Princeton Physicist on ‘global warming’: ‘We should not bow to religious dogma disguised as science’
By Dr. William Happer – Tribune News Service
The media and hostile congressional interrogators have routinely asked nominees for high positions in the new Trump administration some variant of the question, “Is climate change a hoax?”
Nominees should answer forthrightly, “No!”
Climate has been changing since the Earth was formed — some 4.5 billion years ago. Climate changes on every time scale — whether decades, centuries or millennia.
The climate of Greenland was warm enough for farming around the year 1100 A.D., but by 1500, the Little Ice Age drove Norse settlers out. There is no opportunity for a hoax, since climate change is so well documented by historical and geophysical records.
But none of the climate change of the past was due to humans. The very minor warming in the past few centuries is mostly from non-human causes as well.
What is really being asked is, “Do you agree with the party line of the previous administration, that continued emissions of carbon dioxide will destroy the planet unless the people of the world do exactly what they are told?”
The answer to this question should also be a resounding no; we should not bow to religious dogma disguised as science.
Merriam-Webster’s dictionary defines the word “hoax” as “to trick into believing or accepting as genuine something false and often preposterous.”
So hoax is a pretty good description of the article of faith that nominees are being asked to endorse: that carbon dioxide is supposedly dangerous “carbon pollution.”
All living creatures respire huge amounts of carbon dioxide every day. Carbon dioxide is essential to the growth of plants, which have been coping with a carbon dioxide famine for several tens of millions of years, an instant in geological time.
Satellites already show dramatic greening of the earth as carbon dioxide levels begin to recover toward their historical norms. Those levels had been measured in thousands of parts per million (ppm), not today’s puny 400 ppm.
Yes, carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas, but much less important than the major greenhouse gas, water vapor, H2O, and clouds.
Observations, including the extended “hiatus” in warming since about the year 2000 — which is poised to continue now that the El Nino warming of 2015-2016 is behind us — show that more atmospheric carbon dioxide will cause only modest warming of the Earth’s surface.
This would benefit the world in many ways, extending …
Media Slow to Admit California’s ‘Probably Forever’ Drought Is Now Almost Over
By Julia A. Seymour | February 2, 2017 | 8:43 AM EST
California’s “exceptional drought” isn’t exceptionally bad any more. Winter storms have been good for the state, pulling it out of the worst rating from the U.S. Drought Monitor. However, this “huge improvement” barely registered with the broadcast networks that had blamed “climate change” for the crisis.
CNN.com reported on Jan. 26, that “California’s drought is almost over.” For the first time in 36 months, no part of California was under “exceptional drought.” It also showed that only a small portion of the state still in “extreme drought,” but cautioned the drought is not “officially over” yet. But with nearly twice the normal amount of snowpack for the time of year, there were reasons for optimism.
NBC’s Today was the only network news show to mention the change in California’s drought conditions between Jan. 24, and Jan. 31, even though the three networks and many other media outlets had covered the drought often in the past. The broadcast networks had claimed it was unprecedented and “historic,” in spite of experts who refuted those claims. In 2015, the networks also totally ignored how environmental regulations worsened the California drought.…
Anti-Exxon Crusade On The Ropes After Failing To Stop Rex Tillerson’s Confirmation
…Seeing Red—New NASA Climate Change Video Uses Questionable ‘Data’ for Colorful Deception
A visitor to Cornwall Alliance’s Facebook page recently asked our thoughts on a new video from NASA purporting to demonstrate that global warming is happening rapidly and that there’s been no slow-down, let alone “pause,” in the last two decades. Among other media, Huffington Post featured the video in an article titled “NASA Climate Change Video Shows Just How Quickly the Earth Is Warming.”
As is typical, the video uses frightening graphics to communicate numbers that are far less than frightening:
Of course, we’re all accustomed to seeing redness on severe burns and on hot stove burners and oven heating elements. Red means hot-hot-hot! Little does the typical viewer recognize that the entire increase in global average temperature over the period from 1880 to the present is estimated at roughly 1C—a small fraction of the typical difference between low and high readings on a single day in most locations, and a much smaller fraction of the typical difference between winter low and summer high in most locations. Consider what happens to the psychological effect if the picture is rendered in grayscale instead of the shocking reds and yellows:
There’s a lesson in how graphics can be used for psychological manipulation.
The video of course only pictures the numbers fed into it, and the “adjustments” being made over the last three years or more by both NOAA and NASA to their surface temperature “data” are highly suspect because the criteria by which they’re made, the computer codes that apply the criteria, and the whole path of the adjustment process have not been made public and thus aren’t testable/replicable by other scientists. Replicability is the hallmark of sound scientific research. The actual outcome of the adjustments is clear, though: “temperatures” in the early overall period are pushed downward, and “temperatures” in the later part are pushed upward.…
Cheers! Trump preparing executive orders to reduce U.S. role in UN
The Trump administration is preparing executive orders that would clear the way to drastically reduce the U.S. role in the United Nations and other international organizations, the New York Times reported on Wednesday.
