Alberto

[Dirtydawg]

Seems our global warming friends have been quiet about this system since it didn't turn out to be the disaster they hoped, er, I mean feared it would.



Farmers Welcome 'Million-Dollar Rain'

By BRUCE SMITH, Associated Press Writer
CHARLESTON, S.C. -- After splashing ashore in Florida without much punch, the remnants of the first named storm of the Atlantic hurricane season churned northward Wednesday, bringing much-needed rain to the Southeast but also spawning damaging tornadoes.
By early Wednesday, Alberto had weakened from a tropical storm to a tropical depression over South Carolina and all tropical storm warnings were discontinued.
But as it headed northward along the coast, it still pushed nasty weather ahead of it...

...Alberto's winds were about 50 mph when it came ashore near Adams Beach, Fla., still strong enough to be a tropical storm, but well below the 74-mph threshold for a hurricane.
At 5 a.m. Wednesday, its maximum sustained winds were near 35 mph, 4 mph below tropical storm strength, the National Hurricane Center said.
Instead of a disaster, Alberto's rainfall may turn out to be a blessing for Florida's efforts to battle wildfires and for farmers in Georgia who were worried about drought.
"It's definitely a million-dollar rain," said Joe McManus, a marketing specialist with the Georgia Farm Bureau in Macon. "It could save some cotton and peanut fields."
Farmer Orson Adams, 65, was counting on the rain to help germinate the cotton seeds he planted last month in Douglas, Ga.
"What we've gotten has been slow and it's going into the soil," Adams said. "We've got a chance now to survive."
Officials said the storm also gave them real-world practice on the lessons learned from the slow response to some of last year's storms. Hurricane specialists said they ran into a few computer glitches but nothing that couldn't be fixed before the next storm.
"It was a nice tune-up, a nice warm-up," said hurricane specialist Richard Pasch. Florida's Emergency Management spokesman Mike Stone put it another way: "You can train all you want, but nothing beats the real deal."
In Crystal River, Fla., water was thigh-high in the heart of the town, but many people seemed to accept flooding as part of coastal life _ and sighed with relief that it wasn't worse.
"I think overall it could have been worse," said Leslie Sturmer, whose Cedar Key, Fla., neighborhood was briefly cut off from the rest of the state by flooding. "We would have evacuated if there was a serious storm, but this wasn't."

[Dawgbitten]

You have around 15 more to go, Dirty. You and sooner's musings of how some are wishing for disasters/pandemics concerns me about the mental state you guys possess.

We could use one of those systems up here in NE Texas right about now. I think we are back to around 8 inches short for the year. I think that makes it around 20 inches short for the last 2. We will be as dry as West Texas if this persists.

[dhussdawg]

You have around 15 more to go, Dirty. You and sooner's musings of how some are wishing for disasters/pandemics concerns me about the mental state you guys possess.

We could use one of those systems up here in NE Texas right about now. I think we are back to around 8 inches short for the year. I think that makes it around 20 inches short for the last 2. We will be as dry as West Texas if this persists.

It is about the same as many libs wanting us to fail in Iraq. I really believe that those people would rather see us fail then for George Bush to ever get any credit for anything. I see many of the global warming types to be the same. They get a sick kick out of the "I told you so". They want to see a disaster, no doubt. That way, they can scare more people over to their side.

[Dawgbitten]

I don't want to see a disaster, I just want some people to remove their heads from their asses. Plus, I enjoy reading and learning about global warming along with the fact that it aggravates the hell out of sooner and Dirty every time something is posted about it.

If you think about it, GW touches on a little of everything. Past climate history, politics, big industry influence, natural selection, weather/climate patterns, natural disasters, food, and the list could go on. Politically, we should devote as many resources as possible to research and find solutions. We all owe it to ourselves to stay involved and learn as much as possible because if Al Gore and the majority of the world's scientists are right, then we are in for a different future.

And besides, what is dirty doing when he posts the article above? "See, I told you so."

[dhussdawg]

I don't want to see a disaster, I just want some people to remove their heads from their asses. Plus, I enjoy reading and learning about global warming along with the fact that it aggravates the hell out of sooner and Dirty every time something is posted about it.

If you think about it, GW touches on a little of everything. Past climate history, politics, big industry influence, natural selection, weather/climate patterns, natural disasters, food, and the list could go on. Politically, we should devote as many resources as possible to research and find solutions. We all owe it to ourselves to stay involved and learn as much as possible because if Al Gore and the majority of the world's scientists are right, then we are in for a different future.

And besides, what is dirty doing when he posts the article above? "See, I told you so."

