First off better than 60% of all the grain we grow is exported and not used for food for people but cattle.

ihateliberals - What would happen to the price of food if 40% of the annual corn harvest were taken out of the supply line?

What would happen to the price of gas at the pump if the ethanol content suddenly doubled (at a minimum) due to less feedstock?

Finally, what would other nations who depend on our corn exports do for food if we cut them off to take care of our own?

Ethanol is a bad idea today and always has been. Corn should be used for food, not fuel. If we used every acre of corn in the country for ethanol we still would not make a dent in foreign oil imports. Ethanol is expensive, you get less miles per gallon using ethanol, ethanol makes less power,ethanol is harmful to small engines and death for older outboard motors and motorcycles.

liberalhater- what do we use cattle for? Decorations? No, we use them for food: meat, milk and cheese. We use their by-products for leather, dog food, gelatin and fertilizers. So, even the 60% that we export is used to inexpensively feed 3rd world people or make products that benefit humanity. Without taxpayer subsidies, ethanol production would be a bankrupting fiasco and would not produce enough affordable fuel to satisfy our needs.

ihateliberals

Who do you think eat the cattle that eat the corn??????

ihateliberals; so what's your point? Without corn the cattle still need food. Without the corn to export, we don't get the money for the export. Whatever it is used for, the damage from drought is very real and will hit us hard. Are you one of those global climate change deniers? It's real and it's here to stay. Anyone can deny all they want. Materalman80; I agree with that 100%! Ethanol is a huge joke and a rip-off to boot.

Materialman80 is right. Plus the energy balance equation isn't favorable (that is...the energy that goes into ethanol production vs. the energy that you get out of it).

Yes ethanol was a horrible idea; I was actually shocked it was ever actually considered. Now they're stroking these lithium air batteries as the next great thing; good luck with that. It's almost as retarded as ethanol; if they can get the engineering aspects of it worked out to put in vehicles (and there are plenty of challenges there) making it inexpensive and to an acceptable safety level may prove to be the nails in its coffin.

ethanol is not made from the same corn we eat. thats a myth

If you dig into patents filed by energy companies there is going to be a shift soon to bio diesel based on converting lignin and cellulose in waste streams from agriculture (like corn stover and cob) and GMO switch grass grown on marginal (non farming) land.

The resulting value of certain food crops will rise, as both the food element and the non-food elements of the plants being grown will have market value. And is theorized by some to represent a future trade surplus for Americas massive agriculture sector that will "balance the books" in the long run. That seems a bit optimistic but with the world increasing population, food prices are eventually going to catch up.

Never have figured out how CO2, a gas, has any weight at all?

Weight is the force of gravity on an object. Mass X gravitational acceleration = weight.

CO2 might be very light, but it's not without mass, and it's subject to gravitational forces like anything else.

Steve-446003

Never have figured out how CO2, a gas, has any weight at all

Steve, just think about a CO2 fire extinguisher. The canister has a certain weight and after you fill it up with CO2 and re-weight it, it will of course be heavier.

CO2 weighs exactly the same as it solid and liquid form, but like all gasses it has a lower density and occupies more volume. The lower density seemingly allows gases to float off into the atmosphere; because we have a atmosphere with varying levels of density, this allows a gas to drift up against the force of gravity.

In an airless chamber the gases would settle near the bottom from the gravitational pull on its atoms.

ethanol is not made from the same corn we eat. thats a myth

Even so, land dedicated to growing corn for ethanol is land that is now not available for growing other food crops.

You need to read the story "Chicken Little".

How about a science journal or two instead?

Steve-446003

Never have figured out how CO2, a gas, has any weight at all?

Hahaha...Steve, you make me laugh....will try to explain to you...Lets see C02 is made out of two elemets. Carbon (C) and two atoms or one molecule of oxygen (O). Carbon makes about 18% of human body and oxygen about 65%. That means about 83% of human body is made out of those two elemets. If those two elements did not have any weight, we humans and anything else on this planet having those two elements would weight much less...I think you got something here STEVE. A new diet philosophy. Deduct from whatever you weigh 83%....Cool idea.

"These events are kind of what we'd expect with climate change, we'd expect expanding drought, we'd expect warm, record breaking temperatures," Jake Crouch, a NOAA climate scientist, told NBC News. "But it's kind of hard to pinpoint this month or past several months as a telltale sign that climate change is happening. The drought is more of a local factor and isn't necessarily driven by large scale climate change, but is impacting local temperatures. But we've also seen an increase in U.S. temperatures overall."

Let's be realistic - Man is contributing to global warming, but is not the only cause. I think most people would agree with that. But the more important issue is "What should we do about it?"

Unfortunately, we are only part of the problem, so we can only be part of the solution. Just about 4 years ago, the U S and China were emitting approximately equal amounts of Carbon Dioxide into the atmosphere - today, China emits about 40% more than we do.

Without help from China and all of the other rapidly growing countries, nothing that we do alone will make much difference, and if we try to 'go it alone', it will just result in losing more jobs to overseas competitors that continue to use cheap energy - typically from coal.

This will take a group effort - and we're not going to "lead from behind".

Ethanol production produces a byproduct called Dried Distillers Grain or DDG which is then used as animal feed. My brother feeds it to his cattle and they love it. I don't know how many pounds of DDG are produced from a 56 pound bushel of corn but it is substantial. I agree that $8 per bushel corn is way too high but if you expect farmers to grow corn for $2 per bushel, that ain't gonna happen. Corn is already being rationed by the market place. Some ethanol plant have cut back while other have shut down temporarily. Wait until we have bumper crops again. The price will settle back in around $5 per bushel. I'd like $.99 gas too but that will never happen.

It's all a mute point because we use petro in our modern agriculture anyway. So instead of taking the energy directly from crude: we first have to refine it, spray in on the soil, wait a few months investing more man hours and resources like water and land, harvest it, refine it again, and distribute it.

Just an overly simplified example. When designing something for energy efficiency, this isn't the normal way you go about it though. Just so ya know.

The water and land it would use up alone makes it unrealistic.

"The previous warmest July was in 1936, when the nation's average temperature was 77.4 degrees."

77.6 degrees is very little change from the previous record, and we are only looking at the relatively short period of time since records have been kept.

We need to stop wasting corn for ethanol fuel!

There's a great way republicans can help solve the problem of global warming and extinction to boot.

All republican politicians and candidates should be frozen, even if they don't want to be, and sent north. They'd be like tasty frozen treats for the polar bears. So we cool down the north pole, feed the bears, and eliminate a vexing domestic problem all in one fell swoop.

Whenever, someone decides to run for office as a republican, we just say to him "talk to the bears." He then goes up north and gently attempts to explain to the polar bears why they really aren't going extinct, and that no there really is just as much ocean ice as before, and that "come on, you polar bears are supposed to be skinny." Of course the republican will be restrained to prevent him from stealing the polar bears pension, and so that he fully listens to and considers the polar bears' response. The republican however does get bonus points by first covering himself in salmon oil,

William..."Yes ethanol was a horrible idea; I was actually shocked it was ever actually considered."

I suggest you research how powerful ADM is...they own Congress. Democrat and Republicans alike.

77.6 degrees is very little change from the previous record, and we are only looking at the relatively short period of time since records have been kept.

The key isn't the amount of change one sees between the two snapshots in time, but whether or not the frequency of such events increases as well as the overall average temperature: which is exactly what we are observing.

The hot July contributed to a record-warm first seven months of the year and the warmest 12-month period the nation has experienced since accurate record keeping started in 1895.

Amazing how buffoons like to blame this on man made global warming with car exhaust, ac, and factories. They didn't have any of this back in 1895, so what caused it then?

The earth has reached another turning point imo, and is going to make changes for all of us. Like it or not, Mother Earth and Nature is in full control, and has always been in control.

It happened in 1895, it happened in 2012, and it will happen all over again in the future.

Mark,

What you really hate are Neo-Cons—the Regan republicans who pushed aggression, supremacy in the world, puesdo science, and supply side economics. Not all republicans are bad.

For all you worry warts out there... You need to read the story "Chicken Little". The sky is falling!!! The sky is falling!!! Geezzz, It going to get hotter, It's going to get colder. Oh, yes, and look out for Foxy Loxy on your way to tell the "King" (Hussein Obama).

Then you must subscribe to this Japanese fairy tale. And mimic this picture...

It's all a mute point

Want what you say to be taken seriously?

It's a moot point not a mute point.

moot: open to discussion or debate; debatable; doubtful: a moot point.

News,
Why would any company build something that would dilute the demand for its products by increasing supply? They tend to like a good balance between availability and demand.

I would definitely not consider myself either conservative or liberal. I believe either extreme, or any extreme for that matter, is automatically a bad way to go. Anyway...

...There's no doubt that climate change is occurring. So what?! It's always occurred hasn't it? I seem to remember hearing about an Ice Age, and then a "little ice age"? The real thing I think sticks in the craw of so-called "deniers" is the fact that so many people are willing to blindly jump on the global warming bandwagon. Look...pollution is BAD and can't really be doing anything but harm to our planet. On the other hand, this planet is able to f*** itself up pretty badly all by its lonesome. It seems to me that at some point Environmentalists decided to connect the two things (pollution and climate) as a sort of end run around common sense.

I don't believe our pollution is causing the warming trend.

I DO believe our pollution is extremely harmful to our environment.

Again....SO WHAT??? No one reading this is going to change their life drastically enough to make any sort of miniscule difference in pollution for this planet. All this bull@!$%# bellyaching about it from both sides is just political crap!!! The climate is changing and it has AWLAYS BEEN CHANGING.

Oh no MJ,

Definitely a mute point.

RARE SNOWFALL STUNS MUCH OF SOUTH AFRICA

JOHANNESBURG (AP) -- People slowly came outside despite the cold wind Tuesday across South Africa, pointed their mobile phone cameras to the sky and opened their mouths to taste a rare snowfall that fell on much of the country.

The snow began Tuesday morning, part of an extreme cold snap now biting into a nation still in its winter months. By mid-afternoon, officials recorded snowfall across most of South Africa. However, forecasters acknowledged snow remains so unusual that they typically aren't prepared to provide details about snowfall in the nation.

The snow closed some roads and at least one high-altitude pass. The snowfall also closed several border posts in the country.

As the snow fell, workers at offices in Johannesburg rushed outside. Some twirled and danced as the flakes fell. One man rushed to the top of a snow-covered hill and slid down, using a cardboard box as an improvised toboggan. Despite the cold and the snow, beggars who line traffic lights in the city continued to ask passing motorists for cash.

The snow grew heavier in the afternoon in Johannesburg, covering rooftops and slicking roads. Snowflakes are a rare commodity in Johannesburg, even during winter. South African Weather Service records show it has snowed in Johannesburg on only 22 other days in the last 103 years. The last snow fell there in June 2007.

In Pretoria, the country's capital, flurries filled the sky during a visit by U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton. It was the first snowfall there since 1968, the weather service said.

The cold weather is expected to last a few days.

http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/A/AF_SOUTH_AFRICA_SNOW?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2012-08-07-17-06-15

Dad,

In an attempt to disprove climate change—or global warming—you actually just support it further. Shifting climate patterns is indicative of some type of change; wouldn't you agree?

