The American Spectator

Brian Mc| 9.19.11 @ 6:30AM

Very sobering numbers and concisely constructed, worthy of spreading around the web. If I posted to FB though, I would be impressed if even a handful of 'friends' would bother to read it. And that is a shameful indictment of the true state of the Republic.

Timothy L. Pennell| 9.19.11 @ 12:17PM

Look at the Environmental Flat Earthers. The people who SIT IN TREES, so as to prevent them from being cut down. The Great Unwashed. (By that, I mean, THEIR HAIR) Their Hair is always dirty. Their Clothes are always dirty. And they smell.
Because they don't bathe, and they smell so bad, they don't fit in, and they need SOMEWHERE to go.
So, they sit in trees. The work is easy. I'm sure they get food. And the Rent for the branch, is well within their means.
What could be better?
I've explained the MORON'S affinity with the "Movement", but, what about the IDIOTS of the World? The Thomas Friedmans.
How can someone who's so clean, has a nice Apartment, and THINKS he's so smart, align himself with the Dirty, Stupid people who live in Trees?
I think that he's trying to latch on to something. A Cause. Something that he can believe in.
Does he believe in GOD?
I don't know. Does BILL CLINTON count? Does KEYNES? OBAMA?
Why does he believe a guy - AL GORE - who has made Hundreds of Millions selling Carbon Credits, through his Environmental HEDGE FUND? Aren't Millionaires and Billionaires BAD? Aren't Hedge Funds even WORSE?
What about Al Gores huge New House, on the BEACH? Didn't he tell us that the Oceans would rise 100 Ft. if we didn't give him all of our Money, right now?
Or, did Obama really lower the Ocean Levels? (Like he said he would)
And, what's up with all of his Private Jet travel? Are Private Jets GOOD, now?
Why do the Thomas Friedmans let themselves become the USEFUL IDIOTS of one Stupid Cause, after another?
Are they just STUPID?
Was P.T. Barnum, right?
Or, is it that they're WATERMELLONS?
Green on the outside.
RED on the inside.
I'm thinking.......All of the above.

mike| 9.19.11 @ 6:31AM

This sort of example, while dramatic, confuses a short-term situation with a long-term phenomenon.
http://www.besthandbagsshopping.com
http://www.winter-brands.com

MOS was 71331| 9.19.11 @ 10:58AM

Disregard mike's post. It's just advertising.

daddio| 9.19.11 @ 11:35AM

Check your computer for viruses now.

Shamus| 9.19.11 @ 7:07AM

I disagree with Friedman's notion that government is the driving force behind the success of the US economy. In fact, I would argue that it was only during periods where government was at least partially restrained that the US made progress.

oldfart| 9.19.11 @ 7:11AM

Agreed - the best that Government can do, financially, is cause no harm.

Mike Hawk| 9.19.11 @ 7:45AM

Friedman is a Socialist, what would you expect from him?? Free markets are anathama to him.

mames| 9.19.11 @ 12:07PM

Friedman is a lazy pseudo intellectual who has been made a king only by his fellow intellectual pygmies. I am confident he has added tons to the carbon "problem" if for no other reason than hauling his fat ass around the globe and his high intake of calories. Go sell crazy some place else we're all full up here.

Pseudo Intellectual| 9.19.11 @ 3:17PM

HEY! I take offense at that remark. Freidman is most assuredly NOT one of us!

By the way, anyone else see the knee slapping irony in the fact that this pompous "green advocate" makes his living by dissiminating his thoughts via a medium that requires mass deforestation to produce it?

Typical freakin' "Do as I say, not as I do" liberal...

play nice| 9.19.11 @ 4:05PM

"Friedman is a Socialist" - by marriage a very wealthy socialist.

Vote Loud| 9.21.11 @ 11:13PM

Follow the money...

This man is all about HIS wallet and access to the Democrat structure, and the power they can accumulate.

A classic example of why radical "Progressives" (Marxists) like him and the rags and networks that they work for are losing readership and audience.

Yawn!

Occam's Tool| 9.22.11 @ 5:07PM

Yup. He's a gold-digger in multiple ways. And an idiot.

Merlin| 9.19.11 @ 7:19AM

I know that one observation is not science, but getting plants in the garden and orchard to grow like weeds is not difficult and an increase in plant growth is expected if CO2 levels increase. So, let's tax those who are not doing their part to increase carbon emissions.

oldfart| 9.19.11 @ 7:32AM

The Mantra in the 1970's was to plant 10 trees for every person in your household. Those 10 trees would supply each person with lifetime of O2 and tie up TONS of CO2 for centuries. The problem with that it is difficult for the Government to regulate and therefore TAX this kind of activity – so it is ignored today. However, it is still the single most effective way for the average Joe and Jane to make an impact. The exhaust from cars in the '60s and 70's was downright nasty and I can remember smog alerts in Virginia from car exhaust alone on hot August days. The air was so nasty you could see it. That does not happen anymore – I think sometimes we forget how far we have come. Today it seems we are trying separate fly feces from pepper. In business it is called the 'law of diminishing returns' where you are spending more with insignificant results.

Alert1201| 9.19.11 @ 9:21AM

I remember as a kid (late 60s) we had a Pfizer plant that constantly reeked of rotten eggs. When we drove by it my sister and I would playful fall down on the floor gagging and holding our noses. Now you hardly know the place is there. I also remember rivers and streams with a perennial layer of film and scum floating on them and places where you could not fish where now you can even eat the shellfish. On the mouth of the Thames river in New London CT there was a celebration in the mid 80s because the first swan had been seen a few miles up the river where one had not been seen in any living man's lifetime.

Things have gotten much better, but that does not help the envio-wacko's agenda so they are forgotten.

MOS was 71331| 9.19.11 @ 11:01AM

Don't worry about it. If there's more CO2 in the air, plants will automatically respond by growing more and replacing the added CO2 with O2.

daddio| 9.19.11 @ 11:40AM

Why does this seem so hard for people to understand?

JB| 9.19.11 @ 4:24PM

Please, daddio and MOS: We all know that is patently not true. The plants will all burn up or be drowned in the super mega droughts and floods that will encompass the Earth, should the planet's mean temperature rise to levels that they were just a few centuries ago. (Wait, what did I say? We all know the Earth has never been warmer than it is today!) Just ask Tom Friedman.

oldfart| 9.19.11 @ 7:23AM

One key point these people seem to be ignoring is that according to NASA's data the rate of sea level change in decreasing. Also it appears that some data was modified to account to the 'rebounding' of the land masses since the end of the last ice age. Well if the land is going up, including that land below sea level, would it not only cause the sea level to rise as well? DUH? And the sole cause of this is a .039% change in CO2? Do you know why water vapor is excluded? It the single biggest factor in warming. This whole thing is one massive scam.

Rob Schapiro| 9.19.11 @ 7:33AM

Dont get caught up trying to understand the minds of warmists. A lot of people made a very good living perpetuating human caused global warming. They want the good times to keep rolling. In short, follow the money.

daddio| 9.19.11 @ 11:41AM

As in everything-follow the money!!!

play nice| 9.19.11 @ 4:08PM

tulips, any one?

Norbert| 9.19.11 @ 7:36AM

Never heard of Friedman. He may be the enviro-faker you claim. What 'd like to know is - what qualification in any of the geo-sciences do you possess? I ask because I'd like to know how much credibility to your view that global warming isn't man-made.

db| 9.19.11 @ 7:53AM

Hey Dilbert, don't you recognize liberal clap-trap when you hear it?

RustyG| 9.19.11 @ 7:58AM

You should get out more Norbert. Friedman is a pulitzer winning author for the NY Times. He studied at all the same Environmental Science programs as Mr. Kaminsky....... namely none. Mr. Friedman however spews his ignorance twice weekly in the supposed "paper of record" so every lefty can and will repeat it. Mr. Kaminsy needs to geo-science degree to point out the failed logic and inconsistency in the writings of Friedman .....if you would bother to read the article.

RustyG| 9.19.11 @ 8:01AM

Should read "needs NO geo-science degree"..

The Bruce| 9.19.11 @ 11:01PM

Why even get into this discussion? Norbert is the same person, twenty years from now, that'll be trying to convince us that we're all about to die in an ice age due to global cooling -- and I'm sure he'll find a way to make it man made.

In other words, in twenty years, it'll be the 1970s all over again.

JP| 9.19.11 @ 8:43AM

Norbert,
Perhaps you should ask Dr Kevin Trenbeth. He holds a PHD in Atmospheric Sciences, and is currently a big-wig at NCAR. What is interesting is what people like him say off-line. One of the most publicized emails from the Climategate publications came from Trenbeth. He emailed Dr Michael Man and a few other activists in the UK. He asked in exasperation, "What happened to the lost heat content?" It seems thier models over-estimated the amount of heat Greenhouse gases in fact trapped. Just a few weeks ago, his question was answered by the folks at CERN. It appears much more incoming solar radiation is reflected out to space than the experts calculated.

To rub salt in the wound, 2 NASA scientists, Dr Spencer and Dr Christy published a study last month in which they theorized that changes in long term cloud cover variations (especially in the Tropics) have a much more profound effect on Climate than the Alarmists realized. And what did our highly credentialed, high respected, and very well paid Dr Trenbeth do? Why, he pressured the editor of the technical journal which published the paper to resign. That's how our degreed experts do science.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 9:21AM

Norbert,

My degree is not in science. That said, I have read books, many papers, and been to dozens of lectures by climate scientists, and it is clear to me -- not least because of Climategate -- that what is going on with "climate change" is not science.

It is a combination of a few other things: religion, anti-capitalism, and money-grab by grant-chasing scientists and organizations.

Furthermore, the DATA simply don't support the alarmists' claims. Their models absolutely CANNOT explain the flat temperatures of the last decade.

The primary reason, as I understand it, is that all the alarmist models make one particular kind of assumption, namely one of positive feedback. That is, they assume that a warmer planet generates things such as more cloud cover which then serve to warm the planet further.

However, there is much more credible actual EVIDENCE rather than the alarmists' theories that the climate system has negative feedback.

The story I linked to about NASA satellite data is extremely important, by the way.

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 9:59AM

'The story I linked to about NASA satellite data is extremely important, by the way.'

Er, no it's not, Ross. The paper was by Roy Spencer, and it's been shown almost immediately to have no merit and is full of errors - and the editor of the journal has resigned for allowing such an awful paper to be published.

See:

http://www.skepticalscience.co.....dback.html

JP| 9.19.11 @ 11:19AM

Jack,
Pray tell what part of the paper didn't have merit? Was it Spencer's drift calculations, sensor calibrations? statististical methodolgy? What exactly did the peers of Climate Science find wrong with the study?

Offering a citation from some partisan blog no longer holds water -if it ever did. And speaking of peer review, why did Dr Roger Pielke offered this review of UAH's work over the years (including the recently finished study):

"To summarize specifically the UAH MSU dataset, it has gone through about 9 revisions (A, B, C, D, 5.0, 5.1, 5.2, 5.3, 5.4 – some listed in CCSP 1.1.) Two of the revisions involved changes Jim Wentz of RSS spotted, but the other seven were ones John Chrsity and Roy Spencer discovered (i.e. major ones like the spurious warming due to a change in the sensor when the satellite went in and out of sunlight).

Such corrections are what happens in the normal course of science when you are the first to build the data set and discover issues as time goes on, especially when a satellite goes through a calibration shift. Their data are publicly available and their methods published in a diverse range of peer-reviewed journals."

Peilke as well as statistical expert Steven McKintyre took skepticalscience to the woodshed over its strident ad hominem attack on Spencer.

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 12:03PM

There's a very thorough roundup with links here:

http://bbickmore.wordpress.com.....y-own-data

And you can read Wolfgang Wagner's resignation editorial here:

http://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/3/9/2002

As he says:

'Peer-reviewed journals are a pillar of modern science. Their aim is to achieve highest scientific standards by carrying out a rigorous peer review that is, as a minimum requirement, supposed to be able to identify fundamental methodological errors or false claims. Unfortunately, as many climate researchers and engaged observers of the climate change debate pointed out in various internet discussion fora, the paper by Spencer and Braswell that was recently published in Remote Sensing is most likely problematic in both aspects and should therefore not have been published.'

JP| 9.19.11 @ 1:02PM

Peer review journals in Climate Science is an incestuous joke, where climate scientists peer review eachothers studies. Not in chemistry, nor in physics or engineering does this occur. They essientially grade eachothers work. And when one steps out of line (like Wolfgang Wagner), they attack. Wagner was forced to resign.

And please, answer my initial question. Please name one major item in Spencer's paper that was so wrong? Please compare Spencer's paper to Mann, Bradley, and Hughes 1998 Climate Reconstruction paper (aka the Hockey Stick). MBH98 was also "peer reviewed". And the experts did such a fantastic job that they failed to notice huge errors in Mann's R2 verification statistics; divergence between the Stripbark Bristlecone tree-rings and local temperatures; falure of both the Monte-Carlo tests and Red Noise tests...I could go on.. but these failures in and of themselves are enough humiliate if not end the careers of most scientists in other fields. Yet. for some reason people like you ignore them and try to raise strawmen over the work of real scientists like Spencer. Spencer's biggest mistake is to publish corrections to his own work.

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 1:49PM

You're wrong - the work by Mann and all the other top climate scientists has I'm afraid been on track.

I commend the site of Barry Bickmore to you (see also link I posted above). He's a geochem prof and importantly for this discussion he's a Republican and a Morman, and as he says:

'I’ve recently been involved with other scientists and scholars in Utah trying to stop the spread of outright lies, half-truths, abuses of data, and distortions about climate change. Much of this disinformation is coming from (or through) some Republican members of the Utah Legislature, and the other Republican (and some Democratic) members have swallowed it hook, line, and sinker....

'(In addition, I’m a Republican myself, and it galls me that my own party has locally fallen for a bunch of conspiracy theories and scientifically incompetent trash. In my opinion, something has to be done to save the party from disaster in the long run.)'

And of the current Spencer paper (see his Spencer section at http://bbickmore.wordpress.com/roy-spencer ):

'A new paper by Andrew Dessler shows that this is just another in a long string of Roy’s faulty claims to prove that climate sensitivity is lower than previously thought. The main problem in all of these attempts has been rampant abuse of statistics.'

HUH?| 9.19.11 @ 3:28PM

You're attempting to prove the scientific bona fides of an individual by citing the fact that he's MORMON? "Oh, yes, Barry over there believes that the Lord Himself appeared to some old coot in a barn in Utah in the 1800's and said, 'Pardon me, chap, but there's a thing or two I forgot to mention in my last best seller; I was hoping you'd be so kind as to help me set the record straight'. So, clearly, THIS is a man of unimpeachable scientific credibility."

What's next? "I commend to you the published work of the renowned scientific expert, Dr. Jim Smith, who, as further evidence of his scientific expertise, happens to be a Grand Wizard of the Order of Witchery."

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 4:00PM

I don't care what religion he is - the point is that there are some religious republicans who are part of science and not voodoo. I'll wager he doesn't believe in intelligent design either (unlike Roy Spencer).

HUH?| 9.19.11 @ 4:09PM

Sounds like you should be investing in real estate in the North and South Poles, then. Future beach front properties - you know, buy low, sell high and all that...

