Hmmmmm, Weather Reports Now Classified as Political News?

This popped into my news reader, but what I found odd was where the story was posted at on Yahoo News.

NOAA: El Nino changes in Pacific getting stronger

Nothing odd about the headline, but rather where they put it. In the politics section.

A Freudian slip? A sneak peek at the future of weather reporting?

I guess this is just another example of how politicized the debate over AGW, man-made climate change has gotten.

Global Warming Now Blamed For Low Winds

For the love of Pete, can we just stop all of the frickin global warming is to blame for everything nonsense. Now there is an article out saying that winds are decreasing in velocity and global warming is to blame. I. Kid. You. Not.

The wind, a favorite power source of the green energy movement, seems to be dying down across the United States. And the cause, ironically, may be global warming — the very problem wind power seeks to address.

The idea that winds may be slowing is still a speculative one, and scientists disagree whether that is happening. But a first-of-its-kind study suggests that average and peak wind speeds have been noticeably slowing since 1973, especially in the Midwest and the East.

Now there is no scientific proof to back this up, just like most everything else related to the global warming/climate change mass hysteria that has sweep the liberal dream world.

Of course this is not going to stop the enviro Nazis from continuing their plans to build wind farms everywhere but where it might spoil the view of the Kennedys. Reliance on undependable energy sources doesn't matter, as long as they get rid of oil, nuclear, and coal power. You know sources whose quantity can be measured and is reliable.

Hey wind power is great as something to augment existing proven energy sources, but they want to make it a primary source. For some reason these people have slipped off the 'smart grid'.

The study is going to be released and parts like these will of course be ignored by those wanting to push their agenda.

The ambiguity of the results is due to changes in wind-measuring instruments over the years, according to Pryor. And while actual measurements found diminished winds, some climate computer models — which are not direct observations — did not, she said.

And

One of the problems Pryor acknowledges with her study is that over many years, changing conditions near wind-measuring devices can skew data. If trees grow or buildings are erected near wind gauges, that could reduce speed measurements.

Kind of like the same problem they have with all of their temperature gauges they rely on that have been found to sitting in parking lots, next to exhaust shafts, and various other places which render the readings worthless.

Climate Change Luddites Seek to Shut Down New Coal-Fired Plant

Apparently these know-nothings would prefer we all live back in the stone age, a place where their warped ideology resides.

Why the media insists on giving these idiots attention is beyond me. They desperately need psychiatric evaluation, if anything.

They sure do know how to play the fear card, though.

Climate change activists have threatened to break the law as they gather this weekend for a week-long protest camp at the proposed site of a new coal-fired power station.

The protesters aim to shut down the coal-fired plant already in operation on the site at Kingsnorth, Kent, and block the construction of the new £1.5 billion facility.

The new power station would be the first coal-fired plant in the UK for more than 30 years and owners E.ON say it will be cleaner than the facility it is replacing.

But opponents, including the former Government chief scientist Professor Sir David King, say that no new power stations burning coal should be permitted unless they are fitted with carbon capture and storage (CCS) technology which prevents the release into the atmosphere of carbon dioxide (CO2), one of the main greenhouse gases blamed for global warming.

Patrick Gillett, a protester taking part at Climate Camp, told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme this morning: “It is about direct action outside the camp. We will break the law or do whatever needs to take place to stop E.ON peacefully from profiting from climate change. Last year they made £4.2 billion in profit from creating climate change.

“We are planning to shut the coal-fired power station down and we are planning to come back when they create a new coal-fired power station, because we are the last generation that can do it and if we don’t then there is no future for any of us.”

Not much future for your either walking around with your head up your ass.

CA Continues to Promote Policies to Drive Non-Millionaires Away

CA, who for so long has fostered all kinds of left wing special interest causes to fester and grow within it's borders and in fact enables all the special interest groups to dictate so much of the rules and laws in CA, is once again looking to institute some regulations in their latest attempt to save the planet.

Nichols declined to speculate on what the program will cost for individual business sectors such as the utility industry, but said the initiatives overall should benefit the state's economy by about 1 percent starting in 2020.

"Since most of the measures in this plan are designed to make our state more energy-efficient, we believe we can predict with confidence that this is a plan that works to the benefit of the California economy," Nichols said.