Anchorage’s record setting cold summer
Posted on July 27, 2008 by Anthony Watts

From the Anchorage Daily News, some anecdotal evidence that we may not see an ice-free arctic this summer. I had previously blogged on the lateness of a 70 degree plus day in Anchorage, and now it looks like this may be one of the coolest summers on record there. A friend of mine that I have morning coffee with who is pilot that flew to Alaska’s western side to do some fishing told me a couple of days ago that the season is the “worst ever” and he’s an Alaskan native.

Gloomy summer headed toward infamy
CHILLY: Anchorage could hit 65 degrees for fewest days on record.

By GEORGE BRYSON
gbryson@adn.com

(07/24/08 00:10:35)
The coldest summer ever? You might be looking at it, weather folks say. Right now the so-called summer of ’08 is on pace to produce the fewest days ever recorded in which the temperature in Anchorage managed to reach 65 degrees.
That unhappy record was set in 1970, when we only made it to the 65-degree mark, which many Alaskans consider a nice temperature, 16 days out of 365.This year, however — with the summer more than half over — there have been only seven 65-degree days so far. And that’s with just a month of potential “balmy” days remaining and the forecast looking gloomy.
National Weather Service meteorologist Sam Albanese, a storm warning coordinator for Alaska, says the outlook is for Anchorage to remain cool and cloudy through the rest of July.
“There’s no real warm feature moving in,” Albanese said. “And that’s just been the pattern we’ve been stuck in for a couple weeks now.”
In the Matanuska Valley on Wednesday snow dusted the Chugach. On the Kenai Peninsula, rain was raising Six-Mile River to flood levels and rafting trips had to be canceled.

So if the cold and drizzle are going to continue anyway, why not shoot for a record? The mark is well within reach, Albanese said:

“It’s probably going to go down as the summer with the least number of 65-degree days.”

MEASURING THE MISERY

In terms of “coldest summer ever,” however, a better measure might be the number of days Anchorage fails to even reach 60. There too, 2008 is a contender, having so far notched only 35 such days — far below the summer-long average of 88.

Unless we get 10 more days of 60-degree or warmer temperatures, we’re going to break the dismal 1971 record of only 46 such days, a possibility too awful to contemplate.

Still, according to a series of charts cobbled together Tuesday evening by a night-shift meteorologist in the weather service’s Anchorage office, the current summer clearly has broken company with the record-setting warmth of recent years. Consider:

• 70-degree days. So far this summer there have been two. Usually there are 15. Last year there were 21. In 2004 there were 49.

• 75-degree days. So far this summer there’ve been zero. Usually there are four. It may be hard to remember, but last year there were 21. In 2004 there were 23.

So are all bets off on global warming? Hardly, scientists say. Climate change is a function of long-term trends, not single summers or individual hurricanes.

Last year the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded that it’s “unequivocal” the world is warming, considering how 11 of the warmest years on record have occurred in the past 13 years.

So what’s going on in Alaska, which also posted a fairly frigid winter?

LA NINA

Federal meteorologists trace a lot of the cool weather to ocean temperatures in the South Pacific. When the seas off the coast of Peru are 2 to 4 degrees cooler than normal, a La Nina weather pattern develops, which brings cooler-than- normal weather to Alaska.

For most of the past year, La Nina (the opposite of El Nino, in which warmer-than-normal ocean temperatures occur off Peru) has prevailed. But that’s now beginning to change.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration Web site, water temperatures in the eastern South Pacific began to warm this summer — and the weather should eventually follow.

The current three-month outlook posted by the national Climate Prediction Center in Camp Springs, Md., calls for below-normal temperatures for the south coast of Alaska from August through October — turning to above-normal temperatures from October through December.

The hot July contributed to a record-warm first seven months of the year and the warmest 12-month period the nation has experienced since accurate record keeping started in 1895.

Amazing how buffoons like to blame this on man made global warming with car exhaust, ac, and factories. They didn't have any of this back in 1895, so what caused it then?

Reading for comprehension 101. It was in 1895 that accurate records started being kept. It does not say that it was warmer in 1895. For all you know 1895 was a below average month for temperature!

Read the first paragraph here. And read this...

Domo arigato Mr. Re-bot-o. Thanks for interjecting such insight Dad; you're making a real difference in the world. (sic) (Incase people fail to see sarcasm again, I'm looking at you MJ)

The is no such thing as global warming, Fox News has spoken.

Fyi....they were kicked out of Canada for lying (multiple times), So if you believe them...you have serious problems.

Ya'll might want to listen to the scientists whom have made it there life's work to study the climate, kinda what they get paid for. Ya'll know any climatologists that happen to be anchors at Fox News??

Yea....didn't think so.

Red Sheep

You need to read the story "Chicken Little"

And you need to go back to high school. It seems that you have forgotten all your science lessons. Even elementary school children now learn about global warming.

NASA Data Show CO2 Trapping Less Heat than Expected

NASA satellite data from the years 2000 through 2011 show the earth’s atmosphere is allowing more heat to be released into space than computer models have predicted, reports a new study in the peer-reviewed science journalRemote Sensing.

Study coauthor Roy Spencer, Ph.D., a principal research scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville and U.S. Science Team Leader for the Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer on NASA’s Aqua satellite, reports real-world data from NASA’s Terra satellite contradict multiple assumptions fed into computer models used to predict the future climate.

“The satellite observations suggest there is much more energy lost to space during and after warming than the climate models show,” Spencer said in a July 26 University of Alabama press release. “There is a huge discrepancy between the data and the forecasts that is especially big over the oceans.”

In addition to finding that far less heat is being trapped than computer models have predicted, the NASA satellite data show the atmosphere begins shedding heat into space long before United Nations computer models predicted....

http://news.heartland.org/newspaper-article/2011/08/02/nasa-data-show-co2-trapping-less-heat-expected

Ethanol fuel in Aluminum block engine is a bad idea. But Pure Grain alcohol in a vintage steel block motor. With the proper gaskets is racing fuel. So Put into production A hybrid mix of pure grain butanol and unleaded and use the stronger gaskets for older cars. Like muscle cars. Butanol is the way to go instead of ethanol. It is mainly the Carbs gaskets and fuel lines on older cars.

I would like to have a classic truck running on some sort of hybrid fuel like that. Inline 6 chevy 292 with an new intake for fuel injection. Split exhaust. Running high octane Biofuel.

And yes we are contributing to Global warming. And yes the earth does warm and cool in cycles over thousands of years as well. On her own. But we as humans do have enough power to destroy the earth for all. Just by pushing a button. Or by ignoring what we do daily. For every action there is a reaction. Both Science and Faith acknowledge this

New study shows half of the global warming in the USA is artificial
Posted on July 29, 2012 by Anthony Watts

PRESS RELEASE – U.S. Temperature trends show a spurious doubling due to NOAA station siting problems and post measurement adjustments.

Chico, CA July 29^th, 2012 – 12 PM PDT – FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

A comparison and summary of trends is shown from the paper. Acceptably placed thermometers away from common urban influences read much cooler nationwide:

Green ‘drivel’ exposed

The godfather of global warming lowers the boom on climate change hysteria

Two months ago, James Lovelock, the godfather of global warming, gave a startling interview to msnbc.com in which he acknowledged he had been unduly “alarmist” about climate change.

The implications were extraordinary.

Lovelock is a world-renowned scientist and environmentalist whose Gaia theory — that the Earth operates as a single, living organism — has had a profound impact on the development of global warming theory.

Unlike many “environmentalists,” who have degrees in political science, Lovelock, until his recent retirement at age 92, was a much-honoured working scientist and academic.

His inventions have been used by NASA, among many other scientific organizations.

Lovelock’s invention of the electron capture detector in 1957 first enabled scientists to measure CFCs (chlorofluorocarbons) and other pollutants in the atmosphere, leading, in many ways, to the birth of the modern environmental movement.

Having observed that global temperatures since the turn of the millennium have not gone up in the way computer-based climate models predicted, Lovelock acknowledged, “the problem is we don’t know what the climate is doing. We thought we knew 20 years ago.” Now, Lovelock has given a follow-up interview to the UK’s Guardian newspaper in which he delivers more bombshells sure to anger the global green movement, which for years worshipped his Gaia theory and apocalyptic predictions that billions would die from man-made climate change by the end of this century.

Lovelock still believes anthropogenic global warming is occurring and that mankind must lower its greenhouse gas emissions, but says it’s now clear the doomsday predictions, including his own (and Al Gore’s) were incorrect.

He responds to attacks on his revised views by noting that, unlike many climate scientists who fear a loss of government funding if they admit error, as a freelance scientist, he’s never been afraid to revise his theories in the face of new evidence. Indeed, that’s how science advances.

Among his observations to the Guardian:

(1) A long-time supporter of nuclear power as a way to lower greenhouse gas emissions, which has made him unpopular with environmentalists, Lovelock has now come out in favour of natural gas fracking (which environmentalists also oppose), as a low-polluting alternative to coal.

As Lovelock observes, “Gas is almost a give-away in the U.S. at the moment. They’ve gone for fracking in a big way. This is what makes me very cross with the greens for trying to knock it … Let’s be pragmatic and sensible and get Britain to switch everything to methane. We should be going mad on it.” (Kandeh Yumkella, co-head of a major United Nations program on sustainable energy, made similar arguments last week at a UN environmental conference in Rio de Janeiro, advocating the development of conventional and unconventional natural gas resources as a way to reduce deforestation and save millions of lives in the Third World.)

(2) Lovelock blasted greens for treating global warming like a religion.

“It just so happens that the green religion is now taking over from the Christian religion,” Lovelock observed. “I don’t think people have noticed that, but it’s got all the sort of terms that religions use … The greens use guilt. That just shows how religious greens are. You can’t win people round by saying they are guilty for putting (carbon dioxide) in the air.”

(3) Lovelock mocks the idea modern economies can be powered by wind turbines.

As he puts it, “so-called ‘sustainable development’ … is meaningless drivel … We rushed into renewable energy without any thought. The schemes are largely hopelessly inefficient and unpleasant. I personally can’t stand windmills at any price.”

(4) Finally, about claims “the science is settled” on global warming: “One thing that being a scientist has taught me is that you can never be certain about anything. You never know the truth. You can only approach it and hope to get a bit nearer to it each time. You iterate towards the truth. You don’t know it.”

NASA satellite data from the years 2000 through 2011 show the earth's atmosphere is allowing more heat to be released into space than computer models have predicted, reports a new study in the peer-reviewed science journalRemote Sensing.

OMG! Dad, you just quite possibly saved the world. Thank you(!) Whatever shall we do¿

Seriously though, if you're going to quote random things can you at least add something original to it dad?

Earth's Polar Ice Melting Less Than Thought

Better technology yields better data.

Wahr says, according to his team's estimates, about 30 percent less ice is melting than previously thought....

The team used data from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment satellite, which was launched as a joint project between NASA and Germany in 2002. The GRACE satellite measures gravity, which is related to mass, in 20 distinct regions worldwide. Wahr says that gives the team more accurate estimates, because previous teams had to measure ice loss at "a few easily accessible glaciers" and then extrapolate it to the 200,000 glaciers worldwide.

"It's tough to get an estimate [with previous methods]," he says.

With GRACE, the team can measure wide swaths of the earth, giving them a more complete picture. "It was time to do a complete global inventory," he says. Although the team used eight years of GRACE's data, Wahr says it's important to realize that melting patterns are hard to predict.

"Even with an eight-year estimate, it's not clear how far into the future you can project," he says. "A lot of people want to predict into the end of the century, but I think it's too dangerous to do that … We don't have enough info to know what'll happen. There's some ebb and flow to these things."