Of course, it might take another 100,000 years or so for your investment to mature (and that's assuming the normal cyclic pattern that has characterized global climate for the past several million years doesn't continue) - but hey, I for one admire an investor who's willing to take the long view.

JEM| 9.19.11 @ 4:38PM

Sorry folks - no point in arguing with this guy. McIntyre's and McKitrick's study on Mann's stick was devastating and it has never been refuted. I read the paper a few years ago and what was amazing was the assertion that the algorithm Mann used would create a hockey stick with essentially any dataset used.

http://climateaudit.org/ this paper discusses the errors in Spencer's recent work, the corrections already made, and essentially supports the findings, albeit realizing that there is additional study to do. It also takes a nice shot at Trenbeth for his appallingly poor attack on Spencer, as well as his general CYA activity as he realizes ("where's the heat") what he has claimed for over a decade is not supported by the science in any manner at all.

The Cloud CERN study also destroys all the models upon which the warmists were able to create fear and confusion by indicating that CO2 impact on cloud formation has been off, by a larger factor than anyone realized. In fact it may be almost meaningless. Ammonia may be a trace gas with some impact but stellar radiation and the sun's own radiation disruption seems to drive temperatures more. More study is clearly needed, but if anyone wants to say Mann's work has been validated by anyone other than someone in bed with him on the scam, you would be a liar. There is a reason UVA is fighting the FOI request from the AG of Virginia. Once it becomes apparent that Mann was actually guilty of fraud for govt funds received - because he has no real non-tampered data to support his theories - he will be facing jail time, as will Trenbeth. My guess is in the end they will just be sent to some small nothing university to live out their professional lives where they cannot do anymore harm. But what a hit to their standard of living. So, when you are cornered, fight back hard because the alternative is pretty much a non-starter from most people's perspective.

Am I saying that most warmists are evil, fraudulent hucksters, a modern day version of a snake oil salesman of older days gone by? No, but there are a small cadre of them who are - Mann and Trenbeth amongst them - and who deserve severe punishment. They wanted to kill millions in homage to the god of AGW. And I say that on the basis that their preferred remedy was to reduce GDP worldwide, which means more people on the edge of life don't make it. Jack is just someone who drank the koolaid.

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 5:05PM

Accusing a scientist of deliberately falsifying data is about as serious as it gets. But your pathetic little witchhunt is old hat now as the updated models are also showing the same hockey stick effect. I would love warming to be disproven so you can get on enjoying your SUV but it's not working out that way.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 5:25PM

Hack

Bruce Berger| 9.19.11 @ 8:46PM

Jack,

You seem to consider yourself a man of science. That's good. Let me ask you something. Considering that the Earth is 4.6 billion years old and the industrial age has been around for only 150 years or so, wouldn't you agree that to adequately test global warming models we would need to test actual measured temps over the next 100 years at the very least to distinguish AGW from natural variation?

From what I have read it appears that the climate models have, in effect, been fitted to observed data over the last 100 years. That says absolutely nothing about their predictive ability. That should be tested rigorously.

I realize the need to test the models over this time frame doesn't square with the alarmists' need to "do something now". But it is the only way to do it the right way. I assume as a man of science you agree it should be done the right way.

Occam's Tool| 9.22.11 @ 5:11PM

Yes, I believe that he (Mann) was accused of falsifying scientific data. And his being cleared was a whitewash.

The measurement data appears to be crap from the beginning, AND then the data appears to be massaged to fit, the amount of money for supporting AGW seems to be fantastic.

Jack, if this set up was occuring for a scientist at a Big Pharma company, you'd be crying foul if they found a "miracle drug."

Warwick| 9.24.11 @ 12:04AM

As soon as you throw up the tired old idea that "you attack the idea of man-made global warming because you can't stand to let go of your SUV" you show yourself to belong to the gullible schoolgirl legions of green-left ideology believers.

This is debate at such a low level that I reckon you disgust yourself

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 5:55PM

The Mann "hockey stick" has been thoroughly and completely discredited by McIntyre and McKitrick. I would add that I've spoken to McIntyre about this and that he's no right-winger looking to discredit alarmists just for the fun of doing so. He was just really pissed off that a "scientists" would do some of the crap that Mann did, such as using a methodology that created a hockey stick-shaped output no matter what input the program was given.

Here's one of very very many stories on this:
http://www.technologyreview.com/Energy/13830/

Anybody who says that Mann is credible is simply not to be taken seriously.

And that's before Mann's scientific crimes in Climategate which should have been the last nail in the coffin of his reputation.

skip| 9.19.11 @ 12:13PM

Equus Asinus Enthalpy London,

The source 'skepticalscience' you cite is a blog.

The blog 'skepticalscience', in the 'About' page, in the 'About the author' section, states about the author: "He is not a climate scientist."

The link of the blog 'skepticalscience' you provide states the article is a re-post of an article at 'RealClimate' authored by Kevn [sic] Trenberth.

'RealClimate' is a blog.

The blog 'RealClimate', in the 'About' page, states: "The discussion here is restricted to scientific topics and will not get involved in any political and economic implications of the science."

The blog 'RealClimate', in the 'Contributors' page, lists twelve current permanent contributors.

Kevn [sic] Trenberth is not one of the twelve current permanent contributors of the 'RealClimate' blog listed.

One of the current permanent contributors of the 'RealClimate' blog listed is Michael Mann.

Michael Mann is one of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scientists notorious for being completely discredited because he was repeatedly caught lying and cheating by repeatedly intentionally manipulating IPCC non peer-reviewed research inaccurately and dishonestly in order to knowingly intentionally deceive the public.

The link of the article you provide from the blog 'skepticalscience' which re-posted an article from the blog 'RealClimate' authored by Kevn [sic] Trenberth has a link for Kevin Trenberth.

The link for Kevin Trenberth, in the 'About Kevin' section, states about Kevin Trenberth: "He was a lead author of the 1995, 2001 and 2007 Scientific Assessment of Climate Change reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)"

You are an idiot.

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 1:51PM

Hi Shirley Temple - I see you're still in way over your purty little head.

In what universe has Michael Mann's work _not_ been cleared as authoritative?

DaveD| 9.19.11 @ 2:02PM

"In what universe has Michael Mann's work _not_ been cleared as authoritative?"

The one you and I both live in. Mann's famous hockey stick graph has been completely discredited.

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 3:57PM

Sorry but you're wrong. It's just a climate change denier's parroted talking point to say it's been discredited. You need to look beyond your politics.

JEM| 9.19.11 @ 4:47PM

Failing to remember my own advice but here goes.

Jack please provide the link to whatever is your authority for saying McIntyre and McKitrick's destruction of Mann's hockey stick model was ever refuted itself.

And be careful, because statistically speaking, Mann doesn't apparently know much about statistical analysis.

I have looked for a refutation of M&M but have never found one. Give it your best shot - otherwise you are just talking.

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 5:13PM

The refutation lies in subsequent research that is also showing a similar hockey stick effect. What you don't seem to realise is yes, there were flaws in the original paper, but the error margins were stripped out in reporting and nothing has actually disproved the overall effect. This article in a British newspaper is the best explanation I've seen:

http://www.guardian.co.uk/envi.....e-mcintyre

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 6:01PM

You're missing the point, in my opinion. M&M made a significant contribution by showing that Mann was extrapolating from tree rings in a limited geographic area when he created the original hockey stick. But Mann's work has also been verified by countless other scientists that have created temp reconstructions since, including a Republican Congress-requested comprehensive analysis by the National Academy of Sciences. M&M pointed out an error Mann made (that's science), but the error did not significantly effect Mann's conclusions. His reconstruction was still valid and has been replicated using countless proxies from countless geographic locations.

JP| 9.20.11 @ 7:17AM

Mann's entire reconstruction depended upon one single proxy - the California Stripbark Bristlecone. Mann totally mis-used Principle Components (Wegeman 2004, McKintyre 2003-2006, von Storch 2005), without which the sharp blade on his Hockey Stick would have been impossible to construct. Remove the Bristlecone, and you remove the Hockey Stick. Later, M&M also showed the Mann did something similar with the Yamal Series of proxies. And no, niether Mann (using ocean sediments as proxies), nor Santer have been able to reconstruct the Hockey Stick using other methods. That is complete bunk.

JEM| 9.20.11 @ 11:49AM

His error invalidated his entire algorithm. When you can take any set of data and get your desired move? And to Jack - no one has refuted M&M's study - no one. Don't give me studies which just resupport Mann. Give me one which takes apart M&M. You will be looking for awhile. And of course please provide the models used by warmists that predicted future temperature increases that have been within even two standard deviations of their forecasts. M&M had to sue just to get the data Mann used which he said he had lost or it got damaged and destroyed - or the dog ate it - lol!

No, Mann is no scientist. That is why he is fighting as hard as he can to keep the truth out of the eyes of the public. If he had nothing to hide - why not turn over his research? Share it. Open it up to scrutiny. He won't because he already knows it can't.

Shane Hanson| 9.19.11 @ 11:13PM

Nope. You are the typical left wing cheer leader. The hockey stick graph has been debunked. But to the left, repeating a good lie like the hockey stick will not be stopped by facts. The fact is it doesn't matter what the climate change crowd says or lies about, you will back them regardless of the truth. Spencer's paper had a couple of errors, but they used those to attempt to totally discredit him. Mann flat out lied but he has people like you backing him. Hansen has deleted and modified original datasets and in science, that is blasphemy. He did so citing "corrections" to the data. This just is not allowed. You can show the calculations you used to adjust the set, but to actually alter the original set is to totally destroy the data, yet the left still supports this loon. So no matter what the facts are, you will never not support the climate warming scare mongers. It has become your religon.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 11:33PM

With the possible exception of the Loehle outlier, every temp reconstruction of the past several years that has made it into a peer-reviewed journal shows that we have surpassed the highpoint of the MWP and any other period for the last couple millenia. In that sense, Mann's hockey stick has been confirmed.

Spencer's paper had a couple of errors?!??! Ha. He completely made up a global statistical analysis based on one satellite reading (and I'm sure you're aware of his history of serial errors).

Your stuff on Hansen is just right-wing blog slander. You may disagree with him, but his methods and data are and always have been transparent.

I would suggest that it is you who are unable to deal with the facts in front of your face.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 3:36PM

The name "Michael Mann" carries with it the same cachet in the scientific community as the name Anthony Weiner does in the political community. You're basing your argument on the views of a coctail party joke, and yet you expect to be taken seriously?

Drunken Sailor| 9.19.11 @ 4:21PM

No Trinarcria, he doesn't expect us to take him seriously. Jack just likes to jump on some post and stir up the fecal matter to check the aroma.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 5:26PM

There appears to be no other credible explanation...

tsd| 9.19.11 @ 7:53AM

They want to raise the prices on things we need for basic survival (food, heat and shelter) until that is all we can afford to spend our money on... while they steal the money and take the power for they're ultimate fantasy world. These green preachers are the worst type of evil!!

Timothy L. Pennell| 9.19.11 @ 8:19AM

Look at the Environmental Flat Earthers. The people who SIT IN TREES, so as to prevent them from being cut down. The Great Unwashed. (By that, I mean, THEIR HAIR) Their Hair is always dirty. Their Clothes are always dirty. And they smell.
Because they don't bathe, and they smell so bad, they don't fit in, and they need SOMEWHERE to go.
So, they sit in trees. The work is easy. I'm sure they get food. And the Rent for the branch, is well within their means.
What could be better?
I've explained the MORON'S affinity with the "Movement", but, what about the IDIOTS of the World? The Thomas Friedmans.
How can someone who's so clean, has a nice Apartment, and THINKS he's so smart, align himself with the Dirty, Stupid people who live in Trees?
I think that he's trying to latch on to something. A Cause. Something that he can believe in.
Does he believe in GOD?
I don't know. Does BILL CLINTON count? Does KEYNES? OBAMA?
Why does he believe a guy - AL GORE - who has made Hundreds of Millions selling Carbon Credits, through his Environmental HEDGE FUND? Aren't Millionaires and Billionaires BAD? Aren't Hedge Funds even WORSE?
What about Al Gores huge New House, on the BEACH? Didn't he tell us that the Oceans would rise 100 Ft. if we didn't give him all of our Money, right now?
Or, did Obama really lower the Ocean Levels? (Like he said he would)
And, what's up with all of his Private Jet travel? Are Private Jets GOOD, now?
Why do the Thomas Friedmans let themselves become the USEFUL IDIOTS of one Stupid Cause, after another?
Are they just STUPID?
Was P.T. Barnum, right?
Or, is it that they're WATERMELLONS?
Green on the outside.
RED on the inside.
I'm thinking.......All of the above.

R. Nixon| 9.19.11 @ 4:24PM

People of the MSM like Friedman are so invested in Global Warming alarmism that they have painted themselves into a corner from which there is no honorable escape!!

As a result, they have no choice but to "go down fighting" which is exactly what they are doing.

Indy| 9.19.11 @ 8:38AM

Please pay attention to what your children are learning in school, read textbooks, review the curriculum, what movies are shown in class? Learn about Agenda 21, do your local council members, commissioners know what it is and how it is being implemented?

http://biggovernment.com/lrlee.....d-to-ruin/

York Hawk| 9.19.11 @ 8:42AM

When will I safely be able to emit methane from my arse again? Holding flatulence can lead to diverticulitus.

Anthony| 9.19.11 @ 8:44AM

Tell this clown Friedman to have Michael Mann and the other "academics" release their emails and other data that they are trying to hide, and then let's talk about which side is crazy.
For a science that's "settled", information is hard to come by from these same frauds who pretend to be objective scientists.
Follow the grant money and it will lead to leftist whores with an agenda.

MOS 1 1 2 | 9.19.11 @ 8:44AM

I met a retired State Dept. fellow from the D.C. area, recently, who said he has never met an intelligent person who didn't believe in man made global warming. Sort of reminded me of the story of the Manhattan matron, who was astounded when Reagan won 49 states, because, she said, "I never met anyone who voted for him." Thomas Friedman writes for these people.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 9:26AM

MOS,

FYI, the story is about Pauline Kael, former movie critic for the New Yorker magazine, and the statement attributed to her was about Nixon.

It's a great line, though it does appear to be a misquotation of what she actually said! Still, I hope she's glad to be famous for something...

RGK

JohnnyB53| 9.19.11 @ 8:53PM

Kael is also famous for starting a lifelong obsession against Clint Eastwood, who in her mind was unredeemable after playing the lead in the supposedly fascist "Dirty Harry." Watch "Dirty Harry" today and you'll wonder what all the fuss was about.

MOS was 71331| 9.19.11 @ 11:09AM

Hey, MOS 1 1 2! I post as MOSwas71331 because 71331 was my Army Military Occupational Specialty, Airborne Combat Engineer Troop Leader. All the MOSs I heard of were four digit numbers (1331) with a possible prefix (7) for airborne qualified. What does "MOS 1 1 2" mean?

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 9:40AM

Dr. Ron Paul Will Stop Global Warming, Whether It's Real Or Not.

The Tea Party Rebellion Escalates.

Rise Up.

Doctor Right| 9.19.11 @ 10:24AM

Ricky Perry Will Stop Global Warming,Whether It's Real Or Not.

The Ricky Perry Algore Cheerleaders Are In The Building.

We Go Down For RINO's.

Doctor Right| 9.19.11 @ 10:54AM

Yeah, that sounds like something I would post...

