Al Gore, Sheldon Whitehouse, Democrat AGs threaten to silence and bankrupt skeptics
Guest opinion by Paul Driessen
It’s been a rough stretch for Climate Armageddon religionists and totalitarians.
Real World science, climate and weather events just don’t support their manmade cataclysm narrative. The horrid consequences of anti-fossil fuel energy policies are increasingly in the news. And despite campaigns by the $1.5-trillion-per-year government-industry-activist-scientific Climate Crisis Consortium, Americans consistently rank global warming at the very bottom of their serious concerns.
But instead of debating their critics, or marshaling a more persuasive, evidence-based case that we really do face a manmade climate catastrophe, alarmists have ramped up their shrill rhetoric, imposed more anti-hydrocarbon edicts by executive fiat and unratified treaty – and launched RICO attacks on their critics.
Spurred on by Senator Sheldon “Torquemada” Whitehouse (D-RI), Jagadish Shukla and his RICO-20 agitators, and their comrades, 16 of the nation’s 18 Democratic attorneys general (the other 32 are Republican) announced on March 29 that they are going after those who commit the unpardonable offense of questioning “consensus” climate science.
If companies are “committing fraud,” by “knowingly deceiving” the public about the threat of man-made carbon dioxide emissions and climate change, New York AG Eric Schneiderman intoned, “we want to expose it and pursue them to the fullest extent of the law,” under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. “The First Amendment does not give you the right to commit fraud.”
Their initial target is ExxonMobil, but other companies, think tanks like CFACT and the Heartland Institute (with which I am affiliated), and even independent researchers and analysts (like myself) will be in their crosshairs – using a law intended for the Mafia. Incredibly, even United States Attorney General Loretta Lynch says her office has “discussed” similar actions and has “referred [the matter] to the FBI.”
These RICO investigations and prosecutions are chilling, unprecedented and blatantly un-American. They abuse our legal and judicial processes and obliterate the First Amendment freedom of speech rights of anyone who questions the catechism of climate cataclysm. The AGs’ actions are intended to browbeat skeptics into silence, and bankrupt them with monumental legal fees, fines and treble damages.
It is the campus “crime” of “unwelcome ideas” and “micro-aggression” on steroids. It is the inevitable result of President Obama’s determination to “fundamentally transform” the United States, ensure that electricity rates “necessarily skyrocket,” and carve his energy and climate policy legacy in granite.
Mr. O and his allies are on a mission: to rid the world of fossil fuels, replace them with “clean” biofuels (that are also carbon-based and also emit carbon dioxide when burned, but would require billions of acres of crop and habitat land) and “eco-friendly” bird-killing wind turbines and solar installations (that will require millions more acres) – and implement the goals of a dictatorial United Nations.
Former executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change Christiana Figueres put it in the bluntest terms: “We are setting ourselves the task of intentionally to change [sic] the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years” – the free enterprise capitalist system. “The next world climate summit is actually an economic summit, during which the distribution of the world’s resources will be negotiated,” her UN climate crisis cohort Otmar Edendorfer added. “We will redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy.”
Thus, under the 2015 Paris climate treaty, developing nations will be under no obligation to reduce their fossil fuel use or greenhouse gas emissions. They will simply take voluntary steps, when doing so will not impair their efforts to drive economic growth and improve their people’s living standards. Meanwhile, they will be entitled to share $3 billion to $300 billion per year in “climate change adaptation, mitigation and reparation” money. In fact, Mr. Obama has already transferred $500 million in taxpayer money (illegally) from a State Department emergency fund to the UN’s Green Climate Fund.
No wonder developing nations were thrilled to sign the 2015 Paris not-a-treaty treaty.
Recent headlines portend what’s in store. EU electricity prices rise 63% over past decade. Rising energy costs, green policies threaten to kill steel industry and 4,000 to 40,000 jobs, as Tata Steel quits Britain. Thousands of Europeans lose jobs, as manufacturing moves to countries with lower energy prices. Unable to afford proper heat, 40,000 Europeans die of hypothermia during 2014 winter.
