Global warming is now on the list of horrors that British kids worry about.
It’s not easy being a kid these days. First off, there’s the high divorce rate, disintegrating families, bullying and violence in the schools, drug and alcohol abuse, gangs, peer pressure, the lack of proper role models, and eating disorders such as bulimia and anorexia. To say nothing of childhood obesity at the other end of the scale, increasing rates of depression and other clinical psychopathologies, and the decline of religion with its resultant absence of anything to believe in - it all adds up to a bummer of a childhood for altogether too many.…
Article comments
26 - Michael J. West
They say eliminating Saddam would either lead to someone even worse taking over, or create a "power vacuum", leading to chaos and turmoil, and possibly strengthening Iraq's neighbor Iran, which like Iraq is a charter member of President Bush's "axis of exil".
Oh, my God! RJ, did you really write this in 2002? And then dismiss it as erroneous thinking? Wow. That's...wow.
27 - Doug Hunter
Zing #25
That demonstrates exactly why politicians are so loathe to admit fault in any matter large or small. It will be taken that if they're wrong on one issue they must be wrong on others when in reality the issues are completely unrelated.
BTW, there's no need for you to lie about Saddam never having WMD's as his use in the 80's is well documented. You don't need to bend the facts to make Iraq look like a mistake.
As for global warming, the alarmism and scare tactics are what I find most appalling, not the .1 to .3 temperature rise in the last 30 years. The dire predictions of destruction are completely overplayed. I assume if the temperature were cooling due to human action we'd be hearing horror stories about starvation and blizzards and extending permafrost destroying foodcrops and water levels lowering.
Since the last ice age 10K years ago the water levels have risen over 300 feet worldwide (for math morons thats about 3 feet per hundred years compared to a few millimeters in the 20th century) without complete environmental destruction, how then does a millimeter or even a worst case scenario 20 or more feet even come close to wiping out humanity or anything else?
28 - zingzing
"That demonstrates exactly why politicians are so loathe to admit fault in any matter large or small. It will be taken that if they're wrong on one issue they must be wrong on others when in reality the issues are completely unrelated."
true. but so is his seeming assertion that "red china" is somehow behind this global warming idea.
as for saddam/wmds, i think it's pretty obvious that the late-80s is not 2002. and if he had them, where are they? gone? oh, so he doesn't have them. well, there you go.
and as for global warming, i've only been advocating that we do things that are good for us all anyway. restructuring our economy towards technology instead of rapidly diminshing fuel sources, creating less pollution, etc, etc would not hurt in the least.
29 - STM
Global warming ... alarmist? Fu.k me. Try living on a continent that has officially been in drought for six years (and somehow still manages to feed and clothe itself and half the world as well) but was suffering drought conditions prior to that as well.
There are many children here who've never seen rain. Think about that guys, NEVER seen rain, and about the ramifications of that, before you start saying it's alarmist. While we are often in drought, this one is pretty damn serious.
Australian scientists believe the drought is the product of our normal weather patterns, but stress that it has almost certainly been intensified this time by global warming. We are even on water restrictions (for garden hosing, etc) in the cities. Big country towns fare even worse. In places where dam levels were overflowing 10 years ago, today they are just dry, cracked earth. It's just bone dry out in the bush, with lots and lots of fine red dust blowing around. I hope it's not a portent for our collective futures.
We need a rain dance, and it'd be nice if other people on this planet who don't have any understanding of what's it like to live with this stuff year in year out would pay attention to people who are experiencing the effects of global warming first hand and know what's really going on.
It'll only get worse, too, if we don't act soon.
30 - Clavos
South Florida begins water restrictions tomorrow (for lawn watering, car washing, etc.), but our drought is NOT due to Global Warming; we're a Republican state, and GW is against the law here. :>)
31 - RJ Elliott
what for? why do you say that? why... don't get it. not sure where you're going with that one. the chinese want the world to end... yes... that will really work out for them. "we rule over nothing! nothing!!! hahahaha." yeah, next.
Um, because the Red Chinese government hasn't bought into the bogus scare-mongering Al Gore propaganda like you and so many other Western dimwits have?
"red chinese" ...really, what's up with that? you got something against chinese people? do you know any? are you sure they are what you think they are? they ain't red, i'll tell you that. (kind of bigoted, don't you think, white boy?)
