I hate President Bush so much. It's colder than crap in Indiana- highs in the 40s. This weekend we had half inch thick hunks of ice raining down. Almost the end of April, and there's snow piling up on the car. Stupid Bush.…
"A sinister cabal of superior writers."
Article comments
— go to most recent comments26 - Dave Nalle
Didn't know you'd been by my place, Bennett.
Dave
27 - Dave Nalle
>>see also exxon secrets:
a statement of the company's relationship with the Pacific Research Institute. ExxonMobil didn't invest millions here, but ...<<
There's an understatement for you. Out of $4.144 million in revenues, PRI got less than $50K from Exxon/Mobil (about 1% of their total) and a total of only 12% of their revenue came from corporate donations of all kinds. Yeah, Exxon sure bought them out. Exxon gives more money to the Boy Scouts than they gave to PRI. Even more ironically, they donated $1.4 million last year to environmentalist and conservation groups, few of them even remotely political and some of them pretty left wing. Exxon gave a total of $103 million to charity last year. To suggest that the tiny bit they gave to PRI somehow taints PRI is meaningless. They gave that much money to just about every major university and environmental think tank or foundation on earth. Are they ALL tainted?
PRI seems like a pretty worthwhile group. It's broadly funded, focuses on a lot of good subjects, and seems to have pretty laudable goals. There's no indication that it's sold out to any special interest - except that it's kind of free market and libertarian in leanings. And that's ok with me.
Dave
28 - Tom French
The whole world agrees on this. Bush has proven he chooses ecomonics over the environment by not signing the Kyoto treaty. I feel like the time I had to prove there were fifty states to a place i worked. Everyone there thought it was 52. This is not even debatable.
29 - Eric Olsen
hilarious Al, very well done - April is the cruelest month and the demon Bush has only made it crueler. You had ice, we had a foot of snow
30 - Jon Sobel
>>Your link is to Mother Jones<<
And you did exactly as I thought. I purposely linked to some Mother Jones articles to see if you would actually look at the articles, or simply see what the source was and reject it out of hand. And you did just what I knew you would do! So you won't see all the research laid out there, because of where it's published. I, however, am perfectly willing to look seriously at any research you can point to to back up your position. But in your own article on the subject, you didn't cite any such research at all - all you did was include one graph. And what do you cite here, above? An eight-year-old poll via the National Center for Policy Analysis, a supposedly "nonpartisan" organization whose "goal is to develop and promote private alternatives to government regulation and control, solving problems by relying on the strength of the competitive, entrepreneurial private sector." So who, exactly, has an agenda here?
I find it exceedingly disturbing how anti-environmentalists can cite only polls, no actual science, in defending their positions. It's because there is no actual science behind their positions.
31 - Eric Olsen
everyone has an agenda but me and my monkey
32 - Dave Nalle
Jon, the question was whether the majority of scientists agree that humans cause global warming. Therefore a poll of scientists IS the appropriate evidence, not the science they derive their opinions from. In addition, that poll may be cited on the NCPA website, but it's from the Gallup organization, one of the oldest and most respected independent, non-partisan polling organizations in the world. Are you going to tell me Gallup has an agenda now? And the Gallup poll is NOT eight years old as you claim, it's only 3 years old.
As for your irrelevant attack on the NCPA, are you saying that you object to their 'agenda' of encouraging private solutions to problems so that government regulation won't be necessary? You're saying that things like voluntary reduction of pollution are a bad thing?
And Mother Jones? How exactly did you trap me there? I read the article. It was substance free and typical of their polemic-laden propaganda. Are you seriously trying to tell me that Mother Jones is a scientific journal?
Dave
33 - MDE
re:"To suggest that the tiny bit they gave to PRI somehow taints PRI is meaningless."
From what I have gleaned from their site, PRI is a free-market lobbyist think tank group whose mantra concerning global warming is that one should make statements about warming based on ‘sound science’ rather than on casual observations of rising temperatures and melting glaciers (or snowstorms in April). Their interpretations lead them to produce studies that indicate general environmental improvement. They lobbied against Kyoto.
