BreakPoint

BreakPoint: An Inconvenient Driveway

A leading global warming scientist has some startling news for you. Read today’s commentary to learn more. As you probably heard, between 40 and 50 inches of snow fell in the Washington, D.C., area in early February. The record snowfall brought the entire mid-Atlantic region to a halt—paralyzing the government, this time for snow. A Washington Post online headline captured it: “Senate climate change hearings canceled because of storm.” The people most inconvenienced by the blizzards weren’t the residents of this region, or the senators—it was the proponents of man-made global warming. Scientists and activists insisted that people on this side of the Atlantic ignore the evidence in their driveways and, instead, trust their computer models. Not only did they tell us that this winter’s weather didn’t disprove their global warming data, they told us that the record snows were caused by global warming. Really! Of course, 10 years ago, they told us that, on account of the same global warming, “snow is starting to disappear from our lives.” We were told that, because of all that nasty CO2, British children “just aren’t going to know what snow is.” Ten years later, they most certainly do. Not only British children, but children in every state except Hawaii. All of Britain, much of the rest of Europe, and the United States have experienced snowfalls this winter. The data suggests, in fact, that “snow is coming earlier and heavier than it used to.” If all of the white stuff hasn’t left you doubting those computer models, maybe Phil Jones can help you. That would be ironic since, until recently, Jones was the director of the Climate Research Unit at Britain’s East Anglia University. He was the keeper of the data upon which the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) based its predictions—data that has been, to put it mildly, called into question.

In an interview with the BBC, Jones acknowledged that there has been no significant warming since 1995. Let me repeat that. One of the world’s leading global warming advocates says there has been no significant warming since 1995. Fifteen years. He also indicated that there is nothing exceptional about the warming the occurred between 1979 and 1995. He even admitted that is was possible that it might have been warmer during the pre-industrial Middle Ages than it is now. If all of that sounds familiar, it ought to. Those very points have been made by global warming skeptics and reported frequently on BreakPoint. If there has been no significant warming during a period when the models predicted exactly that, or if the world was warmer 1000 years ago before we started burning fossils fuels, then maybe these models, just maybe, are wrong. And threatening us with global catastrophe and upsetting children with pictures of drowning animals becomes unconscionable. Of course, neither Jones nor his fellow advocates will admit that. As Jones also acknowledged, the IPCC tends to leave “inconvenient findings” out of its reports. Why? It’s a matter of worldview. Activists and scientists have too much invested in human-caused global warming. For activists, it’s the threat by which they can create their version of a better world, and scientists have staked their careers and reputations on the accuracy of those computer models. Given what’s at stake, inconvenient snow and cold has to be explained away. Assuming, that is, the people who do so can get out of their driveways.

FURTHER READING AND INFORMATION

What NOAA Isn’t Saying About Snow and Ice Stephen Goddard | Watts Up with That | February 9, 2010 Phil Jones Interview Climate Skeptic | February 14, 2010 Series of Missteps by Climate Scientists Threatens Climate-Change Agenda Washington Post | February 15, 2010 Snowfalls Are Now Just a Thing of the Past The Independent (UK) | March 20, 2000 A Godless Eden: Environmentalism as Secular Religion Stan Guthrie | BreakPoint Online | October 1, 2009 Global Warming as Religion: You Had to See It Coming Chuck Colson | BreakPoint Commentary | December 2, 2009 A Worldview that Leaves Me Cold: Global Warming Chuck Colson | BreakPoint Commentary | March 31, 2009 Global Warming and the Media: Give Us All the Facts Chuck Colson | BreakPoint Commentary | February 2, 2009

02/17/10