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Post by Galactus on Aug 9, 2006 11:04:10 GMT -5
National Review Editor: ‘Global Warming Is Great’
florida after 20 foot sea riseIt’s getting difficult to distinguish actual opposition to global warming science and parody. FYI, the following is not a joke.
National Review editor James S. Robbins shares his thoughts today:
"Personally, I don’t know what all the shouting is about. Global warming is great. Granted, maybe it isn’t really happening, and if it is there are strong reasons to doubt that humans have anything to do with it. But if the world is warming, I say “bravo.”"
What are the benefits? According to Robbins, “vast regions” of Canada would become “comfortably habitable,” “more land will be available for cultivation,” and there will be a “land boom up the coastlines as people rushed on up for beachfront property.”
Robbins brushes off all negative consequences. He acknowledges that rising sea levels could create “some dislocations” but says that a worldwide sea level rise of as much as 20 feet could be taken care of with “some form of sea wall.” The image above illustrates the impact a 20 foot sea level rise on Florida. Apparently, Robbins plans on building a sea wall around the entire state.
Robbins doesn’t even mention increased hurricane intensity, drought, wildfires and the other severe impacts of global warming — much less explain, as he claims, how these natural phenomena can “be overcome.”
Robbins concludes, when “you are enjoying the surfing at your beach house in upper Newfoundland, you won’t care what caused global warming, you’ll just thank goodness it happened.” In so doing, he illustrates an important point. Intentional or not, his arguments are a joke.
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Post by luke on Aug 9, 2006 11:06:45 GMT -5
That's amazing. What a goddamn idiot.
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Post by chrisfan on Aug 9, 2006 11:09:42 GMT -5
his arguments are a joke. Key statement in the entire piece. |
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Post by Dr. Drum on Aug 9, 2006 12:16:17 GMT -5
That's amazing. What a goddamn idiot. My thoughts exactly. BTW, upper Newfoundland? The guy's a friggin' genius at geography, too. |
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Post by skvorisdeadsorta on Aug 10, 2006 11:17:14 GMT -5
This is an interesting article.
Gore isn't quite as green as he's led the world to believe
Updated 8/10/2006 10:44 AM ET E-mail | Save | Print | Subscribe to stories like this
Enlarge By Rusty Kennedy, AP
Former Vice President Al Gore shakes hands with a woman after signing a copy of his book An Inconvenient Truth for her, in Philadelphia last month.
By Peter Schweizer
Al Gore has spoken: The world must embrace a "carbon-neutral lifestyle." To do otherwise, he says, will result in a cataclysmic catastrophe. "Humanity is sitting on a ticking time bomb," warns the website for his film, An Inconvenient Truth. "We have just 10 years to avert a major catastrophe that could send our entire planet into a tailspin."
ON DEADLINE: Your thoughts?
Graciously, Gore tells consumers how to change their lives to curb their carbon-gobbling ways: Switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs, use a clothesline, drive a hybrid, use renewable energy, dramatically cut back on consumption. Better still, responsible global citizens can follow Gore's example, because, as he readily points out in his speeches, he lives a "carbon-neutral lifestyle." But if Al Gore is the world's role model for ecology, the planet is doomed.
For someone who says the sky is falling, he does very little. He says he recycles and drives a hybrid. And he claims he uses renewable energy credits to offset the pollution he produces when using a private jet to promote his film. (In reality, Paramount Classics, the film's distributor, pays this.)
Public records reveal that as Gore lectures Americans on excessive consumption, he and his wife Tipper live in two properties: a 10,000-square-foot, 20-room, eight-bathroom home in Nashville, and a 4,000-square-foot home in Arlington, Va. (He also has a third home in Carthage, Tenn.) For someone rallying the planet to pursue a path of extreme personal sacrifice, Gore requires little from himself.
Then there is the troubling matter of his energy use. In the Washington, D.C., area, utility companies offer wind energy as an alternative to traditional energy. In Nashville, similar programs exist. Utility customers must simply pay a few extra pennies per kilowatt hour, and they can continue living their carbon-neutral lifestyles knowing that they are supporting wind energy. Plenty of businesses and institutions have signed up. Even the Bush administration is using green energy for some federal office buildings, as are thousands of area residents.
But according to public records, there is no evidence that Gore has signed up to use green energy in either of his large residences. When contacted Wednesday, Gore's office confirmed as much but said the Gores were looking into making the switch at both homes. Talk about inconvenient truths.
Gore is not alone. Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean has said, "Global warming is happening, and it threatens our very existence." The DNC website applauds the fact that Gore has "tried to move people to act." Yet, astoundingly, Gore's persuasive powers have failed to convince his own party: The DNC has not signed up to pay an additional two pennies a kilowatt hour to go green. For that matter, neither has the Republican National Committee.
Maybe our very existence isn't threatened.
