Wall Street Journal

Steve Fielding recently asked the Obama administration to reassure him on the science of man-made global warming. When the administration proved unhelpful, Mr. Fielding decided to vote against climate-change legislation.

If you haven’t heard of this politician, it’s because he’s a member of the Australian Senate. As the U.S. House of Representatives prepares to pass a climate-change bill, the Australian Parliament is preparing to kill its own country’s carbon-emissions scheme. Why? A growing number of Australian politicians, scientists and citizens once again doubt the science of human-caused global warming.

Among the many reasons President Barack Obama and the Democratic majority are so intent on quickly jamming a cap-and-trade system through Congress is because the global warming tide is again shifting. It turns out Al Gore and the United Nations (with an assist from the media), did a little too vociferous a job smearing anyone who disagreed with them as “deniers.” The backlash has brought the scientific debate roaring back to life in Australia, Europe, Japan and even, if less reported, the U.S.

In April, the Polish Academy of Sciences published a document challenging man-made global warming. In the Czech Republic, where President Vaclav Klaus remains a leading skeptic, today only 11% of the population believes humans play a role. In France, President Nicolas Sarkozy wants to tap Claude Allegre to lead the country’s new ministry of industry and innovation. Twenty years ago Mr. Allegre was among the first to trill about man-made global warming, but the geochemist has since recanted. New Zealand last year elected a new government, which immediately suspended the country’s weeks-old cap-and-trade program.

The number of skeptics, far from shrinking, is swelling. Oklahoma Sen. Jim Inhofe now counts more than 700 scientists who disagree with the U.N. — 13 times the number who authored the U.N.’s 2007 climate summary for policymakers. Joanne Simpson, the world’s first woman to receive a Ph.D. in meteorology, expressed relief upon her retirement last year that she was finally free to speak “frankly” of her nonbelief. Dr. Kiminori Itoh, a Japanese environmental physical chemist who contributed to a U.N. climate report, dubs man-made warming “the worst scientific scandal in history.” Norway’s Ivar Giaever, Nobel Prize winner for physics, decries it as the “new religion.” A group of 54 noted physicists, led by Princeton’s Will Happer, is demanding the American Physical Society revise its position that the science is settled. (Both Nature and Science magazines have refused to run the physicists’ open letter.)

The collapse of the “consensus” has been driven by reality. The inconvenient truth is that the earth’s temperatures have flat-lined since 2001, despite growing concentrations of C02. Peer-reviewed research has debunked doomsday scenarios about the polar ice caps, hurricanes, malaria, extinctions, rising oceans. A global financial crisis has politicians taking a harder look at the science that would require them to hamstring their economies to rein in carbon.

Credit for Australia’s own era of renewed enlightenment goes to Dr. Ian Plimer, a well-known Australian geologist. Earlier this year he published “Heaven and Earth,” a damning critique of the “evidence” underpinning man-made global warming. The book is already in its fifth printing. So compelling is it that Paul Sheehan, a noted Australian columnist — and ardent global warming believer — in April humbly pronounced it “an evidence-based attack on conformity and orthodoxy, including my own, and a reminder to respect informed dissent and beware of ideology subverting evidence.” Australian polls have shown a sharp uptick in public skepticism; the press is back to questioning scientific dogma; blogs are having a field day.

The rise in skepticism also came as Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, elected like Mr. Obama on promises to combat global warming, was attempting his own emissions-reduction scheme. His administration was forced to delay the implementation of the program until at least 2011, just to get the legislation through Australia’s House. The Senate was not so easily swayed.

Mr. Fielding, a crucial vote on the bill, was so alarmed by the renewed science debate that he made a fact-finding trip to the U.S., attending the Heartland Institute’s annual conference for climate skeptics. He also visited with Joseph Aldy, Mr. Obama’s special assistant on energy and the environment, where he challenged the Obama team to address his doubts. They apparently didn’t.

This week Mr. Fielding issued a statement: He would not be voting for the bill. He would not risk job losses on “unconvincing green science.” The bill is set to founder as the Australian parliament breaks for the winter.

