Of course, the big news this week had to do with the unbelievably vile and stupid video produced by the carbon reduction activist group 10:10 this week. But in its shadow, was another embarrassing news item the you’d think the green crowd would also want to denounce and distance from. Joe Romm and Bill McKibben have announced they detest the 10:10 video. Good for them, that’s the right thing to do, and I applaud them for doing it.
But Joe couldn’t resist his urges to get some licks in with his usual flaming rhetoric, making sure that his readers get reinforced with the message: 10:10 video bad, Watts bad. That’s not a surprise, as it is his standard predictable MO. Mr. Romm is as easy to forecast as DC summer weather; hot, muggy, with a chance of storms.
Due to the uproar over the 10:10 video, this story got rather buried in the climate news cycle. It is almost as embarrassing as the 10:10 video, because, well, who would want this guy to align with their cause?
An audio recording attributed to the al-Qaeda leader and broadcast on the internet yesterday expresses concern about the devastating floods in Pakistan and calls on Muslims to provide relief for the victims.”The number of victims caused by climate change is very big… bigger than the victims of wars,” says the recording.
If genuine, the recording would be Bin Laden’s first since March 25.
It was not clear when the tape was made, but Bin Laden congratulated Muslims on the holy fasting month of Ramadan which ended September 10.
“The catastrophe (in Pakistan) is very big and it is difficult to describe it,” the recording says.
“What we are facing… calls for generous souls and brave men to take serious and prompt action to provide relief for their Muslim brothers in Pakistan.”
The recording makes a series of recommendations to deal with climate changes namely preventive measures that should be taken by governments in the face of disasters.
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Given the events of this week, do the proponents of AGW really want to have OSBL, a man who kills people for having a differing view than him, as an ally for their cause? Do they really want an ally with a world voice that confuses weather with climate?
Note and update: Some people misunderstood my intent, that’s my fault for not writing clearly in the first place, and I accept the criticism for that and offer my apology if I unduly offended anyone. This was simply a case of writing something, then realizing that people were seeing it completely differently than I intended. I’ve removed the lines above that caused the issue and added this clarification below:
In case somebody misunderstands, it should be clearly understood that it is not my intent to compare these AGW proponents to OSBL in any possible way. I only want to point out that like with the 10:10 fiasco, AGW proponents that don’t want this sort of bad publicity connected with their movement, IMO should distance themselves and their organizations from OSBL.
Gentle Bin? Of course he’d want to save the polar bears.
“In my opinion Tim is right. OBL has been gone a long time. Maybe even longer.”
In my opinion you are completely wrong .
I would classify this as a cheap shot from Romm or you Anthony. Sorry, we’ll agree to disagree here.
tats says:
October 2, 2010 at 7:05 pm
In my opinion Tim is right. OBL has been gone a long time. Maybe even longer.
I also agree. Why no video?
“Do they really need to say that? If they don’t make such a statement are sceptics going to suspect that they do endorse OSBL’s terrorism, or at best, that they are indifferent to such acts of terrorism?”
Actually Andrew, they do not need to say anything.
That the Islamo-Fascists want to jump on the Eco-fascist’s bandwagon
requires no comment, just some thought, about lies and the liars who repeat them.
I responded in the McKibben blog that I would find McKibben’s concern about the 10:10 video more congruent if McKibben hadn’t spent so much time in that post bashing skeptics.
My comment was deleted.
The AGW folks are consumed by their zeal and certainty. They do not notice how unhinged they appear to ordinary citizens, and how easily they can cross into vile territory like the 10:10 film.
Labeling skeptics as “deniers” is only somewhat less virulent IMO than pressing a red button and blowing them up in a fantasy turned into film.
Anthony, what problem have I created for myself? I just don’t get the logic of your post, other than to score cheap political points.
REPLY: The problem is your rush to judgment, you have my email, you could have asked. Whatever happened to the “talking to understand” side of your profession before you render a judgment on person’s state of mind? That’s very unprofessional for a psychologist to do IMHO. I’m very disappointed in you. I used to think you played fair and professionally.
I believe your rush to judgment injures me.
Sheesh, now I get jumped on for praising Bill and Joe for their denouncement of the 10:10 video, and saying take it a step farther? It’s an opinion, an idea, a suggestion, not a labeling. Why would anyone (except members of his Al Queda sect) NOT want to refute Bin Laden’s position if he agreed with them? I’m simply saying that while these two guys are denouncing bad acts like 10:10’s fiasco, they have a chance to raise themselves in the eyes of many by denouncing Bin Laden’s position, which confuses weather with climate.
