Wow.  Clive Crook literally destroys the IPCC in on ‘The Atlantic’ Blog.  Kudos for his honesty:

I’m also surprised by the IPCC’s response. Amid the self-justification, I had hoped for a word of apology, or even of censure. (George Monbiot called for Phil Jones to resign, for crying out loud.) At any rate I had expected no more than ordinary evasion. The declaration from Rajendra Pachauri that the emails confirm all is as it should be is stunning. Science at its best. Science as it should be. Good lord. This is pure George Orwell. And these guys call the other side “deniers”.

Read the whole thing.

What is transparent about silencing global warming skeptics at the EPA?

just asking…

Behold the folly of Central planning:

In today’s automobile fleet, the majority of the pollution comes from the oldest, dirtiest cars. In fact, the dirtiest 10% of the cars account for more than 50% of smog and carbon monoxide. The dirtiest one-third of the fleet accounts for more than 80% of the pollution… When it comes to smog, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides and particulates that new SUV is a lot cleaner than an old, poorly-tuned compact…

An economic phenomenon called “price elasticity of demand” is well established when it comes to automobile purchases. In other words, if you raise the price of new cars, people will buy fewer of them or, at a minimum, put off the purchase for a year or so while they drive the old clunker for a few thousand more miles. And fewer new cars means more pollution, which can cause significant health problems. Yet environmentalists and the press have ignored this issue, so as not to inject a note of complexity or doubt into the chorus of glee that greeted the president’s attack on greenhouse-gas emissions….

The Obama fuel efficiency plan may also contribute to a significant increase in highway deaths as vehicles are required to quickly meet the new CAFE standard and will likely become lighter in weight as a result… Specifically, the NRC estimated that in 1993 there were between 1,300 and 2,600 motor vehicle crash deaths that would not have occurred if cars were as heavy as they were in 1976…

Well, one might argue, this would not be the case if everyone drove smaller cars. The NRC study considered this countervailing fact and included it in its estimates. But nearly half of all car crashes (more than 48% in the years studied) are one-vehicle crashes. Put another way: If your car hits a tree or a post or a bridge abutment, you are most certainly better off in a larger car.

via Light Cars Are Dangerous Cars – WSJ.com.

As usual… the “green” movement has some serious explaining to do:

California regulators have apparently discovered it ain’t easy being green…

• “ethanol yields about 30% less energy per gallon of gasoline, so miles per gallon in internal combustion engines drop significantly.”
• It generates less than two units of energy for every unit of energy used to produce it.
• It takes about 1,700 gallons of water to produce one gallon of ethanol. Each acre of corn requires about 130 pounds of nitrogen and 55 pounds of phosphorous.
• Increased acreage means increased agricultural runoff, which is creating aquatic “dead zones” in our rivers, bays and coastal areas.
• It releases nitrous oxide as well as CO2, which is said to trap heat at a rate 300 times more than an equivalent amount of CO2.

Next time you hear an environmentalist lecturing you on how YOU need to adopt some new “green” solution… think beyond step one.

IBDeditorials.com: Will California Shuck Corn Ethanol?.

What he said:

My current concern with the emissions trading scheme is that a religious fervour has built up around the altar of global warming. Those who serve at the altar have become ruthless in their denigration of alternate views. This fervour has now received its imprimatur by reason of a new tax, or should it be tithe to be paid to the Rudd Labor Government.

The similarity in this newest forte of socialism can be defined by the ultimate purpose of divesting the individual of their asset or income stream on the premise of an apparent greater moral good.

But who becomes the benefactors of this divestment? The administrators and the traders. Their pockets are lined with the property and income of others.

Aussie senator denounces global warming scheme.

Windmills of Change, originally uploaded by red321.

Expansive dreams about renewable energy, like Al Gore’s hope of replacing all fossil fuels in a decade, are bumping up against the reality of a power grid that cannot handle the new demands.

The dirty [little] secret of clean energy is that while generating it is getting easier, moving it to market is not.

Politicians in Washington have long known about the grid’s limitations but have made scant headway in solving them. They are reluctant to trample the prerogatives of state governments, which have traditionally exercised authority over the grid and have little incentive to push improvements that would benefit neighboring states.

The Energy Challenge – Wind Energy Bumps Into Power Grid’s Limits – Series – NYTimes.com.

You know… where has this story been the past 5 years NYT??? There WERE ALWAYS problems with the green, wind-driven agenda and this is just one more of those problems that are easily recognizable to anyone of reasonable intelligence… yet only NOW does the NYT run stories about how all these millions of dollar investments aren’t really working because of FUNDAMENTAL LIMITATIONS of the system??? after it has been CHAMPIONING these very solutions for the past decade or so???

