They want to upend and transform America, but demand No Debate on underlying “science”
Paul Driessen
Democrats, climate campaigners and renewable energy interests are in full outrage mode over news that President Trump intends to launch a Presidential Committee on Climate Science. He should do it now.
The PCCS would, at long last, review and question the “dangerous manmade climate change” reports by federal agencies and investigations funded by them. The committee would be led by Dr. Will Happer, a highly respected scientist and well known skeptic – not of climate change, but of manmade climate chaos. He would be joined by other prominent experts – of whom there are many – who share his doubts.
No way! the climate alarmists rant. How dare you question our disaster claims? Our settled science?
No! How dare YOU use those claims to justify your agenda – and your continued efforts to bludgeon and silence us into submission – without letting anyone examine, much less debate, your supposed evidence?
For years, you have loudly and incessantly asserted that the United States and world must end fossil fuel use, or we are “doomed.” Now you’re demanding that the United States completely upend its energy production, transportation and manufacturing sectors, housing and office buildings, and entire economy. You want the federal government to control and limit our lives, choices and living standards – and redistribute our wealth, even to those “unwilling to work,” according to confiscatory socialist principles.
For years, you Democrats, environmentalists, Deep State bureaucrats, government-grant-dependent scientists, news and social media have colluded to censor and silence manmade climate chaos skeptics, and stifle any debate. All of you have huge financial, reputational and power stakes in this.
Your Climate Industrial Complex is a $2-trillion-per-year global behemoth. Your Green New Deal would cost this nation up to $93 trillion by 2030 – sticking every US family with a $65,000 annual bill.
And still you insist that the science is settled, that there is no room for discussion, that we must act immediately to “save the planet” from climate and extreme weather disaster. Now you want to wrap up your kangaroo court proceedings – with our side given no opportunity to present our evidence, defend fossil fuels and carbon dioxide, examine your alleged evidence, or cross-examine your experts.
If your evidence is so solid and unimpeachable, you should be more than happy to lay it on the table, subject it to scrutiny, question our experts, and let us question yours – extensively and mercilessly.
After all, the future of our planet is at stake – or so you claim. The future of our country certainly is.
Your radical agenda and actions are un-American, totalitarian, anti-science, and contrary to our most fundamental principles of open, robust debate – on one of the most critical issues in US history.
A large majority of Americans believe our planet has warmed and is warming. No one denies that. And thank goodness, or we’d still be stuck in the Little Ice Age. But that’s not the issue. The issues are: Is any likely future warming going to be disastrous? And are humans and fossil fuels to blame?
You claim the answer is Yes. Again, where is your proof? If you have any actual evidence, lay it on the table. Show us exactly where the natural forces that have driven countless climate changes throughout history end – and where the human factors begin. Quantify them. Don’t give us computer models that simply reflect the assumptions that went into them. Present solid, Real World evidence. If you have any.
While you’re at it, you also need to prove that dismantling America’s energy and economic system will make one whit of difference in our climate and weather (assuming for the sake of argument that human carbon dioxide emissions now drive climate and weather) – when China, India and other countries are building thousands of coal and natural gas fueled power plants, and millions of cars and trucks.
Their emissions already dwarf ours. And they are not going to give up fossil fuels for decades, if ever.
Prove your GND energy system can actually power America, without destroying jobs, living standards, manufacturing, health, prosperity and environment. As I have said over, over and over, it cannot be done. Your alternatives are not workable, affordable, green, renewable, ethical, ecological or sustainable.
Here’s just a few of the Real World climate science facts that alarmists don’t want exposed or discussed.
Temperatures have risen by tenths or hundredths of a degree in recent years – less than the margin of error, and most of the “highest temperatures on record” have been in urban areas, where local manmade heat skews the data. We’re also experiencing record cold and snow in numerous locations.
The average prediction by 102 climate models is now a full degree Fahrenheit above what satellites are measuring. Michael Mann’s climate model could concoct hockey sticks from telephone numbers and other random numbers. Are we supposed to trust these models on critical energy policy?
