Senator Sheldon Whitehouse's Lonely Battle Against Climate Indifference

Guest essay by Eric Worrall

Mashable’s description of Senator Sheldon’s climate speeches to empty rooms, where even Democrats can’t be bothered to turn up. Senator Whitehouse blames dark money.

Meet the U.S. senator obsessed with climate change

Every week the Senate has been in session since April 2012, one lonely Democratic senator from Rhode Island, Sheldon Whitehouse, has taken to the Senate floor to speak about global warming. On March 13, Senator Whitehouse gave his 200th “It’s Time to Wake Up” speech on climate change.

The speech was atypical for Whitehouse, who has grown accustomed to the unsettling feeling of standing virtually alone on the Senate floor while speaking about a topic that he believes is of the utmost importance.

It’s a very hollow feeling. If you believe that this is a matter of such consequence and that it’s going to hit your home state so hard that you are going to put in this kind of an effort, then to have it be in an empty chamber, it’s a little disconcerting,” he said in an interview, regarding most of his climate speeches.

This time, though, to mark the anniversary, 19 of his Democratic colleagues joined him to discuss the issue.

Whitehouse says he’s learned a lot about the science preparing for these speeches, and also has come to investigate why the politics of this issue are so intractable. This has turned his gaze squarely on the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. FEC, which allowed for unlimited corporate money and so-called “dark money” to flow into politics.

“Climate failure and dark money are two sides of the same coin,” Whitehouse said. Dark money is flowing to groups that promote the view that climate change is not real, and also punish Republicans that contemplate acting to reduce the severity of the problem.

He said he has “very intentionally wanted to be the witness on the ground” to tell future generations exactly why Congress has not acted. In his view, it’s not because of partisanship or the failure of the Democratic system, but rather special interest money flowing unfettered into campaigns, squelching any potential bipartsian compromises on climate legislation.

Read more: https://mashable.com/2018/03/17/sheldon-whitehouse-200-climate-change-speeches/

Its nice that Senator Whitehouse’s colleagues turned out for his 200th anniversary. But endless speeches to empty rooms highlights the scale of Whitehouse’s lost opportunity.

Imagine the good Senator Whitehouse could have done, focussing his obsessive nature on addressing a real issue. He could have been a great reformer, someone who made a real difference to the lives or ordinary Americans. Instead he will be remembered by history the way we remember other half forgotten political failures, as an irrelevant footnote, a blowhard who exemplified the incomprehensible historical delusions of great grandpa’s time.

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Tom Halla
March 17, 2018 7:07 pm

I have seen Senator Sheldon Whitehouse on C-Span, and he really needs a better source of talking points. He apparently understands climate science about as well as he understands constitutional law. The truly scary thing is that he gets reelected. Having fled a state, California, which had DiFi and Babs Bouncer as Senators, I understand the frustration the reasonable people of his state feel.

Reply to  Tom Halla
March 18, 2018 8:47 am

He should be convicted for taking bribes and give his speeches in front of the fellow inmates in a federal prison, not in the Senate: https://defyccc.com/senator-whitehouse-acquires-another-fishy-income-stream/ Senator Whitehouse in a Jailhouse – sounds like a song.

wws
Reply to  Leo G.
March 19, 2018 4:10 am

You should always remember that this is a Senator who represents a state that has just a slightly higher population than Jacksonville, Florida. It can be fairly said that he represents less voters than anyone else in the US Senate. (with the exception of the OTHER Senator from Rhode Island)

Reply to  Tom Halla
March 19, 2018 12:28 pm

Sheldon Whitehouse has some sort of a “climate” mental problem. He needs to see a doctor asap, before they put him out to pasture.

Reply to  pyeatte
March 19, 2018 12:35 pm

Climate derangement syndrome?

March 17, 2018 7:10 pm
ossqss
Reply to  co2islife
March 17, 2018 9:37 pm

Very nicely done!

Reply to  ossqss
March 18, 2018 2:19 am

Thanks, please share with every student you know.

johchi7
Reply to  co2islife
March 18, 2018 8:04 am

co2islife
Great links. I shared them on social media, and I hope more people get educated from them.

Reply to  johchi7
March 18, 2018 8:05 am

Thanks a million. I would love this to get into every classroom out there. The teachers would freak when people actually push back.

Caleb
Reply to  johchi7
March 19, 2018 1:50 pm

Many teachers simply teach “by the book”. Back around 1965 I had an elderly science teacher who taught as she had taught for years, who hadn’t seen all the articles that were then current, explaining that the old idea of “Continental Drift” had been validated by modern observations. When, as a snotty little brat, I told her that her textbook was out of date, she was actually interested. In conclusion: There are some old dogs who can learn new tricks (and I hope I am one of them.)
We definitely need reform in our schools. Before anyone is too harsh on modern school teachers, I dare them to serve as a substitute school teacher in their local school for a month. It is like being in an insane asylum.