I wasnt refering to you, but you are awful touchy about it, haha. I was talking about some of the hardliners would rather see a disaster to prove that they are right then for it to never come. I wish we were much better with our environment, and I wish people wouldnt be so negligent. I am not as convinced that the world will end due to GW in 30 or 40 years or whatever.

[Memdawg]

Here you go Dawgbitten... A view from the other side!!!




Guest Column

Scientists respond to Gore's warnings of climate catastrophe

"The Inconvenient Truth" is indeed inconvenient to alarmists
By Tom Harris
Monday, June 12, 2006
"Scientists have an independent obligation to respect and present the truth as they see it," Al Gore sensibly asserts in his film "An Inconvenient Truth", showing at Cumberland 4 Cinemas in Toronto since Jun 2. With that outlook in mind, what do world climate experts actually think about the science of his movie?
Professor Bob Carter of the Marine Geophysical Laboratory at James Cook University, in Australia gives what, for many Canadians, is a surprising assessment: "Gore's circumstantial arguments are so weak that they are pathetic. It is simply incredible that they, and his film, are commanding public attention."
But surely Carter is merely part of what most people regard as a tiny cadre of "climate change skeptics" who disagree with the "vast majority of scientists" Gore cites?
No; Carter is one of hundreds of highly qualified non-governmental, non-industry, non-lobby group climate experts who contest the hypothesis that human emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2) are causing significant global climate change. "Climate experts" is the operative term here. Why? Because what Gore's "majority of scientists" think is immaterial when only a very small fraction of them actually work in the climate field.
Even among that fraction, many focus their studies on the impacts of climate change; biologists, for example, who study everything from insects to polar bears to poison ivy. "While many are highly skilled researchers, they generally do not have special knowledge about the causes of global climate change," explains former University of Winnipeg climatology professor Dr. Tim Ball. "They usually can tell us only about the effects of changes in the local environment where they conduct their studies."
This is highly valuable knowledge, but doesn't make them climate change cause experts, only climate impact experts.
So we have a smaller fraction.
But it becomes smaller still. Among experts who actually examine the causes of change on a global scale, many concentrate their research on designing and enhancing computer models of hypothetical futures. "These models have been consistently wrong in all their scenarios," asserts Ball. "Since modelers concede computer outputs are not "predictions" but are in fact merely scenarios, they are negligent in letting policy-makers and the public think they are actually making forecasts."
We should listen most to scientists who use real data to try to understand what nature is actually telling us about the causes and extent of global climate change. In this relatively small community, there is no consensus, despite what Gore and others would suggest.
Here is a small sample of the side of the debate we almost never hear:
Appearing before the Commons Committee on Environment and Sustainable Development last year, Carleton University paleoclimatologist Professor Tim Patterson testified, "There is no meaningful correlation between CO2 levels and Earth's temperature over this [geologic] time frame. In fact, when CO2 levels were over ten times higher than they are now, about 450 million years ago, the planet was in the depths of the absolute coldest period in the last half billion years." Patterson asked the committee, "On the basis of this evidence, how could anyone still believe that the recent relatively small increase in CO2 levels would be the major cause of the past century's modest warming?"
Patterson concluded his testimony by explaining what his research and "hundreds of other studies" reveal: on all time scales, there is very good correlation between Earth's temperature and natural celestial phenomena such changes in the brightness of the Sun.
Dr. Boris Winterhalter, former marine researcher at the Geological Survey of Finland and professor in marine geology, University of Helsinki, takes apart Gore's dramatic display of Antarctic glaciers collapsing into the sea. "The breaking glacier wall is a normally occurring phenomenon which is due to the normal advance of a glacier," says Winterhalter. "In Antarctica the temperature is low enough to prohibit melting of the ice front, so if the ice is grounded, it has to break off in beautiful ice cascades. If the water is deep enough icebergs will form."
Dr. Wibjörn Karlén, emeritus professor, Dept. of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology, Stockholm University, Sweden, admits, "Some small areas in the Antarctic Peninsula have broken up recently, just like it has done back in time. The temperature in this part of Antarctica has increased recently, probably because of a small change in the position of the low pressure systems."
But Karlén clarifies that the 'mass balance' of Antarctica is positive - more snow is accumulating than melting off. As a result, Ball explains, there is an increase in the 'calving' of icebergs as the ice dome of Antarctica is growing and flowing to the oceans. When Greenland and Antarctica are assessed together, "their mass balance is considered to possibly increase the sea level by 0.03 mm/year - not much of an effect," Karlén concludes.
The Antarctica has survived warm and cold events over millions of years. A meltdown is simply not a realistic scenario in the foreseeable future.
Gore tells us in the film, "Starting in 1970, there was a precipitous drop-off in the amount and extent and thickness of the Arctic ice cap." This is misleading, according to Ball: "The survey that Gore cites was a single transect across one part of the Arctic basin in the month of October during the 1960s when we were in the middle of the cooling period. The 1990 runs were done in the warmer month of September, using a wholly different technology."
Karlén explains that a paper published in 2003 by University of Alaska professor Igor Polyakov shows that, the region of the Arctic where rising temperature is supposedly endangering polar bears showed fluctuations since 1940 but no overall temperature rise. "For several published records it is a decrease for the last 50 years," says Karlén
Dr. Dick Morgan, former advisor to the World Meteorological Organization and climatology researcher at University of Exeter, U.K. gives the details, "There has been some decrease in ice thickness in the Canadian Arctic over the past 30 years but no melt down. The Canadian Ice Service records show that from 1971-1981 there was average, to above average, ice thickness. From 1981-1982 there was a sharp decrease of 15% but there was a quick recovery to average, to slightly above average, values from 1983-1995. A sharp drop of 30% occurred again 1996-1998 and since then there has been a steady increase to reach near normal conditions since 2001."
Concerning Gore's beliefs about worldwide warming, Morgan points out that, in addition to the cooling in the NW Atlantic, massive areas of cooling are found in the North and South Pacific Ocean; the whole of the Amazon Valley; the north coast of South America and the Caribbean; the eastern Mediterranean, Black Sea, Caucasus and Red Sea; New Zealand and even the Ganges Valley in India. Morgan explains, "Had the IPCC used the standard parameter for climate change (the 30 year average) and used an equal area projection, instead of the Mercator (which doubled the area of warming in Alaska, Siberia and the Antarctic Ocean) warming and cooling would have been almost in balance."
Gore's point that 200 cities and towns in the American West set all time high temperature records is also misleading according to Dr. Roy Spencer, Principal Research Scientist at The University of Alabama in Huntsville. "It is not unusual for some locations, out of the thousands of cities and towns in the U.S., to set all-time records," he says. "The actual data shows that overall, recent temperatures in the U.S. were not unusual."
Carter does not pull his punches about Gore's activism, "The man is an embarrassment to US science and its many fine practitioners, a lot of whom know (but feel unable to state publicly) that his propaganda crusade is mostly based on junk science."
In April sixty of the world's leading experts in the field asked Prime Minister Harper to order a thorough public review of the science of climate change, something that has never happened in Canada. Considering what's at stake - either the end of civilization, if you believe Gore, or a waste of billions of dollars, if you believe his opponents - it seems like a reasonable request.

