praising California for taking action to limit C02. But here again: This costly feel-good California measure, which is actually far less severe than Kyoto, will have no impact on the climate -- only the economy.

Symbolism does not solve a climate crisis.

In addition, we now have many environmentalists and Hollywood celebrities, like Laurie David, who have been advocating measures like changing standard light bulbs in your home to fluorescents to help avert global warming. Changing to more energy-efficient light bulbs is a fine thing to do, but to somehow imply we can avert a climate disaster by these actions is absurd. Once again, symbolism does not solve a climate crisis.

But this symbolism may be hiding a dark side. While greenhouse gas limiting proposals may cost the industrialized West trillions of dollars, it is the effect on the developing world’s poor that is being lost in this debate.

The Kyoto Protocol’s post 2012 agenda which mandates that the developing world be subjected to restrictions on greenhouse gases could have the potential to severely restrict development in regions of the world like Africa, Asia and South America -- where some of the Earth’s most energy-deprived people currently reside.

Expanding basic necessities like running water and electricity in the developing world are seen by many in the green movement as a threat to the planet’s health that must be avoided. Energy poverty equals a life of back-breaking poverty and premature death.

If we allow scientifically unfounded fears of global warming to influence policy makers to restrict future energy production and the creation of basic infrastructure in the developing world -- billions of people will continue to suffer. Last week my committee heard testimony from Danish statistician Bjorn Lomborg, who was once a committed left-wing environmentalist until he realized that so much of what that movement preached was based on bad science. Lomborg wrote a book called “The Skeptical Environmentalist” and has organized some of the world’s top Nobel Laureates to form the 2004 “Copenhagen Consensus” which ranked the world’s most pressing problems. http://www.copenhagenconsensus.com/Default.aspx?ID=158 And guess what?

They placed global warming at the bottom of the list in terms of our planet’s priorities. The “Copenhagen Consensus” found that the most important priorities of our planet included: combating disease, stopping malaria, securing clean water, and building infrastructure to help lift the developing nations out of poverty. I have made many trips to Africa, and once you see the devastating poverty that has a grip on that continent, you quickly realize that fears about global warming are severely misguided.

I firmly believe that when the history of our era is written, future generations will look back with puzzlement and wonder why we spent so much time and effort on global warming fears and pointless solutions like the Kyoto Protocol.

French President Jacques Chirac provided the key clue as to why so many in the international community still revere the Kyoto Protocol, who in 2000 said Kyoto represents “the first component of an authentic global governance.”

Furthermore, if your goal is to limit C02 emissions, the only effective way to go about it is the use of cleaner, more efficient technologies that will meet the energy demands of this century and beyond.

The Bush administration and my Environment and Public Works Committee have been engaged in these efforts as we work to expand nuclear power and promote the Asia-Pacific Partnership. This partnership stresses the sharing of new technology among member nations including three of the world’s top 10 emitters -- China, India and North Korea -- all of whom are exempt from Kyoto.

MEDIA COVERAGE OF CLIMATE CHANGE:

Many in the media, as I noted earlier, have taken it upon themselves to drop all pretense of balance on global warming and instead become committed advocates for the issue.

Here is a quote from Newsweek magazine:

“There are ominous signs that the Earth’s weather patterns have begun to change dramatically and that these changes may portend a drastic decline in food production– with serious political implications for just about every nation on Earth.”

A headline in the New York Times reads: “Climate Changes Endanger World’s Food Output.” Here is a quote from Time Magazine:

“As they review the bizarre and unpredictable weather pattern of the past several years, a growing number of scientists are beginning to suspect that many seemingly contradictory meteorological fluctuations are actually part of a global climatic upheaval.”

All of this sounds very ominous. That is, until you realize that the three quotes I just read were from articles in 1975 editions of Newsweek Magazine and The New York Times, and Time Magazine in 1974. http://time-proxy.yaga.com/time/arch...944914,00.html

They weren’t referring to global warming; they were warning of a coming ice age.

Let me repeat, all three of those quotes were published in the 1970’s and warned of a coming ice age.

In addition to global cooling fears, Time Magazine has also reported on global warming. Here is an example:

“[Those] who claim that winters were harder when they were boys are quite right… weathermen have no doubt that the world at least for the time being is growing warmer.”

Before you think that this is just another example of the media promoting Vice President Gore’s movie, you need to know that the quote I just read you from Time Magazine was not a recent quote; it was from January 2, 1939.

Yes, in 1939. Nine years before Vice President Gore was born and over three decades before Time Magazine began hyping a coming ice age and almost five decades before they returned to hyping global warming.

Time Magazine in 1951 pointed to receding permafrost in Russia as proof that the planet was warming.

In 1952, the New York Times noted that the “trump card” of global warming “has been the melting glaciers.”

BUT MEDIA COULD NOT DECIDE BETWEEN WARMING OR COOLING SCARES

There are many more examples of the media and scientists flip-flopping between warming and cooling scares.

Here is a quote form the New York Times reporting on fears of an approaching ice age.

“Geologists Think the World May be Frozen Up Again.”

That sentence appeared over 100 years ago in the February 24, 1895 edition of the New York Times.

Let me repeat. 1895, not 1995.

A front page article in the October 7, 1912 New York Times, just a few months after the Titanic struck an iceberg and sank, declared that a prominent professor “Warns Us of an Encroaching Ice Age.”

The very same day in 1912, the Los Angeles Times ran an article warning that the “Human race will have to fight for its existence against cold.” An August 10, 1923 Washington Post article declared: “Ice Age Coming Here.”

By the 1930’s, the media took a break from reporting on the coming ice age and instead switched gears to promoting global warming:

“America in Longest Warm Spell Since 1776; Temperature Line Records a 25-year Rise” stated an article in the New York Times on March 27, 1933. The media of yesteryear was also not above injecting large amounts of fear and alarmism into their climate articles.

An August 9, 1923 front page article in the Chicago Tribune declared:

“Scientist Says Arctic Ice Will Wipe Out Canada.” The article quoted a Yale University professor who predicted that large parts of Europe and Asia would be “wiped out” and Switzerland would be “entirely obliterated.”

A December 29, 1974 New York Times article on global cooling reported that climatologists believed “the facts of the present climate change are such that the most optimistic experts would assign near certainty to major crop failure in a decade.”

[b]The article also warned that unless government officials reacted to the coming catastrophe, “mass deaths by starvation and probably in anarchy and violence” would result. In 1975, the New York Times reported that “A major cooling [was] widely considered to be inevitable.” These past predictions of doom have a familiar ring, don’t they? They sound strikingly similar to our modern media promotion of former Vice president’s brand of climate alarmism.[b]

After more than a century of alternating between global cooling and warming, one would think that this media history would serve a cautionary tale for today’s voices in the media and scientific community who are promoting yet another round of eco-doom.

Much of the 100-year media history on climate change that I have documented here today can be found in a publication titled “Fire and Ice” from the Business and Media Institute. http://www.businessandmedia.org/spec...timeswarns.asp

MEDIA COVERAGE IN 2006

Which raises the question: Has this embarrassing 100-year documented legacy of coverage on what turned out to be trendy climate science theories made the media more skeptical of today’s sensational promoters of global warming?

You be the judge.

On February 19th of this year, CBS News’s “60 Minutes” produced a segment on the North Pole. The segment was a completely one-sided report, alleging rapid and unprecedented melting at the polar cap. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/...n1323169.shtml

It even featured correspondent Scott Pelley claiming that the ice in Greenland was melting so fast, that he barely got off an ice-berg before it collapsed into the water.

“60 Minutes” failed to inform its viewers that a 2005 study by a scientist named Ola Johannessen and his colleagues showing that the interior of Greenland is gaining ice and mass and that according to scientists, the Arctic was warmer in the 1930’s than today.

On March 19th of this year “60 Minutes” profiled NASA scientist and alarmist James Hansen, who was once again making allegations of being censored by the Bush administration. http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/...n1415985.shtml

In this segment, objectivity and balance were again tossed aside in favor of a one-sided glowing profile of Hansen.

The “60 Minutes” segment made no mention of Hansen’s partisan ties to former Democrat Vice President Al Gore or Hansen’s receiving of a grant of a quarter of a million dollars from the left-wing Heinz Foundation run by Teresa Heinz Kerry. There was also no mention of Hansen’s subsequent endorsement of her husband John Kerry for President in 2004.

Many in the media dwell on any industry support given to so-called climate skeptics, but the same media completely fail to note Hansen’s huge grant from the left-wing Heinz Foundation.

The foundation’s money originated from the Heinz family ketchup fortune. So it appears that the media makes a distinction between oil money and ketchup money.

“60 Minutes” also did not inform viewers that Hansen appeared to concede in a 2003 issue of Natural Science that the use of “extreme scenarios" to dramatize climate change “may have been appropriate at one time” to drive the public's attention to the issue. http://naturalscience.com/ns/article...6/ns_jeh6.html

Why would “60 Minutes” ignore the basic tenets of journalism, which call for objectivity and balance in sourcing, and do such one-sided segments? The answer was provided by correspondent Scott Pelley. Pelley told the CBS News website that he justified excluding scientists skeptical of global warming alarmism from his segments because he considers skeptics to be the equivalent of “Holocaust deniers.” http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2006/03...y1431768.shtml

This year also saw a New York Times reporter write a children’s book entitled” The North Pole Was Here.” The author of the book, New York Times reporter Andrew Revkin, wrote that it may someday be “easier to sail to than stand on” the North Pole in summer. So here we have a very prominent environmental reporter for the New York Times who is promoting aspects of global warming alarmism in a book aimed at children.

TIME MAGAZINE HYPES ALARMISM

In April of this year, Time Magazine devoted an issue to global warming alarmism titled “Be Worried, Be Very Worried.” http://www.time.com/time/covers/0,16...060403,00.html

This is the same Time Magazine which first warned of a coming ice age in 1920’s before switching to warning about global warming in the 1930’s before switching yet again to promoting the 1970’s coming ice age scare.

The April 3, 2006 global warming special report of Time Magazine was a prime example of the media’s shortcomings, as the magazine cited partisan left-wing environmental groups with a vested financial interest in hyping alarmism.

Headlines blared:

“More and More Land is Being Devastated by Drought”

“Earth at the Tipping Point”

“The Climate is Crashing,”

Time Magazine did not make the slightest attempt to balance its reporting with any views with scientists skeptical of this alleged climate apocalypse.

I don’t have journalism training, but I dare say calling a bunch of environmental groups with an obvious fund-raising agenda and asking them to make wild speculations on how bad global warming might become, is nothing more than advocacy for their left-wing causes. It is a violation of basic journalistic standards.

To his credit, New York Times reporter Revkin saw fit to criticize Time Magazine for its embarrassing coverage of climate science. http://orient.bowdoin.edu/orient/art...section=1&id=7

So in the end, Time’s cover story title of “Be Worried, Be Very Worried,” appears to have been apt. The American people should be worried --- very worried -- of such shoddy journalism.

AL GORE INCONVIENIENT TRUTH

In May, our nation was exposed to perhaps one of the slickest science propaganda films of all time: former Vice President Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth.” In addition to having the backing of Paramount Pictures to market this film, Gore had the full backing of the media, and leading the cheerleading charge was none other than the Associated Press.

On June 27, the Associated Press ran an article by Seth Borenstein that boldly declared “Scientists give two thumbs up to Gore's movie.” The article quoted only five scientists praising Gore’s science, despite AP’s having contacted over 100 scientists. http://www.usatoday.com/weather/news...-reviews_x.htm

The fact that over 80% of the scientists contacted by the AP had not even seen the movie or that many scientists have harshly criticized the science presented by Gore did not dissuade the news outlet one bit from its mission to promote Gore’s brand of climate alarmism. http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=257909

I am almost at a loss as to how to begin to address the series of errors, misleading science and unfounded speculation that appear in the former Vice President’s film Here is what Richard Lindzen, a meteorologist from MIT has written about “An Inconvenient Truth.” “A general characteristic of Mr. Gore's approach is to assiduously ignore the fact that the earth and its climate are dynamic; they are always changing even without any external forcing. To treat all change as something to fear is bad enough; to do so in order to exploit that fear is much worse.” http://www.opinionjournal.com/extra/?id=110008597

What follows is a very brief summary of the science that the former Vice President promotes in either a wrong or misleading way:

• He promoted the now debunked “hockey stick” temperature chart in an attempt to prove man’s overwhelming impact on the climate

•He attempted to minimize the significance of Medieval Warm period and the Little Ice Age

•He insisted on a link between increased hurricane activity and global warming that most sciences believe does not exist.

•He asserted that today’s Arctic is experiencing unprecedented warmth while ignoring that temperatures in the 1930’s were as warm or warmer

•He claimed the Antarctic was warming and losing ice but failed to note, that is only true of a small region and the vast bulk has been cooling and gaining ice.

•He hyped unfounded fears that Greenland’s ice is in danger of disappearing

•He erroneously claimed that ice cap on Mt. Kilimanjaro is disappearing due to global warming, even while the region cools and researchers blame the ice loss on local land-use practices

•He made assertions of massive future sea level rise that is way out side of any supposed scientific “consensus” and is not supported in even the most alarmist literature.

