Celebrities Gone Green

In his book Makers and Takers, Peter Schweizer describes many liberals as "friends of goodness," meaning that supporting goodness is not the same thing as actually being good. A good example are those who advocate higher taxes on the wealthy to help the poor while giving almost nothing personally (Obama, cough! Kerry, cough! Gore, cough!). When they do give, it's usually to "the arts," the ACLU, groups that promote increased government spending, or to churches run by crackpot hate-mongers.

But what's even cooler than pretending to care about the poor? Why, the environment, of course! Here are the "7 Most Retarded Ways Celebrities Have Tried to Go Green."

On a tip from Alex.

Politics of Fear

In a recent cover story, Newsweek "breaks new proctological ground for the depth and breadth of its butt-kissing of the Obama campaign," according to Jonah Goldberg in the print edition of National Review. Newsweek claims (in a cover story, mind you, not an editorial) that "the Republican Party has been successfully scaring voters since 1968, when Richard Nixon build a Silent Majority out of lower- and middle-class folks frightened or disturbed by hippies and student radicals and blacks rioting in the inner cities."

Do Republicans sometimes play on people's fears? Of course they do. Fear is a powerful motivator. Believe it or not, there are things to fear on this planet and I don't see anything wrong with addressing them. However, Republicans do not have a monopoly on fear, as Goldberg points out.

It might strike some as odd to start at 1968 when, four years earlier, the Democratic party ran its infamous 'daisy' ad suggesting that a vote for [Barry Goldwater] might well render The Children into radioactive cinder.

How Al Gore can emit so much CO2 about Bush's fear-mongering without spontaneously bursting into flames of hypocrisy is beyond me, given that his whole post-vice-presidency has been dedicated to scaring the bejeebers out of the whole planet about global warming. 'Hurricanes! Cyclones! Famine!'

Liberals, Democrats, Clintonites, and environmentalists would respond to all of these counter-examples by saying... it's 'raising awareness' and 'highlighting the issue.'

I guess it's only fear-mongering if we're not supposed to be afraid. Clearly the media, in labeling the Republican party as the party of fear, has decided for us that we should fear global warming, "two America's", and the free market, but not terrorism or porous borders.

But I Like To Eat

This just in from Oregon: as president, Obama will not allow us to eat as much as we want. Or drive as much as we want. Or choose what temperature to set our thermostats in our own homes.

We can't drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times ... and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK. That's not leadership. That's not going to happen.

Is there any shred of individual liberty that will be spared by global warming fanatics? I guess I'll start stockpiling food now.

The Real Lesson of Burma

The devastating news from Burma gets worse and worse. The death toll may reach hundreds of thousands due to disease and hunger. Many if not most of the deaths could have been avoided if the communists that run Burma (or Myanmar as the commies call it now) had bothered to warn the people about the tsunami or if they would allow foreign aid in. The government is doing next to nothing about this crisis. They don't care at all for these poor farmers and they hate foreigners even more.

Al Gore blamed the tsunami on man-made global warming on NPR (where else?). Despite the fact that we haven't had any in the last 10 years and the global warming alarmists say not to expect any for the next 10. Actually, this year global temps dropped by about .7 degrees Celsius, which is almost equal to the warming that's occurred since 1880 (.8 degrees). Also, studies do not support this little hurricane theory. Using this disaster to advance the case for massive global warming taxes that will limit our freedom and harm our economy is pretty shady.

If there's a lesson to be learned from this disaster it is the danger communist dictators pose to the world. Spreading freedom around the world is a worthy cause.

Global Warming Is Over Already?

Global temperatures rose by .8 degrees Celsius between 1880 and 1997. Some people got very upset. Temps held steady for a decade but some people continued to demand restrictions on our freedoms and increased taxation to make this all better. These people became very popular.