Violent tornadoes (F3 to F5) averaged 56 per year from 1950 to 1985. But from 1986 to 2018 only 34 per year touched down in the USA on average – and for the first time ever not one did in 2018. The March 3 Alabama tornado was tragic, and the 2-mile-wide 2013 Oklahoma City monster lasted 40 minutes. But the 1925 Tri-State Twister was a mile wide, traveled a record 220 miles, lasted a record 3.5 hours, and killed a record 695 people.
Hurricanes becoming more frequent and intense? From 1920 through 1940, ten Category 3-5 hurricanes made US landfall; from 1960 through 1980, eleven; 1980 through 2000, ten; 2001 through 2018, nine. There is no trend. Moreover, Harvey and Irma in 2017 were the first category 3-5 hurricanes to make U.S. landfall in a record twelve years. The previous record was nine years, set in the Civil War era.
A warmer Arctic? The Washington Post did report that “the Arctic Ocean is warming up, icebergs are growing scarcer, and in some places seals are finding the water too hot.” But that was in 1922!
Polar bear populations are the highest on record: between 24,500 and 28,500 or more of them!
Oceans cannot become “more acidic,” because they are not and have never been acidic. Earth’s oceans are slightly alkaline. That slight alkalinity has decreased slightly (from 8.2 on the pH scale to 8.1) over the past few decades. But they are not getting acidic … and won’t anytime soon.
Carbon dioxide is not a pollutant. It is the miracle molecule without which most life on Earth would cease to exist. In fact, the more CO2 in the air, the faster and better crop, forest and grassland plants grow – and the better they can withstand droughts, diseases, and damage from insects and viruses.
In fact, a slightly warmer planet with more atmospheric CO2 would be tremendously beneficial for plants, wildlife and humanity. A colder planet with less carbon dioxide would greatly reduce arable land extent, growing seasons, wildlife habitats, crop production and our ability to feed humanity.
Millions of Americans are exasperated with Republicans like Congressman John Shimkus of Illinois, who recently whined that it’s “just not worth the fight anymore” to battle climate alarmism – and protect our nation and our children’s future. Elected officials like him need to get spinal implants, learn the Climate Facts, or resign and turn their seats over to someone who will fight for us. That’s why we need the PCCS.
It’s why they hope the President Trump we elected to clean out the Deep State … show why manmade climate chaos claims are pseudo-science … and Make America Great Again for decades to come … will demonstrate his toughness and leadership right now, when we so need him to.
We need to tell Mr. Trump: Please stand up to these Climate Totalitarians who want to destroy our nation, in the name of saving the planet from climate disasters that exist only in computer models, Hollywood movies, and self-serving assertions by the Climate Industrial Complex. Alarmists have controlled the climate narrative thus far. Now we need to give other experts a chance to weigh in, loud and clear.
Appoint your Presidential Committee on Climate Science now! Give sound, honest science a chance.
Paul Driessen is senior policy advisor for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) and author of articles and books on energy, environmental and human rights issues.
The great Freeman Dyson has a wonderful interview discussing the science versus the politics.
https://www.marijnpoels.com/single-post/2019/03/05/We-don%E2%80%99t-understand-climate-its-very-complicated-and-were-only-at-the-beginning-to-understand-what-the-effects-may-be
“Oceans cannot become “more acidic,” because they are not and have never been acidic. Earth’s oceans are slightly alkaline. That slight alkalinity has decreased slightly (from 8.2 on the pH scale to 8.1) over the past few decades. But they are not getting acidic … and won’t anytime soon”
The ocean acidification issue is not about oceans becoming acidic but about a drop in the pH within the oceanic alkaline range. We know from paleo data that even a small drop in pH can cause species extinctions. It is believed that the advent of modern mammals and the spread of mammals on land (out of the water) derive from an ocean acidification event in the PETM. Please see:
https://tambonthongchai.com/2018/10/28/petm/
My difficulty with ocean acidification is twofold. First, that the source of the carbon is fossil fuel emissions is an assumption and a strange assumption since much much larger natural sources exist in the deep ocean. And in fact the data are inconsistent with that assumption. Pls see
https://tambonthongchai.com/2018/09/29/ocean-acidification-by-fossil-fuel-emissions/
My guess is that the ocean acidification fearology derives more from petm realities than from AGW realities.
Rhys is so far left that he can see himself from behind.
