CNN global warming misinformation makes its way to The Radio Factor
SUMMARY: On The Radio Factor, guest host Douglas Urbanski cited a December 18 segment from CNN's Lou Dobbs Tonight to support the assertion, which has been widely discredited, that "man-made climate change" is "one of the biggest lies of our time" and in doing so echoed several of the debunked claims and suggestions about global warming included in that CNN segment.
On the December 22 broadcast of Westwood One's The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly, guest host Douglas Urbanski cited a December 18 segment from CNN's Lou Dobbs Tonight to support the assertion, which has been widely discredited, that "man-made climate change" is "one of the biggest lies of our time" and in doing so echoed several of the debunked claims and suggestions about global warming included in that CNN segment.
As Media Matters for America noted, despite overwhelming evidence of human-caused global warming and warnings by experts that short-term weather conditions are not evidence for or against its existence, Lou Dobbs said during the introduction of his December 18 program: "And tonight, unusual winter storms are dumping snow in unusual places across Western states, and a huge snowstorm is headed toward the Northeast. This is global warming?" Echoing Dobbs during The Radio Factor, Urbanski asserted that "you look at the news today, we're certainly in a cooling trend," and specifically cited "snow in Las Vegas." As The New York Times reported on March 2, climate scientists -- including at least one who has disputed aspects of the scientific consensus on global warming -- completely reject the notion that short-term changes in weather, let alone individual storms, bear any relevance to the global warming debate.
Then, in support of his earlier assertion that "every single day I do a broadcast, there are about six more scientists who add their name to the thousands that say climate change is not man-made and what is happening is not man-made and global warming may not even be happening -- we may even be going into global cooling," Urbanski touted a guest who appeared on the Lou Dobbs Tonight segment: Heartland Institute senior fellow and science director Jay Lehr. Urbanski's assertion that "we may even be going into global cooling" echoed Lehr's December 18 assertion on CNN that "[t]he last 10 years have been quite cool." Yet, as Media Matters noted, according to NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, the 2008 meteorological year (December 2007 through November 2008) "was the ninth warmest year in the period of instrumental measurements, which extends back to 1880. The nine warmest years all occur within the eleven-year period 1998-2008." (GISS further states that "given our estimated error ... we can only say that 2008 probably ranks as somewhere between the 7th and 12th warmest year.) Moreover, the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's (IPCC) 2007 "Synthesis Report" concluded that "[w]arming of the climate system is unequivocal, as is now evident from observations of increases in global average air and ocean temperatures, widespread melting of snow and ice and rising global average sea level."
Urbanski later stated, "the fact is that there is no evidence that there is man-made climate change occurring." In fact, the IPCC report noted that "[t]he observed widespread warming of the atmosphere and ocean, together with ice mass loss, support the conclusion that it is extremely unlikely [less than a 5 percent chance] that global climate change of the past 50 years can be explained without external forcing and very likely that it is not due to known natural causes alone." The IPCC report further determined that "[m]ost of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely [defined in the report as a greater than 90 percent chance] due to the observed increase in anthropogenic [human-caused] GHG [greenhouse gas] concentrations." The IPCC's February 2007 Working Group I Report "The Physical Science Basis" similarly concluded that since 1750, "it is extremely likely [greater than a 95 percent chance] that humans have exerted a substantial warming influence on climate."
From the December 22 broadcast of Westwood One's The Radio Factor with Bill O'Reilly:
URBANSKI: We also have Obama's -- well, over the weekend, he's appointed some environmentalists. He's got more global warming lunacy that he wants to shove down your throat and my throat, all the while cloaking it in the idea that he wants diverse opinion, no matter how inconvenient. If -- meaning, in fact, that he doesn't want diverse opinion, and he doesn't want any inconvenient facts thrown in his face, because if he did, he would not be embracing this notion of global warming.
And you notice, as others have pointed out, that they've changed the words on this. The words on it are now "climate change." It is "climate change." And of course, it's man-made climate change. And it is a myth. It is a lie. It's one of the biggest lies of our time. We'll get to that as today's show goes on also.
[...]