•He incorrectly implied that a Peruvian glacier's retreat is due to global warming, while ignoring the fact that the region has been cooling since the 1930s and other glaciers in South America are advancing

•He blamed global warming for water loss in Africa's Lake Chad, despite NASA scientists concluding that local population and grazing factors are the more likely culprits

•He inaccurately claimed polar bears are drowning in significant numbers due to melting ice when in fact they are thriving

•He completely failed to inform viewers that the 48 scientists who accused President Bush of distorting science were part of a political advocacy group set up to support Democrat Presidential candidate John Kerry in 2004

Now that was just a brief sampling of some of the errors presented in “An Inconvenient Truth.” Imagine how long the list would have been if I had actually seen the movie -- there would not be enough time to deliver this speech today.

TOM BROKAW

Following the promotion of “An Inconvenient Truth,” the press did not miss a beat in their role as advocates for global warming fears. ABC News put forth its best effort to secure its standing as an advocate for climate alarmism when the network put out a call for people to submit their anecdotal global warming horror stories in June for use in a future news segment. http://abcnews.go.com/International/...C-RSSFeeds0312

In July, the Discovery Channel presented a documentary on global warming narrated by former NBC anchor Tom Brokaw. The program presented only those views of scientists promoting the idea that humans are destroying the Earth’s climate. http://epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=258659 You don’t have to take my word for the program’s overwhelming bias; a Bloomberg News TV review noted “You'll find more dissent at a North Korean political rally than in this program” because of its lack of scientific objectivity.

Brokaw also presented climate alarmist James Hansen to viewers as unbiased, failing to note his quarter million dollar grant form the partisan Heinz Foundation or his endorsement of Democrat Presidential nominee John Kerry in 2004 and his role promoting former Vice President Gore’s Hollywood movie.

Brokaw, however, did find time to impugn the motives of scientists skeptical of climate alarmism when he featured paid environmental partisan Michael Oppenhimer of the group Environmental Defense accusing skeptics of being bought out by the fossil fuel interests.

The fact remains that political campaign funding by environmental groups to promote climate and environmental alarmism dwarfs spending by the fossil fuel industry by a three-to-one ratio. Environmental special interests, through their 527s, spent over $19 million compared to the $7 million that Oil and Gas spent through PACs in the 2004 election cycle.

I am reminded of a question the media often asks me about how much I have received in campaign contributions from the fossil fuel industry. My unapologetic answer is ‘Not Enough,’ -- especially when you consider the millions partisan environmental groups pour into political campaigns.

ENGINEERED ‘CONSENSUS”

Continuing with our media analysis: On July 24, 2006 The Los Angeles Times featured an op-ed by Naomi Oreskes, a social scientist at the University of California San Diego and the author of a 2004 Science Magazine study. Oreskes insisted that a review of 928 scientific papers showed there was 100% consensus that global warming was not caused by natural climate variations. This study was also featured in former Vice President Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth,” http://epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=259323 However, the analysis in Science Magazine excluded nearly 11,000 studies or more than 90 percent of the papers dealing with global warming, according to a critique by British social scientist Benny Peiser.

Peiser also pointed out that less than two percent of the climate studies in the survey actually endorsed the so-called “consensus view” that human activity is driving global warming and some of the studies actually opposed that view.

But despite this manufactured “consensus,” the media continued to ignore any attempt to question the orthodoxy of climate alarmism.

As the dog days of August rolled in, the American people were once again hit with more hot hype regarding global warming, this time from The New York Times op-ed pages. A columnist penned an August 3rd column filled with so many inaccuracies it is a wonder the editor of the Times saw fit to publish it.

For instance, Bob Herbert’s column made dubious claims about polar bears, the snows of Kilimanjaro and he attempted to link this past summer’s heat wave in the U.S. to global warming – something even alarmist James Hansen does not support. http://epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=261382

POLAR BEARS LOOK TIRED?

Finally, a September 15, 2006 Reuters News article claimed that polar bears in the Arctic are threatened with extinction by global warming. The article by correspondent Alister Doyle, quoted a visitor to the Arctic who claims he saw two distressed polar bears. According to the Reuters article, the man noted that “one of [the polar bears] looked to be dead and the other one looked to be exhausted." The article did not state the bears were actually dead or exhausted, rather that they “looked” that way.

Have we really arrived at the point where major news outlets in the U.S. are reduced to analyzing whether or not polar bears in the Arctic appear restful? How does reporting like this get approved for publication by the editors at Reuters? What happened to covering the hard science of this issue?

What was missing from this Reuters news article was the fact that according to biologists who study the animals, polar bears are doing quite well. Biologist Dr. Mitchell Taylor from the Arctic government of Nunavut, a territory of Canada, refuted these claims in May when he noted that

“Of the 13 populations of polar bears in Canada, 11 are stable or increasing in number. They are not going extinct, or even appear to be affected at present.” http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/Con...d=970599119419

Sadly, it appears that reporting anecdotes and hearsay as fact, has now replaced the basic tenets of journalism for many media outlets.

ALARMISM HAS LED TO SKEPTICISM

It is an inconvenient truth that so far, 2006 has been a year in which major segments of the media have given up on any quest for journalistic balance, fairness and objectivity when it comes to climate change. The global warming alarmists and their friends in the media have attempted to smear scientists who dare question the premise of man-made catastrophic global warming, and as a result some scientists have seen their reputations and research funding dry up.

The media has so relentlessly promoted global warming fears that a British group called the Institute for Public Policy Research – and this from a left leaning group – issued a report in 2006 accusing media outlets of engaging in what they termed “climate porn” in order to attract the public’s attention.

Bob Carter, a Paleoclimate geologist from James Cook University in Australia has described how the media promotes climate fear:

“Each such alarmist article is larded with words such as ‘if’, ‘might’, ‘could’, ‘probably’, ‘perhaps’, ‘expected’, ‘projected’ or ‘modeled’ - and many involve such deep dreaming, or ignorance of scientific facts and principles, that they are akin to nonsense,” professor Carter concluded in an op-ed in April of this year. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/opinion/m...9/ixworld.html

Another example of this relentless hype is the reporting on the seemingly endless number of global warming impact studies which do not even address whether global warming is going to happen. They merely project the impact of potential temperature increases.

The media endlessly hypes studies that purportedly show that global warming could increase mosquito populations, malaria, West Nile Virus, heat waves and hurricanes, threaten the oceans, damage coral reefs, boost poison ivy growth, damage vineyards, and global food crops, to name just a few of the global warming linked calamities. Oddly, according to the media reports, warmer temperatures almost never seem to have any positive effects on plant or animal life or food production. Fortunately, the media’s addiction to so-called ‘climate porn’ has failed to seduce many Americans.

According to a July Pew Research Center Poll, the American public is split about evenly between those who say global warming is due to human activity versus those who believe it’s from natural factors or not happening at all.

In addition, an August Los Angeles Times/Bloomberg poll found that most Americans do not attribute the cause of recent severe weather events to global warming, and the portion of Americans who believe global warming is naturally occurring is on the rise.

Yes -- it appears that alarmism has led to skepticism.

The American people know when their intelligence is being insulted. They know when they are being used and when they are being duped by the hysterical left.

The American people deserve better -- much better -- from our fourth estate. We have a right to expect accuracy and objectivity on climate change coverage. We have a right to expect balance in sourcing and fair analysis from reporters who cover the issue.

Above all, the media must roll back this mantra that there is scientific “consensus” of impending climatic doom as an excuse to ignore recent science. After all, there was a so-called scientific “consensus” that there were nine planets in our solar system until Pluto was recently demoted.

Breaking the cycles of media hysteria will not be easy since hysteria sells -- it’s very profitable. But I want to challenge the news media to reverse course and report on the objective science of climate change, to stop ignoring legitimate voices this scientific debate and to stop acting as a vehicle for unsubstantiated hype.

This guy hit a lot of homeruns. About the only thing he didn't knock out of the park so to speak was the computer model issue. The problem with the computer models is they can't even predict the past. Plug in the data and it doesn't work for what we know already happened. He is right that they are worthless, but didn't give the obvious proof of it.

Its this sort of BS that made me get out of environmental science and switch to dentistry back in the early 90's, I can't imagine what its like trying to be a voice of reason now, when you have active censorship of those who disagree with the political mantra.

Its a bunch of poor science, tied in with feel good do nothing, which I can see being appealing to some mindsets, but should never influence policy.

Dilbert1234567 · 09-26-2006, 05:05 PM

Well, there is a lot of good science in it, but, they ignore what does not support there views. It used to be about the environment, now its anti globalization.

Elphaba · 09-26-2006, 05:17 PM

Ustwo, thank you for the in depth reporting and article links.

Allow me some time to review the information given, before responding.

rofgilead · 09-26-2006, 06:28 PM

Ustwo, follow the two most prestigious science journals every month. In those journals (Science and Nature), there is at least one article a month now supporting that temperatures are rising, that CO2 levels rising correlates with this temperature change. Further, there are a large number of articles with side issues related to global warming - melting of glaciers in North America and Africa, and changes in animal patterns, ocean currents, etc.

Why should I care what some Senator says? The evidence is all against him.

Rekna · 09-26-2006, 06:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by rofgilead

Ustwo, follow the two most prestigious science journals every month. In those journals (Science and Nature), there is at least one article a month now supporting that temperatures are rising, that CO2 levels rising correlates with this temperature change. Further, there are a large number of articles with side issues related to global warming - melting of glaciers in North America and Africa, and changes in animal patterns, ocean currents, etc.

Why should I care what some Senator says? The evidence is all against him.

Ustwo doesn't care about facts all he cares about is party line.

rofgilead · 09-26-2006, 06:41 PM

Example:

Global Genetic Change Tracks Global Climate Warming in Drosophila subobscura
Joan Balanyá, Josep M. Oller, Raymond B. Huey, George W. Gilchrist, and Luis Serra
Science 22 September 2006: 1773-1775.
Published online 31 August 2006 [DOI: 10.1126/science.1131002] (in Science Express Reports)
On three continents, a low-latitude, natural genetic variant of the fruit fly is increasingly found at higher latitudes, paralleling climate warming over the past 25 years.

Seriously, Ustwo, I can understand how it is possible to have a different perspective on politics, but this is just science and measuring what is happening around us. Just start reading the articles.
_____________________________
On this statement:

Continuing with our media analysis: On July 24, 2006 The Los Angeles Times featured an op-ed by Naomi Oreskes, a social scientist at the University of California San Diego and the author of a 2004 Science Magazine study. Oreskes insisted that a review of 928 scientific papers showed there was 100% consensus that global warming was not caused by natural climate variations. This study was also featured in former Vice President Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth,” http://epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=259323 However, the analysis in Science Magazine excluded nearly 11,000 studies or more than 90 percent of the papers dealing with global warming, according to a critique by British social scientist Benny Peiser.

Peiser also pointed out that less than two percent of the climate studies in the survey actually endorsed the so-called “consensus view” that human activity is driving global warming and some of the studies actually opposed that view.
________________

I say 'Benny Peiser' is just dirt being thrown in peoples eyes. Was he published? If so, in what journal? The papers that support global warming were peer reviewed and did not have major holes in their science or messed up experiments. Rejected papers usually have: 1) missing experiments that need to be completed 2) outright problems or errors 3) badly written, or bad conclusions that do not have supporting evidence.

Scientists in climate change do not make the statement in their papers that "Thus, climate change is caused by humans", because their data usually is on some small, particular aspect of climate change - and would not be able to support the authors making such a huge conclusion. Your senator is just being a peice of shit when he makes the statement that most papers did not directly endorse the notion of man made climate change - science doesn't work that way - politics does.

Anyways, Ustwo, your senator is really incorrect on the science - just read the darned Journals where peer-reviewed, good science is being published monthly supported global warming.

dc_dux · 09-26-2006, 08:18 PM

I dont have any more knowledge or expertise about global warming than most Americans, but I would tend to give more credibility to a group like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) than to Sen Imhofe. Just as an aside, Imhofe's two top contributors are the oil lobby and the electric utility lobby.

The IPCC assessments - that conclude that human activity is a contributing factor of global warming - involve thousands of scientists from over 120 countries who, over a period of years, develop detailed reports on climate change. The peer-review process is far more extensive than even the most prestigious scientific journals – the most recent report was reviewed by more than 1,000 top experts.

There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities.

http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/007.htm

For more on the IPCC assessment process:
http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming...t-process.html

The National Academy of Sciences, an independent organization created by Congress to provide scientific guidance recently a study recently with the same general conclusions.

Maye a picture helps. This graphic of the melting of the polar ice cap over the last 26 years is pretty compelling.

http://www.everybodysweather.com/Sta...lter/index.htm

It obviously doesnt suggest that the decline is human induced. You have to read the numerous independent and peer-reviewed, studies out there to see the impact of human activity as a contributing factor as opposed to just natural occurences.

Then decide for yourself if we should consider policies to address the issue responsibly or just ignore it, vilify any scientist or politician who expresses concern, and hope for the best.

kutulu · 09-26-2006, 09:02 PM

Sorry but the 'junk science' lines don't work. Just about EVERY relevant article puplished in every peer-reviewed article supports global warming theories. If it was just a subset of scientists or just scientists in the US, the opposition could have some support but it's not even close.

j8ear · 09-27-2006, 06:31 AM

What a great thread Ustwo. Whether intentional or not you have set quite a brilliant trap, and so far every liberal but one was snagged...hook, line and sinker. All argueing things not even in dispute. Classic.

Elphaba, kudos to you for at least taking a measured approach to the issue.

-bear

NCB · 09-27-2006, 06:37 AM

This babe let the cat out of the liberal bag.....