He refers to the US as being uber capitalist.
Green New Deal Reveals the Naked Truth of Agenda 21
https://americanpolicy.org/2019/02/25/green-new-deal-reveals-the-naked-truth-of-agenda-21/
I’m seriously disturbed that people can doubt Settled Climate Science and related Environmental Dogma after the Holy Father has pronounced in favour of it. Don’t people know he is infallible!!
If one reads Laudato Si (I know, I know, it’s painful ) item 35 could have been written straight out of Dave Foreman’s playbook (Earth First!!.. Wildlands project!! )
We should Not have Any Border Wall as it may impede migration patterns for little critters and disturb the Eco-System!!
(I’m being facetious of course!! )
ENCYCLICAL LETTER
LAUDATO SI’
OF THE HOLY FATHER
FRANCIS
ON CARE FOR OUR COMMON HOME
35. In assessing the environmental impact of any project, concern is usually shown for its effects on soil, water and air, yet few careful studies are made of its impact on biodiversity, as if the loss of species or animals and plant groups were of little importance. Highways, new plantations, the fencing-off of certain areas, the damming of water sources, and similar developments, crowd out natural habitats and, at times, break them up in such a way that animal populations can no longer migrate or roam freely. As a result, some species face extinction. Alternatives exist which at least lessen the impact of these projects, like the creation of biological corridors, but few countries demonstrate such concern and foresight. Frequently, when certain species are exploited commercially, little attention is paid to studying their reproductive patterns in order to prevent their depletion and the consequent imbalance of the ecosystem.
http://w2.vatican.va/content/francesco/en/encyclicals/documents/papa-francesco_20150524_enciclica-laudato-si.html
Guest Contributor: Dan Botkin
Be that as it may, the greatest importance of the pope’s document is that it makes clear once and for all that this issue is fundamentally a religious and an ideological one, not a scientific one. As I make clear in several of my books and many of my articles, the fundamental irony of environmental science is that it is premised on mythology, on the myth of the great balance of nature, which is not scientific and not scientifically correct
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/07/04/an-ecologists-perspective-on-pope-franciss-encyclical-letter/
Funny how some people here claim to be sceptics but on most foreign policy matters they are incapable or unwilling to dig deeper. Some in this thread from the other side of the pond might be surprised to learn that many europeans are far more worried of constant US/NATO provocations, than Putin. You can complain about the takeover/secession of the Krim whatever you want but, as far as I know, nobody got hurt. Which can not be said of any of the long list of failed US/NATO missions. And: The NATO has Russia surrounded and not the other way.
Btw I am neither left nor a commie or an AGW alarmist, quite the opposite.
Frank, earlier in this thread you said:
“However, if you look at the climate record from 100 centuries of the Holocene, you won’t find many (if any) clear examples of climate changing globally by as much as the 0.9 K change in the past half century.”
I’ve listened to Bill Nye say much the same thing when he suggested “it’s the rate of change that is unprecedented” on TVOntario’s “The Agenda”. The problem here is the ice core proxy data does not have the resolution required for a valid comparison with the instrumental record.
IMHO it appears you are supporting an alarmist position.
That was another Frank. Change my name now. Sorry for the confusion…
It also shows that he’s not going to let data dissuade him from the opinion he wants to have.
It really is fascinating how you assume that any time there is a difference of opinion, it’s always the other person who is wrong.
FrankM: No one (or few) got hurt when Hitler took control of the Rhineland. Nor Austria. Nor the Sudetenland. Without Great Britain’s guaranteed to Poland, there might have been few causalities when the Germans took Poland. But, even that wouldn’t have satisfied Hitler’s appetite.
How big is Putin’s appetite? He certainly want to re-unite or dominate all Russian speakers in the former USSR and Russian Empire. Putin got his start reclaiming Chechnya, which had only a small Russian minority and had been an autonomous area (not an official Republic) in the old USSR. Now Crimea and Eastern Ukraine. His next step is likely be an attempt to connect Crimea to Russia by land that is now part of southeastern Ukraine. He probably wants the Baltic Republics, which had been part of Russia since Peter the Great and which contain many Russian speakers.
