Remember White House science advisor John Holdren’s wackadoodle video about the Polar Vortex? The opening line of the video spoken by Dr. Holdren says
” If you’ve been hearing that extreme cold spells, like the one we’re having in the United States now disproves global warming…don’t believe it.”
He then goes on to present evidence, like this plot of mid-tropospheric temperature, which looks like it is from UAH/Dr. Roy Spencer, though no citation is given in the video.
The funny part? Watch these two guys blow the glossy WH take on this visual out of the water with just a ruler and some common sense.
For more information on the UAH temperature record, see our most recent update here: Global Temperature Report: January 2014 Upper Michigan was ‘coldest’ spot on the globe in January
Then there’s the other satellite record, from RSS: Satellites show no global warming for 17 years 5 months
For more on the polar vortex, see the new WUWT Polar Vortex Page.
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NotTheAussiePhilM says:
February 7, 2014 at 11:55 am
“My concern is with WUWT propagating the obvious nonsense from GB & Co”
I thought your concern was that the world would warm above 16 deg C?
I think I enunciated my concerns fairly clearly
– I can’t be held responsible for you imagination!
😉
otTheAussiePhilM says:
February 7, 2014 at 12:06 pm
@ur momisugly Alan Robertson:
– see above – varying the end point doesn’t make much different….
– the start point is the start of the data – i.e. when satellite measurements started
___________________
Wrong! It makes a lot of difference- so does tilting the entire graph. You know this. That’s the whole point of the video- the government is purposely trying to misrepresent data to the people. You appear to be purposely trying to divert our attention away from that fact.
Gareth Phillips says:
February 7, 2014 at 10:02 am
Lighten up folks! Look this not serious, it’s a joke, no-one with an ounce of common sense would believe what they are saying about the graphs, it’s just good humour and no more valid that saying Glenn Beck is even handed.
Gareth,
I wish it were so, mon ami! I work with new hire engineers. Many of them accept the AGW meme ‘hook, line, and sinker’. They have been so thoroughly engrained in the ‘bad man/save the planet’ platitiudes since early childhood that they will not even evaluate basic evidence that refutes AGW and/or conflicts with their ‘environmental’ belief systems. The cognitive dissonance is readily apprarent and the AGW propoganda so firmly engrained that they will excuse the deceits and refuse verifiable evidence contrary to the AGW orthodoxy. Misleading presentiations like Holdrens serve to reinforce the AGW meme with the faithful, lest their strength of faith should falter.
It’s not a joke. It’s not ‘just good humor’. At the behest of Obama, Holdren, and the EPA, the highly reliable coal fired power plants in the US are being shut down, even as we speak, based on the AGW hyperbole that “Carbon (CO2 gas) Is Pollution”. Even as we endure another colder than average winter! We are losing net electrical generating capacity and only replacing a very small portion of it with unreliable solar and wind power. Our electricity prices are escalating. Liquid propane gas is in short supply and the mosly rural home and farm users are experiencing all-time high prices, if they can even get it!
No. This Is Not A Joke. No one with an ounce of common sense would believe otherwise. The ‘joke’ is that anyone would believe that carbon (the elemetal foundation of all life on this planet) and CO2 gas (the basic molecular plant food for all flora on this planet) are pollution.
Gottta go – lunch time is over.
Mac
Alan Robertson says:
February 7, 2014 at 11:51 am
Gareth Phillips says:
February 7, 2014 at 10:02 am
__________________
Are you OK that the US government is also purposely lying to its citizens?
You re purposely misrepresenting what was shown in the video. The grpahics were purposely mis- constructed by propagandists. Are you also a propagandist?
Alan, are you saying it was not a spoof? Good Lord whatever next. I don’t think I am a propagandist, not in the way Glenn Beck is for instance. As far as the US is lying to it’s citizen, I’m not sure that goes on, but seeing as they are privy to the confidential information held by it’s friends and allies I can well believe it. However, I do not think the US government is as black as painted by most of the radical groups across the world. Sure, they make mistakes, but overall I think they are a positive influence. By the way, should we not be discussing US politics on a more dedicated blog?
Day By Day says:
February 7, 2014 at 11:43 am
Am I alone on what “Carbomontanus says: February 7, 2014 at 9:40 am @Anthony Watts & al”? I don’t think I understood one thing he wrote at us (us being the & al).
__________________
(Inviting Carbomontanus to join in)
English isn’t his first language- By some of his sentence structures, etc., I think he is Germanic. He also tries to weave in Latin and odd references to obscurities and thus becomes difficult to understand, but such practice makes a tingle run up his leg.
“””””…..ferdberple says:
February 7, 2014 at 6:56 am
………………………………………
Climate Reparations is the name of the game. The 3rd world holds the majority of votes at the UN. They want to be paid for the damage the industrialized world has caused through CO2 emissions.
The die was cast when the EPA formally recognized CO2 as a dangerous pollutant. The US, by far the largest CO2 global polluter for many decades, has backed itself into a corner…….”””””
