AGW « Blue Like You

Archive of posts filed under the AGW category.

How will Climategate affect Earth Hour?

Posted by Joanne on 8 March 2010, 11:05 am

H/T to Bruce for reminding us that Earth Hour will be rearing its ugly little head once again on March 27, in spite of the Climategate revelations and all the other scandals that followed it.

I see the WWF is still demanding action on climate change.

How about if we push back and demand some honesty?

* * * *

Related

The New York Times Fights Back Against the Climate-gate Scandal – Myron Ebell, Fox News:

…“Climate scientists are paid to do climate science,” said Gavin A. Schmidt…. “Their job is not persuading the public.”

If only that were so, even in the case of Dr. Schmidt. True, his salary is paid by American taxpayers, but it is almost certainly the case that over the past few years he has been spending a good part of his time during office hours and using government equipment to produce political propaganda for RealClimate.org, a web site run by Schmidt and Michael E. Mann. RealClimate.org has received help from Fenton Communications, the key P.R. firm for the Soros-funded left.
Thus Broder portrays Schmidt as just a scientist trying to be left alone to do his job, but in fact Schmidt is primarily a moderately-skilled political operative working to promote global warming alarmism. Here is Broder quoting Schmidt again:

“What is new is this paranoia combined with a spell of cold weather in the U. S. and the ‘climategate’ release. It’s a perfect storm that has allowed the nutters to control the agenda.”

“Nutters” is English (and Schmidt is English) slang equivalent to “nut” in the sense of crazy person. Well, Schmidt should know—his boss is the director of GISS, Dr. James E. Hansen. Hansen is widely considered to be the leading scientific promoter of global warming alarmism and as such is a highly political animal. He is also increasingly kooky and extreme…

Global Warming: Gore Vs. Gunter – NP:

…Honey bees aren’t dying off because of global warming; they’re dying off because of a tiny mite that has plagued hives for decades. Polar bears aren’t dying off for lack of food to eat or ice to cling to. They aren’t dying off, period.

And the devastating melt of Arctic ice in 2007? Turns out the ice did not melt “in place.” According to a recent study by scientists at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory in California, wind pushed more Arctic ice than usual out into the Atlantic that year where it melted simply because that ocean is warmer than its Arctic counterpart. Not because the Arctic is warming rapidly.

Could this wind shunting have been caused by global warming? Sure. But it just as easily could have other, natural causes.

The point is, there is no consensus on climate science. There never has been. By flinging names like “deniers” at skeptical scientists, barring them from IPCC deliberations, preventing them from seeing the warmers’ raw climate data and keeping them from having their papers peer reviewed, activists like Mr. Gore and the scientists who agree with them have created an artificial consensus.

While that may be good politics, it is very bad science.

Filed under AGW, Al Gore, Big Environment, Big Green, Carbon Shaft, Climategate, Your tax-dollars, climate change, environmentalists.

32 Comments

But can we wish away Al Gore?

Posted by Joanne on 2 March 2010, 7:54 am

There is no shortage of point-by-point criticisms of Al Gore’s New York Times Op-ed, We Can’t Wish Away Climate Change.

My first thought after reading his steaming pile of rhetoric was why did he set himself up for the inevitable drudging? Or does he actually believe that we’re that stupid?

And how is it that the alarmists can continue to hold him up as some kind of prophet and still keep a straight face while they warn us all of impending doom?

Anyway, here are some of the better fisks that I’ve come across. If you find more please let share them in comments. Thanks.

Al’s latest global-warming whopper – Alan Reynolds, New York Post

Al Gore’s weird, disconnected op-ed on climate change – Rick Moran, American Thinker

Al Gore Comes Out of Hiding and Gets a Fisking – Bluegrass Pundit

EXCLUSIVE: Inhofe Blasts Gore Over Climategate – Connie Hair, Human Events

But in response to Gore’s statement that “what is at stake is our ability to use the rule of law as an instrument of human redemption”, Bill Kristol said it most succinctly:

“Redemption comes from God, not Gore.”

