Ebenezer Scrooge – proto-Green?

I read Dickens’ “A Christmas Carol” annually to remind myself why I will someday invent a time machine, travel back to 1843, and have him kneecapped. This year, though, it yielded unforeseen riches in the form of a sudden shock, a unexpected vision of an all too familiar character that I never realized existed in 19^th century London. What was this revelation, this epiphany, this eye-opener? It turns out that the unreconstructed Scrooge is actually a 21^st century environmentalist.

The first rather broad hint of this comes as Scrooge is in his office trying to get rid of two gentlemen who are soliciting charitable donations. When one of them says that many of the poor would rather die than go to the workhouses, Scrooge replies, “If they would rather die, they had better do it, and decrease the surplus population.” A reply that would do Paul Ehrlich and the rest of his Neo-Malthusian misanthropes proud! Of course, they want the poor to die to save the environment, just like all those who condemned millions of Africans to illness and death by banning DDT. That’s more important than human lives. But wait, there’s more!

“Scrooge had a very small fire, but the clerk’s fire was so very much smaller that it looked like one coal. But he couldn’t replenish it, for Scrooge kept the coal-box in his own room, and as surely as the clerk came in with the shovel, the master predicted that it would be necessary to part.”

Scrooge is obviously being conservation minded here, and he is sincerely trying to reduce his carbon footprint on the earth by limiting his use of fossil fuels. And as all Greens desperately wish, he has the power to force another to behave likewise whether that person wants to or not. It’s for his own good, after all.

When Scrooge’s nephew comes in to wish him a merry Christmas, Scrooge snarls, “What right have you to be merry?” What is this but the constant cry of the Al Gores of the world decrying any human comfort or enjoyment as destructive to the planet? Nobody has a right to be merry unless Al and his fellow elites approve.

Before his conversion to Dickensian righteousness, Scrooge walks everywhere – no SUV for him! He eats cheap food and not much of it. He lives in rooms in an old building that has been converted to offices – no planet-killing house or yard. He owns very little furniture or clothing. He has no wife or children - no contributor to overpopulation he! He hates humanity in general and especially people who are enjoying themselves ("If I could work my will every idiot who goes about with 'Merry Christmas' on his lips should be boiled with his own pudding and buried with a stake of holly through his heart."). He is the very model of the modern Green, the master mold of environmentalism. Who cares about the actual reasons for living such a life, it’s good for the planet, isn’t it? We should all be like Scrooge! Well, the old Scrooge. After Dickens' sentimental ghosts get through with him, his consumption of the earth’s resources goes way up – “Make up the fires and buy another coal-scuttle before you dot another i, Bob Cratchit!” He also “knew how to keep Christmas well”, and we all know what THAT means. Redemption, indeed! Bah, humbug!

So in this season of hope and joy, remember that the only way to save the planet is for all of us to be hopeless and joyless like old Ebenezer Scrooge, version one.

Merry Christmas!

It's about time.

SENATOR INHOFE ANNOUNCES PUBLIC RELEASE OF “SKEPTIC’S GUIDE TO DEBUNKING GLOBAL WARMING”

Washington D.C. - Senator James Inhofe (R-Okla.), the outgoing Chairman of Environment & Public Works Committee, is pleased to announce the public release of the Senate Committee published booklet entitled “A Skeptic’s Guide to Debunking Global Warming Alarmism. Hot & Cold Media Spin Cycle: A Challenge To Journalists who Cover Global Warming.”

Click here to download the "Skeptic's Guide" (http://epw.senate.gov/repwhitepapers/6341044%20Hot%20&%20Cold%20Media.pdf)]

The color glossy 64 page booklet -- previously was only available in hardcopy to the media and policy makers -- includes speeches, graphs, press releases and scientific articles refuting catastrophe climate fears presented by the media, the United Nations, Hollywood and former Vice President turned-foreign-lobbyist Al Gore.

The “Skeptic’s Guide” includes a copy of Senator Inhofe’s 50 minute Senate floor speech http://epw.senate.gov/speechitem.cfm?party=rep&id=263759 delivered on September 25, 2006 challenging the media to improve its reporting.

The ‘Skeptic’s Guide’, which has received recognition by the LA Times and Congressional Quarterly, is now available free for international distribution on the Senate Environmental & Public Works Web site (http://epw.senate.gov/w_papers.cfm?party=rep)]

The book, which features web links to all supporting documentation, also serves as a handbook to identify the major players in media bias when it comes to poor climate science reporting. The guide presents a reporter’s virtual who’s-who’s of embarrassing and one-sided media coverage, with a focus on such reporters as CBS News “60 Minutes” Scott Pelley, ABC News reporter Bill Blakemore, CNN’s Miles O’Brien, and former NBC Newsman Tom Brokaw.

Senator Inhofe’s “Skeptic’s Guide” also includes hard hitting critiques of the New York Times, Time Magazine, Newsweek, Associated Press, Reuters, the LA Times, the Chicago Tribune, and the Washington Post.

Senator Inhofe has challenged the media in a series of speeches and hearings to stop the unfounded hype.

“The American people are fed up with the media for promoting the idea that former Vice President Al Gore represents the scientific “consensus” that SUV’s and the modern American way of life have somehow created a 'climate emergency' that only United Nations bureaucrats and wealthy Hollywood liberals can solve,” Senator Inhofe said in October.

Skepticism that human C02 emissions are creating a “climate catastrophe” has grown in recent times. In September, renowned French geophysicists and Socialist Party member Claude Allegre, converted from a believer in manmade catastrophic global warming to a climate skeptic. This latest defector from the global warming camp caps a year in which numerous scientific studies have bolstered the claims of climate skeptics.

Scientific studies that debunk the dire predictions of human-caused global warming have continued to accumulate and many believe the new science is shattering the media-promoted scientific “consensus” on climate alarmism.

See: (http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=264777)

It's too bad that Inhofe will no longer be the chairman of this committee, but I'm glad he took this parting shot. We'll see if the next chairman, Barbara Boxer, will actually promote real science as Inhofe did or if she will go along with her party's alarmist Algorian views.

P.T. Barnum was wrong. There are hundreds born every minute.

From the Christian Science Moniter:

Americans try to shift into 'carbon neutral'

To combat global warming, many try to remove as much carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as they add to it.

By Gregory M. Lamb | Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor

Are you living "carbon neutral" - or better yet, "carbon negative"? Have you gone on a "carbon diet"? Are you shrinking your "carbon footprint" on the earth or aiming for a "net zero" lifestyle?

If so, you've got lots of company, including celebrities, sports teams, airlines, moviemakers, tour operators, and at least one college. They're all trying to make sure that they're removing at least as much carbon (in the form of carbon dioxide, or CO2) from the atmosphere as they add from heating their homes or businesses or traveling by car or airplane.

I'm not even going to belabour the point that human emissions have EXTREMELY LITTLE TO NO effect on global climate. We'll see what the real reason for this is later in the article.

[snip]

Becoming "carbon neutral" involves two steps, environmentalists point out. The first is to reduce carbon emissions through familiar conservation measures: replacing incandescent light bulbs with fluorescent bulbs, using public transit, and so forth. Many online "carbon calculators" help individuals or businesses assess how much carbon they are emitting.

But that only reduces their carbon emissions. To get to zero, they'll need to buy "carbon offsets" by sending money to projects that replace fossil fuels with renewable energy sources, such as solar or wind-power generators, or to projects that remove carbon dioxide from the air, such as tree farms.

For example, a new business-class airline, Silverjet, plans to add a levy of about $26 to its transatlantic fares that will be sent to carbon-reducing projects to offset the carbon burned during the flight.