Quote:

Originally Posted by Christine Stewart, Former Minister of the Environment of Canada

"No matter if the science is all phony, there are collateral environmental benefits.... Climate change [provides] the greatest chance to bring about justice and equality in the world."

Charlatan · 09-27-2006, 07:19 AM

God forbid we should *ever* have justice or equality in the world... Would it really be that bad?

I will have to find the time to read your post, Ustwo. It's soooo long. (sorry, just taking the piss out of you).

As for Ustwo just holding the party line... that isn't fair. I like to believe that Ustwo would still have his position on climate change even if the "party line" shifted. I believe Ustwo to be a man of integrity. Seriously.

aberkok · 09-27-2006, 07:40 AM

After reading, I'm left mostly with questions.

What incentive is there for environmental conservation? Who benefits other than our health and the environment? On the other hand, to ignore oppotunities for conservation brings great financial incentives to polluting business - at least until we all smarten up and buy only green - which we haven't yet.

There is no "smoking gun" to support global warming, just a clear correlation between human pollution and climate change. The non-scientific approach, as demonstrated above, would be to dismiss the changes and continue our undeniably unsustainable ways (and there are only so many trees in the forest, and clean air in the cities, and space in the landfills). The right thing to do is to continue investigating and until then, act prudently.

There are proven benefits to conservation (I can't believe I have to say that...I'm probably going to have to prove it, aren't I?) other than preventing climate change.

j8ear: you should be proud of your brilliant trap

stevo · 09-27-2006, 09:31 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aberkok

What incentive is there for environmental conservation? Who benefits other than our health and the environment? On the other hand, to ignore oppotunities for conservation brings great financial incentives to polluting business - at least until we all smarten up and buy only green - which we haven't yet.

There are proven benefits to conservation (I can't believe I have to say that...I'm probably going to have to prove it, aren't I?) other than preventing climate change.

when was conservation an issue? who's anti-conservation?

aberkok · 09-27-2006, 09:40 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

when was conservation an issue? who's anti-conservation?

What other possible goal could denial of global warming have but to continue current modes of production and consumption?

Incidentally:

Quote:

Originally Posted by Senator James Inhofe

Above all, the media must roll back this mantra that there is scientific “consensus” of impending climatic doom as an excuse to ignore recent science. After all, there was a so-called scientific “consensus” that there were nine planets in our solar system until Pluto was recently demoted.

In the August 30th edition of Skepticality magazine's podcast, astronomer Dr. Phil Plait talked about how, in the final vote on the rules for what defines a planet, less than 400 scientists voted. Most had left the convention by then. The point he made was that whether Pluto is a planet or not isn't a scientific issue. It's just something for the media. In Phil's words - http://www.badastronomy.com/bablog/2...-its-a-planet/

Quote:

Originally Posted by Phil Plait

Which brings me, finally, to my big point. This is all incredibly silly. We’re not arguing science here. We’re arguing semantics. For years people have tried to make a rigid definition of planet, but it simply won’t work. No matter what parameter you include in the list, I can come up with an example that screws the definition up. I’ve shown that already, and I’m just warming up.

The problem here is simple, really: we’re trying to wrap a scientific definition around a culturally-defined word that has no strict definition. Doing this will only lead to trouble. Why? For one thing, it’s divisive and silly. How does a definition help us at all? And how does it make things less confusing than they already are? Charon is a planet? It’s smaller than our own Moon!

My point is that Inhofe is betraying his scientific ignorance by citing non-issues like Pluto. It's really just rhetoric for him to paint the scientific community as fickle by bringing this up.

flstf · 09-27-2006, 09:49 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aberkok

What other possible goal could denial of global warming have but to continue current modes of production and consumption?

To recognize that what is really happening on our planet has happened many times in the past and has little to do with us.

Dilbert1234567 · 09-27-2006, 10:06 AM

Well lets here from one of the Greenpeace founders... (Bold added to important parts, I’d recommend reading the whole thing though)

Quote:

Originally Posted by http://www.mailtribune.com/archive/2002/april/041402n3.htm

Founder of Greenpeace says movement has lost its way

Patrick Moore says environmentalists depend more on rhetoric than science these days

By PAUL FATTIG
Mail Tribune

Patrick Moore wanted to make one point clear at the outset.

"I'm still a very strong environmentalist," said Moore, 54, one of the founders of Greenpeace. "I believe we did a lot of great things to raise public awareness."

Having said that, Moore, who spent 15 years with Greenpeace, took issue with what he believes is today's environmental extremism.

"The environmental movement has shifted from being politically centered and science-based to having a fairly strong left-wing rhetoric that has more to do with politics than science," he said.

"There is no reason why environmentalists should be left-wing."

Moore was one of the featured speakers at Saturday's rally at the Jackson County Fairgrounds sponsored by People for the USA. The theme was to "Restore the Spirit of America."

In addition to drumming up patriotic spirit, the rally was aimed at increasing public awareness about the worldwide "green agenda," organizers said.

Other speakers included former Congresswoman Helen Chenoweth-Hage of Idaho, who is known for taking on the environmental movement.

But Moore, who now works as a public speaker as well as an environmental consultant for governments and industry, has been roundly bashed by the environmental community for his outspoken views.

Some have labeled him an industrial hack while others chastised him for misrepresenting the movement.

"A hallmark of people who aren't able to argue with you is to put you down as a person, rather than deal with the issues," Moore said in an interview before his speech.

Noting that some in the environmental movement have come to agree with his conclusions, Moore said he doesn't consider himself "right-wing" in the political sense.

"I just think it's time to recognize there are 6 billion people on the planet now," he said. "We can't pretend they aren't there. They need food and energy."

A native of Canada who has a doctorate in ecology, Moore said he continues to work with people to try to reduce the impact on the environment.

That's what drew him into the environmental movement more than 30 years ago, he said.

Hailing from a small community on the northern tip of Vancouver Island, Moore helped create Greenpeace in Vancouver in 1971. He was a doctoral student at the time.

"The issue for us then was hydrogen bomb testing in Alaska by the United States," he said, referring to tests being conducted along the Aleutian Island chain.

He was among those who sailed a fishing boat from Vancouver to the islands in protest.

"We captured a great deal of media attention," he recalled. "Tens of thousands marched. President Nixon canceled the remaining hydrogen bomb tests."

For the next 15 years, Moore would be among those taking on French atomic atmospheric tests, then Soviet Union and Japan whaling fleets and the slaughter of baby seals in Newfoundland.

He began to reassess his life in the mid-1980s, he said.

"I wanted to change from the politics of confrontation to the politics of consensus," he said.

"Since I left Greenpeace, I have seen the movement drift into extremism, abandoning common sense and logic," he added. "To a large extent, it is being hijacked by activists who are using green rhetoric to launch agendas that don't have much to do with ecology."

One example is the debate over genetically modified food, he said.

"The environmental issues are exaggerated out of proportion," he said. "There is a huge potential benefit in genetically modified food."

Describing himself as a generalist trying to connect the dots between society and its impact on the environment, Moore said too many in the movement take a simplistic approach.

While it may sound like a good idea to reduce the use of lumber products, that reduction will only increase the reliance on unrenewable products such as plastic, steel and concrete, he said. Timber products are renewable, he noted.

Moreover, about 80 percent of all timber sold in the United States is from private land, he said.

"The reason they are growing trees instead of corn or cattle is because we are building from wood," he said. "There is an economical demand for wood."

But Moore isn't against all issues now on the environmental movement's radar screen.

"I have a lot of time for people interested in climate change," he said. "It is a legitimate issue. But I don't think it deserves an alarmist approach."

The problem is that humankind doesn't know enough at this point to make informed conclusions, he said.

"We can't even accurately predict the weather seven days out," he said. "But it (climate warming) is something to be concerned about."

The point, he said, is that the world is not coming to an end as some would suggest.

"What we really need to do is develop a more holistic or more logical analysis of the environment," he said. "We need to start understanding how all these parts fit together and are related to each other."

Ch'i · 09-27-2006, 11:16 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Rekna

Ustwo doesn't care about facts all he cares about is party line.

I just finished reading most of this thread, and was disappointed to see many of you shoot Ustwo down without any evidence, or anything for that matter, to support your claims or address the OP. I'm not calling you all wrong, just noticing alot of hostility with little back-up.

If he makes you angry in another thread, that's fine. Don't let it get in the way of a different discussion.

host · 09-27-2006, 11:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dilbert1234567

Well lets here from one of the Greenpeace founders... (Bold added to important parts, I’d recommend reading the whole thing though)

Ch'i....it's gonna be alright. Ustwo, IMO, knows perfectly well, what he is doing. He takes the side of oil rich Oklahoma's senator, Inhofe, the man who's idealogical counterpart in the House, is aptly nicknamed, "Smokey Joe" Barton.
Ustwo advocated for men who have sold the quality of the air you bread, out of their own greed and hubris. I can have nothing but contempt, and a vigorous resolve to observe and counter this criminal cabal that assured me that the environment that I lived in, during late 2001, early 2002...three blocks from ground zero, in Manhattan, was non-toxic....when they knew fucking well...that the exact opposite was true. Shed not a moment of concern for them, Ch'i....it is not ignorance that they can trot out as an excuse. They know perfectly well what they are doing, and they revel in it!

Dilbert, I am surprised to see you post from that "side". Bush, Cheney, and Inhofe are "owned" by "big oil", and Ustwo is evidently compelled to post <a href="http://mediamatters.org/items/200607120007">Bozell's position, "du jour"</a>.....

Quote:

http://www.umass.edu/newsoffice/news...cles/36111.php
Report Affirms 'Hockey Stick' Climate Change Data; UMass Amherst Climate Scientist Comments

June 22, 2006

Contact: Raymond Bradley
413/545-2120

AMHERST, Mass. – A National Academy of Sciences report released today confirms that the last few decades of the 20th century were warmer than any comparable period in the last 400 years, affirming the findings of climate scientist Raymond Bradley of the University of Massachusetts Amherst and his colleagues. The report was requested by Congress last year to clarify research involving surface temperature reconstructions published by the scientists in the late 1990s. Bradley issued the following statement regarding the report:

“The National Academy of Sciences released their report today, on Surface Temperature Reconstructions for the Last 2,000 Years. This was requested by Rep. Sherwood Boehlert (R-NY) to clarify the controversy over the so-called “hockey stick” temperature reconstructions of the last 1,000 years by Michael Mann (Penn State University), Raymond Bradley (University of Massachusetts Amherst) and Malcolm Hughes (University of Arizona). These scientists concluded that the late 20th century warmth in the Northern Hemisphere was unprecedented during at least the last 1,000 years. <b>This drew the ire of Sen. James Inhofe (R-OK) and Rep. Joe Barton (R- Texas), who claimed the research was misleading,” Bradley says.</b>

“The NAS report concluded that the Mann et al study “has subsequently been supported by an array of evidence.” They find it plausible that “the northern hemisphere was warmer during the last few decades of the twentieth century than during any comparable period over the preceding millennium.” They note that confidence in the record decreases back in time, especially before A.D. 1600, in agreement with the original conclusions reached by the university researchers. The Academy panel also concluded: “Surface temperature reconstructions for periods prior to the industrial era are only one of multiple lines of evidence supporting the conclusion that climatic warming is occurring in response to human activities, and they are not the primary evidence,” says Bradley.....

Quote:

<b>How Bad is He?</b>
by Sidney Blumenthal

.......No other president has ever been hostile to science. Russell Train, the Environmental Protection Agency administrator under presidents Nixon and Ford, observed, "How radically we have moved away from regulation based on independent findings and professional analysis of scientific, health and economic data by the responsible agency to regulation controlled by the White House and driven primarily by political considerations."

Bush's opposition to stem cell research was just the beginning of his enmity toward science. The words "reproductive health" and "condoms" were forbidden from appearing on websites of agencies or organizations that received federal funds. At the Food and Drug Administration, staff scientists and two independent advisory panels were overruled in order to deny the public access to emergency contraception. At the Centers for Disease Control, scientifically false information was posted on its website to foster doubt about the effectiveness of condoms in preventing HIV/AIDS. At the President's Council on Bioethics, two scientists were fired for dissents based on scientific reasoning. At the National Cancer Institute, staff scientists were suppressed as the administration planted a story on its website falsely connecting breast cancer to abortion. The top climate scientist at NASA, James Hansen, longtime director of the agency's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, was ordered muzzled after he noted at a scientific conference the link between greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. The president also suggested that public schools should equally teach evolution, the basis of all biological science, and "Intelligent Design," a pseudo-scientific version of creationism. "I think that part of education is to expose people to different schools of thought," Bush said.

Bush's antipathy to science had an overlapping political appeal to both the religious right and industrial special interests. Scientific research was distorted and suppressed at the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service, the Department of Agriculture, and the Environmental Protection Agency. The administration censored and misrepresented scientific reports on climate change, air pollution, endangered species, soil conservation, mercury emissions, and forests. Scientists were dismissed or rejected from numerous science advisory committees, from the Lead Poisoning Prevention Panel to the Army Science Board.

In February 2004, 60 of the nation's leading scientists, university presidents, medical experts, and former federal agency directors from both Democratic and Republican administrations, including 20 Nobel laureates, issued a statement entitled "Restoring Scientific Integrity in Policymaking." It declared: "The distortion of scientific knowledge for partisan political ends must cease if the public is to be properly informed about issues central to its well being, and the nation is to benefit fully from its heavy investment in scientific research and education."