Sheri
Reply to  co2islife
March 18, 2018 11:01 am

Very useful. Everything together in one place. I’ve bookmarked your site.

Reply to  Sheri
March 18, 2018 11:09 am

Thanks a million, be sure to share.

Reply to  co2islife
March 19, 2018 5:50 pm

Very well done indeed. Thank you.

Reply to  Gordon Jeffrey Giles
March 19, 2018 6:51 pm

Thanks, please share with others.

John Garrett
March 17, 2018 7:13 pm

The guy is a nutjob.

ToddF
March 17, 2018 7:13 pm

“which allowed for unlimited corporate money and so-called “dark money” to flow into politics.”
Which is Poli Sci speak for you and me being allowed to opine on politics, close to election time. Sure, someone like Anthony Watts will have a bigger audience than a no one like me. Which is why the evil in our country wants to place a value on speech, so as to declare websites like WUWT have a monetary value, and hence are (cue spooky music) Dark Money.
Citizens United was all about a movie, and trying to stop distribution of that movie as it was seen as an in kind contribution.
Lesson? Democrats are as much of a threat to basic rights as any foreign enemy, maybe even more so.

MarkW
Reply to  ToddF
March 18, 2018 2:41 pm

According to the law, when it was close to an election, the only people who were allowed to talk about elections other than face to face, were journalists.
And who determined who qualified as a journalist? The government, of course.

MarkW
Reply to  MarkW
March 19, 2018 7:31 am

Even worse was the Supreme Courts defense of the law.
They delved deep into sub-penumbras of the Constitution to find a governmental interest clause that they could use to over ride the clear language of the first amendment.

Tom in Florida
March 17, 2018 7:15 pm

I would suspect that Sancho Panza was faithfully in attendance at all his speeches?

drednicolson
Reply to  Tom in Florida
March 18, 2018 11:14 am

Though this Quixote happens to tilt *for* windmills.

Jim Heath
March 17, 2018 7:20 pm

I hate to say it guys but I think it’s more likely Pole Shift. We are the only species to witness and understand our own demise. There should be a tax against it.

James Beaver
Reply to  Jim Heath
March 17, 2018 7:32 pm

Pole shift? Aside from time during the field switching polarity, so what?

drednicolson
Reply to  James Beaver
March 18, 2018 11:18 am

Just reverse the polarity of the neutron flow, calibrate the anti-shutdown sensors, and kick the doohickey underneath the doomaflochey. Crisis averted.

Bruce Cobb
March 17, 2018 7:26 pm

Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.
He could be chief of the climate cuckaloos.

Jon Jewett
March 17, 2018 7:28 pm

“an irrelevant footnote, a blowhard who exemplified the incomprehensible historical delusions of great grandpa’s time.” An eloquent turn of phrase.

March 17, 2018 7:44 pm

He likes DC better than RI, because there isn’t snow to shovel there.

drednicolson
Reply to  R Taylor
March 18, 2018 11:20 am

Hard to rub elbows with lobbyists when you’re elbow-deep in snow.

Barbara
Reply to  R Taylor
March 18, 2018 4:57 pm

Sen. Whitehouse will have to run for re-election carrying the baggage as an advocate for carbon taxes,
There is at least one Senate speech on this topic.

Barbara
Reply to  Barbara
March 18, 2018 5:50 pm

U.S. Senate, Sen. Whitehouse
Press Release: 07.26.17
‘American Opportunity Carbon Fee Act Introduced in Congress’
Re: Sen. Whitehouse on climate change and carbon pricing,
https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov/news/release/american-opportunity-carbon-fee-act-introduced-in-congress

Barbara
Reply to  Barbara
March 18, 2018 7:41 pm

U.S. Senate, Sen. Whitehouse
Press Release: 02.05.18
‘Whitehouse, Schatz, Blumenauer, Cicilline Introduce Updated American Opportunity Carbon Fee Act’
Re: climate change, carbon pricing, transition to carbon-free energy.
https://www.whitehouse.senate.gov/news/release/whitehouse-schatz-blumenauer-cicilline-introduce-updated-american-opportunity-carbon-fee-act

Barbara
Reply to  Barbara
March 20, 2018 9:19 am

Congress. Gov
Summary: S.2368- American Opportunity Carbon Fee Act
Introduced in the Senate (02/05/2018)
Bill amends the IRS Code to impose fees.
Major provisions of S.2368, 2018 at:
https://www.congress.gov/bill/115th-congress/senate-bill/2368

Reply to  R Taylor
March 19, 2018 5:52 pm

Correction…There isn’t as much snow to shovel.

