BBC: What Happened to Global Warming?

[BVS]

I agree...

Scary

 

[purpleoscar]

I think that the best scientists are ones that do not have a predetermined "conclusion" already implanted in their minds...

However, even if man-made climate change is proven to be a myth - that doesn't mean we should abandon the pursuit of alternative energy and a clean environment. We are at a point in history as important as the Industrial Revolution. I would personally like to be a part of the generation that "turned the tide" on the old ways of energy and production. In the end, I think we find it is not only more profitable, but also sustainable.

I agree we shouldn't go too far and assume all pollution is okay but without good transparent science yelling doom and gloom will train the public to ignore potential real threats to the environment. Transparency could also go against skeptics if their science sucks.

At least these guys agree to an investigation:

YouTube - Fox News: Calls for Investigation of Climategate Grow

What a lot of skeptics complain about is in this report:

http://www.climateaudit.org/pdf/others/07142006_Wegman_Report.pdf

7. CONCLUSIONS AND RECOMMENDATIONS

Conclusion 1. The politicization of academic scholarly work leads to confusing public debates. Scholarly papers published in peer reviewed journals are considered the archival record of research. There is usually no requirement to archive supplemental material such as code and data. Consequently, the supplementary material for academic work is often poorly documented and archived and is not sufficiently robust to withstand intense public debate. In the present example there was too much reliance on peer review, which seemed not to be sufficiently independent.

Recommendation 1. Especially when massive amounts of public monies and human lives are at stake, academic work should have a more intense level of scrutiny and review. It is especially the case that authors of policy-related documents like the IPCC report, Climate Change 2001: The Scientific Basis, should not be the same people as those that constructed the academic papers.

Conclusion 2. Sharing of research materials, data, and results is haphazard and often grudgingly done. We were especially struck by Dr. Mann’s insistence that the code he developed was his intellectual property and that he could legally hold it personally without disclosing it to peers. When code and data are not shared and methodology is not fully disclosed, peers do not have the ability to replicate the work and thus independent verification is impossible.

Recommendation 2. We believe that federally funded research agencies should develop a more comprehensive and concise policy on disclosure. All of us writing this report have been federally funded. Our experience with funding agencies has been that they do not in general articulate clear guidelines to the investigators as to what must be disclosed. Federally funded work including code should be made available to other researchers upon reasonable request, especially if the intellectual property has no commercial value. Some
consideration should be granted to data collectors to have exclusive use of their data for one or two years, prior to publication. But data collected under federal support should be made publicly available. (As federal agencies such as NASA do routinely.)

Conclusion 3. As statisticians, we were struck by the isolation of communities such as the paleoclimate community that rely heavily on statistical methods, yet do not seem to be interacting with the mainstream statistical community. The public policy implications of this debate are financially staggering and yet apparently no independent statistical expertise was sought or used.

Recommendation 3. With clinical trials for drugs and devices to be approved for human use by the FDA, review and consultation with statisticians is expected. Indeed, it is standard practice to include statisticians in the application-for-approval process. We judge this to be a good policy when public health and also when substantial amounts of monies are involved, for example, when there are major policy decisions to be made based on statistical assessments. In such cases, evaluation by statisticians should be
standard practice. This evaluation phase should be a mandatory part of all grant applications and funded accordingly.

Conclusion 4. While the paleoclimate reconstruction has gathered much publicity because it reinforces a policy agenda, it does not provide insight and understanding of the physical mechanisms of climate change except to the extent that tree ring, ice cores and such give physical evidence such as the prevalence of green-house gases. What is needed is deeper understanding of the physical mechanisms of climate change.

Recommendation 4. Emphasis should be placed on the Federal funding of research related to fundamental understanding of the mechanisms of climate change. Funding should focus on interdisciplinary teams and avoid narrowly focused discipline research.

 

[financeguy]

Bit suspect to be preaching about ethics to the vast majority of scientists who support the case for anthropogenic climate change if the only way these PRIVATE EMAILS became public was presumably as a direct result of a crime.

 

[purpleoscar]

Bit suspect to be preaching about ethics to the vast majority of scientists who support the case for anthropogenic climate change if the only way these PRIVATE EMAILS became public was presumably as a direct result of a crime.