When Hurricane Katrina landed in August 2005 scientific reality and dysfunctional government collided. Bush had systematically distorted, suppressed and ignored evidence of global warming, which scientists believed was responsible for intensifying hurricanes. The director of the National Hurricane Center had briefed Bush on the devastating impact on New Orleans and the Gulf Coast of Katrina before it hit, but the president disregarded the advance warning. The Federal Emergency Management Agency, which under President Clinton had been one of the most efficient and effective, had become a morass of incompetence and political cronyism. Amid its abject failure, Bush praised its director Michael Brown, whose previous experience was as the head of the International Arabian Horse Association, as doing "a heck of a job." New Orleans, a major and unique American city, was destroyed. In the immediate aftermath of the storm, Bush traveled six times to the city, promising to rebuild it to its former glory, but most of the city lay in ruins a year later. In January 2006, Bush declared that he had received no rebuilding plan, apparently unaware that he had already rejected it. ......

Let's hear from 62 prominent scientists, including some nobel laureates:

Quote:

http://www.ucsusa.org/scientific_int...t.html?print=t
Union of Concerned Scientists
Citizens and Scientists for Environmental Solutions
www.ucsusa.org

statement
Restoring Scientific Integrity in Policymaking

————
On February 18, 2004, over 60 leading scientists–Nobel laureates, leading medical experts, former federal agency directors, and university chairs and presidents–signed the statement below, voicing their concern over the misuse of science by the Bush administration. UCS is seeking the signatures of thousands of additional U.S. scientists in support of this effort.
————

Quote:

Science, like any field of endeavor, relies on freedom of inquiry; and one of the hallmarks of that freedom is objectivity. Now, more than ever, on issues ranging from climate change to AIDS research to genetic engineering to food additives, government relies on the impartial perspective of science for guidance.

President George H.W. Bush, April 23, 1990

Successful application of science has played a large part in the policies that have made the United States of America the world’s most powerful nation and its citizens increasingly prosperous and healthy. Although scientific input to the government is rarely the only factor in public policy decisions, this input should always be weighed from an objective and impartial perspective to avoid perilous consequences. Indeed, this principle has long been adhered to by presidents and administrations of both parties in forming and implementing policies. The administration of George W. Bush has, however, disregarded this principle.

When scientific knowledge has been found to be in conflict with its political goals, the administration has often manipulated the process through which science enters into its decisions. This has been done by placing people who are professionally unqualified or who have clear conflicts of interest in official posts and on scientific advisory committees; by disbanding existing advisory committees; by censoring and suppressing reports by the government’s own scientists; and by simply not seeking independent scientific advice. Other administrations have, on occasion, engaged in such practices, but not so systematically nor on so wide a front. Furthermore, in advocating policies that are not scientifically sound, the administration has sometimes misrepresented scientific knowledge and misled the public about the implications of its policies.

For example, in support of the president’s decision to avoid regulating emissions that cause climate change, the administration has consistently misrepresented the findings of the National Academy of Sciences, government scientists, and the expert community at large. Thus in June 2003, the White House demanded extensive changes in the treatment of climate change in a major report by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). To avoid issuing a scientifically indefensible report, EPA officials eviscerated the discussion of climate change and its consequences.

The administration also suppressed a study by the EPA that found that a bipartisan Senate clean air proposal would yield greater health benefits than the administration’s proposed Clear Skies Act, which the administration is portraying as an improvement of the existing Clean Air Act. “Clear Skies” would, however, be less effective in cleaning up the nation’s air and reducing mercury contamination of fish than proper enforcement of the existing Clean Air Act.

Misrepresenting and suppressing scientific knowledge for political purposes can have serious consequences. Had Richard Nixon also based his decisions on such calculations he would not have supported the Clean Air Act of 1970, which in the following 20 years prevented more than 200,000 premature deaths and millions of cases of respiratory and cardiovascular disease. Similarly, George H.W. Bush would not have supported the Clean Air Act Amendments of 1990 and additional benefits of comparable proportions would have been lost.

The behavior of the White House on these issues is part of a pattern that has led Russell Train, the EPA administrator under Presidents Nixon and Ford, to observe, “How radically we have moved away from regulation based on independent findings and professional analysis of scientific, health and economic data by the responsible agency to regulation controlled by the White House and driven primarily by political considerations.”

Across a broad range of policy areas, the administration has undermined the quality and independence of the scientific advisory system and the morale of the government’s outstanding scientific personnel:

*
Highly qualified scientists have been dropped from advisory committees dealing with childhood lead poisoning, environmental and reproductive health, and drug abuse, while individuals associated with or working for industries subject to regulation have been appointed to these bodies.
*
Censorship and political oversight of government scientists is not restricted to the EPA, but has also occurred at the Departments of Health and Human Services, Agriculture, and Interior, when scientific findings are in conflict with the administration’s policies or with the views of its political supporters.
*
The administration is supporting revisions to the Endangered Species Act that would greatly constrain scientific input into the process of identifying endangered species and critical habitats for their protection.
*
Existing scientific advisory committees to the Department of Energy on nuclear weapons, and to the State Department on arms control, have been disbanded.
*
In making the invalid claim that Iraq had sought to acquire aluminum tubes for uranium enrichment centrifuges, the administration disregarded the contrary assessment by experts at Livermore, Los Alamos and Oak Ridge National Laboratories.

The distortion of scientific knowledge for partisan political ends must cease if the public is to be properly informed about issues central to its well being, and the nation is to benefit fully from its heavy investment in scientific research and education. To elevate the ethic that governs the relationship between science and government, Congress and the Executive should establish legislation and regulations that would:

*
Forbid censorship of scientific studies unless there is a reasonable national security concern;
*
Require all scientists on scientific advisory panels to meet high professional standards; and
*
Ensure public access to government studies and the findings of scientific advisory panels.

To maintain public trust in the credibility of the scientific, engineering and medical professions, and to restore scientific integrity in the formation and implementation of public policy, we call on our colleagues to:

*

Sign the statement today—click here.
Bring the current situation to public attention;
* Request that the government return to the ethic and code of conduct which once fostered independent and objective scientific input into policy formation; and
* Advocate legislative, regulatory and administrative reforms that would ensure the acquisition and dissemination of independent and objective scientific analysis and advice.

See a list of prominent signatories.
http://www.ucsusa.org/scientific_int...gnatories.html

Quote:

http://go.ucsusa.org/RSI_list/index.php
Signers of the scientists' statement on scientific integrity include 49 Nobel laureates, 63 National Medal of Science recipients, and 175 members of the National Academies. See the entire list of signers, here.

Note: Italicized names are those of the original signers of the statement

National Medal of Science *
Nobel Laureate †
Crafoord Prize #
The National Academies ^

....and, in the last 24 hours:

Quote:

<div class="post">

<h2 class="date">September 27, 2006</h2> <h3 id="post-8580"><a href="http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/8580.html" rel="bookmark" title="Permanent Link to Bush administration muzzles scientists — Part MMCXVIII">Bush administration muzzles scientists — Part MMCXVIII</a></h3>
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<p>The Bush gang? Blocking a scientific report they don't like? <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/news/washington/2006-09-26-hurricane-report_x.htm">You don't say</a>.</p>

<blockquote><p>The Bush administration has blocked release of a report that suggests global warming is contributing to the frequency and strength of hurricanes, the journal Nature reported Tuesday.</p>
<p>The possibility that warming conditions may cause storms to become stronger has generated debate among climate and weather experts, particularly in the wake of the Hurricane Katrina disaster.</p>
<p>In the new case, Nature said weather experts at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration — part of the Commerce Department — in February set up a seven-member panel to prepare a consensus report on the views of agency scientists about global warming and hurricanes.</p>
<p>According to Nature, a draft of the statement said that warming may be having an effect.</p></blockquote>
<p>It was then, of course, that political appointees intervened. A Commerce official emailed panel chair Ants Leetmaa explaining that the report was not to be released.</p>
<p>Sen. Frank R. Lautenberg (D-N.J.), charged that "the administration has effectively declared war on science and truth to advance its anti-environment agenda … the Bush administration continues to censor scientists who have documented the current impacts of global warming."</p>

<p>If only this were the first time.<br />
<a id="more-8580"></a><br />
Let's not forget, for example, that James Hansen, the longtime director of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, has spoken out repeatedly, explaining to anyone who will listen that Bush administration officials have <a href="http://www.thecarpetbaggerreport.com/archives/6474.html">tried to censor</a> scientific information about global warming.</p>
<p>Indeed, NOAA itself has had <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/04/05/AR2006040502150.html">repeated problems</a> similar to this one.</p>
<blockquote><p>Scientists doing climate research for the federal government say the Bush administration has made it hard for them to speak forthrightly to the public about global warming. The result, the researchers say, is a danger that Americans are not getting the full story on how the climate is changing.</p>

<p>Employees and contractors working for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, along with a U.S. Geological Survey scientist working at an NOAA lab, said in interviews that over the past year administration officials have chastised them for speaking on policy questions; removed references to global warming from their reports, news releases and conference Web sites; investigated news leaks; and sometimes urged them to stop speaking to the media altogether.</p></blockquote>
<p>For example, Christopher Milly, a hydrologist at the U.S. Geological Survey, said he had trouble writing a press release on how climate change would affect the nation's water supply without running into trouble from officials at the Interior Department. In 2002, Milly was told that his release would cause "great problems with the department." A few years later, officials allowed Milly to issue a statement on his research, but only after certain key words — "global warming," "warming climate," and "climate change" — were removed.</p>

<p>Scientists at NOAA's Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory told the WaPo they've had so many problems getting clearance to speak with journalists, a lot of reporters have just stopped asking, leading to a public that only has "a partial sense" of what government scientists have learned about climate change.</p>
<p>One of them said, "American taxpayers are paying the bill, and they have a right to know what we're doing."</p>
<p>There goes the reality-based community again, forgetting how the rules are different in Bush's America….
</p>

et tu, Dilbert1234567.....why?

Dilbert1234567 · 09-27-2006, 11:46 AM

woah woah woah Hoast, don’t group me in with the bush administration. I’m all for reducing our impact on the environment; I just disagree with the scientist findings and the alarmist spin they place on them. Yes, we have an impact on our environment, but how much is not yet known, just a few years ago, we were worried about global cooling, now all of a sudden we are concerned by global warming, the way were going keeps changing; this is fine, science changes as we discover new evidence; however it is irresponsible to cry bloody murder when we don’t have all the evidence yet. Fact is, on most fronts, the environment is getting cleaner, and in those parts its getting worse, it’s getting worse at a declining rate, were heading in the right direction and that is great. We do need to regulate business, so they don’t over pollute and make things worse, but we don’t need to shut down industry altogether, we have too be careful with the environment, but saying were all going to die, is just irresponsible.

Ch'i · 09-27-2006, 11:55 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Dilbert1234567

woah woah woah Hoast, don’t group me in with the bush administration. I’m all for reducing our impact on the environment; I just disagree with the scientist findings and the alarmist spin they place on them. Yes, we have an impact on our environment, but how much is not yet known, just a few years ago, we were worried about global cooling, now all of a sudden we are concerned by global warming, the way were going keeps changing; this is fine, science changes as we discover new evidence; however it is irresponsible to cry bloody murder when we don’t have all the evidence yet. Fact is, on most fronts, the environment is getting cleaner, and in those parts its getting worse, it’s getting worse at a declining rate, were heading in the right direction and that is great. We do need to regulate business, so they don’t over pollute and make things worse, but we don’t need to shut down industry altogether, we have too be careful with the environment, but saying were all going to die, is just irresponsible.

Global warming will eventually cause a cooling trend. Its true that many scientists estimate unrealistic time tables, however, it is important that we do something to stop it. You definately want to do some research before going down this road. These posts have links to some good information on anthropogenic greenhouse gases, and the AGGI (ANNUAL GREENHOUSE GAS INDEX).
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showpos...1&postcount=30
http://www.tfproject.org/tfp/showpos...1&postcount=20

dc_dux · 09-27-2006, 12:37 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by j8ear

What a great thread Ustwo. Whether intentional or not you have set quite a brilliant trap, and so far every liberal but one was snagged...hook, line and sinker. All argueing things not even in dispute. Classic.

I agree its a great thread, whatever the intent. It provided another opportunity to separate global warming facts from the standard fiction that Imhofe included in his speech.

A more detailed analysis of Imhofe's misrepresentation of the facts may be found here:

http://gristmill.grist.org/story/2006/9/25/17124/9789

More importantly on the global warming front, Gov. Schwarzenegger signed California's global warming bill into law today:

Finaly ONE governor understands global warming.

I have to put this full article in as I didn't think any governor really had a clue about global warming beyond a few factoids.

Quote:

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger on Wednesday signed into law a sweeping global warming initiative that imposes the nation's first cap on greenhouse gas emissions, saying the effort kicks off "a bold new era of environmental protection."

Standing on picturesque Treasure Island with San Francisco's skyline in the background, Schwarzenegger called the fight against global warming one of the most important issues of modern times.

"We simply must do everything we can in our power to slow down global warming before it is too late," Schwarzenegger said during an address before signing the bill.

Mayor Gavin Newsom and New York Gov. George Pataki, as well as Democratic legislators, joined Schwarzenegger for the high-profile ceremony. British Prime Minister Tony Blair, who struck a deal with Schwarzenegger over the summer to develop clean technologies, joined the ceremony via video link.

Blair called the bill-signing "a proud day for political leadership" and "a historic day for the rest of the world, as well."