The executive orders would also begin a process to review and potentially abrogate certain forms of multilateral treaties, the Times reported, citing unnamed officials.…
Cheers! Global warming skeptic Rep. Lamar Smith sets ‘Make EPA Great Again’ hearing
A Texas congressman has scheduled a committee hearing next week “to examine the Environmental Protection Agency’s process for evaluating and using science during its regulatory decision making activities.”
Invigorated by the new climate change-doubting presidential administration, a Texas congressman known for his ardent denial of global warming — and early support for President Donald Trump — has scheduled a committee hearing next week “to examine the Environmental Protection Agency’s process for evaluating and using science during its regulatory decision making activities.”
Invited witnesses, including the head of an industry group, “will discuss how EPA can pursue environmental protection and protect public health by relying on sound science,” according to a charter for Tuesday’s hearing of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology.
The hearing, titled “Make EPA Great Again,” will be the first time the committee has met since Trump took office and the 115th Congress convened.
Senate Panel Approves EPA Critic Scott Pruitt to Head Agency
Oklahoma Attorney General Scott Pruitt, a climate change skeptic who fought the Environmental Protection Agency’s regulations on carbon emissions, moved a big step closer to becoming that agency’s leader.
The Senate Environment and Public Works Committee’s Republicans voted 11-0 Thursday in approval of Pruitt serving as the EPA’s administrator following a boycott by Democrats. A vote by the full Republican-led Senate will make him President Trump’s point man for his plan to make the agency more industry-friendly.
Lefties in tizzy over Tillerson: Morano responds: ‘If greens weren’t upset, then I’d be deeply concerned’
Environmentalists are fuming after Rex Tillerson has been confirmed as Secretary of State, but a skeptic of climate change says that’s a good thing.
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Climate change skeptic Marc Morano, who oversees website Climate Depot, finds it “fascinating” to see all the angst.
“The only reservation I would have with Rex Tillerson,” says Morano, “is that he, as CEO of Exxon-Mobil, wanted a seat at the table and sort of played along with the United Nations – their science reports and their claims – and even supported a carbon tax, and sort of took the lesser of all the evils out there.”
Despite those reservations, the fact that environmental groups are so upset makes Morano feel better about President Trump’s choice for Secretary of State.
“If they weren’t upset at the pick for Secretary of State then I’d be deeply concerned,” he says. “But the fact that their heads are exploding, that’s a good thing because it shows that Rex Tillerson is the right man for the job.”…
Warmist Michael Mann calls for ‘rebellion’ against Trump
Professor Michael Mann says the US is ‘firmly back in the madhouse’ as new president launches ‘dizzying, ongoing assault on science’
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The Independent US
Media claim: ‘President Trump, Military Split on Climate Change’
NORFOLK, VA —
A nondescript metal box at the end of an unremarkable pier in Norfolk, Va. is one key to why the U.S. Navy is concerned about climate change.
For nine decades, the Sewells Point tide gauge or its ancestors have been recording the sea level off Pier 6 at Naval Station Norfolk.
The story it tells is clear. Between naturally sinking land and global warming driven sea level rise, the water is a half-meter higher than it was at the beginning of the last century.
That’s creating problems at the world’s largest naval base.
In rough weather, damaging surf slams against electrical, water and steam lines under the piers where the Navy docks its Atlantic fleet. High waves can keep sailors from getting to the ships. Even getting on base is getting harder as “nuisance flooding” becomes a regular problem, cutting off roads around the city of Norfolk.
“It’s not going to stop us from accomplishing our mission. We’re the military. We’ll figure it out,” said Capt. Dean VanderLey, commanding officer of Naval Facilities Engineering Command for the Mid-Atlantic region. “But it just makes things more difficult.”
“The higher the sea level gets, the more we’re going to have to deal with that,” he adds. “I don’t think we fully understand the scope of the problem. And we definitely don’t fully understand the solution.”
Hoax vs. threat multiplier
The commander-in-chief, President Donald Trump, has called global warming a hoax, although he now says there is “some connectivity” between human activity and climate change.
The Pentagon, on the other hand, takes the risks of climate change seriously.
Rising seas threaten coastal installations. Severe storms can cut off supply routes. Extreme heat limits training.
“The military has seen climate change as a problem since 2003, if not earlier,” says retired Army Gen. Gerry Galloway, now with the Center for Climate and Security.
National security threats from climate change are included in eight defense and intelligence documents published before President Obama took office, according to the center.…