Well we don't know if it's a hacker or a whistleblower so it depends on what you mean by ethics. One is unethical and one is not. I'm sure when it comes to George Bush, Sarah Palin, Enron, Linda Tripp, and Goldman Sachs many people wouldn't care about stolen emails if it unearthed taxpayer waste. People also don't seem to care to release interrogation techniques to the world (including terrorists) to unearth what they find illegal. As soon as shareholders and taxpayers are involved it should be expected that some kind of audit should occur, especially when allegedly important documents are being deleted.

Global warming rigged? Here's the email I'd need to see | George Monbiot | Comment is free | The Guardian

Of all people George Monbiot is feeling some damage but not quite enough damage for him. He's set to debate Lomborg and Lawson with fellow Canadian Green Party leader Elizabeth May on December 1st.

The Debates | Munk Debates

I wonder how that will work after this:

It's no use pretending this isn't a major blow. The emails extracted by a hacker from the climatic research unit at the University of East Anglia could scarcely be more damaging. I am now convinced that they are genuine, and I'm dismayed and deeply shaken by them.

Yes, the messages were obtained illegally. Yes, all of us say things in emails that would be excruciating if made public. Yes, some of the comments have been taken out of context. But there are some messages that require no spin to make them look bad. There appears to be evidence here of attempts to prevent scientific data from being released, and even to destroy material that was subject to a freedom of information request.

Worse still, some of the emails suggest efforts to prevent the publication of work by climate sceptics, or to keep it out of a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. I believe that the head of the unit, Phil Jones, should now resign. Some of the data discussed in the emails should be re-analysed.

Then he continues on to say that a bigger conspiracy needs to be unearthed to shake his beliefs. Of course a lot of this "us and them" attitude would be reduced if data was more freely exchanged. Hopefully that will be the outcome of this scandal. Yes heads should roll but science has to continue on with better transparency (unless it is a commercial secret or military patent) which in this case does not apply as it is considered a public health issue (according to the EPA).

 

[Jive Turkey]

Figured this was as good a place as any to post this video. I'm not trying to make a statement, just thought it was interesting

YouTube - Polar Bear

 

[AEON]

Figured this was as good a place as any to post this video. I'm not trying to make a statement, just thought it was interesting

YouTube - Polar Bear

While I agree with the information - I disagree with the tactic. I'm not a big fan of arguments that appeal to emotion. It usually leads to some sort of mob mentality (from the Tea Bag rallies to "Peace" marches)

 

[Jive Turkey]

While I agree with the information - I disagree with the tactic. I'm not a big fan of arguments that appeal to emotion. It usually leads to some sort of mob mentality (from the Tea Bag rallies to "Peace" marches)

Ya, I agree. Thats why I figured I should put the personal disclaimer before the post. I also think that the cg could've been a little better too

 

[INDY500]

Video - Inhofe to Boxer - We Won, You Lost, Now Get a Life! - Congress

 

[diamond]

It must be a b*tch when he's right.

 

[purpleoscar]

YouTube - Ed Begley, Jr. Loses Control Over ClimateGate

PEER REVIEW! PEER REVIEW! PEER REVIEW!

More like BUDDY REVIEW.

 

[diamond]

Actually Ed didn't look bad in this.

 

[BVS]

It must be a b*tch when he's right.

Please, this bitch wouldn't know science if it bit him on the ass. His past on air "expert on global warming myth" ended up being a hack, the guy wan't even a scientist.

 

[BVS]

PEER REVIEW! PEER REVIEW! PEER REVIEW!

More like BUDDY REVIEW.

So Oscar, you believe this all a hoax like your buddy Rush, in your theory what year do you think the scientific community of the world met in order to put together this conspiracy? Do you think they met on some distant island? And do you think it's just because the majority of scientist are socialist, and this was the best way to create a socialist utopia?

 

[diamond]

It's become evident that scientists are manipulating the numbers and politics have now entered into the research of climate change and or global warming.

It's a shame when science is no longer science.

<>

 

[BVS]

It's become evident that scientists are manipulating the numbers and politics have now entered into the research of climate change and or global warming.

Evident, huh? How is it "evident"?