But some environmentalists worry that the idea of going "carbon neutral" could be detrimental if it leads to people only buying offsets and not changing their lifestyles.

"The concept of carbon neutrality is great. But it's one thing for people to do things to reduce their carbon emissions in their own lives; it's another thing for people to buy credits or offsets counting on someone else to clean up their act," says Dan Becker, director of the Sierra Club's global warming project. "It would be bad if it has the impact of creating sort of 'papal indulgences' that people feel that they're allowed to buy a gas-guzzling SUV or otherwise pollute in ways that they could avoid because they can pay someone else to plant some trees in Guatemala."

See my comments in previous blogs. Indulgences is exactly what they are. "Being green" is the newest religion.

"The past year has been tremendous," says Billy Connelly, part owner and marketing director of Native Energy of Charlotte, Vt., which sells carbon offsets. The level of public understanding about carbon emissions is much greater now than two to four years ago when the majority native American-owned company was just starting out.

"It's due in no small part to Mr. Gore's film," he says.

Yes, the Reverand Al, the high pontiff of the greens.

Native Energy invests in solar, wind, and biomass energy-generating projects that aim to "push coal-fired and gas-fired energy off the [electric] grid," Mr. Connelly says. In one native village in Alaska, he says, a wind turbine is replacing expensive diesel fuel that had to be flown in to make electricity.

The villagers have seen firsthand the results of global warming, he says. "The permafrost is literally melting beneath them."

So maybe they'll be able to have gardens now? Why is warmer always bad? Why is permafrost good? What do they use for power when the wind's not blowing?

Individuals who have bought carbon offsets from Native Energy include the Middlebury (Vt.) College ski team, Ben & Jerry's ice cream, Clif Bar energy bars, and the Canadian alternative rock band Barenaked Ladies. The Dave Matthews Band has bought enough offsets, Connelly says, to make up for the carbon the group has emitted during its entire 15 years of touring.

See P.T. Barnum again. There's plenty of them with money, too, I guess.

Meanwhile, the College of the Atlantic in Bar Harbor, Maine, is proclaiming itself to be the first such institution pledged to be carbon neutral. The college plans to offset all student and faculty commuting to campus and any other carbon emissions "caused by our existence," says college president David Hales.

The school's fleet of boats, for example, has been converted to burn only renewable biofuels.

Let's all switch to biofuels. Then we can use all that soy and corn for fuel instead of feeding all those pesky poor people in the third world.

Students are heavily involved on committees now researching how to determine the size of the college's "carbon footprint" and how to best buy carbon offsets. Whatever offsets are purchased must show that the projects they support have "quantifiable, verifiable" results in reducing carbon emissions, Mr. Hales says.

I would REALLY like to see those numbers. How do you verify the amount of carbon a tree takes up?

Trustees, alumni, parents, and donors back the carbon-neutral initiative, he adds. The school's pledge follows other environmental moves at the college. It already buys all of its electricity from a wind- powered source and held a "zero-waste" graduation ceremony last year.

Well, zero waste except for the paper the degrees were printed on. If this "science" is representative of the quality of the other programs at that school, they're of no worth at all.

Actually, I just read constantly.

You paid attention during 100% of high school!

85-100% You must be an autodidact, because American high schools don't get scores that high! Good show, old chap!

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It also appears that I am a genius.

Considering the source, it's just as accurate to say that I'm big in Japan.

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Poetic Justice?

Film industry pollution clogging skies over Hollywood: study

Hollywood is responsible for creating an unwanted special effect in the skies above Los Angeles: pollution, new research published Tuesday showed.

A study by the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) Institute of the Environment said the film industry was responsible for sending 140,000 tonnes of pollutants into the atmosphere every year.

Ozone and diesel emissions from trucks and generators used on movie sets as well as pyrotechnic explosions for special effects all contributed to the layer of smog that hangs over Los Angeles.

"Many industries are moving toward more environmentally sustainable operations, and it's important that we monitor their progress," said institute director Mary Nichols.

Nichols said researchers noted that although several studios and production companies were taking steps to minimise damage, the industry's lack of a unified environmental strategy was a barrier to improvement.

Two UCLA professors who conducted an analysis as part of the study concluded that Hollywood could be doing more, the report said.

"Our overall impression is that, with a few notable and inspiring exceptions, environmental considerations are not high on the agenda in the film and television industry, and that more could be done within the industry to foster environmentally friendly approaches," the professors said.

The researchers cited the example of the makers of "The Day After Tomorrow", who paid for a 200,000-dollar package of environmental measures to offest damage caused by vehicles used in the 2004 blockbuster.

The makers of the last two "Matrix" films were also praised for arranging for more than 97 percent of set materials to be recycled.

The study found the problem was attributable to the transient nature of production companies, saying that "the degree to which work is controlled by short-lived ever-changing production companies" made it "difficult to institutionalize best practices."

Business groups warned against using the report to crackdown on the film and television industry, which generates around 29 billion a year in combined revenues and employs around 252,000 people.

Jack Kyser, chief economist for the Los Angeles County Economic Development Corp, cautioned against further regulation, saying it could force movie and television studios out of California.

"There would be a risk because you have other states out there quite anxious to get a piece of the film industry," he told the Los Angeles Times. "This would just be another nudge."

Now they need to study how much pollution is caused by the Hollywood and Washington elites flying all over the place to tell us peons how we're destroying the planet by living too well.

How low can you go? If you're the UN, it's inestimable:

from the Senate EPW

New UN Children’s Book Promotes Global Warming Fears to Kids

Nairobi, Kenya – A new United Nations children’s book promoting fears of catastrophic manmade global warming is being promoted at the UN Climate Change Conference in Kenya. The books main character, a young boy, is featured getting so worried about a coming manmade climate disaster that he yells “I don’t want to hear anymore!” The new children’s book, entitled “Tore and the Town on Thin Ice” ((http://www.unep.org/PDF/TORE.pdf)) is published by the United Nations Environment Programme and blames “rich countries” for creating a climate catastrophe and urges children to join environmental groups.

The book is about a young kid named Tore who lives in an Arctic village. Tore loses a dog sled race because he crashes through the thinning ice allegedly caused by manmade greenhouse gas emissions. The book features colorful drawings and large text to appeal to young children.

After the boy loses the dog sled race, he is visited by “Sedna, the Mother of the Sea” in a dream. The “Sea Mother” Goddess informs the boy in blunt terms that the thinning ice that caused his loss in the dog sled race was due to manmade global warming.

“I’m the one who created and cares for the sea creatures – whales and walruses, seals and fish,” the “Sea Mother” explained to the boy. The “Sea Mother” then tells the boy she will educate him about the reason the ice is thinning.

The morning after his dream, Tore sets out on a quest for knowledge about the dangers of catastrophic manmade global warming. A “snowy owl” informs Tore that “the planet’s heating up” and that both the Arctic and Antarctica “are warming almost twice as fast as elsewhere.” [EPW Note: The Arctic, according to the International Arctic Research Center was warmer during the 1930’s than today and both the journals Science and Nature have published studies recently finding – on balance – Antarctica is both cooling and gaining ice.]

The “snowy owl” tells Tore that winning dog sledding races “might not be your top worry” and the owl instead tells the boy that “lots of things are changing fast. Some people who hunt for a living are already going hungry because a lot of seals and walruses are heading north.”

The “snowy owl” also asserts that “the great ice cap here in Greenland—mountains of snow and ice up to about four kilometers thick—is thawing.” [EPW Note: A 2005 study by a scientist named Ola Johannessen and his colleagues showed that the interior of Greenland is gaining ice and mass.]

