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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

Al Gore pokes head out of snowbank…

Posted by Joanne on 27 February 2010, 4:35 pm

And declares catastrophe still imminent: We Can’t Wish Away Climate Change – NYT op-ed by Al Gore.

The rhetoric is extremely nauseating but here’s the kicker:

…It is true that the climate panel published a flawed overestimate of the melting rate of debris-covered glaciers in the Himalayas, and used information about the Netherlands provided to it by the government, which was later found to be partly inaccurate. In addition, e-mail messages stolen from the University of East Anglia in Britain showed that scientists besieged by an onslaught of hostile, make-work demands from climate skeptics may not have adequately followed the requirements of the British freedom of information law...

Did you get that? Those nasty deniers caused all the trouble demanding answers from the scientists so they couldn’t do their work properly. It wasn’t about accountability at all. Oh no, they were deliberately trying to confuse the good folks at East Anglia and slow them down.

Bad deniers! Bad.

Is this crap going to be in the next film that he force-feeds to the world’s youth?

* * * *

Update

If you care to submit a letter to the New York Times, here are the rules.

* * * *

You Can Call Him Al … But Al Won’t Call You Back – Fox News

(H/T Orange County Register)

And from the same source – Mark Landsbaum: What to say to a global warming alarmist. (A great summary of all the ‘Gates’.)

Filed under Al Gore, Big Environment, Big Green, Climategate, Follow the money, Global Warming, UN, Your tax-dollars, climate change.

38 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

Stop climate change – Wear a sweater

Posted by Joanne on 24 February 2010, 12:12 pm

Yeah, but if global warming is such a problem why do I need the sweater?

Dear Loblaws – Please forget supporting the WWF and give that money to your Children’s Charities instead. I love your products but hate your politics. Thank you.

Filed under Big Environment, Big Green, Climategate, Follow the money, Global Warming, Propaganda, climate change, environment, environmentalists.

50 Comments

You can’t have it both ways (but they still try)

Posted by Joanne on 21 February 2010, 9:43 am

Lorrie Goldstein presents a compelling argument to global warming alarmists in today’s column Global Warming Snow Job - not that logic was ever their strong suit (or objective science for that matter):

...So, given the somewhat unsurprising news Olympic officials were trucking in snow to Cypress Mountain, site of the freestyle skiing and snowboard events, how did Canadian warmists respond?

Well, here’s our most famous environmentalist, David Suzuki, calmly commenting.

“I’ve watched in horror as the snow just melted away from Cypress Mountain and it’s even more horrifying to me to think of helicopters airlifting snow from Manning Park to fill it back up again.”

In addition to Suzuki’s apparently low tolerance for horror, climatically speaking, his foundation chimed in man-made global warming clearly had a hand in the lack of snow.

So, just to review the warmist perspective:

(1) North of the 49th parallel — global warming explains the lack of snow.

(2) South of the 49th parallel — global warming explains the snow.

Plus:

(1) Warmists can use single weather events to prove global warming.

(2) Opponents can’t use single weather events to disprove global warming.

Does it not occur to warmists that stuff like this is one of the reasons more and more people are starting to think of them as the intellectual heirs of Chicken Little?

And a few words for the Gore-Suzuki bootlicking media:

…As for Canada’s warmist media, if you’re wondering why fewer people are buying your argument neither climategate nor the growing scientific controversies engulfing the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is news, ask yourself this.

How many of you (justifiably) criticized Inhofe, DeMint and Fox for what they said? Now, how many of you criticized Suzuki and his foundation for what they said? Oops.

A final assignment for warmists. Go to your video bible, Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth, and find in all those dramatic visual images linking global warming to present-day heat waves, droughts, floods, melting glaciers, rising sea levels and hurricanes, one image — just one — linking global warming to record snowstorms.

Trust me, you won’t find any, because that would have gotten in the way of Gore’s painfully simplistic argument that more greenhouse gas emissions simply means more heat...

Unfortunately for the Warming lobby, the public is becoming more educated and less likely to placidly accept the Green Koolaid that’s been shoved down our throats for so long. And what many of us would like to see is some kind of redress for this massive propaganda scheme which seems to have been preying on our blind faith and naivete – and costing us big bucks.

At the very least let’s hope we have learned to view the news with a dose of healthy skeptism – and not be afraid of being labelled a ‘denier’.

Filed under Big Environment, Big Green, Climategate, Copenhagen, David Suzuki, Follow the money, Global Warming, Goldstein, Kyoto, MSM bias, Media Watch, Propaganda, UN, Weather, Your tax-dollars, climate change, environment, environmentalists.