Hitler’s motivations are exactly the same as Putin’s. After major defeats in WWI and the Cold War, both want to restore their national greatness and re-unite their people (German or Russian speakers) living outside their current boundaries.
Crossing internationally-recognized border – borders that Russia recognized with the Budapest Memorandum they signed in 1998 – is exactly how Hitler got his start and what Putin is doing today. The situation today is somewhat different today, but I find the parallels scary.
Yes, NATO ignored internationally-recognized borders and separated Kosovo from Serbia by force. That happened after a year of negotiations that attempted to protect the Kosovars from the genocide Serbs inflicted elsewhere in the former Yugoslavia a few year earlier. No NATO country annexed Kosovo. Putin planned his attack on Crimea the day his preferred Ukrainian leader, Yanukovich, lost the support of his allies and security forces in Kiev and fled for Russia. Without any attempt to negotiate a peaceful solution, Russian soldiers secretly took over Crimea within a week. A “referendum” and annexation was complete in less than a month.
Nor was any territory annexed in Iraq, Kuwait, Panama, Grenada, Vietnam, Korea, Japan, Germany or any other place on the long list of places US troops have fought or occupied in the past century.
Your “constant NATO/US provocations” are intended to demonstrate that Putin can’t walk into the Baltic States the same way he did in Crimea. And the Scandanavian and Baltic countries would tell you that they have been subject to numerous Russian provocations.
Frank: Interesting view points, and it is understandable that you take such positions. Here is how I see it, I might be wrong. Comparing your opponent with AH is very popular these days. There are simply no parallels.
Not even wikipedia talks of an annexation which would require force against the will of the public. This was clearly not the case as there was a vote (which no inspector could find any faults, as sure you would have heard that.). It could be called secession, incorporation or whatever.
Then Russia retreated 2009 from Chechnya and the state is independent since (Annexation, russian troops, sources?).
In the Ukraine there is a war fought by Nazis/Faschists with 3rd reich symbolism supported by the local and european governments against the russian population. Yanokovich got putsched out by force with lots of support from the US (Nuland 5B$). Yanokovich could not agree to cut trade with russia, and become a low cost ressource for the EU.
Let’s check where NATO has its troops, all along the russian border line. This makes MAD obsolete, which is dangerous.
In the end it’s all he said she said. Maybe we should work together more than think of each other as a bloodthirsty monster. That is in the end the only way to sustainable peace. But that’s probably an old fashioned view.
And to refresh your memory there was nothing to fight for in Iraq. And somebody should stand up for that first.
FrankM: IMO, comparing Putin to Hitler is very UNpopular, because it suggests that the West should be opposing him more firmly No one is eager to do that. Hopefully, I stuck to facts in my earlier comment, because I have no clear idea of what those facts indicate we should do. Putin seems to use of military force unpredictably and opportunistically, and otherwise be content to slowly undermine his opponents. If you are sure Putin’s appetite and ambitions were satisfied by Crimea, Eastern Ukraine, Chechnya and perhaps Abkhazia and South Ossetia (20% of Georgia), then a tripwire of NATO troops on the border is an unnecessary hazard. Otherwise, a tripwire might be prudent.
As best I can tell, Chechnya is still controlled by Russia, The current Prime Minister, Ramzan Kadyrov, was chosen by Putin in 2007 and approved by the current local government. He is the son of a Chechen rebel who rejoined the Russian side during the second Chechen war. Russian military operations against Chechen rebels officially ended in 2009.
Yanukovich fled the Ukraine after 3 months of continuous and increasingly violent demonstrations in the Maidan, the central square Kiev. Yanukovich fled because the violence had cost him the support of the Ukrainian military, the security forces in Kiev, and much of his party. The day after he fled, the Parliament (Rada) UNANIMOUSLY declared the Presidency vacant, appointed a temporary leader, and scheduled elections. Since a significant number of representatives were missing that day, Yanukovich’s unanimous dismissal technically fell short of meeting the requirements of the constitution, but all the leaders and many members of Yanukovich’s party endorsed his dismissal.