Excuse me while I apply some liberal logic to argue with Ms Nichols. Since we won't see any benefit for more then 10 years why should we permit it. That is the argument they use to block drilling for oil, so what is good for the goose is good for the gander.
CA continues to pursue all these onerous rules on businesses, that quite a lot of businesses have finally had enough and leaving the state. The price of doing business is just too expensive, not only in terms of money, but also in terms of time spent trying to abide by all the rules and regulations in the state. Companies leave, corporate tax base goes with them, individuals can no longer afford to live in the state so they also move on. Some follow their company, others merely move to neighboring states. California's tax base continues to shrink, their social programs bills continue to increase, and all of those millionaire Hollywood continue to slap most average Americans in the face calling us all kinds of vile names and playing the guilt trip card to try and get us to bend to their will.
A sane person would look at the price of goods in CA, from gas to groceries, and instantly conclude that whatever they are doing we certainly don't want to repeat it. In the business world the phrase is called "best practices". You mimic what works and discard what doesn't.
Oh yeah the Reuters headline was priceless also. California unveils ambitious climate plan Unproven conclusions, based on junk science, guiding government policy is going to change the climate how? I think my headline more accurately describes the story. And notice they have dropped the phrase Global Warming in favor of the now in vogue climate change, previously known as the four seasons.

What's An Enviro Wacko To Do?

Earlier this year, the Swiss came out with their silly ruling regarding “The Dignity of Living Beings with Regard to Plants,”, in which they decided that the arbitrary killing of flora is morally wrong.

So what are you to do if you are a global warming apostle and believe that different trees need to be planted even though there is not one shred of scientific evidence that one tree is better then the other, but in order to do this you must cull the existing trees out of the forest?

Cutting down the aspens would cause new sprouts to multiply, so scientists instead use a technique called "girdling," in which they strip a band of bark from around each tree. It starves the trees by preventing sugars produced by the leaves from traveling to the roots.

In recent weeks, crews have girdled more than 6,700 trees - mostly aspens, with some birches - near one of the measuring towers. They should die in a year or two, allowing other species to flourish.

This silliness is going on in Michigan.

"Are you so sure you can tell us how much carbon is saved from your tree? That's the kind of question that makes people dubious about forest management" as a tool for limiting greenhouse gases, Pershing said.

Curtis and Vogel can't say yet how much carbon the new blend of trees will absorb, but they hope to find out.

So all you folks buying your carbon credits and having companies plant trees in a feel good attempt to assuage your guilty conscience about climate change have just another piece of evidence that points to you being a sucker.

I wonder how that will look on a bumper sticker: Starve a tree for global warming.

What Color is the Sky in Your World?

More "climate change" silliness from Australia.

SCIENTIST Tim Flannery has proposed a radical solution to climate change which may change the colour of the sky.

But he says it may be necessary, as the "last barrier to climate collapse."

Professor Flannery says climate change is happening so quickly that mankind may need to pump sulphur into the atmosphere to survive.

Australia's best-known expert on global warming has updated his climate forecast for the world - and it's much worse than he thought just three years ago.

He has called for a radical suite of emergency measures to be put in place.

The gas sulphur could be inserted into the earth's stratosphere to keep out the sun's rays and slow global warming, a process called global dimming.

"It would change the colour of the sky," Prof Flannery told AAP.

"It's the last resort that we have, it's the last barrier to a climate collapse.

"We need to be ready to start doing it in perhaps five years time if we fail to achieve what we're trying to achieve."

Now it's down to five years. I hope the reporters revisits this loon in 2013 to see what he has to say at that time.

Oh, Now They Tell Us: Global Warming Could Stop Naturally Within 10 Years

Not that I ever bought into the scam to begin with.

Global warming may stop over the next decade because of natural climate cooling, scientists now claim.

German scientists behind the study have warned Governments looking to save money not to use it as an excuse to cut back on preventative action.

Noel Keenlyside, a climate researcher at the Leibniz Institute of Marine Sciences in Germany who led the study, said: "The natural variations change climate on this timescale and policy makers may either think mitigation is working or that there is no global warming at all."

Climate researchers have long predicted more greenhouse gases in the atmosphere would spur a general warming trend over the next 100 years.

But the latest research study in the journal Nature claim natural variations will overwhelm any human warming effects in the short-term.

The German team made a computer model that takes into account natural phenomena such as sea surface temperatures and ocean circulation patterns.

They checked their work by producing a set of forecasts using data recorded over the past 50 years and found the retrospective forecasts were accurate.