How much will clean energy cost anyway??? I guess we’ll never know because there will always be another bank-breaking technical hurdle in the way after we invest in whatever environmentalists demand we invest in… they don’t have a clue… the fact that the Grid CANT SUPPORT wind-mills SHOULD HAVE BEEN THE FIRST THING YOU IDOTS took a look at!

You know, this is just one more example of Liberalism’s fundamental problem: the law of unintended/unexpected consequences. A MARKET-DRIVEN approach to energy would have uncovered these kind of problems and put investment dollars where it would be more useful. These poor saps in Maple Ridge, N.Y. just took the word of a few self-proclaimed expert politicians — who assured everyone that THEIR plan would magically make our lives better — and now have nothing to show for it. This kind of top-down market decision-making causes NOTHING but problems… and this is exactly what Obama is suggesting… that HIS ideas will save us all.

the utter arrogance…

Two things* have grabbed my attention this week. First, Stanford University has a really interesting interview with Christopher Hitchens, an interview which isn’t necessarily recent, but is nevertheless relevant. Secondly, I have been trying to understand the almost religious fervor with which Democrats are opposing drilling of any kind. Prohibiting drilling seems to be the new ‘moral’ issue for Democrats: like abortion, drilling must be prohibited at any and every opportunity… at least, that’s what I used to think. What has recently become clear to me is that this issue is NOT, in fact a moral issue… it is actually a merely political one. To be a truly moral issue, one would expect outrage whenever the ’sin’ is practiced. Political issues, on the other hand, are selective–like taxes, only the wealthy get accused of not paying enough. What leads me to believe that drilling is merely a political issue is the almost deathly silence by members of the Left, particularly in the US congress in the face of new drilling projects only miles off our own Gulf by China, Venesuela, Mexico, and Saudi Arabia. I began to wonder why this could be; what could cause this selective outrage–outrage aimed ONLY at US businesses and energy producers. The answer became clear after listening to Hitchens’ interview.

The interview begins with the following question:

“Why do you think they [the left] broke over Iraq, and to a lesser extent, over Afghanistan, since, both the ostensible reconstruction and what happened was a promotion of democracy? Why was the left angry, what currents do you see that alienated them from the policy since they were not a part of the realist politique of the 1970’s and 80’s?”

Hitchens responds by saying

“The crucial thing for most of the left now is what goes under the name of anti-globalization; a primitive … non-marxist form of anti-capitalism. ANd if that is your main concern, then by definition the United States is the main enemy, which with only a little displacement means that any potential enemy of the United States is at least a potential friend. I have certainly read articles… from quite prominent leftists that give the strong impression that Jihadism may have its drawbacks, but it is better than no anti-globalization at all. In other words, it is a move from a conservative position to a reactionary one.”

Now, my argument depends in part on the validity of Hitchen’s claim, so I want to spend at least some time establishing the evidence of his contention of the new anti-capitalist agenda of the modern Democrat party.

First, there is developing a preference within the Democratic party to replace private, capitalist institutions with their respective government counterparts. Health care policy is a prime example of this developing preference; Democrats want to turn an entire segment of our economy into a government institution. If Democrats believed in the capitalist system; why would they want to socialize a trillion-dollar business? The question, obviously, is rhetorical. Anyone with the slightest respect for capitalism wouldn’t be demanding a complete government takeover as the solution of first choice–especially when other approaches may be tried without such a fundamental shift.

Read the rest of this entry »

Ok… another global warming post. Ok… it turns out that both Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama have endorced an 80 by 50 (80% recution in CO2 emissions by 2050) CO2 plan. Let’s look at what this would actually mean for Americans… (via WSJ.com)

By the year 2050, the Census Bureau projects that our population will be around 420 million. This means per capita emissions will have to fall to about 2.5 tons in order to meet the goal of 80% reduction.

It is likely that U.S. per capita emissions were never that low – even back in colonial days when the only fuel we burned was wood.

If that comparison seems unfair, consider that even the least-CO2 emitting industrialized nations do not come close to the 2050 target. France and Switzerland, compact nations that generate almost all of their electricity from nonfossil fuel sources (nuclear for France, hydro for Switzerland) emit about 6.5 metric tons of CO2 per capita

Today, the average residence in the U.S. uses about 10,500 kilowatt hours of electricity and emits 11.4 tons of CO2 per year (much more if you are Al Gore or John Edwards and live in a mansion). To stay within the magic number, average household emissions will have to fall to no more than 1.5 tons per year. In our current electricity infrastructure, this would mean using no more than about 2,500 KwH per year. This is not enough juice to run the average hot water heater.