TA
March 17, 2018 7:44 pm

From the article: “Dark money is flowing to groups that promote the view that climate change is not real,”
Who are these groups? Senator Whitehouse should name the guilty parties.
When do the folks here at WUWT get our cut of the Dark Money?

Mickey Reno
Reply to  TA
March 17, 2018 8:27 pm

Whitehouse doesn’t understand climate science, and he doesn’t understand Citizen’s United, either. The Supreme Court ruling on Citizens merely “granted” the little people the same rights to speak before an election which McCain-Feingold had reserved to “media” companies. Why should the NY Times or the Washington Post have editorial freedom that those two idiots (McCain and Feingold) sought to deny the rest of us?

Barbara
Reply to  TA
March 19, 2018 1:42 pm

UNEP FI
Category: News
There are pages of news articles at this website and also under Older Posts.
Including: words, cl!mate den!er$, climate change, etc.
http://www.unepfi.org/category/news

Barbara
Reply to  Barbara
March 19, 2018 6:14 pm

UNEP FI
Category: Publications
There are pages of publications at this website. Also see Older Posts.
Includes climate change.
http://www.unepfi.org/category/publications

J Philip Peterson
March 17, 2018 7:59 pm

I was looking to see if there are any videos of Senator Cruz vs Senator Whitehouse, = would have been a perfect “debate” on the subject…

Anyone have/found one video including Cruz and Whitehouse on the subject?

clipe
March 17, 2018 8:03 pm

In related news…
Why Is Yawning So Contagious?

gary turner
March 17, 2018 8:06 pm

Sen Whitehouse is an archetype, matching a small mind to the smallest state. Let us hope this match is unique.

Tom Halla
Reply to  gary turner
March 17, 2018 8:13 pm

No real correlation. California is the third largest state, and had Barbara Boxer.QED

John F. Hultquist
Reply to  Tom Halla
March 18, 2018 11:22 am

You are thinking of a linear relationship.
It could be a curve, like the one HERE.
Or consider water, temperature, density.

Tom Halla
Reply to  John F. Hultquist
March 18, 2018 12:40 pm

Unless otherwise stated, correlation refers to Pearson’s R 🙂

KT66
March 17, 2018 8:17 pm

Excuses. Excuses. All that imaginary money from big fossil that nobody can find is to blame. Has anybody received their check yet? Is it in the same place as all that hard evidence that they can’t produce? Apparently contrarians have been so successful that they have made both disappear.

Gerard O'Dowd
Reply to  KT66
March 17, 2018 8:33 pm

The lobbying check from Big Oil to climate change skeptics to deny AGW can be found in the same “lock box” as Social Security taxes to fund retirements for senior citizens.

March 17, 2018 8:20 pm

Sheldon Whitehouse is simply a mentally-ill doofus Liberal.
(yeah, now that’s triply redundant and what you call an ad hom attack)
No doubt that since November 9, 2016, he has gone from one triggered TDS hallucinatory episode to the next, until he ups his Xanax dose to calm down his manufactured anxiety for awhile. (another ad hom).
Any analysis of the things he has said through the years, including on how the right was reacting to ObamaCare legislation, you can see this guy hallucinates regularly about the political right.
So as to not be accused of “strawManning” or making shit up, here are some of Sheldon’s documented hallucinations (beyond his weekly Senate floor rants his colleagues laugh at):
– He made claims that solar PV and “renewables” would lower the cost of electricity in his state and would free the US of foreign oil. Politifact gave him a “mostly false” rating. His continues to insist he is correct.
http://www.politifact.com/rhode-island/statements/2012/jan/08/sheldon-whitehouse/us-sen-sheldon-whitehouse-says-development-solar-p/
– During the ObamaCare/ACA legislative fights, he made statements that the right would running around in blood-thristy crowds in the streets. Again, hallucinations.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/20/AR2009122002872.html
– On the Senate floor he called Republicans opposed to ObamaCare/ACA “racists” and compared them to the Aryan Nation. When confronted by a reporter after his speech, he denied he said those things and told the reporter to go check the records. The reporter did check the transcripts, and Whitehouse did say those things. Again Whitehouse was having hallucinations.
https://web.archive.org/web/20140201202414/http://www.washingtontimes.com/weblogs/watercooler/2009/dec/20/sen-whitehouse-foes-health-care-bill-are-birthers-/?feat=home_top5_read
– Whitehouse said of the ClimateGate emails released from Univ East Anglia/CRU, ““Climategate should properly be known as Climategate-gate because it was the scandal that was phony.” Even though everything is the emails was authetic. He hallucinates that authenticated emails are phoney only in his mind.
https://web.archive.org/web/20150506103652/http://thinkprogress.org/green/2011/12/15/390202/video-climate-hawks-whitehouse-and-franken-hold-climate-crisis-colloquy/
Clearly Senator Sheldon Whitehouse is prone to hallucinatory attacks and is today suffering from regular bouts of TDS.

