Guest essay by Eric Worrall
According to NY Times, the Arctic Council has been unable to agree a statement on the alleged climate threat in the Arctic because of pressure from the Trump administration.
U.S. Pressure Blocks Declaration on Climate Change at Arctic Talks
By Somini Sengupta
May 7, 2019ROVANIEMI, Finland — Under pressure from the United States, the Arctic Council issued a short joint statement on Tuesday that excluded any mention of climate change.
It was the first time since its formation in 1996 that the council had been unable to issue a joint declaration spelling out its priorities. As an international organization made up of eight Arctic countries and representatives of indigenous groups in the region, its stated mission is cooperation on Arctic issues, particularly the protection of the region’s fragile environment.
According to diplomats involved in the negotiations, at issue was the United States’ insistence not to mention the latest science on climate change or the Paris Agreement aimed at averting its worst effects. The omission is especially notable because scientists have warned that the Arctic is heating up far faster than the world average because of rising greenhouse gas emissions.
Foreign Minister Timo Soini of Finland, the council’s outgoing chairman, made it clear, without naming names, that resistance to climate action was a minority opinion.
“A majority of us regarded climate change as a fundamental challenge facing the Arctic and acknowledged the urgent need to take mitigation and adaptation actions and to strengthen resilience,” Mr. Soini said in his 10-page statement.
Read more: https://www.nytimes.com/2019/05/07/climate/us-arctic-climate-change.html
The Arctic Council statement is available here. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo was the US Signatory.
I’m surprised at the apparent upset. Lack of US support for climate action cannot be that big a deal, I mean surely other members of the Arctic Council aren’t planning to sit on their butts doing nothing until the USA agrees to hand out lots of climate cash?
“A majority of us”….voted to get paid….where’s our money
If the majority REALLY believe the Arctic is warming & the sky is falling, why the hell couldn’t the “majority” cowboy up and simply state that?
Why pussyfoot around? If the “majority” doesn’t have the courage their convictions (even though I happen to strongly disagree with their opinion), then what they really have is “feelings”, not convictions.
What a bunch of wusses.
Résistance to climate mitigation may well be a minority view, but that doesn’t make it wrong. It just means that the minority hasn’t joined in the madness of the crowd.
Ben Vorlich,
Or it could mean that the minority was one of the first to leave the madness of the crowd.
Charles Mackay, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, 1841
The Empty Suited crowd admired the Kings new Clothes and expressed kudos to the Clothiers ability.
The Loan Wolf Minority was the only one to see, The King has no clothes.
Everyone else was afraid to say anything, including the king’s own aids.
Very apt…
Yea. History. Flimflam (re-popularized 1967) about 16th century, bamboozle, hornswallgo – noun, dodge, trick, gimmick, ploy, ruse. Verb-fleece, gaff, hose, rook, screw etc.
Exactly.
Since this is supposedly an “ARCTIC” forum, the “science” should be limited to the state of the Arctic sea ice, not generalised waffle about “climate change” and what defective models project when extrapolated way outside their calibration period.
Maybe the US should have inserted something about the summer sea ice extent being the same as it was in 2007 when AR4 came out and everyone started freaking out about melting Arctic sea ice.
You meant to say “offal”?
might also have been a tad embarrassing as temps in the nthn nations are presently winter again with snow and record cold;-) see Iceagenow.info for a pile of reports;-)
and it FINALLY rained in my part of SE aus and the grounds so dry its nonwetting the runoff is awesome over the roads and pooling in my yard
cold wet soggy muddy and LOVING IT!!!! 😉
O/T Family of Bishop Hill?
None of the marching brooms were very smart, or doing anything particularly productive.
Ah, it might be a minority opinion, or so they say. It might be that the minority opinion is not so minority, but some of the majority agree but are taking political cover from pretending to be pro climate change action.
When liberals fail, it’s always someone else’s fault.
Mr Soini is a consevative populist.
Thank you, President Trump… and thanks for increasing the tariffs on China as well…
+50
American Tariffs on Chinese Goods hurts China more than the US.
Chinese retaliation and subsequent placement of Tarrifs on American goods (food) only hurts China
China already has huge tariffs on US goods.
That’s the point of imposing the recent tariffs on Chinese goods.
Even so, US tariffs on Chinese goods are still miniscule compared to Chinese tariffs on US goods.
It’s odd how the left always says that US tariffs on Chinese goods hurt US consumers, yet curiously, Chinese tariffs on US goods do not hurt Chinese consumers.