Mr Keenlyside said: "This is important because policies are made in the short term.

"Our results show we might not have as much change in climate over the next 10 years."

The incredibly wealthy noted climatologist Algore was unavailable for comment.

Thanks to Ace for the link!

Latest Grim News: Global Warming Will Increase AIDS Cases

At least they're being creative. I have to admit I hadn't heard this one yet.

CLIMATE change is the latest threat to the world's growing HIV epidemic, say Australian experts who warn of the "grim" outlook in the fight against the infectious disease.

A leading professor of health and human rights, Daniel Tarantola, has cautioned that global warming will indirectly make citizens of developing countries even more vulnerable to death and severe ill health from HIV/AIDS.

"It was clear soon after the emergence of the HIV epidemic that discrimination, gender inequality and lack of access to essential services have made some populations more vulnerable than others,'' said Prof Tarantola, of the University of NSW.

Of course we've poured untold billions into fighting AIDS and HIV. But of course, it's never enough. Now they're working in some food shortage hysteria.

They're playing on our fears!

Those problems had not gone away, he said, and today extra threats were lurking on the horizon "as the global economic situation deteriorates, food scarcity worsens and climate change begins to affect those who were already dependent on survival economies''.

"Climate change will trigger a chain of events which is likely to increase the stress on society and result in higher vulnerability to diseases including HIV,'' said Prof Tarantola, due to address an HIV forum in Sydney tonight.

Prominent HIV scientist Professor David Cooper, director of the National Centre in HIV Epidemiology and Clinical Research, agreed environmental change would have a negative impact on HIV sufferers.

"Climate change will lead to food scarcity and poorer nutrition, putting people with perilous immune systems at more risk of dying of HIV, as well as contracting and transmitting new and unusual infections,'' Prof Cooper said.

"And this would effect Australia too, because these infections could potentially spread. Just look at the horror that SARS and avian flu have caused.''

The specialist said the HIV landscape was grim, with 16,000 new infections worldwide each day and the failure of research to produce a much-needed cure or vaccine.

He echoed the deep pessimism of 35 top British and US scientists who predicted this week that a vaccine would be at least 10 years and maybe even 20 years away.

"It's a pretty grim situation,'' Prof Cooper said.

Thanks to Ace for the link.

Reader CoquimboJoe passed along this link of things allegedly caused by global warming. Well, we have a new addition.

UN Using Climate Change Hoax as Pretext for Income Redistribution

To no surprise, the socialists at the U.N. are planning on using "climate change" as a pretext for international income redistribution.

The global fight against climate change after the Kyoto pact expires will fail unless rich countries can come up with creative ways to finance clean development by poorer nations, a U.N. official said on Saturday.

"We are not going to see that major developing country engagement unless significant financial resources and technology flows begin to be mobilized," Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said in a media briefing.

De Boer and Katherine Sierra, World Bank Vice President for Sustainable Development, said they were studying a long list of financing schemes and proposals and were hopeful of meeting an end-2009 deadline.

What a communist/socialist dream! Take the variation in the earth's surface temperature due to whatever reason, label it, and then and use that as a license to legally take money from "rich countries" (code for "the U.S.") and hand it out to other countries as they see fit. The beauty of this from the socialist standpoint is there is no end to this money stream. You can punish success around the world plus make yourself very rich and powerful by having grantee's obligated to you for their handouts. And if you don't knuckle under and worship at the feet of the U.N., some official there punishes you by deciding that you are "rich" and have to pay some assessment.

Somewhere, Uncle Joe Stalin is smiling.

Climate Change Calamity: Beer the Next Victim

This truly is grim news. I've been a skeptic for far too long, but this could have serious lifestyle implications.

BEER will be short supply, more expensive and may taste different as climate change affects barley production, a scientist says.

Drought conditions in parts of Australia where malting barley was grown was likely to get worse, according to Jim Salinger of New Zealand's National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research.

Barley production in the main growing region of Canterbury in New Zealand - where brewing giant Lion Nathan gets about 70 per cent of its malted barley - would also be affected, the New Zealand Press Association said.

"It will mean either there will be pubs without beer or the cost of beer will go up," he said.

Malting barley production in Australia was likely to be hit hard in parts of Western Australia, South Australia, Victoria and NSW.

The dry areas of Australia would become drier and water shortages would get worse.

"It will provide a lot of challenges for the brewing industry," Dr Salinger said.