42 Comments

The rats are jumping ship

Posted by Joanne on 18 February 2010, 8:04 am

Yvo de Boer has just announced his intentions to resign as executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. Can you spell f-a-i-l-u-r-e?

Meanwhile we learn via Terence Corcoran and Lawrence Solomon that ‘at least five major U.S. corporations have pulled out of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership‘. Yet several of our Canadian provinces are still hanging onto the cap-trade scheme.

Why is it taking our Canadian political leaders so long to catch up on the latest news? Why are they not at least acknowledging the mistakes?

As Lorrie Goldstein says today, We’re drowning in climate stupidity.

Demand answers, Canada!

Do not go placidly into that carbon trade cesspool.

* * * *

Related

Cap-and-Trade Cracks Up – Myron Ebell, Fox News:

…So cap-and-trade is dead. But other piecemeal energy-rationing policies are still very much alive. The Environmental Protection Agency is going ahead with regulating greenhouse gas emissions using the Clean Air Act. Senator Lindsey Graham (R-S.C.) is working with Senators John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joseph Lieberman (D-Conn.) on a “compromise” package that can gain bipartisan support. Senator Jeff Bingaman (D-N.M.) has passed a renewable electricity requirement and new building energy efficiency standards out of his committee.

And big corporations are still circling the trough. By my count, U.S. CAP still has twenty-three corporate members plus eight environmental pressure groups that front for big business. And of course, BP America, Conoco Phillips, Caterpillar, and many other companies that don’t belong to U.S. CAP still hope to make money off the “right” sort of policies to raise energy prices.

The good news is that public opinion has turned decisively against global warming alarmism and energy-rationing. People have figured out that they, not big business special interests, will end up paying the bills when energy prices, in President Obama’s elegant formulation, “necessarily skyrocket.” And, guess what? In the November elections, the American people will have a lot more votes than James Rogers of Duke Energy or Jim Mulva of Conoco Phillips.

* * * *

In case you missed it:

Many thanks to Frmgrl and Bec for the tip about Dave Rutherford’s interview with Jim Prentice yesterday. Definitely worth a listen. [Click on Wednesday Feb. 17 at 11 am]

* * * *

Friday Update

Denial not just for the deniers – Peter Foster, Financial Post

Filed under Big Environment, Big Green, Canadian economy, Carbon Shaft, Climategate, Copenhagen, Flicking politicians, Follow the money, Goldstein, Lemmings love taxes, Science/tech, UN, Your tax-dollars, climate change, environment, environmentalists, grassroots power.

54 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

The Asbestos Enablers

Posted by Joanne on 5 February 2010, 7:58 am

Even though Jean Charest and the Federal Conservative government frequently find themselves at odds on environmental issues, they appear to be co-conspirators regarding the export of asbestos as Jeffrey Simpson points out this morning:

…But Mr. Charest said it was up to India to act if it felt asbestos led to health problems. He was accompanied by a representative of an asbestos lobby group that receives money from both the federal and provincial governments; his group, he said, gives information to asbestos users about its possible risks. In other words, caveat emptor! Meantime, it’s business as usual for Quebec’s asbestos exports…

Or is it just the environment that Jean Charest cares about? Not the health of people in developing countries?

And to the Conservative government, how about showing some backbone on this issue? You really don’t have much more to lose in Quebec anyway.

And to Mr. Iffy – Have you finally figured out where you stand?

Hypocrites the lot of you!

* * * *

Charest faces questions about export of asbestos during visit to India – Record

UN climate guru on skeptics: “hope that they apply it (asbestos) to their faces every day” - B.C Blue

Charest: Asbestos “is politically part of our history” – B.C. Blue

* * * *

Feb. 12 Update

On hot seat over asbestos – Gazette:

…On the trade mission, the premier was quoted in La Presse as saying “Chrysotile (asbestos) can be used in a safe manner; this is what WHO reports say. It is not a banned substance. It is up to the government of India to put the necessary laws in place.”

In fact, the World Health Organization has said that all types of asbestos, including the type mined in Quebec (chrysotile) cause asbestosis, mesothelioma and cancer of the lung, and recommends against continued use of any form of asbestos. The International Labour Organization adopted a resolution in 2006 urging the elimination of use of all forms of asbestos and of materials containing asbestos…

Filed under Canadian Government, Flicking politicians, Follow the money, Iffy, Iggo Waffles, Michael Ignatieff, Quebec politics, Voter cynicism, economy, health, hypocrisy.

28 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