All I see here is the same old blah blah blah from hypocites who complain about climate change and then jump into their four+ passenger cars and drive to work all alone instead of taking the bus. If you don't want to take personal steps then stfu. You have NOTHING to say.

dadoftim....

Bwhahaha...I googled the title of your last post. love the sites...

http://www.globalclimatescam.com

http://antimisandry.com...

Buch of BS sites...

ASA’s claim that Greenland is experiencing “unprecedented” melting is nothing but a bunch of hot air, according to scientists who say the country's ice sheets melt with some regularity.

A heat dome over the icy country melted a whopping 97 percent of Greenland’s ice sheet in mid-July, NASA said, calling it yet more evidence of the effect man is having on the planet.

But the unusual-seeming event had nothing to do with hot air, according to glaciologists. It was actually to be expected.

"Ice cores from Summit station [Greenland’s coldest and highest] show that melting events of this type occur about once every 150 years on average. With the last one happening in 1889, this event is right on time," said Lora Koenig, a Goddard glaciologist and a member of the research team analyzing the satellite data.

But rather than a regular 150-year planetary cycle, the new NASA report calls the melt “unprecedented,” the result of a recent strong ridge of warm air, or a heat dome, over Greenland -- one of a series that has dominated Greenland's weather since the end of May.

'NASA should start distributing dictionaries to the authors of its press releases.'

- Patrick J. Michaels, a climatologist

"Each successive ridge has been stronger than the previous one," said Thomas Mote, a climatologist at the University of Georgia. This latest heat dome started to move over Greenland on July 8, and then parked itself over the ice sheet about three days later. By July 16, it had begun to dissipate, along with the ice, NASA said.

Climate skeptics said the NASA report itself was the only “unprecedented” item.

“NASA should start distributing dictionaries to the authors of its press releases,” joked Patrick J. Michaels, a climatologist and the author of the World Climate Report blog.

“It’s somewhat like the rush to blame severe weather and drought on global warming,” Anthony Watts, a noted climate skeptic and the author of the Watts Up With That blog, told FoxNews.com. “Yet when you look into the past, you find precedence for what is being described today as unprecedented.”

It's the latest hot water for the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, which critics say has shifted focus and priorities from space and aeronautics to the earth we live on -- and the planet's changing climate.

NASA chief cryospheric scientist H. Jay Zwally told FoxNews.com that the melting has been increasing as the temperatures in Greenland have been increasing.

“Climate in the Arctic has been warming about three to four times more than the global average, and Greenland surface temperatures (observed by satellite and surface instruments) have been increasing about 2 degrees Celsius per decade during about the last 20 years,” he said.

Zwally would be in a position to know: He was lead scientist for the ICESat project, which ran from 2003 to 2010, and used satellites to measure Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets.

“This is the most extensive area of surface melting during last 40 years of satellite observations,” he said.

It may be in line with the 150-year cycles of melting, however. Mary Albert, executive director of the NSF Ice Core Drilling office, and Kaitlin Keegan, an engineering PhD student and a fellow in Dartmouth’s polar environmental change program, are working on a paper on the Greenland ice sheet melt, a school spokeswoman told FoxNews.com.

Neither was available to describe the exact findings, but in a blog posting detailing her work, Keegan noted that several cores dating back millennia have also reflected the 150-year cycle.

“In Greenland there have been many deep ice-core drilling projects which drilled ice to the bedrock,” she wrote. “In the past 10,000 years (the Holocene), there is on average a melt layer every 150 years.”

NASA ice scientist Tom Wagner told the Associated Press researchers don't know precisely how much of Greenland's ice had melted in this latest event, but it seems to be freezing again.

“The belief that almost any aberration in weather and climate today can be attributed to global warming is pure folly,”

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2012/07/26/skeptics-put-freeze-on-nasa-hot-air-about-greenland-ice/#ixzz22z2NU0Z7

dadoftim "RARE SNOWFALL STUNS MUCH OF SOUTH AFRICA"

It's Winter in the Southern Hemisphere at this time of year.

I'm a little troubled with all this good and bad stuff about corn produced ethanol. The big advantage of bio-fuel over fossil fuel is that it does not theoretically increase the amount of carbon in our atmosphere. The carbon in gas, oil and coal products was "sequestered" by geological processes over hundreds of millions of years, even billions. The carbon from bio-fuel comes from our atmosphere as plant take it up and use it to produce cellulose and other food and fuel stuffs. The real question is whether it is efficient to use corn, switch-grass, or any other living organism to produce fuel in that growing, transporting and processing also requires fuel to accomplish and may have a net negative effect in the long run. But that has not been demonstrated to an easily understood model. But if fossil fuel is the primary culprit in Global Warming and the resultant droughts, then trashing bio-fuel projects in favor of more drilling is bass ackwards.

The CEO of Exxon is admitting that Global Warming is real...but that it can be managed.

Let's face it, humans have been little more than a virus on this planet.

Even parasites must look at us and shake their heads as we destroy our host (Earth).

Never understood those against the idea of global warming. Even if it is false, which all science indicates otherwise, how is less pollution bad?

The way I see it, you have two groups... those who believe in global warming (generally liberals), and those who do not believe (generally conservative). The liberals say we should try to pollute less, to help mitigate global warming. The conservatives argue against the idea of polluting less because they claim global warming is a "lie".

My question is: How is the idea of polluting less a bad thing?

Some say we can't make a measurable difference because of the pollution from China. So we should just pollute the f*** out of everything because someone else is doing it? We should just be lazy and dump waste everywhere because they are doing it?

Why do conservatives get such a hard-on over the idea of polluting anything and everything?

I get it... liberals believe it, so as a conservative you HAVE to be against it. No matter what it is, you have to be against everything a liberal says. But did you ever stop and thing that all they are saying is to pollute less? How is that bad?

pullmyfinger13

All I see here is the same old blah blah blah from hypocites who complain about climate change and then jump into their four+ passenger cars and drive to work all alone instead of taking the bus. If you don't want to take personal steps then stfu. You have NOTHING to say.

Speak for yourself. I commute to work every day.I have a car ( a Nissan Versa) but I only drive on weekends.

Regarding the summer in Alaska: Global warming is all about the average temperature worldwide, not regionally. If you look at the average temperatures in the northern hemisphere for the past 40 years, you will find an unprecedented increase in those temperatures.

Of course the grasslands could be bursting into flame and still people would say tha.... er... Well, the Greenland icecap could suddenly melt and still you would say... um wait. I need to think of something that hasn't already happened...

dadoftim

You seem to have a lot of climate information available - here's a thought;

35 years ago there was talk by the 'climate experts' that we should be preparing for another 'Ice Age'. Wouldn't it be ironic if all of the Carbon Dioxide that we're putting into the atmosphere is actually 'preventing' that cooling trend?

mguy: You just got to the crux of the problem.

We want to pollute less because we know pollution is bad for us.

They want to pollute more because doing so increases short term profits.

If a corporation was a person it would be locked up as a dangerous sociopath with no morals or conscience.

mguy478: (#1.54) You put it very well.

Aside from the simple reaction against "liberal elite scientists," there is a profit motive for the folks who shape conservative opinion. On the one hand, the main (if not the only) culprit in mankind's share of global warming is the burning of fossil fuels. There is enormous money behind the coal and petroleum industries, lobbying against doing anything about CO2. On the other hand, using alternative sources of energy, at least in the near-term, is going to be more expensive. So, if government doesn't subsidize it (which means you need taxes), it's going to eat into corporate profits.

One other point you might mention in all of this is that cutting pollution isn't the only beneficial side-effect we'd get from cutting our reliance on oil, in particular. Significantly, this ol' planet of ours is going to run out of oil some day. Count on it. The rosiest projections seem to be that it might not occur until our grandchildren's lifetimes, but it will occur.

Spend a moment thinking about how that will play out. In this country we will have food in the fields but not enough fuel to harvest it. In the middle east, they will still have what little oil is left, but no food. Will the oil-producing nations put that oil in tankers and send it to us to harvest the crops?

Or will they put it in their air force jets to come here and take them? Will we have fuel for our air force? We simply have to find economical replacements for oil (and eventually for coal as well) and who's to say that it's fine to wait a few more years before we start really trying?

mark-1751582===Man your sick as can be. When you think about this mess a little more you should consider sending Obama along with the many Democrats that are in the wrong profession. Besides this is a world wide problem like it has been for ages. Mother Nature runs this planet not humans. It might be hot this Summer and cold as hell come Winter. Records have been broken in each direction leaving scientist guessing like WTF.

Getting back to the corn crops, the United States uses close to 40% of all corn grown in this country for ethanol. Now that we are in a drought you have to think about just how is getting the corn. We are stuck with the high prices for fuel of any kind. Feed the people and the livestock damn the ethanol production because most of that is shipped out of the country.

Aside from the simple reaction against "liberal elite scientists," there is a profit motive for the folks who shape conservative opinion.

And you think there is not a huge profit motive for the Chicken Little's involved in this hype. If you don't see that, I have some nice farmland in the Sahara I could sell you!

All this talk about man caused global warming is a bunch of crap. All the talk was global warming for several years until it was proved that although we did reach new heights in temperatures in some places, we also reached new lows in others. Then they tried to change it to climate change. Well I have news for you. The earth has been much hotter and much colder during its history and we have nothing to do with it. The climate changes regardless of what we do or don't do. I beleive God is in charge. He created this earth and it will be around until he decides to destroy it. How close do you think we are?

35 years ago there was talk by the 'climate experts' that we should be preparing for another 'Ice Age'. Wouldn't it be ironic if all of the Carbon Dioxide that we're putting into the atmosphere is actually 'preventing' that cooling trend?

No, the irony is that these are the same scientists (generically) that made those claims. And for the same reasons - they don't actually understand climate, weather, etc. You should put as much stock in their predictions of what will happen a decade from now as I put in their predictions of the weather next Tuesday. NONE.

The biggest problem I think is that the government hires all these scientists to solve our problems. Well the problem is the scientists know that if they solve the problems then they do not have a job anymore. You go out and hire someone and tell them that you are going to higher them and pay them until they solve a certain problem. When do you think the problem will be solved?

rgmoon, nobody thinks we are going to run out of problems, and most scientists have a great deal of integrity.

" I beleive God is in charge."

Well, there's your problem right there. Nobody is in charge.

dadoftim, I feel bad for Tim. Since you're hellbent on destroying the environment since you don't think global warming exists, what a shame it will be when Tim lives in an industrial wasteland. I hope people like you are dead and gone before you become greatgrandadoftimjr and totally destroy this place.

Dr. Larry, you're ducking the point. Some other day we can debate whether the community of scientists as a whole has a profit motive or, on the contrary, engages in legitimate scientific inquiry.

The point I was making was that there is a plain profit motive that explains why non-scientists spend so much effort making scientific claims about global warming.

All of that being what it is, if I were forced to bet, I'd put my money on the scientific community getting the answers right.

The other point of my post, which you completely ignored, is that there are significant, inescapable reasons why we must move away from fossil fuels, whether we like it or not.

@ROY WILSON-336103: Your argument that we shouldn't do anything about global warming until the Chinese do is idiotic. Is it okay to steal just because others are doing it? Should we avoid using a new technology until another country adopts it? It's also stupid to say, "well, as just one person, my actions won't make a difference, so why should I bother?" A small effort is better than none. And by the way, China is erecting solar panels and wind turbines like crazy. They are also building more energy-efficient homes and businesses. Their exploding demand for electricity is a huge problem, but at least they take global warming seriously.

