MIT Prof on Global Warming

From Dr. Lindzen, my hero:

Over the last 100 years or so, globally averaged surface temperature, which is always varying a little, has gone both up and down, but over the whole period it is estimated to have risen about half a degree centigrade (using the US National Climate Data Centre's analysis; other analyses give as much as 0.65C).
advertisement

However, this value is associated with substantial error bars, and the warming is occurring in a system that can vary about that much without any forcing at all - something not surprising in a system that is both turbulent and heterogeneous.

Yes, there does appear to be warming, but the amount is hardly certain or indisputable. And the amount found does not appear that alarming.

The alarm, I would suppose, comes from the notoriously inadequate climate models.

Ah yes, my favorite chestnut from my years as a graduate student: proof by computer simulation. It was shoddy science then, and its shoddy science now. True science should be based on empirical observation, and models verified by empirical observation (ie models that make measurable predictions that can then be checked against reality to ascertain the model's accuracy). To call global warming alarmism "science" is a gross distortion.

Climate vs. Weather

Link:

Last week, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), a US government agency, announced that for the second consecutive month, temperatures across the US were actually cooler than average. We can't whine about lack of coverage here because in fairness, ABC's Bill Blakemore (presumably an Al Gore voter) jumped right on the story. However, they spent as much time telling viewers how this trend did not debunk the global warming theory as they did reporting on the fact that temperatures dropped. ABC went on to explain to its viewers that this was a trend in weather, not climate. Big difference.

They're actually right about that, and we'd agree with them on that point. But as Noel Sheppard points out over at NewsBusters, back on August 4, Blakemore reported on the nation's heat wave, citing it as evidence of so much global warming. Apparently, it's climate when the temperature goes up, it's weather when the temperature goes down.

Geez.

Via Instapundit

Link:

We see odd symptoms of this progressive disease in the most surprising ways. Note the current agitating for intervention in Dafur—but without promises to “stay the course” when it gets messy (and it will); note also sermonizing about the killing there without frequently mentioning the culprits: radical and racist Islamists (notice the odd preference for the passive voice that thousands “perish” or “die” rather than Islamic nomadic and Arab nationalists raping, butchering, and machine-gunning them).

It is hard to know whether liberals are more scared of doing nothing while 400,000 “perish” or indirectly aiding George Bush’s trumped war against terror by lending their support to stopping radical Islamic killers, many of whose enablers in the Sudanese government were the very ones who hosted Osama bin Laden.

The steadfast refusal of some in our body politic to call a spade a spade puzzles me. The same kind of head-in-the-sand mentality applies to the current debates about racism in higher education, where blacks and hispanics recieve more help than other races in admissions and financial aid.

Liberals tolerate anything but Christianity

Link.

There must also be the legitimate suspicion that Christianity is regarded as a “soft target” by union activists. It is doubtful whether student bodies of other faiths would be informed that they had to accept those who did not wish to uphold their beliefs as executive committee members or have their termcards scrutinised for perceived slights against homosexuality.

This article goes out to Lewis Pasiliao.

John Edwards, PS3, and Walmart

Yesterday, a staff person for former Sen. Edwards contacted a Wal-Mart
electronics manager in Raleigh, North Carolina to obtain a Sony
PlayStation3 on behalf of the Senator's family...
The Company noted "the PlayStation3 is an extremely popular item this
Christmas season, and while the rest of America's working families are
waiting patiently in line, Senator Edwards wants to cut to the front.
While, we cannot guarantee that Sen. Edwards will be among one of the first
to obtain a PlayStation3, we are certain Sen. Edwards will be able to find
great gifts for everyone on his Christmas list."

What a crock. Just because he's an ex-senator he thinks he gets special access to the PS3? Give me a friggin break.

Mark Tapscott

Via Instapundit.com -:

"When Republicans worry more about staying in government than about limiting government, they get thrown out of government."

Beautifully put. I can't help but feel like the GOP's current pain is well deserved ... I'm just not happy that we have to suffer through the next few years of a D-Rat congress.

The New Yorker:

The Critics: A Critic At Large:

"Converse concluded that “very substantial portions of the public” hold opinions that are essentially meaningless—off-the-top-of-the-head responses to questions they have never thought about, derived from no underlying set of principles. These people might as well base their political choices on the weather. And, in fact, many of them do."

My only surprise is that political scientist needed a bunch of research to reach this conclusion.

Election Day Approaches

Greg Mankiw's Blog: Election Day Approaches:

"So the next time a friend of yours tells you he's not voting, don't try to change his mind. It's a good bet that if he's not voting, he's not been following the election closely anyway. Maybe he watched a baseball game instead of the debates. Maybe he is bored silly with all the talk of targeted tax cuts, privatized social security, and campaign finance reform. Maybe he's as ignorant about public policy as those focus groups of undecided voters that are the media's latest darling.

So rather than pushing your friend to the polls, perhaps you should thank him for staying at home. He's making your vote count just a little bit more."

Via Instapundit. Nice -- I actually favor some sort of basic intelligence test prior to voting to ensure that voters have some minimal level of knowledge and understanding of the issues.