Michael Kelly
March 17, 2018 8:43 pm

“Its nice that Senator Whitehouse’s colleagues turned out for his 200th anniversary.”
Hey, give the guy some credit. Anyone who has been married 200 years has got something going for him. My first marriage lasted 27 years. It only seemed like 200 years – under water!

Ed Zuiderwijk
Reply to  Michael Kelly
March 18, 2018 2:35 am

That’s probably unfair on your first wife?

March 17, 2018 8:58 pm

As far as the US Senate is concerned, I have advocated this political theory for some time:
Thesis: Since Senator Harry Reid-era began in 2006 and continuing to this day, a key goal of senior Democrats in both the House and the Senate of the US Congress has been to neutralize Congress in its constitutional roles.
Rationale: Congress, and most especially the House of Representatives, are by the design of the constitution’s framers, to be the voice of the People in our federal government. Democrats are desperately trying to neutralize the voice of the People. They cannot have the People running the government. For Democrats (actually Progressives), the Government exists to impose its will on the People, and any rights the People have have been granted by the government. That is of course, exactly opposite of what the Constitutions intends.
Finally, even though Congress is viewed as a co-equal branch with the Executive and Supreme Court, it has sole the power of Impeachment and Removal of the President, Vice-President, or any appointed officer or Supreme Court justice or lower court judge in the Federal government.
Background: The Democrats have long believed (now mistakenly) that the US Presidency would never return to the GOP control due to demographic shifts in the US. Thus they saw Bush Jr. as the last US Republican president ever (or a least for a very long time). Obama was supposed to be the start of a long run of Democrats, and thus an Imperial Presidency was preferred. A Liberal President that would run rough-shod over the People and the Constitution that protects them could nullify Congress’s constitutional check on the President.
The Left envisioned the Democratic President would, due to aging of the Supreme Court, be able to install a Progressive bench there to ensure lower court judicial activism would not be nullified, but instead would be supported and affirmed by the Supreme Court.
LEgislation that they could never get through Congress, they could essentially enact via activist judges and a Liberal SCOTUS. A SCOTUS that would turn upside-down the very definition for words in the Constitution. to it Progressive beliefs ( actually that’s a form of hallucinations if they believe it).
Supporting evidence:
– Republicans took impeachment and removal off the table for Obama under heavy media pressure and suggestions from Democrats that impeaching the first black President would simply be racism. Thus Obama had license to violate the Constitution at will, only check by the courts.
– The Senate never passed a Budget bill under Democratic Party control after 2008. It passed abudget only recently after the GOP regained control of the Senate. Passing budgets is Congress’s most important constitutional duty. But passing a budget means out-of-control spending must be accounted for. And votes then become accountability at the ballot box for voters. And once the GOP took over the House in 2011, the Speaker Bohnert sequester gambit only further strengthened Democrats resolve to nullify Congress on imposing spending limits. (To be sure, there are many swamp-dwelling Republicans who do not like spending limits).
– President Obama specifically worked the Paris climate treaty and the Iran nuclear treaty to only be “agreements” to avoid the Senate ratification, which he could never get. Senate Democrats (the vast majority at least) supported the President’s unilateral stripping them of their ratification authority.
(there are lots of other instances of Democrats actively working to undermine Congress’s constitutional authority…)
Conclusion: A key objective of senior Democratic Party Senators and Congressmen/women has been to neutralize Congress and rule the nation through an imperial (Democratic) President and (from the Progressives the President would appoint to the judiciary) allow Liberal Judicial activism to re-write black letter law.
One final note:
Thank God for President Trump beating Hillary with 56% of the vote*. Trump saved the nation and the Constitution from Progressives. At least for now.
* the only vote that matters in determining the US Presidency.

Tom in Florida
Reply to  Joel O’Bryan
March 18, 2018 6:12 am

I would add that while everyone has their opinion of Donald Trump, and even for those of us who dislike him personally, he was the right man for the job at the right time in our history specifically for the reasons you show above.

TA
Reply to  Tom in Florida
March 18, 2018 8:14 am

Trump has his flaws but he makes a Great President. If you are a conservative, anyway.
Trump needs some help from fellow Republicans/Conservatives. We need to get out and vote. Any Democrat victories will be a setback for Trump’s agenda and for our personal freedoms and future. Every vote counts.