Next, a polar bear informs Tore that it is hungry because the ice is too thin to stand on and hunt and the bear says that other bears have “starved” because the sea ice went out to sea. The polar bear adds, “We may not have much of a future.” [EPW Note: In May of 2006, biologist Dr. Mitchell Taylor from the Arctic government of Nunavut, a territory of Canada, noted that “Of the 13 populations of polar bears in Canada, 11 are stable or increasing in number. They are not going extinct, or even appear to be affected at present.” (http://www.thestar.com/NASApp/cs/ContentServer?pagename=thestar/Layout/Article_Type1&c=Article&cid=1146433819696&call_pageid=970599119419 ]

The polar bear concludes by telling Tore, “It looks like many animals and fish and birds will go extinct—die out—during your lifetime, partly because of changes in climate.”

The child is described “at a loss for words” after hearing this grim news and just “stare[s] at the polar bear.”

After a whale appears to present more climate fear, the boy finally screams, “Listen, I’ve had all the bad news I can stand. Our world is melting. Polar bears are starving and all sorts of animals won’t survive. I don’t want to hear anymore!”

The whale responds, “That’s the spirit! Get good and angry. You’ll need all that energy to make a difference.” The whale then goes on to describe computer model projections of massive coastal flooding in the future and the potential destruction of human life in coastal areas because of the projected sea level rise. [EPW note: Many scientists dispute the notion that mankind has created a climate doomsday. See: ((http://epw.senate.gov/pressitem.cfm?party=rep&id=264777))]

The whale continues, telling the child that more hurricanes and “other things you call ‘natural disasters’ are on their way, too – and they’re getting harsher.” [EPW Note: The relationships between global warming and hurricanes is currently under debate, with the great majority of scientists believing there is little connection. For instance, 2006 was anticipated to be a record year for Hurricanes, but turned out to be one of the calmest seasons in many, many years.]

Finally Tore has had enough and asks, “Is there anything at all a kid like me can do?”

The “Sea Mother” tells him of the dangerous effects that an oil and gas based energy system has on the climate and the “Sea Mother” singles out the industrialized world as the cause of her predicted climate catastrophe.

“Rich countries use—and waste—an awful lot of energy. Huge cars. Too many cars instead of efficient trains and buses,” the “Sea Mother explains to Tore. [EPW Fact: Several developing world nations will soon pass the U.S. in greenhouse gas emissions. China alone will pass the U.S. in emissions in 2009. ]

Finally the “Sea Mother” tells Tore that the solution to the climate crisis can begin in his Arctic village by “setting up solar panels to get electricity from the sun, and modern windmills to capture the energy of the wind.”

The book ends with a section answering the question “What can you do?” The books answer includes such suggestions as “Join or create an environmental club,” “only drive cars if you must,” and “write to your political leaders.”

Shameless.

Government Scientists Demand Repeal of Laws of Physics, Claim They Don't Take Global Warming Seriously Enough
Mathematical Laws Could Be Under Fire As Well

(Washington, DC) While most people think of the laws of physics as immutable entities that cannot be changed or argued away, some scientists disagree. Many of them applaud the recent report released by the British Government which they claim closes the scientific debate on global warming.

How then do they answer charges that the computer models used to calculate the catastrophic effects of global warming due to anthropogenic CO2 used in this report are not only unrealistic in their reproductions of past and present climate, but give physically unlikely results for future effects as well?

"Obviously Nature is wrong," says Dr. J. Hinsen of NASA's Project EarthScare. "We've put thousands of hours into programming these models and hundreds of thousands of dollars into running them, so they must be right. Plus, they confirmed every preconception we had about the effects of increased atmospheric CO2, and we're very knowledgeable and educated people. How many Ph.D.s does Nature have?"

When asked about the mathematical theorems governing nonlinear systems which would tend to invalidate the long term predictions of any climate model, Dr. Hinson responded by putting his fingers in his ears and repeatedly chanting, "Nah, nah, nah, I can't hear you."

Dr. K. Bentrerth had stronger words. "Look, we know that human emissions are causing global warming and that there will be catastrophic results unless climate modelers like myself are given much more money to keep the public scare....., I mean informed so that they don't object to paying more for everything. If the laws of physics won't back us up on this, they'll just have to be changed. After all, we're facing a crisis here and we can't hold on to these antiquated notions that just get in the way of my new found publicity and funding and really cool new friends. Al Gore called me 'Keith' yesterday. My name's really Kevin, but it's a start."

"The bottom line," says Dr. Cutie Jurry of Georgia Tech, "is that physical laws are only useful insofar as they agree with what we say reality is. If they start to provide ammunition for skeptics, they have to go."

It's a Charlie Brown Jihad!

When you hear the words "holiday video", what comes to mind? Probably Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer or A Charlie Brown Christmas or home movies of people opening presents, decorating trees, and having a big dinner. But if you're Islamic:

Islamist Holiday Video Calls for Jihad and Slaughter of 'Crusaders'
from MEMRI

This ten-minute video ( http://switch3.castup.net/cunet/gm.asp?ai=214&ar=M4-006&ak=null ), titled "Rise Up," was posted on Islamist websites on October 22, 2006, and was described as "a gift for 'Eid Al-Fitr." Produced by an individual identified as "Abu Osama" (whose real identity is unknown), it calls on the Muslims to wage jihad against the "Crusaders." A caption in the film explains that Abu Osama produced the film on the occasion of the establishment of the Islamic State of Iraq.

The film begins with footage of horsemen under the caption: "O ye who believe! What is the matter with you, that, when ye are asked to go forth in the cause of Allah, ye cling heavily to the earth? Do ye prefer the life of this world to the Hereafter? But little is the comfort of this life, as compared with the Hereafter" (Koran 9:38).

Next, several Al-Qaeda leaders and commanders, including bin Laden, Al-Zawahiri, Al-Zarqawi and a number of unidentified young men (who may be field commanders or intended suicide bombers) call upon the Muslims to join the jihad. The following are excerpts:

Al-Zawahiri says: "I urge you, in [the name of] the duty of jihad, which is incumbent upon every Muslim, to hurry and pursue martyrdom in order to kill the Crusaders and the Zionists." An armed individual calls: "[Oh] defenders of the faith, hurry and prepare [for jihad], this is no time for [internal] disagreement." Another individual, sitting under a banner that reads, "Expel the polytheists from the Arabian Peninsula," asks: "Are there no men in this nation?" and a masked individual declares: "Jihad is ancient, and the fate of [all] infidel leaders is one and the same: to be slaughtered."

The video then shows a scene in which a man is beheaded. This is followed by another beheading, even more grisly, in which the severed head is waved in the air. (Both scenes, and another graphic scene, have been omitted from the version of the film posted here, but are available upon request).

The film ends with a caption congratulating the Shura Council of the Jihad Fighters in Iraq on the occasion of the establishment of the Islamic State of Iraq. It also conveys greetings for 'Eid Al-Fitr, and expresses hope for the unification of all the jihad fighters in Iraq.

Happy Holidays!

More Dispatches From Fantasyland

From Breitbart via Drudge

Climate extremes are coming, study says

The world _ especially the Western United States, the Mediterranean region and Brazil _ will likely suffer more extended droughts, heavy rainfalls and longer heat waves over the next century because of global warming, a new study forecasts.

But the prediction of a future of nasty extreme weather also includes fewer freezes and a longer growing season.

In a preview of a major international multiyear report on climate change that comes out next year, a study out of the National Center for Atmospheric Research details what nine of the world's top computer models predict for the lurching of climate at its most extreme.