URBANSKI: Obama said, quote, he will "once again put science at the top of his agenda." Let me tell you what he means by that. He will not put science at the top of his agenda; he will put convenient science at the top of his agenda. He will put science at the top of his agenda that goes along with a certain ideology. Ideology first with these people. Always remember that.
He said, Obama did, "Promoting science isn't just about providing resources. It's about protecting free and open inquiry." He means, in fact, just the opposite, that it is not about protecting free and open inquiry. He said it's about ensuring that facts and evidence are never twisted or obscured by politics or ideology when in fact, my friends, precisely what he is doing is twisting the facts and obscuring them by politics, by ideology. He said, Obama did in his weekly radio address, he said, "It's about listening to what our scientists have to say, even when it's inconvenient." In fact, he said, "Especially when it's inconvenient."
Well, President-elect Obama, there's a lot of inconvenient facts out there for you, folks, especially when it comes to climate change. They only want a type of view that is an opinion -- not science -- about climate change. And they have their political reasons for it. So he names this guy, his name is John Holdren, who's a physicist from Harvard's Kennedy School of Government, to be his science adviser. And Holdren, by the way, has talked about things that are way outside of science. He's one of these guys who weighs in on all sorts of issues because he's got the name "professor" -- he's got the title "professor" in front of him, so they're an expert on everything.
He -- for example, one of the things he's big on is calling for the U.S. to have a no-first-use policy when it comes to nuclear weapons. And to take nuclear retaliation off the table as a response to chemical or biological attacks, which of course, would be a disastrous thing for the United States government to do. But that's what this guy is a -- is a proponent of. So, as I'm looking at this story -- and I kid you not, and I've said this before -- every single day I do a broadcast, there are about six more scientists who add their name to the thousands that say climate change is not man-made and what is happening is not man-made and global warming may not even be happening -- we may even be going into global cooling.
Well, of course, you look at the news today, we're certainly in a cooling trend. And of course, they'll blame that on global warning, as The Associated Press did in their idiotic article by Seth Borenstein last week. It wasn't even an article; it was an editorial piece. So we've got, let's see -- from CNN there are three meteorologists -- OK, we've got CNN meteorologist Chad Myers. He, last week, said -- he's also an American Meteorological Society certified meteorologist, he's on CNN. He explains on the 18th of December that the whole idea of man-made climate change is arrogant and that mankind is in danger of dying from other natural events much more dangerous than global warming.
You've got snow in Las Vegas. You've got weather every place. You've got cold records being set. And you've got this guy, Chad Myers -- he is the second CNN meteorologist, by the way, to challenge global warming conventions. And, you know, then you get also on Lou Dobbs on CNN, Dr. Jay Lehr, and he is an expert on environmental policy. And he says that if you go back to the 13th century, we were probably seven degrees warmer than we are now. And he points out that was a very prosperous time for mankind. Big surprise. And he talks about how much cooler the Revolutionary War was than we are now. But that it's always a changing -- a changing issue. So you've got more scientists -- and I could spend hours boring you with how many scientists absolutely discredit and debunk this lie about global warming.
[...]
URBANSKI: So let me just get this straight. In a sort of 24-hour period -- maybe even hours -- Barack Obama embraces the mythology of climate change -- man-made climate change. He embraces the radicalism and appoints these radicals who support this theory and basically deny the completeness of the science, deny the overwhelming evidence that is fact -- the fact is that there is no evidence that there is man-made climate change occurring. And within hours of him appointing these radicals and saying to the American people that he wants to follow the science wherever it leads so that it's not twisted or obscured by politics or ideology when, in fact, he means precisely the opposite, that he wants to find the truth no matter how inconvenient it is including when it's inconvenient -- when in fact he doesn't want to find the truth on this at all.
Oh jeez. Here we go again, and cue our global warming deniers now I suppose...
Curse those loose leash laws.
All ready for a group of ignorant yet loud pontificators?
Perhaps they're buzy fornicators.
They'll be along now, any moment I'm sure.
My favorites are the links to Inhofe's website, or today's local weather report from the wingnuts hometown. Yes, it's cold in December.