Nice try, Clint.

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 10:58AM

You Israel Firster Ricky Perry Algore Cheerleaders can stop Poseur Punk Posting under my name.

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 11:18AM

That Was Not Me.

That Was Israel Firster Ricky Perry My Fantasy Love Algore Cheerleader Pussy Poseur Punk Posting.

Get Bent, Asshats.

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 12:50PM

That Was Drunken Sailor, My Fantasy Love Algore Cheerleader Pussy Poseur Punk Poster.

We Bend Each Other.

Doctor Right | 9.19.11 @ 12:52PM

That Was Drunken Sailor, My Fantasy Love Algore Cheerleader Pussy Poseur Punk Poster.

We Bend Each Other.

Drunken Sailor| 9.19.11 @ 1:12PM

That Was Doctor Right, My Fantasy Love Algore Cheerleader Pussy Poseur Punk Poster.

We Bend Each Other.

Doctor Right| 9.19.11 @ 1:57PM

Yeah...I'm sure EVERYONE will think that was me...

Drunken Sailor| 9.19.11 @ 2:46PM

I was just thinking the same thing DR. Poor picked on Clint, I think it has made him unhinged.

Is it just me or does he show a lot of repressed homosexual tendencies?

Doctor Right| 9.19.11 @ 3:11PM

It's NOT just you; I have noticed that as well, and remarked on it on several occasions.

Many of Clint's posts are filled with angry, homoerotic references...Makes you wonder if he's even aware of it?

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 3:22PM

Dr.Reich Thinks About Queer Stuff Quite A Lot.

Doctor Right| 9.19.11 @ 4:09PM

...Only when I read your posts, Clint!

Clint | 9.19.11 @ 8:32PM

Uh Oh !

Dr.Reich's Queer For Tea Party Clint.

Drunken Sailor| 9.19.11 @ 3:32PM

I think he is totally aware of it, but can't help himself or come to terms with it. Thus the mental instability.

Then again I think he has a blow up Ron Paul doll so I could be wrong.

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 3:57PM

We Heard Drunken Swabbie Blows The Navy Goat.

Doctor Right| 9.19.11 @ 4:10PM

It's part of the "follower" mentality. Extreme politics attracts people with extreme emotions. Eric Hoofer discussed this at length in "True Believer":

SUMMATION:
Hoffer argues that all mass movements such as fascism, communism, and religion spread by promising a glorious future. To be successful, these mass movements need the adherents to be willing to sacrifice themselves and others for the future goals. To do so, mass movements often glorify the past and devalue the present. Mass movements appeal to frustrated people who are dissatisfied with their current state, but are capable of a strong belief in the future. As well, mass movements appeal to people who want to escape a flawed self by creating an imaginary self and joining a collective whole. Some categories of people who may be attracted to mass movements include poor people, misfits, and people who feel thwarted in their endeavors. Hoffer quotes extensively from leaders of the Nazi and communist parties in the early part of the 20th Century, to demonstrate, among other things, that they were competing for adherents from the same pool of people predisposed to support mass movements. Despite the two parties' fierce antagonism, they were more likely to gain recruits from their opposing party than from moderates with no affiliation to either.

The book also explores the behavior of mass movements once they become established (or leave the "active phase"). With their collapse of a communal framework people can no longer defeat the feelings of insecurity and uncertainty by belonging to a compact whole. If the isolated individual lacks vast opportunities for personal advancement, development of talents, and action (such as those found on a frontier), he will seek substitutes. These substitutes would be pride instead of self-confidence, memberships in a collective whole like a mass movement, absolute certainty instead of understanding."

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 4:56PM

Ya Wanna Play Your Cherry Pickin' Games, Religious Hypocrite, Dr.Reich.

"Take man's most fantastic invention -- God. Man invents God in the image of his longings, in the image of what he wants to be, then proceeds to imitate that image, vie with it, and strive to overcome it."
-- Eric Hoffer

The opposite of the religious fanatic is not the fanatical atheist but the gentle cynic who cares not whether there is a god or not.
Eric Hoffer

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 5:06PM

Interesting, that Plastic Faux Christian Dr.Reich has a serial problem with Us Catholics & then quotes Hoffer at Us.

Doctor Right| 9.19.11 @ 5:07PM

...And your point is..?

Sorry, Clint, but being able to cut-n-paste from a website about Eric Hoffer does NOT lessen your latent, deeply repressed tendencies...

Clint | 9.19.11 @ 8:33PM

I Could Deeply Recess My Boot Up Your Fixated Fag Ass.

Occam's Tool| 9.22.11 @ 5:17PM

Is that a threat of violence, C(lint) Elegans?

Clint| 9.19.11 @ 3:19PM

Uh Oh !
More Queer Talk From The Ricky Perry Algore Cheerleader Drunken Swabbie.

Dan Hirsch| 9.19.11 @ 11:04AM

In the late '80's Bill Buckley wrote an article in National Review cautioning that since the 'workers' were rejecting the communists' so-called 'help' to improve the proletariat's lot, the communists were looking for more appreciative beneficiaries. Mr. B suggested that the communists would now try to save 'the trees', because trees would never be so rude and ungrateful as to reject the communist salvation as Lech Walesa and the Gdansk shipyard workers so ungallantly did.

Then in September of 1989, Scientific American published an entire issue devoted to "Managing the Planet". Having learned to read research papers in grad school, I subscribed to that rag to maintain my skill at understanding impenetrably dense research writing.

That issue had articles, most written by honest-to-God research workers with more PhD's than names, devoted to some of the major variables in the global climate system. I recall they covered the moisture cycle, the carbon cycle, ocean currents, weather systems. I read every one of them-they all came to the same general conclusion: this is a very complicated subject, we don't have enough data and computing power to model the subject. They concluded that they did not know how or why things were the way they were. They needed a lot more research to have any kind of model for their field of study. Which to those of us fluent in researchese means send more money!

After wading through these articles I was surprised that they shared the "Heck, if we know..." conclusion. I was then shocked when I read the "Editor's Note" at the front of the issue. He obviously was a lot smarter than his authors; he said that it was CLEAR from these articles that there was no time for delay - we had to act about global climate change and act now because of the serious conclusions of the research in this issue.

I was appalled. So I 'cancelled my own g-d subscription,' that day. But I did learn a couple of things:

SA's editor knew that his readers didn't read the articles

that SA's authors didn't read the editorials and

to be on the lookout for more climate malarkey. This was already after the Ice Age, Nuclear Winter, and Global Cooling hoaxes and "Dewey Defeats Truman!"

This global climate farce has been political since it was invented!

It was SA Vol 261, No 3...I encourage you to take a look at this - if they weren't going to enslave us with this, it would be funny.

And another thing; it's amazing how much of our lives and our treasure they'll waste to 'fix' the ocean level rising 3' in a hundred years. Especially when you consider how little they are doing about the ocean level temporarily rising, 30', 40', 50' in half an hour, which actually happened at least twice in the last 8 years! Is anyone doing anything different after 250,000+ real, live human beings with names and families were killed in the 2004 and 2011 tsunamis? Of course not! If they did, they know we would expect to see some positive results, results soon. Maybe they could tote up the lives 'not lost, or saved' based on imaginary events, or maybe Hollywood disaster movies that actually didn't come true...

The climate thing has been a political ruse from the git go. Nothing has shown it to be anything else. Every syllable out of Al Gore's mouth proves it yet again. When oh when will the Securities and Exchange Commission bring Al Gore up on securities manipulation and fraud charges?

DTOM

DH

PS - Recently, in my dentist's office, I picked up an issue of Scientific American. The articles were not written by researching PhD's; they were written by Time Magazine correspondents!! Don't let anyone, throw that bird cage liner, fish wrap, toilet paper at you, ever! Sheesh...DH

MOS was 71331| 9.19.11 @ 11:14AM

Well said, Dan. For puzzled readers, DTOM is short for "Don't tread on me." (I'll save you the trouble of searching for it on the internet.)

WJ| 9.19.11 @ 11:44AM

Friedman is a repulsive hypocrite. Pictures of his 15,000 square foot mansion can be found on the web. His massive carbon footprint with that house is proportional to the massive waistline he sports.

R. Nixon| 9.19.11 @ 4:13PM

....and his overstuffed EGO!!!!

daddio| 9.19.11 @ 11:48AM

http://wattsupwiththat.com/

Dr. X| 9.19.11 @ 12:13PM

My degree is not in natural science, but I've got enough training in critical thinking to be extremely skeptical of the global-warming crowd.

15,000 years ago, the spot where I now sit was covered by glaciers, as was almost 1/3 of the current U.S. The globe sure as hell warmed, and it wasn't because prehistoric Native tribes were driving around in SUVs.

Further, the warming that melted the glaciers was hardly a disaster for Man. One of the things that bothers me about the global warming "science" is that it assumes that the world as we experience it should be permanent. Natural history, from fish fossils on desert floors to glacial recession, demonstrates that the natural world is always in a state of flux. On the one hand, we're taught evolution; on the other hand, the very same folks tell us the would should always remain as it is.

Al Gore warns us of the impending catastrophe and the flooding of New York City, etc. etc. Who says it shouldn't be such? The world has undergone many "catastrophic" changes. Ask the Romans at Pompeii. Or just wait until the caldera under Yellowstone blows.

Anthony| 9.19.11 @ 2:05PM

Dr.X, You make an excellent point, and one that I have tried out on warmers, to no avail. In addition to the glaciers of 15,000 years ago, I have made mention that for millions of years previously, most of the Earth was under a vast shallow inland sea, and numerious variations thereof.
When I remind warmers of our childhood dinosaur books, with the various eras showing vast portions of the U.S. different from today, they remain mute.
But your point about Algore says it all about these fanatics. It's all about them and their time on earth. This generation is the most egocentric ever to have inhabited the planet.
What climate changes that have transpired over the billions of years the Earth has existed is lost on these morons. They want things as they have known them to be, and demand no changes, despite how insane that perspective is. Their 80 years on this planet is the most important in the entire lifespan of Earth.
The Earth has, and will always undergo climate changes, but if Algore & friends are not there to witness it, did it really happen? That is what drives these self absorbed idiots.

The Bruce| 9.19.11 @ 11:24PM

Another good example is... ask the now dead residents of a land mass that is now the Mediterranean Sea.

Seems that ocean levels rose even in the absence of our SUVs back then.

George S| 9.19.11 @ 12:47PM

We are also being suckered by the logic of false alternatives. If AGW is indeed happening, then the only alternatives we are given is:

a) Raise the price of energy and send that money to Democrat bundlers in the form of Solyndra type loans; charge carbon taxes that eventually wind up in the pockets of politicians; install a cap and trade market that creates the latest crop of billionaires becoming rich off your money without having to work.

b) The sea levels will rise as a result of melting ice caps, swallowing cities whole; hurricanes will be more frequent and powerful causing untold destruction; fertile farmlands turn into deserts; drinking water disappears causing widespread human suffering.

That's it, pick one. Not offered as an alternative: longer growing seasons worldwide allowing greater food production from crops and livestock; increase in population in once frozen climates; increase in economic activity as a result of happier people (businesses, vacationers and retirees are found in warmer climates); overall health of people improving from warmer climates.

Scientist may disagree on the mechanisms on the AGW debate. but one thing they'll never agree on is the wild predictions from An Inconvenient Truth.

So, what exactly is the problem with a few extra days of summer and why must we go broke to prevent that from happening?

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 4:03PM

I take it you'll be happy to accommodate a few thousand Bangladeshis in your neighborhood George. Well done.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 4:16PM

Yeah - that's not a false alternative:

"Raise energy prices and go green OR be overrun by a swarm of immigrants from Bangladesh".

But I should like to think the Bangladeshi's will be all too pleased to relocate to the newly available beautiful tropical shores of the North Pole (I hear the view will be lovely there year round).

Occam's Tool| 9.22.11 @ 5:20PM

Happy to welcome as many Hindus and Buddhists as possible. Love Indian food. Need more Indian restaurants in Northern Minnesota.

Shane Hanson| 9.19.11 @ 11:21PM

See, your false alternatives are even worse than that but the left is just dishonest. Lets just say global warming is real for a second and follow this logic.
1. We completely restrict energy and the burning of fossil fuels to lower the CO2 output. The outcome of this: We lower food production and the manufactoring of pharmacueticals, pesticides and herbicides. Food becomes scarce in the US and we ship less over seas and the third world countries starve to death.
2. We ignore it. The world gets warming, the coasts move in and disease picks up. Less food is produced become some lands become arid. The food becomes scarce and we don't ship as much food over seas, the third world starves again.

So if their reality is true, a bunch of people starve to death either way. So what is the benefit to their solutions? Ah, nothing. But they do obtain significant power if we go along with them.

dw| 9.19.11 @ 12:52PM

The "Green Crowd" is being used by he "Red Crowd".

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 1:04PM

Gorebull warming is a political power play, nothing more.

Tom Osterman| 9.19.11 @ 1:26PM

Back when Reagan, in one of his first acts as President, deregulated the price of gasoline, liberals predicted that prices would soar due to "price gouging," I.e. Big Oil would charge consumers both arms and legs for a gallon because the government would not stop them. What actually happened is that the dollar price per gallon stabilized, and remained stable for around a quarter century.

After a while, liberals took a different tack: Big Oil was charging too little, encouraging consumers to drive wasteful and environmentally harmful vehicles like SUVs. What was needed was higher gas taxes to encourage conservation.

So here we have the great paradox of energy pricing: when the private sector raises the price of gas, it's greed, but when the government raises the price of gas, it's enlightened public policy. And liberals think no one will notice!

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 1:50PM

Big government to progs is like heroin to a junkie.

Brian| 9.19.11 @ 3:42PM

The left discusses the calamity of doing nothing as a reason to do "something". But it would seem the rationale for doing "something" would be definitive proof it would actually work. I am a computer model skeptic even IF I believed global warming were real. Do we really think that we've crafted an algorithm that approximates the complexity that is Mother Nature? Isn't that the height of hubris? And isn't the most frightening cataclysm that we do "something" and then it not work (after we've bankrupted our nation, set off massive geopolitical instability, and be less equipped to deal with any consequences of global warming - if it were real to begin with)? Wouldn't any so-called progressive agree that we should be certain of the outcome - which requires much deeper understanding of how our climate works, science that is definitively not settled. Especially when the computer models have been wrong to date.

GBinPA| 9.19.11 @ 3:46PM

Great article. I suspect that the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide may have been caused by the natural warming cycle rather the other way around. At any rate, nobody's buying this garbage any more.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 4:25PM

Chemistry disproves your "suspicion" GBinPA. First, CO2 concentration levels are going up consistent with CO2 emission levels
Second, there is nothing in the natural carbon cycle cannot explain increase of 3.2-4.1 GtC per year past 25 years
Chemistry closes the door on your suspicion, as the ratio of heavy (C-13) to light (C-12) carbon has been declining (which shows the increased CO2 is traceable back to decayed plant and animal matter, or fossil fuels); the ratio of oxygen to nitrogen decreasing (which shows that it is actually carbon being emitted and binding with the oxygen, rather than naturally occurring CO2), and there is a decrease in relative amounts of radioactive (C-14) carbon.

David N| 9.19.11 @ 3:49PM

Tom Freidman knows everything, don't you know? Global warming is a fact, he knows why the economy slowed down, man, he just knows everything.