It's a shame when science is no longer science.

Oh please, don't pretend like you EVER respected science.

 

[purpleoscar]

So Oscar, you believe this all a hoax like your buddy Rush, in your theory what year do you think the scientific community of the world met in order to put together this conspiracy? Do you think they met on some distant island? And do you think it's just because the majority of scientist are socialist, and this was the best way to create a socialist utopia?

Talk to this guy:

YouTube - New EU president confirms New World Order desire (19Nov09)

I don't think Marxism is so well hidden to fool anyone who keeps track so conspiracy or ideology used as a term, it doesn't matter to me. They are authoritarians and their cap and tax/world government is just more of the same. Socialists love to take old terms and give them makeovers but anti-growth policies are all the same. I also don't think a year can be attached because the base monkey mentality of narcissism and authoriarianism is in most humans and powergrabs will always happen and they need to be rebuffed every generation or so. Whether it's communism/facism/absolutism it's different variations on the same psychology. I already quoted Maurice Strong who is a psychopath that wants impossible energy reductions and James Hansen is another psychopath who wanted to shut down coal plants which would be devastating to the economy. These people have no compassion and no one should take them seriously as compassionate people anymore. After seeing the hockey stick graph in university with open Marxists using it to the hilt to justify a massive transfer of wealth I can now rest easy that no more delays with scientific data will occur to "denalists" who ask for it. Any scientific claim that public policy should be steered in a certain way will be audited. This is just basic for business and even then some get around it. It's obvious that scientists need to be put under that same scrutiny.

 

[BVS]

None of that answers the question of science, but I didn't actually expect you to understand...

But funny post none the less.

 

[purpleoscar]

None of that answers the question of science, but I didn't actually expect you to understand...

But funny post none the less.

Nice dodge. I've already posted hours of the denialist point of view that you think is "crap". You asked me about a conspiracy and I answered your question well. The science has been argued by skeptics for years and now the peer review process will have to allow for their papers in journals for journals to now be taken seriously. People are not going to take Michael Mann's word that other papers are 'bad' without a reason and people are not going to wait for the backup data when scientific policy claims are made. Especially when "peer review" is used as an insult precisely to ostracize legitimate scientific inquiry. There are questions about the medieval warming period, holocene period and the hockey stick graphs. There are also questions about cosmic rays and the solar atmosphere. There are questions about how much radiation does or doesn't escape (Lindzen). Also S02 from China:

CRU’s Phil Jones: “Maybe because I’m in my 50s, but the language used in the forecasts seems a bit over the top re the cold.” � Watts Up With That?

These issues have not been satisfactorily handled. Then you have an IPCC guy admitting this (like it's all okay):

Lateline - 23/11/2009: Tim Flannery discusses hacked climate emails

When we come to the last few years when we haven’t seen a continuation of that (warming) trend we don’t understand all of the factors that create earth’s climate...We just don’t understand the way the whole system works… See, these people work with models, computer modelling. So when the computer modelling and the real world data disagree you’ve got a very interesting problem… Sure for the last 10 years we’ve gone through a slight cooling trend.

So apparently when the IPCC just looks at models versus reality it's just "a very interesting problem" with no pause to solve that problem before we create a massive tax. So yeah it's hard to answer scientific questions the way you want because the IPCC is even more confused. Then you get the propaganda that says the science is settled and that there is a consensus to add to the confusion. Then you add the training the public undergoes to feel guilty about all climate change and psychologically blaming all changes on ourselves after watching what used to be normal weather reports. Pointing out all climate change (warmer or cooler) doesn't point out that man is at fault. It just points out that it changed. That's why an investigation and audit of the claims will help to clear things up. Since "we just don’t understand the way the whole system works" there should be more due diligence and studies to get a better idea on what's actually going on in the climate than predicting with simple computer models.

I love how more questions are being asked:

Climategate: Making New Zealand warmer | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog

 

[BVS]

Nice dodge. I've already posted hours of the denialist point of view that you think is "crap". You asked me about a conspiracy and I answered your question well.

No, you didn't answer me at all you went on a rant about marxism, blah, blah, blah...

Here's what I'm getting at...

Do you agree that it's a majority of science that agrees global warming is occuring?