I love those ones the best. For example, I live in the mountains of NC. Currently, it's cold outside. Imagine that eh?
Tell'em to come to New Orleans in August when your eyeballs feel like their melting... ;>)
...they're melting...
Take the names of those who say there's no global warming because it's cold. They'll be sure to convert next time it's hot.
It's dark outside. What's all this "sun" crap I keep hearing about? Typical Liberals, just making crap up as they go along, trying to push their agenda on us!
Oh yeah, the "sun" is reeeaaallly hot and reaaallly bright. Sure it is. So why is it so dark outside?
Maybe the reason for the meh response so far from the "global warming deniers", might be the fact that on the list of pressing priorities at the moment, chief among them the bleak economy with many very nervous Americans this Christmas season, that global warming, or the climate change "crisis" doesn't seem so critical right now in light of everything else.
Did you happen to see the other thread where there were like hundreds of responses mostly from deniers putting forth arguments, using, as the good Col. noted above, Inhofe's website, and weather reports from say, Maine that "proves" global warming doesn't exist.
Nah, I missed it.
Nah, I think they're just warming up.
Tommy, the response from the deniers is nowhere near "meh", it's a strident attack against any suggestion that human behavior may be affecting our climate, or that Americans may have to adjust any part of their lifestyle.
I don't think the new "no texting while driving" law that's coming up is a big deal compared to the economy, but I don't have a website denying that the law is going into effect at the beginning of the year, and I don't spend hours arguing that there's no such law.
Col, The strident attacks by deniers is only rivaled by the strident defenders; of course both sides of this debate have their passionate voices. My point was that this issue, as do most, has taken a sabbatical from "crisis" headline reporting it was during rosier economic times.
Whether hardline proponents or opponents like it or not, many are more worried about their own finances than who has the stronger evidence on this issue to promote their agendas.
your argument is fundamentally flawed in two ways. first, the deniers do not have science on their side. so while they may be just as "passionate", that does not make their argument equal. second, you are making the argument that fighting global warming must always cost something, so we have to wait for "rosier economic times" to return. in most cases, the opposite is true. raising mileage standards on cars is a win win situation. less pollution, less oil imports, and more money in the pocket of the person who owns the car.
Tommy, Merry Christmas, you are a class act on this site !!!!
Doris, That is a very nice thing to say, thank you. I gladly return the compliment. Best wishes to you and yours for a wonderful Christmas and a joyous 2009.
In fact, Best wishes all around, to everyone here, Happy Holidays!!
I'm here! It's not so much the global warming issue itself for me, it's the proposed hysteria that bothers me the most. I live in southern Nevada so I'm looking forward to a long, hot summer. Merry Christmas and happy new year.
Who's proposing hysteria?
See how you get tricked into being scared?
Ted Turner for one. The U.N. in general. Both do posess considerable influence. Was the second line a question or rhetorical statement? I'm not at all scared by the prospect of climate change, just in the way it's being handled by our government and media.
I have 6 inches of global warming on my driveway, the same as last winter and many before it. The last time we had a warm winter in Canada was 81/82 and it didn’t snow till April. Is this the “crisis” you hysterical Nancys want? Last year was the coldest winter in 12 years in Canada, I still pay big heating bills, fly to Fla. to get warm, enjoy great skiing, shovel the snow and wonder where this climate crisis is.
Do you warmies like wallowing in fear and misery? You hang on to this 23 year old theory, 19 years of IPCC predictions, scare our children to the point that they think won’t see their grand kids, make it a pollution issue despite Greenpeace celebrating the cleaner air we enjoy, use logic to prop up your doomsday love affair that a five year old could punch holes through, demonize any opposing view, arrogantly moralize the silly theory,
History will curse and laugh at the very thought of human monkeys dictating temperatures of planets.You enviros will be held responsible.
Me, I'm just going to cut down a live Christmas tree, burn wood in fireplace, drive my SUV to grandma's house and watch my children enjoy the celebration. Let it snow!
I do find your post refreshing and I will do the same and toast you one ice cold one !
Hear-hear, wolfman! Merry Christmas!
and if the kids inherit a world negatively affected by global warming, that's their problem.