Fast forward to today: the latest data from all four major global temperature tracking outlets showed that global temps cooled between .65 and .75 degrees Celsius in the last year. This wipes out all of the warming that has occurred in the last century. This is not a surprise considering all the anecdotal evidence: the first snowfall in recorded history for Baghdad, the coldest winter in 100 years for China, and record levels of Antarctic sea ice. Carbon emissions may have a small effect on climate, but there are clearly larger factors (like solar activity) at play. I wonder if they'll take back Al Gore's Nobel Peace Prize. Probably not, as Jimmy Carter and Yasser Arafat kept theirs.

Global Warming in Baghdad?

Apparently not, as it snows for the first time in 100 years.

Consensus Debunked

The "consensus" on global warming that has been jammed down our throats isn't holding up too well. The media claims that the scientists who contradict claims that CO2 emissions are destroying the planet are akin to the Flat Earth Society or Holocaust deniers. A new Senate report outlines the views of 400 prominent scientists who disagree with the claims of Gore and the UN IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change). 400! These scientists are sacrificing piles of grant money to stand up for the truth: that trying to control our climate is impossible, that variations in global temps are normal, that greenhouse gases are only one of many things influencing climate (and CO2 is a small part of greenhouse gases, water vapor makes up the vast majority of it), and that reasonable ideas for improving the environment are cast aside for hysteria. 

Global Warming Update

Good news on the global warming front:

• So far the US and Canada have resisted efforts to get them to sign legally binding agreements to cut carbon emissions at the Bali global warming summit
• The former director of the National Hurricane Center contradicts Henry Waxman's (D-CA) investigation that claims Republicans pressured him to change his testimony regarding the impact of global warming on hurricane activity.
  
• Pope Benedict is now a global warming "denier." He will make a speech on January 1 (the speech was released in time for the Bali conference): The Pope "suggested that fears over man-made emissions melting the ice caps and causing a wave of unprecedented disasters were nothing more than scare-mongering." HT American Thinker.
  

Court Rules Gore Is a Liar

The British government has been trying to force all school children to see Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth." However, they were sued by a truck driver claiming the government was guilty of political indoctrination. The judge ruled that the movie could be shown, but teachers must explain that it is a political work showing only one side of the argument and must acknowledge eleven falsehoods in the movie. Here's the 11, as listed in newsbusters.org:

• The film claims that melting snows on Mount Kilimanjaro evidence global warming. The Government's expert was forced to concede that this is not correct.
• The film suggests that evidence from ice cores proves that rising CO2 causes temperature increases over 650,000 years. The Court found that the film was misleading: over that period the rises in CO2 lagged behind the temperature rises by 800-2000 years.
• The film uses emotive images of Hurricane Katrina and suggests that this has been caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that it was "not possible" to attribute one-off events to global warming.
• The film shows the drying up of Lake Chad and claims that this was caused by global warming. The Government's expert had to accept that this was not the case.
• The film claims that a study showed that polar bears had drowned due to disappearing arctic ice. It turned out that Mr Gore had misread the study: in fact four polar bears drowned and this was because of a particularly violent storm.
• The film threatens that global warming could stop the Gulf Stream throwing Europe into an ice age: the Claimant's evidence was that this was a scientific impossibility.
• The film blames global warming for species losses including coral reef bleaching. The Government could not find any evidence to support this claim.
• The film suggests that the Greenland ice covering could melt causing sea levels to rise dangerously. The evidence is that Greenland will not melt for millennia.
• The film suggests that the Antarctic ice covering is melting, the evidence was that it is in fact increasing.
• The film suggests that sea levels could rise by 7m causing the displacement of millions of people. In fact the evidence is that sea levels are expected to rise by about 40cm over the next hundred years and that there is no such threat of massive migration.
• The film claims that rising sea levels has caused the evacuation of certain Pacific islands to New Zealand. The Government are unable to substantiate this and the Court observed that this appears to be a false claim.

Climate Change: What Do the Studies Say?