* * * *

Related

More inconvenient news for the global warming alarmists:

UN’s climate link to hurricanes in doubt – Times Online

Cyclone climate link rejected – The Australian

El Nino killed Costa Rican toad, not global warming – Oneindia

British scientist in climate row admits ‘awful’ emails – Sydney Morning Herald

‘The Acceleration of Disbelief,’ Starring ‘Floor Mat’ Al Gore - Big Journalism (this is a must-read)

So is this one: Climategate: ‘a lot of common data’ – Phil Jones exposes AGW dominoes to Commons committee – Gerald Warner, Telegraph:

...And oh, yes – one further interesting fact emerged from yesterday’s Select Committee grilling. Professor Edward Acton, the Vice-Chancellor of the “University” of East Anglia, now thinks more money should be devoted to researching the Mediaeval Warm Period. So apparently it exists after all.

Who knew?

* * * *

Local ‘Green Energy’ issues:

Wind farm faces opposition – Guelph Mercury article via Windaction

Ontario power risk – Parker Gallant, Full Comment

* * * *

Wednesday Update

Welcome Jack’s Newswatch readers! And please check out Crux of the Matter – Trust Conservative gov’t timetable to refute AGW.

Peter Foster: Climate snow jobs – FP Comment

Wind power the worst kind of mirage – Henk Tennekes, FP

* * * *

Friday – Saturday Update

Waiting to hear ‘we’re sorry’ – John Robson, Ottawa Citizen

Blowing away taxpayers – Michael Trebilcock, Financial Post

Filed under AGW, Al Gore, Arrogance, Big Environment, Big Green, Carbon Shaft, Climategate, Copenhagen, Dalton McGuinty, Follow the money, Global Warming, Ontario economy, Propaganda, Science/tech, UN, Wind farms, Your tax-dollars, climate change, economy, environment, environmentalists, scandals.

45 Comments

The Audacity of Caution

Posted by Joanne on 1 March 2010, 7:52 am

Dr. Jack Kruuv, Professor Emeritus of Physics at the University of Waterloo has a few choice words for Maxime Bernier in today’s Waterloo Region Record:

“Politicians should keep their trap shut, when they don’t know what they are talking about.”

And since politicians represent the people that elect them, then by extension he is telling us to keep our traps shut. So much for open debate in Canadian taxpayer-supported universities.

This is the kind of attitude that we’re up against.

Have at it, BLY nation.

* * * *

Update

Fantastic post at American Thinker by Rick Moran (H/T Maz2) where he savages Al Gore’s NYT op-ed – Al Gore’s weird, disconnected op-ed on climate change:

…In other words, Gore obviously believes we should sit down, shut up, and let him and his buddies reach into our pockets and remove trillions of dollars without demanding proof of the scientific basis for his power grab…

Sound familiar?

Phil Jones on the hot seat – not sharing data is “standard practice” – WUWT (H/T Maz2)

And a terrific comment from a reader at the Daily Mail:

“Prof Jones today said it was not ’standard practice’ in climate science to release data and methodology for scientific findings so that other scientists could check and challenge the research.”

It is standard practice in every proper science to release date and methodology in the greatest of detail so that every aspect of the research and of the argument can be ‘falsified’ (using the Popper meaning of the word).
That is how science works.
That is why science works.
Not to do so puts climate research at the level of iridology, homeopoathy, and alchemy.
Add political agenda, and finding, and you have a bastardised pseudo-science barely worth another look. Unscrupulous people making money out of the latest political bandwagon, to justify further taxation by this dreadful government.

Which many of us have suspected for a long time.

- PeterMac, Ronda, Spain, 01/3/2010 18:45

Filed under AGW, Al Gore, Arrogance, Big Environment, Big Green, Climategate, Follow the money, Global Warming, Science/tech, Your tax-dollars, climate change, democracy, environment, environmentalists, grassroots power.

43 Comments

Maxime Bernier – Climate Realist

Posted by Joanne on 25 February 2010, 8:14 am

Thank you Maxime Bernier for being the first politician to have the courage to publicly acknowledge what we all have been aware of for the last several months – that the so-called ’settled science’ is unraveling and the alarmists’ hysteria is a crock as Lorrie Goldstein points out today – Mad Max makes sense. [Sidenote: MP Colin Mayes was pilloried by climate alarmists for expressing doubts to a constituent in December.]

In case you missed it, Maxime Bernier had the audacity to suggest that perhaps a bit of healthy skeptism might be in order before committing tons of money to attempt to solve a unsubstantiated problem that may or may not be able to be solved by human intervention. The opposition parties are saying that this is proof of where the Harper Government really stands on climate change, but many of us grassroot supporters only wish that were so.

Lorrie Goldstein is also a climate realist and truth seeker who feels that PM Harper should be taking the same approach as Bernier, but he gives the Conservative Government a back-handed compliment:

The good news is Harper is better on climate change than the opposition parties. The bad news is, that’s not saying much.