Do you agree that within this majority the majority believe man contributes to it?

Do you agree that this belief has been talked about and studied well before Al Gore?

So, when do you believe and why were all these scientists pulled aside and asked to do this? It's a pretty simple question. If you cannot answer this, then you have no conspiracy. You're making huge accusations, so let's start backing these ridiculous things up, shall we?

 

[purpleoscar]

No, you didn't answer me at all you went on a rant about marxism, blah, blah, blah...

The argument (I mentioned before) on my side is bolstered by a founder from Greenpeace who mentioned Marxists were pervading environmentalism after the Berlin wall fell which connects to my blah, blah Marxist rant about "conspiracy" or collusion or whatever you want to label it.

YouTube - Issues with Scientists, Politicians, and the Media - from The Great Global Warming Swindle

9:40​

Ironically Margaret Thatcher helped with money for climate science for an excuse to go for nuclear power (less popular then) because of her political fights with unions in coal. Later on the communists moved in after the Berlin wall fell and the issue garnered media attention (usually through alarmism) which brings more funding which gets you up to the 1990's with IPCC reports. Al Gore was there already in the '80s but until his documentary came out it was mostly popular in academic circles. Once the movie came out the alarmism increased even more until today where you look at climate change on weather reports and now we are trained to feel guilty when a hurricane or tornado hits. That wasn't the case before. Even increased prostitution is being blamed on floods from climate change.

Do you agree that it's a majority of science that agrees global warming is occuring?

No. See my next paragraph. BTW climate change happens all the time because it's not "global warming" anymore. Pointing out warming or coolling or dryer or wetter weather doesn't mean we did it. That goes back to the point where we are trained to believe every change is us. How can the majority of scientists agree on something when "...we just don’t understand the way the whole system works"?

Do you agree that within this majority the majority believe man contributes to it?

NO. I just posted Tim Flannery who says they don't know how the climate works. That's not science that's like phrenology with computer models. What does "the majority" have to do with good science. The "majority" in the past used to believe in eugenics.

These people want to make money off of predictions based on "...computer modelling. So when the computer modelling and the real world data disagree you’ve got a very interesting problem…". That's lame for most taxpayers. I wouldn't invest in a company that had that as their product idea.

Do you agree that this belief has been talked about and studied well before Al Gore?

Yes and the guy who first did it predicted more warming by the 1940's than did happen. Who cares? If you want to dump Al Gore I'm with you.

So, when do you believe and why were all these scientists pulled aside and asked to do this? It's a pretty simple question. If you cannot answer this, then you have no conspiracy. You're making huge accusations, so let's start backing these ridiculous things up, shall we?

It has nothing to do with "pulled aside". This isn't a movie. It has to do with scientists trying to keep their funding and governments looking for an excuse to tax people. I've talked about this with you before. When people work for government they don't do it completely out of altruism. They want to get paid and especially government pensions otherwise they wouldn't be there. There's an entire industry of government and private sector that want to make billions on cap and tax legislation. It's no different than lawyers liking legislation that gives them more jobs or brokers who like mutual funds so they can collect more fees. There are people currently investing money in shares of "green companies" which makes them more emotionally and financially invested in C02 being a problem. If it's not then the bubble will burst just like the dot.com crash and now subprime loan derivatives. Then all those climate scientists will also have to get another job. Now that the emails are virtually confirmed to be true we have emails that show the medieval warming period was to be eliminated precisely because they want to show what is happening now is not natural for policy motives. Working with others who openly admit skepticism and pushing them (or else they lose their jobs) to fudge the data to produce these claims can be considered collusion or conspiracy. I would quit and look for another job than continue with these people precisely because down the road I could be investigated. As an accountant if I see deceptive information I have to refuse to standby it or fix it until it has no material errors. BTW I've been in that position. It's no fun and fixing it meant I had to lose money on the file but FUCK IT the guy had bullshit numbers and he wanted to beef up his profits to sell his crappy pizza company to another guy. That's immoral. I refused even when my partner tried to force me to do it. He couldn't fire me because I would sue him but people with integrity have to make some sacrifices to avoid being implicated in such things. Greed exists in business, government or wherever people are.