Smokie-

Hi smokie. I'm a friend of marks. Just got back from a dive and got a seal. Tasty, but still hungry. Just wanted to know. I'm really curious. Do you smell or taste like smoked salmon? If by chance you do, why not come up to the pole for a visit, and possibly brunch. Be sure to bring any republican friends with you.

the prior record was in 1936 at 77.2 degrees. Wow I bet those model T's really helped polute the earth.

Now almost 70 years later, we beat it by .2 degrees...Shut down the presses. We need to cut back on model T's and have them do emission testing. fukin tree huggers.....The earth is not in an ICE age..

I am not in denial. I don't believe. in global warming. The hottest temps on record are in the late 1800's go figure. Keep buying bottled water and driving the roads

IDIOTS....

Boffer goes bonko. I bet boffer never read a book, too.

My point I guess was that we could have days in the 90s here all during January here in the north east for 10 years in a row and you people would still be denying it. So, I'm not expecting to convince you otherwise. If I didn't have kids I would find it very amusing that someday your quality of life will deteriorate because of it and still you will deny it. But my kids and their children are going to have a very hard time of it and yes, it will be the fault and failure of this generation. All so Exxon, BP and others like them could become fabulously wealthy corporations.

I am not trying to monger fear. Just expressing regret that the big corporations have pulled the wool over so many peoples eyes. I hope we are wrong, but I really don't think so.

Since none of the deniers seem to listen, let me reiterate: hotter temperatures more often are a sign of warming; climate change includes weirdness like higher or lower rainfall, and possibly lower temperatures locally.

Now, the big question is what do we do about it? I frankly think it's hopeless. We should just be making efforts at prediction and mitigation. Even if everybody believed it was happening (maybe they will in 20-30 years), there's really nothing practical we can do. We can't stop GHG emissions. It's just not possible. Be realistic. All we can do it work toward an attainable goal: like maintaining CO2 below 500ppm, or something like that, and planning for the consequences. Depressing, eh?

Well, coming from a person who actually walks the walk, I think I have some standing to say what I say...I am electric neutral at my house with a grid-connected solar PV system that generated 100% of what I use; and my company buys it's plastic parts from an outfit right here in New York that gets its power from that wind turbine in my photo there.

What are YOU doing to help? Bitching here isn't.

There's a been a bill recently introduced in Congress to legalize industrial hemp. The ratio of power into production versus power generated, for hempseed oil is 1/3. After that you can still use the rest of the the plant for ethanol, paper, blue jeans, and rope. Hemp not only grows on land that is unsuitable for food crops, it conditions the soil and puts nutrients into it so that food crops need less fertilizer. When hemp is grown in rotation with corn, the corn costs less to grow.

The constant dumping of 90 million tons of heat-trapping emissions into the Earth's thin shell of atmosphere every 24 hours. Twenty percent of the global warming pollution we spew into the sky each day will still be there 20,000 years from now!

The Polluters and Ideologues are financing pseudoscientists whose job is to manufacture doubt about what is true and what is false; buying elected officials wholesale with bribes that the politicians themselves have made "legal" and can now be made in secret; spending hundreds of millions of dollars each year on misleading advertisements in the mass media; hiring four anticlimate lobbyists for every member of the U.S. Senate and House of Representatives. the tobacco industry hired actors, dressed them up as doctors, and paid them to look into television cameras and tell people that the linkage revealed in the Surgeon General's Report was not real at all. The show went on for decades, with more Americans killed each year by smoking than U.S. soldiers killed in all of World War II. This time, the scientific consensus is even stronger. It has been endorsed by every National Academy of science of every major country on the planet, every major professional scientific society related to the study of global warming and 98 percent of climate scientists throughout the world. In the latest and most authoritative study by 3,000 of the very best scientific experts in the world, the evidence was judged "unequivocal."

The ART OF THE SCRIPT FOR THIS SHOW WAS LEAKED to The New York Times as early as 1991. In an internal document, a consortium of the largest global warming polluters spelled out their principal strategy: "Reposition global warming as theory, rather than fact." Ever since, they have been sowing doubt even more effectively than the tobacco companies before them. To sell their false narrative, the Polluters and Ideologues have found it essential to undermine the public's respect for Science and Reason by attacking the integrity of the climate scientists. That is why the scientists are regularly accused of falsifying evidence and exaggerating its implications in a greedy effort to win more research grants, or secretly pursuing a hidden political agenda to expand the power of government.

Such slanderous insults are deeply ironic: extremist ideologues - many financed or employed by carbon polluters - accusing scientists of being greedy extremist ideologues.

Any one who denies global warming IS A LIAR!

boffer,

If you're trying to convince people there is no global warming, stop posting. You're only making it obvious how ignorant the argument against global warming is.

Just a very quick word about the tragedy of the commons. I see a lot of people say "why shouldn't we burn the oil, because if we don't, China will burn it anyway?"

Friends, AGW models may not be proved beyond all doubt, but they do present the most-likely scenario, and in that scenario the US will experience more frequent, more widespread, and more persistent drought, right at a time when we're counting on robust agricultural exports to bolster our unstable economy. Meanwhile, the strength of the Chinese economy is cheap labor. We have a lot more to lose than the Chinese, so must "lead from behind".

This will cost us, but we'd rather be a nation of farmers than a nation of slaves.

boffer, are you really that superficial in your analysis? If an event happened once in 1936 and not again until 2012, and that was all there was to it, sure, we might think nothing of it.

But what if, in 2012 and thereabouts, it was happening over and over and over again, and trending worse, and those things weren't true in 1936?

Different?

Did you really not think of that, not at all?

When its 70 for the whole months of December, and January, I might consider it. Remember every 8 seconds, someone is born, every 10 seconds, someone dies. Could it be over population?? Of course. Should be a limit in how many kids one should have. But that would cause an uproar. So deal with it. You aren't going to stop climate change..It is what it is...

Boffer, so in post 1.70 you say there is no global warming, then in 1.79 you state that we can't stop climate change.

You're just making this up as you go aren't you?

Yeah, enter the deniers in three... two... one...

The President of Exxon-Mobil is no longer a denier. Kind of speaks volumes, doesn't it?

Charlie,

You beat me to it. I remember Rush saying his experts are predicting global cooling.

Jeff is in denial, obviously.

New Ice Age???? What planet are you on? As the ice in the poles is melting, the "New Ice Age" will be a warm one.

Headlines read "Hottest Month on Record".... video is from blaze set by ARSONIST in Oklahoma.... plenty of factual reporting here at NBC............

There will be another ice age in the Earth's future, you can count on it.

And your post, Jeff, brands you as a complete moron. If you continue to require that science gives us absolute answers, you might as well go read the Bubble and finish your lobotomy.

Yep Rush will set you straight and Inhofe will make sure this Global Warming scam cools down soon. *wink*

Global Warming isn't "junk science".

It merely BECOMES "junk science" once people begin using a single data point as definitive "proof" to prove/deny the existence of some phenomenon they and their political affiliations wish to believe is true - such as the case here right now.

Phrenology. Look at Eugenics...

Neither are sciences so don't be confusing them with REAL science like Climatology. Try again.

Jeff,

Really??? can you even grasp how ridiculous that sounds?

According to your logic, the computer you are typing on and the monitor you are looking at don't really exist because they are based on technology and knowledge that was obtained through research conducted by scientists.... Those crazy scientist that once thought phrenology was a valid theory.... therefor the keyboard and monitor don't exist.

That is the basic logic of your argument.

AGW or not CO2 is only one element to climate change. But people like simple and easy to measure, so people jump on the band wagon and feel virtuous and pleased with themselves.

Meanwhile too many people concentrated in an uneven patchwork will devolve into more war and environment degradation. As total population rises there will be little fresh water that isn't being diverted to agriculture or cities where it will evaporate into the air or trickle into the ocean. Forests are being cut down some places and replanted elsewhere. Top level food chain of the ocean has been severely thinned and the tiny stuff is proliferating causing changes in ocean chemistry. Of course climate patterns are going to change, and thinking CO2 control is going to fix everything is to be in denial.

Not only are we in the warmest 12 month period of record, the top six hottest years were in the last decade.

Something is going on and global warming science makes sense.

Remember the "There's no such thing as acid rain" and "Cigarettes don't cause cancer" Deniers?? The Heartland papers revealed that big industry is behind all the denying. Big surprise....

Hey Jeff1570172 (bad jeff ha). What your saying is called a FALSE EQUIVALENCY. Your comparing Phrenology and Eugenics to Climate change science. What is the consequence of English and Americans in the 19th century being interested in Phrenology?? Who died over that? and that was before the scientific method was fully developed. Thats like saying police are useless today because they used to be very corrupt in 1900. hmmm. And Eugenics.. was cooped by the nazis but again.. what is the consequence of eugenics really? The end of human life on the planet?? No. The nazis could be stopped in any number of scenarios.. The sun is a tad more powerful than the nazis. Besides that.. those two things werent nearly universally agreed upon.. the consequences of not taking climate change seriously are much more serious than whether or not scientists of the 18 hundreds had conversations about what parts of the human brain relates to various states of being. What if the scientists are right jeff? Oh ya.. its doesnt matter to you because you have food water and airconditioning.

I need more proof- RWNJ

"An active storm pattern in the Southwest contributed to California having its fifth wettest July on record and Nevada having its eighth wettest, NOAA said. Wetter-than-average conditions were also observed through the rest of the Southwest, along the western Gulf Coast, and through the Ohio Valley where West Virginia had its tenth wettest July."

Hot, wet, whatever.... come this winter we'll see RECORD SNOW STORM due to GLOBAL WARMING.......

Climate is not something MAN has control over.... it's called WEATHER... man has NEVER been able to control the weather.....

When science becomes driven by an agenda, it loses credibility.

Kornfed, when agenda drives science it loses credibility, not the other way around. Use your brain.

Damn scientists always trying to use edumacation to make money for those evil alternative energy people who are like arch villains in James Bond movies. We shouldn't be listening to 98% of climate scientists, Richard Muller, NASA scientists and studies performed by many accredited universities... we should be listening to the CEOs of Exxon, Chevron, BP, Shell, Koch bros, Rush Limbaugh, Bill Orielly, Ann Coulter, Glenn Beck and ANY faux news anchor because, clearly, they know more about science and climatology then these so called scientists and have absolutely NO vested interest in keeping the status quo because they are truly paragons of caring and philanthropy.

Booooooooooooooooooooooo!!!!! to all you scientists keep your math "magic", scientific method and process to you selves. We want to live in COMPLETE denial.

Kornfed, when agenda drives science it loses credibility, not the other way around. Use your brain

What ever you say homer hehe

Yesterday it snowed in Johannesburg South Africa so according to the same science the earth is headed to an ice age. Funny how a normal cyclic weather pattern all of a sudden becomes proof of something else...

This year in on track to be the hottest recorded worldwide. Last year was the 6th hottest. The top 6 hottest were in the last decade.

See a pattern?

What ever you say homer hehe

Do you think you're insulting me? :D lol

Oh ya.. its doesnt matter to you because you have food water and airconditioning.

There are millions of people who live in or near the desert, Africa especially. They haven't had a hard time surviving for the last few thousand years have they?

Humans do better in warmer climates, it's the cold spells you need to worry about.

@Sanescience

The problem is we keep littering the environment with garbage and you see nothing wrong with it?