Well sorry ferd, but that simply is not true.
The US is the world’s ONLY large land mass carbon SINK. WE are not a SOURCE of atmospheric CO2.
EurAsia, is near carbon neutral, but slightly sourcing. Australia is significantly carbon sourcing, but largely because it is mostly desert, and nothing grows there; plus they have a lot of coal. In the overall scheme of things, they are not big CO2 “polluters”.
But the USA’s extensive agriculture including large tree farming activities, easily swamps all the CO2 generated from our use of energy to make products for the world.
NZ is also an agriculturally rich carbon sink, but not big enough to amount to a hill of beans. They have tree farming down to a science. Tree farms are carbon sinks (lots of growing) but “old growth” forests are not; they are mostly carbon neutral. If old growth forest were carbon sinks, they would eventually become a solid block of wood. If they were carbon sources, they would eventually disappear (evaporate or burn up, or burn down). They don’t do either so they must be carbon neutral.
So don’t blame us; or US . we ain’t the problem.
@Alan Robertson
I am purposely trying to divert your attention *with* the facts:
If you plot the trend to 2008 & 2009, it doesn’t make much different
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/plot/uah/trend/plot/uah/to:2008/trend/plot/uah/to:2009/trend
And I disagree that the tilting makes a big different
– as I said above, the human brain deals with perspective all day long, and is very good at processing what it means
– and, as I said above, if the people who came up with that graphic were on the ball, they would have used current data not 4/5 year old data…
– but if it makes you happy, I’ll concede that someone could use perspective to try to emphasize one end of a graph vs the other
– but in this case, the amount of perspective applied doesn’t seem all that great…
In the end, the trend is what it is, and doesn’t need exaggerating
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/plot/uah/trend/plot/uah/to:2008/trend/plot/uah/to:2009/trend
Carbomontanus says:
You’re wrong because at the end of the video your Neanderthals evolve and start MEASURING the positive slope of that lie of a horizontal “0” axis thus exposing the fraud of it in a very scientifically acceptable manner -via autopsy. Isn’t all truth, large and small, what this site of Anthony’s is all about?
Gareth Phillips says:
February 7, 2014 at 12:25 pm
“…are you saying it was not a spoof?”
—————–
What spoof? The video was lighthearted and funny, for certain, but it pointed out the obvious tricks used by the administration in order to present data in a distorted way, but the video was not a spoof.
__________________
“I don’t think I am a propagandist, not in the way Glenn Beck is for instance.”
—————-
Then why attack Glenn Beck, et cie? Why try to obscure the truth of things? Why act like a propagandist if you aren’t one?
_______________________
“As far as the US is lying to it’s citizen, I’m not sure that goes on,”
——————
Of course you aren’t sure… right. Uh- huh- you don’t pay any attention to the world, at all. You didn’t get the point of the video, did you- you are lying through your teeth.
______________________
“By the way, should we not be discussing US politics on a more dedicated blog?”
————————
Of course we can discuss politics here and especially since this thread deals with actions of the US gov’t… The entire effort to change mankind’s behavior because of “climate change” is political. You know that full well, therefore your pretense that politics is to be avoided is just another attempt by you to obscure the truth. You have shown yourself to have exceedingly limited veracity. Got any more rabbit holes you want to dance around?
I think there’s an important point that’s being lost in all of this. I think there’s an additional ‘nature trick’ involved in John Holdren’s graph. The graph begins in 1978. Oh well, of course it does; the MSU satellites were first launched in 1978. But, the satellites were launched in November 1978! 10 months of 1978 are not even measured! True; the southern half of the globe was into summer, but what is the land mass for snow cover vis a vi the northern half, and thus what is the summer/winter temp. differentials between the two hemispheres? What is the temp. anomaly for the last 2 months, out of 12, for 1978?
All temp. records for the satellites begin in 1979. The NOAA NCDC analysis uses 1979 as a start date. RSS uses 1979 as well. Why did Holdren show a graph inclusive of 1978?
Day By Day says: Am I alone on what “Carbomontanus says:
He does evoke an interesting question to climate analysis albeit in an obtuse way with his reference to electronic band pass filters. Digital computer models aren’t doing a very good job at predicting future climate has anyone considered using an analog version?
NotTheAussiePhilM says:
February 7, 2014 at 12:35 pm
@Alan Robertson
I am purposely trying to divert your attention *with* the facts:
_____________________
Why keep bringing up W.f.T. graphs? That’s like trying to change the subject. Deal with the video and this thread.
The point is, members of the current administration presented that graph dishonestly, to make the data appear to show something that it doesn’t and that is being dishonest. Your words will not obscure Holdren’s actions.
The guy with the ruler says that 1998 was “the warmest on record.” Wasn’t 1934 the warmest on record (in the US, at least), even with all the recent adjustments and manipulation?