Gore has held these apocalyptic views about the environment for some time. So why, then, didn't Gore dump his family's large stock holdings in Occidental (Oxy) Petroleum? As executor of his family's trust, over the years Gore has controlled hundreds of thousands of dollars in Oxy stock. Oxy has been mired in controversy over oil drilling in ecologically sensitive areas.
Living carbon-neutral apparently doesn't mean living oil-stock free. Nor does it necessarily mean giving up a mining royalty either.
Humanity might be "sitting on a ticking time bomb," but Gore's home in Carthage is sitting on a zinc mine. Gore receives $20,000 a year in royalties from Pasminco Zinc, which operates a zinc concession on his property. Tennessee has cited the company for adding large quantities of barium, iron and zinc to the nearby Caney Fork River.
The issue here is not simply Gore's hypocrisy; it's a question of credibility. If he genuinely believes the apocalyptic vision he has put forth and calls for radical changes in the way other people live, why hasn't he made any radical change in his life? Giving up the zinc mine or one of his homes is not asking much, given that he wants the rest of us to radically change our lives.
Peter Schweizer is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and author of Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy.
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Post by chrisfan on Aug 10, 2006 11:24:27 GMT -5
This is an interesting article. Gore isn't quite as green as he's led the world to believe Updated 8/10/2006 10:44 AM ET E-mail | Save | Print | Subscribe to stories like this Enlarge By Rusty Kennedy, AP Former Vice President Al Gore shakes hands with a woman after signing a copy of his book An Inconvenient Truth for her, in Philadelphia last month. By Peter Schweizer Al Gore has spoken: The world must embrace a "carbon-neutral lifestyle." To do otherwise, he says, will result in a cataclysmic catastrophe. "Humanity is sitting on a ticking time bomb," warns the website for his film, An Inconvenient Truth. "We have just 10 years to avert a major catastrophe that could send our entire planet into a tailspin." ON DEADLINE: Your thoughts? Graciously, Gore tells consumers how to change their lives to curb their carbon-gobbling ways: Switch to compact fluorescent light bulbs, use a clothesline, drive a hybrid, use renewable energy, dramatically cut back on consumption. Better still, responsible global citizens can follow Gore's example, because, as he readily points out in his speeches, he lives a "carbon-neutral lifestyle." But if Al Gore is the world's role model for ecology, the planet is doomed. For someone who says the sky is falling, he does very little. He says he recycles and drives a hybrid. And he claims he uses renewable energy credits to offset the pollution he produces when using a private jet to promote his film. (In reality, Paramount Classics, the film's distributor, pays this.) Public records reveal that as Gore lectures Americans on excessive consumption, he and his wife Tipper live in two properties: a 10,000-square-foot, 20-room, eight-bathroom home in Nashville, and a 4,000-square-foot home in Arlington, Va. (He also has a third home in Carthage, Tenn.) For someone rallying the planet to pursue a path of extreme personal sacrifice, Gore requires little from himself. Then there is the troubling matter of his energy use. In the Washington, D.C., area, utility companies offer wind energy as an alternative to traditional energy. In Nashville, similar programs exist. Utility customers must simply pay a few extra pennies per kilowatt hour, and they can continue living their carbon-neutral lifestyles knowing that they are supporting wind energy. Plenty of businesses and institutions have signed up. Even the Bush administration is using green energy for some federal office buildings, as are thousands of area residents. But according to public records, there is no evidence that Gore has signed up to use green energy in either of his large residences. When contacted Wednesday, Gore's office confirmed as much but said the Gores were looking into making the switch at both homes. Talk about inconvenient truths. Gore is not alone. Democratic National Committee Chairman Howard Dean has said, "Global warming is happening, and it threatens our very existence." The DNC website applauds the fact that Gore has "tried to move people to act." Yet, astoundingly, Gore's persuasive powers have failed to convince his own party: The DNC has not signed up to pay an additional two pennies a kilowatt hour to go green. For that matter, neither has the Republican National Committee. Maybe our very existence isn't threatened. Gore has held these apocalyptic views about the environment for some time. So why, then, didn't Gore dump his family's large stock holdings in Occidental (Oxy) Petroleum? As executor of his family's trust, over the years Gore has controlled hundreds of thousands of dollars in Oxy stock. Oxy has been mired in controversy over oil drilling in ecologically sensitive areas. Living carbon-neutral apparently doesn't mean living oil-stock free. Nor does it necessarily mean giving up a mining royalty either. Humanity might be "sitting on a ticking time bomb," but Gore's home in Carthage is sitting on a zinc mine. Gore receives $20,000 a year in royalties from Pasminco Zinc, which operates a zinc concession on his property. Tennessee has cited the company for adding large quantities of barium, iron and zinc to the nearby Caney Fork River. The issue here is not simply Gore's hypocrisy; it's a question of credibility. If he genuinely believes the apocalyptic vision he has put forth and calls for radical changes in the way other people live, why hasn't he made any radical change in his life? Giving up the zinc mine or one of his homes is not asking much, given that he wants the rest of us to radically change our lives. Peter Schweizer is a research fellow at the Hoover Institution and author of Do As I Say (Not As I Do): Profiles in Liberal Hypocrisy. Going to print my t-shirt now ... Results vs Rhetoric Maybe for Gore's next movie, he can visit Crawford with Bush and get a tour of the enviro-friendly features that were built into his ranch house. ;D |
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Post by strat-0 on Aug 18, 2006 20:47:29 GMT -5
I've been doing a little confirming of things I thought I already knew (i.e, research) for a course I'm developing on transmissions, and it has been interesting.