Oh, it's political now. Let's not clean up your house and see how that look, now you have a whole world with everyone just doing whatever they want and there is no problem, right?

What kind of logic is this?

Yesterday it snowed in Johannesburg South Africa so according to the same science the earth is headed to an ice age. Funny how a normal cyclic weather pattern all of a sudden becomes proof of something else...

Yes because we all know the GLOBE (Earth) consists only of Johannesburg South Africa in the winter... *rollseyes* Even my 5 year old can see the error in that logic.

Jeff-1592116 is hilarious.

Somebody please agree or compliment Jeffrey.

Because he is doing the beleagured and belittled 'right wing luddite/denier polka' for all of us to enjoy and we're ignoring him like he's just another typical angry old white conservative guy.

Phrenology and Eugenics? I'm surprised you didn't mention the theory that the world was flat and the sun revolved around the earth. Point is that none of them were based on fact....just theories.

Jeff, have you ever asked yourself why the new ice age prediction was wrong? What has happened since the 70's? I'm not going to debate the issue because there would not be any winner but the number of people living in the 70's using energy is not anywhere near the number of people today. Not just here in the U.S. but all over the world. The world population have doubled since 1970 and the amount of fossil fuel burned since 1970 is astronomical. There are other factors but they too are debatable. The fact is the high temperature records are being broken every year or so where in the 70's it was the low temperatures that were being broken. The weather patterns are changing from the norm so instead of hiding our heads in the sand hoping it will go away we should be looking for ways to stop the changes in our weather before it's too late. If it isn't already too late.

Btw Charlie your post brands you as a 12 year old.

And what does that statement say about you?

Just like you are not insulting me Jeff...lol lol

No, you need no help in that department. :D

Yes because we all know the GLOBE (Earth) consists only of Johannesburg South Africa in the winter... *rollseyes* Even my 5 year old can see the error in that logic

... and now you are attempting to insult others Jeff. Oh the shame of a hypocrite

Somebody give Lloyd Braun the hand job he is looking for. He is pulling the typical Liberal stroke my ego, my thoughts mean more than anyone else macarena. EYY!

The problem is we keep littering the environment with garbage and you see nothing wrong with it?

They don't care. They honestly don't. It's the same mentality it takes to throw cigarette butts out the car window or garbage for that matter. They just don't care.

When science becomes driven by an agenda, it loses credibility.

Kornfed, when agenda drives science it loses credibility, not the other way around. Use your brain

What's ignorant is that Jeff and Kornfed said the same thing in a different way and are arguing about it.

agenda drives science....science becomes driven by an agenda....It's the same damn things.

There will be another ice age in the Earth's future, you can count on it.

Just by then everyone will be long gone.

They had a inch and a half of rain in the worst hit areas and now some are claiming the drought's over. The article said 63 percent, not 100 percent so CA getting rain is meaningless.

This article states it pretty well I think. :)

Conservatives Still Trying To Dispute Global Temperature Trend

Conservative media are attempting to use a new paper by climate contrarian Anthony Watts to question the reliability of global temperature records. But the paper, which has not been peer-reviewed, only addresses surface temperature records in the continental U.S., which have been confirmed by satellite data.

Conservative Media Falsely Claim Study Undermines Global Temperature Record

Fox: Watts' Results "Show The Planet Warming" At About Half The Rate "Cited By The Government." In a press release posted on his blog, former television meteorologist Anthony Watts claims that his analysis shows that "reported 1979-2008 U.S. temperature trends are spuriously doubled" as a result of poor site selection for temperature stations and adjustments made by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration to correct for errors in the temperature data. FoxNews.com claimed that the paper raises questions about global temperature records:

Watts cherry-picked the well-sited stations and reanalyzed their data; his results show the planet warming at just 0.155 degrees Celsius per decade, rather than the 0.309 C per decade cited by the government.

The article has been significantly revised from an earlier version that claimed the study "calls into question just how hot our planet is getting," without noting the correction. FoxNews.com promoted the article on its front page with the following headline:

Other Media Outlets Suggested That Watts' Paper Casts Doubt On Global Temperature Data.

• Politico: Watts' Paper Concluded "Researchers Have Nearly Doubled The Actual Effects Of Global Warming." [Politico's Morning Energy email, 7/30/12]
• Human Events Suggests Study "Debunk[s]" Global Warming. [Human Events, 7/30/12]
• Breitbart: Watts' Paper "Crushes Global Warming Data Claims." [Breitbart.com, 7/30/12]

Scientist: Watts' Data Only Concerns The Continental U.S. "Which Is Approximately 2% Of Global Surface Area." Scott Mandia, Professor of Earth and Space Sciences at Suffolk Community College and co-founder of the Climate Science Rapid Response Team, stated: "Fox News is incorrect. Watts' data is for the 48 continental US states which is approximately 2% of global surface area. His analysis cannot be used to speak to global climate change." [Email to Media Matters, 7/31/12]

Satellite Data Confirm Warming Trend Globally And In The U.S. Professor Mandia further noted that "The rate of warming measured in the US is in line with satellite inferred trends and satellites do not have thermometers nor are they 'poorly sited.'" The following graph created with 2010 data provided by NOAA shows that surface temperatures for the continental U.S. (red and blue bars) closely track two methods of analyzing satellite temperatures (yellow and teal lines):

Dr. Carl Mears, senior scientist at Remote Sensing Systems, said last year that globally "both the overall amount of warming and the spatial patterns of warming in the surface datasets are in general agreement with satellite measurements of atmospheric temperature." The following graph shows that global temperatures measured by satellite data also closely tracks surface temperatures:

FoxNews.com: "Many Skeptics Take Issue With What They Call Systematic Data Manipulation Hidden From Their View." FoxNews.com claimed that the peer-reviewed adjustments that NOAA applies to correct for known problems in the data, such as the urban heat island effect, is "hidden from" skeptics:

Many skeptics take issue with what they call systemic data manipulation hidden from their view. For example, climate blogger Steve Goddard told FoxNews.com that "adjustments" made in the past to climate data have merely conflated the problem Watts uncovered. [FoxNews.com, 7/30/12]

NOAA Uses Openly Peer-Reviewed Methods To Correct Data. NOAA explained the peer-reviewed science behind their data adjustments:

The observations come from the U.S. Historical Climatology Network (USHCN), a network of 1221 climate observing stations in the continental United States. These data are extensively quality controlled for errors and for small biases that may have occurred through time due to artificial changes at each observing station. These artificial changes include station relocations, different instrumentation, and changes in the landscape surrounding the station (e.g. urbanization, removal or planting of vegetation, etc.).

[...]

Methods that have been used to correct temperature data are described in more than a dozen peer-reviewed scientific papers by NOAA's National Climatic Data Center (NCDC). A series of data corrections was developed to specifically address potential problems in trend estimation of the rates of warming or cooling in the USHCN. They include:

1. Station moves and instrumentation changes (Karl and Williams 1987, Quayle et al. 1991),

2. changes in observing practices, such as observing time changes (Karl et al. 1986), and

3. urbanization (Karl et al. 1988). [NOAA, 10/20/09]

WaPo: "Watts' Failure To Make Certain Adjustments To The Raw Data ... Is A Serious Flaw." The Washington Post's Capital Weather Gang noted that Watts failed to apply needed adjustments to the data:

Watts' failure to make certain adjustments to the raw data, as NOAA has done, is a serious flaw knowledgeable bloggers say. Specifically, Watts did not apply a time of observation bias correction according to Howard University chemistry professor Josh Halpern, who blogs under the pseudonym Eli Rabett. McIntyre also pointed out this problem: "There is a confounding interaction with TOBS [time of observation] that needs to be allowed for, as has been quickly and correctly pointed out." [Washington Post, 7/31/12]

When Subjected To Peer-Review, Previous Station Siting Concerns Have Proven Unfounded

Lack Of Peer-Review Casts Doubt On Credibility Of Watts' Paper. The Washington Post's Capital Weather Gang noted that Watts' paper has not yet been peer-reviewed by scientists and explained why that casts doubt on the credibility of the paper:

Science blogger David Appell had it exactly right when he said the Watts paper is "exactly the kind of paper that most needs peer review: based on a lot of judgements and classifications and nitty gritty details...."

Furthermore, given the serious accusations Watts et al. make about the integrity of NOAA's temperature analysis, it's critical NOAA be given the opportunity to respond just as they did the last time Watts issued such a challenge in 2009. NOAA's U.S. temperature record has been painstakingly constructed by many scientists over many years and many peer-reviewed publications support its methodologies. [Washington Post, 7/30/12]

A Peer-Reviewed Study Found "No Evidence" That Temperature Trends Are "Inflated Due To Poor Station Siting." A 2010 peer-reviewed study by NOAA scientists and published in the Journal of Geophysical Research addressed photographs promoted by Watts of temperature stations sited near heat sources and found "no evidence" that the temperature trends "are inflated due to poor station siting." Peter Thorne of NOAA's National Climatic Data Center referenced the study, and told the New York Times' Andrew Revkin that "if anything, we are under-estimating the real world warming trends for the contiguous United States." [Journal of Geophysical Research, 6/8/10] [New York Times, 7/30/12]

Watts' Previous Study Found That Station Siting Isn't Exaggerating The Warming Trend. In a May 2011 analysis published in the Journal of Geophysical Research, Watts and his co-authors stated that the overall temperature trends from properly placed stations are "nearly identical" to those from poorly placed stations. Watts now claims that the site rating method used in the paper was "incomplete." From the 2011 study co-authored by Watts:

Temperature trend estimates vary according to site classification, with poor siting leading to an overestimate of minimum temperature trends and an underestimate of maximum temperature trends, resulting in particular in a substantial difference in estimates of the diurnal temperature range trends. The opposite-signed differences of maximum and minimum temperature trends are similar in magnitude, so that the overall mean temperature trends are nearly identical across site classifications. [Journal of Geophysical Research, 5/3/11] [Watts Up With That?, 7/29/12]

http://mediamatters.org/research/2012/07/31/conservatives-still-trying-to-dispute-global-te/189034

agenda drives science....science becomes driven by an agenda....It's the same damn thing dumb asses.

Science should drive agenda because it's the facts to base agenda on. Agenda such as Conservatism or Liberalism should NEVER drive science because it dilutes, impairs, distorts or hides facts to go along with an agenda.

IF you don't understand the difference then you should be careful who YOU call a dumbass. :)

Hey I have an idea, hold on now its really out there, instead of all the your right or wrong and name calling why don't we just accept the fact that global warming and climate change aside we are still screwing up our planet and having a major negative effect that will be felt by future generations. So why not just start embracing sustainability, energy efficiency, and alternate energy methods with meaningful investment and implementation instead of the fighting? To me it would appear to be a win win situation, and no it doesn't mean say good bye to FF overnight. Take the political BS out of it, along with those who have other motives and interests and see it for yourself. We have got to be better keepers of our planet or we are all screwed. Or I suppose we can just keep fighting and letting ignorance win out. Ever see that South Park episode where people from the future are coming back to the present because the future sucks since we screwed it up now? To change the future they end up with the choice to do something meaningful or choose the gay pile? Right now it would appear we have a large contingent who are bent on going to the gay pile regardless of anything. Why not go with the others who are trying to do something meaningful?

It is time

CuongDNguyen

The problem is we keep littering the environment with garbage and you see nothing wrong with it?

Oh, it's political now. Let's not clean up your house and see how that look, now you have a whole world with everyone just doing whatever they want and there is no problem, right?