I know what you're thinking, "Jon does not post enough about global warming." Well here you go: a researcher has examined all of the published climate studies in the last three years to see how many supported the "consensus" that man was at least partially responsible for global warming (not even, as Gore claims, that man is primarily responsible and that global warming will result in catostrophe). Out of 528 studies on climate change found in the literature, only 7% explicitly endorsed the "consensus", 6% rejected this view, 45% accepted this view without saying so explicitly, and 48% were neutral. Guess how many referred to the catostrophic results of global warming? Only one out of 528. It is clear that the global warming hysteria is being driven by politicians and tree huggers, not science.

Is the Science Settled?

The global climate models took another hit. These models are what the Al Gore's of the world base their predictions of disaster, intending to scare us into allowing massive new taxation and government control. The models predicted that for every degree centigrade of warming, precipitation would increase by 1-3%. However, the American Thinker brought to my attention a study published in CO2 Science has just shown that precipitation actually increases by 7% per degree C. This is a big difference and it's an important difference. Increases in precipitation will help cool the planet and throw off the catastrophic predictions significantly. Scientists clearly have a long way to go to understanding climate. I'm all for conservation and improving energy technology to reduce pollution, but let's hold off on Kyoto-like protocols and let's not vote for politicians that support them.

Blacktop a Major Cause of Warming?

Moonbattery points out another chink in the armor for the global warming crowd: bias in collecting temperature data. Many sites used to measure temperature have changed significantly over time: blacktop, buildings, etc (do you think the site on the left changed at all in the last 100 years? Picture from moonbattery). This artificial warming has nothing to do with climate change. It is unlikely that a site will move toward a cooling bias, the opposite is far more likely. These sites indicate a slight warming trend over the last 100 years, but even if we accept this data as perfect, we have no idea how much of this .6 degree increase is due to carbon dioxide emissions, precipitation, or solar activity, among other things. Considering that the data is suspect, there may not be any climate change occurring at all.

Gorezilla

Has there ever been anyone so drunk on his own celebrity than Al Gore? He is a great example of how, when you are so sure you are right, the ends justify the means. Because global warming is such a huge threat, in his mind, drastic changes to our lifestyle are needed. Americans won't go for these changes unless they are scared. Enter his book and film. James M. Taylor challenges a number of Gore's key deceptions in the Chicago Sun-Times today. It appears that Big Al is preparing to run for president. My dream is that Hillary will win the Democratic nomination and both Gore and Ralph Nader run as independents. Romney, Thompson, or (hopefully not) Giuliani would win by 10% of the vote.

Klaus - Leader of B Squad

Sorry to post two days in a row on global warming, but this article is just too good. Vaclav Klaus, president of the Czech Republic, argues in the Financial Times that global warming propaganda is huge threat to individual freedom, democracy, the market economy, and prosperity. He answers a series of questions submitted by readers, some from my line of thinking, but mostly from Al Gore types. Klaus argues that global warming “is more about social than natural sciences and more about man and his freedom than about tenths of a degree Celsius changes in average global temperature.” The "imminent crisis" that is global warming is an attempt to use government to restrict our freedoms and to control markets. I highly recommend this quick Q&A, Klaus (I love the name Klaus, by the way, it reminds me of Willem Dafoe's character in the Life Aquatic) sums up the arguments I'm trying to make, only he's smarter than me.

News Flash: The Earth Changes Temperature

Quick global warming update: Climatologist Timothy Patterson has new data to indicate the variations in temperature over the last 5,000 years. As you might guess, the temperature did not remain constant during that time period. He found periods of rapid warming or cooling, several degrees in a few years, despite the fact that Romans and Mayans didn't drive Escalades. This suggests that perhaps we shouldn't get too worried about .6 degrees of warming over a century. Patterson also cites a poll of climate scientists. In one two-thirds of more than 530 climatologists surveyed did not believe that "the current state of scientific knowledge is developed well enough to allow for a reasonable assessment of the effects of greenhouse gases." And half of those polled said that the science of climate change was not settled enough for policymakers to be considering it. Patterson goes on to say that in 2020 the sun will enter its weakest cycle in two hundred years. This may have even more impact than compact fluorescent light bulbs. However, I feel compelled to include my global warming disclaimer: let's conserve energy, let's develop new technology to reduce pollution, but let's not have useless Kyoto-like protocols or taxes that will damage the global economy.