The demonstrations began when, three days before signing, Yanukovich backed out of a trade deal with the EU that had been under negotiation for about five years. After two decades of misrule by pro-Western oligarchs from Kiev and pro-Russian oligarchs from Donets, many Ukrainians looked to the West and this agreement as their best hope for reducing corruption and increasing prosperity. The demonstrators were a diverse collection of groups totaling a half million on one occasion. A significant minority were nasty right-wing groups, including Neo-Nazis, but the demonstrators were supported (and fed) by the vast majority of people in Kiev. (Since many non-Russian speaking Ukrainians viewed the invading Germans as liberators in 1941, there is strong Neo-Nazi element in Ukrainian politics. Putin unfairly characterizes all anti-Russian sentiment as being Pro-Nazi.
Anyone who thinks Victoria Nuland (or John McCain) and American dollars could motivate about 100,000 demonstrators to occupy the Maidan for 3 months in winter and adversity needs to recognize that the web is polluted with a vast amount of false or misleading information from Russian internet trolls and RT. Think for yourself. Nuland was involved in negotiating a political agreement with the opposition that would restore the 2004 constitution (which granted the president less power), move up elections, but leave Yanukovich in power. The agreement was too late; too much blood had been spilled in the past few days. When the opposition political leaders read the agreement to the demonstrators, they were booed and rejected. Yanukovich fled that same night. Some of my detailed information is from a short ebook derived from coverage by the KyivPost newspaper.
As for working together, Bush infamously looked into Putin’s eyes and saw a good man, Obama and Clinton infamously came into office expecting to “reset” relations with Russia, and Trump mostly infamously of all admired Putin was looking to get along with him. The growing problem between Putin and the West isn’t a matter of both sides perceiving bloody-thirsty monsters. The fundamental disagreement is Putin’s stated desire to restore Russian national greatness by directly or indirectly controlling as many Russian speakers and related Slavs and as much of the old Russian empire and USSR as possible. The second fundamental disagreement arises because Putin has seen popular demonstrations – applauded or supported by the West – bring down his government, friendly governments and other autocrats like himself: Eastern Europe in 1989, Russia in 1917 and 1991, Kiev in 2006? and 2014, and the Arab Spring. Putin knows that such demonstrations threatened him in 2012? and are coming for him or his successors someday.
You might remember that Iraq had possessed AND USED WMD before the 1991 Gulf War. The cease-fire that ended that war required inspections, supervised destruction of WMD and compliance with UN resolutions on this subject. Saddam hid many of his WMD and then secretly destroyed some or all of them several years later, something inspectors only learned about when Saddam’s brother-in-law defected and told them where to look. Saddam stupidly believed (and later told us) that Iraq was safer if his enemies believed he still possessed or might possess WMD. He certainly retained the capacity to rebuild. The CIA and every other Western intelligence agency believed what Saddam wanted them to believe. Even opponents of the war like Colin Powell and the lead author of the National Intelligence Estimate submitted to Congress believed it (though Suskind’s book, “The Way of the World” asserts that a very high-level source reported no WMD about one month before the fighting started). Yes, Cheney and other neocons greatly exaggerated and over-publicized what was known about Iraqi WMD. Yes, with 20-20 hindsight, those WMD didn’t pose an imminent danger to the US; the only justification for war under international law. Nevertheless, half of the Democrats in Congress including (Kerry, Clinton, Biden, Schumer, Daschle, Feinstein, Edwards and Reid) voted to approve the use of force. Unlike today, they clearly remembered being the target of Flight 93 a year earlier. And you could even sympathize with the paranoid Cheney, who as Secretary of Defense in 1991, had failed to bomb any of Saddam’s WMD, because the CIA had no idea of the scope of his program or where it was located. Nor could he stop the launch of Scud missiles attacking Israel and Saudi Arabia, any one of which might have carried chemical or biological weapons.
Commies cry when planet thrives – since their pretext will then die
caused by engine they dismiss- source of economic bliss
MEOW , Commies cannot resist – underlies pretense of gifts
A draconian wish list – of the Despots in our mist –
Pinkish hue cannot hide gist
Republicans who believe in climate change seek alternative to Green New Deal
“We have a voice in this, too,” Rep. Francis Rooney, R-Fla., said
https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/congress/republicans-who-believe-climate-change-seek-antidote-green-new-deal-n973146