What kind of logic is this?

I'm not sure what your replying to, but everyone just doing whatever they want is anarchy. We don't quite have that. But as long as politics and interest groups treat climate change like a marketing campaign where CO2 is the "star" we are setting ourselves up to miss the big picture.

Simple fact is, humanity is GREAT at hindsight, not so much at foresight. I have no doubt that we are leaving a footprint on Earth, with all the trash, pollution and everything else we do as we strip the resources from her. How much of an impact? Only time will tell, I just hope we don't reach a tipping point. The Earth is changing, she always will, that doesn't mean we get to close our eyes to what we are doing to it and pretend her continuous changes are the ONLY reason.

Kornfed

The fact is the high temperature records are being broken every year or so where in the 70's it was the low temperatures that were being broken

1930's were before 1970. How do explain that period of high temps?

I believe my statement was to Jeff who was pointing out the prediction was about a coming ice age in the 70's. In either case the temperatures in the 30's weren't as hot as today or temperatures would not be broken now. You know...July is hottest month on record in the headlines.

@ Jeff

If you check my post you'll see that I edited the dumb ass part because it was a bit too crude but I believe you still fail to see that both statements mean the same thing. Maybe an English course is in order. I don't care whether science drives an agenda or an agenda drives science. It's the statement you both made that I commented on.

Hotest July ever in the US, what about the rest of the planet? Oh snap!

Yes, snap. What about the rest of the planet:

From http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2012/06/120618152733.htm :-

The globally-averaged temperature for May 2012 marked the second warmest May since record keeping began in 1880. May 2012 also marks the 36^th consecutive May and 327^th consecutive month with a global temperature above the 20^th century average.

There you go. That's what is happening to the rest of the planet.

That doesn't jive with the propoganda they want spoon fed to the gullible.

Yes, science is all propaganda. Don't believe anything they tell you! Temperature measurements are all false! It's a conspiracy by Al Gore in collusion with thermometer manufacturers to worry people so much everyone buys their own thermometer!

Umm, Bobby? You're basically saying, "People like a warm day, so a warming planet is good."? I like warm weather, myself, but it poses a tad of a problem when it results in droughts where there used to be rain, and floods where there used to be dry land.

Oh, and your comment that people in Africa haven't had a hard time surviving for the last few thousand years... might want to check with those folks about the fun of living in a desert. If it weren't for oil in a lot of those countries, they wouldn't have jack crap to build an economy with.

When I was in college in the 70's man was destroying the environment and according to the scientists of the time, we're in a new ice age now. 100% wrong then, yet people still believe.

Yes, they did not anticipate globalization and the effect mankind would have with increasing emissions. So what's your point?

Maybe an English course is in order.

No, just my ignore list. :)

Charlie....one way to let everyone know you are not qualified to have an opinion, not that matters here, is to confuse local weather patterns with climate.

Here is a short article you can read about similar droughts dating back to the early 1700's.

http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/ybd01

Bobby - just read your posts that sullyness pointed out, now I try not to go after others on here to often, and as you can tell, I'm trying to look at the bigger picture with the whole climate debate, but really? Reading your post and the reasoning contained there in just gave me a headache. (shaking head)

Lyrica..."Simple fact is, humanity is GREAT at hindsight,..."

Oh really. Pompeii was destroyed more than once by Mt. Vesuvius. Right across the bay from Pompeii, on the very foot of Mt. Vesuvius, is Naples, Italy. Population 1.3 million.

What was that you were saying about hindsight?

Oh really. Pompeii was destroyed more than once by Mt. Vesuvius. Right across the bay from Pompeii, on the very foot of Mt. Vesuvius, is Naples, Italy. Population 1.3 million.

You do realize that Pompeii was lost to history for almost two thousand years before being rediscovered. It was only considered a myth up to that point.

Hindsight only works when there's something to base it off of.

This year in on track to be the hottest recorded worldwide. Last year was the 6th hottest. The top 6 hottest were in the last decade.

See a pattern?

150 years of research on a planet that is billions of years old? You see a pattern?

Another inconvenient truth for warmists. New research suggests that the co2 level of the atmosphere was a lot higher during the Medieval Warm Period than today.

http://denialdepot.blogspot.com/2009/04/co2-levels-may-have-been-over-2000ppm.html

I don't deny we are warming, I deny the fact we can do anything about it!

Kornfed @ 2.17

When science becomes driven by an agenda, it loses credibility.

Jeff @2.24

Kornfed, when agenda drives science it loses credibility, not the other way around. Use your brain

You guys are saying the same thing, then fighting about it. Kind of reminds me of Abbott and Costello

2012's July was 77.6 as stated by this article. I think we can relax, its happened before...even before man had the chance to spew a great deal of C02 into the air. The agenda just hypes it up as they always do.

I knew someone would say this. AVERAGE temperature. Do you get what that means? It means across the US BOTH day and night, the average temperature, EVERYWHERE INCLUDED was 77.6 which is...and here is the really important take away.... 3.3 degrees above the ENTIRE average of the 20th Century.

That's the meaningful part. 3.3 degrees ABOVE THE AVERAGE FOR THE ENTIRE 20TH CENTURY.

Why is that important? Because in the last 25 years of the 20th Century the average temperature went up every year. They were OVERALL the hottest 25 years on record for... drum roll... the entire planet. You can google this yourself. It's out there in a million different forms.

150 years of research on a planet that is billions of years old? You see a pattern?

This:

How Do We Investigate Climates of the Past?

In order to understand climate and make educated future predictions, we need to understand how and why climate has changed throughout Earth history. Earth's climate has undergone a myriad of changes during the 4.6 billion years of Earth history. This week, we will focus on how scientists figure out how climate has changed through time.

Past climates can be grouped into three timeframes according to the types of data that are used to reconstruct climate conditions.

• The Instrumental Records "Era" - The period (the past 140 years approximately) when we have relatively precise, quantitative, direct measures of climate such as temperature, precipitation, and wind speeds.
• The Historical Records "Era" - Accounts of weather and climate span almost the entire period of recorded human history. Historical records include written accounts of droughts, floods, especially frigid winters, unusually hot summers, and storms as well as timing and quality of harvests and timing of seasonal changes. Such accounts lack the numerical precision of modern instrumental records, but span a much longer period of time. Historical records overlap with the timeframe of the "Instrumental Records Era".
• The Prehistoric "Era" of Paleoclimatology - also overlaps with the two more modern "eras", while plumbing the depths of the geologic history of Earth. Various types of data provide paleoclimatologists with information about the climates of ancient times. These types of data are called proxies. Tree rings, ice cores from Greenland and Antarctica, sediments from the bottoms of lakes and seas, and many other natural proxy records of climatic conditions help us piece together the story of Earth's climates before the time of recorded human history.

http://www.windows2universe.org/earth/climate/CDcourses_investigate_climate.html

That explains some for you.

Another inconvenient truth for warmists. New research suggests that the co2 level of the atmosphere was a lot higher during the Medieval Warm Period than today.

Ah, warmists. I can see where this is going but here. :) First of you do understand the difference between may have been and were right? In other words your link does not prove anything, it makes a hypothesis and does not prove it to be factual.

The link also makes statements which are not true.

This modern measurement period began warmists started measuring co2 at Mauna Loa in Hawaii.

That's false.

Sorry but quoting a blog that does not use any peer-reviewed data, just ad hom attacks and innuendo does nothing to help your case. Rather it makes you look bad.

I don't deny we are warming, I deny the fact we can do anything about it!

That would be right when people cannot accept the reason it's happening. People are not going to give up their life styles but to keep adding fuel to the fire is not the way to put out a fire. Not to worry though...nature will take care of the problem when the time comes and if there is one fact that cannot be denied...man cannot win a fight with nature.

1970's - look out a NEW Ice Age is coming!! oh no oh no oh no!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Oddly enough there was one study done in the 70s which suggested the possibility of an ice age, it was picked up by Newsweek and Times which ran the article and that's pretty much it. It was then soundly put to bed in the early 80s which facts started coming in that Global Temps were rising, not falling.

So if you wish to run with that pathetic strawman by all means do. :)

Better yet here's an example of a similar argument and rebuttal to it.

The vast majority of climate papers in the 1970s predicted warming.

In the thirty years leading up to the 1970s, available temperature recordings suggested that there was a cooling trend. As a result some scientists suggested that the current inter-glacial period could rapidly draw to a close, which might result in the Earth plunging into a new ice age over the next few centuries. This idea could have been reinforced by the knowledge that the smog that climatologists call ‘aerosols’ – emitted by human activities into the atmosphere – also caused cooling. In fact, as temperature recording has improved in coverage, it’s become apparent that the cooling trend was most pronounced in northern land areas and that global temperature trends were in fact relatively steady during the period prior to 1970.

At the same time as some scientists were suggesting we might be facing another ice age, a greater number published contradicting studies. Their papers showed that the growing amount of greenhouse gasses that humans were putting into the atmosphere would cause much greater warming – warming that would a much greater influence on global temperature than any possible natural or human-caused cooling effects.

By 1980 the predictions about ice ages had ceased, due to the overwhelming evidence contained in an increasing number of reports that warned of global warming. Unfortunately, the small number of predictions of an ice age appeared to be much more interesting than those of global warming, so it was those sensational 'Ice Age' stories in the press that so many people tend to remember.

http://www.skepticalscience.com/ice-age-predictions-in-1970s.htm

You guys are saying the same thing, then fighting about it. Kind of reminds me of Abbott and Costello

There is a distinction Brian on which way to put it. I certainly understood what Jeff was getting at, but we disagree about which way it should be put...Him telling me to get a new brain suggests his Liberal frustration at my valid point. Science driving an agenda suggests that the agenda was driven by the findings of scientific discovery, while I think that the focusing on one factor, out of a countless number of possible factors, is agenda driven, when pertaining to man's contribution to the warming climate.

"People like a warm day, so a warming planet is good."? I like warm weather, myself, but it poses a tad of a problem when it results in droughts where there used to be rain, and floods where there used to be dry land.

Warmer weather will mean more rain. (more water evaporates which returns to earth) Parts of the U.S. are having a drought because of the La Nina effect we are currently under.

As far as humans doing better in warmer climates, that is 100% fact and using Africa as an example of how humans survive in warm weather is just that an example. People would have to be completely clueless about the the weather patterns on Earth to assume the entire planet would be a desert.

Life originated from the desert regions, not from the poles or the 45th parallel.

Warmer weather will mean more rain. (more water evaporates which returns to earth) Parts of the U.S. are having a drought because of the La Nina effect we are currently under.

This is true. The drought can be summed up by Dave Mathew's song "Funny the way it is" ...contrasting ones misfortune to another's fortune. In other words, there is flooding going on someplace else on this earth. One trend begets another.

Sorry but quoting a blog that does not use any peer-reviewed data, just ad hom attacks and innuendo does nothing to help your case. Rather it makes you look bad.

The "blog" has links to where it got it's information like "180 Years of atmospheric CO2 Gas Analysis by Chemical Methods, published in the prestigous Journal "Energy and Environment" by Dr Ernst-Georg Beck."

or this little story..

Years of bad data corrected; 1998 no longer the warmest year on record

My earlier column this week detailed the work of a volunteer team to assess problems with US temperature data used for climate modeling. One of these people is Steve McIntyre, who operates the site climateaudit.org. While inspecting historical temperature graphs, he noticed a strange discontinuity, or "jump" in many locations, all occurring around the time of January, 2000.