[Personal attack deleted]
I have nothing against the Chinese people...however, I DO have something against their totalitarian Communist government that enslaves them while raping the planet! Why is that so difficult for you to comprehend???
[Personal attack deleted]
32 - STM
Clav: I know you're just having a gee-up, but can you imagine what it's like for a child never to have seen or felt rain falling on their skin. We had a photo published in the paper a few years back where a drought affected town got a spot of rain and some kids were standing outside a farm looking up at the sky with their arms out to feel the water falling on their skin. It's serious stuff here old boy. We are in deep strife.
33 - RJ Elliott
My predictions (from five years ago) about what would happen in Iraq were not entirely correct. In fact, I don't know anyone who accurately predicted all the consequences of toppling Saddam's totalitarian, anti-American regime in Iraq.
But I am utterly baffled by what that has to do with Al Gore's "Global Warming" scare-mongering, Red China's blanket exemption from Kyoto, or the fact that "Global Warming" would actually benefit some regions by producing longer growing seasons and fewer deadly blizzards.
34 - Michael J. West
"white boy" is an insult now? A fighting-words insult?
Well, okay. I guess whatever you are insulted by, is an insult. I, myself, always considered it a rather accurate descriptor when someone called me "white boy," but to each his own, of course.
35 - jaz
no man enjoys being called a "boy", and in many sub-cultures that kind of thing usually ends in an altercation deliberately provoked
oh ..and RJ...all of your predictions for Iraq have proven to be shit for the most part, haven't they?
but credit where it's due...you are at least mensch enough to almost admit it...sort of
36 - zingzing
"I have nothing against the Chinese people...however, I DO have something against their totalitarian Communist government that enslaves them while raping the planet! Why is that so difficult for you to comprehend???"
well, it's people that are causing global warming, not communism. is that hard to figure out? (white... boy...)
"Oh, and it's rather...safe...to call me "white boy" over the internet. I recommend you stick to typing that insult over the computer while using an anonymous name, rather than saying it to my face. I highly recommend that."
bring it on, cracka! oh, you're too easy. you know nothing of the chinese people if you insist on calling them all "red." (they're yerrow. oh, i'll get myself killed one day.) and if you are only referring to the government, which is somewhat foolish in this case, you can have my apology. but, i stand by my "white boy," white boy. i'm a white boy too. so i can say it. bitch.
"Red China's blanket exemption from Kyoto, or the fact that "Global Warming" would actually benefit some regions by producing longer growing seasons and fewer deadly blizzards."
all the while destroying the world economy and making their exports worthless, making any short term benefits completely useless.
"My predictions (from five years ago) about what would happen in Iraq were not entirely correct. In fact, I don't know anyone who accurately predicted all the consequences of toppling Saddam's totalitarian, anti-American regime in Iraq."
yeah, that would be the "they" in your essay. "they" (us) were right about just about everything, eh? right about everything... oh, basking in the glow... it warms my soul... not that i have soul...
jaz: "no man enjoys being called a "boy", and in many sub-cultures that kind of thing usually ends in an altercation deliberately provoked"
"deliberately" is the word.
mjw: ""white boy" is an insult now?"
white boy!
37 - STM
Jaz: "no man enjoys being called a "boy", and in many sub-cultures that kind of thing usually ends in an altercation deliberately provoked"
Hello there, old boy ....
38 - Clavos
Stan,
You're right, I know the drought over there is serious.
We really are starting water restrictions here tomorrow, but droughts here are nothing new; they come and go and have done so for decades.
39 - RJ
"white boy" is an insult now? A fighting-words insult?
Well, okay. I guess whatever you are insulted by, is an insult. I, myself, always considered it a rather accurate descriptor when someone called me "white boy," but to each his own, of course.
Try calling a Black man a "black boy" sometime, to his face, and see the reaction you get. It will be enlightening, I'm sure...
40 - RJ
all of your predictions for Iraq have proven to be shit for the most part, haven't they?
Pretty much.
But please name someone who offered a prediction of a specific outcome (like I did), way back in 2002, that was even close to the reality on the ground...
41 - zingzing
the "they" did!
42 - RJ
More "Global Warming" scare-mongering aimed at frightening people like "zingzing" here:
"Before this century is over, billions of us will die and the few breeding pairs of people that survive will be in the Arctic," predicted James Lovelock, a renowned environmental scientist.