What about Valerie Jarrett trying push the National Endowment for the Arts to help with Obama's "aggressive agenda"? What about, in the emails, WWF asking to beef up the stats so that the claims would make a big splash? Should I use the world collusion or conspiracy? Does it matter?

With so many people involved in this scandal there doesn't have to be a time when they got together with their robes in a darkroom sitting at a black round table plotting evilness. They are all following their self-interest accept a self-interest at the expense of others. At least if they made products people want or allowed us to know about real environmental problems by being a watchdog there would be no problem because we would get our money's worth.

So whether you call it a conspiracy or robbery or crooks it's all the same. Religions don't needs a special meeting to plot to fool believers to make money. They just say they believe and go make money. This kind of collusion unfortunately exists alot. Just look at playground bullying and gangsters and cliques. It's a base part of human nature. You're trying to diminish the fact that top climate scientists that influence the IPCC are caught with their pants down colluding to manipulate the peer review process to avoid critics from seeing their crappy data. Who cares when or if they had a special meeting to fool people? They are trying to fool people. If they are colluding they are colluding. Are you telling me that you will only be mad if the word is "conspiracy" instead of "collusion"? Talk about pedantics! You wouldn't ask that of tobacco companies would you? If you see an email that states they want to make tobacco more addictive (because it's their self-interest) you're not going to ask for evidence of a special evil meeting are you? Or you see a scientist trying to ramp up alarmism and politicians and entrepreneurs getting together (oops IPCC meetings) on how to make money from legislation it's all the same. $$$ at the expense of others. These are serious allegations and that's why there will be an investigation.

When an investigation is done and more is learned about the climate (presumably lots of time will pass before that technology and knowledge is developed) then we will see what we should be alarmed about if anything at all. We need to know mostly how the climate works before we spend trillions on an environmental project only to find that we went in the wrong direction. Didn't just Gore talk to Schmidt recently and said that C02 is only 40% of the warming and methane and soot is the rest? They need to get their science straight so that when there actually is an emergency we can target the right chemicals and not be so jaded (because of past false alarmism) we can actually believe again that they are mostly correct.

 

[BVS]

I stopped reading when you said you believe the majority of scientists don't believe in climate change... It completely contrdicts your whole premise of a conspiracy.

The rest of your long winded post, doesn't even matter... The truth is you DO NOT UNDERSTAND how science works. You never have. You've posted some of the most abhorrent "science" I've ever seen in FYM. You've posted a lot of racist, bigoted, political junk science, and some of it you've learned from(as you watched it get dispelled) this one you haven't yet, but I still have hope.

Even Rush agrees that the majority of scientists agree, he just thinks the minority are right, but we all know he's a bafoon and his "scientist" has been proven to be a fraud.

 

[diamond]

Pajamas Media � Climategate: Alarmism Is Underpinned by Fraud (PJM Exclusive)

Files from the UK Climatic Research Unit were hacked. They show that data was massaged, numbers were fudged, diagrams were biased, there was destruction of data after freedom of information requests, and there was refusal to submit taxpayer-funded data for independent examination.

 

[purpleoscar]

I stopped reading when you said you believe the majority of scientists don't believe in climate change... It completely contrdicts your whole premise of a conspiracy.

Even Rush agrees that the majority of scientists agree, he just thinks the minority are right, but we all know he's a bafoon and his "scientist" has been proven to be a fraud.

You stopped reading? Typical! Rush Limbaugh doesn't believe in the majority. Unless you believe that scientists who know the errors in their computer models is a scientific consensus. He believes it's a hoax and the emails show that there is no scientific consensus. The "consensus" is manufactured and just bullying. If people knowingly propagate phony computer models how can there really be a consensus? If good skeptical science is kept out of journals what does peer review mean? I agree that there is a consensus to collect money but that's not scientific consensus. The term "consensus" and "peer review" are corrupted by scientist's actions and politicians who need a particular outcome to collect money.

This problem isn't going to go away until it's resolved.

Pretending the climate email leak isn't a crisis won't make it go away | George Monbiot | Environment | guardian.co.uk

But it is also true that the emails are very damaging. The response of the greens and most of the scientists I know is profoundly ironic, as we spend so much of our time confronting other people's denial. Pretending that this isn't a real crisis isn't going to make it go away. Nor is an attempt to justify the emails with technicalities. We'll be able to get past this only by grasping reality, apologising where appropriate and demonstrating that it cannot happen again.