In Africa and other energy-deprived regions: Millions die in 2015 from lung and intestinal diseases – due to open cooking and heating fires, spoiled food and unsafe water, and absence of electricity.
Meanwhile, despite mandates, loan guarantees, feed-in tariffs, endangered species exemptions and other subsidies, renewable industries are barely surviving: SunEnergy, world’s largest green energy company, faces bankruptcy, as share prices fall 95% in one year. Solar company Abengoa US files for Chapter 15 bankruptcy. China stops building wind turbines, as grid is damaged and most electricity is wasted.
But Climate Crisis ruling elites pay little attention to this. They will be insulated, enriched, and protected from their decisions and deceptions – as they decide what energy, jobs, living standards and freedoms the poor, minority, blue-collar and middle classes will be permitted to have.
Equally disturbing, their drive for total control is based on a chaotic world that is totally at odds with what the rest of us see outside our windows. Even after “homogenizing” and massaging the raw data, climate alarmists can only show that global temperatures may have risen a few tenths of a degree (barely the margin of error) during the 2015 El Niño year, after 19 years of no temperature increase, following two decades of slight warming, following three decades of slight cooling and warming.
On the “extreme weather” front, tornadoes, snows, floods and droughts are no more frequent or intense than over the past century. No Category 3-5 hurricane has made US landfall in a record 125 months. Polar ice remains well within historic fluctuations, and sea levels are rising at barely seven inches per century.
Alarmists thus rely on computer models that predict even “worse catastrophes,” if global temperatures rise even 0.5 degrees C (0.8 F) more than they already have since the Little Ice Age ended and Industrial Era began. However, the models are hopelessly deficient, and totally unable to predict the climate.
They overstate the climate’s sensitivity to carbon dioxide and methane, atmospheric gases chosen because they result from fossil fuel use (and from many natural sources). They assume these two gases have become the primary forces in climate change – and ignore or downplay changing solar energy, cosmic ray and geomagnetic output; major periodic fluctuations in Pacific and North Atlantic Ocean circulation; volcanic activity; regional and planetary temperature cycles that recur over multiple decades, centuries or millennia; and other natural forces that have always driven planetary warming, cooling and weather.
The models and modelers do this because these factors and their roles in climate change are not well understood, are difficult to measure, and do not fit the “humans are at fault” meme. They compound these errors by assuming that any warming will be dangerous, rather than beneficial for people and agriculture.
These oversights can be characterized as careless, recklessly negligent, or even “knowingly deceitful” and fraudulent. So can “nine inconvenient untruths” that a United Kingdom judge highlighted in Al Gore’s infamous fake-documentary movie – and Mr. Gore’s recent claim that atmospheric CO2 is fueling Zika outbreaks. Likewise for James Hansen’s repeated assertion that sea levels could rise “several meters” (117 inches) over the next century, and the bogus studies behind the phony “97% consensus” claims.
Can you picture the cabal of AGs filing RICO actions in these cases? If you want the facts, and a few chuckles about climate alarmism, see the Climate Hustle movie, coming May 2 to a theater near you.
Paul Driessen is senior policy analyst for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (www.CFACT.org) and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power – Black death.
“The First Amendment does not give you the right to commit fraud.”
Well, everyone knows that … the right to commit fraud is either purchased outright, anointed through elective office, garnered through legal means (see attorney generals recent actions), or allowed indirectly through (government) administrative processes. Although, rights gained through one of the above can be rescinded at almost any time by the remaining three process.
See Hillary (examples abound), Trump (university), Obama (no one has infringed on his right to commit fraud yet), Jagadish Shukla ….
Meanwhile the 1% are living it up in Panama and Switzerland.
Yeah, soon it will be zero percent. The west is intent on killing off the few geese who lay golden eggs in the society. Their ‘final’ solution to this is to redistribute until the productive sector is destroyed. Even an ignormamus knows that the other 99% will be even worse off. Economics died a quiet death, too, along with science and productive thought in this crazy new world.
‘The Panama Papers’
11 million leaked financial files from Panama another tax haven.
http://www.icij.org
The intent is highly questionable but more than likely just a political stunt.