That’s for sure. Here is the alternative, Lorrie:

“The fact is, no one with any scientific credibility denies the science behind man-made climate change,” said Liberal science, industry and technology critic Marc Garneau, the former head of the Canadian Space Agency.

No one with any scientific credibility – Oh you mean Phil Jones? Bernier refers to him in a portion of his letter that was edited out by LaPresse:

…Phil Jones has admitted that we still do not know if the medieval period when the Vikings colonised Greenland was really warmer than today. But that if that was the case, it would contradict the claim that our era has been exceptionally warm due to human activity…

Marc Garneau must be living in a cave somewhere to make a statement like that. Does he not keep up with the news?

Lorrie Goldstein points out that we can still take a healthy, common-sense approach to the environment without buying into the alarmism:

…The reason he should pull Canada out of the UN-inspired Kyoto-Copenhagen madness, now, is that none of what it leads to — global cap-and-trade markets and/or carbon taxes — has worked in the real world.

Besides, unelected warmists have had their day with their never-ending “do what we say or the planet gets it” hysteria.

Canadians want sensible policies to (further) reduce air and water pollution and automobile emissions, make oilsands development environmentally sustainable, conserve energy, clean up toxic waste dumps, safely dispose of nuclear waste, provide clean drinking water to native reserves, preserve forests, put scrubbers on coal-fired electricity plants and expand public infrastructure, including effective public transit.

(As for renewable energy, let’s figure out what works and is economically viable before ramming unwanted industrial wind factories down people’s throats in rural communities, while savaging their democratic rights.)

All of these things make sense regardless of where one stands on climate change…

But back to Mmmm-Mmmm Maxime Maxime as some of my readers refer to him. Is it possible that Bernier is setting the stage for a future leadership bid? Robert Silver seems to think so. He’s comparing Bernier to Sarah Palin!

And ChuckerCanuk thinks this could herald the beginning of the Second Quiet Revolution in Quebec.

Jim Prentice seemed a bit testy yesterday when questioned about Maxime’s remarks:

“I did not talk to Maxime about that (letter) before it was published. As you know, there are many points of view on the science debate that is currently circulating around,” said Prentice in an interview in Washington, where his is discussing climate and energy issues with U.S. officials.

“The views that Maxime has put forward are his personal views. They are not the government’s view. I don’t specifically share them. He is certainly entitled to his perspective, but it is his perspective as an individual. It’s not the government’s perspective.”

Is it possible that Jim Prentice wishes he could also be as forthright as Bernier, but that he is shackled by his Cabinet position and by the fact that Canada must also be careful about policies that could affect trade with the U.S.?

* * * *

Update

Britain’s Weather Office Proposes Climate-Gate Do-Over – Fox News

Filed under AGW, Big Environment, Big Green, Climategate, Copenhagen, Follow the money, Global Warming, Goldstein, Kyoto, UN, Your tax-dollars, climate change, environmentalists, grassroots power.

64 Comments

The debate is NOT over

Posted by Joanne on 15 February 2010, 10:06 am

Yesterday saw two huge news stories but you’ll only hear one from most of Canadian MSM. And make no mistake. Alexandre Bilodeau’s historic Olympic achievement is certainly worth celebrating.

But another major event may be in danger of slipping under the radar unless we force it to the forefront - Professor Phil Jones is now backtracking on previously-held dogma about global warming and climate change. One wonders what fellow High Priest Al Gore is thinking right now. In fact, where is he? Hiding in a snow drift somewhere on the east coast?

In any case, Tim Ball was on the Roy Green show yesterday for a brief chat on the significance of all this [click on Sunday Feb. 14 at 2 pm and fastforward to the last 10 minutes]. Roy asked Tim if ‘this thing is totally unraveling right now?’ and Tim answered ‘completely’ and the question is now ‘how long is it going to take for the politicians to realize it?’ They both agreed that the pols would be ‘breaking their ankles jumping off the bandwagon’, but they have a problem having already committed so much money to it.

Tim Ball reiterated that opinion in his column in CFP – IPCC Corruption Included Ignoring Facts and Science:

Watch the Richter Scale as Politicians Jump Off the IPCC Wagon

Jones only concedes some points but they are enough from the high priest of the CRU and IPCC to completely destroy its credibility. What will the sycophants and exploiters like Gore and the Mainstream Media do now? What about politicians who based positions and policy on environment and energy on the IPCC? What about the massive scams of Cap And Trade? What about the extreme environmental groups who have bullied and preached from the moral high ground? What about the scientists who took vehement positions without understanding? It is a very sad day for science, the people and the world.

