Bennett's Sense of Irony: It's snowing in December
Discussing then-upcoming screenings of former Vice President Al Gore's documentary film, An Inconvenient Truth, on the December 15 edition of CNN's The Situation Room, conservative radio host William Bennett mockingly claimed that "half the people in the country" will "have to fight through snowstorms to watch this global warming thing."
Of course, the mere fact of snow in December in the United States is not indicative of whether or not the earth is warming. As the National Climactic Data Center noted in its preliminary 2006 report, "[f]ollowing the warmest year on record for the globe in 2005, the annual global temperature for 2006 is expected to be sixth warmest since recordkeeping began in 1880." That report also noted that "the 2006 annual average temperature for the contiguous United States (based on preliminary data) will likely be 2°F (1.1°C) above the 20th Century mean, which would make 2006 the third warmest year on record."
From the 4 p.m. ET hour of the December 15 edition of CNN's The Situation Room:
BLITZER: All right. I want to move on and talk about --
BENNETT: Sure.
BLITZER: -- Al Gore a little bit, your former boss. He's got all these screenings now for An Inconvenient Truth, his movie, his film on global warming. A lot of people are suspicious that -- you know what? He still has that itch. He wants to be president of the United States. Is this simply a venue for him to throw his hat back in the ring?
BRAZILE: Well, for now, he's said that he's not interested, but he hasn't closed the door. But I think what Al Gore is trying to do now is to keep his commitment to the activists, to -- you know -- to educate people, to activate them. He's holding over 1,800 house parties tomorrow night across the country, 7 p.m. I know Bill Bennett will probably tune in and watch it.
[...]
BENNETT: Because I think it's an easier win for a Republican. But, by the way, when they got it tuned into the Al Gore channel tomorrow night, if they flip by accident, and they get Obama, people aren't going to go back.
But, by the way, half the people in the country, in the northern tier, are going to have to fight through snowstorms to watch this global warming thing.
Using his logic, that means he should have hair on top as well, therefore why the terrible comb-over?
I've noticed that the only time Drudge Report, for example, has a story about global warming, it's immediately followed by a link/headline about record snow or record cold in some isolated area of the country/world.
That's when he's not linking to the latest James Inhofe fairy-tale press release saying the media and the science community are making up global warming completely.
And a week before Christmas it's 40 degrees out, temperatures are supposed ot stay in the 40's until next week at least, with rain possible on Thursday and Friday.
Bull Bennett is a moron. Maybe he's got money wagered on Global Warming.
It's almost 60 in Jersey today. Go figure.
65 in my area of NJ today.
Actually it was 68 degrees in my part of jersey. By Old Double Down's (Bill Bennett's) logic, if I haven't placed any bets today I am now cured of my gambling addiction. However, If a place a double reverse on the Eagles to win and be under next week, and parlay that against the Giants, then I am sure I have fallen off the wagon. NUTS!
[link to wwwa.accuweather.com]
where it has barely snowed at all this month. Hell, I live in Mount Pleasant, which is supposed to be colder than a witches teat, for most of the year, and there have been days this month where I could walk outside in shorts. Bennett's an idiot.
it rained all the snow off the ground in early Feb. We had global warming then but nobody knew.
Individual weather events do not--oh, nevermind.
I just wanted to say that you could make a ton of money betting Bennet onn global warming.
dinero somewhere--that'll be good.
to combat global warming - it called WINTER!
but I sold it. I live in central MN and we haven't had a decent amount of snow cover in quite a few years. I remember as a child having at least a foot of snow cover by Christmas - it's been years since we've had anything like that.
I lived there from 6th grade to my 2nd year at St Cloud State. Cold as hell, blizzards and occasions when it was down to 70 below. SOunds like it has changed a bit in the last 30 years...
Here in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area we're about to break the record for latest recorded first half inch of snow. This weekend my wife and I were out hiking in light jackets and got warm in those. It's ridiculously warm for this time of the year.
I know my personal experience with recent winters doesn't prove global warming, but it helps make it easy to accept.
I live in Prior Lake, what city do you live in?
I'm in St. Paul, very close to its border with WSP. I've been kind of curious where you (and some of the other MN posters) lived.