One of the most damaging emails was sent by the head of the climatic research unit, Phil Jones. He wrote "I can't see either of these papers being in the next IPCC report. Kevin and I will keep them out somehow - even if we have to redefine what the peer-review literature is!" [...] Even so, his message looks awful. It gives the impression of confirming a potent meme circulated by those who campaign against taking action on climate change: that the IPCC process is biased. However good the detailed explanations may be, most people aren't going to follow or understand them. Jones's statement, on the other hand, is stark and easy to grasp. [...]

If you take the wording literally, in one case he appears to be suggesting that emails subject to a request be deleted, which means that he seems to be advocating potentially criminal activity. Even if no other message had been hacked, this would be sufficient to ensure his resignation as head of the unit. I feel desperately sorry for him: he must be walking through hell. But there is no helping it; he has to go, and the longer he leaves it, the worse it will get. He has a few days left in which to make an honourable exit. Otherwise, like the former Speaker of the House of Commons, Michael Martin, he will linger on until his remaining credibility vanishes, inflicting continuing damage to climate science.

http://volokh.com/2009/11/24/climategate-and-the-social-validation-of-knowledge/

At the very least, the Climategate revelations should weaken our confidence in the above conclusion. At least some of the prominent scholars in the field seem driven at least in part by ideology, and willing to use intimidation to keep contrarian views from being published, even if the articles in question meet normal peer review standards. Absent such tactics, it’s possible that more contrarian research would be published in professional journals and the consensus in the field would be less firm. To be completely clear, I don’t think that either ideological motivation or even intimidation tactics prove that these scientists’ views are wrong. Their research should be assessed on its own merits, irrespective of their motivations for conducting it. However, these things should affect the degree to which we defer to their conclusions merely based on their authority as disinterested experts.

Manufacturing conensus: why Climategate hurts the warming faith | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog

Hello is anybody listening? Does anybody care?

William Kininmonth, former head of the National Climate Centre at the Bureau of Meteorology, tells me he reported in Energy and the Environment on another astonishing attempt to stifle sceptics:

As an invited speaker to an international seminar invited by the Russian Academy of Sciences to discuss the scientific basis of the Kyoto Protocol it was perplexing that the event did not commence on schedule. The delay was particularly odd, as it appeared that the listed speakers were assembled. The program did commence after nearly two hours wait and the reason for the delay became apparent. Sir David King, chief scientific adviser to the United Kingdom government, had been lobbying vigorously to have a number of the listed international speakers omitted from the program. He even submitted his own program of speakers! Having failed in his objective, King absented himself from the proceedings for the remainder of the day…

The pre-seminar lobbying by Sir David King further underscored the politicisation of the climate change issue. It became apparent that the objective of the UK delegation was to defend the findings of the IPCC and convince the members of the Russian Academy of Sciences that the science of climate change is settled… The input of independent scientists (at the meeting), who could demonstrate shortcomings in the IPCC findings, clearly would hamper the UK delegation in meeting its objectives and were to be silenced.

Why the UK government would want to take on the role of sheriff in defence of the IPCC is not clear until one remembers that the Blair Government has made the promotion of Kyoto and hence its ‘war against global warming’ a top foreign policy objective for reasons that can only be speculated about.

I guess you're not going to read any of this but others will.

 

[BVS]

Your reading comprehension is abysmal, I didn't say Rush believed IN the majority. It's like I'm debating with a child who speaks a different language.

You'll never get anything done by not understanding and living in such paranoia.

Bye

 

[purpleoscar]

Your reading comprehension is abysmal, I didn't say Rush believed IN the majority. It's like I'm debating with a child who speaks a different language.

You'll never get anything done by not understanding and living in such paranoia.

Bye

Dodge, dodge, dodge. Your "majority" argument sucks and I ripped it apart. You're like Ed Begley Jr. and can't argue properly. Science is not based on elitism or consensus. Even if C02 scientifically can be proven (not yet) to be at fault what are we willing to do about it? C02 will still increase with cap and trade. We just have to eat higher costs until we can find a new technology to replace oil. Good luck!