Proving fraud and deceit in a court of law is no simple task, especially as there are numerous highly credentialed scientists who can dispute the “consensus”. GCMs are not facts, merely projections, so Exxon can claim that they merely use different projections.
So why pick on Exxon? They have very deep pockets and can defend themselves vigorously. So that means a long drawn out expensive, resource consuming initiative for the AGs. More than likely the initiative will die by the wayside now the AGs have demonstrated their “green” credentials.
So why pick on Exxon? that is simple –
http://freebeacon.com/politics/clinton-calls-for-exxon-probe-after-company-cuts-off-foundation-funding/
think New York and who could imagine cutting off funding to Hildabeast and the next POTUS = The Clinton Foundation
I say bring it on.
In a court of law, only evidence counts…hearsay, innuendo, and logical fallacies do not carry a single iota of weight.
Let’s have a public and court ordered airing of all of the adjustments to the historical climate data-base, the legacy of failed predictions, the falsified global climate models, etc…
Yes, lets see it all become the subject of a legal proceeding.
Good idea…the sooner the better.
I have to say I’m a little worried by some of the courts’ decisions on this subject. The left has accumulated an avalanche of activist friendly judges.
Yes, that is a concern.
In a “reasonable” world (never mind “perfect”), your suggestion would be right on point. However the tactic that the left is using in this and similar cases is economic intimidation; defending yourself in court is extremely expensive. (And imagine the adverse publicity that the MSM would inflict). Therefore it is to THEIR benefit to drag this out as long as possible.
The current textbook instance of this is Mann vs Steyn. Mikey has dragged this out 5 years and cost Mark millions, even though Mann does not have a legal leg to stand on. (Of course Mann vs Ball was the trial run and IT is still ongoing.)
The irony of the “fossil fuel funding” meme is that Mark Steyn and Dr Ball are paying for their defense out of their own pockets while Dr Mann (who couldn’t garner even one amicus brief from any scientist or organization) is funded by a mysterious “Climate Science Legal Defense Fund”, a chain of shadow organizations (that I’d bet my house goes back to George Soros). (Is there a “racketeering” investigation here?)
Come to think of it, the second irony (or blatant contradiction) is that Ball and Steyn are the defendants; not Michael. When he asks for donations to his legal DEFENSE fund, isn’t that fraud?
Sheldon is angling for the EPA Director post or maybe Dept. of Justice.
…….New York AG Eric Schneiderman intoned, “we want to expose it and pursue them to the fullest extent of the law,” under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act. “The First Amendment does not give you the right to commit fraud.”
Well then, it should be the climate alarmists and especially those at NASA and NOAA who are fudging the temperature record that should be shaking in their boots with that statement. Those who know that the CAGW theory is full of holes need to keep a record of this statement from the New York’s AG. Once the fraud of CAGW is exposed, I would be the first one remind him of what he said.
If Republicans would just get out and vote this would all become moot very quickly.
Trump could appoint Professor Judith Curry as National Science Advisor and the big hairy uncertainty monster would stop this leftist pseudo-science in it’s tracks.
From Brewer’s;
‘The notorious “witch-finder” Matthew Hopkins travelled throughout the eastern counties in the 1640s to hunt out witches and is said to have hanged 60 in one year in Essex alone. In 1647 he was tested by his own methods; when cast into the river, he floated, and was hanged as a wizard.’
Nothing but a “pleasing legend” apparently.
“Matthew Hopkins died at his home in Manningtree, Essex, on 12 August 1647, probably of pleural tuberculosis. He was buried a few hours after his death in the graveyard of the Church of St Mary at Mistley Heath.[67] In the words of historian Malcolm Gaskill, Matthew Hopkins “lives on as an anti-hero and bogeyman – utterly ethereal, endlessly malleable”.[68] According to historian Rossell Hope Robbins,[69] Hopkins “acquired an evil reputation which in later days made his name synonymous with fingerman or informer paid by authorities to commit perjury”.[70]
What historian James Sharpe has characterised as a “pleasing legend” grew up around the circumstances of Hopkins’ death, according to which he was subjected to his own swimming test and executed as a witch, but the parish registry at Mistley confirms his burial there.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Matthew_Hopkins
Interesting but I’ll take Brewer’s word for it any day over Wiki’s.