But your moniker speaks of my attitude, me first, them last. Bah Humbug!
it's just a little takeoff on how kids go me first. whereas you, you pride yourself on being ignorant.
So much for your Christmas spirit.
NASA has disputes on the subject.
Yes but not that it is happening, and that we are contributing. Their disputes are all about how bad it is going to get, and how soon!
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2008/05/02/a_tale_of_two_thermometers/
At the top, let me say I am familiar with The Register; it is on a list of publications I check from time to time about technological issues. But that very familiarity enables me to say I do not regard it as an unbiased source on this topic.
It's also worth noting that eveything that author Steven Goddard has on the site is the same thing: nit-picking at data points, attempting to disprove global warming. In this case he essentially argues that NASA - more particularly, Dr. James Hansen - is deliberately falsifying data to indicate continued warming that doesn't exist. That is a very serious charge which of course he didn't dare make directly, but I defy anyone to read the article and reasonably conclude that such was not his intent.
By the way, back in August he used totally invalid methodology in a failed attempt to claim NASA had skewed data showing a large-scale loss of Arctic ice and got ruthlessly debunked by the very source he cited.
So neither the source nor the author can be considered unbiased on the issue. (In fact, there appears to be something of a mystery as to just who this Steven Goddard is.)
And last before getting to the article, in the Rrastro's comment we see again how the denialists pluck one single article out of one single source making one single claim about one set of data and tossing that up as if it were a crushing rejoinder.
With that, to the article:
First, the very link he cites about the study that "reignited the debate" about global warming by predicting a period of slightly cooler temperatures quotes the study as saying that a cyclical change in ocean currents would "temporarily offset the projected anthropogenic warming" for maybe a decade. (Emphasis added.) Despite Goddard's attempt to distort the finding, the authors are not predicting an end to global warming but only a stall in it. What's more, the authors themselves say they used "a simple approach" that only used one set of data.
(By the way, Nature is a peer-reviewed journal which has published other studies related to global warming. For example, in November, it had a study that indicated that the rise in carbon dioxide in the oceans "could increase the volume of oxygen-depleted 'dead zones' in tropical oceans by as much as 50% before the end of the century." In December, in "Nature Reports," is had an article on what's been learned about climate change in 2008. None of it is beneficial to Goddard's arguments.)
Then he compares graphs of temperature records done by the UK Meteorological Office's (popularly known simply as the Met) Hadley Center for Climate Studies and NASA, claiming the former the world is "not much warmer now than it was than it was in 1878 or 1941" while NASA's shows "worldwide temperatures increasing at a record pace - and nearly a full degree warmer than 1880." That is a patently deceptive description: The apparent difference in the slope of the graphs is due almost entirely to the difference in scale on the Y (vertical) axis. When you look at the actual numbers charted, you'll see that the Met's chart says the difference between 1940 and now is about 0.4 degrees and NASA's says it is about 0.45 degrees - and the difference between 1880 and now is about 0.7 degrees for the Met and 0.75 degrees for NASA. So according to Goddard, 0.7 degrees is much the same as an earlier figure but 0.75 degrees is a dramatic change.
He then challenges NASA's reevaluation of 70 years of earlier data by claiming it's statistically ridiculous, but he's the one that's absurd: "From a statistical viewpoint, data recalculation should cause each year to have a 50/50 probability of going either up or down." That's true if and only if any adjustments are correcting previous, randomly-distributed errors. If the need for such corrections arises from systematic error, there is no reason to assume a 50/50 distribution.
He can't even get the math right: He says the corrections show a 55/15 distribution toward what would show increased recent warming and says the odds against that are a trillion to one - only to have to admit it's actually about a millon to one; he was off by six orders of magnitude.
He can't even get the source right: It turns out the adjustments were made by an agency of NOAA, not NASA.
And all that is without even going to the second page.
Conclusion: The article is trash.
Footnote: Before Goddard or anyone else tries to use info from the Met again, they might check out its website, particularly its "Climate Change Facts."