Now, does any rational person (I'm intentionally excluding "zingzing" with the qualifier "rational") actually believe this is an even remotely-realistic scenario?
Oh, by the way, the recent UN Climate Report claims that cow farts (yes, COW FARTS) are a larger contributor to "Global Warming" than all human industry and development combined. So, perhaps the "concerned environmentalist" (as "zingzing" surely views himself to be) should be demanding the genocide of the bovine genus instead of the draconian regulation of industry**?
**("industry" as defined as "all economic activity that occurs in the West" which would exempt Red China and India, or one-third of the total human population on Earth, of course...)
43 - CARE
I HATE KIDS!!!
44 - Mark Edward Manning
These same British children losing sleep over global warming will grow up to be the next generation of fly-tippers. Just watch. Britain is crap at recycling and that likely won't change, especially with only fortnightly rubbish collection services coming into effect. Because it's so much easier to complain about America and Australia not signing the Kyoto Treaty while tossing one's weekly average of six bags of rubbish in a secluded area of the park before going to hospital to give birth to one's tenth child than to actually do something or make allowances for the environment... It makes one seem intellectually "with it" even if it's dead obvious that they're a bigger polluter than a gas-guzzling station wagon ...
About considering global warming a greater threat than the Islamofascists setting up camp here: That reminds me of the special environmental issue of Vanity Fair, the one with Al Gore, Bobby Kennedy Jr. and George Clooney on the cover, which also stipulated that climate change was more a pressing threat than the jihadists. Makes sense, doesn't it? Fret and panic over something that we don't really understand all that well and ignore a threat to our livelihoods that we know is real!
45 - Mark Edward Manning
Clavos: "South Florida begins water restrictions tomorrow ..."
You're from S. Fl., Clavos? I was in the Palm Beach-Boca Raton area just two weeks ago, but I wasn't aware of any water restrictions there ...
We actually had quite a drought for a while here in Britain last summer and it was looking serious and there was what we call a "hosepipe ban" in effect too. But we've had a ton of rain over the past six months, so groundwater levels may have returned to normal. They should be, considering some parts of England recently got flooded.
46 - Clavos
MEM,
Yup, Miami.
Two weeks ago, there weren't any water restrictions. They began day before yesterday; and, as I said to Stan, they're not unusual, but they rarely last more than a few months; although this time they ARE talking about making them permanent.
They may not extend as far north as Palm Beach. Believe it or not, as close as PB is, they tend to get more rain up there than we do; the fronts (especially in winter) coming from the north will often come down to there but not get down this far.
As you may know, rural folk in the Deep South also call a garden hose a "hosepipe." Now I know where they got it from.
47 - Les
Why aren't the kids [and adults] watching the BBC specials exposing the myth of Global Warming ["Gore's Convenient Lies"] exposed in The Great Global Warming Swindle!! Entire Documentary here. and the myth exposed in this Scientist work.
Wake up kids you been had!!
48 - RJ
The Sun is getting warmer...should we blame Bush and the USA?
Quote:
Since the late 1970s, the amount of solar radiation the sun emits, during times of quiet sunspot activity, has increased by nearly .05 percent per decade, according to a NASA funded study.
"This trend is important because, if sustained over many decades, it could cause significant climate change," said Richard Willson, a researcher affiliated with NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies and Columbia University's Earth Institute, New York.
...
"Historical records of solar activity indicate that solar radiation has been increasing since the late 19th century. If a trend, comparable to the one found in this study, persisted throughout the 20th century, it would have provided a significant component of the global warming the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports to have occurred over the past 100 years," he said.
49 - RJ
"Global Warming" on Mars, Jupiter, Pluto, and Neptune's moon Triton - is the internal combustion engine/capitalism/the USA/Karl Rove to blame?
50 - Clavos
Absolutely not!
It's cow farts.
51 - STM
Clav: "It's cow farts."
Or Jack Burton's voluminous cloud of hot air ....
52 - RJ
Thanks for posting the link to "The Great Global Warming Swindle" on YouTube, Les. I watched it last night, and it was very informative. A lot more honest, and credible, than Al Gore's science fiction film
The Day After TomorrowAn Inconvenient Truth...53 - Clavos
I watched it tonight. Too bad it's not getting wider exposure; people need to see that film.
Good link, Les!
54 - zingzing
funny
55 - zingzing
spam blocker, spam blocker, let my comment come over!