MikeN| 9.19.11 @ 3:53PM

The .04% amount of CO2 is irrelevant. Increasing the amount of CO2 will have a warming effect on the atmosphere and a substantial one of about 1 degree Celsius. The author of the new study that shows holes in climate science die to satellite measurements, Roy Spencer, has posted on his blog about why carbon will warm the atmosphere. The question is whether this 1 degree will be amplified or reduced thru feedbacks.

Incidentally I think you are also misrepresenting that study as well.

R. Nixon| 9.19.11 @ 4:09PM

.04% is the equivalent to 4 seats in a 10,000 seat stadium. Who are you trying to kid!!!

Think about it people.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 4:23PM

It's even sillier than that - 0.04% represents the TOTAL amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, not the increase in CO2 observed over the last half a century. Using that figure (0.008%, or an increase from 0.032% to 0.04%), the analogy would be like adding less than ONE seat in a 10,000 seat stadium.

Brubaker| 9.19.11 @ 7:42PM

"The .04% amount of CO2 is irrelevant. Increasing the amount of CO2 will have a warming effect on the atmosphere and a substantial one of about 1 degree Celsius. "

So, according to you, the amount of CO2 increase is irrelevant. Increasing the amount of CO2, whether by a minuscule amount or by a huge amount, will result in 1 degree Celsius in atmospheric warming.

The scary part is, that probably makes sense to you.

ella8| 9.19.11 @ 4:01PM

I am working on increasing my standard of living. If Friedman had it his way I would either be sterlized, forced to have an abortion, or unable to afford raising children. The Obama administration is already pushing the third agenda; my health insurance, heating my home, driving my car, and buying groceries are all more expensive.

ella8| 9.19.11 @ 4:13PM

The next step is making safe family friendly vehicles non existent and forcing us to live in urbanized areas where only the rich or those on welfare can afford to have children. I grew up working poor, we didn't get government handouts, we payed taxes, and life was a struggle. This heartless man would like that struggle to be even greater for the average American. People need to wake up and realize this can't be solved by taxing millionares and the GOP needs to grow a pair and stand up for those of us that are losing any gain we have made in our standards of living thanks to the pseudoreligious ideologues on the left like Obama and Friedman. We need leaders who stand with fervor and intelligence against the green machine. I will not sacrifice my standard of living and my family. Life is hard enough without the watermelon burden. It sure the hell is a regressive tax.

Pundit Pete| 9.19.11 @ 4:08PM

Ross - Ya dun good man!
Good job of tackling the subject with facts, logic and an easily understandable writing style. I take back what I've said about some of your pieces in the past (too long, too complex, too geeky).

However..... and as Reggie McDaniel (RIP) used to say, "there's always a however" ........ nothing will convince me that it's not the Tea Party's fault. Just look at what they've done to our economy as revealed in this Pundit Pete Press article.
http://punditpete.blogspot.com.....t-and.html

Keep up the good work!

MikeN| 9.19.11 @ 4:16PM

R Nixon it is arguments like that why climate scientists don't take skeptics seriously. It is not 4 seats in a 10000 seat stadium, but rather carbon spread throughout the atmosphere, at a very small amount. This small amount traps heat, if you increase this amount it will trap some more heat. You are starting at zero, and the existing level of carbon raises the temperature by about 30 degrees. Doubling this level of carbon will warm things up by one more degree.

R. Nixon| 9.19.11 @ 6:14PM

BALONEY!!!

There are plenty of climate scientists who do not buy this CO2 theory.

Those who were involved in the CERN Experiment certainly are not buying your theories.

They seem to have actually proved that cosmic rays and the sun have a lot more to do with climate change than CO2 and IPCC forecasting models.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 4:16PM

Where to begin?

Mr. Kaminsky starts with an ad hominem attack on Mr. Friedman, and then criticizes Friedman for utilizing an ad hominem attack.

Mr. Kaminsky then builds a strawman by taking two things Friedman said -- that Perry rejects the science of climate change, and that Texas is on fire -- and claiming that Friedman is falsely arguing that a singular weather event is conclusive proof of the science of climate change (Friedman made no such argument).

Mr. Kaminky then makes a semantics argument by focusing on Friedman's use of the term 'global weirding,' a term that Friedman didn't coin. Friedman explained exactly what that meant -- the hot gets hotter, the wet gets wetter, the dry gets drier -- but Mr. Kaminsky does not try to
challenge the substance of Mr. Friedman's point.

Mr. Kaminsky then dismisses Mr. Friedman's point -- that a warmer atmosphere holds more water, and this leads to magnified droughts -- by claiming that Mr. Friedman made the logical fallacy of appealing to authority. Specifically, Mr. Kaminsky dismisses the substantive point because Freidman cited ClimateProgress. Never mind that the referenced ClimateProgress article was actually quoting from the Texas state climatologist in making the point about relative humidity and droughts. Also never mind that the sunbstantive point Friedman was making is, in fact, basic high school physics, regardless of what authority is being appealed to.

Most egregiously, Mr. Kaminsky claims that the most recent science, as revealed by NASA satellites, shows that we have nothing to worry about. In fact, this report Mr. Kaminsky references was authored by Roy Spencer. It was so rapidly and thoroughly debunked that the editor of the journal who published it had to resign in shame because of the sloppy peer review process that allowed the serial errors to be published. Dessler recently published a piece thoroughly destroying Spencer's made-up statistical analysis.

Mr. Kaminsky's own appeal to authority is grossly overstated. While Dr. Giaever did resign from the American Physics Society, the man is a mechanical engineer who got his Nobel prize in 1973 for something to do with electrons tunneling thru solids, or something like that. He is not a climate scientist. He is an 82 year old man who hasn't published anything since the 1970s and who has man Senator Inhofe's go-to man on global warming denialism for years.

Mr. Kaminsky's next attack is the predictable and oft-repeated mantra that any attempt to put a price on carbon (a) will wreck the economy, and (b) is socialism. These scare tactics do not pass for logic. And Mr. Kaminsky could use a bit of a lesson on externalities.

Mr. Kaminsky builds another strawman by claiming that no one reports on the fact that CO2 is only 0.04 percent of the atmosphere, "not even Fox." Anyone who knows anything about climate science knows this fact ... it is reported in terms of 394 "parts per million" after all. It's not news, so why would anyone report on it? And the fact that CO2 is a small % of the atmosphere doesn't change the fact that it is the primary heat-trapping gas in the atmosphere (along with water, which of course has a feedback effect). But for the heat-trapping effect of this small amount of CO2, the planet would be approximately 18 degrees C below zero, and the sun's energy would simply bounce off the planet and radiate off into space.

Mr. Kaminsky's bullet points at the end are nothing novel and in no way undermine AGW theory. Scientists have long known that greenhouse effect of increases CO2 is logarithmic, which is why its forcing effect is expressed in terms of CO2 doublings rather than in terms of absolute amounts. We know based on analysis of isotopes that the increase in CO2 levels is anthropogenic, primarily from the burning of fossil fuels. And that water has a greenhouse effect should be troubling, not dismissed, because (as Friedman pointed out and as high school physics tells us) a warmer atmosphere holds more water ... in other words, water vapor will be a positive feedback and enhance the warming caused by rising CO2 levels.

But let's be fair to Mr. Kaminsky, he does have a significant moment of honesty when he says that the point of his article is not to offer a science lesson. It is also not a very good lesson on logic.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 4:23PM

Buzz- gorebull warming is NOT man made, it is a political power play by the commies in government, your post that goes around in circle is typical prog BS, get a grip, the government is NOT your savior and is completely out of control with the hussein at 1600.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 4:32PM

And them commies better not take my guns either. Bunch of faggots.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 4:37PM

It's called the second amendment.

Jack London| 9.19.11 @ 4:28PM

Very well put, Buzz. But there's not much point in arguing the science with these wacko deniers - it's only about politics to them. Any science that comes between them and their 'property rights' must be denied and anyone who knows what he's talking about is, as Perry and co on delight in, simply not as stupid as them and therefore cannot, by definition, be understood.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 4:40PM

At the end of the day, the "science" of the alarmists is based on an assumption of positive feedback which much smarter people than I believe is erroneous, such as here:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/200.....-feedback/

The politics of the alarmists basically assumes that people are stupid and that we won't react and adapt to whatever change their is.

Meanwhile, over a few decades during which temperatures warmed slightly (before this decade), heat-related deaths declined in almost every major metropolitan area as humans realized the risks of too much heat exposure and changed either their behavior or their environment to mitigate their risks.

I would note that the point of Giaever's resignation is not that he said (at least not this week) that man-made climate change is a hoax, but rather than he said that what is being put forward as science is more like religion.

What other science, other than perhaps evolution, causes this sort of religious, emotional reaction, and even fear of disagreement?

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 5:02PM

You criticize Friedman for citing Joe Romm, and now you're going to rely on Anthony Watts to undermine the conclusion of the great majority of scientists that the net effects of feedbacks will be positive?!!?
These are the feedbacks we know:
-- As the atmosphere warms, it holds more water, which enhances the warming.
-- As the planet warms, sea ice melts, reducing the earth's ability to reflect solar energy,which enhances the warming.
-- As the earth warms, permafrost melts, causing massive release of methane, which enhances the warming.
-- As the oceans warm, they hold less CO2, which causes more CO2 to escape to he atmosphere, which enhances the warming.
-- As the soil warms, there is greater microbacterial activity, which breaks down more soil and releases stored carbon, which enhances the warming.

And I won't even get into the possible feedback effects of wildfires and increased air conditioning use.

The only feedback that is plausibly argued as negative is clouds, and scientists on both sides acknowledge that we do not know enough about how and where clouds will form in response to warming(higher clouds enhance worming, lower clouds will have a cooling effect) ... or even if more clouds will form at all.

The AGW theory-as-religion argument is just another one of those read-and-repeat catch lines ... I think it was coined first by Patrick Michaels. Obviously, folks who think climate change is a real threat believe it is the skeptics hose views are more akin to religion, in that they deny all of the evidence in front of their eyes an the only real plausible theory that has been advanced to explain why the climate is changing.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 5:50PM

"-- As the atmosphere warms, it holds more water, which enhances the warming.
-- As the planet warms, sea ice melts, reducing the earth's ability to reflect solar energy,which enhances the warming.
-- As the earth warms, permafrost melts, causing massive release of methane, which enhances the warming.
-- As the oceans warm, they hold less CO2, which causes more CO2 to escape to he atmosphere, which enhances the warming.
-- As the soil warms, there is greater microbacterial activity, which breaks down more soil and releases stored carbon, which enhances the warming."

Since I wasn't around then, perhaps you could comment on whether the above series of events occurred as the earth emerged from the last ice age. As I recall, that worked out rather well for us.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 6:05PM

Yes, Trinacria, these feedbacks occurred as we come out of ice ages. The increased solar input from the Milankovich cycles is quite small, and could not have brought us out of ice ages by itself. These positive feedbacks were triggered as a result of those cycles, and it is generally understood that brought us out of the ice ages.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 5:58PM

That was Lindzen, not Watts.

Furthermore, you say that the feedback we don't understand is clouds, but my understanding is that that's the majority of the feedback in the alarmists' models.

What's crazy about your religion is that you say we must "explain why the climate is changing." It's like asking why there are poor people; it's the wrong question.

The question is "why wouldn't the climate change over time?" sort of like the right question is "why are there rich people?" But the left never asks the right questions because the answers are so inconvenient to their true motivations, which are political and economic.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 6:15PM

I didn't read your link, which was to WUWT, but I'm familiar with Lindzen's iris theory.

Spencer says that most of the models presumse clouds to be a positive feedback, but my reading of the comprehensive reports is that they are quite clear in saying they don't know the effect of clouds. Lindzen obviously argues that clouds will be a negative feedback. And I don't think any of the models say that clouds is the majority of the feedback ... water vapor and snow (albedo) are generally seen as the most important feedbakcs.

Why do you find it necessary to impinge the motives of folks who believe climate change is a serious threat? My motivations have nothing to do with politics and economics ... I am motivated solely by my little girls and wanting them to have a liveable planet. And everyone I know who thinks climate change is a serious problem has a similar motivation.

Look, the climate has changed in the past and will change in the future. What's striking now is the speed at which the planet is changing, and the infrastructure we have built up that will cause massive economic loss if even the moderate ill effects of climate change come to fruition. We know quite wll what has caused most of the significant climate changes in the past, and none of those forcings are present now. Human civilizations are a relatively recent phenomenon in the history of the planet. There's a lot to lose if we cause the climate to change dramatically. Why wouldn't we ask what is causing it and what can we do to avoid it?

William| 9.19.11 @ 10:21PM

RK: I am an agnostic on AGW. But I don't see how anyone can take the categorical position that human activities over the past 150 cannot have had ANY effect on atmospheric CO2 levels or (at least potentially) global warming.

Bruce Berger| 9.19.11 @ 9:01PM

Buzz,

How do you explain the fact that the earth has been significantly warmer in the past, with higher concentrations of CO2 than exist today, yet somehow the earth has arrived at today's relative nirvana?

In fact, when measured relative to the last 2.5 billion years of the earth's existence current temps are in the lowest quartile.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 9:11PM

There's nothing really to explain Mr. Berger. I'm not sure what your point is.

Bruce Berger| 9.19.11 @ 9:52PM

You seem to be quite confident in your climate knowledge, so I was hoping to get a big picture historical perspective from you about how we should think about relatively recent human history in the much longer history of the earth.

If you don't feel like tackling it, that's ok.

William| 9.19.11 @ 10:30PM

Buzz: I think it was you who punted on this one. The
question points up the arguable hubris in believing we know the "right" temperature for the earth and even may be able to stabilize it. If AGW is significant, we should be concerned about it and take reasonable, cost-sensible steps to limit it.
But surely even that supposedly 90+% of scientists who accept AGW would say that, if steps are taken, we can eliminate global warming. If so,they should go on record that they believe AGW is essentially the SOLE cause of global warming.

William| 9.19.11 @ 10:32PM

The penultimate sentence should have said the 90+% of scientists who accept "would NOT say."

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 11:04PM

Sorry William. Not being coy, just not sure what you're asking. Human civilization has thrived over the last 15,000 years or so. It seems reasonable to conclude that keeping temperatures in that range would be a good thing. We have hundreds of billions living within a few feet of sea level, and trillions of dollars of infrastructure money invested in that same area, so it seems keeping temperatures in ranges that minimize coastal destruction would be a good thing. We have an infrastructure built around certain agricultural zones, so it seems like a good idea to keep temperatures at a level that will keep those zones stable. And it seems reasonable to keep temperatures at a level that will minimize extreme weather events. And minimize climate refugees. And minimize habitat loss and destruction of ecosystems.

Beyond that, I'm really not sure what you're saying.

William| 9.20.11 @ 1:05AM

Wow, I'm not sure what to say. Maybe I've missed something, but I find your response shocking.

Buzz: I'll accept that the climate for the last 15,000 years has, on average, been very favorable for mankind. Over this time, we have grown from single-family or small family groups of early humans to the cultivating, husbanding and ultimately modern civilization we are today. This favorable climate likely was a significant reason for the extraordinarily rapid evolution of modern man.