Republicans in the U.S. have, in recent years, turned ever more to the cost arguments against climate legislation. That’s made sense in light of the economic crisis. If Speaker Nancy Pelosi fails to push through her bill, it will be because rural and Blue Dog Democrats fret about the economic ramifications. Yet if the rest of the world is any indication, now might be the time for U.S. politicians to re-engage on the science. One thing for sure: They won’t be alone.

The EPA apparently doesn’t care about any negative comment of their GHG Endangerment findings, even internally, so the exercise in Democracy we did yesterday apparently was for naught.

“The time for such discussion of fundamental issues has passed for this round. The administrator and the administration has decided to move forward on endangerment, and your comments do not help the legal or policy case for this decision… I can only see one impact of your comments given where we are in the process, and that would be a very negative impact on our office.” – Internal EPA email, March 17th, 2009

The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) has caught EPA administration red-handed in concealment of internal dissent as well as apparently proceeding with plans in advance. From this PDF circulated today by CEI, here are the points:

EI is submitting a set of four EPA emails, dated March 12-17, 2009, which indicate that a significant internal critique of EPA’s position on Endangerment was essentially put under wraps and concealed. The study was barred from being circulated within EPA, it was never disclosed to the public, and it was not placed in the docket of this proceeding. The emails further show that the study was treated in this manner not because of any problem with its quality, but for political reasons. CEI hereby requests that EPA make this study public, place it into the docket, and either extend or reopen the comment period to allow public response to this new study. We also request that EPA publicly declare that it will engage in no reprisals against the author of the study, who has worked at EPA for over 35 years. The emails, attached hereto, consist of the following: 1) a March 12 email from Al McGartland, Office Director of EPA’s National Center for Environmental Economics (NCEE), to Alan Carlin, Senior Operations Research Analyst at NCEE, forbidding him from speaking to anyone outside NCEE on endangerment issues; 2) a March 16 email from Mr. Carlin to another NCEE economist, with a cc to Mr. McGartland and two other NCEE staffers, requesting that his study be forwarded to EPA’s Office of Air and Radiation, which directs EPA’s climate change program. The email notes the quantity of peer-reviewed references in the study, and defends its inclusion of new research as well. It states Mr. Carlin’s view that “the critical attribute of good science is its correspondence to observable data rather than where it appears in
the technical literature.” It goes on to point out that the new studies “explain much of the observational data that have been collected which cannot be explained by the IPCC models.” (Emphases added); 3) a March 17 email from Mr. McGartland to Mr. Carlin, stating that he will not forward Mr. Carlin’s study. “The time for such discussion of fundamental issues has passed for this round. The administrator and the administration has decided to move forward on endangerment, and your comments do not help the legal or policy case for this decision… I can only see one impact of your comments given where we are in the process, and that would be a very negative impact on our office.” (Emphasis added); 4) a second March 17 email from Mr. McGartland to Mr. Carlin, dated eight minutes later, stating “ I don’t want you to spend any additional EPA time on climate change.” Mr. McGartland’s emails demonstrate that he was rejecting Mr. Carlin’s study because its conclusions ran counter to EPA’s proposed position. This raises several major issues. A. Incompleteness of the Rulemaking Record: The end result of withholding Mr. Carlin’s study was to taint the Endangerment Proceeding by denying the public access to important agency information. Court rulings have made it abundantly clear that a rulemaking record should include both “the evidence relied upon [by the agency] and the evidence discarded.” Ethyl Corp. v. EPA, 541 F.2d 1, 36 (D.C. Cir. 1976), cert. denied, 426 U.S. 941 (1976). B. Prejudgment of the Outcome of the Endangerment Proceeding: The emails also suggest that EPA has prejudged the outcome of this proceeding, to the point where it arguably cannot be trusted to fairly evaluate the record before it. Courts have recognized “the danger that an agency, having reached a particular result, may become so committed to that result as to resist engaging in any genuine reconsideration of the issues.” Food Marketing Institute v. ICC, 587 F.2d 1285, 1290 (D.C. Cir. 1978). C. Violations of EPA’s Commitment to Transparency and Scientific Honesty: Finally, the emails suggest that EPA’s extensive pronouncements about transparency and scientific honesty may just be rhetoric. Shortly before assuming office, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson declared: “As Administrator, I will ensure EPA’s efforts to address the environmental crises of today are rooted in three fundamental values: science-based policies and programs, adherence to the rule of law, and overwhelming transparency.” Jan. 23, 2009, link. See also Administrator Jackson’s April 23 Memo to EPA Employees, “Transparency in EPA’s Operations”. These follow the President’s own January 21 memo to agency heads on “Transparency and Open Government”. And in an April 27 speech to the National Academy of Sciences, the President declared that, “under my administration, the days of science taking a back seat to ideology are over.” Because of ideology, however, it was this back seat to which Mr. Carlin’s study was relegated; more precisely, it was booted out of the car entirely. For these reasons, we submit that EPA should immediately make Mr. Carlin’s study public by entering it into the Endangerment docket, and that it should either extend or reopen the comment period in this proceeding to allow public responses to that study. It should do so, moreover, while publicly pledging that Mr. Carlin will suffer no adverse repercussions from agency personnel. Mr. Carlin is guilty of no wrongdoing, but the tenor of the emails described above suggests he may well have reason to fear reprisals.