On the upside, there's apparently no evidence this will affect North American brewing capacity.

Thanks to Hot Air for the link.

Inconvenient Truth: Global Warming Ended Ten Years Ago

Despite the more hysterical predictions we've heard of late, the evidence continues to mount that if the earth was warming, it stopped quite some time ago.

Of course, don't expect this fact to be widely reported, if it indeed even makes it into any U.S. newspapers or television broadcasts.

CATASTROPHIC predictions of global warming usually conjure with the notion of a tipping point, a point of no return.

Last Monday - on ABC Radio National, of all places - there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs. Anyone in public life who takes a position on the greenhouse gas hypothesis will ignore it at their peril.

Duffy asked Marohasy: "Is the Earth still warming?"

She replied: "No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you'd expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years."

Duffy: "Is this a matter of any controversy?"

Marohasy: "Actually, no. The head of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has actually acknowledged it. He talks about the apparent plateau in temperatures so far this century. So he recognises that in this century, over the past eight years, temperatures have plateaued ... This is not what you'd expect, as I said, because if carbon dioxide is driving temperature then you'd expect that, given carbon dioxide levels have been continuing to increase, temperatures should be going up ... So (it's) very unexpected, not something that's being discussed. It should be being discussed, though, because it's very significant."

Duffy: "It's not only that it's not discussed. We never hear it, do we? Whenever there's any sort of weather event that can be linked into the global warming orthodoxy, it's put on the front page. But a fact like that, which is that global warming stopped a decade ago, is virtually never reported, which is extraordinary."

Duffy then turned to the question of how the proponents of the greenhouse gas hypothesis deal with data that doesn't support their case. "People like Kevin Rudd and Ross Garnaut are speaking as though the Earth is still warming at an alarming rate, but what is the argument from the other side? What would people associated with the IPCC say to explain the (temperature) dip?"

Marohasy: "Well, the head of the IPCC has suggested natural factors are compensating for the increasing carbon dioxide levels and I guess, to some extent, that's what sceptics have been saying for some time: that, yes, carbon dioxide will give you some warming but there are a whole lot of other factors that may compensate or that may augment the warming from elevated levels of carbon dioxide.

"There's been a lot of talk about the impact of the sun and that maybe we're going to go through or are entering a period of less intense solar activity and this could be contributing to the current cooling."

Al Gore? Any reaction? Hello? Anyone home?

If Marohasy is anywhere near right about the impending collapse of the global warming paradigm, life will suddenly become a whole lot more interesting.

A great many founts of authority, from the Royal Society to the UN, most heads of government along with countless captains of industry, learned professors, commentators and journalists will be profoundly embarrassed. Let us hope it is a prolonged and chastening experience.

Wishful thinking, perhaps. More like they'll just change the subject. One thing about proponents of the global warming scam is they'll never admit they were wrong. They'd never be able to regain any credibility, so don't wait around for them to admit they were incorrect.

With catastrophe off the agenda, for most people the fog of millennial gloom will lift, at least until attention turns to the prospect of the next ice age. Among the better educated, the sceptical cast of mind that is the basis of empiricism will once again be back in fashion. The delusion that by recycling and catching public transport we can help save the planet will quickly come to be seen for the childish nonsense it was all along.

The poorest Indians and Chinese will be left in peace to work their way towards prosperity, without being badgered about the size of their carbon footprint, a concept that for most of us will soon be one with Nineveh and Tyre, clean forgotten in six months.

We should only be so fortunate.

The scores of town planners in Australia building empires out of regulating what can and can't be built on low-lying shorelines will have to come to terms with the fact inundation no longer impends and find something more plausible to do. The same is true of the bureaucrats planning to accommodate "climate refugees".

Penny Wong's climate mega-portfolio will suddenly be as ephemeral as the ministries for the year 2000 that state governments used to entrust to junior ministers. Malcolm Turnbull will have to reinvent himself at vast speed as a climate change sceptic and the Prime Minister will have to kiss goodbye what he likes to call the great moral issue and policy challenge of our times.

It will all be vastly entertaining to watch.

I wonder what those who called the truth-tellers deniers will have to say?

How about those who characterized skeptics as being on par with Holocaust deniers?

What will they have to say?

Likely nothing. In fact, we'll still see apocalyptic stories of impending doom, with reports how global warming is hastening the arrival of spring, despite cool temperatures across much of the United States.