Tom Harris is mechanical engineer and Ottawa Director of High Park Group, a public affairs and public policy company. He can be reached at letters@canadafreepress.com

[arkansasbob]

now memdawg, don't you know that all of those "scientists" are on exxon-mobile's payroll and have a sexual relationship with dick cheney? what credibility do they have against such a highly reputable non-scientist as al gore?

as for the hurricane issue, i believe there is a good chance that this year may be almost as bad as last year. all the experts that i have read seem to think so. as much as i would love for it to be a mild season so we can rub it in the global warming fanatics' faces, i just don't expect it to be so. of course, it has nothing to do with runnaway greenhouse warming, but we wil just have to be patient and allow time to prove that -- it is the only way most of these folks will ever change their minds (if that is possible at all). i just hope we manage to keep them from wasting billions of dollars on this nonsense in the meantime.

[Dawgbitten]

I stand with the majority.

[Dawgbitten]

Actually, I think you guys should post more about the 1970's Time magazine article. There isn't enough mileage with that one and it needs more exposure.

[daybreaker2]

It is about the same as many libs wanting us to fail in Iraq.

Ok, seriously? wtf? I do not want to see us fail in Iraq. I do not want a terrorist attack on the US. I do not want to see dead US Troops. I do not want to see a large disasterous hurricane. I would gladly bow down to the Republicans if it meant the world was all sunshine and roses, but guess what - the world is NOT all sunshine and roses. And the things the Republicans are doing, imo, are just screwing things up even more. Not pushing for economic reform, or ecological reform, and instead restricting personal rights... Damn right I am going to be vocal and say that I think you guys are wrong.

Saying you dont agree doesnt mean you take pride in seeing the other side fail, though, when it costs lives. Anyone who thinks I, or any other liberal, actually *wants* a huge hurricane to hit, or a terrorist attack to happen, is just a brain-dead moron without any clue. The world is NOT black and white. Wake up and start to think for yourselves.

