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Interesting editorial about a lone Senator

sitarro

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Nov 17, 2003
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http://biz.yahoo.com/ibd/060929/issues01.html?.v=1


Investor's Business Daily
Cooling Down The Climate Scare
Friday September 29, 7:00 pm ET


Environment: The country is drowning in wild alarums warning of impending doom due to global warming. Yet there has risen -- from the U.S. Senate, of all places -- a lone voice of rational dissent.
While Al Gore drifts into deeper darkness on the other side of the moon, propelled by such revelations as cigarette smoking is a "significant contributor to global warming," Sen. James Inhofe is becoming a one-man myth-wrecking crew.



Inhofe, a Republican from Oklahoma, took to the Senate floor two days last week to expose the media's role in the global warming hype. This is a man who more than three years ago called the global warming scare "the greatest hoax ever perpetrated on the American people" and has made a habit of tweaking the left-leaning environmental lobby.

One member of the media, Miles O'Brien of CNN, responded last week to Inhofe's criticism of the media with a piece criticizing Inhofe and challenging his arguments. If anything, it seems that O'Brien's reply simply motivated Inhofe to continue his effort to undress the media's complicity and bring light to the issue.

We hope so. The "science" on global warming and the media's propaganda campaign need to be picked apart.

The assumptions made by gloomy theorists should be revealed for what they are: mere conjecture.

The lies and carefully crafted implications, many of them discharged like toxic pollutants by a former vice president, deserve a thorough and lasting deconstruction.

What the public needs -- and deserves -- is a credible voice to counter the sermons from Gore, on whose behalf cigarettes were distributed in 2000 to Milwaukee homeless people who were recruited by campaign volunteers to cast absentee ballots. Inhofe could be that voice.

He's no John the Baptist crying out in the wilderness. What he is, in fact, is a thrice-elected senator, a former member of the House and, before that, a state senator and representative.

For those not impressed by a political background -- after all, Gore, far out of proportion to his qualifications, rose to the second most powerful position on Earth -- consider that Inhofe is an Army veteran and longtime pilot, and has actually worked in the private sector.

Unlike most in the Senate, Inhofe is willing to stand on a soapbox and expose his head to his opponents' rhetorical stones. Name another in that august body who would dare label as a hoax the premise that undergirds the day's most trendy pop cult. Is there anyone there who would want to try to stand up to the likes of O'Brien?

O'Brien's biased report is not exactly the type of exposure global warming skeptics hope for, though. The goal, say the skeptics, should be to teach and inform, to provide an alternative to the flood of hyperbole and intentionally misleading thunder that's passed off as settled science.

There are enough scientists to fill a fleet of Humvees who can express scepticism over global warming, despite Gore's claims that the matter has been resolved in favor of his conclusions. But none has the forum a U.S. senator can command. With rare exceptions, scientists can marshal media attention on the climate change issue only by spouting the party line that man-made emissions are causing Earth to warm. That's the sort of stuff the press laps up like a starving dog.

Without the wind of a compliant media at his back, Inhofe nevertheless got his message out to America, primarily through C-Span and the Drudge Report, which linked to his speeches at the Web site of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works.

Among those responding to Inhofe's first speech included a scientist and a meteorologist. Both hold views on global warming that are in line with the senator's -- which puts them at odds with the environmental lobby's assertions of "consensus" that have been relentlessly beaten into the masses for more than a decade.

The most important audience, though, is among the Americans who have no links to science. They're the ones who have a lot to learn and will benefit the most from someone who has mass access to the public and is willing to challenge the widely -- and often uncritically -- accepted claims about climate change.
 
I'm not impressed with the Senator's science background, and I expect he is a little out of his league. A majority of scientists (and, more importantly, a majority of good scientists) think that Global Warming is real and manmade. 16 National Academys of science, including all of those in the G8 nations, have signed an agreement that global warming is real and something needs to be done about it.

http://www.royalsociety.org/document.asp?tip=1&id=1433

Scientific analysis of the literature also reveals that a very large majority of scientists believe global warming is real and manmade.

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/306/5702/1686

Some scientists do not believe in global warming, but if their theories were very good then they would get published in a respectable scientific journal, like Science and Nature. Also, if you follow the money, a good number of those scientists who don't believe in global warming have been tied to oil companies. Here's a couple scientists who were caught with ExxonMobile connections.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/life/science/story/0,12996,1399585,00.html

Now if he had something real to say, or something novel, or the reports in Science and Nature weren't getting out to the press, then maybe he could speak up. However, here the senator is out of his league, and I chalk this right up there with hollywood liberals shouting about our government.
 
I'm not impressed with the Senator's science background, and I expect he is a little out of his league. A majority of scientists (and, more importantly, a majority of good scientists) think that Global Warming is real and manmade.

How does Senator Inhofe's science background differ from Al Gores?

How can you qaulify that a majority of scientists and as you desicribe them "good scientists" concur with the theory that global warming is manmade?

Here is a list of 17,000 scientist that believe global warming cannot be attributed to manmade causes.

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p357.htm

Are we to believe that all of these scientist are not "good scientists"?