Minnesota is pretty well represented on the message board here. Lots of progressives in our state I guess (except for me)!! Hey at least I got TPaw home in November!
Hey at least I got TPaw home in November! - from Bruce1ace
As much as I'd love to blame you, it was probably Hatch's to lose and his temper helped him accomplish that.
Are you a MN native? I was born and raised in a small town near Brainerd.
Grew up in Bloomington, graduated Kennedy Class of 83, used to vacation up on Gull lake in the 70s (Birch Bay resort) with the family and visit Paul Bunyon Land like all good Minnesotans. I wonder what went wrong??
I live in Richfield. Originally from Iowa. Every winter since moving up here, everyone's always said "this is gonna be the year we get snow." And every winter it's a giant disapointment. I too remember having lots of snow as a kid (some times it even snowed by Holloween, or shortly after). But those days are long gone, it seems. Sad.
One of my stocks dipped today. The economy must not be doing well after all.
We got hit hard on Dec. 1. About a foot of snow. Not that you could tell. Except for the telltale molehill of what were towering mounds of snow, it's all gone.
When I was a kid, when snow covered the ground, it stayed that way till late March or early April. Not anymore.
Times are tough for a snowblower salesman in Chicago today. It's hard to convince people to invest $500 in an appliance they'll use once or twice a year. Unless it's a pasta maker.
Gosh Bill, if you happened to check the weather the last week in the northeast, it was springlike conditions a week before X-mas but I'm sure you would have been one of those saying there was no way the Titantic could sink also....
....maybe you need to observe some of those polar bears having to swim 2 hours or more just to find an ice mass to walk on to convince you.
The polar bears might mistake Bill for an elephant seal.
Oh yeah, you're right on that point.
...not just warming. Global climate change will manifest itself differently in different parts of the Earth, at different times in the year. Winters may be WORSE, even as average temperatures are higher.
Yes, Bill, math is hard. These are not easy dynamics to understand. All the more reason to stop making the problem worse.
Sorry, but willful know-nothingism really chaps my @$$.
Sorry, but willful know-nothingism really chaps my @$$. - from Valentinian
And your chapped @$$ is something none of us want to see.
...to unchap my @$$, with stupids like this on TV!
might be indicated, adequate aloe or not.
Is the Botox a Pelosi reference, or something? Otherwise, I'm stumped...
than just moisturizer.
Just trying to help.
We best get back on topic!
National weather just announced record high temperatures yesterday with a reporter standing on a NY street in front of a Christmas tree in his shirtsleeves. Chicago temperatures in the 50’s and I’m still running errands in Michigan on my skinny tire road bicycle. The opportunity to use cross-country skis have been so few in recent years that I don’t remember where they are.
Wouldn't be nice if these people would just go awya. This fraud went after Clinton till his gambling was exposed. Then he talked about reducing crime by aborting black babies ( which he did say was wrong at the end) and now this crap. Drug Czar?? What's he smoking?
by the way who IS going awya? BTW, what IS awya?
BTW, why don't you scientists stop bloviating and tell me what year we should use for a base year if we're going to sign onto Kyoto (no Googling, dammit--I'm sure you can answer this since you've studied it so much).
What base year would be fair. Your answer will tell a lot about you.
This cracks me up... both you and BB preface your main point with "By the way..."
What is a "base year" and what do you have against Google? I would like to see a source for something rather than have you pull it out of your (unchapped?) @$$.
if you don't know what a base year is re: Kyoto, then get your chapped @ss educated.
establishes 1990 GHG levels as a "baseline." Is this what you are talking about?
I misspoke.
you're right. Baseline year is the correct terminology.
Let's fine what would be a fair baseline year. 1990 penalizes the U.S.
The premise of Kyoto - which many disagree with - is something along the lines that the West is disproportionately responsible for the current levels of GHG in the atmosphere, and so is given a larger reduction target.
It was not a perfect compromise - compromises seldom are (I remember something about three fifths of a person).
I don't see how taking our toys and going home has done anything to solve the problem.
would you like to fine that baseline year?
See how annoying it is when people start pointing out typos to get off topic?
You got me.