Ditto. My stocks are temporarily down, but the overall effect in the end will be even more profit when China is no longer allowed to steal from us and is forced to trade fairly with us.
Great stock purchasing opportunity…. a nearly 20% bonus long term.
I’ve been looking for an excuse to post this:
https://www.bing.com/videos/search?q=mike+tyson+sphinx+thanks+mr.+trump&view=detail&mid=E2D6818556F143B56475E2D6818556F143B56475&FORM=VIRE
Yes thank you for making life harder for those who have to buy stuff.
You can have a cheap TV, just so long as you are happy to work for chinese wages.
Indeed, long overdue retaliatory US tariffs on Chinese goods & services are but a fraction of the truly massive Chinese tariffs on US goods & services.
This cartoon is such a welcome sight every year. Now that we’ve reached the right margin the tension is unbearable !!
“…that resistance to climate action was a minority opinion.”
Resistance is futile. You will be assimilated!
Resistance is futile. Exterminate ! Exterminate ! Exterminate !
Check out 1970’s Dr Who if you are not familiar with The Daleks.
One difference between a Dalek and a leftist climate crazy, they both look scary, and make a lot of noise, but the Daleck can be defeated by merely stepping off a curb. Leftist climate nuts are far more cloying in that regard.
I am not sure about that. In later episodes of the daleks I have seen them climb stairs.
Showing a capacity for learning from their mistakes which leftists have never acquired. 😮
the Daleck can be defeated by merely stepping off a curb
That’s a myth (and a misspelling of Dalek). Daleks have the ability to defy gravity and float up (and down) stairs – at least as far back as the 1980s (when it was first seen on screen) though they may have had the ability as early as the 1960s but just never seen on screen (See 1960s story the Chase In which the Dalek time craft lands on the lower portion of the Mary Celeste’s deck, exit their craft and search the ship. a few minutes later you see Daleks on the upper potion of the deck. As there were no ramps, they had to “climb up” somehow)
https://www.hooktube.com/watch?v=gMnDxv_8_cU
BORG
Way to go, Eric. “lots of climate cash?” cuts right to the point.
As Medieval troubadours ironically observed:
“His bread I eat, his song I sing.”
Old Scottish saying. He who pays the piper calls the tune.
I think they want the US to stump up the money!
I think they want the US to stump up the money!
ding ding ding. we have a winner.
They will not do anything, there is nothing to do, because this is all about the USA handing out TONS of cash to the little people, to relieve their suffering, all the heat they have to face in the arctic.
If they don’t get paid, fine by me! I don’t care if they go naked and shivering in the summer wind. Their only interest is what they can gouge out of us. I’d love to see them picking peppers in the sun.
‘I don’t care if they go naked and shivering in the summer wind.’
That gave me a visual – ever seen one of them Fairbanks, Alaska mosquitos?
Not quite the Arctic Circle yet, but they’ve got signs.
And for those of you that have never been there, the entire area is wetlands, and in the summer when the sun is out all day, you get skeeters that could carry you away.
“”I don’t care if they go naked and shivering in the summer wind.””
I got shivers from imaginary sight of Timo Soini naked, and picking peppers in the sun. I mean he is very big man, some 150 Kg`s+. And as a politician he is a total joke. Luckily he quits his job very soon.
Thank you Sara for shivers!
The state bird. Go right through your jacket
Happy to have given you guys a hearty laugh over it.
“…scientists have warned that the Arctic is heating up far faster than the world average because of rising greenhouse gas emissions.”
I know, right?
I’ve been noticing lately that our oven now heats up faster. We’ve done work on the house, adding insulation, tightening up the basement etc. which would mean a rise in “greenhouse gasses”, notably CO2. So thanks, CO2! It truly is the magical gas.
“Its stated mission is cooperation on Arctic issues, particularly the protection of the region’s fragile environment”.
Good luck with that. Russia, US, China and Japan are scrambling for the estimated $35 trillion worth of untapped oil and natural gas. Not to mention nickel, copper, coal, gold, uranium, tungsten, and diamonds.
Follow the money. (The military surely will).
Give to the holy warriors in the Climate Crusades. Never mind what they do in that far off land or the imposing castles they build with your funding in their isolation from reality.
“Climate Crusades”. An apt description if ever I’ve heard one.
The crusades were encouraged and often mandated by the popes of the day. The kings and princes involved would dutifully, if not reluctantly, go off to war in the middle east. They often travelled by boat to get there, they were unprepared for the environment, ill equipped, un-committed, and often defeated resoundingly through lackluster planning.