“Hey! We didn’t fund you but you did real research that broke slapshot’s shtick anyway! Now we won’t just sue, we’ll prosecute!!! That’s how political (climate) science is done!”
Thoughtcrime.
Its interesting to me that these political topics explode with responses within hours of being posted while the science-based topics trickle along and die quickly – many of the legitimate questions raised not being addressed. Different participants too. Not a criticism. An observation
73 comments in 3 hours is light for this site.
I have noted the opposite…the threads where someone purports to have evidence that CAGW is a legitimate concern can have 100 responses in a few tens of minutes.
Hopefulness among the worried set.
It is interesting to me that you appear to be a concern troll. Not a criticism, just an observation.
Look to the BuilerBurg !
“These RICO investigations and prosecutions are chilling, unprecedented and blatantly un-American.”
Substitute “McCarthy’ for “RICO”. Sound familiar?
It is clearly a sign of desperation since they cannot debate the issue. How do they justify data fabrication and record tampering? I never thought I would live to experience what Marxists routinely did in old Russia. The only thing missing is the Gulag and firing squads…so far. Goons like Whitehouse would have been right at home in Stalinist Russia.
At least there WERE actual spies such as Julius and Ethel Rosenberg, Judith Coplon, Alger Hiss, and Rudolph Abel. Despite McCarthy’s deplorable behavior falsely accusing people his general suspicion of Soviet infiltration was correct. The worst thing about McCarthy was that his grandstanding sucked away resources making it more difficult to catch the real spies.
“and the Heartland Institute (with which I am affiliated), and even independent researchers and analysts (like myself)”
The stupidity… It hurts!
There there. Try educating yourself.
To me it appears someone tries to protect the source the money comes from. If you got other information, let me know.
“To me it appears someone tries to protect the source the money comes from.”
Exactly…thank you for making the point in blunt terms.
And we all know where the big money in the climate game is coming from, and where it is going to…don’t we.
You are looking in the mirror without even realizing it.
So the question for you is: Project much?
People can be independent and be affiliated with organizations. To compare, a contractor working for a company is both an independent contractor and affiliated with the companies they have done work for.
As far as the money, Heartland’s financial documents were stolen and published online a few years ago (by Peter Gleick, who confessed publicly. This was a clear set of federal crimes committed,and was not prosecuted, but I digress). The results of the revelation were underwhelming, with only a few million in income and expenses annually. They are dwarfed by giants such as Greenpeace, much less other the sheer might of the US government’s spending, which is in the 10s of billions annually on “green” energy research and subsidies.
As for oil company income, yes they have a lot. They also spend a lot in their day to day business, and if they spend too much trying to push politics, then they have to answer to their stockholders.
Advocacy organisations (such as Heartland) do not employ independent scientists.
You are splitting hairs and ignoring the point. People are routinely contracted for short terms. This does not jeopardize their description as “independent”, meaning that they are not affiliated with any group.
“knowingly deceiving” is not “freedom of speech”
Wagen,
Who’s knowingly deceiving who? The software models that all the CAGW theory depends on were written by people that have little or no training in software engineering. As a 30+ year veteran in the field, I can assure you that is a recipe for bugs. We can’t trust the output of them any more than an uncalibrated piece of lab equipment. You wouldn’t drive across a bridge built by a mathematician, would you?
Wagen on April 4, 2016 at 4:10 pm
“knowingly deceiving” is not “freedom of speech”
____________________
that’s trivial, Wagen – for either side.
Start with linking Your fiscal relevant docs in the next comment.
“These RICO investigations and prosecutions are chilling, unprecedented and blatantly un-American.”
Never heard of McCarthy?
Hi Wagon
Yes I heard of McCarthy.
Now have you ever heard of Kim Philby? The BBC is running a good historical documentary on his betrayal and work with the East Germans.
The threat McCarthy was going after was real.