Read the EPA internal emails, including photographs of the originals here. Call your congressional representative. This is legally wrong and makes a mockery of the public comment process. Tell them here: 202-224-3121.Source

By SBVOR

Click here for the article in our local paper alleging that the Yampa Valley Sustainability Council has described itself as “the green police”. That scary title is probably prophetic.

You see, these are members of the single most dangerous religious cult ever known to mankind. And, as we well know, these cult members never limit their “green police” activities to encouraging voluntary compliance with their religious creed.

After the Green cult got DDT banned, tens of millions of Africans died needlessly from Malaria as a direct result and there was essentially zero benefit to the environment. With that one example alone, one could argue that this Green cult is far more evil than The Third Reich.

The following quote (from the first link) is instructive:

“Especially as we’re introducing that zero impact initiative, it’s a great reminder to be friendly to the environment”

That quote is telling because the Green religion is all about the fantasy of homo sapiens having zero impact on the planet and its ecology. But, all living things always have an impact on the planet and its ecology. In fact, all inanimate things always have an impact on the planet and its ecology. The planet and its ecology are always evolving and always changing.

The Green cultists would like to see all eco-systems restored to — as they imagine it — some Garden of Eden perfect moment prior to the arrival of homo sapiens. They would then like to freeze that moment in time for all of eternity. They are pursuing an utterly unachievable pipedream. You see, change is the only constant in the entire (ever changing) universe.

About 2.4 billion years ago, this planet experienced something often described as the “Oxygen Catastrophe” (aka “The Great Oxidation”). This so-called “catastrophe” was created when “evolving lifeforms [sic] developed oxyphotosynthesis”. That new oxygen producing capability initially produced limited quantities of oxygen. But with time “this oxygen accumulated and eventually caused an ecological crisis to the biodiversity of the time, as oxygen was toxic to the microscopic anaerobic organisms dominant then.”.

Oxygen — previously a mere trace element — now makes up about 21% of our atmosphere (and, CO2 accounts for less than 0.04%). I suppose we are fortunate in that those organisms which caused such “catastrophic” changes to our atmosphere did not possess the “intelligence” (or lack thereof) to create a movement hell bent on eliminating their impact on the environment.

The current concentration of CO2 is near an all time record low for the last 600 million years. Present CO2 concentrations have been accurately described as a CO2 famine. The public is coming to understand that man made CO2 does not represent any credible threat of creating any meaningful — much less catastrophic — climate change. And, that is precisely why the so-called “Green” cultists are turning their attention to Methane.

Of course, science will probably determine that man made Methane hysteria is also unwarranted. But, only after riding another $50 billion gravy train (or more) to that station. At that point, the so-called “Green” cultists will — no doubt — identify some new boogie man to scare everybody with.

Isn’t it ironic that the very people who voted for “Change” are the same people who — with a religious fanaticism — fear any and all environmental change (even beneficial change) as though it were the devil itself?

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