These graphs were created by NASA's Reto Ruedy and James Hansen (who shot to fame when he accused the administration of trying to censor his views on climate change). Hansen refused to provide McKintyre with the algorithm used to generate graph data, so McKintyre reverse-engineered it. The result appeared to be a Y2K bug in the handling of the raw data.

McKintyre notified the pair of the bug; Ruedy replied and acknowledged the problem as an "oversight" that would be fixed in the next data refresh.

NASA has now silently released corrected figures, and the changes are truly astounding. The warmest year on record is now 1934. 1998 (long trumpeted by the media as record-breaking) moves to second place. 1921 takes third. In fact, 5 of the 10 warmest years on record nowall occur before World War II. Anthony Watts has put the new data in chart form, along with a more detailed summary of the events.

The effect of the correction on global temperatures is minor (some 1-2% less warming than originally thought), but the effect on the U.S. global warming propaganda machine could be huge.

Then again -- maybe not. I strongly suspect this story will receive little to no attention from the mainstream media.

Listen, I'm not going to swap articles with you back and fourth, MY POINT isn't that warming is not happening, my point is that it is not completely understood by scientist who make bold predictions and then when shown to be wrong make yet another bold prediction and expect us to not question. I read over and over how the Medieval warm period was because of less volcanic activity, and it is stated as fact not one theory which it is, but as absolute fact.

The problem has been scientist making matter of fact statements instead of showing their research and letting theory's and hypothesis be made, they draw concrete conclusions which are not to be questioned. Politicians who have agendas (on both sides) jump onto any scientific evidence that backs their side and then tries to poke holes in the others side. The earths climate is complicated being made up of sun levels / spots, ocean currents, natural cycles, volcanic activity, ect..., ect.... Once a scientist says it is fact and not up for debate I know he is full of $h!t and can not be trusted. Science can give us data points which we try to use to make informed decisions, but to many times that data isbeing used (sometimes manipulated) to make canclusions that have nothing to do with fact.

The sky is falling!!! The sky is falling!!!

Thank the Lord that it is. Its always been falling, it always will be falling, if it weren't falling we'd be in a world of hurt or on the moon or some other planetary body that can't hang on to its atmosphere. So lets not screw it up by making it into an overheated, carbon saturated cesspool. Venus too has an atmosphere, unfortunately it is a 900 degree, mixture of nitrogen, water vapor, and carbon compounds that pretty much does in any space craft that tries to make a landing there. As to the sky is falling part, lets pray that any tripping point stumbled upon by human consumption of fossil fuel does not include run away global warming.

Listen, I'm not going to swap articles with you back and fourth, MY POINT isn't that warming is not happening, my point is that it is not completely understood by scientist who make bold predictions and then when shown to be wrong make yet another bold prediction and expect us to not question.

This is a very good point. In fact, the science channel has a theme...always question!

Good points Logic

The problem has been scientist making matter of fact statements...

Because they have facts to back them up?

Yeah, that's a problem alright. *rollseyes*

Get real and when you do let me know.

Wait, LogicReguired,

Isn't the Earth 6000 years old?

Because they have facts to back them up?

The interpretation of data does not constitute fact.

Steve,

Hot, wet, whatever.... come this winter we'll see RECORD SNOW STORM due to GLOBAL WARMING.......

The reason you cannot understand the difference is because you get hung up on labels. Do not worry though, many people in your camp have the same problem and are unable to differentiate hot weather from Global Warming and its affects on said hot weather.

Global warming is not about local events. This article is full of crap for saying that our hot weather is Global Warming. Our hotter weather was an affect of Global Warming occurring around the world. Normally storms are driven into the Northern Hemisphere due to the Wintery conditions in the Southern Hemisphere during our summer months. Global Warming is a process which screws around with those weather patterns and less moisture is drawn up from the South. Essentially you can think of it as cancer for the climate. This leads to less moisture being around to form storms here in the Northern Hemisphere and they only occur sporadically and usually in conjunction with a larger system coming off of the sea.

Global Warming also raises the World-wide temperature slowly, by tenths of a degree a month leading to single digit gains over a year or more. However that is all it takes because of how fragile the Earth's ecosystem is. It would take only a 3 to 5 degree change in the World-wide temperature to send us into a severe cold snap or to flood coastal areas and islands. It all has to do with the temperature of the sea.

As the sea heats up it produces the ability to create much stronger storm systems. At a certain point though the melting of the ice counteracts this rise in temperature and storm activity falls off sharply during the spring/summer months. However during the winter it produces much stronger and colder storms because the moisture that is developed from evaporation of sea water is that much colder from the melted ice.

A great example is the Bearing Sea. Over the winter the Bearing Sea almost completely froze over. The last time that happened was many decades ago. The ice persisted for weeks and it shut down the crab fishing industry in that area entirely.

Global warming is not just about warming trends. This is where you are getting hooked on the labels; admittedly not as good as hooked on phonics. "Global warming" is not only about warming, it is also about the cause and effects of those warming trends. Global warming is not some fringe area pseudo-science, it has been developed into a full fledged scientific theory. What is currently being discussed is if we are contributing to it or if this is just the high end of a natural cycle.

Every time I see someone make your argument it makes me laugh because they are parroting something someone they "trust" in has told them ("trust" because it is not really trust, it is parroting). Anyone that looks at the science and what is predicted to be caused by Global Warming and applies a it of forward thinking logic is going to realize that the "Warming" modifier is just a name and not an indicator.

Just as the National Socialists party had nothing to do with them actually being Socialists, it was just a name to delude people into thinking something that was not true, so have the leader of the "deniers" circle used the word "Warming" in the same way.

Sorry but quoting a blog that does not use any peer-reviewed data, just ad hom attacks and innuendo does nothing to help your case. Rather it makes you look bad.

Look in the mirror. Quoting left-leaning blogs or other sites does not help your case.

The point is - the article, and its background, are comparing data for a 117-year period. It is ridiculous if you try to extrapolate that.

Study up on the life of a mayfly. You will see why they are alternately believe in warming or cooling.

(Hint - because their reference point is infinitesimal compared to the scale of climate change).

Jeffey

Yes because we all know the GLOBE (Earth) consists only of Johannesburg South Africa in the winter... *rollseyes* Even my 5 year old can see the error in that logic.

So its better to think the earth only consists of the Midwestern states? See my point, Just making the exact same conclusion with similar findings as the article, its called sarcasm but only intelligent people can understand it, you must be blond.

ROFL

Just think of the new C02 that we have put into the Mars atmosphere from our recent visits! We have already begun the process of ruining that planet!

"Two things are infinite: the universe and human stupidity, and I'm not sure about the universe."

Albert Einstein

It's Obama's fault. He allowed us to send another robot to Mars, and now the Martians are pissed at us for sending too much junk to their planet and have turned their heat rays on us!

I doubt that they will find that there was INTELLIGENT life on earth...

Just think of the new C02 that we have put into the Mars atmosphere from our recent visits! We have already begun the process of ruining that planet!

Actually, we can make mars habitable by creating a denser atmosphere.

Mar's atmosphere is 95% CO2. If you could measure the change, we actually reduced it.

So Obama is causing drought, wildfires, and heatwaves??? Wow man, what will you think of next.

Well, let's pray to GOD history does not repeat itself!!!

Obama will win and the earth will continue to grow warmer.

If Obama wins, we all lose. Look up the word loser in the dictionary, you'll see a picture of Obama.

You go ahead and pray, since you don't seem to have actually done much truth seeking when it comes to religion.

If Obama wins, we all lose. Look up the word loser in the dictionary, you'll see a picture of Obama.

Wow t-baggers really bringing it today snooooooooooooze.

Hardtostarboard.... if you truly feel that way I hope you can endure another George W Bush because Romney is EXACTLY the same in economic and foreign policy as well as thinking that the wealthy deserve a greater piece of the pie at the expense of the other 95% of Americans. Please please please attempt to dispute that Mittens is NOT GWB 2.0.

@hardtostarboard

I did, I saw picture of you and Romney.

How is Obama a failure? Foodstamp or whatever? He didn't created all of this, he inherited it.

hardtostarboard

... I get it man - you need a PICTURE dictionary to comprehend the definition of simple words :)

Are you absolutely sure you did not see W. lurking there in the corner?

"How is Obama a failure? ... He didn't created all of this, he inherited it."

Next send us a list of all the times Reagan blamed the horrible economy he inherited on Jimmy Carter.

Don't bother, you'll just be wasting your time. Reagan buckled down and started working on fixing the problem instead of blaming everything on the previous administration. That is the difference between a leader and a community organizer.

You're full of @!$%# the economy Reagan inherited was not nearly as bad as the one Obama inherited.

Reagan's recession didn't even have a housing crisis.

Or a financial disaster, all he inherited was a sluggish economy, sort of like where we are now.

Not to mention he raised taxes and ran up record deficits, did you not know that.

You righties really like to make Reagan out to be something he wasn't.

I remember that time very well. Every day you went into a store to buy anything, the price was higher. Inflation was 12 % and interest rates were 20% + . You couldn't borrow money to buy a pack of gum. Our military was in shambles and a joke !! The only President worse in my life than that loser Carter is the current fundraiser-in-chief Barry Husein Obama who got into college by stating he was a citizen of Indonesia. Let's see all your college applications and records Barry - selamat malam !!

You righties really like to make Reagan out to be something he wasn't.

And they don't like to remember that Reagan also raised taxes. :)

Reagan doubled the national debt and raised taxes doing it.

The last Presidents to pay down on the national debt were Clinton and Carter.

Hardtostarboard,

Regardless of whether it's after four years in off ice or eight, Obama will still have been President. He'll earn more for one speaking engagement as a past President than you or I can earn in years. I have a tough time rating that as a loser.

DBK......scientists also said the Earth was flat , at one time...hhmmmm????

scientists also said the Earth was flat

Those were dumb scientists, now they're smarter

Excellent post DBK - I wonder why so many people refuse to take this issue seriously. A family member used to work for the organization posted below ... lots of education on climate change if you're so inclined to read it.

http://www.acespace.org/

Inhofe is one of Oklahoma's US Senators. Probably can't see through the wildfire smoke to visualize the effects of climate change.

God does have a sense of humor!

Oklahomans, do yourself a favor, please vote this idiot out of office!

Dear truthseeker: Sorry to burst your bubble, but that is completely false. Eratosthenes calculated the circumference of the earth to a rather close tolerance, (assuming he used the Egyptian stadion). Scientists understood the earth was round(ish) from ancient Greek times, and Columbus would have known that too. As in the present case with climate change deniers, the ignorant and misinformed might have believed the Earth was flat, but scientists knew better.

Scientists also developed the materials that allow you to post remarks on msnbc.com. The value of those remarks I leave for others to decide.

truthseeker doesn't really care if it is true or not. He wants it to be true, so in his mind it is.

I would think people are smart enough to understand Earth has gone through many changes, and climate change is inevitable period. The second warmest July was in 1936. If people are paying attention these cycles will always happen.

I would also think people are smart enough to understand science is the study of past events and nobody can predict 100% what will happen in the future. The world is not a controlled environment and will never be a laboratory or computer model.

Relax people worrying about climate or the weather is a futile notion.

The world is not a controlled environment

At least you don't believe in God, that's a relief

While deniers like to quote the "second hottest July was in 1936," they conveniently neglect the line in the article that says we're in the hottest 12 month period on record...