"It's going to be a wild ride, especially for specific regions," said study lead author Claudia Tebaldi, a scientist at the federally funded academic research center.

Tebaldi pointed to the Western U.S., Mediterranean nations and Brazil as "hot spots" that will get extremes at their worst, according to the computer models.

This is absurdity piled on absurdity. Computer models cannot predict next week's weather accurately, let alone what will happen years from now. The virtual world of the computer is NOT REALITY and never will be. But if you take the most extreme results of these fantasies, in other words the outliers in read data terms, you may be able to scare some government agency into giving you more money.

As the world warms, there will be more rain likely in the tropical Pacific Ocean, and that will change the air flow for certain areas, much like El Nino weather oscillations now do, said study co-author Gerald Meehl, a top computer modeler at the research center. Those changes will affect the U.S. West, Australia and Brazil, even though it's on South America's eastern coast.

For the Mediterranean, the issue has more to do with rainfall in the tropical Atlantic Ocean changing air currents, he said.

"Extreme events are the kinds of things that have the biggest impacts, not only on humans, but on mammals and ecosystems," Meehl said. The study, to be published in the December issue of the peer-reviewed journal Climatic Change, "gives us stronger and more compelling evidence that these changes in extremes are more likely."

What are the odds that the "peers" doing the reviewing for this journal would have any skepticism of these methods? If you think they're impartial towards catastrophic climate change, I've got a bridge for sale that you might be interested in.

The researchers took 10 international agreed-upon indices that measure climate extremes _ five that deal with temperature and five with precipitation _ and ran computer models for the world through the year What Tebaldi called the scariest results had to do with heat waves and warm nights. Everything about heat waves _ their intensity, length and occurrence _ worsens.

"The changes are very significant there," Tebaldi said. "It's enough to say we're in for a bad future."

The measurement of warm nights saw the biggest forecast changes. Every part of the globe is predicted to experience a tremendous increase in the number of nights during which the low temperature is extremely high. Those warm night temperatures that should happen only once every decade will likely occur at least every other year by the time we reach 2099, if not more frequently, Tebaldi said.

Give me a freakin' break! Do these people actually believe that any nonlinear model with feedbacks can be accurate this far into the future? Who could possibly take this seriously?

Read the whole thing, if you have the stomach. It gets worse. I'm not sure what these people think they're doing, but it isn't science.

I thought this was an Onion article. Unfortunately, these people are serious.

From Commondreams.org

Converting Climate Skeptics
Churches and environmentalists spread the word about global warming

WASHINGTON - October 18 - A coalition of over thirty-five religious and environmental groups will issue a united statement and call to action tomorrow as part of a national movement to make environmental stewardship and creation care a top policy priority, especially in response to global warming. Centered on the new film The Great Warming, this movement will reach people from all walks of life encouraging good environmental stewardship and immediate action to address climate change.

"Global warming affects everyone regardless of religion, political affiliation or income level" said Carl Pope, Executive Director of Sierra Club. "Heightened concern about global warming’s impact on the poor has united groups with concerns about poverty and justice, like the Sierra Club and leading religious institutions."

No, what impacts the poor are misguided efforts to curb "greenhouse gases" so that poorer nations who don't have the money for so-called "green" technologies can't develop.

The Great Warming Call to Action statement -- signed by high-profile religious leaders from across the faith and ideological spectrum, key policy-makers, celebrities, environmental groups, and many of the most respected scientists in the world -- calls on our country to take immediate action to address climate change.

List to follow. True Believers all.

As part of this alliance, the Sierra Club has joined with faith groups like Christian Coalition and the Religious Action Center of Reformed Judaism in seeking to engage a wide array of people, including those who are not yet global warming believers, around simple solutions that can help reduce the threat of global warming. The coalition is urging all Americans, especially those who are skeptical about climate change, to see the movie. In major cities across the country, practical efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are also being undertaken; letting decision makers at all levels know that global warming is an urgent priority.

See, it's a RELIGION. And as such, I think all further federal funding to any organization that believes in anthropogenic global warming should be stopped IMMEDIATELY. Separation of church and state, you know.

"The Great Warming provides an excellent opportunity for dialogue and action about global warming," said Lyndsay Moseley, Associate Washington Representative for Faith Partnerships at the Sierra Club. "Our goal is to help people care for one another and future generations by being part of the solution to global warming, not the problem."

Members of the movement are hoping that The Great Warming will play a major role in converting climate skeptics, just as Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth helped open eyes with its charts and predictions. Reflecting the emerging voice of the evangelical community, The Great Warming reveals how climate change is affecting the lives of people everywhere. While the film presents a moving picture of a world changed by global warming, it also makes a business case for taking action. With hard-hitting comments from scientists, religious leaders, and public-opinion leaders the film taps into the growing public interest and the growing concern within the faith community.

Al Gore's fantasy included the now universally discredited "hockey stick" temperature graph as one of the eye-opening charts. Plus, I hope you notice how evangelicals here are valued members of liberal society because they support global warming pseudo-science, but some of these same people accuse them of being ignorant troglodytes when they vote Republican.

The Great Warming will launch in Regal Cinemas across the U.S. November 3rd.

Here's the list of True Believers who signed the Call to Action statement:

Alanis Morissette
Narrator, “The Great Warming” So she MUST know a lot about climate.
Edward O. Wilson
Professor Emeritus, Harvard University Whose work, though important, is in Etymology, not climate
Brent Blackwelder
President, Friends of the Earth no comment needed
Andrew Young
Civil-rights Leader, Former UN Ambassador suffering from publicity deprivation
Rev. Jim Wallis
President, Sojourners/Call to Renewal I'm religious but I can also be cool
Dr. Sayyid Syeed
Islamic Society of North America found a new way to get the US to destroy its own economy
Carl Pope
Executive Director, Sierra Club no comment needed
Larry Schweiger
President & CEO, National Wildlife Federation ditto
Rev. Dr. Bob Edgar
Genl. Secretary, National Council of Churches that nobody goes to anymore
Paul R. Epstein, MD
Center for Health & Global Env., Harvard give me more funding! (GMMF)
Robert Correll PhD
Chair, Arctic Climate Impacts Assessment ditto
Marlee Matlin
Actress, Academy Award Winner therefore an Everything Expert (EE)
John Topping
President, The Climate Institute GMMF
Dr. Mohamed El-Ashry
Senior Fellow, UN Foundation who knows why?
Rev. Clifton Kirkpatrick
President, Alliance of Reformed Churches now people outside my church will know who I am
Paul de Vries PhD
President, New York Divinity School ditto
Peter Vander Meulen
Co-chair, Micah Challenge USA ditto
Prof. Paul Mayewski
Director, Climate Institute, University of Maine GMMF
The Rev. David G. Mullen
Bishop, Evangelical Lutheran Church which one is that?
Helen Hunt
Actress, Academy Award Winner EE
Greg Nickels
Founder, US Mayors Climate Protection Agreement we need to divert attention from REAL urban problems
Chevy Chase and Jayni Chase
Actor / Activists EEs
Sheila Watt-Cloutier
Chair, Inuit Circumpolar Conference GMMF
Rabbi Frederick Reeves
The Temple, Atlanta Georgia free publicity
Nikita Lopoukhine
Chair, IUCN Comm. World Protected Areas GMMF
James Gustave Speth
Dean, Sch. Forestry & Environment, Yale GMMF
Anjelica Huston
Actress, Producer, Director EE
Ross C. Anderson
Mayor, Salt Lake City They didn't ask ME to sign the US Mayors CLimate Protection
Agreement
Dr. Kevin Trenberth
Head of Climate Analysis, NCAR GMMF
The Rev. Dean W. Nelson
Bishop, Evangelical Lutheran Church Another one!
Matthew Sleeth, MD
Author and Religious Educator Buy my books!
Barbara Lerman-Golomb
Coal. on the Environment and Jewish Life ??????????????
Peter Borgdorff
Exec. Dir. Emeritus, Christian Reformed Church We with it, we're hip
David Coss
Mayor of Santa Fe See Ross C. Anderson
Keanu Reeves
Narrator, “The Great Warming” Super EE
Ted Turner
Philanthropist and feeling deprived since he sold his networks
Rev. Dr. Joel C. Hunter
President, Christian Coalition of America I'm COOL, I tell you, COOL
John Podesta
President, Center for American Progress ex-Clinton appointee
Kevin Knobloch
President, Union of Concerned Scientists who hate science
Dr. Warren Washington
Head of Climate Change Research, NCAR GMMF
Christopher Flavin
President, Worldwatch Institute GMMF
Ed Begley Jr.
Environmental Activist and Actor EE
James Hansen
Adjunct Professor, Columbia Earth Institute GMMF (and PLEASE don't cut NASA's Earth
Sciences program)
Rev. William Sinkford
Pres, Unitarian Universalist Congregations We need something to believe in
Rabbi David Saperstein
Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism who knows?
Dr. Gerald Durley
Providence Missionary Baptist Church, Atlanta See, we Baptists are NOT all knucke-dragging Neanderthals!
Lester R. Brown
President, Earth Policy Institute GMMF!
Calvin B. DeWitt
Pres., Acad. of Evangelical Scientists & Ethicists GMMF
John L. Petersen
President, The Arlington Institute GMMF! We think about the future, you know. Unlike the
rest of you slobs.
Sister Patricia Daly
Tri-State Coalition for Responsible Investment Give us your money!
Kathleen Rogers
President, Earth Day Network GMMF
Mike MacCracken, PhD
Chief Scientist, The Climate Institute GMMF
Shirley Franklin
Mayor of Atlanta Stop looking at those sinkholes!
Wes Bannister
Chairman, Metropolitan Water District of S. California We can't keep stealing Colorado's
water indefinitely. Let's blame someone else.
Christopher Guest
Actor, Writer, Director therefore, EE
Monique Tilford
Center for a New American Dream I think she just likes causes
Michael Eckhart
President, American Council on Renewable Energy GMMF
The Rev. Murray D. Finck
Bishop, Evanglical Lutheran Church another one!
Lucy Liu
Actress EE
Russell Dickerson
Chair, Dept of Atmospheric Science, U. Maryland GMMF
Bill McKibben
Author “The End of Nature” Buy my book
Rev. Dr. James A. Forbes Jr.
The Riverside Church, New York Eventually, they'll just drop the "church" part.
Eric Chivian, MD
Center for Health and the Global Env., Harvard GMMF
Rev. Peter Illyn
Executive Director, Restoring Eden GMMF
Jesse Lava
Executive Director, FaithfulDemocrats.com no comment needed
Dr. Tony Campolo
Evangelical Assoc. for Promotion of Education But not science, I guess. Do I detect a sneaky plot to discredit science so completely that evolution will be out of the public schools?
Martin J. Chavez
Mayor of Albuquerque, NM What, me worry about important things?
David Neff
Editor & VP, Christianity Today Yes, we are COOL!

I don't know whether to laugh, cry, or retain an attorney

from the US Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works

WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 11, 2006

NUREMBERG-STYLE TRIALS PROPOSED FOR GLOBAL WARMING SKEPTICS

CONTACT: MARC MORANO ( marc_morano@epw.senate.gov ), MATT DEMPSEY ( matthew_dempsey@epw.senate.gov )

A U.S. based environmental magazine that both former Vice President Al Gore (http://gristmill.grist.org/print/2006/9/19/11408/1106?show_comments=no ) and PBS newsman Bill Moyers, for his October 11th global warming edition of “Moyers on America” titled “Is God Green?”

(http://www.grist.org/news/maindish/2006/05/09/roberts/index.html ) have deemed respectable enough to grant one-on-one interviews to promote their projects, is now advocating Nuremberg-style war crimes trials for skeptics of human caused catastrophic global warming.

Grist Magazine’s staff writer David Roberts called for the Nuremberg-style trials for the “bastards” who were members of what he termed the global warming “denial industry.”

Roberts wrote in the online publication on September 19, 2006, "When we've finally gotten serious about global warming, when the impacts are really hitting us and we're in a full worldwide scramble to minimize the damage, we should have war crimes trials for these bastards -- some sort of climate Nuremberg.” (http://gristmill.grist.org/print/2006/9/19/11408/1106?show_comments=no )

Gore and Moyers have not yet commented on Grist's advocacy of prosecuting skeptics of global warming with a Nuremberg-style war crimes trial. Gore has used the phrase "global warming deniers" to describe scientists and others who don't share his view of the Earth's climate. It remains to be seen what Gore and Moyers will have to say about proposals to make skepticism a crime comparable to Holocaust atrocities.

The use of Holocaust terminology has drawn the ire of Roger Pielke, Jr. of the University of Colorado's Center for Science and Technology Policy Research. “The phrase ‘climate change denier’ is meant to be evocative of the phrase ‘holocaust denier,’” Pielke, Jr. wrote on October 9, 2006 (http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/author_pielke_jr_r/index.html#000952).

“Let's be blunt. This allusion is an affront to those who suffered and died in the Holocaust. This allusion has no place in the discourse on climate change. I say this as someone fully convinced of a significant human role in the behavior of the climate system,” Pielke, Jr. explained.

The article Global Warming: The Chilling Effect On Free Speech (www.spiked-online.com/index.php?/site/article/1782/ )last week in Spiked Online addresses this new found penchant by environmentalists and some media members to charge skeptics of human caused catastrophic global warming with “crimes against humanity” and urge Nuremberg-style prosecution of them.

So skepticism, the engine that drives real science, is now a crime? And I completely agree with Dr. Pielke about this being an affront to Holocaust victims. But the total reality of the situation is even worse than what's here, merely treating skeptics like war criminals. John Brignell at Number Watch is entirely correct when he labels the current environmental movement a religion, not a science. Though they attempt to sway the gullible with scientific sounding terminology, their real mission is to make converts to their particular belief system and to persecute the heretics. They've managed to subvert entire governments into destroying their economies "for the cause". They make the fundamentalist Moslems' efforts at converting the world to Islam look like damp firecrackers in comparison. "Alas, poor science" to quote Prof. Brignell. That such nonsense should be perpetrated in your name.

At least the authors name is appropriate

I don"t know when I"ve seen so many non sequiturs on one page.

From The Independent

US population hits 300 million, but is it sustainable?

By Andrew Buncombe in Washington

Published: 11 October 2006

The population of the United States will pass 300 million today, or tomorrow. No one knows exactly where, no one know precisely when. It is a milestone for sure but is this a cause for celebration or anxiety?

Some American commentators are already saying the landmark is a chance to note the US is perhaps the only country in the developed world where the economy is being bolstered by a population that is growing at a discernable rate. But many experts say passing the 300 million milestone should be a wake-up call that demands a reappraisal of the extraordinary, unparalleled rate of consumption by the world's largest economy and its third largest by population.

As an economic model for the rest of the world to follow - in particular the rapidly developing economies of China and India - it is unsustainable, they say.