Chris
Reply to  Tom in Florida
March 18, 2018 9:42 pm

“Trump has his flaws but he makes a Great President. If you are a conservative, anyway.” By what logic is he a conservative? Increasing the federal deficit by 60% when the economy is in year 7 of a recovery and interest rates are being increased to keep the economy from overheating? Tearing up free trade agreements? Tax cuts that primarily benefit the wealthy? Oh yeah, that is a conservative position – my mistake.

MarkW
Reply to  Tom in Florida
March 19, 2018 7:32 am

Since the rich pay the vast majority of taxes, tax cuts are going to benefit them more than anyone else.
But then the leftists believe that the job of government is to take money from those who work and give it to them.

MarkW
Reply to  Tom in Florida
March 19, 2018 7:34 am

BTW, you leftists cheered when Obama more than doubled the deficit.
And this so called recovery, until Trump came along was the weakest recovery ever recorded. Not even strong enough to increase the percentage of the population that was working.

Walter Sobchak
March 17, 2018 9:07 pm

I have been denying global warming for years. Whitehouse and other warmunists say that I am getting dark money. The sad truth is that I do not get dark money, I do not get light money, either. Heck, I do not even get dingy gray money. I get no money at all.
Please, Koch Brothers, Exxon, Peabody Coal, anyone, please send me some money, any money. My family would really appreciate it. Pretty Please.

Hivemind
Reply to  Walter Sobchak
March 17, 2018 11:31 pm

Same here.

Phillip Bratby
Reply to  Hivemind
March 18, 2018 2:14 am

Me too. Combating climate change alarmism costs me a lot of my own money.

Ed Zuiderwijk
Reply to  Walter Sobchak
March 18, 2018 2:37 am

Oh, if only!

PaulH
Reply to  Walter Sobchak
March 18, 2018 6:50 am

That’s why I haven’t seen any money! It’s all too dark to see!

Reply to  Walter Sobchak
March 19, 2018 12:33 pm

Same here, so far. But I got a nice AFP “Hot Air Tour” T-shirt, about ten years ago.

ossqss
March 17, 2018 9:31 pm

Where is the link in his evolution to advocacy? Where did the money and influence come in to play?
It is there, just not exposed yet.

Reply to  ossqss
March 17, 2018 9:49 pm

Sheldon caught doing insider trading. Really. Anyone but a Senator or Congressman would have gone to jail. He probably still does it, just is better at hiding it.
Now his climate change advocacy speeches are his attempt at indemnification (by climate virtue, anyone who would prosecute surely is working for big oil) from his insider trading activity.

ossqss
Reply to  Joel O’Bryan
March 17, 2018 9:56 pm

I would really like to see something documenting that. Really would!

Reply to  Joel O’Bryan
March 17, 2018 10:32 pm

Sheldon Whitehouse wasn’t alone in the insider trading that went on immediately after a closed-door briefing in Sept 2008 from Bernanke and SecTreasury Paulson about how the stock markets were about to implode. But somehow amazingly his investment broker began selling a huge percentage of Sheldon’s positions. Congress had insider information that had it been done by you or me, we’d have been in prosecuted and see time at Club Fed.

MarkW
Reply to  Joel O’Bryan
March 19, 2018 9:31 am

Congress explicitly exempted itself from the insider trading laws.

March 17, 2018 9:31 pm

Dear Senator Whitehouse
If atmos co2 were a control knob that determines surface temperature it would be easy to present empirical evidence of that relationship. But it ain’t.
https://ssrn.com/abstract=3142525

March 17, 2018 10:00 pm

Sophisticated analysis reveals that the 200 units of excessive bloviation raised the CO2 level by 15 ppm +/- 0.000001 ppm.

Pop Piasa
March 17, 2018 10:06 pm

“It’s a very hollow feeling. If you believe that this is a matter of such consequence…”
Enough said for me, anybody object?

Pop Piasa
Reply to  Pop Piasa
March 17, 2018 10:10 pm

[]

Pop Piasa
Reply to  Pop Piasa
March 17, 2018 10:12 pm

Drat! Fussy old blockquote conventions.