Is it possible that there are scientist pursuing manmade global warming theories with the expectation of continued allocation of grant monies?
 
How does Senator Inhofe's science background differ from Al Gores?

How can you qaulify that a majority of scientists and as you desicribe them "good scientists" concur with the theory that global warming is manmade?

Here is a list of 17,000 scientist that believe global warming cannot be attributed to manmade causes.

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p357.htm

Are we to believe that all of these scientist are not "good scientists"?

Is it possible that there are scientist pursuing manmade global warming theories with the expectation of continued allocation of grant monies?

So true, just because someone calls themselves a scientist doesn't mean that they can't be bought. What makes people think they are infallible, weathermen are "weather scientists", how often are they even close? The opinions vary so much that I think screwing up our economy on the advice of Algore and friends is a ridiculous idea.
 
How does Senator Inhofe's science background differ from Al Gores?

I don't know, and I'm not defending Gore.

How can you qaulify that a majority of scientists and as you desicribe them "good scientists" concur with the theory that global warming is manmade?

Quantitative analysis on the number of journal articles released on Global warming and the conclusions the authors draw.

Here is a list of 17,000 scientist that believe global warming cannot be attributed to manmade causes.

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p357.htm

Are we to believe that all of these scientist are not "good scientists"?

I consider good scientists ones who get to write up their projects in the top scientific journals and who hold top research positions. I'm not saying your scientists are bad, just not as good; they're in a lower tier.

Is it possible that there are scientist pursuing manmade global warming theories with the expectation of continued allocation of grant monies?

That is less likely than scientists being funded by oil companies to say global warming doesn't exist. It would require some sort of conspiracy by the NSF and other grant foundations not to give out grants to people who are researching that global warming does not happen. Why would the NSF and PNAS have an agenda with regards to global warming?
 
I think this little price tag might give you some idea of why scientist could easily be for sale... That is a TRILLION DOLLARS with a T.

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article1772355.ece


greenhouse gas emissions
By Philip Thornton, Economics Correspondent
Published: 30 September 2006
The cost of curbing the soaring emissions of harmful gases that are blamed for causing global warming has been estimated at $1 trillion by a major study of the cost of climate change.

The volume of emissions of the gases that cause global warming will double by 2050 unless rich countries agree to take significant policy steps to cut energy use, it shows.

The report, byPricewaterhouseCoopers, lays bare the potential damage to the environment of the industrial revolution in China and India. It puts a price of $1 trillion (£526bn) on the cost of sorting out the problem spread over the next generation. The bill is equivalent to a year's output of the economy of Canada, and less than half of the total stock of debt that has been built up by Britain's households. But it is less than the cost in terms of environmental catastrophe and loss of life that scientists fear will happen as temperatures and sea levels rise. "It is implicit from our findings that a trillion dollars certainly is a cost worth incurring," said John Hawksworth, the chief economist at PwC and author of the report.

Turbo-charged growth in emerging economies is helping to drag billions of people out of poverty across Asia, Latin America and eastern Europe.

But according to PwC, the price will be paid by sharp rises in global energy consumption and carbon emissions. They say it means the rich nations that have done most to cause the problem must take more drastic action to reduce their environmental impact.

The report comes as the environmental community awaits a key Treasury-commissioned report on the economic cost of climate change. Sir Nicholas Stern, a former chief economist at the World Bank, is expected to conclude that it will be cheaper to act now to curb energy use than to pay for the cost of symptoms later.

His findings, which will be presented to G8 environment ministers during a closed-door session at a summit in Mexico next week, will also outline the financial impact of global warning. Sir Nicholas will reject the alternative argument that the world should maximise economic growth to build reserves to meet the costs of the final reckoning.

PwC said it had attempted to put a price on slowing the growth in carbon emissions because it was impossible to calculate the cost of climate change. "If sea levels rise and a lot of people in Bangladesh drown do you calculate the loss of their lifetime earnings, even though they will be lower than for the UK? It is a difficult moral question," Mr Hawksworth said.

PwC's analysis shows its projections for economic growth of the seven largest emerging economies (E7) - Brazil, China, India, Indonesia, Mexico, Russia and Turkey - imply global carbon emissions will double by 2050. PwC estimates that assuming countries continue with current policies to reduce energy use by 1 per cent a year, emissions will rise by 7 gigatons of carbon (GtC) presently to about 15 GtC by 2050.

Mr Hawksworth said if the world abandoned its recent achievement on cutting energy intensity by 1 per cent a year - then emissions would treble to 24 GtC. Even a radical strategy - which he calls "green growth" - of boosting the share of non-fossil fuels used in energy from 12.5 per cent to 30 per cent, combined with a slightly tougher cut in energy intensity use - would keep emissions only at current levels. "This business as usual approach is clearly unacceptable," Mr Hawksworth said. "Ideally even more needs to be done but this would be challenging enough to achieve."

PwC's report gives a wish list of measures that could deliver lower emissions than exist now by 2050 . These include: energy efficiency improvements beyond the historic trend; road pricing where proceeds are not given back to motorists; investment in hydrogen-based technologies; a major switch from coal to has, nuclear and renewables, particularly in China and India; and expanding carbon capture and storage - taking carbon at source and storing underground or undersea.