California's efforts on global warming have been in the spotlight since Schwarzenegger and the state's legislative Democrats reached an accord last month on the Democrat-authored bill to cut greenhouse gases.

The negotiations culminated in the last week of the legislative session, handing the Republican governor a key victory during an election year in which he has sought to portray himself as a friend to the environment.

On Wednesday, Schwarzenegger called the bill signing a historic occasion.

"It will begin a bold new era of environmental protection in California that will change the course of history," he said.

He expected other states, the federal government and even other nations to follow.

"I'm convinced of that ... because nothing is more important than protecting our planet," he said.

Schwarzenegger's Democratic opponent in the November election, state treasurer Phil Angelides, also supports the new law.

It imposes a first-in-the-nation emissions cap on utilities, refineries and manufacturing plants in a bid to curb the gases that scientists blame for warming the Earth. Two years ago, a state board adopted tight regulations on automobile tailpipe emissions, an initiative that is being challenged in federal court by automakers.

State reports have predicted the effects of global warming could be severe for the state, leading to earlier melting of the Sierra snowpack and threats to the state's water supply. It also could lead to changes in the growing season in the nation's No. 1 agricultural producer, even jeopardizing the Napa Valley wine industry.

Schwarzenegger also was expected to sign a second Democrat-sponsored global warming bill with consequences beyond the state's borders. That bill will prohibit California's large utilities and corporations from entering long-term power contracts with suppliers whose electricity sources do not meet the state's greenhouse gas emission standards.

The measure by Sen. President Pro Tem Don Perata, D-Oakland, is intended to force coal plants in the western U.S. to install cleaner technologies.

California's efforts to cut greenhouse gas emissions from industry and automobiles are part of a goal to reduce the state's emissions to 1990 levels by 2020, an estimated 25 percent reduction. California is the world's 12th largest producer of greenhouse gases such as carbon dioxide, methane and nitrous oxide that are trapping heat in the Earth's atmosphere.

Schwarzenegger issued an executive order in 2005 calling for an even more ambitious reduction - cutting the levels of greenhouse gases to 80 percent below 1990 levels by 2050.

In an interview Tuesday with The Associated Press, Schwarzenegger described the emissions-cap bill as one step in a long-term strategy by the nation's most populous state to combat global climate change. He said the state should further reduce industrial emissions and adopt initiatives such as placing greater emphasis on renewable energy and hydrogen-fueled cars.

The industrial emissions cap has been praised by environmentalists as a step toward fighting global climate change, but business leaders have warned that it will increase their costs and force them to scale back their California operations.

Industry officials say California lawmakers must ease other regulatory burdens to counter the higher costs they face with the tighter emissions standards.

An example could be eliminating the sales tax levied on new equipment, said Dorothy Rothrock, vice president of government relations for the California Manufacturers and Technology Association.

"If we do continue to discourage California manufacturing, emission will happen elsewhere without regulation, and we will not have achieved our goal of reducing emissions," she said.

Schwarzenegger said it is possible to protect the environment as well as the state's economy. He expects the law will lead to a new business sector in California devoted to developing the technologies industries can use to meet the tougher emission requirements.

"We can save our planet and boost our economy at the same time," the governor said.

http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercu...a/15622177.htm

stevo · 09-27-2006, 12:53 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by aberkok

What other possible goal could denial of global warming have but to continue current modes of production and consumption?

Huh? possible goal of denial? There's no goal in my denial of global warming and I would consider myself a conservationist, especially when it comes to our oceans and fisheries. I'm for all kinds of conservation. What I'm not, though, is sold on global warming. I have yet to see any proof to convince me that its true. What I have seen is a lot of historical data that shows the temperature of the earth fluctuating for thousands of years that can't possibly be due to man's burning of fossil fuels.

Ch'i · 09-27-2006, 01:08 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

What I have seen is a lot of historical data that shows the temperature of the earth fluctuating for thousands of years that can't possibly be due to man's burning of fossil fuels.

Man did not induce or cause the natural climate changes on our planet. However, it is very likely that we are intensifying it.

Do some research.

Ustwo · 09-27-2006, 01:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

Huh? possible goal of denial? There's no goal in my denial of global warming and I would consider myself a conservationist, especially when it comes to our oceans and fisheries. I'm for all kinds of conservation. What I'm not, though, is sold on global warming. I have yet to see any proof to convince me that its true. What I have seen is a lot of historical data that shows the temperature of the earth fluctuating for thousands of years that can't possibly be due to man's burning of fossil fuels.

Thats just it. My very first science project as a kid was on acid rain effects. My first advanced degree was in ecology. I did two years post grad work on it too. I've been a fisherman all my life. I grew up in a wooded area, and despite being in the burbs, I am more at home in the woods than downtown. I have no reason to 'deny' human caused global warming because if it were true it would destroy that which I love. I'm not being paid off by oil companies, I wasn't when I was 20 and saw how much of the global warming stuff was garbage, and I'm not now.

As a scientist I can say, global warming may be happening to some extent, but there is not one shred of evidence that it is human caused or even unusual.

stevo · 09-27-2006, 01:22 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ch'i

Man did not induce or cause the natural climate changes on our planet. However, it is very likely that we are intensifying it.

Do some research.

very likely = maybe? possibly? 50% sure? 95% sure? how confident are you? how confident is this research you speak of?

Ustwo · 09-27-2006, 01:41 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ch'i

Man did not induce or cause the natural climate changes on our planet. However, it is very likely that we are intensifying it.

Do some research.

And we need to redistribute all the wealth at the point of a gun, and dinosaurs are still amoung us. Come on Ch'i, I started doing research on this I'd guess about the time you were born and the data does not support your conclusion. The data barely supports a warming trend.

I'll be willing to bet my practice I've done more research than you on this.

Edit: This is from your journal Amazon Rainforest, which provides 20% of the earth's oxygen . I'm all for saving the rainforest but the myth of oxygen loss due to deforestation was put to rest in the early 90's. If every tree on earth died it would have very little effect on the O2 level.

Ch'i · 09-27-2006, 02:43 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Ustwo

And we need to redistribute all the wealth at the point of a gun, and dinosaurs are still amoung us. Come on Ch'i, I started doing research on this I'd guess about the time you were born and the data does not support your conclusion. The data barely supports a warming trend.

I'll be willing to bet my practice I've done more research than you on this.

Edit: This is from your journal Amazon Rainforest, which provides 20% of the earth's oxygen . I'm all for saving the rainforest but the myth of oxygen loss due to deforestation was put to rest in the early 90's. If every tree on earth died it would have very little effect on the O2 level.

First of all, I never said we need to redistribute all the wealth at the point of a gun (I hate guns). Secondly, that paranoia thread was for fun.

There has been a one degree temperature increase, but I can understand the negligibility of that fact. Hopefully your right.

Global warming aside, even if anthropogenic greenhouse gases aren't causing a heating trend (which is up for debate), they still need to be reduced. I remember seeing people in Tokyo having to wear filter masks because of the pollution.

Ustwo I realize you probably know alot more about this than I do, so your word does have value. However, I'd still really appreciate it if you could take me to the information/research that supports your statements.

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

how confident is this research you speak of?

Most of my research comes from http://www.cmdl.noaa.gov/index.php, and science journals. I tend not to read an article that hints at bias, and make sure I research both sides of an argument.

aberkok · 09-27-2006, 02:54 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by stevo

Huh? possible goal of denial? There's no goal in my denial of global warming and I would consider myself a conservationist, especially when it comes to our oceans and fisheries. I'm for all kinds of conservation. What I'm not, though, is sold on global warming. I have yet to see any proof to convince me that its true. What I have seen is a lot of historical data that shows the temperature of the earth fluctuating for thousands of years that can't possibly be due to man's burning of fossil fuels.

Try and stay on topic here. I'm not talking about you. I'm talking about Senator Inhofe. It's one thing if you/Ustwo are fed up with a lack of evidence in favour of a causal relationship between human pollution and global warming. I respect that.

You'd have to be very naive to think that Senator Inhofe gave his speech because he loves great science. There's almost always an ulterior motive behind what politicians say. My money's on the big polluters' lobbies.

roachboy · 09-27-2006, 03:05 PM

ustwo--in this area i would almost be inclined to respect something of your positions if you would just step down from your posture of "i am mister science and mister science says global warming is bullshit" and present a better range of better information to allow folk to come to their own conclusions about the matter.

seriously: i am curious to learn more about this issue.

but it seems that you do not imagine us smart enough to deal with legitimate information: instead you quote imhof's speech here or bite stuff from junkscience there: none of which does your case justice.

if there is a serious argument against global warming to be made, by all means make the argument and refer to sources that open up the topic.

i am not afraid of books and i imagine others are not either, so if that is what you have to refer to, then do it.

but this mister science shit is tiresome.
and saying you like trees and go fishing doesnt really help, particularly since you adduce it to the (continued) exclusion of data to back your claims up.

and it almost looks like you are trying to bully ch'i into agreeing with you.
now you woudlnt be trying to do that, would you?

------------------

from what i gather from your last post above, your real opposition to the notion of global warming does not seem to rest on the science you claim a monopoly on here--it seems to rest first and foremost on your irrational fear of what you imagine "socialism" to be. that positions you not as mister science but rather as some rightwing ideologue whose views are basically political even as you try to fob them off as scientific. i am not sure this is a good impression to generate. i do not understand what you are doing.

---------
it seems to me that below the surface of this debate about global wamring is another one about the american transportation model and its consequences. it seems to me that this debate is really about cars and all that they entail, from carbon monoxide emission levels to dependency on petroleum, from the interests of american automobile manufacturers and petroleum corporations and their political shills of both parties to those of folk who ride bicycles.

it seems to me further that this debate is really about whether this transportation model should be changed--perhaps with more emphasis on new automobile technologies to more mass transit (as examples)---and that the debate about the science (whatever you think of it) is a displacement of this other, more fundamental debate.

if that is the case, then it is really difficult to imagine how the political interests of the various parties with stakes in this question are to be distinguished from the types of arguments being made across scientific data.

Paradise Lost · 09-27-2006, 07:48 PM

I read most of the article up until the Media part, because I already believe the media hypes everything, and climate change is no exception. Anyway, I didn't feel the article was all that bad, in fact, the Senator seemed like he knew what he was talking about. That could just be my lack of knowledge, which is probably horrible compared to the Senator's.

These are just a few things I found weird though...

Quote:

a new study in Geophysical Research Letters found that the sun was responsible for 50% of 20th century warming.

If this is true, I'd like to how or why. The sun didn't just get warmer, so this would obviously something to look into to see if it has any connection to problems global warming might have caused, and therefore, caused the sun to have a more direct effect on us.

Quote:

The history of the modern environmental movement is chock full of predictions of doom that never came true. We have all heard the dire predictions about the threat of overpopulation, resource scarcity, mass starvation, and the projected death of our oceans. None of these predictions came true, yet it never stopped the doomsayers from continuing to predict a dire environmental future.

What any of these things has to do with climate change, I'm really not sure. Just because dire predictions made in the past turned out wrong later doesn't mean some dire predictions made in some other area can't possibly be true.

Quote:

This costly feel-good California measure, which is actually far less severe than Kyoto, will have no impact on the climate -- only the economy.

For all the arguing about bad science or unsupported beliefs, I'd have to say this one is the biggest problem the Senator threw out without any evidence to show he's correct. "Why, nothing will happen!" "How do you know?" "Cause."

Quote:

If we allow scientifically unfounded fears of global warming to influence policy makers to restrict future energy production and the creation of basic infrastructure in the developing world -- billions of people will continue to suffer.

Ditto on this quote.

My belief is that yes, the media will blow things out of proportion, any by any sort of ethical standards, shouldn't be allowed and certainly not be allowed to be taken seriously by people reading about it. You have to remember that most media articles written about contested theories such as this will pick out ones featuring controversial ideas, and I'm sure if it were done in an intelligent, low-key fashion, it may actually be a good place to spark genuine debate, no matter how far-fetched the idea seems. You never know, it could turn out to be true.

But also, I really don't think the scientists are at fault here, especially not from peer-reviewed journals. They print what they perceive to be true, and report it how they see it. PRJs, especially highly respected ones, are enormously difficult to get into, and rely on very hard proof that what the scientist says is true, may just in fact be true. I feel you get the growing concern for it because it's been reported on in PRJs so often, and, the fact that absolutely nothing is being done on the political end of things to perhaps look even further into the evidence and see what's truly going on. And if not bring about change specifically for global warming, then at least to remedy the things supposedly caused by and linked to global warming. I think the economy can suffer the minor hit for the potential major gain to be received from change.

matthew330 · 09-27-2006, 07:53 PM

"seriously: i am curious to learn more about this issue." Don't let your animosity toward a participant on a message board get in the way of that curiousity. Christ, you complain when links aren't provided, links and quotes are provided and you want books. Aren't you a professor? Don't you work in a university? Surely they have a library that could satisfy that curiousity, and relieve ustwo of that burdon.

That was just an annoying post. The only comment I have regarding the topic at hand is that it's the politcs of fear at it's finest targeted at a younger audience that's looking for something other than their 2nd girlfriend to get pissed about. Welcome to politics. Surely you know something about that roach.

Ch'i · 09-27-2006, 07:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Paradise Lost

If this is true, I'd like to how or why. The sun didn't just get warmer, so this would obviously something to look into to see if it has any connection to problems global warming might have caused, and therefore, caused the sun to have a more direct effect on us.