What I wanted to confirm was that the planetary gearset was used on the Ford Model T back in 1903. It was, and what's interesting is that this gearset is at the heart of every automatic transmission made, though it was abandoned for many years in favor of "sliding gear" transmissions (the "manual" transmission).
But I also discovered a few things that I didn't know. The Tin Lizzie got 20 - 30 mpg. We haven't moved an awful lot from that in 100 years. Of course, it only had about 40 horsepower.
It was originally available configured to either run on gasoline or ethanol (grain alcohol, aka, corn liquor) to suit the needs of the resourceful farmers of the country. The declining price of gas caused it to be favored, and prohibition forced the demise of ethanol as a fuel altogether. How different things might have been.
~~~
In the years to come, I believe we will see oil do the same thing to the Middle East's economy that silver did to Spain during the early colonial period - ruin it. They are squandering the income from their greatest resource. And when it's gone, they will have little except for some lavish palaces and other unsustainable things. It's a pity they are still operating in the mindset of the 14th century.
Ethanol will return, and hydrogen will eventually be the common fuel. It will take many years to crack the hydrogen problems, but it will happen. We might crack solar, too.
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Post by Galactus on Aug 23, 2006 17:58:12 GMT -5
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Post by strat-0 on Aug 23, 2006 18:53:16 GMT -5
Wow. Measuring polar bear penises. ("He'd bite youuuu!")
"Scientists report this shrinkage could, in the worst case scenario, endanger polar bears there and elsewhere by spoiling their love lives and causing their numbers to peter out."
Maybe the WWF can arrange a massive air drop of Viagra-laced seal carcasses.
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Post by strat-0 on Aug 24, 2006 19:19:40 GMT -5
No comments on my inspired Model T observations or oil/silver comparison?  |
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Post by Dr. Drum on Dec 13, 2006 7:15:53 GMT -5
More confirmation that we probably have no more than a generation to get this thing under some kind of control... tinyurl.com/u9e3x |
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Post by Dr. Drum on Dec 17, 2006 8:53:41 GMT -5
Frighteningly, the emissions cut required is probably going to be about 30% higher than what David Miliband proposes here. However, the carbon rationing scheme in this piece is bascially the same one George Monbiot outlines in his new book.
Keeping a carbon copy
The U.K. has plans to put a tail on every Briton's carbon trail now that the global warming crisis is really heating up
Gwynne Dyer
Hamilton Spectator
Dec 16, 2006
Here's the plan. Everybody in the country will get the same allowance for how much carbon dioxide they can emit each year and every time they buy some product that involves carbon dioxide emissions -- filling their car, paying their utility bills, buying an airline ticket -- carbon points are deducted from their credit or debit cards. Like Air Miles, only in reverse.
So if you ride a bike everywhere, insulate your home and don't travel much, you can sell your unused points back to the system. And if you use up your allowance before the end of the year, then you have to buy extra points from the system.
This is no lunatic proposal from the eco-radical fringe. It is on the verge of becoming British government policy and Environment Secretary David Miliband is behind it 100 per cent.
In fact, he is hoping to launch a pilot scheme quite soon, with the goal of moving to a comprehensive national scheme of carbon rationing within five years.
A huge share of total emissions is driven by the decisions of individual consumers. Miliband thinks the least intrusive, most efficient way of shaping those decisions is to set up a system that tracks everybody's use of goods and services that produce a lot of greenhouse gases and rewards the thrifty, while imposing higher costs on the profligate.
And there is no time to lose. The world's carbon emissions have to stop growing within 10 to 15 years, he says, and Britain must cut its total carbon emissions by 60 per cent in the next 30 or 40 years.
"We are in a dangerous place now," he told the Guardian newspaper on Dec. 11, "and it is going to be very difficult to get into a less dangerous place. The science is getting worse faster than the politics is getting better. People know the technology exists to get a lot of this done...but there is a huge chasm of mistrust between countries about how to do this... .
"The developing countries won't take on any carbon reduction targets until they believe the countries that have caused the problem do so."