What Consensus?

Al Gore's scientific "consensus" on the threat of global warming just does not seem to be materializing. Recent polls of those in the climate science community do not seeem to match Gore's claims. A recent poll of the National Registry of Environmental Professionals (a U.S. based, accrediting organization of 12,000) found that 59% think human activities are largely to blame for warming and only 39% think curbing carbon emissions should be a priority. Al Gore's response to these thousands of "denying" scientists? "Only an insignificant fraction of scientists deny the global warming crisis. The time for debate is over. The science is settled." In other words, "You insignificant 41% - SHUT UP!" The media and the Democrats (redundant, I know) are shouting louder and louder about global warming. If they win the White House, get ready for extreme global warming taxes.

Day Light Savings - A New Enemy of the Planet?

An astute reader who shall remain Matt Dunmore (check out his photo of the day) emailed me a letter to the editor published in Arkansas Democrat Gazette. It highlights a new cause of global warming - Daylight Savings Time. Doesn't the government know the impact of an extra hour of daylight on our icecaps?! I believe the author meant it as a joke, but it appears the Gazette took it at face value. You can click on the image to open a new window, that should sharpen the text up a little bit.

Global Warming Update

Every hurricane, ice berg or warm breeze nowadays is attributed to global warming. However, in April the average temperature was only 51.7 F, -.3 degrees cooler than average for the last century. We should all immediately buy Hummers, fly private planes and jack up the AC if we want to avoid an ice age that will surely wreck havoc across the globe. I'd say we only have about 5 years to act, or else the planet is doomed. Seriously, more and more prominent climate scientists (thanks, Drudge Report) are changing their tune and rejecting the doom and gloom prophesies, while the nut jobs at Greenpeace build an ark. As I've stated before, I strongly support conservation and investment in technologies that will lower our carbon dioxide emissions. However, global warming is not a crisis (see my previos posts) and the extreme solutions (Kyoto Protocol, insane taxation, limiting the number of children you can have) offered to solve this non-crisis would have horrible effects on our economy and the welfare of the developing world while doing next to nothing to cool the planet. Obama and Hillary have joined other Dems in the Senate to propose a new $366 billion a year global warming tax, which would average $4,500 for a family of four and would increase over time. Awesome.

Global Warming: Its Effect On Our Kittens

Global Warming Debate

Al Gore's film has sparked considerable debate on global warming. This has surprised many people who had not heard the arguments of the other side. If you are interested in this subject, listen to this podcast of a debate held on NPR (PDF transcript also available) to be exposed to the arguments of experts on both sides. I also recommend Michael Crichton's book State of Fearfor a more biased view. I believe that Christians are called by God to take care of this planet. The planet has warmed by half a degree celcius. CO2 levels have increased, which should increase global temperature, but no one knows by how much, since other factors play a large role: the sun, urbanization, water vapor, clouds, and thousands of others. Global temperatures have been either rising or falling since creation. Sea levels have been rising since the last ice age. Is the current global temperature optimal? Do we have the power to keep the earth at a constant temperature? Is trying to (when we know so little) worth the trillions it would cost in slowing the global economy? I would argue that tackling poverty and disease is a better use for our money (click here to do that). In the NPR debate, Sheik Yamani, the Saudi oil minister is quoted as saying "the Stone Age did not end because we ran out of stones." Pollution is bad, but technology will advance, lowering our CO2 emissions, without the Kyoto Protocol demanding it.