Well I hope that politicians wake up but I fear they’ll only do the right thing once the public is made aware of the inconsistencies and contradictions. And that will only happen once the media decides to cover the stories or if ordinary citizens start taking up the fight for truth.

As Adrian MacNair brilliantly pointed out, the pols are only going to do what’s popular:

…Don’t expect our politicians to drop everything either. “Conservative” Environment Minister Jim Prentice is still sending Canada’s industry on a suicide pact with the United States’ own Obamachange legislation, and the province of British Columbia still has a carbon tax on fuel that isn’t making the unemployment rate any better right now. They don’t care. They still believe utterly that the public believes utterly in the science behind boiling pots of frogs and hockey stick graphs.

You can’t really blame them. They’re politicians. If Canadians believed that the world faced the grave danger of alien abduction and medical probing, you can bet the government would install some kind of alien-abduction and probing prophylaxis system that would make us feel better. Just like we do when we strip for the peek-a-boo cameras at the airport…

Meanwhile, expect to see some media outlets continue to stick tenaciously to the old party line until media consumers and ordinary citizens start demanding the truth.

* * * *

Update:

Al Gore sticks his nose out of the ground – Al Gore sticks to his guns, says ‘climate crisis is unfolding before our eyes’ – Washington Times

Is Global Warming Dead? – Blake D. Dvorak at Chicago Now:

…All of which leads the Post’s Dana Milbank, no friend of conservatives or Republicans, to write in his column that all that talk about more frequent and worse hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, droughts because of global warming was about as scientifically valid as the recent babble that record-breaking snow storms in DC disprove global warming. “Argument-by-anecdote isn’t working,” he says. Only too true and it’s about time someone not on the right had the courage to say it.

But Milbank takes his column further. Noting recent revelations and contradictions in the science, he writes: “The science is overwhelming — but not definitive.” There was a time when such blasphemy would earn Milbank the title of “denier.” But that time is swiftly passing and there’s beginning to be a general retreat from the global warming crowd on all the doomsday scenarios and “we have X number of years to save Earth” talk. Milbank notes that even Al Gore’s outfit is switching from TV ads about climate change to the importance of green energy…

* * * *

Tuesday Update

Lots of great links out there. Too many to keep up with really.

Follow the money: BBC exposed in biggest climate racket on planet – Climategate

IPCC scaremongering is destroying its credibility – Bjorn Lomborg

Less horror and Gore, more honest debate – Paul Schneidereit, Chronicle Herald

And this is a blockbuster of a column – Climate: Politics of fear by Chris Vander Doelen of the Windsor Star:

…To me, the most important lesson to be learned from climate change and its believers isn’t about the environment at all. It’s about mob behaviour and the politics of fear.

The global warming cult came so close to taking over the free world because it mixed the fear-mongering and moral superiority of old-time religion with the central control of classic Marxism.

The brilliant mix of do-gooderism and totalitarianism explains why those huddling under the climate umbrella are an unlikely coalition of church ladies, the well-meaning, union hardliners and college-age anarchists.

The people who pushed global warming didn’t want to save the planet — they wanted to enslave it through taxation.

The money — trillions of dollars — would have been redistributed by shadowy forces at the United Nations to those with favoured political systems. Capitalism, of course, would have been dead in a matter of decades. Liberty would have disappeared along with free markets…

Filed under AGW, Big Environment, Big Green, Climategate, Copenhagen, Global governance, MSM bias, Media Watch, Science/tech, UN, Your tax-dollars, climate change, grassroots power.

56 Comments

Changing the channel on climate change

Posted by Joanne on 9 February 2010, 8:01 am

In a recent column Lorrie Goldstein posited that the reason so many in Canadian MSM ignore climategate and associated flaws that are now bubbling to the surface, is because those journalists have invested so much into the subject that they are afraid of losing face:

…Why have Canadian media largely ignored this growing controversy? Perhaps the best answer is embarrassment. Having shilled for warmist hysteria for so long, having dismissed any questioning of man-made climate change orthodoxy as equivalent to Holocaust denial, they don’t know how to climb down, or cope with the tidal wave (pardon the pun) of controversy now hitting climate science all over the world…

That may be true, but I do sense a change in the wind of the climate change debate. Almost every day now we are seeing dribbles from media reluctantly leaking the steady barrage of errors in the science.