On a global scale the average US citizen uses far more than his or her fair share of the planet's resources - consuming more than four times the worldwide average of energy, almost three times as much water and producing more than twice the average amount of rubbish and five times the amount of carbon dioxide, a major contributor to global warming. The US - with five per cent of the world's population - uses 23 per cent of its energy, 15 per cent of its meat and 28 per cent of its paper. Additional population will mean more people seeking a share of those often-limited resources.

It may be that America's citizen number 300,000,000 will be an undocumented migrant, born to undocumented parents somewhere in the South or the West, where population growth is the fastest. Almost one-third of America's annual population growth of between 0.9 per cent and 1 per cent is the result of immigration - much of it illegal.

"America is the only industrialised nation in the world experiencing significant population growth," Victoria Markham, the director of the Centre for Environment and Population (CEP), says in a new report. "The nation's relatively high rates of population growth, natural resource consumption and pollution combine to create the largest environmental impact, felt both within the nation and around the world." She adds: " The US has become a 'super-size' nation, with lifestyles reflected in super-sized appetites for food, houses, land and resource consumption. 'More of more' seems to characterise modern-day America - more people than any generation before us experienced, more natural resources being utilised to support everyday life and more major impacts on the natural systems that support life on earth."

Some commentators believe this growth has a modest impact on the nation's resources and can bring many benefits. Greg Easterbrook, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based, independent research and policy institute, recently wrote: "What should not worry us about continuing US population growth ... is the question of whether we can handle it - we can," he said.

Lester Brown, the director of the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental group also based in Washington, said: "In times past, reaching such a demographic milestone might have been a cause for celebration - in 2006 it is not. Population growth is the ever-expanding denominator that gives each person a shrinking share of the resource pie. It contributes to water shortages, cropland conversion to non-farm uses, traffic congestion, more garbage, overfishing, crowding in national parks, a growing dependence on imported oil and other conditions that diminish the quality of our daily lives."

Mr Brown said there was also a global perspective to America's rapacious model of consumption. In addition to foreign policy decisions at least influenced by a desire to secure diminishing resources, he said the US was setting an example to the developing world that was unsustainable. "We used to think of the developing countries as places that did not consume very much ... But it is starting to change and they are beginning to behave like us and heading for income levels like us," he said.

If China's economy continued to grow at 8 per cent a year, Mr Brown said, income levels in that country would equal the 2004 US level by 2031, by which time China's population would stand at 1.45 billion.

If current consumption rates were multiplied to take into account its population growth, China's paper consumption would be double the current total world production of paper and its vehicle fleet would be 1.1 billion; the world's current total fleet is 800 million.

"What China is teaching us is that the Western economic model is not going to work for China and if it will not work for China it will not work for India and in the long-term ... it will not work for us as well," he said.

It was in 1915 that the US population reached 100 million. Fifty-two years later, in 1967, it reached 200 million. It has taken just 39 more years for the milestone of 300 million to be achieved.

1915: US population reaches 100 million

The population of America hit the 100-million mark in 1915, two years before President Woodrow Wilson would enter the First World War. Americans were stunned by the sinking of the British liner, 'Lusitania', enthralled by Charlie Chaplin and arguing about immigration. "There is here a great melting pot in which we must compound a precious metal," said Wilson, as a million European immigrants poured into the US each year.

The 'great white hope' Jess Willard beat black boxing champion Jack Johnson in a dubious bout in Havana; Marines were dispatched to Haiti after a mob killed its president and the Ku Klux Klan was reestablished as a 'benevolent' organisation.

1967: US passes 200 million

By 1967, when the US population hit 200m, the US was up to its neck in the Vietnam War, Muhammad Ali was stripped of his world heavyweight title for refusing the draft, dozens were killed in race riots in Detroit, and San Francisco was beguiled by the Summer of Love.

Eugene McCarthy said he would run for president, the 25th Amendment to the Constitution was passed allowing for a transfer of power to the vice-president if the president was incapacitated and three Apollo astronauts burned to death during a simulation at Cape Canaveral. The millionth telephone was installed in the US. Hit films included The Graduate, In the Heat of the Night and Bonnie and Clyde.

Supersize nation: how America is eating the world

300m Expected population of the United States by the end of this week

75 Life expectancy for men in the US. Women are expected to live until 80

63 Life expectancy for men in the developing world. Women are expected to live until 67

395m Projected population of the US by 2050

1,682m³ US annual water consumption per capita

633m³ The world's annual water consumption per capita

545m³ The developing world's annual water withdrawals per capita

5lbs Amount of waste each US resident produces per day. That compares with about 3lbs per person per day in Europe, and about 0.9-1.3lbs per person a day in the developing world

$39,710 US Gross National Income per head, 2004

$8,540 World's GNI per head

$4,450 Developing world's GNI per head

19.8 US carbon dioxide emissions per capita, in metric tonnes

3.9 World's carbon dioxide emissions per head, in tonnes

1.8 Developing world's carbon dioxide emissions per head, in tonnes

58bn Number of burgers consumed by Americans every year

54m Number of Americans who are obese

300,000 Deaths per year related to obesity

678lbs US annual paper consumption per head

115lbs The corresponding figure for the world

44lbs The figure for the developing world

204m number of vehicles on US roads

37% Percentage of the total cars in the world on America's roads

1 in 7 Barrels of world oil supply used by US drivers

24m Number of Americans who drive SUVs

7,921 US energy consumption per capita, 2001, expressed in kilograms of oil

1,631 World's energy consumption per capita, in kilograms of oil

828 Corresponding figure for the developing world

The population of the United States will pass 300 million today, or tomorrow. No one knows exactly where, no one know precisely when. It is a milestone for sure but is this a cause for celebration or anxiety?

Some American commentators are already saying the landmark is a chance to note the US is perhaps the only country in the developed world where the economy is being bolstered by a population that is growing at a discernable rate. But many experts say passing the 300 million milestone should be a wake-up call that demands a reappraisal of the extraordinary, unparalleled rate of consumption by the world's largest economy and its third largest by population.

As an economic model for the rest of the world to follow - in particular the rapidly developing economies of China and India - it is unsustainable, they say.

On a global scale the average US citizen uses far more than his or her fair share of the planet's resources - consuming more than four times the worldwide average of energy, almost three times as much water and producing more than twice the average amount of rubbish and five times the amount of carbon dioxide, a major contributor to global warming. The US - with five per cent of the world's population - uses 23 per cent of its energy, 15 per cent of its meat and 28 per cent of its paper. Additional population will mean more people seeking a share of those often-limited resources.

Here we go, GLOBAL WARMING. Anthropogenic CO2 has NEVER been shown to be a "major contributor" to global warming. And of course these per capita figures include all the resources used by agriculture and industry as well as by private citizens. But let's not look at any meaningful figures when our aim is to make the US the big bad wolf.

It may be that America's citizen number 300,000,000 will be an undocumented migrant, born to undocumented parents somewhere in the South or the West, where population growth is the fastest. Almost one-third of America's annual population growth of between 0.9 per cent and 1 per cent is the result of immigration - much of it illegal.

So why do European nations mock US efforts to control legal and illegal immigration? Seeing as our growth is threatening the planet and all. we SHOULDN'T be letting anyone else in.

"America is the only industrialised nation in the world experiencing significant population growth," Victoria Markham, the director of the Centre for Environment and Population (CEP), says in a new report. "The nation's relatively high rates of population growth, natural resource consumption and pollution combine to create the largest environmental impact, felt both within the nation and around the world." She adds: " The US has become a 'super-size' nation, with lifestyles reflected in super-sized appetites for food, houses, land and resource consumption. 'More of more' seems to characterise modern-day America - more people than any generation before us experienced, more natural resources being utilised to support everyday life and more major impacts on the natural systems that support life on earth."