Yep, good name.
but it kept em off the streets at home unemployed and dangerous;-)
also increased the amount of single ladies to choose from for the landed gentry
It’s only about the money … that the UN WMO Green Climate Fund doesn’t have! 😀
Ha ha
Gotta love Trump! A clear-eyed president.
Strange, isn’t it, how fervent Climate activists start whining once they have to spend their own money rather than OPM (other people’s money).
Majority of Arctic area is in Russia, so what is Vladimir Vladimirovich saying about his majority?
No Komment…
(Warmer weather grows better bigger potatoes for making less costly Vodka
goodly chunks of russia have hit below avg temps snow ice cold etc, dont reckon Mr Putins worried over anything warming at all. my friend that lives in near the middle reckons its -2 or -3 days around 10c with snow again and hes not thrilled
Drill, baby, drill…
The United States of America chooses to not participate in the ‘Climate Change’ fraud.
How copy? Message received? Over….
Beautiful. Finally, these money grabbers are afraid to perpetuate the lies they’ve been feeding the public. Never would have happened without Trump.
They have 24 hours of daylight! Time to resurrect Solyndra!
If the Arctic Council cannot agree on its Climate Change References because of the Trump Administration, then that is just Excellent.
I read the statement. To quote Mr Vincent Gambini…”Everything that guy just said is bullshit. Thank you.”
The country with the largest Arctic land presence of course is Russia. For Russia, climate change is pure lip service. So they’ll do anything to hobble the other countries in the Arctic region using “climate action” to hinder others countries developments in the region.
Russia already is well-known for pushing aggressively to claim mineral rights far out into the Arctic Ocean on the Lomonosov Ridge, which is huge encroachment of Denmark-Greenland’s clear rights.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lomonosov_Ridge
And the Finns, well they’ve got to be very worried about getting on Putin’s bad side. The Finns can never forget the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact which handed huge portions of Finland to Russia. Portions that remain in Russia’s recognized territory to this day. SO the Finns have to be careful not to antagonize Putin, and they’ll play the useful idiot role to make the US look bad on what everyone knows, that climate change is simply a wedge politically and diplomatically as means to other ends.
“One day after visiting the Franz Josef Land archipelago in the Arctic, Putin claimed that icebergs had been melting for decades and suggested that global warming was not mankind’s fault.
“The warming, it had already started by the 1930s,” Putin said in comments broadcast from an Arctic forum held in the northern Russian city of Arkhangelsk. “That’s when there were no such anthropological factors, such emissions, and the warming had already started.”
Quote from, wher else than Sth China Morning Post.
Neither Russia or China are bothered by global warming, actually Russia would benefit greatly from 1.5C rise, especially since apparently the Arctic is warming twice as fast as the rest.
He has been building big Nuclear ice breakers. WUWT?
because theres a need for them..for rescue and other jobs like exploration for oil etc.
seeing as usa has ONE functional icebreaker and 2 U/S ones they seem to stripping for parts and Russians tend to go help out fairly willingly, I’d be glad they at least ARE making sure they have the means to clear ice and get shipping through, if it does get a lot cooler and icier up there then everyone will be needing icebreakers more often.
wasnt it the russians saved the ship of fools?
Correct me if I’m wrong… but isn’t this the first time the Arctic Council
has tried to fold “climate change” language and mandated action ($$$) into
their group pronouncement?
Note that it’s the “diplomats” who seemed to be tasked with writing
these statements.
“…the Arctic is heating up far faster than the world average because of rising greenhouse gas emissions.”
It is interesting that they assume the warming of the Arctic has only one cause. The data on the temperature of “the Arctic” doesn’t correlate very well at all with the CO2 concentration. Has anyone else noticed?
It increased from about 250 to 290 over a period when the Arctic warmed 15 C with some uncertainty (1 deg C per 2.5 ppm) , and since then it rose from 290 to 350 the temperature increased about another 3 degrees with great uncertainty (1 degree per 20 ppm) . Since then it rose from 350 to 410 it hardly warmed at all, maybe 1 C with high uncertainty (1 C per 60 ppm).
See a trend here?
The natural variation happened until 1950, whereafter human steel and cement industries and power generation really got going.
That the Arctic warming is because of “human activity” is highly uncertain. The mechanism is not warming air, it is warmer sea water entering the Arctic, which is caused by solar insolation, not CO2 nor IR back-scatter.