Watch the BBC production. It might educate you to the times, and the threats free civilizations faced at the time.
Then perhaps you would not make such flawed comparisons.
michael
I brought it up to show that it is not “Un-American”. Americans have experience already.
Still wrong. McCarthy was investigating real treason with a real foreign power which held ill will toward the U.S.A. and was engaged in getting its citizens to become spys.
Alot of the investigations were a result of the Alger Hiss case.
http://law2.umkc.edu/faculty/projects/ftrials/hiss/pumpkinp.html
http://www.historynet.com/the-alger-hiss-spy-case.htm
So no the two situations are not the same. McCarthy was intent on exposing a foreign threat; the Rico 20 and Senator Sheldon Whitehouse are intent on suppressing debate. Preventing the American people from hearing -seeing information that may alter their view points.
You need to read more broaden your horizons.
michael
I agree that the comparison to McCarthyism as the liberal media would have you belive is apt, however, the comparison as far as the truth of McCartyism is concerned is terrible. Propagating the lie does not help the search for truth. Mike the Morlock is entirely correct on this point. A better analogy, one already mentioned, is the Salem witchcraft trials.
Mike, just because McCarthy was right about there being spies and traitors does not mean he was correct in his methods. Espionage is a crime, and something to be feared. However, he went after people for their political opinions. He tried to bury anyone who had anything nice to say about communism. It is likely that he pushed many sympathizers into treason due to his hamfisted actions. Moreover, he sacrificed the First Amendment in the idea of “protecting America”. However, any patriot knows that if America gives up her ideals, she isn’t worth protecting.
And yes, Wagen, I think this is very much a continuation of the McCarthy style politics, so I will agree that the unprecedented is an inaccurate description.
“They abuse our legal and judicial processes and obliterate the First Amendment freedom of speech rights of anyone who questions the catechism of climate cataclysm.”
vs
“knowingly deceiving”
Yelling “fire!” In a crowded movie theatre where no fire exits is knowingly deceiving. It could cause real harm to others and is not a “free speech” right.
Expressing a different opinion about what climate will be 100 years from now is not an immediate danger and is a free speech right. No one knows what will happen in 100 years.
“No one knows what will happen in 100 years.”
Correct! All climate projections are made under a scenario (we will continue as we do now; we will slow carbon emissions) and work under a “all else being equal” scenario only (no huge asteroids impact; no super volcanoes coming to live).
Yes Wagen, start with listing “the Who” in your diverse (we)
_________
Wagen on April 5, 2016 at 4:16 pm
“No one knows what will happen in 100 years.”
Correct! All climate projections are made under a scenario (we will continue as we do now; we will slow carbon emissions) and work under a “all else being equal” scenario only (no huge asteroids impact; no super volcanoes coming to live).
“and implement the goals of a dictatorial United Nations.”
😀
Yes! The UN police force is about to break my front door and they will force me to use wind power!
😀
Wagen,
Some good advice: best to not post, because when you do you look very naive and credulous.
The UN is composed of corrupt bureaucrats from top to bottom, with one goal in mind: to become the world’s de facto governing body. Once that goal is achieved, you can forget your free speech. Or maybe you prefer that free speech should be restricted. In either case, consider some facts:
The Obama Administration is busy constructing FEMA camps capable of housing hundreds of thousands of inmates. Places like that used to be called “concentration camps”.
And if you’re so deluded to the point you want to start labeling people “conspiracy theorists”, read some recent history. In the 1860’s President Lincoln arbitrarily revoked habeas corpus, and imposed martial law. The Supreme Court upheld those actions.
So the precedent is set. All it would take is a terrorist attack… and there’s his excuse. Those voicing opposition or protesting will be ‘detained’ indefinitely. And without habeas corpus, your lawyer won’t do you any good. And the law is alrerady on the books that allows the President to shut down any website he wishes.
With all those tools available, and given the total lack of any ethics or morals in this administration, what do you think? Do you believe the President will be a good boy, and not use them?
I will be surprised if we’re that fortunate.
dbstealey said: ‘The Obama Administration is busy constructing FEMA camps capable of housing hundreds of thousands of inmates. Places like that used to be called “concentration camps”.’