Excellent post. May your days be merry and bright, and may all your Christmases be Light. (and with great relatives that don't fight ;-)
As most of the country digs out from this last "Global Warming" blast, I want to take the opportunity to wish each and every poster here the Merriest of Christmases and the Happiest of the New Year. May yours be a Holiday filled with families, friends and neighbors!
How about that? Snowing? In December? That global warming must be a farce.
Merry Christmas to you as well Oscar! And well, everyone else.
I'm saying what I have said somewhat tongue in cheek. We generally don't get snow right here until about mid-January and the "normal" (if there is such a thing) is only about 6-8" for the Winter and I'm currently looking at about 24"-30" in my front yard. But, hey, we are on the downside toward longer days and that is a plus, hate going to and from work in the dark.
Merry Christmas Oscar.
I should be joining the global warming deniers. I slipped on the ice this morning and broke my arm, but I'm not enough of a scientist to debate the experts who say that the earth is warming.
I'm not even smart enough to heed my wifes warning as she left for work today. She said "be careful the steps are icy". Boy am I going to hear it when she gets home.
Sorry to hear about the accident, King. Spent last Christmas Eve in the ER after slipping on a wet (not frozen) patch of concrete and tearing up a hand (no broken bones). Despite some of my posting, I do not deny that the climate may be changing, but my take is biased, of course, by my own personal experiences. We, in our little corner of the world, are not seeing record heating, summers in my youthful years were hotter than they are today. This winter, as of the present, has been colder and wetter than normal (and how do we define normal?). I'm somewhat skeptical than man has as much influence on what is happening as some of the global warming crowd. But I'm sure we will debate this (and other topics) in the new year. In the meantime, heal quickly and "watch the steps!"
merry christmas oscar. we frequently disagree, but you're always willing to keep it on a civil level.
I'm sure we will continue to disagree on certain topics, but I'm thankful we can do it without be disagreeable. Thanks also to you for keeping the discourse civil. Until the first of the year, take care and keep yourself surrounded with family and friends. Best wishes.
"And you notice, as others have pointed out, that they've changed the words on this. The words on it are now 'climate change.' It is 'climate change.'"
Because they have to make it clear to nitwits like Ubanski who don't know the difference between weather and climate.
Regardless, there's one article I found that references scientific papers dating back to the 1970's that refer to "climactic change" and "climate modification."
*Urbanski*
FoxNoise ......
oh.... nevermind.... I'm to damn cold to care
the warmest period in record was the 13th century and resulted in major population increase due to abunduce of foodstuffs in the americas and europe. The coldest was the 17th and 18th centuries. The end of the medieval warm period was probably due to a volcano. The start of the little ice age is attributed to a series of volcanic eruptions.
The climate is warmer than a hundred years ago...if you ignore instrument error which increases steeply as you go back in time and sampling differences which also change dramatically over time. Now we use highly accurate satellites and in the past the occasional thermometer or goverment weather station.
Maybe mankind is reasponsible but the historical record indicates natural forces such as solar variation may be just as responsible...unless you are part of the UN wanting ti make sure taht wealthy nations are punished for success or their minions.
In the end technology will allow us to cope.
Punished for sucess. Two words that can cover a lot of territory singly. The imagination can run rampet using them in combination. The UN's ability and desire to do so, you base on what?
Or their minions. Do they have like a secret handshake, matching vinyl jackets? I somhow invision a greasy haircut and a permenat slouch. Or do you get a better quality minion where you're from?
Oh sigh, the so-called "Medieval Warm Period" strikes again.
the warmest period in record was the 13th century
No, it wasn't. Period.
In fact, the MWP very likely did not exist except as a temporary reversal of an overall cooling trend, a reversal that was limited to parts of the Northern Hemisphere. And while there is some data that indicates that limited area might have been as warm then as it was in the early 20th century, about a hundred years ago, there is nothing to say it was anywhere near as warm as now. NOAA says "the late 20th and early 21st centuries are likely the warmest period the Earth has seen in at least 1200 years."