As far as ‘taint’ caused by ExxonMobil money goes, PRI was a free-market group from the get go as described in the history section on their site.
I referred to PRI as a single instance of what was discussed in the Mother Jones article cited and acknowledged that the amount of money was not great. I do not hold that one should dismiss their work out of hand.
re:"Jon, the question was whether the majority of scientists agree that humans cause global warming"
How about let's discuss global warming, generally. Can we agree that the phenemenon is real? Some folks (eg PRI) won't go that far.
Mark
34 - Eric Olsen
I agree it's real and think the solution is the aggressive development of alternative energy sources
35 - Jon Sobel
>>Are you seriously trying to tell me that Mother Jones is a scientific journal?<<
No, of course not. Neither is Blogcritics, neither are you, and neither am I. That's a big part of the problem here: we all, to some extent, have to trust our sources. (I'd still like to see you back up your claims with scientific evidence, but you can't, so we'll move on). As an atheist who grew up in a house full of scientists, I tend to trust the overwhelming body of scientific evidence as exemplified by the IPCC report, over journalists or polls. BTW the poll you referred to is cited on a page with a 1997 date, that's why I said "eight-year-old" - I'm curious about when that poll was actually conducted, can anyone enlighten on this?
Anyway, you can spend all day disparaging my sources and I can spend all day disparaging yours. For example, the allegedly nonpartisan NCPA's Global Warming "Science" page lists ONLY articles that challenge the broad scientific consensus that human activities contribute to global warming. It's a perfect example of an organization trying to pretend to exhibit a "cooler head" in order to mask a very one-sided agenda.
But the fact is, the evidence of global climate change, as you admit in your own article, is clear. As Mark says, "The melt is going on right now. What are we going to do about it?" How could reducing CO2 emissions possibly NOT make sense?
36 - MDE
re:"How could reducing CO2 emissions possibly NOT make sense?"
My question is, would it make any difference to the warming trend?
Mark
37 - MDE
My opinion: Stop trying to reduce CO2 emissions. The Capitalists cannot move on this until the oil is gone. If they start building nuclear reactors, I’d bet the farm that it will be in addition to fossil fuel, not instead of. Focus money and publicity on groups modeling scenarios based on the assumptions of continuing warming. Make more movies about the coming changes like “Day after Tomorrow” to desensitize folks. Encourage people to get: “a couple hundred feet of elevation, 40 acres, southern exposure, a deep well, a big garden, several guns, cows, chickens, a wood furnace.” (thanks for the line Bennett) or (god forbid) start some social planning to minimize human loss.
Mark
38 - Dave Nalle
MDE, I haven't run into anyone but the most trenchant ideologues who think the earth hasn't warmed up a bit in the last 500 or so years. The science also supports that. The warming is somewhere around 1.6 degrees over that time.
The real argument is whether this is just the natural cycle which it appears to be, or whether humans had any impact on the trend.
Jon: "(I'd still like to see you back up your claims with scientific evidence, but you can't, so we'll move on)"
Back up WHAT claims? I haven't made any scientific claims on this thread. The only claim I made was that most scientists do NOT in fact support human causality in global warming and I provided the evidence for that.
Jon: " lists ONLY articles that challenge the broad scientific consensus that human activities contribute to global warming"
There you go again. There is NOT a broad scientific consensus on this. You seem to be deliberately missing the point. The overwhelming majority if climate scientists believe there IS global warming, but also believe it is NOT caused by humans. This isn't a theory, it's a fact. Your consensus does not exist. In that context, the NCPA is not pushing a radical agenda, they're presenting the facts as supported by 83% of climate scientists.
Jon: "But the fact is, the evidence of global climate change, as you admit in your own article, is clear. As Mark says, "The melt is going on right now. What are we going to do about it?" How could reducing CO2 emissions possibly NOT make sense?"
Because it's pointless? Our CO2 emissions are so minute compared to natural sources that they aren't enough to cause global warming and conversely cutting them down won't make any difference in the process of global warming either. Even if it could make a difference, it's almost certainly too late. Not to mention that nations like the US and Europe have already reduced emissions enormously, with no measurable effect except on local environments - which is certainly a good thing in its own right.