If a basic tenet of media responsibility is to report the facts as they are, we would see an even-handed debate citing global warming proponents and skeptics. Yet the overwhelming amount of reportage we see leans decidedly to the side of the proponents, while skeptics are dismissed.

The shame is the public is being misled and the media will lose more credibility if their doomsday scenarios don't pan out. In fact, I'd suggest the hysteria will be getting worse over time, what with one report even suggesting now that global warming may be responsible for earthquakes.

The cost to the public may be even greater as a result of legislation forcing overly ambitious controls over carbon dioxide emissions which in the end may do little or nothing.

Crossposted at NewsBusters.

UPI gets memo on global warming Climate Change

A while back we started hearing the news that the media was going to start changing the way it referenced Al Gore's scam, substituting the phrase Climate Change for Global Warming, and in light of the conference in NYC this week that really debunked a lot of the hype and hysteria of global warming, it would appear that the new concept is taking off.

Here is the headline of a UPI story on climate change in Canada.

Climate change reported grim for Canada

The story has the usual dire predictions of the end of the world, penguins laying down with polar bears, jihadists converting to Christianity. You know, all the usual Armageddon stuff; but there is one bright spot.

"I'm told by some wine enthusiasts in the country that we'll have even better wines coming from southern British Columbia and the Niagara area as we get warmer, hotter summers in those parts," he told the CBC.

So are they saying that basically their climate is going to be like France?

Let's hope that doesn't come with the cuisine and attitude.

Obnoxious Nanny-Stater: Global Warming = Terrorism

Yes, he's ready for the presidential stage.

Good grief, he's sounding more like Algore by the day.

While he acknowledged that scientists are unable to predict its consequences, Mayor Bloomberg yesterday compared the scourge of global warming to the threat of terrorism and the proliferation of weapons of mass destruction. Although it is a "long-term" fight, he said, reducing gas emissions may save the life of "everybody" on the planet, the same way that fighting terrorism and its proliferation saves lives in shorter terms.

Addressing a U.N. climate change conference, the mayor also announced a new plan to reduce the use of tropical hardwoods by New York City and told delegates that the city plans to host a meeting in June of leaders from 20 major world cities to discuss ways for the largest municipalities to reduce global warming. Other participants in the conference called for a "war" against climate change, in which the United Nations would serve as a front-line combatant.

Why, I find that term war offensive and aggressive. Couldn't we call it something else? Maybe slapfight?

Mr. Bloomberg renewed his call, made first late last year, for taxing countries such as America that emit large amounts of carbons, which are believed to cause changes in the planet's climate. "So long as there's no penalty or cost involved in producing greenhouse gases, there will be no incentive" to meet targets set by international institutions, the mayor told the General Assembly. "For that reason, I believe the U.S. should enact a tax on carbon emissions.

"Terrorists kill people. Weapons of mass destruction have the potential to kill an enormous amount of people," Mr. Bloomberg told reporters after addressing the U.N. General Assembly, but "global warming in the long term has the potential to kill everybody."

There you have it folks, from the ultimate in nanny-state politicians. Forget the fact Islamic extremists want to wipe us all out.

It's junk science that we have to fear.

We've evolved from we have nothing to fear but fear itself to we have nothing to offer but fear itself.

Like smoking, Mr. Bloomberg said, these are preventable killers. "We should go after terrorists every place in this world, find them and kill them, plain and simple," he said. If weapons of mass destruction "get out of the hands of the countries that have them and get into the hands of terrorists, the potential is just mind-boggling," he added. And while global warming "is a much longer-term thing," he said, it "has all of the same potentials of destroying the planet that we live on. No scientist knows for sure what's going to happen, but you don't want to wait to find out."

Hot Air links. Thanks!

Despite Coming Ice Age, Poor Will Be Hardest Hit by Global Warming

As noted here earlier, despite the caterwauling and hysteria, we could see another ice age before long.

Still, no amount of evidence will stop the clowns at the UN from shaking everyone down in order to aid the wretched refuse of the earth in coping with the dreaded global warming climate change.

The developed world should help poor countries brace for global warming by assisting them in taking steps like restoring coastal forests and training health care workers, the head of the U.N.'s climate panel said.

Recognizing that climate change may be hard to reverse, experts are now examining "adaptation," or how to deal with potential catastrophes such as rising seas as a result of melting glaciers.

"In the developing countries it's critical we think of combining mitigation measures with adaptation measures," said Rajendra Pachauri, head of the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change that shared the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with former U.S. Vice President Al Gore.