If they did, I’d publicly thank them for doing so.
– Anthony
Why no video?
I’d suggest that he purchase a new I-phone4, and call Fox News for a live (for awhile) interview.
Could be angling for the soon to be vacated post as head of the IPCC.
This is bogus. OBL has been dead for years. Research “Tim Osmand”. He worked for CIA.
R. Craigen @ur momisugly 7:12 “exactly the product I was searching for, linking to”
Not too many days ago I suggested that people look at a web site for a specific charity. Their adds have been coming at me ever since. Sort of odd in that I was recommending them and now I am being targeted. Shouldn’t they be trying to reach people that don’t know of them?
Yes, it seems to me more likely that OBL has been dead since 2001, and that this latest recording is fraudulent. Seriously, how long would you expect a man who was suffering from kidney failure in summer of 2001 and dependent on a dialysis machine, to last in the mountains of Afghanistan? A month? A year? Nine years?
Anyone is, of course, free to disagree.
Tom in Texas, Tats, and Tim: the conspiracy theory isn’t very likely. Occam’s razor should be used. The more likely alternatives are: 1) Bin Laden never existed at all, and has always been a fabrication, or 2) Bin Laden is real and still alive. Real and fake at the same time seems to be pushing it to me.
I really don’t think this helps.
Do we sceptics need to distance themselves from every person we find undesirable who happens to be a sceptic? I certainly hope not and every time the CAGW crowd tries to smear us by association I think that’s pretty petty and neither here nor there.
But you know what is really interesting ?
Virtually EVERYONE has in fact, pitched in enormous amounts of money and aid for Pakistan. Including islamic and truly poor nations.
What is Osama talking about ?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2010_Pakistan_floods
Keith Kloor;
In Osama’s vision of the the future has he would have it, he stands in front of a class of children and begins the lesson with a prayer. Upon noticing that some of the children are less than enthused with the prayer he has chosen, the produces a small box with a red button…
Osama’s ideology is identical to that expressed in the 10:10 video, only the “religion” is different. Those in the warmist community who have distanced themselves from the 10:10 video should rightly be asked to do the same with Osama.
Oh? Bin Laden? You mean the guy in cave on kidney dialysis who’s been running around with his dialysis machine in tow, keeping one step ahead of infidel forces?
I call US intel nonsense, like a bunch of the other released videos and recordings that were shown to be fakes.
Fwiw, the chances of Bin Laden being alive are minor at best. He required weekly kidney dialysis and this is not something that comes easy in the tribal zone of Pakistan. Further, the release of only tape recordings without any video for many years now point to a guy who is good with a computer and another guy who is no longer among the living. AQ was targeting the House of Saud. No more, no less. Guilt by association to the moonbats with 1010 really does not make AQ any greener than Australia after the locusts were done with it. Hitler was a vegetarian with one testicle. That does not make vegetarians Nazis or people with one testicle Nazis. The may be, but that is the extent. Its an orthogonal axis.
Maybe Osama is just shootin’ for a Nobel?
I hear it’s pretty easy.
[snip, I understand your sentiments, but let’s not invite another sect into the argument here, even in jest ~mod]
I want to correct a mistake in my earlier post. I wrote that the pro-AGW crowd is packed full of attack dogs. Change that to Pit Bulls.
Just a note. Someone did a study of the Bin Ladin videos, post 9-11. He has the most MARVELOUS plastic surgeon! His MD has managed to change his nose something like 5 times, from flat and oblate, to pointed and hawk like. Amazing man, OBL, more “looks” than a People Mag. Starlet!
So has anyone nominated Osama for IPCC Chief?
OBL is almost certainly dead. (Though a friend of my mother’s is sure she saw him buying pot plants in a gardening shop in Devon.)
He is supposed to be the great mastermind of a bunch of highly trained terrorists, but none of them can slip over to Dubai and buy some tax-free decent video equipment.
This story is just agricultural by-product.
Anthony, it appears that you have some readers here who agree with me on the “association” charge.
I’ll just say this (which I wrote as part of reply to you over at my site) before calling it a night (it’s getting late here on the East coast): You’d have a better argument if Bin Laden’s jihad against the West stemmed from radical environmentalism instead of a radical Islamic worldview.