So do we abandon the whole thing? Chock it up to a huge scam?

Or how about taking a sensible approach regarding the environment? How about getting back to the basics of trying to clean up our air and water so that we can enjoy the outdoors again during our all-too-short summers in Canada?

Even Scott Brison admits that ‘the discussion has shifted from environmental responsibility to the biggest economic opportunity of the 21st century.’

Maybe so, but let’s focus that green energy market opportunity on cleaning up pollution. That would have an immediate impact, as well as benefiting future generations. If Canadians can come up with cutting-edge technology, so much the better.

Do I have a consensus?

* * * *

Update

Global Warming And Journalists – NCTimes.com Blogs:

…The bolded part is most revealing. Nisbet is cautioning global warming activists and their allies in the media to avoid being tied down to specific predictions vulnerable to being proven false or exaggerated. Instead, Nisbet suggests journalists writing stories that focus on general statements that are harder to falsify. So when you start seeing stories about the public health dangers of global warming, you’ll know the “framing science” PR angle behind it.

Journalists who follow the “framing science” path had better beware that much of the public will object to this as manipulation, attempting to motivate them by fear instead of objectively discussing the facts. Contempt for the public is a sure path to extinction.

Well, let’s hope so.

* * * *

Friday Update

Green Quebec government looking for oil sands investors – QMI

Filed under AGW, Big Environment, Big Green, Canadian economy, Climategate, Copenhagen, Follow the money, Global Warming, Goldstein, UN, climate change, environment.

54 Comments

Why is the TRUTH so Inconvenient?

Posted by Joanne on 31 January 2010, 10:13 am

The global warming debate has really been heating up lately with the two opposing sides becoming increasingly fractious and combative.

Credibility in the Warming side is steadily breaking down and yet the proponents cling to their belief that the overall science is still sound. Most politicians are afraid to confront the new reality and seek refuge in the propaganda without giving more than a passing thought to the remote possibility that we may not be hearing the truth. In some cases they are even declaring war on the ’skeptics’.

Our Conservative Government seems to be seeking the mushy middle on this subject but still succeeds in getting reamed from both extremes of the AGW divide.

Frankly, I believe it is up to columnists like Lorrie Goldstein, Rex Murphy, Lawrence Solomon and Terence Corcoran to try to get the truth out there (with the assistance of bloggers and other social media, letters to the editor, etc.). We need to communicate to the public that the science is at the very least somewhat questionable – that it is not settled - and maybe we shouldn’t even be calling it ’science’ but rather intensive lobbying by various self-interested groups. But the Warmists are hurting their own cause with the coverups and screwups.

Let’s just hope that the public starts tuning into the controversy as well.

I’ve heard the Warmist argument that we can’t afford not to act and so forth. Well if the science is indeed unsettled then we are in for a needless assault on our economy which is just starting to recover. At the very least why not try to get more information and plan to take action when the economy is stronger? And what about the unforeseen side-effects of the mindless accelerated push for green energy?

Let’s pressure our politicians, scientists and the media for all the facts – not just the ones that conveniently support their arguments and personal agenda.

* * * *

Update from the Department of Irony:

Now climate-change scientists say ozone hole stops global warming – M4GW

* * * *

More fallout from in-your-face political know-it-alls and lobbyists:

Lawn companies seek charges against minister, activists – CTV (H/T Musings of the Techical Bard):

…The activists worked with the Ontario government to ban pesticides using alleged false and misleading information to undermine the industry, Lowes said.

The documents filed on Tuesday allege the activists knowingly presented false and misleading information about the health and environmental risks associated with pesticide products, knowingly misled the public, lawn care industry and government officials, and impeded access to Health Canada approved pesticide products through fraudulent means.

The legal manoeuvre, if endorsed by the court, could result in federal charges being filed against Gerretsen and others by police or by a private individual, and there may be sufficient grounds for a criminal charge of fraud, Lowes said…

Will Dalton use our tax dollars to try and buy his way out of this one too? It worked in Caledonia after all.