Talking about someone ELSE's ignornace? I thought the only reason you were here was to showcase YOUR ignorance and firm grasp of propaganda parrot talking points, it is certain you have displayed nothing else as of yet.
anybody ventures into this little mutual admiration gauntlet is to give you people a break from each other.
It's an entirely altruistic thing.
Base year for what? Co2 emissions? CO2 levels?
I don't think you know what you're talking about.
He's got his teeth into some Right Wing talking point and won't let go because he thinks it's significant. He acts as if Kyoto is the only proposal on the table to address climate change, and then thinks that by debunking that, he can debunk the whole mess.
As always with right wingers, it's Black or White. There's no middle ground. With us, or agin' us.
Kyoto has been Utopian Mecca for a long time. If it's no longer important to you, say so.
...even though it doesn't go nearly far enough ("nearly far?").
If Kyoto's no good, name an alternative.
what do you suggest? A baseline year of, say, 1920? Or maybe I'm missing your point.
is not with the baseline, it's with the targets. CO2 will keep accumulating in the atmosphere even with cuts in emissions.
Because I am lazy (and also still at work), I will cut-n-paste:
"The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has predicted an average global rise in temperature of 1.4°C (2.5°F) to 5.8 °C (10.4°F) between 1990 and 2100). Current estimates indicate that even if successfully and completely implemented, the Kyoto Protocol will reduce that increase by somewhere between 0.02 °C and 0.28 °C by the year 2050 (source: Nature, October 2003)."
Thus: not nearly far enough.
for your studied, coherent, and detailed response.
just keep sippin' your cognac and run away from any meaningful discussion.
Don't get down to nuts and bolts. It's confusing.
have any idea who the bipolar Republican is responding to?
Uh oh, I just ended a sentence with a preposition! I hope it's gone or I'm in for a severe thrashing.
for that severe thrashing. If you don't get it for free, you can pay people for it.
Who friggin cares what temperature it is. The Earth is going to shake off humans like a bad habit. We are pimples on a gnats butt in the grand scheme of things. We aren't warming the world. it's warming itself. If it's not us evil humans,then who???
Blame the cows. Animals generate more damage to the atmoshpere than humans do: [link to news.independent.co.uk]
Poo poo you say? Then why is Mars getting warmer? It must be all those martians driving SUVs.
HA!
higher methane production.
If a climate on any planet can change, ever, then it's impossible that a 40% increase of atmospheric co2 since the Industrial Revolution could have any effect.
You just totally devastated the theory of global climate change. That's awesome.
The calculations of cattle contirbution to AGW take into account fossil fuels used in their production, as you would know if you had actually read the report.
As to Mars warming, I guess you are arguing that insolation is driving our climate change? There's no recent trend in solar input, so that doesn't fly.
Is the title a riff on Smilla's Sense of Snow or is this Morrissettian irony we're talking about here?
on Morrissettian anything, myself. Nothing against Canadians.
The former -- thanks for noticing -- but the latter works as well.
in southern Illinois. The crappie weren't biting too good.
I had to de-wax my surfboard to put on the ol' winter wax. I left it in the yard all morning and still had to get out the heat gun to get the last of it off.
Global warming, my foot.
are going to have to fight through snowstorms to watch this global warming thing [An Inconvenient Truth screenings]." - Bill Bennett
Somebody should tell Riverboat Bill that "An Inconvenient Truth" is available on DVD . . .
...who can grasp the basic concepts of science. Is that so much to ask? That way when the debate starts over issues like this they (Repubs) can join in, instead of just babbling dribble. I'd really like to see them included in the "dialogue" instead of them holding hearings with Michael Crichton.
...the thread?
to that right-wing tactic of taking a specific date in time and comparing temperatures. Whether hotter or colder than normal, that is not really the point at all. Long-term trends are what matter.
That would be like looking at one week of the stock market and making a universal decision on whether to buy or sell, based just on that week's performance...or single day..or whatever.
Right-wingers just love to make these kinds of arguments to support whatever ill-informed position they are trying to make.
The irony is that, for those in denial, Bennett may have done more to prove Global Warning exists by making that moronic statement.
Someone should(n't) tell him that half the snowmobiling country wants to know what happened to the snow! Bill just gave them a reason to believe. That is sweet justice.