As I understand it, the sun cools down, and heats up regularly,. Though overrall it is on a cooling trend.

More evidence for man's impact on the environment...

Quote:

NOAA 2006-025
NOAA Public Affairs
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Contact: Jana Goldman
2/27/06

RESEARCHERS IDENTIFY CAUSES OF 1979-2003
UNUSUAL STEP-LIKE COOLING OF GLOBAL LOWER STRATOSPHERE

Findings from satellite observations combined with a new NOAA computer model show that a significant cooling of the global lower stratosphere between 1979 and 2003 occurred in steps. Research published this week finds that while human influences led to the overall cooling during the period, natural factors helped modulate the evolution of the cooling.

“This research advances our knowledge of fundamental influences, such as the role of greenhouse gases and volcanic eruptions, that force changes in the Earth's climate,” said Venkatachalam Ramaswamy, senior scientist at NOAA’s Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory in Princeton, N.J., and lead author of the paper. “The findings, derived from combining observations and numerical modeling studies, improves our understanding of how human and natural forcings cause changes in the Earth's climate system.”

The lower stratosphere is the region of the Earth's atmosphere from about 8 to 14 miles above the surface, where ozone plays a critical role in absorbing harmful ultraviolet radiation from the sun. Microwave Sounding Unit data from NOAA's polar orbiting satellites have shown that the two major volcanic eruptions, El Chichon in 1982 and Pinatubo in 1991, were initially followed by brief warming periods, then later by prolonged cooling periods in the global lower stratosphere.

“The unusual manner in which the cooling of the lower stratosphere evolved between 1979 and 2003 is very likely unique and unprecedented, and has not previously been well understood,” Ramaswamy said. “Climate model simulations show that human influences, namely stratospheric ozone depletion and greenhouse gas increases, and natural factors, namely volcanic aerosols and variations in the sun's energy output, combined to produce two step-like decreases in the lower stratospheric temperatures, one in the 1980s and the other in the 1990s.”

The simulations successfully replicated the complex observed stages of this temperature change, including the two step-like features marking the transitions of the lower stratosphere to a progressively colder state.

The simulations used a state-of-the-art coupled atmosphere-ocean model, developed at GFDL, one of NOAA's Office of Oceanic and Atmospheric Research laboratories. This laboratory has performed world-leading research in climate modeling for more than 50 years. The numerical calculations were performed on the NOAA supercomputer located at GFDL. The results of this research were carried out by a team that included scientists from GFDL, the National Center for Atmospheric Research, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, University of Miami and Rutgers University.

The researchers performed a variety of simulations employing combinations of the known changes in various factors, including human-made factors such as ozone depletion and long-lived greenhouse gas increases, and natural mechanisms of climate variability to see how these factors affected the cooling trend. The research indicates that the evolution of the cooling during 1979-2003 results from unusual juxtaposition of human-induced factors, volcanic events and the variations in the sun's output.

If ozone depletion continues, it would be an even more dominant factor in further lowering the stratospheric temperatures in the future. If there is complete ozone recovery because of the phasing out of the ozone-depleting substances, the stratospheric cooling trend would be governed by the long-lived greenhouse gases (e.g., CO2). Variations in the sun's output and any potential volcanic activity could affect the pattern. The findings are in a paper titled “Anthropogenic and Natural Influences in the Evolution of Lower Stratospheric Cooling” which was published in this week’s Science magazine.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, an agency of the U.S. Commerce Department, is dedicated to enhancing economic security and national safety through the prediction and research of weather and climate-related events and providing environmental stewardship of our nation's coastal and marine resources. Through the emerging Global Earth Observation System of Systems (GEOSS), NOAA is working with its federal partners and 60 countries to develop a global monitoring network that is as integrated as the planet it observes.

Seaver · 09-27-2006, 07:57 PM

Quote:

If this is true, I'd like to how or why. The sun didn't just get warmer, so this would obviously something to look into to see if it has any connection to problems global warming might have caused, and therefore, caused the sun to have a more direct effect on us.

Actually the sun goes through periods of warming and cooling. It corrolates directly with the amount of sunspots and solar flares.

Paradise Lost · 09-27-2006, 08:56 PM

That's pretty sweet.

ubertuber · 09-27-2006, 11:03 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by matthew330

"seriously: i am curious to learn more about this issue." Don't let your animosity toward a participant on a message board get in the way of that curiousity. Christ, you complain when links aren't provided, links and quotes are provided and you want books. Aren't you a professor? Don't you work in a university? Surely they have a library that could satisfy that curiousity, and relieve ustwo of that burdon.

That was just an annoying post. The only comment I have regarding the topic at hand is that it's the politcs of fear at it's finest targeted at a younger audience that's looking for something other than their 2nd girlfriend to get pissed about. Welcome to politics. Surely you know something about that roach.

When one is annoyed, sometimes the best thing to do is use the back or scroll buttons.

Seaver · 09-28-2006, 05:48 AM

More info and science on the sun-based warming cycles.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/1045327.stm

Quote:

Sun's warming influence 'under-estimated'
The Sun
Opinion is divided over the Sun's impact on climate change
By BBC News Online science editor Dr David Whitehouse

Scientists at Armagh Observatory claim a unique weather record could show that the Sun has been the main contributor to global warming over the past two centuries.

I suspect that the greenhouse lobby have under-estimated the role of solar variability in climate change

Dr John Butler
The weather observations, made almost daily since 1795, comprise the longest climate archive available for a single site in Ireland.

Dr John Butler, the astronomer in charge of the project, told BBC News Online: "We can see global warming taking place over the past two centuries that suggests that changes in the Sun are at least partially responsible."

The data will confuse some climate experts who argue that the influence of changes in the Sun on rising temperatures has already been studied, and discounted, as a major cause of global warming.

Longer is better

The observations at Armagh began in 1795, a few years after the observatory was founded. Temperature, pressure and, later, rainfall have been measured every day with the exception of a period around 1825.

In all that time, the Armagh meteorological instruments have been moved only about 20 metres.

Armagh Observatory
The Armagh Observatory's weather archive spans two centuries
"What makes the data so useful is that the site of the observatory has not changed all that much in 200 years," said Dr Butler. "Other weather stations have been engulfed by towns and cities that make the long-term reliability of their data questionable."

When analysed, the data allow the average temperature at Armagh to be calculated to an accuracy of 0.1 deg C per decade. Eventually the entire data set will be placed on the internet.

"It's quite apparent from our data that global warming, of about a degree C, has been taking place for at least a hundred years," Dr Butler told BBC News Online.

Shorter is warmer

The researchers point out that the mean average temperature at Armagh seems to be related to the length of the Sun's activity cycle. This cycle is on average 11 years in duration but it can vary a few years either way.

"We have found that it gets cooler when the Sun's cycle is longer and that Armagh is warmer when the cycle is shorter," said Dr Butler.

Scientists cannot yet fully explain how natural variations in the Sun's brightness and activity may affect the Earth's climate. While the Sun is about 0.1% brighter during shorter cycles the effect is not enough to account for the observed warming trend.

"But the Sun's activity does affect the flux of cosmic rays, high-energy particles from deep space, that strike our atmosphere," said Dr Butler.

Consequently it has been suggested that because cosmic rays are the main source of ionisation in the Earth's atmosphere they may have an influence on cloud formation.

Solar cycle
Average temperatures in Armagh appear to correlate with solar activity
In general, the more cosmic rays that reach the Earth, the more low cloud there is. However, a higher solar activity leads to lower cosmic ray flux and reduced low cloud.

Low clouds cool the Earth by reflecting more solar radiation back into space, so a drop in the amount of low cloud contributes to global warming.

High cloud does the opposite and tends to warm the Earth by reflecting more of the Earth's infra-red radiation back to the ground.

It may be that changing cloud cover has caused global warming over the past century or so.

However, Dr Butler is cautious about this issue: "There is currently very little evidence for a low-altitude cloud reduction over the past century. But there is some evidence for a global increase in total cloud."

"I suspect that the greenhouse lobby have under-estimated the role of solar variability in climate change," he added. "However I am not in favour of polluting the atmosphere, for whatever reason."

roachboy · 09-28-2006, 07:16 AM

here is a nice little intro to the motivations behind my post above, and others, that operate with a degree of suspicion about the sources of infotainment being posted that simply denies global warming is a problem. in a context shaped by corrupt information, interpretive suspicion is not irrational.
one effect of corrupted information is that it makes debate difficult---positions that are prefabricated do what they are designed to do---talk past each other, generating problems about standards of evidence, making a sense of informed judgment difficult to achieve.
and this would be part of the point of generating corrupt information: to jam a stick into the spokes of the wheel, to disintegrate debates that you cannot control.

at the center of this seems to me a question about the intertwining of science and politics--behind that is the status imputed to scientific data/research---behind that is the question of how and why this status is imputed.

the questions i posed to ustwo operated under the assumption that somewhere behind the bluster was a core of information not structured by contemporary practices of information corruption in the interest of generating smoke for corporations whose business interests are threatened by such research.

i await an answer.

meanwhile:

Quote:

The denial industry

For years, a network of fake citizens' groups and bogus scientific bodies has been claiming that science of global warming is inconclusive. They set back action on climate change by a decade. But who funded them? Exxon's involvement is well known, but not the strange role of Big Tobacco. In the first of three extracts from his new book, George Monbiot tells a bizarre and shocking new story

Tuesday September 19, 2006
The Guardian

'The impacts of the climate-change deniers sponsored by Exxon have been felt all over the world.' Photograph: AP

ExxonMobil is the world's most profitable corporation. Its sales now amount to more than $1bn a day. It makes most of this money from oil, and has more to lose than any other company from efforts to tackle climate change. To safeguard its profits, ExxonMobil needs to sow doubt about whether serious action needs to be taken on climate change. But there are difficulties: it must confront a scientific consensus as strong as that which maintains that smoking causes lung cancer or that HIV causes Aids. So what's its strategy?

The website Exxonsecrets.org, using data found in the company's official documents, lists 124 organisations that have taken money from the company or work closely with those that have. These organisations take a consistent line on climate change: that the science is contradictory, the scientists are split, environmentalists are charlatans, liars or lunatics, and if governments took action to prevent global warming, they would be endangering the global economy for no good reason. The findings these organisations dislike are labelled "junk science". The findings they welcome are labelled "sound science".

Among the organisations that have been funded by Exxon are such well-known websites and lobby groups as TechCentralStation, the Cato Institute and the Heritage Foundation. Some of those on the list have names that make them look like grassroots citizens' organisations or academic bodies: the Centre for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, for example. One or two of them, such as the Congress of Racial Equality, are citizens' organisations or academic bodies, but the line they take on climate change is very much like that of the other sponsored groups. While all these groups are based in America, their publications are read and cited, and their staff are interviewed and quoted, all over the world.

By funding a large number of organisations, Exxon helps to create the impression that doubt about climate change is widespread. For those who do not understand that scientific findings cannot be trusted if they have not appeared in peer-reviewed journals, the names of these institutes help to suggest that serious researchers are challenging the consensus.

This is not to claim that all the science these groups champion is bogus. On the whole, they use selection, not invention. They will find one contradictory study - such as the discovery of tropospheric cooling, which, in a garbled form, has been used by Peter Hitchens in the Mail on Sunday - and promote it relentlessly. They will continue to do so long after it has been disproved by further work. So, for example, John Christy, the author of the troposphere paper, admitted in August 2005 that his figures were incorrect, yet his initial findings are still being circulated and championed by many of these groups, as a quick internet search will show you.

But they do not stop there. The chairman of a group called the Science and Environmental Policy Project is Frederick Seitz. Seitz is a physicist who in the 1960s was president of the US National Academy of Sciences. In 1998, he wrote a document, known as the Oregon Petition, which has been cited by almost every journalist who claims that climate change is a myth.

The document reads as follows: "We urge the United States government to reject the global warming agreement that was written in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997, and any other similar proposals. The proposed limits on greenhouse gases would harm the environment, hinder the advance of science and technology, and damage the health and welfare of mankind. There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth."

Anyone with a degree was entitled to sign it. It was attached to a letter written by Seitz, entitled Research Review of Global Warming Evidence. The lead author of the "review" that followed Seitz's letter is a Christian fundamentalist called Arthur B Robinson. He is not a professional climate scientist. It was co-published by Robinson's organisation - the Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine - and an outfit called the George C Marshall Institute, which has received $630,000 from ExxonMobil since 1998. The other authors were Robinson's 22-year-old son and two employees of the George C Marshall Institute. The chairman of the George C Marshall Institute was Frederick Seitz.

The paper maintained that: "We are living in an increasingly lush environment of plants and animals as a result of the carbon dioxide increase. Our children will enjoy an Earth with far more plant and animal life than that with which we now are blessed. This is a wonderful and unexpected gift from the Industrial Revolution."

It was printed in the font and format of the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences: the journal of the organisation of which Seitz - as he had just reminded his correspondents - was once president.

Soon after the petition was published, the National Academy of Sciences released this statement: "The NAS Council would like to make it clear that this petition has nothing to do with the National Academy of Sciences and that the manuscript was not published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences or in any other peer-reviewed journal. The petition does not reflect the conclusions of expert reports of the Academy."