By all means let's reduce emissions and make everything we do more efficient and more environmentally sound, but don't try to tell us that it's going to solve the global warming situation, because it just isn't true, and those who support the theory of human caused global warming are mostly just using the issue to push a political agenda.
Dave
39 - MDE
re: "MDE, I haven't run into anyone but the most trenchant ideologues who think the earth hasn't warmed up a bit in the last 500 or so years"
Are we talking about 'a bit' of warming or about melting glaciers?
Mark
40 - MDE
re: "The real argument is whether this is just the natural cycle which it appears to be, or whether humans had any impact on the trend"
I contend that at, this point, this is an academic exercise with little importance to the social policy questions that we need to get to when we accept that significant change is in the wind.
Mark
41 - Jon Sobel
Again... we're reading different sources. Everything I read, that doesn't have either a right-wing or anti-environmentalist agenda, points to a broad consensus among scientists. From what I've read, the people denying it are mostly cranks like Michael Crichton and non-scientists who have a political agenda.
As soon as I have time, I'll find and post the links backing up the broad consensus I am referring to. It might well be worth a new post.
42 - JR
Dave Nalle: The overwhelming majority if climate scientists believe there IS global warming, but also believe it is NOT caused by humans. This isn't a theory, it's a fact. Your consensus does not exist. In that context, the NCPA is not pushing a radical agenda, they're presenting the facts as supported by 83% of climate scientists.
I'd like to see the questions, the full results, and who actually took the survey; because I think your interpretation is incomplete and/or inaccurate.
43 - Richard
Eric, Your monkey is funded by exxon mobil and supports global warming so there will be more bananas! I breathe exhaust fumes because they are ok! Plastic never hurt anyone! Bovine growth hormone is good for your children! The clean water act was supposed to make all water fishable and swinable by the 1980's, but we are doing a good job here in AmeriKa
44 - Eric Olsen
personally, here in Ohio, I'm all for global warming. I would love to see the North Coast become a tropical resort area and my property values triple
45 - Dave Nalle
MDE: "Are we talking about 'a bit' of warming or about melting glaciers?"
While there are lots of anecdotal reports of melting glaciers there has yet to be a measurable increase in sea levels, which suggests that the melting glaciers one place are refreezing somewhere else. And regardless, we're talking about 1.6 degrees, which is a 'bit' of warming.
Mark
Jon: "Again... we're reading different sources. Everything I read, that doesn't have either a right-wing or anti-environmentalist agenda, points to a broad consensus among scientists. From what I've read, the people denying it are mostly cranks like Michael Crichton and non-scientists who have a political agenda."
Then the sources you are reading and not citing are biased. Not having a right wing or anti-government agenda implies that your sources are equally biased from the other direction. My source is the Gallup organization. Are you going to say they are biased to the right?
Jon: "As soon as I have time, I'll find and post the links backing up the broad consensus I am referring to. It might well be worth a new post."
Find one which actually surveys climatologists, not something like the Mother Jones piece which merely states there is a broad consensus.
JR: "I'd like to see the questions, the full results, and who actually took the survey; because I think your interpretation is incomplete and/or inaccurate."
Gallup charges $95 for full access to its polls, but I was able to use their site to confirm the poll exists and I've found multiple detailed references to it on the web. Just do a google search for (gallup poll climatology)
BTW, even the IPCC can't seem to get climatologists to support global warming. They did a survey of scientists from an environmentalist mailing list and still didn't get a consensus in favor of global warming. Check this article out http://freedompage.home.mindspring.com/ippc.htm
Richard: "The clean water act was supposed to make all water fishable and swinable by the 1980's, but we are doing a good job here in AmeriKa"
As someone who lived through the era prior to the implementation of the Clean Water act through its implementation I've always been amazed at how well it worked. I remember when the Charles River in Boston used to catch on fire periodically because of industrial methane-producing waste floating in it. Today you can fish or swim in the Charles. that's pretty amazing for 30-some years.