Some commentators believe this growth has a modest impact on the nation's resources and can bring many benefits. Greg Easterbrook, a fellow at the Brookings Institution, a Washington-based, independent research and policy institute, recently wrote: "What should not worry us about continuing US population growth ... is the question of whether we can handle it - we can," he said.

Lester Brown, the director of the Earth Policy Institute, an environmental group also based in Washington, said: "In times past, reaching such a demographic milestone might have been a cause for celebration - in 2006 it is not. Population growth is the ever-expanding denominator that gives each person a shrinking share of the resource pie. It contributes to water shortages, cropland conversion to non-farm uses, traffic congestion, more garbage, overfishing, crowding in national parks, a growing dependence on imported oil and other conditions that diminish the quality of our daily lives."

And New York City can never have a population of 1,000,000 because there's not room for all the horses. Seriously, since the growth is mostly due to immigration and not birth rates, there's an easy solution to all this if it's really so much of a problem.

Mr Brown said there was also a global perspective to America's rapacious model of consumption. In addition to foreign policy decisions at least influenced by a desire to secure diminishing resources, he said the US was setting an example to the developing world that was unsustainable. "We used to think of the developing countries as places that did not consume very much ... But it is starting to change and they are beginning to behave like us and heading for income levels like us," he said.

And we can't have THAT, can we? Then who would be the noble savages? Who would people like this use to make the rest of us feel guilty?

If China's economy continued to grow at 8 per cent a year, Mr Brown said, income levels in that country would equal the 2004 US level by 2031, by which time China's population would stand at 1.45 billion.

If current consumption rates were multiplied to take into account its population growth, China's paper consumption would be double the current total world production of paper and its vehicle fleet would be 1.1 billion; the world's current total fleet is 800 million.

"What China is teaching us is that the Western economic model is not going to work for China and if it will not work for China it will not work for India and in the long-term ... it will not work for us as well," he said.

And HOW is China teaching us this again? Making up numbers doesn't make an argument, Mr. Brown.

It was in 1915 that the US population reached 100 million. Fifty-two years later, in 1967, it reached 200 million. It has taken just 39 more years for the milestone of 300 million to be achieved.

1915: US population reaches 100 million

The population of America hit the 100-million mark in 1915, two years before President Woodrow Wilson would enter the First World War. Americans were stunned by the sinking of the British liner, 'Lusitania', enthralled by Charlie Chaplin and arguing about immigration. "There is here a great melting pot in which we must compound a precious metal," said Wilson, as a million European immigrants poured into the US each year.

The 'great white hope' Jess Willard beat black boxing champion Jack Johnson in a dubious bout in Havana; Marines were dispatched to Haiti after a mob killed its president and the Ku Klux Klan was reestablished as a 'benevolent' organisation.

What does this last paragraph have to do with population?

1967: US passes 200 million

By 1967, when the US population hit 200m, the US was up to its neck in the Vietnam War, Muhammad Ali was stripped of his world heavyweight title for refusing the draft, dozens were killed in race riots in Detroit, and San Francisco was beguiled by the Summer of Love.

Eugene McCarthy said he would run for president, the 25th Amendment to the Constitution was passed allowing for a transfer of power to the vice-president if the president was incapacitated and three Apollo astronauts burned to death during a simulation at Cape Canaveral. The millionth telephone was installed in the US. Hit films included The Graduate, In the Heat of the Night and Bonnie and Clyde.

???????????????????????????????????????????

Supersize nation: how America is eating the world

300m Expected population of the United States by the end of this week

75 Life expectancy for men in the US. Women are expected to live until 80

63 Life expectancy for men in the developing world. Women are expected to live until 67

395m Projected population of the US by 2050

1,682m³ US annual water consumption per capita

633m³ The world's annual water consumption per capita

The water consumption stats always get to me. Since when does my taking a shower have ANY effect on water supplies in the Third World? And again, this figure includes agricultural and industrial uses. Should we cut back on food exports to the rest of the world so that the US uses less water?

545m³ The developing world's annual water withdrawals per capita

5lbs Amount of waste each US resident produces per day. That compares with about 3lbs per person per day in Europe, and about 0.9-1.3lbs per person a day in the developing world

$39,710 US Gross National Income per head, 2004

$8,540 World's GNI per head

$4,450 Developing world's GNI per head

So how is a higher national income bad for the rest of the world again? I'd also like to see how these figures were calculated.

19.8 US carbon dioxide emissions per capita, in metric tonnes

3.9 World's carbon dioxide emissions per head, in tonnes

1.8 Developing world's carbon dioxide emissions per head, in tonnes

Well of course it's low. the developing world doesn't PRODUCE anything.

58bn Number of burgers consumed by Americans every year

54m Number of Americans who are obese

Oh, now I see why we're a threat to the rest of the world. They're afraid we might trip and fall on them. (Obesity rates are higher in Britain, BTW)

300,000 Deaths per year related to obesity

678lbs US annual paper consumption per head

115lbs The corresponding figure for the world

44lbs The figure for the developing world

See comment under CO2 production.

204m number of vehicles on US roads

37% Percentage of the total cars in the world on America's roads

1 in 7 Barrels of world oil supply used by US drivers

24m Number of Americans who drive SUVs

7,921 US energy consumption per capita, 2001, expressed in kilograms of oil

1,631 World's energy consumption per capita, in kilograms of oil

828 Corresponding figure for the developing world

Again, these figures (at least for the US) include ALL uses, not just private vehicles.

This sort of article is fairly common, the implication being that any resource used by people in the US is somehow unfairly taken from a third world subsistance farmer who is now going to die because we left the faucet running while we brushed our teeth this morning. We also don't produce anything that is needed or wanted by the rest of the world, we just drive our SUVs around endlessly while eating cheeseburgers and throwing reams of paper out of the windows. These days we also have the blame for climate change, despite all the evidence that shows it to be a natural process (this is especially interesting). But, again, since most of our population growth in the US is due to immigration and not birth rates, there's a very easy solution to the increasing population. Well, easy in that it's obvious. Which means that it will never happen.

From the "you've got to be kidding" files
courtesy of Bloomberg.com

California sues GM, Ford, Toyota, Over Global Warming

General Motors Corp., Ford Motor Co. and four other automakers were sued by California for making vehicles that contribute to global warming, causing pollution and erosion[??] that costs the state millions of dollars.

I guess that would be the erosion caused by clearing slopes that are mostly unconsolidated soil so people can build houses with nice views. And managing the forests so poorly that natural fires get completely out of control because of all the brush buildup. And GM causes all this how?

The lawsuit filed today in U.S. District Court in Oakland said General Motors, Ford, Toyota Motor Corp., DaimlerChrysler AG, Honda Motor Co. and Nissan Motor Co., the six largest automakers in the U.S., have created a ``public nuisance'' by making millions of vehicles that emit huge quantities of carbon dioxide, a greenhouse gas that contributes to global warming.

The suit, which seeks damages related to pollution, beach erosion and reduced water supplies, is the latest action by California to push businesses and the federal government to address global warming. The legislature approved a measure last month to force utilities to cut emissions, and the state has sued the U.S. for failing to address the effects of global warming.

??????????????!!!!!!!!!!!

``Vehicle emissions are the single most rapidly growing source of the carbon emissions contributing to global warming, yet the federal government and the automakers have refused to act,'' said California Attorney General Bill Lockyer in a statement.