But it was too late. Seitz, the Oregon Institute and the George C Marshall Institute had already circulated tens of thousands of copies, and the petition had established a major presence on the internet. Some 17,000 graduates signed it, the majority of whom had no background in climate science. It has been repeatedly cited - by global-warming sceptics such as David Bellamy, Melanie Phillips and others - as a petition by climate scientists. It is promoted by the Exxon-sponsored sites as evidence that there is no scientific consensus on climate change.

All this is now well known to climate scientists and environmentalists. But what I have discovered while researching this issue is that the corporate funding of lobby groups denying that manmade climate change is taking place was initiated not by Exxon, or by any other firm directly involved in the fossil fuel industry. It was started by the tobacco company Philip Morris.

In December 1992, the US Environmental Protection Agency published a 500-page report called Respiratory Health Effects of Passive Smoking. It found that "the widespread exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) in the United States presents a serious and substantial public health impact. In adults: ETS is a human lung carcinogen, responsible for approximately 3,000 lung cancer deaths annually in US non-smokers. In children: ETS exposure is causally associated with an increased risk of lower respiratory tract infections such as bronchitis and pneumonia. This report estimates that 150,000 to 300,000 cases annually in infants and young children up to 18 months of age are attributable to ETS."

Had it not been for the settlement of a major class action against the tobacco companies in the US, we would never have been able to see what happened next. But in 1998 they were forced to publish their internal documents and post them on the internet.

Within two months of its publication, Philip Morris, the world's biggest tobacco firm, had devised a strategy for dealing with the passive-smoking report. In February 1993 Ellen Merlo, its senior vice-president of corporate affairs, sent a letter to William I Campbell, Philip Morris's chief executive officer and president, explaining her intentions: "Our overriding objective is to discredit the EPA report ... Concurrently, it is our objective to prevent states and cities, as well as businesses, from passive-smoking bans."

To this end, she had hired a public relations company called APCO. She had attached the advice it had given her. APCO warned that: "No matter how strong the arguments, industry spokespeople are, in and of themselves, not always credible or appropriate messengers."

So the fight against a ban on passive smoking had to be associated with other people and other issues. Philip Morris, APCO said, needed to create the impression of a "grassroots" movement - one that had been formed spontaneously by concerned citizens to fight "overregulation". It should portray the danger of tobacco smoke as just one "unfounded fear" among others, such as concerns about pesticides and cellphones. APCO proposed to set up "a national coalition intended to educate the media, public officials and the public about the dangers of 'junk science'. Coalition will address credibility of government's scientific studies, risk-assessment techniques and misuse of tax dollars ... Upon formation of Coalition, key leaders will begin media outreach, eg editorial board tours, opinion articles, and brief elected officials in selected states."

APCO would found the coalition, write its mission statements, and "prepare and place opinion articles in key markets". For this it required $150,000 for its own fees and $75,000 for the coalition's costs.

By May 1993, as another memo from APCO to Philip Morris shows, the fake citizens' group had a name: the Advancement of Sound Science Coalition. It was important, further letters stated, "to ensure that TASSC has a diverse group of contributors"; to "link the tobacco issue with other more 'politically correct' products"; and to associate scientific studies that cast smoking in a bad light with "broader questions about government research and regulations" - such as "global warming", "nuclear waste disposal" and "biotechnology". APCO would engage in the "intensive recruitment of high-profile representatives from business and industry, scientists, public officials, and other individuals interested in promoting the use of sound science".

By September 1993, APCO had produced a "Plan for the Public Launching of TASSC". The media launch would not take place in "Washington, DC or the top media markets of the country. Rather, we suggest creating a series of aggressive, decentralised launches in several targeted local and regional markets across the country. This approach ... avoids cynical reporters from major media: less reviewing/challenging of TASSC messages."

The media coverage, the public relations company hoped, would enable TASSC to "establish an image of a national grassroots coalition". In case the media asked hostile questions, APCO circulated a sheet of answers, drafted by Philip Morris. The first question was:

"Isn't it true that Philip Morris created TASSC to act as a front group for it?

"A: No, not at all. As a large corporation, PM belongs to many national, regional, and state business, public policy, and legislative organisations. PM has contributed to TASSC, as we have with various groups and corporations across the country."

There are clear similarities between the language used and the approaches adopted by Philip Morris and by the organisations funded by Exxon. The two lobbies use the same terms, which appear to have been invented by Philip Morris's consultants. "Junk science" meant peer-reviewed studies showing that smoking was linked to cancer and other diseases. "Sound science" meant studies sponsored by the tobacco industry suggesting that the link was inconclusive. Both lobbies recognised that their best chance of avoiding regulation was to challenge the scientific consensus. As a memo from the tobacco company Brown and Williamson noted, "Doubt is our product since it is the best means of competing with the 'body of fact' that exists in the mind of the general public. It is also the means of establishing a controversy." Both industries also sought to distance themselves from their own campaigns, creating the impression that they were spontaneous movements of professionals or ordinary citizens: the "grassroots".

But the connection goes further than that. TASSC, the "coalition" created by Philip Morris, was the first and most important of the corporate-funded organisations denying that climate change is taking place. It has done more damage to the campaign to halt it than any other body.

TASSC did as its founders at APCO suggested, and sought funding from other sources. Between 2000 and 2002 it received $30,000 from Exxon. The website it has financed - JunkScience.com - has been the main entrepot for almost every kind of climate-change denial that has found its way into the mainstream press. It equates environmentalists with Nazis, communists and terrorists. It flings at us the accusations that could justifably be levelled against itself: the website claims, for example, that it is campaigning against "faulty scientific data and analysis used to advance special and, often, hidden agendas". I have lost count of the number of correspondents who, while questioning manmade global warming, have pointed me there.

The man who runs it is called Steve Milloy. In 1992, he started working for APCO - Philip Morris's consultants. While there, he set up the JunkScience site. In March 1997, the documents show, he was appointed TASSC's executive director. By 1998, as he explained in a memo to TASSC board members, his JunkScience website was was being funded by TASSC. Both he and the "coalition" continued to receive money from Philip Morris. An internal document dated February 1998 reveals that TASSC took $200,000 from the tobacco company in 1997. Philip Morris's 2001 budget document records a payment to Steven Milloy of $90,000. Altria, Philip Morris's parent company, admits that Milloy was under contract to the tobacco firm until at least the end of 2005.

He has done well. You can find his name attached to letters and articles seeking to discredit passive-smoking studies all over the internet and in the academic databases. He has even managed to reach the British Medical Journal: I found a letter from him there which claimed that the studies it had reported "do not bear out the hypothesis that maternal smoking/ passive smoking increases cancer risk among infants". TASSC paid him $126,000 in 2004 for 15 hours' work a week. Two other organisations are registered at his address: the Free Enterprise Education Institute and the Free Enterprise Action Institute. They have received $10,000 and $50,000 respectively from Exxon. The secretary of the Free Enterprise Action Institute is Thomas Borelli. Borelli was the Philip Morris executive who oversaw the payments to TASSC.

Milloy also writes a weekly Junk Science column for the Fox News website. Without declaring his interests, he has used this column to pour scorn on studies documenting the medical effects of second-hand tobacco smoke and showing that climate change is taking place. Even after Fox News was told about the money he had been receiving from Philip Morris and Exxon, it continued to employ him, without informing its readers about his interests.

TASSC's headed notepaper names an advisory board of eight people. Three of them are listed by Exxonsecrets.org as working for organisations taking money from Exxon. One of them is Frederick Seitz, the man who wrote the Oregon Petition, and who chairs the Science and Environmental Policy Project. In 1979, Seitz became a permanent consultant to the tobacco company RJ Reynolds. He worked for the firm until at least 1987, for an annual fee of $65,000. He was in charge of deciding which medical research projects the company should fund, and handed out millions of dollars a year to American universities. The purpose of this funding, a memo from the chairman of RJ Reynolds shows, was to "refute the criticisms against cigarettes". An undated note in the Philip Morris archive shows that it was planning a "Seitz symposium" with the help of TASSC, in which Frederick Seitz would speak to "40-60 regulators".

The president of Seitz's Science and Environmental Policy Project is a maverick environmental scientist called S Fred Singer. He has spent the past few years refuting evidence for manmade climate change. It was he, for example, who published the misleading claim that most of the world's glaciers are advancing, which landed David Bellamy in so much trouble when he repeated it last year. He also had connections with the tobacco industry. In March 1993, APCO sent a memo to Ellen Merlo, the vice-president of Philip Morris, who had just commissioned it to fight the Environmental Protection Agency: "As you know, we have been working with Dr Fred Singer and Dr Dwight Lee, who have authored articles on junk science and indoor air quality (IAQ) respectively ..."

Singer's article, entitled Junk Science at the EPA, claimed that "the latest 'crisis' - environmental tobacco smoke - has been widely criticised as the most shocking distortion of scientific evidence yet". He alleged that the Environmental Protection Agency had had to "rig the numbers" in its report on passive smoking. This was the report that Philip Morris and APCO had set out to discredit a month before Singer wrote his article.

I have no evidence that Fred Singer or his organisation have taken money from Philip Morris. But many of the other bodies that have been sponsored by Exxon and have sought to repudiate climate change were also funded by the tobacco company. Among them are some of the world's best-known "thinktanks": the Competitive Enterprise Institute, the Cato Institute, the Heritage Foundation, the Hudson Institute, the Frontiers of Freedom Institute, the Reason Foundation and the Independent Institute, as well as George Mason University's Law and Economics Centre. I can't help wondering whether there is any aspect of conservative thought in the United States that has not been formed and funded by the corporations.

Until I came across this material, I believed that the accusations, the insults and the taunts such people had slung at us environmentalists were personal: that they really did hate us, and had found someone who would pay to help them express those feelings. Now I realise that they have simply transferred their skills.

While they have been most effective in the United States, the impacts of the climate-change deniers sponsored by Exxon and Philip Morris have been felt all over the world. I have seen their arguments endlessly repeated in Australia, Canada, India, Russia and the UK. By dominating the media debate on climate change during seven or eight critical years in which urgent international talks should have been taking place, by constantly seeding doubt about the science just as it should have been most persuasive, they have justified the money their sponsors have spent on them many times over. It is fair to say that the professional denial industry has delayed effective global action on climate change by years, just as it helped to delay action against the tobacco companies.

· This is an edited extract from Heat, by George Monbiot, published by Allen Lane. To order a copy for £16.99 with free UK p&p (rrp £17.99), go to Guardian.co.uk/bookshop or call 0870 836 0875

source: http://www.guardian.co.uk/climatecha...875760,00.html

host · 11-19-2006, 01:07 AM

Sen. Inhofe is in the process of being stripped of his remaining influence over US global warming response, by fellow senators of his own political party:

Quote:

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...701770_pf.html
Party Shift May Make Warming a Hill Priority

By Charles Babington
Washington Post Staff Writer
Saturday, November 18, 2006; A06

Dramatic changes in congressional oversight of environmental issues may pump new life into efforts to fight global warming, activist groups and lawmakers said yesterday.

Sen. John W. Warner (R-Va.) announced his intention to become the top Republican on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, now headed by Sen. James M. Inhofe (R-Okla.), who has said that global warming is a hoax. Warner has called for action against climate change, and his ascension to a leadership post would accelerate significant changes already underway.

Sen. Barbara Boxer (D-Calif.) -- a liberal who has called global warming a dire threat -- is in line to chair the committee in the next Congress as a result of last week's elections, which will give Democrats the Senate majority. Environmentalists have been hailing her impending replacement of Inhofe as chairman. Warner's takeover of the ranking minority member's slot, they said yesterday, would raise even greater hopes for advancing their agenda.

"That could drastically change the way that committee operates," said Karen Steuer, government affairs chief at the National Environmental Trust. "We might see, on a number of issues, bipartisan legislation coming out of that committee, and that would be a huge step forward. . . . In one fell swoop, it's gone from the Dark Ages to the Space Age."

First, however, GOP senators must decide whether Warner's seniority on the committee grants him the right to be the ranking Republican. Inhofe issued a statement saying that he thinks Warner "has misunderstood the rules" and that "I intend to retain my leadership position in the 110th Congress, returning as the Ranking Member" of the environment committee.

Warner responded in a statement: "I carefully reviewed the rules in consultation with the Secretary of the Majority, who assures me that my seniority on the Committee forms a clear basis, under longstanding precedent" for claiming the top Republican spot. Warner will surrender the Armed Services Committee chairmanship and assert his party leadership claim on the environmental panel.

Senate aides said seniority traditionally determines who obtains ranking status. They noted that in 1987, the Foreign Relations Committee's Republicans wanted Richard G. Lugar (Ind.) to be the panel's ranking Republican, but the full party caucus overruled them and gave the slot to the more senior Jesse Helms (N.C.). The 110th Congress's GOP senators will vote on committee positions by Jan. 3.

Whoever is the top Republican on the environment committee, Boxer said in an interview yesterday that she plans aggressive hearings on environmental concerns, especially climate change. "There is a pent-up desire on the part of many people in the country to get back to making progress on the environment," she said, adding that she plans "to roll out a pretty in-depth set of hearings on global warming.".......

boatin · 11-19-2006, 09:18 PM

Quote:

First of all, the one degree Fahrenheit rise coincided with the greatest advancement of living standards, life expectancy, food production and human health in the history of our planet. So it is hard to argue that the global warming we experienced in the 20th century was somehow negative or part of a catastrophic trend.

This is completely cherry picking the original argument - I acknowledge that.

But anyone that throws an "argument" like that into a speech is less than credible to me. Is he suggesting that because we got great benefits during the time the temperature went up, that there can't be negative consequences? I'm no debating whizz, but he's drawing conclusions that are impossible.

