USA Today‘s house editorial today bemoans the fact that Climategate “gives ammunitiion to the skeptics,” but concludes that “the overwhelming scientific consensus remains that the Earth is warming, largely because of human activity, with potentially calamitous consequences involving melting ice caps, rising sea levels and shifting agricultural patterns.”
So do they get a skeptic to fill the daily “Another View” slot they offer to rebut their editorial? No — they get another alarmist! Under the panicky-but-now-tired headline “We need to act quickly!”, Melanie Fitzpatrick of the Union of Scientists Concerned About Their Grant Funding writes:
Now that the United States and other countries are finally moving to seriously address global warming, polluter-funded front groups and their allies in Congress are making exaggerated claims about stolen e-mails from climate scientists in a last ditch effort to derail action.
I guess Ms. Melanie missed the memos about the vast wealth that flows to alarmist science and environmental pressure groups, which they extract both from taxpayers and extort from those same “polluters” she’s talking about. And what a shock — she’s yet another politically disinterested, principled scientist who contributes to the Huffington Post.
RSS Updates 
RSS E-Mail Updates 
CEI.org
To Ms. Melanie & friends:
I hear many comments that science is nonpolitical, and it is true, but the same cannot be said about the scientists. They provide advice to the governments often based on their prejudices and on what the governments want to hear. Let’s take a look at the governments. Europeans, especially the Germans, try to kill the carbon industry because they want to sell the overpriced ( and not very efficient ) wind mills, or nuclear plants. Third world countries are getting on the band wagon because they want the developed nations to pay them compensation for burning coal and oil, which sometimes they themselves provide. And the rest is plodding along as not to antagonize them and the very vocal groups at home. President Obama, and I have a lot of respect for him, is embarking on a policy that is going to cost Americans a lot of money and will achieve very little, simply because he is getting the wrong advise or he wants to “win back” some of the old friends in Europe. He might as well be concentrating on how to turn down the sun, the effect would be similar, and less costly!
Way back in the 70’s, as a university physics student (and worried about the “approaching” ice age!), I have learned that the CO2 spectrum is practically saturated, i.e. virtually all infrared frequencies that CO2 can absorb are already absorbed! It means that addition of CO2 to the atmosphere will have insignificant impact on the green house effect. Virtually all the respectable scientific studies, that I read since then, confirm that. I am yet to see one that shows otherwise, the one that is not fudged, of course.. So how was it possible for those pseudo scientist to highjack the debate to such an extent that we may be reverting to the stone age ( a bit of exaggeration here)?! Where are the respectable scientists who know the truth?
It makes perfect sense to clean up the industries or to use the renewable energy, where it is possible, but let’s face it, the only practical replacement to carbon based energy at present is nuclear. Do we really want nuclear reactors in our back yards?!
Global warming may or may not be a fact, but it is not our doing. It has happened many times in the past and will happen again. Some people may be aware that the Vikings kept cattle on Greenland about 1,000 years ago, perhaps they will do it again soon!
There have been numerous fluctuations in global temperature even in the past 10,000 years and they were not anthropogenic. By the way, nobody seems to be able to explain adequately what ended the last ice age. Could it really be the CO2 from our ancestors’ camp fires!?
I do not believe there is global warming. Hardly use air condioner this summer it was cooler.Use to have heat waves in the hundreds.Now the weather has been colder and getting snow and ice storms alot of places early this year. I think Al Gore should pay back the money he got rich on by lying to the public. Concern Citzen
there is warming (in some places) it's just not primarily caused by humans…….
http://www.carboncommand.com
Comments on this entry are closed.