Specifically where are these camps being constructed? Evidence of their existence?
Chris,
As usual, you want me to do your homework for you. I’ve posted those links before, and as usual anyone who disagrees just argues, deflects, makes accusations of ‘conspiracy theory’, and in general responds like you.
Here’s a thought: do your own searches, using the appropriate keywords. You will find the answers. But you won’t like the answers, because you’re nothing if not naive. You exist in your own blog bubble, gravitating to those blogs that reinforce your belief system. Then you come here, trying to convince readers more intelligent than you that CO2 is the control knob of global temperatures, and other falsified nonsense.
You’re making no headway here, Chris. Readers of this “Best Science” site are too well educated in the hard sciences to fall for the climate alarmist narrative. If you were a smart guy, you would have seen that by now.
Chris ,
FEMA camps capable of housing hundreds of thousands of inmates. Places like that used to be called “concentration camps”.
____________
You think an army corps can’t handle it’s data bank ?
Of construction material and erection Plans?
“to rid the world of fossil fuels”
There is “war on drugs”, there is “war on terror”, what is so special about “war on fossil fuels”?
Depends. How stupid are you?
I am that stupid that I think that it is easier to get rid of fossil fuels than it is to get rid of drugs or terrorism.
Ah, that stupid… indeed.
“I am that stupid…”
Without a doubt.
Wagen, pay attention.
Illicit drugs are enormously harmful to people who use them and to the people around them.
Terrorism, in all it’s forms is enormously harmful to everybody anywhere near it.
Fossil fuels have lifted huge chunks of the world’s peoples out of bronze age, or stone age poverty.
One of these things is different. One of these things is not like the other two.
“Alcohol is enormously harmful to people who use them and to the people around them.”
So what?
Why are you using “fossil fuels”?
Oil, coal and gas.
Hic!
To get to work. I wish the bus company would use electric busses fueled by the water power that is abundent here.
Why go to war on something that has brought so much benefit? http://www.moralcaseforfossilfuels.com/data/
Drugs benefit many people! Why fight them 🙂
35 year climate model predictions ONLY 300% Too Hot compared to reality of mid tropospheric tropical temperatures by Satellite & Balloon measurements. See John Christy’s 2nd February 2016 Testimony to Congress Fig. on page 13.
Incompletely characterized and unwieldy. So, we define the scientific domain in limited frames of reference to explain our observations with accuracy inversely proportional to time and space offsets from an established reference. Faith, axioms, and guesses are accepted with increasing correlation between observations and consensus.
That said, I wonder if science will receive a fair hearing in a land instructed by gods from the twilight zone, or in modern jurisprudence, emanations from a penumbra. What do the oracles proclaim?
The current warming up from the Little Ice Age is very similar to the warm up from the Dark Ages Cooling Period that occurred about 1300 years ago. Models have been generated that show that the climate change we have been experiencing is caused by the sun and the oceans and Mankind does not have the power to change it. Despite all the claims, there is no real evidence that CO2 has any effect on climate. There is no such evidence in the paleoclimate record. There is evidence that warmer temperatures cause more CO2 to enter the atmosphere but there is no evidence that this additional CO2 causes any more warming. If additional greenhouse gases caused additional warming then the primary culprit would have to be H2O which depends upon the warming of just the surfaces of bodies of water and not their volume but such is not part of the AGW conjecture. In other words CO2 increases in the atmosphere as huge volumes of water increase in temperature but more H2O enters the atmosphere as just the surface of bodies of water warm. We live in a water world where the majority of the Earth’s surface is some form of water.
The AGW theory is that adding CO2 to the atmosphere causes an increase in its radiant thermal insulation properties causing restrictions in heat flow which in turn cause warming at the Earth’s surface and the lower atmosphere. In itself the effect is small because we are talking about small changes in the CO2 content of the atmosphere and CO2 comprises only about .04% of dry atmosphere if it were only dry but that is not the case. Actually H2O, which averages around 2%, is the primary greenhouse gas. The AGW conjecture is that the warming causes more H2O to enter the atmosphere which further increases the radiant thermal insulation properties of the atmosphere and by so doing so amplifies the effect of CO2 on climate. At first this sounds very plausible. This is where the AGW conjecture ends but that is not all what must happen if CO2 actually causes any warming at all.