* * * *

Update

How Many Climategates Are Needed? – CFP

Climategate: Is the British government conspiring not to prosecute? – James Delingpole, Telegraph

Climategate: Al Gore and the politicization of science – Roger L. Simon, Pajamas media

* * * *

Tuesday Update

The UN’s enviro-activist in-chief – National Post

Real deal on Canada’s environmental ranking: Goldstein – Lorrie Goldstein

Filed under AGW, Big Environment, Big Green, CPC majority solution, Canadian economy, Climategate, Copenhagen, Dalton McGuinty, David Suzuki, Follow the money, Global Warming, Global governance, Goldstein, Socialism, UN, Wind farms, environmentalists.

133 Comments

Where exactly does the PM stand on AGW?

Posted by Joanne on 29 January 2010, 3:41 pm

I think Springer’s really nailed the conundrum that PM Stephen Harper finds himself in right now concerning Anthropogenic (man made) global warming.

If we are perfectly honest here, many of us at BLY are finding the Prime Minister’s stance on climate change and global warming somewhat disconcerting – especially in light of recent events that are increasingly calling the scientific credibility into question.

Neil D made an interesting observation in the previous post and I think it reflects the opinion of many Conservative supporters:

This is the problem I’m having… we all know he doesn’t believe the planet is warming, he’s called it a wealth-transfer scam in the past, yet he continues on like he does believe although not whole-heartedly leaving himself open to all kinds of criticisms from so many different people. I know he’s not being totally honest and you know he’s not being totally honest and he knows he’s not being totally honest but what I’m personally looking for in a leader, and especially in the Prime Minister of Canada,is someone who IS honest! Someone willing to call a spade a spade and then deal with the fallout.

Do you really think the Libs, Dippers and Greens (or the Bloc) will think any less of him?
He doesn’t have to come out and say that global warming is a scam but the very least he could do is question the science and ask for a full debate. That’s not too much to ask for.

But as Springer and Hunter point out, trying to find a middle, rational ground is difficult for PM Harper in a media environment where even the faintest suspicion of skepticism is cause for a tarring and feathering by CTV, CBC and the opposition leaders.

But wouldn’t we respect a leader more who follows the actual science and responds accordingly, rather than trying to appease the propagandists simply because the majority of Canadians seem to have swallowed the Green Koolaid without an ounce of healthy skepticism?

* * * *

Update:

The federal environment policy is made in Canada, not Washington – Jim Prentice

Swiss jets form wingtip ‘honour guard’ to escort Harper plane out of airspace – Canadian Press (H/T Sammy):

…Security and media on board the PM’s plane were initially shocked by the sudden appearance of fighter jets, but were eventually assured that there was no threat to anyone’s safety.

Rather, it was an “honour guard” sent to escort the prime minister out of Swiss air space, a Harper spokesman explained.

The honour guard escort is rarely deployed, and is considered a heartfelt sign of close ties between Switzerland and Canada, the spokesman said...

* * * *

Saturday Update:

The folks predicting climate change apocalypse seem to have fallen curiously mute – Rex Murphy, National Post:

...No one’s really talking about the failure of Copenhagen now because the ostensible threat to humanity was shown to be shrouded in hype. Al Gore and his crew simply don’t have now what we used to call “the face” to deliver another grand and imperiously moralizing lecture to the world and its carbon-consuming innocents after the travesty revealed in Climategate and the clutter of revelations that followed it.

Keeping Canadian students in the dark on climate – Lawrence Solomon, Financial Post:

…At our high schools, climate change is taught as dogma, with Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth, a staple (in the U.K., after a high-profile case before the High Court found that An Inconvenient Truth is an error-filled work of propaganda, Gore’s film can no longer be presented as scientifically valid). At our universities, no school dares encourage debate on global warming among its faculty, for fear of repercussions in research funding. By the time students have gone through high school and experienced a year or two of Canadian university, as would have been the case with many in the Munk audience, they almost surely would never have been exposed to the scientific controversy over climate change by their schools, except dismissively. One recent graduate of an Ontario university whom I know, who only discovered the controversy over climate change after receiving her master’s in environmental engineering, feels outrage at being kept in the dark by her school in the area she chose for her career…

And the following are really good links that I don’t have time to follow up on at the moment. Perhaps another blogger or columnist will and then leave a note to that effect? Thanks.

U.N.’s Global Warming Report Under Fresh Attack for Rainforest Claims – Fox News

(Related: The corruption of science – EU Referendum)

Lots more at NewsWatchCanada.

Climate chief was told of false glacier claims before Copenhagen – Times Online

Uh Oh – Pachauri caught out in IPCC 2035 glacier melt issue – Watts up With That

Harper must go! – CJunk. Well I think that’s a tad harsh!