Central Canada benefited enormously from the ~15 degree warming of the past 15,000 years as the ice sheets and permafrost melted to be replaced by vast forests and lakes and animals including millions of bison and deer. To consider the Arctic “endangered” because of warming is odd because everything we know about a glaciation is negative. Absolutely nothing good happens during a glaciation. All the surviving animals are driven south into a much more contested area. Enormous areas of forest are lost – tens of millions of square kilometres of forest are devastated and locked in a grip of death that only ends tens of thousands of years later.
The high Arctic is a wasteland, barren of life for almost 100,000 years at a time. If this can be permanently ended by increasing the CO2 concentration, so be it. But I have serious doubts that this is the controlling mechanism. The effect is too weak, and there is no empirical evidence that it has such a powerful effect.
It seems the “preservationists” wish the world to remain the same as in some version of reality in the North that exists in their minds. How many people do they wish to have to survive on raw meat, blubber and uncooked fish? All of us?
Some want to preserve the frozen hell, others want to make it colder. A pox on both their houses.
BTW Mercutio was effective in his hexing of those two houses.
The most serious logical flaw in Climate Change is the unchallenged assumption that warming is net detrimental to the planet and humanity.
It has clear benefits to humanity and the biosphere that the scammers have always suppressed, while only emphasizing potential negatives.
And even if the CO2-control knob hypothesis is accepted uncritically, why would we want to live in the colder climate of end-of-LIA period circa 1850-1870?
What about giving us at least some credit for all the good work we have done in the past? For example, how many of the current members of the Arctic Council provided any useful contribution to this?:
“The United States and the Soviet Union are mounting large‐scale investigations to determine why the Arctic climate is becoming more frigid, why parts of the Arctic sea ice have recently become ominously thicker and whether the extent of that ice cover contributes to the onset of ice ages.” NY Times, July 18, 1970
According to the Times, there were a number of interesting issues that the U.S. was to study, at least one of which might still be worth looking into: “Among the hypotheses to be assessed is one that attributes ice ages to the absence of pack ice on the Arctic Ocean. Winds off that ocean are very dry and drop little snow on Northern lands, but if the sea were open the snows would be heavy and ice sheets would begin to form, the hypothesis holds.”
Also potentially useful to understand, just in case…. “Other scientists have proposed that, by sprinkling coal dust on the pack, or through other manipulation, it would be possible to melt the ice, open the ocean to navigation and ameliorate the northern climate.”
https://www.nytimes.com/1970/07/18/archives/us-and-soviet-press-studies-of-a-colder-arctic-us-and-soviet-press.html?searchResultPosition=1
“According to diplomats involved in the negotiations”
Diplomacy:
– the art and practice of conducting negotiations between nations
– skill in handling affairs without arousing hostility
Science debate ? Who needs science ?
Diplomat: “a person sent abroad to lie for his country”
The Arctic Council said “No one seriously expected the member countries to spend their OWN money did they? – we need the US”
Is there an Antarctic Council pleading for a global warming budget?
It’s back!!
“Scientists and environmental groups warn that the retreat of Arctic sea ice threatens polar bears and marine species, but also contributes to rising sea levels, adding to the risk of coastal flooding.”
Melting sea ice raising sea level!!!!! How come this nonsense is still out there and being repeated?
The NSF apologized for making the same assertion back in 2011. They apologized in 2011 SIX YEARS after making the assertion.
When polar bears hunt for seals from the sea ice they contribute to sea rising level. Hence, if all sea ice is melted or alternatively all polar bears became extinct the see levels would fall, not a joke but a true science fact!
Good point. So the healthier and more numerous the Polar Bears get the greater the sea level rise. Seals must make no difference as they are already in the water and according to Archimedes lesser known principle and if a Polar Bear eats a Seal then sea level will neither rise or fall as water displacement stays the same now that the weight of the Seal is inside the Polar Bear. x
The ‘x’ was an accident and not meant to be taken as familiarity.
What were Russia’s views?
The NYT article said in part ‘According to diplomats involved in the negotiations, at issue was the United States’ insistence not to mention the latest science on climate change or the Paris Agreement..’.
If I remember correctly, what Trump did was to insist on not using the words ‘climate change’ and ‘Paris Agreement’, so this quote misrepresents Trump by adding the words ‘the latest science’ before the words ‘climate change’ (no surprise there). What the article doesn’t appear to explain is why exactly the Artic Council could not (or would not) issue a statement.
It was -30C in Chicago in February and that air came from a much colder Arctic basin. So what if its warmed up 3C. It’s warming is concentrated in the winter and at night.