NO, NO, NO. The most significant source of carbon emissions is LIVING ORGANISMS and other natural processes. All human activities, including vehicle emissions, account for only 6% of total atmospheric CO2. And ALL THE CO2 IN THE ATMOSPHERE can only account for 26 to 28% of any warming. This "single most rapidly growing source" crap is just that - crap, designed to sway the scientifically ignorant, which unfortunately includes most lawyers and federal judges.

California has already targeted carmakers with rules that would require them to lower emissions. The state enacted rules in 2004 that would force them to cut the amount of carbon dioxide and other tailpipe gases by up to 30 percent in cars sold in the state. Several other states have adopted or are weighing similar rules.

There would be a much larger impact on CO2 emissions if the California legislature, judges, lawyers, and "environmentalists" would just STOP BREATHING.

Overturn

Edward Cohen, a spokesman for Honda, and Dave Barthmuss, a spokesman for General Motors, didn't immediately return calls seeking comment.

To quote Dr. Johnson, "It is impossible to criticize unrelenting imbecility"

Automakers are suing to overturn these rules. Redesigning cars to address such restrictions would cost the industry billions of dollars, carmakers have claimed, especially in the California market. The state asked a federal court on Sept. 15 to throw the case out. The judge has yet to rule.

If I was a car maker, I would just stop selling cars in CA. Switch to bicycles or something. If they want no emissions, give them no emissions. Even electric cars won't work there for long, because they won't be able to generate the electricity to charge the things up (see below).

California legislators approved the toughest pollution limits in the U.S. last month, requiring utilities, oil refineries and other companies to cut emissions tied to global warming by 25 percent in the next 14 years. California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, a Republican who is seeking re-election this year, said he supports the measure.

Burning Gasoline

Carbon dioxide is a byproduct of burning gasoline. [ DUH!] Car companies say the only way to meet California's emissions rules is to reduce vehicle fuel consumption. They claim the state is trying to regulate fuel economy, or the number of miles a car runs on a gallon of gas, a standard which is set by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Automakers including GM, Honda, and Toyota said they are developing so-called fuel-cell cars in response to consumer demand for better fuel economy amid higher gas prices. Fuel cells produce only water vapor as a byproduct.

I assume these are the much-touted but elusive hydrogen powered cars (otherwise known as "little Hindenburgs"). Again, I hope they don't need electricity.

The lawsuit is California v. General Motors, U.S. District Court, Northern District of California.

So, I guess the legal profession has begun a brief hiatus in their attempt to sue fast food makers and is now turning its attention to "global warming". At least obesity is something real. I'm no fan of Ford, Toyota, or GM, but this has got to be the most ridiculous reasoning for a lawsuit ever. And unfortunately other states are promising more of the same. It's going to get awfully stupid out there soon, and it doesn't look like there will be any letup.

You can always tell when the end of the federal fiscal year approaches

from My Way News:

ARCTIC ICE MELTING RAPIDLY, STUDY SAYS

Arctic sea ice in winter is melting far faster than before, two new NASA studies reported Wednesday, a new and alarming trend that researchers say threatens the ocean's delicate ecosystem.

Scientists point to the sudden and rapid melting as a sure sign of man-made global warming.

Of COURSE it is! What else could it be?

"It has never occurred before in the past," said NASA senior research scientist Josefino Comiso in a phone interview. "It is alarming... This winter ice provides the kind of evidence that it is indeed associated with the greenhouse effect."

Earth to NASA - ever heard of the Cretaceous? There was NO ARTIC SEA ICE WHATSOEVER.

Scientists have long worried about melting Arcticsea ice in the summer, but they had not seen a big winter drop in sea ice, even though they expected it.

For more than 25 years Arctic sea ice has slowly diminished in winter by about 1.5 percent per decade. But in the past two years the melting has occurred at rates 10 to 15 times faster. From 2004 to 2005, the amount of ice dropped 2.3 percent; and over the past year, it's declined by another 1.9 percent, according to Comiso.

Two years is NOT A TREND! It's what would be called an anomaly in most scientific fields, and that only if you had enough good data collected from previous years to establish what "normal" is.

A second NASA study by other researchers found the winter sea ice melt in one region of the eastern Arctic has shrunk about 40 percent in just the past two years. This is partly because of local weather but also partly because of global warming, Comiso said.

And on what basis is this conclusion drawn? They're not saying.

The loss of winter ice is bad news for the ocean because this type of ice, when it melts in summer, provides a crucial breeding ground for plankton, Comiso said. Plankton are the bottom rung of the ocean's food chain.

"If the winter ice melt continues, the effect would be very profound especially for marine mammals," Comiso said in a NASA telephone press conference.

The ice is melting even in subfreezing winter temperatures because the water is warmer and summer ice covers less area and is shorter-lived, Comiso said. Thus, the winter ice season shortens every year and warmer water melts at the edges of the winter ice more every year.

Scientists and climate models have long predicted a drop in winter sea ice, but it has been slow to happen. Global warming skeptics have pointed to the lack of ice melt as a flaw in global warming theory.

The latest findings are "coming more in line with what we expected to find," said Mark Serreze, a senior research scientist at the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colo. "We're starting to see a much more coherent and firm picture occurring."

"I hate to say we told you so, but we told you so," he added.

Serreze said only five years ago he was "a fence-sitter" on the issue of whether man-made global warming was happening and a threat, but he said recent evidence in the Arctic has him convinced.

He's an easy sell, then. What about ANY of this indicates a strictly anthropogenic source? And why would human-generated CO2 accumulate in the atmosphere for over 100 years and only now be suddenly causing sea ice to melt?

Summer sea ice also has dramatically melted and shrunk over the years, setting a record low last year. This year's measurements are not as bad, but will be close to the record, Serreze said.

Equally disturbing is a large mass of water - melted sea ice - in the interior of a giant patch of ice north of Alaska, Serreze said. It's called a polynya, and while those show up from time to time, this one is large - about the size of the state of Maryland - and in an unexpected place.

"I for one, after having studied this for 20 years, have never seen anything like this before," Serreze said.

Well, no, because you've only been at it FOR 20 YEARS. That's not a long time in climate terms.

The loss of summer sea ice is pushing polar bears more onto land in northern Canada and Alaska, making it seem like there are more polar bears when there are not, said NASA scientist Claire Parkinson, who studies the bears.

The polar bear population in the Hudson Bay area has dropped from 1,200 in 1989 to 950 in 2004 and the bears that are around are 22 percent smaller than they used to be, she said.

That's not what Dr. Mitch Taylor, the "leading Canadian authority on polar bears" says:

A leading Canadian authority on polar bears, Mitch Taylor, said: "We’re seeing an increase in bears that’s really unprecedented, and in places where we’re seeing a decrease in the population it’s from hunting, not from climate change."

Mr Taylor estimates that during the past decade, the Canadian polar bear population has increased by 25 per cent - from 12,000 to 15,000 bears.

He even suggests that global warming could actually be good for the bears, and warns that the ever-increasing proximity of the animals to local communities could mean that a cull will be required sooner rather that later if bear numbers are to be kept under control.

In the northern territories, where temperatures have risen an average of four degrees since 1950, wildlife experts such as Mr Taylor say the bears have never been healthier or more plentiful.

Hmmmm

This kind of apocalyptic stuff always comes up at this time of year because researchers have to justify their existance to the federal overlords that provide their funding to keep themselves on the grant money gravy train. I didn't have the heart (or the stomach) to comment on this, which is even more egregious (and pathetic). Atmospheric scientists at NASA are especially anxious since the agency wants to spend more money on actual space projects and less on environmental and climate studies. Whether it's wise to give NASA more money to spend on anything at all is a topic for another time.