(note: this is not aimed at all conservatives. Just those who say dumb-ass things like "Seems our global warming friends have been quiet about this system since it didn't turn out to be the disaster they hoped")

[Memdawg]

Daybreaker,

I'm sure that you don't want those bad things to happen, but the National Democrat Party, cares about one thing and one thing only... How the Hell to get the almighty POWER back, from the Republicans...

They, along with very influential media types will say and do almost anything to see that come to fruition, regardless of the consequenses... I don't think that all Republicans are great, some are idiot politicians that only care about themselves, but for the most part, they represent the conservative movement and are decent folks...

What the Dems don't seem to get is that words and actions mean things, ie. call Bush a liar and terrorist himself, and all the idiots in the world pick up on it and it becomes the gospel...

The truth about the scientists that are screaming catastrophe are only doing so, to be able to secure giant sums of money in the form of grants from stupid pols that love ripping off the American taxpayer... If Al Gore truly believed what he says, he wouldn't be criss crossing the globe burning jet fuel or riding in HUGE, gas guzzling, CO2 emitting SUV limos!!!

[dhussdawg]

Ok, seriously? wtf? I do not want to see us fail in Iraq. I do not want a terrorist attack on the US. I do not want to see dead US Troops. I do not want to see a large disasterous hurricane. I would gladly bow down to the Republicans if it meant the world was all sunshine and roses, but guess what - the world is NOT all sunshine and roses. And the things the Republicans are doing, imo, are just screwing things up even more. Not pushing for economic reform, or ecological reform, and instead restricting personal rights... Damn right I am going to be vocal and say that I think you guys are wrong.

Saying you dont agree doesnt mean you take pride in seeing the other side fail, though, when it costs lives. Anyone who thinks I, or any other liberal, actually *wants* a huge hurricane to hit, or a terrorist attack to happen, is just a brain-dead moron without any clue. The world is NOT black and white. Wake up and start to think for yourselves.

(note: this is not aimed at all conservatives. Just those who say dumb-ass things like "Seems our global warming friends have been quiet about this system since it didn't turn out to be the disaster they hoped")

Well, I said many not most and it wasnt aimed at you. Man, you guys are touchy. I am a Republican and I can admit that there are some in my party that would rather harmful things happen to the other party that would hurt the nation just for political gain. Some people think that if a bad thing happens it can be good to open up people's eyes. Some people would rather see bad things happen to open up eyes then for them to never happen because they think that the bad thing will happen eventually. Some just want bad things to happen to shame the other party and if you dont believe that, you are brain-dead moron without any clue, and that is black and white.

[Dawgbitten]

Daybreaker,

I'm sure that you don't want those bad things to happen, but the National Democrat Party, cares about one thing and one thing only... How the Hell to get the almighty POWER back, from the Republicans...

They, along with very influential media types will say and do almost anything to see that come to fruition, regardless of the consequenses... I don't think that all Republicans are great, some are idiot politicians that only care about themselves, but for the most part, they represent the conservative movement and are decent folks...

What the Dems don't seem to get is that words and actions mean things, ie. call Bush a liar and terrorist himself, and all the idiots in the world pick up on it and it becomes the gospel...

The truth about the scientists that are screaming catastrophe are only doing so, to be able to secure giant sums of money in the form of grants from stupid pols that love ripping off the American taxpayer... If Al Gore truly believed what he says, he wouldn't be criss crossing the globe burning jet fuel or riding in HUGE, gas guzzling, CO2 emitting SUV limos!!!

Massive left wing conspiracy.

[Dirtydawg]

I don't want to see a disaster, I just want some people to remove their heads from their asses. Plus, I enjoy reading and learning about global warming along with the fact that it aggravates the hell out of sooner and Dirty every time something is posted about it.

If you think about it, GW touches on a little of everything. Past climate history, politics, big industry influence, natural selection, weather/climate patterns, natural disasters, food, and the list could go on. Politically, we should devote as many resources as possible to research and find solutions. We all owe it to ourselves to stay involved and learn as much as possible because if Al Gore and the majority of the world's scientists are right, then we are in for a different future.

And besides, what is dirty doing when he posts the article above? "See, I told you so."

It doesn't aggravate me. I'm just having fun with you and Salty. Honestly, I don't follow it closely enough to get aggravated by it.

[Soonerdawg]

IPlus, I enjoy reading and learning about global warming along with the fact that it aggravates the hell out of sooner and Dirty every time something is posted about it.

That's pompous. You still don't get it. You can't aggravate me, because even if global warming is real, I'm not worried about it. I'm writing to others, not you. You a hopelessly lost worrier. The rest of the world doesn't have to be.