The USA today article is interesting as well. He's drawing the worst possible conclusions from the article. While he's arguing that the media (and others) are painting the worst possible scenario with their facts. Hypocrisy doesn't build much confidence.

And I'd love to see the documentation that environmental groups give more money than the fossil fuel industry to politicians. I suspect that's a carefully constructed statistic.

My point: if you're calling BS on others credibility, you should be pretty flawless yourself... and I don't see it.

Intense1 · 11-19-2006, 10:40 PM

So what you're saying, ustwo, is that Al Gore is basically potentially full of crap, is that it? Hey, we Tennesseans have known that for years - that's why we didn't put him over the top in 2000!

I am like most Americans and don't have a true in-depth knowledge of the science of climate activity, but I do know enough to realize that when dueling apologists appear, one doesn't pick one's side before fully checking out the information presented by both. Pity the rest of America is so indoctrinated to believe the doom's day theory of "global warming" over Sen. Imhoffe's. Especially when his arguement has been so well presented. (Yes, I read it all)

Edited to state: Just because an argument comes from someone who is in a political party that one doesn't espouse doesn't mean that this view point isn't valid, Host and Roachboy. Pardon me for saying, but it appears that the two of you seem to discount any argument that doesn't fit in with your view of how you see the world. You just want to put down what doesn't fit with your views. That's your right - just as it's my right to give my view.

09-26-2006, 05:05 PM	#2 (permalink)
Dilbert1234567 Devils Cabana Boy Location: Central Coast CA	Well, there is a lot of good science in it, but, they ignore what does not support there views. It used to be about the environment, now its anti globalization. __________________ Donate Blood! "Love is not finding the perfect person, but learning to see an imperfect person perfectly." -Sam Keen

09-26-2006, 08:18 PM	#7 (permalink)
dc_dux Location: Washington DC	I dont have any more knowledge or expertise about global warming than most Americans, but I would tend to give more credibility to a group like the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) than to Sen Imhofe. Just as an aside, Imhofe's two top contributors are the oil lobby and the electric utility lobby. The IPCC assessments - that conclude that human activity is a contributing factor of global warming - involve thousands of scientists from over 120 countries who, over a period of years, develop detailed reports on climate change. The peer-review process is far more extensive than even the most prestigious scientific journals – the most recent report was reviewed by more than 1,000 top experts. There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities. http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/007.htm For more on the IPCC assessment process: http://www.ucsusa.org/global_warming...t-process.html The National Academy of Sciences, an independent organization created by Congress to provide scientific guidance recently a study recently with the same general conclusions. Maye a picture helps. This graphic of the melting of the polar ice cap over the last 26 years is pretty compelling. http://www.everybodysweather.com/Sta...lter/index.htm It obviously doesnt suggest that the decline is human induced. You have to read the numerous independent and peer-reviewed, studies out there to see the impact of human activity as a contributing factor as opposed to just natural occurences. Then decide for yourself if we should consider policies to address the issue responsibly or just ignore it, vilify any scientist or politician who expresses concern, and hope for the best. __________________ "The perfect is the enemy of the good." ~ Voltaire Last edited by dc_dux; 09-26-2006 at 09:12 PM..

09-27-2006, 06:31 AM	#9 (permalink)
j8ear Gentlemen Farmer Location: Middle of nowhere, Jersey	What a great thread Ustwo. Whether intentional or not you have set quite a brilliant trap, and so far every liberal but one was snagged...hook, line and sinker. All argueing things not even in dispute. Classic. Elphaba, kudos to you for at least taking a measured approach to the issue. -bear __________________ It's alot easier to ask for forgiveness then it is to ask for permission.

09-27-2006, 07:19 AM	#11 (permalink)
Charlatan Getting it. Super Moderator Location: Lion City	God forbid we should ever have justice or equality in the world... Would it really be that bad? I will have to find the time to read your post, Ustwo. It's soooo long. (sorry, just taking the piss out of you). As for Ustwo just holding the party line... that isn't fair. I like to believe that Ustwo would still have his position on climate change even if the "party line" shifted. I believe Ustwo to be a man of integrity. Seriously. __________________ "My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars." - Old Man Luedecke

09-27-2006, 07:40 AM	#12 (permalink)
aberkok “Wrong is right.” Location: toronto	After reading, I'm left mostly with questions. What incentive is there for environmental conservation? Who benefits other than our health and the environment? On the other hand, to ignore oppotunities for conservation brings great financial incentives to polluting business - at least until we all smarten up and buy only green - which we haven't yet. There is no "smoking gun" to support global warming, just a clear correlation between human pollution and climate change. The non-scientific approach, as demonstrated above, would be to dismiss the changes and continue our undeniably unsustainable ways (and there are only so many trees in the forest, and clean air in the cities, and space in the landfills). The right thing to do is to continue investigating and until then, act prudently. There are proven benefits to conservation (I can't believe I have to say that...I'm probably going to have to prove it, aren't I?) other than preventing climate change. j8ear: you should be proud of your brilliant trap __________________ !check out my new blog! http://arkanamusic.wordpress.com Warden Gentiles: "It? Perfectly innocent. But I can see how, if our roles were reversed, I might have you beaten with a pillowcase full of batteries."

09-26-2006, 05:17 PM	#3 (permalink)
Elphaba Deja Moo Location: Olympic Peninsula, WA	Ustwo, thank you for the in depth reporting and article links. Allow me some time to review the information given, before responding.

09-26-2006, 06:28 PM	#4 (permalink)
rofgilead Crazy Location: Nowhere	Ustwo, follow the two most prestigious science journals every month. In those journals (Science and Nature), there is at least one article a month now supporting that temperatures are rising, that CO2 levels rising correlates with this temperature change. Further, there are a large number of articles with side issues related to global warming - melting of glaciers in North America and Africa, and changes in animal patterns, ocean currents, etc. Why should I care what some Senator says? The evidence is all against him.

09-26-2006, 06:41 PM	#6 (permalink)
rofgilead Crazy Location: Nowhere	Example: Global Genetic Change Tracks Global Climate Warming in Drosophila subobscura Joan Balanyá, Josep M. Oller, Raymond B. Huey, George W. Gilchrist, and Luis Serra Science 22 September 2006: 1773-1775. Published online 31 August 2006 [DOI: 10.1126/science.1131002] (in Science Express Reports) On three continents, a low-latitude, natural genetic variant of the fruit fly is increasingly found at higher latitudes, paralleling climate warming over the past 25 years. Seriously, Ustwo, I can understand how it is possible to have a different perspective on politics, but this is just science and measuring what is happening around us. Just start reading the articles. _____________________________ On this statement: Continuing with our media analysis: On July 24, 2006 The Los Angeles Times featured an op-ed by Naomi Oreskes, a social scientist at the University of California San Diego and the author of a 2004 Science Magazine study. Oreskes insisted that a review of 928 scientific papers showed there was 100% consensus that global warming was not caused by natural climate variations. This study was also featured in former Vice President Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth,” http://epw.senate.gov/fact.cfm?party=rep&id=259323 However, the analysis in Science Magazine excluded nearly 11,000 studies or more than 90 percent of the papers dealing with global warming, according to a critique by British social scientist Benny Peiser. Peiser also pointed out that less than two percent of the climate studies in the survey actually endorsed the so-called “consensus view” that human activity is driving global warming and some of the studies actually opposed that view. ________________ I say 'Benny Peiser' is just dirt being thrown in peoples eyes. Was he published? If so, in what journal? The papers that support global warming were peer reviewed and did not have major holes in their science or messed up experiments. Rejected papers usually have: 1) missing experiments that need to be completed 2) outright problems or errors 3) badly written, or bad conclusions that do not have supporting evidence. Scientists in climate change do not make the statement in their papers that "Thus, climate change is caused by humans", because their data usually is on some small, particular aspect of climate change - and would not be able to support the authors making such a huge conclusion. Your senator is just being a peice of shit when he makes the statement that most papers did not directly endorse the notion of man made climate change - science doesn't work that way - politics does. Anyways, Ustwo, your senator is really incorrect on the science - just read the darned Journals where peer-reviewed, good science is being published monthly supported global warming.

09-26-2006, 09:02 PM	#8 (permalink)
kutulu Junkie	Sorry but the 'junk science' lines don't work. Just about EVERY relevant article puplished in every peer-reviewed article supports global warming theories. If it was just a subset of scientists or just scientists in the US, the opposition could have some support but it's not even close.

09-27-2006, 11:46 AM	#19 (permalink)
Dilbert1234567 Devils Cabana Boy Location: Central Coast CA	woah woah woah Hoast, don’t group me in with the bush administration. I’m all for reducing our impact on the environment; I just disagree with the scientist findings and the alarmist spin they place on them. Yes, we have an impact on our environment, but how much is not yet known, just a few years ago, we were worried about global cooling, now all of a sudden we are concerned by global warming, the way were going keeps changing; this is fine, science changes as we discover new evidence; however it is irresponsible to cry bloody murder when we don’t have all the evidence yet. Fact is, on most fronts, the environment is getting cleaner, and in those parts its getting worse, it’s getting worse at a declining rate, were heading in the right direction and that is great. We do need to regulate business, so they don’t over pollute and make things worse, but we don’t need to shut down industry altogether, we have too be careful with the environment, but saying were all going to die, is just irresponsible. __________________ Donate Blood! "Love is not finding the perfect person, but learning to see an imperfect person perfectly." -Sam Keen

09-27-2006, 03:05 PM	#29 (permalink)
roachboy Super Moderator Location: essex ma	ustwo--in this area i would almost be inclined to respect something of your positions if you would just step down from your posture of "i am mister science and mister science says global warming is bullshit" and present a better range of better information to allow folk to come to their own conclusions about the matter. seriously: i am curious to learn more about this issue. but it seems that you do not imagine us smart enough to deal with legitimate information: instead you quote imhof's speech here or bite stuff from junkscience there: none of which does your case justice. if there is a serious argument against global warming to be made, by all means make the argument and refer to sources that open up the topic. i am not afraid of books and i imagine others are not either, so if that is what you have to refer to, then do it. but this mister science shit is tiresome. and saying you like trees and go fishing doesnt really help, particularly since you adduce it to the (continued) exclusion of data to back your claims up. and it almost looks like you are trying to bully ch'i into agreeing with you. now you woudlnt be trying to do that, would you? ------------------ from what i gather from your last post above, your real opposition to the notion of global warming does not seem to rest on the science you claim a monopoly on here--it seems to rest first and foremost on your irrational fear of what you imagine "socialism" to be. that positions you not as mister science but rather as some rightwing ideologue whose views are basically political even as you try to fob them off as scientific. i am not sure this is a good impression to generate. i do not understand what you are doing. --------- it seems to me that below the surface of this debate about global wamring is another one about the american transportation model and its consequences. it seems to me that this debate is really about cars and all that they entail, from carbon monoxide emission levels to dependency on petroleum, from the interests of american automobile manufacturers and petroleum corporations and their political shills of both parties to those of folk who ride bicycles. it seems to me further that this debate is really about whether this transportation model should be changed--perhaps with more emphasis on new automobile technologies to more mass transit (as examples)---and that the debate about the science (whatever you think of it) is a displacement of this other, more fundamental debate. if that is the case, then it is really difficult to imagine how the political interests of the various parties with stakes in this question are to be distinguished from the types of arguments being made across scientific data. __________________ a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear it make you sick. -kamau brathwaite Last edited by roachboy; 09-27-2006 at 03:14 PM..

09-27-2006, 07:53 PM	#31 (permalink)
matthew330 Banned	"seriously: i am curious to learn more about this issue." Don't let your animosity toward a participant on a message board get in the way of that curiousity. Christ, you complain when links aren't provided, links and quotes are provided and you want books. Aren't you a professor? Don't you work in a university? Surely they have a library that could satisfy that curiousity, and relieve ustwo of that burdon. That was just an annoying post. The only comment I have regarding the topic at hand is that it's the politcs of fear at it's finest targeted at a younger audience that's looking for something other than their 2nd girlfriend to get pissed about. Welcome to politics. Surely you know something about that roach.

09-27-2006, 08:56 PM	#34 (permalink)
Paradise Lost "Afternoon everybody." "NORM!" Location: Poland, Ohio // Clarion University of PA.	That's pretty sweet. __________________ "Marino could do it."

11-19-2006, 10:40 PM	#40 (permalink)
Intense1 Crazy Location: Music City burbs	So what you're saying, ustwo, is that Al Gore is basically potentially full of crap, is that it? Hey, we Tennesseans have known that for years - that's why we didn't put him over the top in 2000! I am like most Americans and don't have a true in-depth knowledge of the science of climate activity, but I do know enough to realize that when dueling apologists appear, one doesn't pick one's side before fully checking out the information presented by both. Pity the rest of America is so indoctrinated to believe the doom's day theory of "global warming" over Sen. Imhoffe's. Especially when his arguement has been so well presented. (Yes, I read it all) Edited to state: Just because an argument comes from someone who is in a political party that one doesn't espouse doesn't mean that this view point isn't valid, Host and Roachboy. Pardon me for saying, but it appears that the two of you seem to discount any argument that doesn't fit in with your view of how you see the world. You just want to put down what doesn't fit with your views. That's your right - just as it's my right to give my view. __________________ (none yet, still thinkin') Last edited by Intense1; 11-19-2006 at 11:21 PM.. Reason: clarity and spelling