Besides being a greenhouse gas, H2O is also a primary coolant in the Earth’s atmosphere transferring heat energy from the Earth;s surface to where clouds form via the heat of vaporization. More heat energy is moved by H2O via phase change then by both convection and LWIR absorption band radiation combined. More H2O means that more heat energy gets moved which provides a negative feedback to any CO2 based warming that might occur. Then there is the issue of clouds. More H2O means more clouds. Clouds not only reflect incoming solar radiation but they radiate to space much more efficiently then the clear atmosphere they replace. Clouds provide another negative feedback. Then there is the issue of the upper atmosphere which cools rather than warms. The cooling reduces the amount of H2O up there which decreases any greenhouse gas effects that CO2 might have up there. In total, H2O provides negative feedback’s which must be the case because negative feedback systems are inherently stable as has been the Earth’s climate for at least the past 500 million years, enough for life to evolve. We are here. The wet lapse rate being smaller then the dry lapse rate is further evidence of H2O’s cooling effects.
The entire so called, “greenhouse” effect that the AGW conjecture is based upon is at best very questionable. A real greenhouse does not stay warm because of the heat trapping effects of greenhouse gases. A real greenhouse stays warm because the glass reduces cooling by convection. This is a convective greenhouse effect. So too on Earth..The surface of the Earth is 33 degrees C warmer than it would be without an atmosphere because gravity limits cooling by convection. This convective greenhouse effect is observed on all planets in the solar system with thick atmospheres and it has nothing to do with the LWIR absorption properties of greenhouse gases. the convective greenhouse effect is calculated from first principals and it accounts for all 33 degrees C. There is no room for an additional radiant greenhouse effect. Our sister planet Venus with an atmosphere that is more than 90 times more massive then Earth’s and which is more than 96% CO2 shows no evidence of an additional radiant greenhouse effect. The high temperatures on the surface of Venus can all be explained by the planet’s proximity to the sun and its very dense atmosphere. The radiant greenhouse effect of the AGW conjecture has never been observed. If CO2 did affect climate then one would expect that the increase in CO2 over the past 30 years would have caused an increase in the natural lapse rate in the troposphere but that has not happened. Considering how the natural lapse rate has changed as a function of an increase in CO2, the climate sensitivity of CO2 must equal 0.0.
OK, all that being said then take me to court for my taking a more scientific approach to the climate system.
The Ptolemaic model of the universe was once the consensus of science. If consensus defines scientific fact then all those that do not believe in the Ptolemaic model of the universe should be taken to court and charged with fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud.
“The Ptolemaic model of the universe was once the consensus of science. If consensus defines scientific fact then all those that do not believe in the Ptolemaic model of the universe should be taken to court and charged with fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud.”
Yes indeedy …. however the date is not AD150 is it?
Mankind has moved on a tad scientifically since then. Or don’t you agree?
In other words that argument is specious.
It absolutely does not apply now given the knowledge Man has acquired since.
If fact is fact then it is always fact no matter how much time has gone by. If the “scientific consensus” of the past turned the Ptolemaic model of the universe into fact then the Ptolemaic model should still be scientific fact today. But in reality “scientific consensus” is really an oxymoron because science is not a democracy. Theories of science are not validated by a democratic process. The laws of science are not some form of legislation. Just because a theory is, at one time, popular among a specific set of individuals does not mean that it in any way has become fact. I myself think that it is terrible the way Man is burning up the Earth’s very finite resources of fossil fuels just as quickly as possible and I would like to add the AGW conjecture as another reason to conserve but the AGW conjecture is just too full of holes for me to support. It is a matter of science. The arguments against the AGW conjecture are all grounded in science. People who do not believe in the religion of AGW should not be labeled as heretics and punished for some form of blasphemy as if the AGW conjecture were the law of the land.