The West is sensitive to being seen as lecturing developing countries, or insisting they make the cuts the G7 never made until now.

China and India have ratified the Kyoto protocol but do not have to meet the targets to reduce their emissions of carbon dioxide and five other greenhouse gases.

© 2006 Independent News and Media Limited
 
I don't know, and I'm not defending Gore.
The only reason I mention Gore is due to the fact that he is a torch bearer on the manmade global warming front. His scientific back ground may not be any better than Inhofe's.


Quantitative analysis on the number of journal articles released on Global warming and the conclusions the authors draw.
Is there such analysis?


I consider good scientists ones who get to write up their projects in the top scientific journals and who hold top research positions. I'm not saying your scientists are bad, just not as good; they're in a lower tier.
They are not my scientists. How excatly do you know which "tier" those 17,000 scientist are in?


That is less likely than scientists being funded by oil companies to say global warming doesn't exist. It would require some sort of conspiracy by the NSF and other grant foundations not to give out grants to people who are researching that global warming does not happen. Why would the NSF and PNAS have an agenda with regards to global warming?

Global warming is not happening? The issue is whether or not it is manmade. Again, how can you qualify that scientists that do not claim manmade global warming are funded by oil compaines?
 
I think this little price tag might give you some idea of why scientist could easily be for sale... That is a TRILLION DOLLARS with a T.

http://news.independent.co.uk/environment/article1772355.ece

I can understand why some scientists are for sale. For example, some are bought by oil companies. The sale is a bit trickier for grant money, because why would people try to sell them away from falsifying global warming? Obviously oil companies would benefit by proving global warming wrong, but who wants to pay to only prove that global warming is happening and man's fault?
 
The only reason I mention Gore is due to the fact that he is a torch bearer on the manmade global warming front. His scientific back ground may not be any better than Inhofe's.



Is there such analysis?

Yes, I linked to it in my post. It was done in one of the top scientific journals.

They are not my scientists. How excatly do you know which "tier" those 17,000 scientist are in?

Well the scientists that you're referring to. How many of those scientists have journal articles over global warming in top journals? How many are members of PNAS or other national academy's of science? I know 1/3 of those who signed don't even have advanced degrees, and only about 30% of those who signed work in Bio/Chem/Life Sciences. That's how I know many are not really top tier. I've already supplied links about the official positions of many national academy's of science and overall journal articles, which believe global warming is man made. If those 17,000 are all well qualified and top tier, then there are many more top tier scientists who believe that it is man made anyways.

Global warming is not happening? The issue is whether or not it is manmade. Again, how can you qualify that scientists that do not claim manmade global warming are funded by oil compaines?

Some scientists don't believe that Global Warming is happening.
 
I can understand why some scientists are for sale. For example, some are bought by oil companies. The sale is a bit trickier for grant money, because why would people try to sell them away from falsifying global warming? Obviously oil companies would benefit by proving global warming wrong, but who wants to pay to only prove that global warming is happening and man's fault?

Gee, a Trillion....TRILLION DOLLARS to fix the problem... and of course it's the advanced nations that feed the rest of the world and develop the many things that improve lives for people all across the globe that are responsible and must pay. How many of these world renowned scientist are from countries that want to see the economy of the U.S. screwed up?

What is said about the effects of natural disasters such as earthquakes, forest fires and volcanoes. How about the effect of the difference in the sun's eruptions and heat variances over the last few years?

You can't be that naive.... oh wait, you blame everything on big oil, you are that naive.
 
Gee, a Trillion....TRILLION DOLLARS to fix the problem... and of course it's the advanced nations that feed the rest of the world and develop the many things that improve lives for people all across the globe that are responsible and must pay. How many of these world renowned scientist are from countries that want to see the economy of the U.S. screwed up?

Why does the trillion dollars inspire the NSF to give out grants relating to global warming? They don't see any benefit from those trillion dollars. Only the private sees that money. The people giving the donations belong to non-profit organizations anyways.

What is said about the effects of natural disasters such as earthquakes, forest fires and volcanoes. How about the effect of the difference in the sun's eruptions and heat variances over the last few years?

You can't be that naive.... oh wait, you blame everything on big oil, you are that naive.

Global warming models incorporate natural disasters and the Earth's natural cycles. Those are basic ingredients to normalize results. Not incorporating those variable would be naive, which is why the models account for them.

I don't blame everything on big oil. Some of those scientists are paid off, especially the more outspoken ones, but some of them just have the opinion that global warming isn't man's fault. Scientific opinion, however, is a weighted measure and many of the people who don't believe in Global warming don't count for very much.

Why bring in the ad hominem attacks and pejorative language? I haven't said anything to attack you. Also, I certainly hope that you have some advanced degree in Bio/Chem and some experience in the field to back you up before you say I'm naive at the workings and politics of science. If it is naive to not believe in grand conspiracies about destroing the US economy between international scientists and US grant foundations, well then I'm naive.
 

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