Look at the crap the conservative government in New Zealand has to deal with there:

New Zealand's Cap-and Trade Cramdown - WSJ.com

New Zealand's government is crowing about the amended cap-and-trade bill passed Wednesday as a "balanced" and "responsible" solution to fight global warming. That is, if pork barreling and ramming a bill through parliament without any serious economic study of its impact is what's considered "responsible."

Prime Minister John Key's National Party-led government ran on a campaign promise to amend the previous government's onerous cap-and-trade law, which was rushed through before the last election. Mr. Key promised to water down the scheme to protect the economy from severe harm, while fulfilling New Zealand's Kyoto Protocol commitments.

The Key government soon found that its coalition partners, the ACT Party and the Maori Party, had serious reservations about passing what turned out to be the world's most comprehensive cap-and-trade bill. No wonder they were alarmed: National's bill covered all greenhouse gases and would affect most of the economy, including the country's key export industries of agriculture and forestry.

Critics also questioned the usefulness and timing of the bill, pointing out that New Zealand only contributes 0.2% of total global emissions, and a Copenhagen deal next month looks unlikely. Add in the climate-gate scandal bubbling in Britain, where evidence surfaced that climatologists tried to suppress skeptical global-warming studies, and there's even more reason to delay.

Yet the nominally conservative Key government plowed ahead by buying off the Maori Party earlier this week. In return for votes, the Maoris will get "energy efficiency assistance" for 8,000 low-income homes, the right to plant trees on government land to offset emissions elsewhere, and other goodies. The Nationals then rushed the bill through parliament under the "urgency" tool, used to extend sitting hours for priority business. The bill still only passed by a hair, 63-58.

Pork barreling to get a bill passed is nothing new in politics. But in this case it is only part of a bad picture: The government still has not released its own comprehensive study of the new law's potential economic impact. Kiwis may soon demand one as their energy prices rise and foreign investment goes elsewhere—all in the name of being "responsible."

What a waste of money. Even if it's passed in the U.S. the conservatives will win and water it down just like everybody else. Why bother?

 

[Diemen]

Why don't we tone down the "your argument is crap, you can't debate for crap" on both sides of this argument, ok?

 

[purpleoscar]

Why don't we tone down the "your argument is crap, you can't debate for crap" on both sides of this argument, ok?

Agreed. Let the others argue:

YouTube - Hot 'Climategate' debate: Scientists clash LIVE on RT

WWF vs. Astrophysicist.

NYT on Russian Malaria:

10,000,000 MALARIA CASES IN RUSSIA; Large Numbers of Petrograd Factori... - Article Preview - The New York Times

http://query.nytimes.com/mem/archive-free/pdf?_r=1&res=9803EFDE113FE432A25753C2A9649C946095D6CF

WWF already has a bad reputation in Lomborg's book for alarmism so it shouldn't be a surprise a WWF Russian doesn't know what he's talking about. Also one of the emails that was hacked has WWF asking for more "beefed up" predictions.

 

[A_Wanderer]

Purpleoscar, your perception of science is very postmodern, looking straight at the social status of the scientists and imposing an agenda upon every piece of research that goes against your position.

 

[purpleoscar]

Purpleoscar, your perception of science is very postmodern, looking straight at the social status of the scientists and imposing an agenda upon every piece of research that goes against your position.

Postmodern? Thanks for giving me a laugh. Marxists have in the past been "looking straight at the social status of the scientists the general population and imposing an agenda upon every piece of researchindustry that goes against your their position(s)".

Here's some more from Steve McIntyre on the limits of tree data:

New!! Data from the Decline � Climate Audit – mirror site

IPCC: “Inappropriate” to show the decline � Climate Audit – mirror site

The Trick � Climate Audit – mirror site

Some of the comments below on the articles are a good sum up on the limitations of using tree data to compare modern temperatures to the past.

Happy Thanksgiving!

 

[BVS]

So let me get this straight...

A bunch of marxists set out a plan, then bullied a few scientists(because only a minority believe) into making up climate change so that they can take over the world?

I needed a good laugh, thanks...