Gary Pearse
March 17, 2018 11:20 pm

I believe a large proportion of those still carrying on with the notion of catastrophe ‘poised’ to strike after Climategate, the killer Pause and the contrariness of nature in general, have been battling mounting doubts in their minds. They still have faith that warming will continue but a weariness and less than wholehearted prosecution of the meme is clearly evident.
The cut from 3-5C increase by 2100 to 2C being catastrophic has since been further cut to 1.5C because forecasts using the CO2 formula for temperature rise have proven to be 200% too high. At the same time because of embarrassment caused by such over the top calculations, ECS has been trimmed lower and lower, even by the IPCC although they illogically cling to an upper bound of 5C but make sure to lower the lower bound to 1.5C to not be left far out from recent determinations converging on ~1.5 per doubling – a level that is broadly accepted as benign.
The greening of the planet and doubling of harvests accompanying increased CO2 and modest warming has taken climate worriers by surprise, totally undercutting the ‘cost’ of carbon. Although still vilified by proponents of disaster, rising carbon dioxide is establishing itself as a net benefit.
Non scientists like Whitehouse and Al Gore are becoming the lonely spokespersons for a dying issue. I’m not surprised that Democrats have been walking away from this spent non-issue.

Reply to  Gary Pearse
March 17, 2018 11:25 pm

I wonder how long it will take for a majority of alarmists, professional and lay alike, to suddenly act like none of this nonsense ever happened? Slinking away from a position, rather than standing and saying one was wrong, is common.

TA
Reply to  Gary Pearse
March 18, 2018 8:33 am

“I believe a large proportion of those still carrying on with the notion of catastrophe ‘poised’ to strike after Climategate, the killer Pause and the contrariness of nature in general, have been battling mounting doubts in their minds. They still have faith that warming will continue but a weariness and less than wholehearted prosecution of the meme is clearly evident.”
I think that is right. Skeptics keep asking Alarmists for proof of CAGW and there is no proof, and they know it and we know it. That’s what’s got them discouraged. And there’s nothing on the horizon that will get the Alarmists across the finish line other than having the temperatures climb, climb, climb. They are captive to the thermometer.
So we are all waiting to see what the temperture gauge will do in the future.

tadchem
March 17, 2018 11:29 pm

Modern discussions of atmospheric physics almost universally neglect the Adiabatic Lapse Rate – the single most influential factor in atmospheric temperature distribution. The ALR is almost independent of the composition of the atmosphere, but strongly dependent on the *weight* of the atmosphere. Literally millions of *measurements* over more than 20 years have led to a mathematical model that represents the ALR simply as a function of atmospheric density and the force of gravity. In the lower 80% of the earth’s atmosphere (11 km) the temperature drops 75.5° C – 6.5° C for every kilometer increase in altitude – about 2° C for the height of a tall building.
This temperature gradient also drives convection, which stirs the atmosphere and makes efforts to ‘homogenize’ atmospheric temperatures ludicrous.
Against this background variability the alleged heating due to increased CO2 concentrations is miniscule.

Reply to  tadchem
March 17, 2018 11:47 pm

careful. There be dragons ahead for you with that kind if independent thinking.
Also Tad, don’t overlook the most important GHG, water vapor, i.e. humidity.

Brett Keane
Reply to  Joel O’Bryan
March 18, 2018 11:40 pm

tadchem, not to worry, you have the right of it. Like Maxwell and all real Physicists since!

Bob Stewart
Reply to  tadchem
March 18, 2018 12:12 pm

The adiabatic lapse rate is highly dependent upon the water vapor content of the atmosphere. Ditto convection at the surface. After a clear, calm night in the winter, it is a delight to watch the cold, dry air drain onto relatively warm water of our salt water cove. As the sun rises, we can see the mist lift from the surface and move majestically under the influence of whatever light breezes are created to accommodate the upward motion of the warmed, moist air. Glider pilots look for recently plowed fields anticipating strong lift for the same reason.

thomasjk
Reply to  tadchem
March 20, 2018 3:39 am

…..Relative to the “greenhouse” effect produced by atmospheric H2O molecules, the alleged heating due to about a .01% increase of atmospheric CO2 is minsicule…..and the hypothesis is proving over and over to be ludicrous when applied to the real world and can only stand up within the imaginary world that is being created by garbage in/garbage out computer models.

Sören F
March 18, 2018 12:13 am

What’s it called when a reception of something, a creation of debt, is unjustly identified and appointed to someone?

March 18, 2018 2:29 am

Senator Whitehouse is a sad and delusional clown.
When (not if) the CAGW sc@m is officially disconfirmed, political hacks like Whitehouse, the DNC, Obama, Algore, et al, will try to deny any culpability in the biggest and most expensive sc@m in human history, which has: cost millions of lives, $trillions of wasted taxpayer money, severely lowered living standards, severely inhibited economic and technological advancement and generally made people’s lives miserable for no reason whatsoever.
CAGW has always been a political phenomenon, and never a physical one. Period!
The scientists and politicians that perpetuated and enabled this CAGW sc@m to flourish must be held accountable for all the harm they’ve committed— “All that is required for evil to flourish is for good men to say nothing.”
Humanity must not give these evil CAGW advocates a pass. They must be prosecuted for their: lies, data manipulation, obfuscation, corruption of justice, intensional bogus science, bogus pal-reviewed papers, destruction of evidence, malfeasance of public funds, purgery, slander, etc.,
If these CAGW scoundrels get away with their crimes, similar sc@ms are soon to follow.
“If we fail to learn the lessons of history, we are doomed to repeat them.”