The science certainly is "getting worse" in the sense that every forecast is worse than the one before. The most recent assessment of the state of the Arctic by the International Panel on Climate Change, whose full fourth report is due next year, was published early in the journal Geophysical Research Letters last week because its forecast was so alarming.
If current trends persist, the scientists reported, the Arctic Ocean will be entirely ice free in the summer not in 2080, as previous forecasts suggested, but by 2040, just 33 years from now.
Then the dark ocean surface absorbs much more heat than the reflective ice did, and another element of feedback kicks in, and the speed of warming increases again....
Those in the know are very frightened, but there is still that "huge chasm of mistrust."
The developing countries that are only now beginning to emit large amounts of greenhouse gases look at the mountain of past emissions produced by the developed countries --the source of most current climate change -- and they want the rich countries to cut back very deeply, deeply enough to leave the developing countries some room to raise their consumption without dooming us all to runaway climate change.
That's where the long-range target of 60 per cent emission cuts for Britain comes from.
Britain only produces 2 per cent of global greenhouse gas emissions, so a 60-per-cent cut in Britain alone is still only a drop in the bucket, but the aim is to set an example: see, we can do this without impoverishing ourselves, so other developed countries can, too. And if they do, then a deal to control the growth of emissions in the developing countries is within reach.
So individual carbon credit accounts for all and if you want to do things that produce more carbon dioxide than your annual allowance, you will pay for it.
The frugal and the poor can sell their unused credits back into the system and every year or so, as the average carbon efficiency of transport or food production or power generation improves a little bit, the size of the free personal carbon allowance is reduced a little bit.
It is, I suspect, the shape of things to come.
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Post by maarts on Apr 6, 2007 6:33:41 GMT -5
If this following scenario is true then I really believe that mankind's committed one of the worst crimes in humanity right here.
Great Barrier Reef could be dead in 20 years
April 6, 2007 - 7:44PM
The Great Barrier Reef could be dead in 20 years unless there is a drastic reduction in greenhouse gas emissions, a marine biology expert said today.
Rising sea temperatures were bleaching the coral and causing it to die, said Professor Ove Hoegh-Guldberg of the Australian Research Council Centre for Excellence for Coral Reef Studies.
At the same time, increasing levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere were turning the world's oceans more acidic and preventing corals from forming their limestone skeletons, he said.
Prof Hoegh-Guldberg and Professor Terry Hughes provided expert advice to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which released its latest report in Brussels today.
The combination of rising temperatures and increasing acid levels could be deadly for the reef, Prof Hoegh-Guldberg said.
"I'd say with 20 to 50 years under the current unrestricted emissions of CO2 into the atmosphere it is highly likely that it will be significantly changed to the point where we no longer have live corals," he said.
"They could be replaced by things like seaweed.
"It (the reef) certainly won't be the place it is now, which is a place of incredible biodiversity."
The warning signs had been around since 1998 when a major bleaching event caused the death of 16 per cent of the world's coral.
Prof Hoegh-Guldberg said the reefs were like a "canary in a coal mine" for other vulnerable areas of the environment, such as glaciers and rainforests, which were also retreating due to global warming.
Around 60 per cent of Australia's bird species were in the wet tropics area of north Queensland.
"The predictions are that if we have a very sharp increase in temperature that is predicted, we will lose at least 50 per cent of that by the middle of the century."
Also of concern was the dramatic increases in the rate of coral diseases, some of which have increased five fold in the past decade.
But action was needed now on climate change.
"If we don't cut back on emissions very dramatically, we are going to look at loss of things like the Great Barrier Reef and other coral ecosystems," Prof Hoegh-Guldberg said.
"If we take it seriously and reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 80 per cent in the next 30 years, we have chance of saving these ecosystems but this is the last time we have the option to choose."
AAP
I've swam and dived at several parts of The Great Barrier Reef. It's one of the reasons I wanted to move to this country- I cannot describe how beautiful this part of nature is- so deservedly on the World Heritage List, a source of pride for the locals and a source of life for so many creatures. remember- reef is living tissue, it's not plant life at all. It has been created and recreated over thousands of years- many creatures there are as old as the first man.
I honestly believe that if Australia doesn't do everything possible to reduce greenhouse emissions and murders this unique piece of nature, it'll be a crime that would deserve severe penalties for all responsible parties. Regardless whether the debate is valid on greenhouse emissions and global warming being a 'real', can we take the risk to lose everything here when it is too late?
God, I couldn't bear it if we had to draw a shroud over this beautiful part of Australia. It'd bring tears to my eyes for sure.
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Post by Thorngrub on Apr 11, 2007 12:22:21 GMT -5
I skimmed the above posts, and all I caught was something about polar bear penis shrinkage.
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Post by Dr. Drum on Apr 22, 2007 6:44:00 GMT -5
Happy Earth Day, peeps.
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