The 2001 IPCC report summarized current knowledge this way: "Current evidence does not support globally synchronous periods of anomalous cold or warmth over this time frame, and the conventional terms of 'Little Ice Age' and 'Medieval Warm Period' appear to have limited utility in describing trends in hemispheric or global mean temperature changes in past centuries"
Certainly we've learned a lot since then but it hasn't helped the skeptics. In fact, in October, at the 2008 Joint Meeting of The Geological Society of America, two geologists presented a paper arguing that "several glaciers in western North America were advancing during the Medieval Warm Period," which would mean either that it was actually cooler then than now or, as other evidence indicates, any warming was regional, not worldwide.
And should it be necessary to point out that whatever the precise truth of the climte of 700 years ago, we do not live 700 years ago? That the world we inhabit is nothing like medieval Europe and attempting to draw present-day sociological lessons about growth and plenty from that period is just downright silly?
technology will allow us to cope
It might help - that is, if it's technologies such as renewable energy and conservation.
Didn't you notice that he claimed the UN was trying to take our money? Don't you know that when someone claims a conspiracy without evidence, they win the argument? You've got a lot of learning to do, mister.
when someone claims a conspiracy without evidence, they win the argument
Do they? Oh dear, I hadn't known that. My bad.
You've got a lot of learning to do, mister.
Apparently so.
Lets go ahead and say for a moment that you are right... hell lets go ahead and say that global warming is a farce and an imaginary concept of those of us on the liberal left.... and we ignore completely the changes going on around us and that there really is not a thing we can do about it...
Now... even if we are to presume this scenerio... the fact that the coal and oil and paper-mills and food manufacturers and all the other industries that pump millions of pounds of carcinogens/deadly chemicals/etc into the air...
Would it not be in your best interest to want to at least put that to a stop?
Seriously... as I said above, lets assume that CO2 does nothing to the atmosphere or that the chemicals pumped into the air don't actually deplete the ozone layer that protevts us from the dealy rays of the sun...
Are you ok with the mercury in the water? the crude oil in our water? the benzine or chromium in our air?
Even if these things had nothing to do with global warming and it is just the Earth having a tantrum for a short stint...
Are you really ok with your kids breathing, drinking, or eating in all that unnecessary garbage that everyone knows hurts us??
The big boy industry that scum like Bush/Cheney or Rush defend and support want us all to believe that global warming is a farce so that they can continue to damage our bodies, forget the Earth for a moment, OUR BODIES... our kids bodies... all in the name of profit!
If this is what you want to defend... more power to ya pal... but your a fool if you keep doing so!!
One could start a separate debate regarding the effects and need to control individual pollutants, and what levels are actually harmful.
Getting back to the topic of climate change...
First, the planet was warming for a period of time. Even those of us who are labeled "deniers" reognize this. That period of warming, however, switched to cooling approximately 10 years ago.
More importantly, if the IPCC, Al Gore, Barack Obama, and all of the others who want to convince us that we (mankind) are causing this warming were actually interested in science, they would welcome the debate and if they were correct the debate would make their case stronger.
Instead, they choose to label us "skeptics", "deniers", or worse, and denegrate anyone who doesn't buy in to their story. That is not how one advances science; it is how one advances ideology.
There is no valid science in any of the "models" that have been constructed by the IPCC. They created models that assume increasing levels of atmospheric CO2 cause an increase in global temperature. What a surprise that when they run the models and they input an increasing level of CO2, the model shows the global temperature increases.
In fact, the opposite is true and anyone who has left a carbonated beverage to sit out too long knows it. Take any cabonated beverage and increase the temperature of it, and the CO2 bubbles away. The solubiliy of carbon dioxide in water goes down as the temperature goes up.
The models the global warming crowd hang their hat on have never predicted anything correctly. How can one believe they can predict the climate 50 or 100 years from now.Atmosopheric CO2 levels have continued to rise, yet temperatures are dropping. This is because the increasing CO2 is most likely a lagging effect of warming, not a cause. Just warm up your sparkling water, soda, or beer and watch the carbon dioxide bubble into the atmosphere. Planet warms a bit --> oceans warm a bit --> atmospheric carbon dioxide increases.
If you want to continue to believe that man is the cause of global warming, remember that every time you exhale, you are adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. And if we (mankind) could manage to cool the planet, that would mean fewer plants, smaller crops, less food. The warm cycles of the planet ar when life has flourished.