Bob Stewart
Reply to  SAMURAI
March 18, 2018 12:30 pm

And there are all those windmills that will need to be decommissioned and safely removed. I grew up in So. Calif. and as a boy the oil fields in the Huntington Beach/Long Beach area were quite an eyesore. They also had an aroma that was very distinctive. The same visual picture can now be found in the foothills surrounding L. A., the most egregious being the winds farms NW of Palmdale. Hundreds of windmills of all sizes and vintages cover the slopes. It looks like photos of early oil field developments. They may not smell, but like many of the “green” alternatives, they play havoc with birds.
As for retribution, I think Karma is about all we can hope for. Just getting these fools out of town and off to their retirement villas will suffice. Left to their own devices,, and lacking the discipline of their PR staff, I rather doubt they’d survive the temptations of gluttony inflamed by idleness.

Ed Zuiderwijk
March 18, 2018 2:32 am

Dark money will go the same way as dark matter: into the dustbin of failed ideas.

Just Jenn
March 18, 2018 6:43 am

Anyone ever notice that when attacked the simpletons return to putting the adjective “dark” in front of whatever noun they feel will make it more sinister and increase their own credibility (in their own minds that is).
Dark = Opposite of light which of course equals good.
Back to the article: Who keeps sending this moron to Congress anyway? Seriously. I’m not going to look up the man’s record, but is he on some committee that is essential for the people of Rhode Island? Is his voting record on matters that concern the people of his state such that they overlook his 200 attempts on a ridiculous issue? In other words, is he really a boob that is lucky to get votes or is there something more going on behind closed doors as it were?
If nothing else is going on….you gotta wonder why he is even there……

MarkW
Reply to  Just Jenn
March 18, 2018 2:48 pm

Morons who like his ability to send other people’s money [their] way.
Which to them, is by far the most important job of a Senator or Representative.

arthur4563
March 18, 2018 6:54 am

” He made claims that solar PV and “renewables” would lower the cost of electricity in his state and would free the US of foreign oil.” Since oil (foreign or domestic) is virtually never used to generate electricity, someone ask this ignorant dope how renewable electricity would have any conceivable effect on oil. Notice how they always choose oil, or big oil as the evil. Apparently incest is big in Rhode Island, and this dope is related to the majority of R.I. voters, who also apparently share his
mental deficiencies. I wonder how they find their way to the polling booths? Rhode Island doesnt deserve to be a state, or have any Senators. Give it back to Massachusettes

Phoenix44
Reply to  arthur4563
March 18, 2018 9:25 am

And since when have people opposed having things that are cheaper?
If he can show a single bill that is cheaper because of renewables, I would be very, very surprised.

Gary
Reply to  arthur4563
March 18, 2018 9:35 am

Arthur,
Badmouth Sheldon all you want (he is an idiot), but your attacks on Rhode Island aren’t quite fair. The State gained it’s charter from the King of England in 1663 to fend off the land grabbing of Massachusetts and Connecticut. It’s not possible to “give it back” unless you mean to the indigenous people’s descendants, but in that case there’s a lot of America to “give back.” As for the way RIers vote, you have to understand that the Democrat Party has controlled the State since 1937 when it took over from a corrupt Republican Party. It won the loyalty of lower economic and immigrant groups by securing their jobs and ending abuses by the factory owners. The loyalty has persisted through multiple generations even though the Party is as corrupt and self-serving as the one it replaced. RIers aren’t stupid as you suggest; they’re practical, settling for small potatoes when there’s little other choice. Part of that is a benighted provincialism, part is going along to get along. A few right-thinking people oppose the regime, but they have long odds against their success.

Another Ian
Reply to  Gary
March 18, 2018 6:46 pm

Gary
Find yourself a copy of Bernard Cornwell’s “The Fort” to see an early tribute to Massachusetts
(and a bit of the war of independence that you might not have met before)

March 18, 2018 7:48 am

Are politicians getting dumber? And is that even possible? I guess I feel sorry for the guy, unless it’s an act & he actually has a clever plan to extract loot from taxpayers and/or Soros/greenie-people. I mean, Algore did it.