But how can you pick this short -- eye-blink -- period out of the billions of years of geological (and climate) history of the earth and presume that we can keep the climate forever the way it has been during this brief period of geological time? Apart from all the milleniums that came before, just in the past several million years we have gone through many ice ages, the last of which ended some 20,000 years ago and eventually led to the rise of man. If one were going to make a rough guess of what the natural processes of the earth will produce next, you would have to bet on another ice age.

There were, of course, hundreds of millions of years, indeed billions of years, that preceded this recent period of ice ages. During that time the earth went through extremes of climate change and the continents came together and parted several times. The changes in the world's climate during that time were dramatically greater than even the most extreme projections of modern global warming enthusiasts.

I don't know whether man could survive those extreme climate fluctuations from the distant past, and I don't know what these historical climate fluctuations may say about the future of the earth's climate, EXCLUDING the effects of man's activities, but I feel comfortable in saying that there WILL be changes and that man currently does not have the competence to predict them. I am also certain that while man has (potentially) the ability to control the contributions he makes to factors affecting future climate, he cannot prevent those changes that would have incurred anyway, without any contribution from humans.

I don't know whether you are saying that, without any AGW, the climate of the earth would always stay as it has been the last (few) 10-15,000 years, or whether you are saying that man should do (and presumably has the power to do) whatever is necessary to ensure that the earth retains this climate regardless of what the natural evolution of the earth otherwise would produce. In either case your view on the importance of man in the scheme of nature, and our power to control the processes of the environment, is, I think, way over the top.

Viewed from this perspective, the climate of the last 10-15,000 years, and indeed the evolution of mankind from apes to modern humans (maybe a few million years) was an almost immeasurably small portion of the earth's history. Given this perspectcive, how can you pick out the last 15,000 years of earth's climate as something that could be expected to extend into the earth's indefinite future, were it not for the pernicious influence of modern man?

William| 9.20.11 @ 1:08AM

Somehow the last paragraph got out of place.

Buzz B| 9.20.11 @ 1:21AM

I didn't say that I expect the climate of the last 15,000 years to extend indefinitely.

I also very much agree with you that, based on relatively recent (in geologic terms) history, we should be trending toward an ice age now ... but instead we're warming.

You pushed me to write something on what the "right" temperature was. So I gave you some thoughts. It was based on the last 15,000 years because that is the period in which humans have thrived. You were just waiting to explode with this diatribe no matter what I wrote.

Whatever, I get bored and have been known to egg on other posters as well. But I didn't say anything that was particularly over the top. I'm not even sure what it is I'm supposed to respond to from your recent postings.

William| 9.20.11 @ 1:47AM

Buzz; I was not sandbagging you. I made other posts under this article in which I supported your points, and I did think your posts seemed to make sense, even though I do not have the detailed knowledge on the science to make an independent judgment. Also, as I said, I think a basic understanding of the science plus common sense suggests there might well be something to AGW.

I don't recall pushing you for a "right" temperature and I don't think you have answered the issues raised in my last post. I don't take any pleasure in this: I think those who categorically deny AGW are in the same category as flat -earthers. I thought you were a non-idealogical supporter of AGW, based upon a knowledge of the science. I accept that you do know the science, but I think that in focusing on the trees in the most recent growth in the forest, you have lost sight of the bigger forest -- which is several billion years of earth geologic and climate history.

This is why I was so surprised at your last post. Your other postings didn't seem to be idealogical, but this one seemed to reflect the liberal mindset that if you are smart enough, and have the power (through, e.g., government) you can make people, or the world, how you want them/it to be. It either had to be that, or that you believe -- in response to a question I raised in another of my posts -- that global warming is entirely attributable to human activity and (although I don't think this follows) that if we can eliminate AGW we can prolonged the current climate indefinitely.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 10:32PM

What's your take on it Mr. Berger? I guess I don't think there is anything in our paleoclimatic history that undermines the conclusion that human activities have been the primary driver behind recent warmings and that things are only going to get worse. Is there something particular in the Earth's history that you think contradicts this?

Occam's Tool| 9.22.11 @ 5:28PM

I dunno, Buzz. Looking at it from North of Fargo:

Last year the local lake froze over in Northern Minnesota like it always does and there was ice fishing. This year (in mid- late September) the weather was already 36 degrees this morning. I expect that by late November the lake will freeze and not unfreeze until late April.

Maybe our lows won't go below minus 30 this winter, this year. That would be some Global warming, you betcha!

Yah.

Occam's Tool| 9.22.11 @ 5:30PM

Next year, my son will be going on nine---time to buy an icefishing shed then. Maybe with a set up for below ice TV to watch the fishies.

Yah. You betcha. Global warming is a real problem here.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 4:42PM

Oh, are you suggesting that putting a tax on carbon will not damage the economy? It would likely be the biggest tax increase in the history of the planet. You think that's good for economic growth?

And the plan that the Dems want to pass is socialism, or at least it is wealth redistribution. If you don't want to call that socialism, that's up to you, but the semantics are not the issue.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 4:52PM

I'm not sure what "plan" you're referring to that the Dems want to pass with respect to CO2. If you're referring to cap-and-trade (a la Waxman-Markey), then I'd remind you that was the system that Bush Sr adopted to deal with SOx and acid rain, and that Bush Jr. tried to adopt for NOx and SO2 (before a court struck it down). It is also the plan that McCain had been introducing for yearsin the Senate before he got a Tea Party scare.

Me, personally, I do support an initially modest, revenue-neutral carbon tax. Here's why:
(1) Even as one who supported the Waxman-Markey bill (a nearly-2000 page bill passed by the House in 2010), it is hard to deny that it was a beast. Anytime we start crafting a program that has the government administering a massive cap-and-trade system, that of necessity is going to include offsets, we create a system rife for favoritism and speculation. For many, ‘cap-and-trade’ has become synonymous with big government bureaucracy, a political non-starter.
(2) There is growing sentiment on both sides of the political aisle to eliminate subsidies for big oil and coal. It is also likely that the production and investment tax credits (and most likely the DOE guaranteed loan program) for renewable and alternative energy sources will be on the chopping block when they come up for renewal, if not before. It is a superficially attractive argument that all energy “subsidies,” including those for renewables, should get the same treatment. While many who support alternative energy expansion will disagree with the presumed equivalency of big oil subsidies and production tax credits for alternatives, we need to deal in the politically possible.
(3) The whole basis for the renewable energy tax credits, legally and morally, is to level the playing field -- not only to account for subsidies and government-funded fossil fuel infrastructure, but for the external costs that fossil fuel combustion imposes on society (and that renewables and alternatives would not). Our leaders need to start talking in terms of these externalities. Even without climate change adaptation cost considerations, the National Academy of Sciences has placed the societal costs from fossil fuel combustion – primarily health care costs -- at $120 billion per year.
(4) Historically, talk of tax increases was politically poisonous to the right. Now, it seems, subsidies are drawing even more ire from both sides of the aisle. For one worried about climate change, placing a price on carbon (disincentivizing fossil fuels) and giving tax credits to alternative energy sources (incentivizing alternatives) have the same leveling effect.
(5) The proposal would be that, as the tax credits for alternatives are drawn down, the price of carbon ratchets up at identical levels.
(6) The revenue-neutral aspect of such a carbon tax needs to be emphasized. The tax is collected at every wellhead, mine and port of entry, based on the carbon content of the fuel. Every dollar collected is returned to the public in equal amounts per adult (and half shares for each child) by checks issued each Spring. The initial level would have to be set quite low because the cost of the tax will no doubt be passed upstream to the end users, and drastic price increases will scare many (at least until they start getting their rebate checks).
(7) The low level of the initial tax would not dramatically change behavior (at least not as much as many believe is needed). But, again, we need to deal with the politically possible. And, very significantly, even a low initial price on carbon would put in place the mechanisms and the logistics to allow for a higher tax to be collected in the future, once the pendulum of climate change public opinion swings back and people start appreciating those rebate checks each Spring.
(8) It will be easily understood that people who are energy efficient will receive more in rebates than they pay in increased costs, while folks who live energy-intensive (or fossil-fuel-intensive) lives will be net losers. The incentives for personally increasing efficiencies will be in place and easy to grasp.
(9) Even though the tax itself will be revenue-neutral, this proposal will ultimately be a debt reducer, another political selling point. This is because government will be spending less on alternatives, even though the playing field between alternatives vs. fossil fuels continues to be as level as it is under the present system.
(10) Many Republicans, from Susan Collins and Bob Corker to Lisa Murkowski and Lamar Alexander, have supported some version of a revenue-neutral carbon tax in the past. There are others in the GOP who recognize the threats of climate change (Lindsay Graham, John McCain) and who could return to their statesmen roots and get behind such a plan. This would be needed to offset likely Democratic opposition from the coal states.
(11) To gain support from Tea Party Republicans, such a system would have to be in lieu of, rather than in addition to, EPA command-and-control regulation of greenhouse gas emissions. Such regulations are being finalized now and, absent the formidable legislative hurdle of amending the Clean Air Act, EPA has little choice but to issue such regulations.
(12) Under international law, a carbon tax would also allow the U.S. to place a tariff on incoming goods (not just on oil, but on fossil fuel intensive products from, for example, China). This should be a political selling point. But, more importantly, it would allow the U.S. to exercise its huge leverage as the world's biggest consumer to influence behavior in the developing countries.
(13) If, as some believe, the threats of climate change prove to be overblown, then ‘no harm, no foul.’ The low level of the initial tax will not make much of a difference on the macro level. To the extent it does, it would just be to steer us towards cleaner (in the traditional sense) and more domestically generated energy sources. If, as most scientists believe, the harmful effects of climate change become more pronounced over the next few years and the public begins again to demand some action, then the mechanisms and the logistics are in place to set a price on carbon that will have a meaningful emission-reduction effect.

john| 9.19.11 @ 5:19PM

fairly sensible; rare on this subject

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 5:41PM

This is the most profoundly well packaged bundles of bull shit I've ever read in one of these posts.

Thank you, Buzz, for demonstrating precisely the type of wild assumptions (made with absolute metaphysical certitude) upon which the man-made global warming models are based. Well done, comrade.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 5:43PM

that's bundle (singular)...

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 5:23PM

Buzz B,

For someone who takes the position of attacking the author on his logical fallacies, I find the following statement from your post rather curious:

"Mr. Kaminsky's next attack is the predictable and oft-repeated mantra that any attempt to put a price on carbon (a) will wreck the economy, and (b) is socialism. These scare tactics do not pass for logic. And Mr. Kaminsky could use a bit of a lesson on externalities."

Upon what experiemental evidence do you base this conclusion? At a minimum, the hypothesis that arbitrarily placing a value on the production of CO2 could thereby increase operational costs that would either (a) decrease net revenue and, by extension, shareholder value, (b) result in corporations passing along the cost to consumers, or (c) place US corporations (and workers) at a competitive disadvantage relative to coutries who chose not to participate in this system, seems to have sufficient face validity to warrant rigorous economic research. Yet you exhibit no reticence in doing precisely that which you have accused Mr. Kaminsky of doing; namely, you dismiss as a simple scare tactic a potentially valid hypothesis without a shred of evidence to support your position. You don't credibly rebut the substance of his claim; rather, you dismiss it as illogical without revealing a single flaw in the logic.

With respect to the second claim (i.e., the notion that placing a value on CO2 represents a form of socialism), it has widely been reported that the aim of commoditizing CO2 would be two-fold. Like any tax on a commodity, the primary aim would be to decrease consumption; however, since the tax disproportionately affects those who can least afford it, the presumed second aim of the tax would be to use the proceeds to provide subsidies to those for whom the tax would create the greatest burden. By definition, therefore, the tax would result in a redistribution of wealth and the state would be the vehicle through which it would occur. Sounds kind of like socialism, doesn't it?

But enough about debate tactics and underlying biases. Let's address the practical aspects of the commoditization of CO2.

Who sets the price?

Who polices compliance and will the price be sufficient to both fund regulatory oversight and subsidize those who are disproportionately burdened by this regressive tax?

If the most egregious offenders of CO2 emission policies don't agree to participate in the cap and trade system (think China, Russia, India, virtually any country in the middle east), does this not place US-based companies (and, by extension, US workers) at a competitive disadvantage?

Further to this point, do CO2 emissions observe national borders or is it sheer folly to regulate emissions from one country when neighboring countries have no such regulation?

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 5:53PM

Trinacia -- I'll try to respond to your points.

The "wreck the economy" scare tactic has been used to oppose every major piece of environmental legislation that has ever passed. And industry has always survived just fine. and there are very credible studies which demonstrate that the clean air and water protected by those laws, as well as the technologies needed to comply with them, havehelped the economy more than the cost of complying has harmed the economy.

I'm fairly certain that placing a price on carbon would result in higher costs being passed on to the consumers. That's the idea if we want to create incentives that will effect behavior. I do worry about it being regressive. But if it were truly revenue-neutral and offset directly by rebate checks (rather, than, say a decrease in the income tax rate), then I believe most lower income folks would wind up getting more in rebates than they pay in increased costs.

The "socialism" scream is another scare tactic, and it's kind of silly to have to rebutit with any detailed argument. Taxes aren't socialism. Socialism involves the ownership of the means of production and centralized planning of who gets what. You are absolutely correct that all taxes involve a redistribution of wealth ... so are you saying that all taxes are socialism? I assume you agree that we need some taxes.

Who sets the price ... well, whoever drafts the law. As I said, I would initially set it quite low under my ideal scheme. And I would ratchet down the production tax incentives for renewables to correspond with ratcheting up the price on carbon. It would be based on the carbon content of the fuel.

Policing would probably fall to the Dept of Interior (could be EPA or Commerce or Energy or another agency though). The regulatory oversight would be minimal, which is one reason why a carbon tax is so preferable to cap-and-trade in my opinion. Basic physics tells us the carbon content of the various types of coal and crude, so all we'd really need to know is the voolume being extracted or imported, and we know that already. I would think the current IRS could get out the rebate checks. I don't really see any significant regulatory costs from a simple carbon tax.

I favor equal distribution of rebates, for the sake of simplicity And as I said above, I think the rebate system would rebut any regressive effect on low income folks. But I live in Appalachia, where upwards of 90% of our electricity comes from coal-fired power plants. There's not much question that certain regions will be harder hit that others. And there's a legitimate argument to be made that the distribution of collected revenue should be something other than in equal shares, to account for that disparate impact.

As far as placing the U.S. at a competitive disadvantage, this is something we face with all of our environmental and labor laws ... countries that don't have such standards can make stuff cheaper. The carbon tax I propose has advantages over traditional regs though, because under GATT we can place tariffs on imported goods so long as we place the same tax on domestic goods. So we could tax all incoming fossil fuels. And I would argue that GATT even allows us tax goods from other countries that use fossil fuels in the manufacturing process if that country doesn't impose a similar cost. So it actually gives us some market leverage to persuade others to adopt similar measures. And, obviously, taking domestic action gives us more credibility in post-Kyoto negotiations to get other countries to adopt similar measures.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 7:44PM

RESPONSES BELOW:

I'm fairly certain that placing a price on carbon would result in higher costs being passed on to the consumers. That's the idea if we want to create incentives that will effect behavior. I do worry about it being regressive. But if it were truly revenue-neutral and offset directly by rebate checks (rather, than, say a decrease in the income tax rate), then I believe most lower income folks would wind up getting more in rebates than they pay in increased costs.