If this goes to prove ANYTHING… it is that Democrats are so out-of-touch with facts and reality that neither facts nor reality matter to them in the slightest. They are completely willing to believe that we can have lower carbon footprints in 2050 than we did in 1700… even though there was next to NO industry in the 1700’s. The Democrats who want or believe this is possible suffer from a severe mental impairment. They are delusional. To even suggest this as a matter of public policy is laughable…

Are these the minds we want RUNNING the country? (oh! let’s allow these minds to manage the economy too…)

Once again… it looks as if global warming is not really global ‘warming’ anymore… per dailytech.com

Twelve-month long drop in world temperatures wipes out a century of warming

Over the past year, anecdotal evidence for a cooling planet has exploded. China has its coldest winter in 100 years. Baghdad sees its first snow in all recorded history. North America has the most snowcover in 50 years, with places like Wisconsin the highest since record-keeping began. Record levels of Antarctic sea ice, record cold in Minnesota, Texas, Florida, Mexico, Australia, Iran, Greece, South Africa, Greenland, Argentina, Chile — the list goes on and on.

you know… I’m sick and tired of time and time again needing to correct the destructive ideological belief system that is the environmentalist movement.  Their words are taken with the utmost seriousness by politician and reporter alike… and they have nothing substantive to show that this “warming” is anything more then a natural, cyclical change in the earth’s environment.  Well, I might as well turn the tables here and call all you environmentalists “global cooling deniers”. 

from Canada’s National Post:

Snow cover over North America and much of Siberia, Mongolia and China is greater than at any time since 1966.

China is surviving its most brutal winter in a century. Temperatures in the normally balmy south were so low for so long that some middle-sized cities went days and even weeks without electricity because once power lines had toppled it was too cold or too icy to repair them.

And remember the Arctic Sea ice? The ice we were told so hysterically last fall had melted to its “lowest levels on record? Never mind that those records only date back as far as 1972 and that there is anthropological and geological evidence of much greater melts in the past.

The ice is back.

According to Robert Toggweiler of the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory at Princeton University and Joellen Russell, assistant professor of biogeochemical dynamics at the University of Arizona — two prominent climate modellers — the computer models that show polar ice-melt cooling the oceans, stopping the circulation of warm equatorial water to northern latitudes and triggering another Ice Age (a la the movie The Day After Tomorrow) are all wrong.

“We missed what was right in front of our eyes,” says Prof. Russell. It’s not ice melt but rather wind circulation that drives ocean currents northward from the tropics. Climate models until now have not properly accounted for the wind’s effects on ocean circulation, so researchers have compensated by over-emphasizing the role of manmade warming on polar ice melt.

Last month, Oleg Sorokhtin, a fellow of the Russian Academy of Natural Sciences, shrugged off manmade climate change as “a drop in the bucket.” Showing that solar activity has entered an inactive phase, Prof. Sorokhtin advised people to “stock up on fur coats.”

“We just have to slow down our economy and cut back our greenhouse gas emissions ’cause we have to save the planet for our grandchildren.“ 

It’s good to finally hear an honest liberal out there.  Does it surprise anyone that The ends of the global warming movement are the SAME ends liberals had before the global warming crisis was invented?  Am I the only one who notices this?

Is it not also ironic that global warming proponents are now shifting gears, covering their tracks, by warning against global climate “change”?  This way, if the numbers don’t show the warming they predicted… it won’t matter to their cause.  If the planet starts cooling… the same people will still be espousing the same solutions — big government regulation.

I seem to be on an environmentalism role these days… and I’d hate to loose the momentum now…

Anyway, for those of you who didn’t know… here’s what Hillary Clinton thinks to herself every time she flips a light switch…

“I turn off a light and say, “Take that, Iran?” and “Take that, Venezuela?” … We should not be sending our money to people who are not going to support our values”

As an aside, I can’t think Hugo Chaves really appreciates the negative inference all that much, I mean, she should really be more careful about offending her political role models– I would If I were here.

Anyway, this also represents a fabulous opportunity to distinguish the differences between the conservative and liberal approaches to Iran. Conservatives still understand the power of force in what Robert Cooper refers to as the “old world”. The left, on the other hand thinks that switching our lightbulbs will be the path to victory. LINK