Filed under AGW, Big Environment, Big Green, Canadian economy, Carbon Shaft, Climategate, Copenhagen, Global Warming, Kyoto, MSM bias, Media Watch, Propaganda, Science/tech, Stephen Harper, UN.

64 Comments

McGuinty and Charest – Hypogrits Extraordinaire

Posted by Joanne on 28 December 2009, 8:22 am

I admit this isn’t the most charitable way to resume the post-Christmas blogging season, but Premiers McGuinty and Charest really need to be excoriated on their Copenhagen performance.

We’ve already singled out Dalton McGuinty in a previous post, but he deserves another needling along with his opportunistic Quebec sidekick.

Lorrie Goldstein pilloried them both in his Dec. 27 column – The Climate Blame Game. First of all Lorrie works from the premise that climate change negotiations have more to do with laying blame than actually trying to resolve a problem:

…Laying blame — elsewhere — is vital to politicians when confronting (a) a “problem” they don’t really think is a problem, but their voters do (b) a problem they know they can’t fix or (c) a problem whose solution, even assuming it works, would require sacrifices from people that people are unwilling to make.

All of these are relevant in the current climate of hysteria about global warming.

Blaming someone else is also important to politicians because, for all their grandiose rhetoric, they don’t think in terms of “saving the planet.” They think of successfully managing their own political careers, and, at least in most democracies, of four-year election cycles at best…

Then he goes after McGuinty and Charest:

…But since it’s important for politicians to appear to be concerned about “saving the planet”, Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty and Quebec Premier Jean Charest blamed Prime Minister Stephen Harper for not showing enough leadership, while they and their seconds blamed Alberta for the oilsands.

Aside from throwing a hand grenade into Confederation, the hypocrisy of these two is breathtaking.

If McGuinty wants to “save the planet” from global warming, he should shut down Ontario’s coal-fired energy plants — a promise he has repeatedly broken — plus board up Ontario’s auto sector, which he and the feds just spent billions of tax dollars saving.

If Charest wants to “save the planet” he should stop subsidizing cheap electricity for Quebec consumers and sell more hydro power to the U.S,, so the Americans won’t have to burn as much dirty coal, as advocated by Laval University economists Jean-Thomas Bernard and Jean-Yves Duclos…

Charest’s outburst was indeed full of political posturing and lack of loyalty to his own country (H/T Back Off Government). [More at BC Blue]

Now before any liberal trolls try countering that criticism with this tripe, please check out BC Blue’s response which underscores that even the Liberal premiers of Ontario and Quebec appear to be aware of the weakness of Her Majesty’s Official Opposition. Apparently they feel the need to step into the vacuum.

Angelo Persichilli also shines a spotlight on the hypocrisy of those who blame the source of the ‘dirty energy’ while still using it themselves:

…The environment is not polluted by the people who extract oil from the tar sands, but by the people who use that oil. We don’t want to give up our cars, we refuse to lower our air conditioning and home heating, and we don’t want to give up our air flights, the most serious air polluters of our skies. Nobody wants to tell us that the cost of production will go up during the transition – in many cases destroying industries forever or lowering our salaries to remain competitive…

Exactly. Back Off Government sees a parallel to the Little Red Hen. Not only do Charest and McGuinty need that ‘dirty oil’ for power (especially in the case of Ontario’s auto industry), but they also rely on Alberta for wealth transfer in the form of equalization payments. Actually a more apt fable may be the story of the Goose that Laid the Golden Egg.

And all this would still be remotely acceptable if the science was settled – which it isn’t.

As Mark Steyn recently pointed out, climate change is more of a substitute religion and money-making scheme than a serious effort to reduce man-made global warming – if indeed it does exist (Why climate change is hot hot hot):

…When man was made in the image of God, he was fallen but redeemable. Gaia’s psychologically unhealthy progeny are merely irredeemable. Anti-humanism is everywhere, not least in the barely concealed admiration for China’s (demographically disastrous) “One Child” policy advanced by everyone from the National Post’s Diane Francis to Sir David Attenborough, the world’s leading telly naturalist but also a BBC exec who once long ago commissioned the great series The Ascent of Man. If Sir David’s any guide, the great thing about man’s ascent is it gives him a higher cliff to nosedive off.