Jassean Kidd
March 18, 2018 9:13 am

I could interpret ate that in a way that was clear to my eyes realize real lies and real eyes realize real lies so that’s what I’m gunna say for now 👎

Jassean Kidd
March 18, 2018 9:16 am

If I spent time worry about something like this then wake me up please

Phoenix44
March 18, 2018 9:24 am

I do love the idea that bad people will use their money to stop action.
Do these bad people have a different Earth to live on when the Apocalypse comes? Or are they so bad that they want the Apocalypse?
This isn’t the same as smoking, where you could make money lying and not be affected by the lies: if the Alarmists are right, it will be and for everyone, rich as well. So where is the incentive to fund “lies”?

Curious George
Reply to  Phoenix44
March 18, 2018 10:07 am

They know they are right, that’s settled.

Pop Piasa
March 18, 2018 11:06 am

Jonathan Harris made these accurate predictions concerning the “Whitehouse era” in Progressivism.

JMR
March 18, 2018 1:43 pm

The senator’s belief about dark money makes it sound like every member of the House and Senate is a mindless automaton that will function in a certain way when money is inserted. Does he really believe his elected colleagues are so empty and so easily manipulated? Who is paying him to make all of his speeches?

MarkW
March 18, 2018 2:39 pm

To a leftist, dark money is any money that they don’t control.

Streetcred
Reply to  MarkW
March 18, 2018 4:26 pm

It’s where they hide it once it is procured. 😉

Streetcred
March 18, 2018 4:25 pm

Now that the Democrat senators have their “dark money” they don’t have to turn up to work and listen to Sheldon prattle on.

Brett Keane
March 18, 2018 10:11 pm

Now now Eric, my Greatgrandparents’ generation were hardworking nationbuilders. Whitehouse would get a dropkick from them. They had real scientists then too. Think Maxwell through Rutherford….

Joel Snider
March 19, 2018 12:12 pm

Scientist declares Sen. Whitehouse is ‘a complete moron, scientifically’
A prominent scientist is pushing back on Democratic Senator Sheldon Whitehouse (RI) for his lecture on the Senate floor that anyone skeptical of man-made global warming is guilty of “grave sin” and “listening to evil voices.” See: Sen. Whitehouse: ‘Climate deniers’ guilty of ‘grave sin’ & ‘LISTENING TO EVIL VOICES’ – Instead ‘listen to the oceans’
“I am really getting sick and tired of this blowhard Sheldon Whitehouse (D-RI) lecturing us for being sinners,” Dr. Thomas P. Sheahen, an MIT educated physicist and author of the book “An Introduction to High-Temperature Superconductivity,” told Climate Depot. Sheahen is the writer of the popular newspaper column “Ask the Everyday Scientist.” Sheahen is featured in the new book,
‘The Politically Incorrect Guide to Climate Change’ by Marc Morano.
“Senator Whitehouse is a complete moron, scientifically. He doesn’t know any real science at all. He believes in the mythology initiated a generation ago by Al Gore, where CO2 emitted by mankind is entirely to blame,” Sheahen explained.
Sheahen continued: “Here’s the reality: There is no such thing as a ‘climate denier.’ That category doesn’t exist. There are certain facts that we all agree on: a) the climate is always changing; b) the globe is warming; c) there is a finite human contribution (e.g., the urban heat island effect). Where disagreement begins is on the role of CO2 in heating the planet. There is great scientific controversy about that point, because of factors such as how molecules absorb and re-radiate photons at various altitudes in the atmosphere, because of flow via convection of warm air from the surface to the upper atmosphere; and more. It’s a really complicated field of science.”
Sheahen added: “Sheldon Whitehouse has no intention whatsoever to engage in any scientific debate at all. Instead, he quotes the entirely false and manufactured statistic that “97% of scientists agree…” and goes from there to further faulty steps:
1) he asserts that he knows the truth perfectly;
2) he asserts that anybody who disagrees with him is a sinner.
I say it’s high time that our religious leaders stepped forth and shouted “Stop!” to Senator Whitehouse and similar bloviators.”
Sheahen concluded: “No way is Whitehouse capable of defining some action as a ‘sin.’ His scientific acumen is so weak that he cannot even defend the position he holds but instead resorts to the ‘argument from authority’ to brush off any scientific disagreement.”

ResourceGuy
March 19, 2018 3:06 pm

Lonely or loony? The former is not unusual for politicos marking time. The latter is an accessory to policy fraud.

Patrick
March 19, 2018 5:06 pm

Whitehouse is ULTRA liberal nut job…and the clear thinking people in Rhode Island all know he is an arrogant jackass suffering from global warming derangement syndrome and Bush derangement syndrome! He gets elected in Rhode Island because he has a “D” next to his name on the ballot. Hopefully this November Rhode Islanders will wake up and smell the coffee and kick his ass out of the Senate and end our national embarassment!