Dave
46 - Richard
Dave, You should stay in a field you know about. To call the claen water act a success because a river does not catch fire is the lamest thing I have ever heard. Our waters are even more deadly than ever. The goals of the clean water act have never been realized, and it had been more than 20 years since it was supposed to have been successsful. I don't know the present condition of the Charles, nor do I have the time to check, but thousands of miles of streams in every state have consumption warnings, limiting fish intake. We don't even regulate for drugs and personal care product limitations in our streams, let alone hormone mimiking chemicals.
47 - Richard
Dave, Just for your information It was the Cuyahoga River that inspired the nation to enact the Clean Water Act: And it was the national goal to eliminate the discharge of pollutants into navigable waters by 1985. Where do you think highway runoff goes? Do you think it is good for fish? How smart are you?
http://www.cwru.edu/artsci/engl/marling/60s/pages/richoux/
48 - Jon Sobel
I've gone ahead and posted quotes and links that I think go pretty far towards adding up to conclusive evidence of the "broad consensus." I thought it was worth its own post, but I accidentally filed it under Culture instead of Politics. Then I realized it fits just as well under Culture.
From what I've observed, the Clean Water Act has had some successes and some failures. The waters around New York City are significantly cleaner than they were in the 70s, and I witnessed the cleanup of the Charles too, as Dave points out.
Dave, regarding the link you just posted, it's from back in 1997 again - how could it have been referring to the latest IPCC report?
49 - Richard
John, Sure some success, some failure. Did they meet their goal by 1985? No. Have they met it 20 years later? No. Some success!
50 - Dave Nalle
>>From what I've observed, the Clean Water Act has had some successes and some failures. The waters around New York City are significantly cleaner than they were in the 70s, and I witnessed the cleanup of the Charles too, as Dave points out. <<
Richard seems not to grasp the fact that my comment on the Charles was purely anecdotal. Given how polluted the Charles was - as I recall they used to have a security fence to keep people away from the river - the degree to which it was cleaned up is truly amazing. I can also comment with personal knowledge about the Potomac and the James and the Chesapeake Bay area in general - where I used to dive. They're also remarkably cleaner and healthier than they were.
I never claimed that the clean water act had made every drop of water in the country pure as 30,000 year old glacial melt, but from what I've seen the results in at least some major problem areas have been pretty damned impressive.
Dave
51 - Richard
I guess Dave is easily impressed, either that of he knows little of the health of our Nations waterways. No one is saying pure it terms of cleanliness, just wanted to make a point that, just because something seems better than before, doesn't mean it is. We are talking about the Nations waters, not particular streams that were so bad they caught fire. Today we have male fish producing eggs, so it that better?
52 - Richard
If you stupid right wing bastards want to talk about clean waters rather than say some idiotic thing like "its better" Take a look at your states 303(d) list that lists all the impaired waterways in your state, which lists the reasons that particular waterway is impaired and then tell me the clean water act is working.
53 - Temple Stark
No need to start calling people, bastards. Sheesh. Fear who you might become :-)
54 - marc
"If you stupid right wing bastards "
Taking a cue from your new leader Howard Dean I see.
That'll get you exactly nowhere in '06 or '08.
55 - marc
Oh BTW I want one of these: "Today we have male fish producing eggs"
Think of the possibilities! I'll be swimmming in Bass caviar.
And rich, rich, RICH I tell ya!
Bring on the dirty streams and lakes.
56 - Dave Nalle
Richard, you epitomize the pessimism which has doomed the left to irrelevance in modern politics. For you the glass is always half empty and never even a little bit full.
In the face of some notable victories for water cleaning you can't say "good, but we have to do better", you have to reject, deny and demand. It's not a victory unless it's total, and it's always doom and gloom.
This sort of attitude discourages progress. Because no increment of progress is ever good enough people become dismayed and discouraged.
The standard scenario: set an unrealistic goal, achieve great things getting part way there, then reject the entire process because it was a 'failure', even though measured objectively the outcome was positive.
It must be a depressing world to live in.
Dave
57 - Jon Sobel
I had the same reaction to Richard's posts, but I wouldn't extrapolate it to "pessimism which has doomed the left to irrelevance in modern politics." I don't believe his attitude is typical of people "on the left." Environmentalists (and I'm not referring to the radical fringe, here) tend to be a celebratory lot, I think, actually, celebrating small or partial victories, then moving on to try to do more.