Very few sciences could survive being embraced as a religion. Imagine the kind of engineering or math you’d get if it also had to function as a “faith tradition.” What’s also changed since the seventies is the nature of the UN and the transnational bureaucracies. Once it became obvious that “climate change” represents an almost boundless shakedown of functioning jurisdictions by dysfunctional basket cases, the die was cast. “Aid” is a discredited word these days and comes with too many strings attached. But eco-credits sluiced through an oil-for-food program on steroids offers splendid new opportunities for bulking up an ambitious dictator’s Swiss bank accounts…

And so we are left with two eastern Liberal premiers who obviously think that the path to their promised political land lies in efforts to humiliate our beloved country and stir up talk of western separation. The reason for their scorn has little scientific basis. It’s all about what they perceive to be the populist response to the flavour-of-the-month cause that could actually cause our country great harm in so many ways.

Let’s show them how off-track they really are in the next Quebec and Ontario elections.

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Related: “Mr Premier, are you ready to see me? Are you ready?” – ChuckerCanuk. I missed that one just before Christmas but L. Ian MacDonald’s column is really worth checking out. And frankly it’s rather frightening how easily President Obama appears to have been manipulated.

Filed under AGW, Barack Obama, Big Environment, Big Green, Climategate, Copenhagen, Dalton McGuinty, Energy, Follow the money, Global Warming, Goldstein, Jean Charest, Ontario, Quebec, UN, climate change, economy, environmentalists, hypocrisy.

47 Comments

The Copenhagen Shakedown Con is on

Posted by Joanne on 16 December 2009, 1:12 pm

Kevin Gaudet from the Canadian Taxpayers Federation was on Rutherford this morning explaining the cold hard realities of what the environmentalists are trying to wring out of us in Copenhagen (H/T Bec).

[Update: Link added to CTF after publication. Much of the info is also available there - Blog Admin]

Please, please listen to the archives at CHQR. Click on Dec. 16 at 9 am. The interview starts right after the news.

This is your money folks! If you don’t act now, it will be too late. We will be held hostage forever. Write letters, call your MP, talk to your friends and family. Do something!

It’s a shakedown and you’re the victim. Don’t be duped.

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Related:

Please check out SDA – The Sound Of All Hell Breaking Loose, Pt. 14.

“From My Cold Dead Hands!” – Fildebrandt.ca

The scare tacticians – David Warren:

...But the activists will come up with something, for their livelihoods depend upon it. And as the world’s climate is constantly changing, and has been doing for the past 4.54 billion years, “climate change” itself will provide new opportunities.

For this reason, I think we need, after thorough public inquiries, to bring criminal prosecutions against some of the major scientific players exposed by the recent release of e-mails and papers at the centre of the “global warming” scam. The more any percipient reader pours through those “hacked” documents, the clearer he will see the criminal intent behind the massaging of the numbers; for the masseuses in question stood to benefit directly and personally from getting “the right results.” This is by its nature an issue for the criminal courts.

My reasoning here is that “environmentalism” at large has — like all other “progressive” movements — exploited public gullibility about motivations.

The leading lights have accumulated wealth and power, while presenting themselves as men of goodwill. They have projected themselves through sympathetic media as unselfish and pure, and have demonized their opponents as selfish and impure, while themselves being on the take…

An inconvenient cash cow – Roy Clancy

Must read Update

The climate change conference from Hell - Kelly McParland:

…We have Al Gore, he of the energy-sucking mansion and private jets, who charges $1,200 a handshake to be fawned over by fans, announcing that new hot-off-the-presses data show the Arctic ice cap will be fully melted in seven years, the only problem being that it’s not true.

All this so countries like Canada can pony up something in the range of $100 billion for a climate fund, to be dispursed to people like Mugabe, so they can use it to pad their foreign bank accounts “adapt” their nations to climate change.

Remind me again why I want nothing to do with these clowns and their farce of an international climate crisis, and why I have no faith whatsoever in their ability to mount a credible emisions plan…

Must-listen Update

AM770 now has guest-host Roy Green’s interview with Lord Christopher Monckton archived. Go here and then click on today (Dec. 16) at 1:30 pm. I guarantee you will be glad you did.

Lord Monckton Charges Eco-Dictatorship - EIR

Copenhagen Grifters Plan $3,000 Con – Kevin Gaudet at CFP

Climategate goes SERIAL: now the Russians confirm that UK climate scientists manipulated data to exaggerate global warming – James Delingpole (H/T Maz2)

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Payback time for Greenpeace (H/T Warren Z at SDA):