Nobody with a sound mind can deny climate change. It's always changing. The real denial is pretending this is something new to Earth.

In the past Earth has been too warm and too cold for human life. Just face the fact that we are all lucky to be alive period. The Earth will once again be uninhabitable, and that will have nothing to do with human interference.

New or not, it's happening, and we're going to need to deal with the consequences. Regardless of the causes.

Nobody with a sound mind can deny climate change. It's always changing. The real denial is pretending this is something new to Earth.

No, of course it is not new. There have been times when the planet was considerably warmer than today. The problem isn't the extreme. The problem is in the rate of change. If we had the same change over several thousand years, life would easily adapt. As it is, we are causing such a sudden change that the ecosystem isn't able to keep up and we are seeing mass die-outs of plants and animals.

This has been going on for a while, and climate change scientists have been warning about it for a while, and been constantly told that they are idiots. It's only now, when the mass die-out is of our own crops that people are starting to pay attention.

Now, the emphasis has changed from "it's not happening" to "oh, well, too late to do anything about it now."

In the past Earth has been too warm and too cold for human life. Just face the fact that we are all lucky to be alive period. The Earth will once again be uninhabitable, and that will have nothing to do with human interference.

Did your parents ever teach you to take responsibility for your actions?

When presented with the information backing the theory of plate tectonics, the vast majority of the scientific community thought the idea was preposterous.

It's now accepted as scientific fact.

And your point is?

At one time scientists thought that dinosaurs were cold blooded too. But they changed their minds as more evidence came along.

Coincidentally we've had raging sunspot activity for the last two years.

SpaceWeather.com -- News and information about meteor showers, solar flares, auroras, and near-Earth asteroids

No they don't want the government out of ther SS checks..they just want out of paying for their SS checks...see how conservatism workd

Last time around (during the Dust Bowl) the situation was remedied by improved agricultural techniques. Doesn't sound like an inevitable cycle to me but... if you want to go through the Dust Bowl again maybe that's what it will take before you start thinking about nature as something we have to cultivate and not abuse.

Animal (including human) respiration is not significant with respect to global warming because the CO2 being exhaled comes almost entirely from food produced by taking CO2 out of the atmosphere, leading to a net change of zero.

The problem comes from burning fossil fuels which creates CO2 from carbon that was removed from the atmosphere tens of millions of years ago, and at a rate vastly faster than natural processes can return it to underground deposits.

"CO2 from carbon that was removed from the atmosphere tens of millions of years ago"

And that is the bottom line. All other influences are a net zero.

Mom's a snowbird and doesn't have a basement on the mobile home. I had to get a job and pay rent for this basement. It stays pretty cool without running my air conditioner, so I can help the environment a little. I also drive as little as possible and bicycle instead. Not because I think our current heat spell is entirely due to man made greenhouse gasses. I think it's due to recent increased Solar activity. I just avoid pollution as much as I can, because it's stupid to crap in your mess kit.

And of course there have been absolutely no advances in climate modeling in the past 35 years. We just quit studying it because we already knew the answers.

And the computer I'm typing this on has an Intel 8086 CPU with 640K of memory and a 2-color monochrome display. And 2 floppy disk drives.

Yeah, right!

That the earth was going in to an ice was presented by one scientist. One of the major news magazines gave it front page cover and now everyone thinks it was consensus in the scientific community, when in fact it never was.

Your mistaken about what scientists wrote in the 70's. NO ONE predicted imminent global cooling.

A few scientists wrote about global cooling that could be expected to happen 10,000 years from now if humans did not do anything to affect the climate.

And one scientist did a "what if?" study to explore what would happen IF an accepted constant was wrong by a factor of 3 (except it was correct) and IF our aerosol production increased by a factor of 4 (it decreased). The very next year, that same author wrote that the scenario he had conjectured was not even remotely plausible.

Meanwhile, for every decade since the 1950's, the vast majority of scientific opinion has been that human release of CO2 will lead to disruptive climate change due to global warming.

and space travel

Corporate science is. Remember, Al Gore and Warren Buffet have invested millions to create the first Energy Exchange when Herr obama nails us with his carbon tax. Of course it won't be in NYC it will be in Chicago. Coincidence?

What about medical science? Is that a liberal conspiracy too? Just askin'

Hey, I just thought of it, maybe it's the pathetically educated right wing nuts who do not understand science, math, space travel, and medical improvements (you know, the ones who slept through high school) who are the liberal conspiracy?

There is nothing liberal in science; science is cold and unyielding.

Real science just is. Has nothing to do with politics.

And those liberals caring for people.....pfft why the hell would anybody do that.

zoiks

EXACTLY... If anything, we should be prepared to ride out WHATEVER the earth tosses our way. To even truly believe that WE, HUMANS can effect the GLOBE in any true manner is the most arrogant thing humans have ever proposed and I believe the idea was born in the most arrogant country the planet has ever seen. LOL

We're causing this thing and polluting the environment to boot. Cleaning up coal and gas emissions is a win-win on every front.

'To even truly believe that WE, HUMANS can effect the GLOBE in any true manner is the most arrogant thing humans have ever proposed.' Your ignorance is what is arrogant. Get a grip and start working on an education.

Who would have thought that a single celled organism (too small to see) could cause global weather changes? But that is exactly how O2 filled the atmosphere billions of years ago. Prior to that time, all O2 that was available was used up by iron and other metals as they belched out of the deeper earth to form rust. Then single celled organisms called Cyanobacteria (that could not live in an O2 rich atmosphere) created so much byproduct of O2 that it rose in concentration in the atmosphere to the point that they could not survive. Get it?

Bart, you're speaking in general terms. I want to hear SPECIFICALLY what I'am to do,what my country (USA ) is to do and the rest of the world. IF this is so critical, lets hear it !!

baliman...there are several good books on survival available at Amazon.com.

I'm asking what are we supposed to do to correct our climate changing ways ??

I can not provide links or I would spam you for your mindless egotistical posturing.

Go look up Skeptical Science.

Record cooling across the globe?? Are you out of your mind? Get a clue moron.

The past decade was the warmest on record, and the one before that was the next warmest.

Do you think you can just spout idiotic nonsense willy-nilly and pretend on that basis that there isn't a problem?

OK, once again, look up the difference between weather and climate.

There will be a quiz later.

The differences between local, regional, and global will also be on the quiz.

Maybe if you stopped allowing right wing extremists to define what was a liberal, you wouldn't find it necessary to separate Democrat from liberal.

Actually hottest 12 months on record according to the article. On tract to be hottest year worldwide.

We know coal and gas emissions pollute the atmosphere and increase temperatures. Planet's been heating up very quickly since the industrial revolution.

Not meaningless at all--a pattern.

The record-keeping is for the past 117 years. That means absolutely NOTHING for the millenia that the earth has been around.

We have historic evidence that the earth has been hotter than it is now, we just did not have sensors, thermometers, and recording of temperatures.

The only "pattern" is in the hyped-up hysteria about the cause of warming. Remember, 30 years ago, "climate scientists" were telling us we were entering a mini ice age. How's that working out?

I thought the earth was created in six days about 7000 years ago...

Dr Larry, climate scientists were NOT telling us any such thing. Stop trying to rewrite history.

You might also note that during those periods when the earth was warmer than now we also did not have people, let alone civilizations. Do you really think it's wise to run an uncontrolled experiment to see how well humans survive in a climate regime they've never experienced before?

People have experienced warmer climates before. The Middle Ages, and The Bronze Age were both warmer for longer than what we've been experiencing. Oddly, unlike the current prognosis, human civilization did rather well during these previous warm periods.

Den, you're simply mistaken.

Those periods rivaled temperatures in the 20th century, but not current temperatures.

And those were regional effects.

No one who has studied the likely consequences of global warming thinks this is going to be anything other than ugly.

Not even close idiot. Why don't you actually watch it. You might learn something.

Zorro... you're the real IDIOT !!

I watched it. Gore is the idiot.

No. What gave you that bizarre idea?

Scott-461700

who believes in AGW? Virtually every major science organization in the word, 97-98% of actively researching climate scientists.

We have paleoclimatology for temperature proxies before reliable worldwide records in the 1800s

Tree rings, ice cores, sea bed sediments, lake bed sediments, corals, geology etc.

And they all agree with each other.

Well, you would be right. Do you really think this is the hottest month ever? In the worlds history? Cmon Materialman. Use your head.

"Scott-461700

Record temps in Cleveland Ohio was 103°F. IN 1941!!! Hottest on record?? You liberals are hilarious. How long have we been keeping accurate records? 200 years at most? And they were not real accurate back then. So Liberals will believe in global warming and that the world evolved from nothing.

You people are jokes.”

EVERYONE...READ THIS POST AND TAKE SPECIAL NOTE OF THE LAST STATEMENT. I THINK WE COULD ALL TAKE PAUSE AND REFLECT ON HOW QUICKLY WE SOMETIMES PROJECT US OURSELVES.

You people are jokes.

He estimated its size to within 2%, not 10%. If he used the Greek stadion, he was off by 16%. Although it isn't definite, since he performed his calculations in Egypt, it can be assumed he used the Egyption stadion, which would make his estimate off by about 2%.

Right. I was just pointing out to some uneducated slob that people are always saying " scientists thought the earth was flat" when in fact no scientist ever thought that. only religious nuts and fools ever did.

"tj"

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA ... what a freaking mindless half-wit you are. It was the prevailing theory for most all humans that the earth was flat and it wasn't discovered to be otherwise until CHRISTIAN explorers and intellectuals determined that it had to be round you blathering stooge.

Jeez, if you leftist dolts were any dumber or any more uneducated we could probably talk the rest of modern society into using you losers for target practice and as real live crash-test-dummies ... jeez.

Get yourself a library card you idiot ... and USE IT.

While we all know that Christians think that if it is written in a book, it must be true; as the daughter of a sailor I know that people have been sailing the ocean as long as humans have existed on this earth- and they werent worried about falling off the edge.

Eratosthenes of Cyrene c. 276 BC – c. 195 BC Lived before Christians.

For your belief to creditable, the Early Christians would only have come out when it was after dark and when The Moon was not visible, because one look at either one would show have that they should also be round. After banging into things in the dark you might have expected critical thinking to arrive at the conclusion that the World was "lumpy", but they could not come to an agreement, so they decided to minimize the message by asserting that the Earth was flat. Thus saving much time as they went around the World carrying a dead man on a wooden cross, it's a message that has been definitely and repeatedly misunderstood, but none the less conveyed a sense of unquestioned belief and dedicated faith, a success requiring only submission, against simple message belief or else.

Panther, Greek sailors knew the world was spherical from at least about 600 BCE. So unless your Christians had a time machine, they didn't come close to discovering this.

By 200 BCE, the Greeks knew that the earth was spherical and about 25,000 miles in circumference. They also knew that the moon was a sphere smaller than the earth and which orbited the earth. They also knew that the sun was much larger than the earth and much farther away from the earth than the moon. Based on their estimates for the large size of the sun, they also speculated that the earth orbited the sun.

It wasn't until the Christians came along that the flat earth nonsense became widespread among ignorant and religious people.

You're a dope. And yes, you will pay higher energy prices, even if Obama is not in the White House. And yes, you will blame Obama, anyway.

nice talk dubster... i thought liberals were supposed to be so nice, kind and understanding - you're just another A HOLE.

"Under my plan of cap-n-trade system, electricity rates WOULD necessarily increase", stated by none other than, then Senator Barack Obama. 2008.

He did it! LOL