"We know extremes of temperatures are going to go up, now we have to adapt to them," he said at a climate panel at Columbia University late on Wednesday.

Uh, actually, we don't know that.

The United Nations agreed to start an adaptation fund for poor countries last month at climate talks in Bali, Indonesia. It comprises only about $36 million, but might rise to as much as $5 billion a year by 2030 if investments in green technology in developing countries increase.

Maybe guys like Pachauri and Gore can start contributing by waiving their speaking fees and stop jetting around the world on the public dime.

They may also want to start paying attention to those who don't agree with them and actually look at the data available that doesn't concur with their opinions.

Manbearpig: Climate change 'significantly worse' than feared

Of course, this bloated oaf needs to make sure he uses the term climate change, especially when most of the country is in the dead of winter, with subzero weather across the nation.

Really though, is anyone outside the fawning press taking him seriously any more?

Climate change is occurring far more rapidly than even the worst predictions of the UN's Nobel Prize-winning scientific panel on climate change, Al Gore said on Thursday.

Recent evidence shows "the climate crisis is significantly worse and unfolding more rapidly than those on the pessimistic side of the IPCC projections had warned us," climate campaigner and former US vice-president Gore said.

There are now forecasts that the North Pole ice caps may disappear entirely during summer months within five years, he told a gathering at the World Economic Forum in Davos.

Naturally, the story doesn't provide any evidence to support his absurd claims.

Of course, once 2013 rolls around, these gross exaggerations will never be revisited and Gore will never be held accounatble for his outlandish claims, all made, of course, while handsomely lining his pockets at the expense of the gullible.

Global Warming Scam to Cost EU $100 Billion

Naturally, it's referred to now as climate change. You can also bet your last dollar that this $100 billion figure will wind up being a fraction of what actually gets spent in the long run.

And, of course, it won't matter one bit.

So when we get to the year 2020, and nothing has been accomplished for the enormous sum spent, we'll be told it wasn't enough.

EUROPEAN Union plans to cut greenhouse gas emissions could cost at least €60 billion ($99.88 billion) a year, European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said today.

"Taking action is not cost free, although we think we can limit the cost of our proposals to around 0.5 per cent of gross domestic product," he said, according to remarks prepared for delivery in London.

Mr Barroso's total estimate, which will apply for the next 12 years, counts on the 27 EU nations undertaking all the commission's recommendations, in a package to be unveiled Wednesday, in an extremely cost efficient manner.

The bill for reducing carbon dioxide emissions by 20 per cent by 2020, compared to 1990 levels - the baseline goal of EU leaders - was previously estimated to be 1.0 per cent of European GDP, or €120 billion ($199.75 billion) a year.

EU leaders agreed in March last year that this target was the best way to contain global warming to less than two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, as recommended by UN climate experts.

On the positive side, Mr Barroso said: "Our proposals should reduce Europe's reliance on imported gas and oil by around €50 billion ($83.23 billion) by 2020. These are figures with a real impact on our growth and prosperity".

He said the cost of inaction, as calculated by one of his key climate advisers, "could even approach 20 per cent of GDP.
The longer we delay, the higher the costs of adaptation and mitigation".

The commission's package aims to strengthen the EU's emissions trading system, set targets for renewable energy use and review rules on national aid for environmental purposes.

When the bloc's leaders set their goals last year, they offered to go 10 per cent better than their own target, cutting emissions by 30 per cent over the same period if others were prepared to match it, as an incentive to major polluters.

They also set a binding target for renewable energy to provide 20 per cent of Europe's needs by 2020, compared to 8.5 per cent currently, and agreed that this should be achieved by some countries doing more than others.

But less than a year later, many EU countries - not to mention industry - have criticised the package they had asked the commission to draw up to reach their goals as either being too costly or too damaging to certain sectors.

With this mystical ability to control the weather, why can't they simply snap their fingers and make it so?

Meanwhile, in other globwarm news, the Swedes will now be joining the Canadians in studying the devastating effects of bovine belching.

I kid you not.

A Swedish university has received $590,000 in research funds to measure the greenhouse gases released when cows belch.

About 20 cows will participate in the project run by the Swedish University for Agricultural Sciences in Uppsala, about 40 miles north of Stockholm, officials said Monday.

Cattle release methane, a greenhouse gas believed to contribute to global warming, when they digest their food.