RESPONSE: This is precisely my point. If lower income folks end up getting more in rebates than they pay in increased costs, someone else bears the cost of this redistribution. When wealth is transferred there is, by definition, an economic cost. At a minimum, there's an administrative cost (someone has to collect and redistribute the money); on the larger scale, corporations are faced with increases in operational costs. Some of this will be passed on to consumers (who, unless they are among those with the lowest incomes, will not be fully compensated by the rebates), but some will likely be borne by the corporation. When corporations are faced with increased operational costs, they pay lower dividends to shareholders (who in turn have less to invest in things like growing their own business or buying more widgets) and they begin to look with increasing scrutiny for ways to cut costs (and we both know the first thing to go when this happens). But let's assume, as you suggest, that most of the cost will be passed on to consumers - if the corporation can pass along the cost with no impact on net revenue, and the consumer will be reimbursed for the increased cost that they incur, how is consumption decreased?
___________________________

The "socialism" scream is another scare tactic, and it's kind of silly to have to rebutit with any detailed argument. Taxes aren't socialism. Socialism involves the ownership of the means of production and centralized planning of who gets what. You are absolutely correct that all taxes involve a redistribution of wealth ... so are you saying that all taxes are socialism? I assume you agree that we need some taxes.

RESPONSE: "Socialism involves the ownership of the means of production and centralized planning of who gets what." When the government decides what level of CO2 production/usage is acceptable, sets the "price" that companies shall pay for it's production/usage, and determines how the proceeds are redistributed, how can it be said that the market is not centrally planned?
_____________________________

Who sets the price ... well, whoever drafts the law. As I said, I would initially set it quite low under my ideal scheme. And I would ratchet down the production tax incentives for renewables to correspond with ratcheting up the price on carbon. It would be based on the carbon content of the fuel.

RESPONSE: "Who sets the price ... well, whoever drafts the law." So legislators - not market forces - will dictate price? Why stop at CO2 prices? Why, legislators have certainly demonstrated a keen understanding of fundamental economic principles. Perhaps they could dictate the price of things like CT scans and coronary bypass surgery and ... wait a second, that's been done before - nevermind.

Moreover, if renewables were economically viable, why the need for production tax incentives in the first place? Wouldn't the potential market demand be sufficient incentive for companies to invest in the development of renewable energy platforms?
________________________________

Policing would probably fall to the Dept of Interior (could be EPA or Commerce or Energy or another agency though). The regulatory oversight would be minimal, which is one reason why a carbon tax is so preferable to cap-and-trade in my opinion. Basic physics tells us the carbon content of the various types of coal and crude, so all we'd really need to know is the voolume being extracted or imported, and we know that already. I would think the current IRS could get out the rebate checks. I don't really see any significant regulatory costs from a simple carbon tax.

RESPONSE: "I would think the current IRS could get out the rebate checks." REALLY? They're going to be awfully busy policing the health insurance mandate (which will require a projected increase of 16,000 agents).

"I don't really see any significant regulatory costs from a simple carbon tax." Has there ever been in the history of this country a tax that didn't carry with it the need for enforcement/regulatory oversight? Or are you perhaps suggesting that current IRS agents aren't fully occupied with their current responsibilities?
_______________________________

As far as placing the U.S. at a competitive disadvantage, this is something we face with all of our environmental and labor laws ... countries that don't have such standards can make stuff cheaper. The carbon tax I propose has advantages over traditional regs though, because under GATT we can place tariffs on imported goods so long as we place the same tax on domestic goods. So we could tax all incoming fossil fuels. And I would argue that GATT even allows us tax goods from other countries that use fossil fuels in the manufacturing process if that country doesn't impose a similar cost. So it actually gives us some market leverage to persuade others to adopt similar measures. And, obviously, taking domestic action gives us more credibility in post-Kyoto negotiations to get other countries to adopt similar measures.

RESPONSE: So if I'm a US small business or corporation that relies on affordable imports for component parts or other goods, I get a double whammy: first I'm hit with the increased operational costs related to my own carbon output, then I have to pay a higher cost of goods as the result of foreign companies increasing their prices to compensate for the increased cost of importation. Looks like I better start shedding jobs...

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 8:10PM

Seems like a lot of this is just arguing for the sake of arguing.

Yes, the people who bear the cost of the carbon tax would be those who use the most fossil fuel. That is the desired result, not an unfortunate consequence.

Your description that attempts to equate a carbon tax with socialism could be said about every tax and regulation. The government sets the standards for the amount of some additive that can go into food, the amount of pollution a source can emit, and the extent of safeguards a factory must install. The government sets the level of any tax or fine or penalty collected. And the government determines how all collected revenue is distributed. So, under your definition, all taxes and regulations are socialism.

With respect to legislators setting the price ... my response is the same. They sat the level of all taxes; this would be no different.

With respect to why renewables need the production tax credit (which I propose phasing out), the government has provided the funding, contracts and R&D for a whole host of new technologies, so that's not unusual. But more importantly, the government incentivizes fossil fuel in a whole host of ways. Quite apart from the $10 billion or whatever it is in direct tax deductions, the government built and maintained an entire infrastructure that supports a fossil fuel economy, it uses troops to protect the flow of oil, it gives cheap leases to federal lands, it pays for miner disability benefits and spill clean-up assistance, it pays to monitor and clean up traditional pollution, and it pays costs for health problems associated with fossil fuel use. I would argue that providing incentives for renewables and alternatives is just one small step to levelling the uneven playing field that our government has already created in favor of fossil fuels.

You don't really make an argument why the regulatory costs of a simple carbon tax would be high, other than government is bad. I don't see where it would cost more than any other tax, which is minimal with existing agencies.

I don't see your double-whammy argument. Products will be subject to one price increase, either the tax imposed at the first sale in this country, or the increased price of a product as a result of that tax. If the fossil fuel comes from another country, it will be subject to the same tax. If its a good from a country that doesn't put a price on carbon, it will be subject to a tariff equal to the increased cost a domestically manufactured good incurs. Obviously, our major trading partners of Canada and Europe already put a price on carbon. The most likely outcome if we and Europe and Canada and the rest of the developed world begin slapping a tariff on Middle East oil or Chinese products, that they'll just impose the price themselves so that they can garner the revenue rather than the countries to which they are exporting.

George S| 9.19.11 @ 10:34PM

"Simple carbon tax"... Who gets the money? And what did they do to earn it? Why not attach a monitor to people and tax each breath they take? Simple, no?

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 10:57PM

Read my previous post at 4:52 in this same thread if you truly care about what I mean by a simple revenue-neutral carbon tax.

George S| 9.19.11 @ 11:14PM

Oh I did read it and it still does not answer the question of who gets the money that gets attached to carbon sales and consumption. Does it go to the Treasury as the sales tax on gasoline does? Well, we have seen what happened to the revenue neutral social security system (yes, that was the model of revenue neutral prior to the late 1980's). Does it go to more Solyndras? Oh you bet it will.

The purpose of a sin tax is to discourage activity. So far, no one has yet to prove Al Gore's predictions have any validity. That is the point of all this, right? To avoid Al Gore's clairvoyant visions of the Earth? Or else why bother? If you say it is because of 120 billion in health care savings then congratulations on the birth of another Straw Man. As if people will stop getting sick if we only levy more taxes.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 11:20PM

You must not have read it. I propose that every penny collected is returned to the American public in equal amounts per adult, with half shares per child.

Obviously, we disagree on the merits of the science, but nothing I say or have learned is in anyway based on Al Gore.

The $120 billion number is the National Academies' assessment of costs we as a society bear as a result of fossil fuel combustion, and it does not include the effects of climate change or a host of other things that were hard to estimate. Mostly it is health care costs and infrastructure maintenance.

Trinacria| 9.20.11 @ 1:47PM

Buzz,

Your argument that US businesses would not be placed at a competitive disadvantage by virtue of our ability to tax imports is valid insofar as we're limiting ourselves to the US market. While I pretend to no particular expertise in internation business, it seems self-evident that a US company that competes in global markets would, in fact, incur a further increase in operational costs that foreign competitors are not burdened with. If I sell my product in Asia, South America, Africa, etc., I'm certainly not competing on a level playing field. Add to that the fact that I'm already burdened with the second highest corporate income tax rate in the world and extraordinarily high human resource costs relative to foreign competitors.

Of course, I could always move my operations over seas and lower both my (carbon) tax burden and my human resource costs, but then it would be hard to argue the the tax hasn't had an economic impact in the US (and as far as I can tell, it also hasn't really achieved it's desired result; namely, decreasing my company's consumption of fossil fuels).

Occam's Tool| 9.22.11 @ 5:35PM

I think it's a great idea with our economy collapsing to pass another tax designed to max swine like Al Gore rich and the rest of us poorer, for dubious, very dubious, climate effect.

China will tell us to screw ourselves, fool. We will weaken ourselves for nothing, anyway. And then, it has not been shown that our intervention will do anything anyway, or that it is do to man's actions at all.

People LIVE in Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The most powerful environmental damage man can do was done to those cities.

William| 9.19.11 @ 4:21PM

This subject is a sad commentary on what happens when science becomes polluted by political agendas -- and I think this is true for those on both ends of the debate. The result is that the average person has no way to know what the truth might be.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 4:29PM

That's exactly the strategy of the ExxonMobils of the world. They don't have to disprove AGW theory, just throw enough crap to the wall so that the average person is confused.

Nick| 9.20.11 @ 5:33AM

Buzz B.,

"They don't have to disprove AGW theory, just throw enough crap to the wall so that the average person is confused."

It is incumbent on those who propose the theory to prove it, not the other way around. Skeptics poke holes in the theory, and the proponents defend it with observations that are repeatable. They don't hide their data. This is how real science works.

You AGW Hoaxers are losing this debate, big time. Keep dreaming of some sort of Cap and Tax pipe-dream, it's not going to happen.

Also, why did you claim that there are "hundreds of billions of people living ithin a few feet of sea level"?

Even if you meant millions, you're still making it up, according to a March, 2000, report by Vivien Gornitz:

"Approximately 400 million people live within 20 m of sea level and within 20 km of a coast, worldwide. However, this figure is not very precise -- the spatial distribution of coastal populations is not known to better than 20-30 km." (Emphasis mine.)

Source: http://www.giss.nasa.gov/resea.....ornitz_04/

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 4:27PM

William- A vast majority of the scientists that call MMGB " real", are funded by governments, what do you think they will publish as " evidence"?

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 4:35PM

By the way progs, what ever happened to the up and coming ice age that the government said was inevitable in the '70's?

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 4:44PM

Another blogosphere-generated myth. Of all the peer-reviewed articles published in the 1970s that made predictions one way or the other, by a 6-to-1 ratio they were prediciting warming rather than cooling. A couple mainstream magazines had the cooling predicition on the cover, which probably started this blogosphere myth. But the Bulleting of Meteorological Society (BAMS) did a comprehensive analysis in 2008 of all the 1970s science literature and showed that it is just false that scientists were predicting cooling. Others, notably NOAA, have reached the same conclusion. I can give you a cite to link for those reports if you want. We knoew the warming effect of CO2 back in the 1970s, and we also knoew the cooling effect of aerosols. So there was some bases for the small minority that was predicting cooling. But the great majority (44 out of 51) of those who made a predicition believed that CO2 would be the dominant forcing agent in coming decades.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 4:49PM

If you say so Al, they got you hook, line and sinker.

Paul from SA| 9.19.11 @ 5:29PM

Wrong. Check the headlines. They are very similar to today: 100% consensus among all scientists, 100% certainty, along with the same dire, scary predictions of massive death, famine, droughts, flooding, disease, hurricanes, tornadoes,... and it's caused by humans and we must raise taxes. The only difference is it was global cooling.

It's the same headlines they used in previous weather/climate scares going back to the early 20th century.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 6:28PM

http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/....._of_th.php

http://www.usatoday.com/weathe.....ling_N.htm

skip| 9.19.11 @ 10:28PM

This is in addition to my post in this thread above 9.19.11 @ 12:13PM.

One of the twelve current permanent contributors listed at the blog 'RealClimate', in addition to Michael Mann - one of the IPCC scientists notorious for being completely discredited because he was repeatedly caught lying and cheating by intentionally manipulating IPCC non peer-reviewed research inaccurately and dishonestly in order to knowingly intentionally deceive the public - is William Connelly.

The link of the article you provide from the blog 'scienceblogs' is posted by William Connelly and authored by William Connelly among several others.

The link of the article on a study you provide from 'USA Today' is authored by William Connelly among several others.

In this thread you repeatedly cite the National Academy of Sciences.

The National Academy of Sciences is a politically appointed council.

The politically appointed National Academy of Sciences is established by Congress.

The politically appointed National Academy of Sciences is established as an honorific society.

The politically appointed National Academy of Sciences has had as a committee member and advisor to various panels Michael Mann.

The politically appointed National Academy of Sciences attempted to refute the Global Warming Petition Project at petitionproject.com signed by 31,487 scientists who debunk manmade global warming, who provide their names, degrees, scientific specialties, the peer-reviewed research, 132 references to the peer-reviewed research, and verified the academic credentials and the professional credentials of all 31,487 scientists in response to saboteurs.

The politically appointed National Academy of Sciences attempted to discredit the 31,487 scientists at petitionproject.com who debunk manmade global warming and provide their names, degrees, scientific specialties, the peer-reviewed research, 132 references to the peer-reviewed research, and verified the academic and professional credentials of all 31,487 scientists in response to saboteurs.

Your lengthy commentary is light on scientific evidence and reason and experience and heavy on political ideology and emotional prattle.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 10:37PM

So anyone associated with realclimate, the IPCC or the National Academies is untrustworthy in every study they do? Got it.

Your tin foil conspiracy crowd awaits your return to the Mothership.

skip| 9.19.11 @ 10:50PM

This brief commentary is devoid of scientific evidence and reason and experience and is exclusively political ideology and emotional prattle.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 10:55PM

Can you refute the BAMS study that scientific literature in the 1970s was overwhelmingly concerned with warming not cooling, except by saying that one of the authors has some ties to someone who has ties to some blog or organization you disagree with?

skip| 9.19.11 @ 11:46PM

I couldn't help but notice your political emotional prattle devoid of scientific reason and experience ignored that the sources you've used from the non peer-reviewed research of the discredited IPCC, the politically appointed National Academy of Sciences, and the blog RealClimate, all have in common Michael Mann, one of the IPCC scientists notorious for being completely discredited because he was repeatedly caught lying and cheating for intentionally manipulating IPCC non peer-reviewed research inaccurately and dishonestly in order to knowingly intentionally deceive the public.

I couldn't help but notice your political emotional prattle devoid of scientific reason and experience ignored the Global Warming Petition Project at petitionproject.com, signed by 31,487 scientists who debunk manmade global warming, who provide their names, degrees, scientific specialties, the peer-reviewed research, 132 references to the peer-reviewed research, and verified the academic credentials and the professional credentials of all 31,487 scientists in response to saboteurs.

Global Warming Petition Project:

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.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 11:51PM

not worth responding to

skip| 9.20.11 @ 12:29PM

To clarify:

It is not worth responding to a connection between Michael Mann and the sources you cite to support your arguments.

It is not worth responding to a petition 31,487 scientists have provided about greenhouse gases in general and carbon dioxide in particular.