Aphan says:
February 7, 2014 at 10:20 am
Gail Combes-
“More reach”?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Good, glad to hear it. I just hope he is also reaching the independents. (I have no radio or TV, haven’t for years. I hear Glen Beck occasionally on other people’s equipment.)
NotTheAussiePhilM says: ” And I disagree that the tilting makes a big different – as I said above, the human brain deals with perspective all day long, and is very good at processing what it means”
1) It makes a difference … period.
2) It was intentional.
3) The human brain, mine and yours, is continuously fooled every waking moment by false perspectives because we are only able to view things in 2 dimensions and are therefore condemned to rely solely upon on our visual cortex to synthesize the third and toss out whatever doesn’t ~appear~ to make any sense.
http://www.reto.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/dsc03634.jpg
@Alan Robertson
Please see my previous comment answers your points:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/02/07/friday-funny-two-guys-with-a-ruler-blow-up-the-white-house-global-warming-video-claims/#comment-1561332
“By the way, should we not be discussing US politics on a more dedicated blog?”
For the last 5 years (at least!) EVERYTHING is political. Once Washington decided to take over every aspect of every facet of life, there is nothing that can be discussed adequately unless the political questions are fully addressed first. When I say EVERYTHING is political now, I mean the food you have for dinner, the private beliefs you may or may not have, what you are allowed to do and what you are not allowed to do with your free time, and what “science” is politically in favor and which “science” is politically out of favor – those are just a few.
I HATE living in a world like this, but I didn’t make it. All I can do is fight it.
@Mike M
Really? So your total criticism of the WH video is that the graph presented for 3 seconds has a couple of degrees of perspective added, and your brain can’t cope with it?
– and that makes the GB analysis video a worthy piece of journalism?
philjourdan says:….
>>>>>>>>>>>
Look I am very glad Beck took the time to debunk this. I am very much opposed to censorship of any kind but It STILL does not get around the fact that in the USA you have a group of people who will ONLY hear what ‘Trusted Sources” (neutral and on the left) say. The right is pretty much convinced. It is the middle of the roaders that is the target audience and I hope like heck that is who Beck is reaching but I have my doubts and that is why I would have liked a more neutral source.
I went through this a decade ago with Lynn Cohen-Cole and a hand full of others. Organic Consumer Assoc. and Food & Water Watch supported the LIE that farmers were responsible for the e-coli food poisonings (It is a slaughter problem- feces on contaminated meat) They pushed the Food Safety Modernization Act that allows the UN/WTO to regulate US farmers.
Because the ‘Trusted” big name NGOs supported the Food Modernization Act and we did not we were called “Hysterical”. You would not believe the closed mindedness (well yes you would) Maude Barlow a “no dog in this fight” Canadian, is a director of both. She was handsomely rewarded for selling the US consumer out with an appointment as New Senior Advisor to the UN President on water issues.
The food borne illness doubled after the USDA/FDA ‘Modernized’ food inspection with the international HACCP regs.
@Gail Combs – I fully understand your reservations. But the truth is you will not get any truth from sources that “some” will believe. We see that daily in the MSM – indeed just recently there was an article here of another paper deciding they knew more than any scientists and the debate is over.
They will slam the source. But you only need to lead them back to the data. That is why they slam the source. They cannot refute the message.
Get a life NTAPM! You are just getting yourself deeper and deeper into backing up
something that is trying to trick folk by presenting a graph that looks like something that it is not.
Why are you trying to back up obvious visual trickery. It weakens your case more, and your case is teetering on the brink already after 17 years of no warming!
People wonder why the era of ’78-’79 is where this chart starts. The simple answer to that is that this is satellite data. Before then, there was no data. So, I have to give John Holdren a break on that point.
The end point is arbitrary because newer data is available and should have been used. Thing is, using newer data would have hurt Holdren’s argument.
Gareth Phillips says: @ur momisugly February 7, 2014 at 12:25 pm
…. However, I do not think the US government is as black as painted by most of the radical groups across the world…..
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Neither did I until I started looking into it a decade ago. Now I KNOW the US government is totally corrupt.
So do a lot of other Americans. Poll: 77% of Americans Concerned about Government Corruption; Majority See it Getting Worse
Rasmussen poll: 7% Think Congress is Doing a Good or Excellent Job
It looks even more foolish relative to the longer temperature record.
http://issuu.com/faykelly-tuncay/docs/salby_lecture/1
Slide 30
Tom J says: @ur momisugly February 7, 2014 at 12:49 pm
I think there’s an important point that’s being lost in all of this… What is the temp. anomaly for the last 2 months, out of 12, for 1978?
All temp. records for the satellites begin in 1979. The NOAA NCDC analysis uses 1979 as a start date. RSS uses 1979 as well. Why did Holdren show a graph inclusive of 1978?
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Nice catch. They lop off several years of recent data but add in a partial year (a cold year) to lower the starting point.
Sleazy
If you level out the baseline and place the red line where it is supposed to be, the 1978 to
present trend would be nearly as flat as a chest on a female Olympic gymnast!