Ratcheting Up the Climate Hysteria

Now it's "unequivocal" and will have "abrupt and irreversible" impacts.

Forget the fact this is a total scam; these nitwits have an agenda, and no amount of facts can stop them.

A UN panel has agreed a landmark report on climate change, and says the world must act hastily to prevent the worst predicted effects coming to pass.

After arduous talks in Valencia, Spain, scientists agreed a document they hope will shape debate on the next phase of the fight against climate change.

It declared the fact of global warming "unequivocal", and said it may bring "abrupt and irreversible" impacts.

The text will be officially launched by UN chief Ban Ki-moon on Saturday.

Delegates to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) summarised thousands of pages of scientific analysis, bringing together elements of the three reports already released this year, on the science of climate change, impacts and adaptation, and options for mitigating the problem.

"This is the strongest report yet by the IPCC - but says that there is still time to act," Bill Hare, an Australian climate scientist and one of the authors, told Reuters.

Among the report's top-line conclusions are that climate change is "unequivocal", that humankind's emissions of greenhouse gases are more than 90% likely to be the main cause, and that impacts can be reduced at reasonable cost.

A reasonable cost? Sure. And guess who's going to foot the bill for this farce?

UPDATE: More here. Just what the people need: Another tax to fund this scam.

H/T: RadicalRon.

Good News: Global Warming Helps Rainforests

Actually, they're known as jungles, but ever since we immersed ourselves in PC psychobabble, the jungles became known as rainforests.

Whatever the case, this report notes how global warming, er, climate change, actually is helping the jungles grown more lush.

Of course, it also comes with ominous warnings.

Climate change may lead to lush growth rather than catastrophic tree loss in the Amazonian forests, researchers from the US and Brazil have found. A study, in the journal Science, found that reduced rainfall had led to greener forests, possibly because sunlight levels are higher when there are fewer rainclouds.

Shocking how there's more sunlight when there are fewer clouds. I wouldn't believe it, but the experts say it's so.

Still, there's a big but coming.

But scientists cautioned that while the finding raises hopes for the survival of the forests, there are still serious threats. Climate models have suggested that the forests will suffer as the region becomes drier and will release huge quantities of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere.

Prehistoric Climate Change

Baby Mammoth Discovery Unveiled

A baby mammoth unearthed in the permafrost of north-west Siberia could be the best preserved specimen of its type, scientists have said.

Wonderful. At the end of the article you find this:

Mammoths first appeared in the Pliocene Epoch, 4.8 million years ago.

What caused their widespread disappearance at the end of the last Ice Age remains unclear; but
climate change, overkill by human hunters, or a combination of both could have been to blame.

What? Do my eyes deceive me? Climate change do they say?

But, but, but how could that have happened way back then without fossil fuels being burned or evil Republicans in the White House to casue it? There must have been some real monster SUV's those cavemen were driving back then.

Bad News Mounts For Goracle

First, his son gets busted again, then we find out people are becoming more skeptical to his alarmist bloviations, and now his much-hyped Live Earth concerts Saturday are running into some problems.

Rio may cancel Live Earth gig on safety worries

Brazilian organizers of the Rio de Janeiro leg of the Live Earth global concerts were trying to convince authorities on Wednesday not to cancel the Saturday show due to security concerns.

The Rio state prosecutor's office said earlier there were not enough police to safeguard the climate change awareness concert on Copacabana beach as all security efforts would be concentrated on preparations for the Pan American Games, starting July 13.

Police have stepped up operations against drug gangs in Rio's slums in the run-up to the Games. Last week, they raided a slum on the city outskirts, killing about 20 people after a long siege of the area in which two dozen people had been killed and more than 60 wounded since May.

A real quagmire in and around Rio.

A cancellation would be embarassing for city officials who hope the events will showcase Rio's legendary charms instead of exposing its rampant crime.

Rio has one of the highest murder rates in the world, with a toll comparable to some war zones. At least 1,800 people were killed in the first four months of 2007 in the metropolitan area, official figures show.

Meanwhile, Rio isn't exactly the only trouble spot for this silly exercise in self-congratulations.

Last month, Istanbul was dropped from the list cities set to hold the concerts because of a lack of interest and security concerns. Ticket sales have been slow for most Live Earth shows and organizers had to shift venues in Johannesburg in a bid to improve sales.

UPDATE: The Rio show is canceled (via Hot Air).