Now the model
Toneb on April 5, 2016 at 1:10 pm
“The Ptolemaic model of the universe was once the consensus of science. If consensus defines scientific fact then all those that do not believe in the Ptolemaic model of the universe should be taken to court and charged with fraud and conspiracy to commit fraud.”
How many charged you estimated?
And yes, Ptolemaic and RICO are
perfect equivalents.
Glorifying obvious political grandstanding with a superficial legal veneer is unbecoming this site. Remember only 4 of the 16 on the podium said they would join Schneiderman. Remember Schneiderman launched in an election year, using selected out of context materials from one biased wamunist blog.
Not unimportant. But will not end well for warmunists persuing the Big Tobacco RICO analogy propounded by Oreskes. Wrong is wrong.
Why is Ted Cruz never mentioned in these RICO actions? And Donald Trump?
Surely they (particularly Cruz) have made enough public statements against the CAGW concept that they should be pursued by the warmists. Since the whole case is political, why don’t they go whole hog?
I am somewhat confused here.
Won’t it be a good thing if these court cases proceed?
Won’t the accused put the entire scam “onto the witness stand” and shred it?
Isn’t this what we want: put Mann and others into the witness box?
Am I wrong in thinking these prosecutions are a good thing?
William,
They have no intention of taking it to court. The threat, they are hoping, is enough to silence at least some of their critics. Defending ones self against Federal charges can be very expensive. For companies especially, it may be cheaper to issue a public apology and donate money to the “correct” cause(s). Yes, this is basically an attempt at extortion. Unprecedented you say? Think back on the last big tobacco lawsuits; those were just big cash grabs too.
“Think back on the last big tobacco lawsuits; those were just big cash grabs too.”
No, those were lawsuits against companies for illegal behavior, for saying cigarettes were safe when their own research indicated they were not. Take another present day example. Say a drug company develops a diabetes drug that has some bad side effects that don’t become apparent for many years. Is it OK for them to tell the world that their drug is safe, even though their own research says it is not?
Chris,
Are you really that credulous? Yes, some tobacco companies lied. Not as much as, say, Obama or Hillary. But really, is a lie worth more than $200 billion? And did that money go to the people who got sick from smoking? Nope, not a dime. The government took it all.
Smokers always knew they were doing something unhealthy. Mark Twain even commented about it. But he thought the tradeoff was worth it. Just like folks today.
If the states and feds really wanted to punish the tobacco companies, throwing a few CEO’s in the penitentiary would have had a bigger effect. As it is, that tobacco settlement cost was just passed on to consumers.
The same with the Deepwater Horizon oil spill. The day after it happened, and before anyone knew there were any safety violations, Obama stated that “Twenty billion dollars” was the figure he had in mind. Guess what? That issue was just settled — for $20 billion.
But of course if you’re the government, destroying the beautiful Animas river has no consequences at all. Not one EPA bureaucrat was fired, or even demoted. Or even given a meaningless letter of reprimand.
Governments have become corrupt organized crime rackets. They don’t throw people in jail because their interest is in extorting as much loot as they can. Jails cost money. But accidents, or any other pretext, can be used to extort money from companies. As much money as possible.
Do you honestly believe that a government that uses the IRS to go after groups for their entirely legal political activities would draw the line at squeezing money from companies, using any pretext they can come up with?
Most folks are not nearly that naive.
The tobacco lawsuits are shaky, and arguably unethical. The critical point being that they didn’t have exclusive knowledge of these effects, and they ended up paying for harming our health by selling more products that harm our health (in short, it makes no sense that they were fined but not shut down, and it makes less sense the more you think about it).
However, they at least paid doctors to research the health effects of tobacco and then buried the research when it gave the answers they didn’t want. Here, the best they have is that Exxon had some speculation about something outside their field of expertise and then didn’t follow up. That is literally it.
William,
Has the entire politi- climate fiasco been driven this far by the search for truth, or because of the money and power at stake?
Has anything changed, or will it, because of threatened court proceedings?
The puppet masters are quite adaptable, wouldn’t you agree?