It is worth expounding extensively for radical political, social, and economic tyrannical change adversely affecting the liberty of mankind on the basis of pseudo-reasoned experience of trivial quasi-scientific minutiae of statistical insignificance amounting to nothing more than emotional prattle.

It is worth noting a primary weapon in your arsenal of argumentation is the non sequitur, and typical of your style would be alleging this recent news item to be one itself:

"We've just learned that some flares are many times stronger than previously thought"

"Solare flares were already the biggest explosions in the solar system-and this discovery makes them even bigger"

"About 1 in 7 flares experience an "aftershock""

"We call it the 'late phase flare'"

"The energy in the late phase flare can exceed the energy of the primary flare by as much as a factor of four"

(9.19.11 @ science.nasa.gov/science-news/)

Never bring emotional prattle to a reason and experience fight. This thread is testament to the result. Thank you for the documentation.

Nick| 9.20.11 @ 5:39AM

Buzz B.,

"Your tin foil conspiracy crowd awaits your return to the Mothership."

This, from the same guy who also wrote this: "That's exactly the strategy of the ExxonMobils [sic] of the world."

What size is your tinfoil hat, conspiracy nut? Did ExxonMobile also kill the scientist who invented an engine that runs on water?

Nick| 9.20.11 @ 5:43AM

p.s. Disregard the [sic] in the second quotation. I spelled it wrong. It just didn't look correct as I typed it. Bad editing on my part.

My point still stands, though.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 4:42PM

jack- If you look at something and see it as being blue, but a member of the " intelligentsia " says it is red, who do you believe?

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 4:56PM

What will be the next government scare tactic, bodily functions done at the wrong time of day?, who knows!

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 4:57PM

Buzz- Guns are good, they helped build this country.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 5:14PM

buzzz-

"(7) The low level of the initial tax would not dramatically change behavior (at least not as much as many believe is needed)."
-------------------------------------------------------
Thank you for proving my point.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 5:16PM

I believe I will fire up the charcoal tonight but before that, go do some off roading in my V-8 4x4,I love America.

Dick Nome| 9.19.11 @ 9:25PM

Be sure you consume some high gas quotient legumes with the animal flesh you sacrifice on the pit. Have a blast.

john| 9.19.11 @ 5:17PM

I don't mind Obama but I can't stand Greenies. Environmentalism has never been about any environment, neither concerned for humans nor for the ecology as a whole. It is an anti-modern movement, just like Jihadist Islam, seeking to return all (except the activist class I suppose) to a medieval standard of freedom and of living. In fact there is only one Jihad on the other, Enemy, side in the current Fourth World war, for the Anti-modern Jihad has Greenie and Islamic wings, as well as a wing for every other religion or Fascist ideology known to mankind.

Why else do we get so-called environmentalist policy doubling the price of the world's corn thus starving the poor; poisoning the soil and water of the Corn Belt, and creating an enormous dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico, worse than 1,000 oil spills? And that's just Ethanol...which also consumes billions in direct and indirect subsidies.

And on a lighter note, we have light bulbs and flush toilets that don't light and don't flush. The list is endless.

I think repealing the N.E.P.A. and abolishing the EPA would be good starts, plus repeal of the Endangered Species Act and passage of a new statute prohibiting people with merely an ideological interest in a matter from filing any lawsuit. Then perhaps we might discharge all known Environmentalists from employment at any university, college, school, or other publicly funded job of any kind.

These people are enemies of America, as evil as Osama Bin Laden and ten times as dangerous, and they should meet Bin Laden's fate.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 5:21PM

Then I see you hate America.

Paul from SA| 9.19.11 @ 5:24PM

Just like the animal rights activists. They don't care about animals suffering, they just want to control humans.

If they really cared, they should be protesting lions and hyenas and sharks and birds and ants, and trying to protect the impalas and other prey from being eaten alive.

Paul from SA| 9.19.11 @ 5:22PM

The bad news for Friedman and AlGore is that fewer and fewer people are believing this global warming nonsense. People are finally hearing the other side.

I don't know how these AGW people can preach to us with a straight face. Friedman's main house is the size of a mall. One of his libraries is larger than most people's homes. His Co2 footprint is equal to billions of people. 99% if his inherited wealth could be donated to the poor and he could still live like a king, spewing CO2 like it's going out of style.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 5:29PM

It's called socialism.

HiHoSilver| 9.19.11 @ 5:29PM

I think that the author makes some good points, and I hope the numbers given and references made are done fairly. I'm sure there is a great deal of climate mongering that occurs which is not based as much on data as it is on fashion and feeling.

I would take issue with the author on what he is saying about the green left using carbon to try and take over peoples' lives or take a larger share of the economic pie. It sounds like a conspiracy theory to me. (i.e. the left will say whatever they have to to get control of your money) Some of the climate folks may be wrong or misguided, but I find it a little improbable that they are simply using this as vehicle (a low emission vehicle of course :-) ) for a political agenda which has nothing to do with the environment. I think that most of them actually do believe anthropogenic carbon dioxide and other GHGs are destroying the planet. I would suggest attacking their argument without so much attacking their motives. That is very hard to do with certainty unless someone explicitly states their motivation.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 6:07PM

HiHo,

I don't have time for a long answer at this point, but I would suggest to you that if Socialist International supports a carbon tax, then there's something more to this than environmentalism.

From this page
http://www.socialistinternatio.....cleID=2032

a couple of quotes:
"carbon tax revenues could be returned to the public through dividends or progressive tax-shifting"
"The argument has also been made that a carbon tax applied globally offers the better prospect for bridging the current division between developed and developing countries. The idea would be to try to put the same price on carbon everywhere and in the most direct way possible. The tax could be adjusted annually by a global body possibly similar in structure and intent to the international climate/environmental court discussed in this report. In line with the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, developing countries that commit to a carbon tax could receive a percentage of the carbon tax revenues from developed countries to help fund technology transfers, forest preservation and adaptation to already ongoing climate change. "

And here's a good one:
“A climate change response must have at its heart a redistribution of wealth and resources,” said Emma Brindal, a climate justice campaigner coordinator for Friends of the Earth.
http://epw.senate.gov/public/i.....59494b48a6

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 6:22PM

Why do we have a tax system that taxes (penalizes) things that are good for society, like working (the income tax), creating jobs (the corporate tax), buying things (sales tax) and owning property (real estate tax)? Why shouldn't we tax things that actually cost society money?

HoHo is right. Impinging motives is a very weak logical argument. You attacked Friedman for the same thing.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 6:33PM

I assume you mean impugning motives...

Actually, it's not weak. It's very important when it comes to matters of politics and economics to understand what someone's motives are. This is quite different from science where motives should be irrelevant (but clearly aren't in this particular area of scientific discussion.)

You have the beginning of a point with your question about taxes, but you lose it when you assume that CO2 emissions "cost society money". I simply don't agree with your premise.

Furthermore, even if I did agree, you have to ask "compared to what?" Analysis of Waxman-Markey, for example, suggests that it would impact climate by less than 1/10th of a degree (C) by the middle of the century at a truly massive economic cost.

Here's Heritage's assessment of the costs. Even if you want to divide by 2, or by 10!, they're far far too expensive for any potential benefit.
http://www.heritage.org/resear.....man-markey

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 7:21PM

The National Academy of Sciences has estimated the costs to society from burning fossil fuels is $120 billion per year, and that is NOT counting the effects of climate change. http://www8.nationalacademies......rdID=12794

I personally think Waxman-Markey is a beast. Though I support it if the alternative is nothing, I don't love it.

\Three things in response to your particular point >> (1) anything we do in the U.S. is only going to have a limited effect. We need global action especially with the direction China and the other BRIC countries are heading. But that's not an excuse for doing nothing. We'll never be able to convince another country if we don't get our own house in order.
(2) Of course given the warming in the pipeline, any actions we take now aren't going to have a huge effect for decades. All the more reason to get started now, I would argue.
(3) Many believe the emission-reduction goals of W-M were too modest, especially the scientists.

Trinacria| 9.19.11 @ 7:56PM

And how many economists do they have on staff at the National Academy of Sciences?

By the way, they seem to be curiously silent on the subject of the economic BENEFITS to society of burning fossil fuels. Perhaps its because they're so enormous as to be incalculable. In either event, it seems rather disengenuous of them to present the gross, rather than the net, impact.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 8:20PM

Trinacria -- Respectfully, you are blinded by ideology. No matter how much evidence you're presented, you cling to your preconceived ideas. The National Academies is an independent group of experts, and it was actually their National Research Council arm of the Academies that did this report. And yes, it does include economists.

Trinacria| 9.20.11 @ 2:05PM

Buzz,

Thank you for your respectful reply. With equal respect, I'm quite familiar with the National Academy of Sciences; the question was rhetorical and intended to point out what I regard as a curious limitation in the analysis.

Any economic analysis of the impact of a given phenomenon must deal in terms of the net effect (financial cost vs. financial benefit); limiting one's analysis to the cost without consideration of the quantifiable benefits precludes meaningful assessment of the total economic impact. If you'll pardon the admittedly simple (and strained) analogy, this would be like adding up the annual costs of my investments and drawing a conclusion regarding the financial impact without considering the returns on the investment. Of course the cost will seem high when there's no counterbalancing benefit.

Surely you don't think this is an unreasonable expectation?

chemman| 9.19.11 @ 8:03PM

What exactly are you doing personally to stop sucking on the teat of big energy? Don't talk about what others believe or what you say you believe. Tell be how you walk the talk.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 8:14PM

Not enough chemman, I don't do nearly enough.

Bruce Berger| 9.19.11 @ 9:24PM

Let's assume there are two different people on opposite sides of the globe, emitting the exact same amount of CO2. Even in your view of the world, I think it is safe to assume that any negative effects of their respective activities cancel each other out. So, what is the point of taxing each person, when their externalities cancel out? In a two-person world of the type I have just described there would be no need for a carbon tax.

Now, two people with two different carbon emissions may necessitate a carbon tax to compensate the lower user for the negative effect on his/her existence from the greater use of the other. In such an example, potentially a case could be made to use the tax proceeds to compensate one human from the excesses of another.

However, I see very few people advocating the use of a carbon tax for such a purpose. Instead, in almost every carbon tax scenario that I have seen the carbon tax proceeds seem to be targeted to be the property of the state.

It is just a trojan horse to increase the size of the state. That is why I have a problem with the carbon tax.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 9:48PM

Collins (R) and Cantwell (D) proposed (in a short 39 pages) a cap-and-dividend bill that would return 75% of revenue collected to the public in the form of lower taxes. Murkowski (R) almost saved the Kerry-Lieberman-Graham bill last year by attempting to transform it into a revenue-neutral carbin tax. Corker and Alexander, both GOP senators from Tennessee, have both supported versions of a revenue-neutral carbon tax. Al Gore thinks we should reduce the income tax rate by precisely the same about we tax carbon ("tax what you burn, not what you earn"). And my proposal is closer to that of James Hansen, clean and simple revenue-neutral carbon tax where revenue collected is distributed directly back to the public. Those are just the ones off the top of my head, but the idea of a revenue-neutral carbon tax has been floated by many.

Bruce Berger| 9.19.11 @ 10:02PM

Yet, the bill that came closest to passing was the one where proceeds would have gone to the state. Watch what people do, not what they say.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 10:46PM

I'm not going to defend Waxman-Markey, because I thought it was a monstrosity myself. But 80% of the allowances would have been given away for free, and the bulk of the collected revenue was to go to impacted consumers and displaced workers. At least that's my recollection, I haven't studied that bill for awahile since it dies in the Senate last Fall.

George S| 9.19.11 @ 10:26PM

What Al Gore thinks is immaterial as long as the 16th Amendment is in place. Won't be too long before we have both a carbon tax and an income tax.

And by the way, why would government go through all the trouble to collect a tax from one end and give it back in the other? Answer: because they will give it back to political interests.

We are not stupid: any extra money that comes out of our pockets will wind up in someone else's who didn't work for it creating a good or a service WE NEED. That is the end game here and we are not buying this happy bullshit anymore.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 10:47PM

The government should go through the trouble as a way to disincentivize fossil fuel use and internalize some of the societal costs that fossil fuel combustion causes.

George S| 9.19.11 @ 10:59PM

That power was never given to the federal government by our Constitution. Fossil fuels are taxed heavily but we still use them because without energy we starve, freeze and become immobilized. Is that a 'societal cost' of less concern than a warmer climate?

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 11:10PM

I'm not sure about your Constitution, but mine gives Congress the power to lat and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises ...

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 11:10PM

"lay" and collect

william| 9.19.11 @ 11:35PM

I think George has a point. I've read your posts on a carbon tax and they are reasonable -- which isn't to say I fully agree with them. But George is right, we 've become a society whose politics runs on "soft" corruption: the implicit understanding that if I direct government money to you, you will support me for office, by vote if not also by contribution. The Foundinf fathers believed this was corruption justifying ( in part) a revolution.

william| 9.19.11 @ 11:35PM

I think George has a point. I've read your posts on a carbon tax and they are reasonable -- which isn't to say I fully agree with them. But George is right, we 've become a society whose politics runs on "soft" corruption: the implicit understanding that if I direct government money to you, you will support me for office, by vote if not also by contribution. The Foundinf fathers believed this was corruption justifying ( in part) a revolution.

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 11:43PM

I agree with your comments on politics and government corruption. In fact, I think it is precisely that corruption that has prevented any meaningful action on climate change. I'm not sure why that prevents us from writing a law that specifically directs where collected money will be spent.

William| 9.19.11 @ 6:50PM

I don't know if you're right, but you deserve credit for hanging in there.

Occam's Tool| 9.22.11 @ 5:37PM

Whoever needed to fart on this blog, please do so. The gas is already there, and ya kanna break the laws of biophysics, man.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 5:41PM

Progs-They can't even predict tomorrows weather and you believe them about the weather for the next several years, WOW.

gary| 9.19.11 @ 6:37PM

Does anyone remember who it was that made this joke?

In twenty years, Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" will be the "Reefer Madness" of our time.

no hussein 2012| 9.19.11 @ 6:42PM

Ross Kaminsky, good column.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 6:49PM

I must admit that I was unaware of the fallout from and furor over Spencer's article which was the subject of the Forbes article I linked to.

While it's certainly not shown that Spencer was wrong, I would have used another example of recent science which calls into question the alarmists' theories.

For example, recent work at CERN also raises interesting questions about climate science...and CERN is staying far away from the politics:
http://www.idealtaxes.com/post3425.shtml

And even this one has people who say that the findings aren't big enough to involve climate change:
http://www.physorg.com/news/20.....uzzle.html

Anyway, using a piece which has that level of question about it is an unnecessary distraction to my arguments, so for those who agree with my take on the issue overall, I do apologize for that oversight. And I thank those who pointed out the controversy to me.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.19.11 @ 6:50PM

The debate between the questioned study's author and his critics (and supporters) is quite interesting and can be found here:
http://www.drroyspencer.com/20.....our-paper/

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 7:25PM

An honest mistake, I would never impugn your motives. But it does show you should read more than one side of the debate. And at least you didn't overstate the results of the CERN experiments, as I've seen many skeptics do.

Hank Rearden| 9.19.11 @ 7:44PM

This is Tom Friedman's house...

http://wonkette.com/413811

As a capitalist, I would have to say, more power to him. But, isn't it a bit strange that these climate agitators like Friedman and Algore have not carbon footprints, but HUGE carbon footprints? After all, he could live in an apartment in NYC and take public transportation to work without sacrificing himself. That is what NYC is set up for!