I'm guilty of generalizing about "the right" too, sometimes. I try to be aware of it.
58 - Dave Nalle
Ah, but I see Richard's reaction as part of an overall pattern. Look at the attitude of Steve S. and Natalie on the gay marriage issue, particularly the recent article and discussion of the civil unions in Connecticut. It's a big step forward, but for them it's a hideous failure because it's not a 100% victory. Same thing with healthcare - nothing but a socialized medical system will do - a hybrid system is unacceptable. Same thing with environmental issues. Even though drilling in ANWR is really not an environmental disaster, it's taken as the first sign of an environmental apocalypse. It goes on and on. Every little bump in the road is a mountain and every pothole is a bottomless pit.
Dave
59 - RJ
"How could reducing CO2 emissions possibly NOT make sense?"
Fair enough. Stop breathing.
Or choke a kitten.
60 - RJ
Make more movies about the coming changes like “Day after Tomorrow”
This movie was pure fiction. No one credible takes it seriously.
61 - RJ
"cranks like Michael Crichton"
You just KNEW this attack was coming...
62 - RJ
"Our waters are even more deadly than ever."
Cite?
63 - Marc
Hey damm it!
Where the hell are my male roe carrying bass?
And while your at it toss in a couple trans-sexual tarpon from the Florida Keys
64 - Richard
Why is it doom and gloom to state that when the act didn't meet the goal in 1985, and still dosent? Are your standards lower than mine? Since the United states dosen't measure the amounts of personal care products and drugs in our waters in a systematic way, we can't even tell how deadly our waters are. I noticed no one said they looked at the 303(d) list for their state, how convenient of you. George Bush dosen't want to measure the effect of global warming on people or the environment either, that way we can all stick our heads in the sand and state how rosy everything is.
65 - Richard
Actually drilling ANWR isn't such a big deal. The cariboo(?)are going to die anyway because of global warming, so who cares?
66 - Dave Nalle
>>Why is it doom and gloom to state that when the act didn't meet the goal in 1985, and still dosent?<<
It's doom and gloom because you seem to place no value on the progress which HAS been made and gripe because we haven't met other less realistic goals.
I'd just like to hear you admit that our waterways are, overall, much cleaner than they were in the 1960s.
Dave
67 - Richard
Oh Dave I bet you don't know allot about the water quality near your home, let alone the nations. Tell me what progress has been made? Rivers don't burn? What about all the new chemicals that are added to the streams every day? Thta isn't necessarily progress. And belive me I bet no one who knows anything about endocrine distuptors or PPNs in out waterways will state that out waters are cleaner. If they do, they could not prove it.
68 - Richard
The big problem is that the goals of the clean water act were possible to achieve much more efficiently back them. We diodn't seem to care enough to try, and now because of infrastucture , it would be much more difficult. Now we have chemicals never dreamed of in the 60's flowing in our streams, and we are still discovering their effect on aquatic life.
69 - richard
Here is a link obout endocrine disruptors
70 - Maurice
Richard (or is it richard) no river has caught fire since 1969.
71 - Dave Nalle
Richard, I don't know of anywhere in the nation where it's legal for any kind of industrial waste to be discharged directly into a waterway or even in such a way that it can get into the water table. Right now in this area they're mainly battling issues with pesticide runoff from golf courses and the like. Are things somehow different in other parts of the country?
Dave
72 - Richard
Yea, I know, but someone thinks that proves the clean water act is a success!
73 - Dave Nalle
Richard, 50 years ago they were dumping sulfuric acid and petroleum biproducts directly into rivers. They don't do that anymore. On the most basic level that's success. Embrace it.
Dave
74 - Richard
Dave, Please list the rivers this was happening in. For every one you list there will be 10 that have serious other problems that you know nothing about. Richard
75 - Richard
Runoff from streets can be considered industrial runoff, and it is happening all the time.
How about MTBE? This is going into the aquifers in the west, and Bush wants to allow the oil companies to get away scott free! Hows that for republican clean living?