If anyone's interested here's a cogent read
http://www.andrewbostom.org/blog/2008/12/25/horse-hockey-climate-scientology-"getting-rid"-of-the-medieval-warming-period/
Sometimes I wonder if the denialists actually read and understand the sources they cite. The piece at the link at least cites more than one source, unusual for denialists, but it still for the most part uses data more than a decade old and trots out the standard accusations that anything showing global warming is "spurious" and "politicized," even fradulent, and exists solely to "fit some policy agendas." In short, global warming science is all part of some huge conspiracy.
You want fraudulent analysis? I'll show you fraudulent analysis. Look at Figures 3 and 4 at the link, designed to refute temperature data that challenged the idea of the MWP. Figure 3 is the original graph of the data. Figure 4 is a supposed "correction" of the data with a label pointing to peaks in the year 1400-1500 range reading "20th century no longer highest." But note that Figure 4, the "corrected" version, stops at 1950. If it had included the remaining 50 years of the century, as Figure 3 did with numbers based on actual temperature readings, the 20th century still would have been warmer even after the "corrections."
That is another trick of the denialists: Picking whatever time frame is convenient for them: You want to say it was warmer at some time in the past? Just ignore the last 50 years of data.
The corrections themselves are interesting: Our other denialist here linked to a piece that challenged corrections to earlier data on the grounds that most of them pointed to increased evidence for global warming and that, he insisted, was statistically absurd. Yet here we have a case where every claimed correction runs in one direction, that of proving the existence of a MWP. So we have two cases trying to deny global warming, the second of which uses an argument the first calls ridiculous.
(I also can't help but notice that the "corrections" for the period in question seem to consist mostly of running across the top of the larger error bars on the original graph.)
My earlier statement stands: "The MWP very likely did not exist except as a temporary reversal of an overall cooling trend, a reversal that was limited to parts of the Northern Hemisphere. And while there is some data that indicates that limited area might have been as warm then as it was in the early 20th century, about a hundred years ago, there is nothing to say it was anywhere near as warm as now."
The author of the linked piece blandly asserts that the MWP is "a well-established phenomenon ... during which global temperature conditions were warmer than those at present," but since that is exactly what is as issue, it can't be taken seriously any more than his use of an IPCC graph from 1996 (Funny how the IPCC becomes a reliable source when it serves his ends.) since the climate study he spends the rest of the time trying to shoot down postdates that graph.
A few last things:
- The first source cited, Dr. David Deming, is a notorious anti-global warming fanatic who considers global warming "pseudo-scientific mumbo-jumbo" and the very concept of environmentalism "anti-scientific." He is associated with two rightwing think tanks and he has been blessed with op-ed space in the Washington Times and Investors Business Daily.
- The committee before which he testified was chaired at the time by Sen. James Inhofe, whose views on global warming I expect you know. The hearing was held for the specific and avowed purpose of getting testimony from every skeptic Inhofe could find. During his testimony, Deming actually argued that humans should emit more carbon dioxide as a hedge against a future ice age.
- Finally, the blogger himself, one Andrew Bostom, is a rightwing hack who is a frequent contributor to American Thinker and to David Horowitz's FrontPageMag which I almost typed as FrontPageRag but decided against it. Bostom is best known for writing books devoted to "proving" that Islam is both inherently anti-Semitic and permanently devoted to brutal, violent conquering of non-Muslims. Right before the linked post he called the naming of John Holdren as Obama's chief science adviser "Climate Scientology Jihad" that "puts our economy and our security at risk" and insisted we need more "energy development (coal, natural gas, oil) now." (Emphasis in original.)
Sort of a self-reinforcing circle jerk of denialists. One I find quite unpersuasive.
I need to clarify something:
Our other denialist here linked to a piece that challenged corrections to earlier data on the grounds that most of them pointed to increased evidence for global warming and that, he insisted, was statistically absurd.
The "he" in that sentence refers to the author of the linked piece, not the commenter here.
Makes one wonder why they work so hard to be in denial...perhaps:
they're stubborn; they're willfull, and they don't give a d*mn.