On climate change itself. If it is a science, can't we have a citation of the paper or papers that are key to this argument, so we can all read them? Perhaps the math would be too difficult for a lot of us to understand, but at least we could see what the reasoning and the data are. And even complicated math one can work one's way through in many cases.

BenzieBen| 9.19.11 @ 9:01PM

The author points out that our atmosphere is approximately 78% nitrogen and 21% oxygen. Of the remaining 1%, more than 90% is Argon and .0016% is carbon dioxide. What he does not mention that Friedman's columns about science consist of 32% bad logic and 68% fecal matter.

Friedman is well prepared to lecture us on high-level science because his major was Mediterranean Studies.

Ross goes on to explain that, because the "greenhouse effect" is logarithmic, an additional 1% increase in carbon dioxide has less impact on temperatures than the previous 1% increase.

Similarly, each column authored by Friedman has less impact on the American public than the previous one.

Interstellar Bill| 9.19.11 @ 9:49PM

Buzz is typical of Warmistas who incessantly recite how the warmer air 'holds more water'.

Rather, physical law merely says that it CAN hold more water, but whether it does or not is an entirely empirical matter, not the syllogism so deceitfully smuggled in by this tiresome mantra. (Study the entry for 'Data' in an encylopedia.)

Buzz, go check the real world, where absolute humidity has been CONSTANT. This is because rising CO2 reduces transpiration water-losses, so that global relative humidity has declined from what is was in colder prior decades.
Also, did you know the world's deserts are shrinking due to rising CO2?
See, the planet is already healing!

Once you strip away the bogus extreme-weather accusations, all the Warmistas have left is their by-now-hoary sea-level screams. Too bad it's declining. (Warmistas call it a mere pause.)

I only want one thing from the learned Buzz:
Name your AGW falsification-criterion, which every theory must have if it is truly scientific.
I propose an unmistakeable Little Ice Age by 2020. (Check the early 1300's.)

What say you, Buzz?

Buzz B| 9.19.11 @ 10:27PM

You are of course correct Interstellar Bill, that the statement that 'warmer air holds more water' is imprecise. It's a shorthand, just like GHGs "trap heat" when actually they absorb and reflect radiant energy. But I think it's pretty well-settled that water vapor is a positive feedback, both in theory and in observation. See http://www.nasa.gov/topics/ear.....ming.html. As the temperature of the atmosphere rises, more water is evaporated from ground storage (rivers, oceans, reservoirs, soil). Because the air is warmer, the absolute humidity can be higher (which is where the shorthand comes from that the air is able to 'hold' more water when it's warmer), leading to more water vapor in the atmosphere. As a greenhouse gas, the higher concentration of water vapor is then able to absorb more thermal IR energy radiated from the Earth, thus further warming the atmosphere. But it is certainly true that measurements of absolute humidity are hard to come by (I'm not aware of your studies showing that it has remained constant).

I am aware of studies that suggest AGW is causing deserts to shrink, and others reaching a contrary conclusion. It is a legitimate area of uncertainty.

C'mon, sea levels have risen steadily for three decades. The fact that they've taken a slight downturn the last six months is most likely attributable to la nina, not any change in the long-term trend.

More fundamentally, the fact that not every prediction of every article over the past two decades has come true does not logically refute AGW theory. A great many projections have come true, and a great many are even more severe than predicted. Certainly, all the precise impacts and the speed at which they come to fruition continue to be matters of scientific inquiry.

I've seen this falsification stuff on various blogs recently. I understand it's part of the last step of the scientific process, and that AGW doesn't fit nicely within some of that process due to the absence of a 'control' earth where all the components of the climate can be tested. But the bottom line, if we have several years of temps back down at average 20th century levels without any natural forcing as an explanation, then I would say AGW theory has been falsified.

Interstellar Bill| 9.20.11 @ 2:48AM

Buzz
Your phrase is telling:
'without any natural forcing as an explanation'
sure sounds like a weasel-out
(what would an un-natural negative forcing be?)
Or perhaps your're thinking of cosmic-ray induced albedo increases.
From they way the Warmistas react to that idea you can be sure they regard it
as un-natural. Do you?

You can look on WUWT for the humidity facts.

What you implicitly admit is that any immanent cooling, however you explain it, means that CO2 is relativly weak.

Don't you agree that a doubling-sensitivity of only 1 deg C would falsify AGW?

And the sea-level decline is older than 6 months.
None of the doomsayers predicted it.
If it continues for 10 more years,
will that falsify AGW?
30 more years?

Sherlock| 9.19.11 @ 10:03PM

I do hope some of the green people read this article. they need to educate themselves about their religion. Stop reading the NYT, because it is rare to find intelligence in the articles there. Liberalism is leaving our society, but some will hold on to it, even if it means being buried with it.

Mertsj| 9.19.11 @ 10:27PM

What do you think of the blood letters of G. Washington's day???

That's exactly the way you global warming freaks are going to be remembered.

Mertsj| 9.19.11 @ 10:30PM

And furthermore, men always look for a god. Having abandoned the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, they cling to global warming as their idol of choice and think they are enlightened.

Dan King| 9.19.11 @ 10:39PM

I mostly agree with this article, but will correct a minor point. The absolute quantity of CO2 is not the issue - it is the change in relative quantities. Thus the "problem" (if there is one) is the ratio 390 to 320 - not the absolute magnitudes of those numbers.

But the other point is that the ratio has to be measured logarithmically. Thus one worries about increases by factors of 10, not by only a few. For example, a hydrogen cyanide concentration in the parts per trillion would probably not be harmful. But increase that to parts per billion and folks might start to panic.

Justin| 9.19.11 @ 10:58PM

Great Article!!!

Thank you for not just pointing out how stupid the fear-mongering, left-wing, let's-create-green-jobs-even-if-it-makes-zero-sense crowd is.

Also, thanks for the great links to the other articles and real science that backs your viewpoints!

POST American| 9.19.11 @ 10:59PM

--------------------BOTTOM LINE----------------------

---Oh yes, the 'carbon tax' thing, which such
'CON--servatives' as Rick Perry and SUB-Mitt
ROME-KNEE have given support to.

leland | 9.19.11 @ 11:07PM

Ignorance is a a rich mans best friend. Your article sir, is toxic.

Ross Kaminsky| 9.20.11 @ 12:08AM

I presume you're talking to me, leland.

Please tell me how ignorance benefits Bill Gates or Steve Jobs or Warren Buffett? Your statement is meaningless tripe of the worst sort.

Dick Nome| 9.20.11 @ 9:12PM

Whoever that guy is Ross, he may not realize we are Carbon based life forms and CO2 is a necessity to sustain life.

Russell | 9.20.11 @ 3:23AM

A renaissance man like Ross Kaminsky stoop to slopping toxic schlock across the airwaves of the American Heartland ? Almost unimaginable:

http://tinypic.com/r/11klbvs/7

JP| 9.20.11 @ 7:27AM

"I'm not sure what "plan" you're referring to that the Dems want to pass with respect to CO2. If you're referring to cap-and-trade (a la Waxman-Markey), then I'd remind you that was the system that Bush Sr adopted to deal with SOx and acid rain, and that Bush Jr. tried to adopt for NOx and SO2 (before a court struck it down). It is also the plan that McCain had been introducing for yearsin the Senate before he got.."

Nothing like strawmen to move things along. We're not talking about, poisonous aresols but CO2. Last time I checked CO2 was not considered a poison. Stay on track; stay focused. I know it is difficult, but even Progressives can do it.

Taxing CO2 is akin to taking nitrogen in our atmosphere, or water vapor. But, you must hand it to Progressives. They are very creative in thier search to tap into new revenue streams.

Rick Smith | 9.20.11 @ 11:21AM

I must while I simply doubted all the crap in & around global warming or climate change or whatever name they come up with - I just trusted the fact that anything algore says must be a lie and directed towards the moron's that surround him. I am thankfully for this article pointing out something I hadn't thought of and that being the air being more nitrogen & oxygen than anything else. So we're talking about less than 1% of our atmosphere - truly amazing. My other thought was I had learned in grade school we are closer to the sun in the winter yet colder climate prevails while being closer to the sun - so I kind of thought that perhaps the sun actually had something to do with our warming and cooling. But there I go again!

dw| 9.20.11 @ 6:39PM

The global warming hoax is nothing more that a front for the socialist continued assault on capitalism and the destruction of the United States economy. Those who support it are either inter connected to this effort or the usual dupes conned into taking the field on behalf of our enemy.

1.) In 1986 Patrick Moore, one of the main founders of Greenpeace quit the group citing the take over of the enviormental movement by the neo marxist, who due to fall of the Soviet Union needed another vehicle through which they could continue their war against capitalism. Using enviormental green language to mask their real objectives marxist manipulate scores of naive dimwits in their effort to achieve the destruction of America.
2.) In 2009 the "Climatgate" scandal erupted, which involved at least 2 prominent AGW scientist Michael Mann and Phil Jones, whos emails were leaked to the public. They showed that the two of them deleted files that had been requested under the Freedom of Information Act concerning a U.N. climate change report. Also it was proven that Mann's Hockey Stick graph, which was extensively used by Al Gore to promote his agenda, purposely left out the warming that occured during the Medieval Period which would counter their claim that it is the advent of the industrial age that has caused man made warming.

3.) More than 31,000 scientist, including over 9,000 PHD's have signed a petition rejecting AGW. Pretty sure that diffuses the claim that the science is settled.
In fact recently Nobel Prize winner for Physics, Dr. Ivar Giaever resigned from the APS and stated in his letter of resignation, " The claim is that temperture has changed from 288. t0 288.8 degrees kelvin in about 150 years, which if true means to me that the temperture has been amazingly stable and both human health and happiness have definitely improved in this "warming period".

4.) Throughout the 20th and into the beginning of the 21st century CO2 emmisions have steadily risen while temperture has not steadily increased. Surface temperture in the 1930's were higher than today and from the 40s through the 70s tempertures declined, which led to the alarmist "chicken littles" to declare we were on the verge of a new ice age otherwise known as "global cooling".

5.) CO2 accounts for .039% of all atmospheric molecules.
- Humans and their activity account for only 3% emmissions each year.
- Since 1998 surface tempertures have declined
- Over the last 150 years avg. tempertures has risen .8 degrees kelvin

There is much more detail and additional information that absolutely disputes man made global warming and shows it for what it really is--An on going attempt to destroy capitalism and by extension America by the neo marxist socilaist left.

POST American| 9.21.11 @ 12:27AM

-----------------BOTTOMLESS LINE-------------------

Putting aside the Eduard de ROT-child 'sourced',
Al Gore fronted, carbon tax, that's to be paid to
the ROT-child owned Bank of International Settlements in
'BASE--ALL' Switzerland

----EVEN, for a moment, putting aside the
awesome Globalization RED China set up and TREASON OP

NOW ----------ONE AND ALL
--look up into those late summer skies
all knitted up with CHEM-trails, take a good
deep whiff, and think--------

----------------------FUKISHIMA------------------------

--------------------------FUKISHIMA--------------------

-----------------------------FUKISHIMA-----------------

Think REAL HARD

--------------------THINK FAST

Marc Jeric| 9.21.11 @ 7:03PM

This global warming conspiracy needs to be put in perspective to be properly understood. This far-left attack by government-paid drones started in the 1970′s with the global cooling scam: we should disarm our nuclear bombers and fill them with soot to be spread over the poles and so prevent those new glaciers from descending south and crushing the New York skyscrapers to dust. When that did not work the same fakers invented the global warming hoax in the 1990′s; we should nationalize all industries and organize a UN-sponsored world socialist government based on “social justice” with the fakers in charge. What with 12 years of substantial cooling the fakers switched to the climate change flimflam in the 2000′s; so whatever happens we should…see above under the global warming hoax. And now we are faced with the cap & trade power grab – but the aim is the same as above. Our socialists, marxists, communists, Hollywood stars, university professors in social and political “sciences”, and environmentalists are all clamoring for action while spurring President Obama ("Tomorrow the oceans will stop rising and the planet will start healing") and his 35 czars/komissars to undertake immediate measures to save the planet – with the same aims as described above.
In the meantime our Mian Stream Media are unanimous in spreading this criminal propaganda daily; the ABC, CBS, NBC, MSNBC, CNN, NPR, the NY Times, the Washington Post, etc. drive this drivel daily. What is totally ignored are the detailed descriptions of faked data, skewed computer programs, politically revised conclusions by the UN-sponsored far-left clique of biased scientists – all government-paid drones that no private enterprise would hire. Another thing ignored is the “Global Warming Petition” (see Internet) where 31,487 independent US scientists (including 9,029 of them with PhD degrees) dispute decisively the findings of the UN-sponsored panel; also ignored is the “Manhattan Declaration on Climate Change” (see also Internet) where a smaller number of competent world scientists, about 712, including 142 pure climatologists, state the same – i.e., that the man-caused catastrophic global warming is a farce. The books by Christopher Horner, Robert Carter, and AW Montford describing the lies, fakes, phony data, opposite conclusions, redacting by UN political hacks, reverse graphs, etc., have exposed this far-left propaganda in painful detail.
In the case of the above mentioned Petition, several "environmentalists" had submitted phony names with phony credentials in order to sabotage that effort. It took several years of painstaking and expensive effort (we contributed a lot of private money for that) to clean up the list from those saboteurs and verify all academic and professional data of the signatories.
To put this whole conspiracy in terms of numbers, let me say that the projected world-threatening increase of carbon dioxide of 100 ppm (parts per million) by the end of this century would increase the termal absorptivity of the atmosphere by one-eighth of one percent; that is the definition of something totally negligible. On the other hand the sun cycles of cooling and heating are thousands of times more powerful with regard to the carbon dioxide in the air; when the sun is cold the oceans absorb many millions of tons of it; and when the sun heats up the oceans release the carbon dioxide in quantities thousands of times bigger than anything the mankind could produce. To illustrate this point in more accessible terms to somebody who who is not a climatologist or a scientist or an engineer; the argument of catastrophic anthropogenic (human-caused) global warming issued by our panic driven socialist/marxist government-paid hacks is like saying that a burp of a lonely wolf in Alaska will transform Florida into a Sahara-like desert - immediately!
As for that bloviating gasbag Al Gore and for Dr. Mann who inverted cause and effect in his "studies" - they should be brought to the The International Court in The Hague on charges of crimes against humanity. And now let us add the name of komrad Krugman to this list of international criminals.
Marc Jeric (signatory of both documents referenced above)

Marc Jeric| 9.21.11 @ 7:07PM

Sorry - I meant Friedman; but keep Krugman as well in the criminal group.

POST American| 9.22.11 @ 12:50AM

-----------SOBERING BOTTOMLESS LINE----------

Forget the inspid Rockefellow front op
Thomas Friedman.

----GET INTO Alan Watt and 'Cutting Through
the Matrix'

CHECK OUT his older shows from 2006/7/8.

He goes all into the, then, coming collapse
and RED China TREASON OP finale.

He even delves into the likelihood of Japan
being taken down by a HAARP sourced seismic
event ---and DEPOP OP combo.

CHECK IT OUT!

---------------------SPREAD THE WORD!