Acclaimed Polar Bear Researcher Has "Integrity Issues"

Who'd have thunk it? The guy who wrote up the report of dead polar polar bears in the water that was cited extensively by Al Gore and used by enviro wackos everywhere to pressure the planet to panic over global warming seems to have some integrity issues.

A federal wildlife biologist whose observation in 2004 of presumably drowned polar bears in the Arctic helped to galvanize the global warming movement has been placed on administrative leave and is being investigated for scientific misconduct, possibly over the veracity of that article.

Charles Monnett, an Anchorage-based scientist with the U.S. Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement, or BOEMRE, was told July 18 that he was being put on leave, pending results of an investigation into "integrity issues."

There was another scientist that accompanied Monnett on the study which was conducted in 2004 named Gleason. While he doesn't dispute the 4 dead polar bears he does dispute the cause.

According to a transcript, investigator Eric May asked Gleason his thoughts on Gore referencing the dead polar bears. Gleason said none of the polar bear papers he has written or co-authored has said "anything really" about global warming.

"It's something along the lines of the changing environment in the Arctic," he said.

Gleason said others put their own spin on research or observations.

Yes folks, four dead polar bears is all it takes for environmental zealots to shut down all the energy production in this country. Well that and some little guppies and lizards.

Michael Bloomberg: 50 Years From Now the Earth Might Be "Uninhabitable"

Scary stuff.

But don't panic! All you need to do is cough up more taxes to science experts like Michael Bloomberg, and the global warming apocalypse can be averted.

Sorry, I meant to say 'climate change apocalypse'.

Whatever - just give Bloomberg your money and nobody will get hurt.

MICHAEL BLOOMBERG: If you ask the public ‘is there global warming,’ is in ’50 years the earth going to be dramatically different or perhaps uninhabitable,‘ their eyes roll. Nobody can think 50 years in advance.

MICHAEL BLOOMBERG: Your job is not to ask the public where they want to go and get behind them. Your job is to tell the public and convince the public where they should go, and lead from the front.

The Mayors of these cities are not asking the public whether they are willing to spend to live healthier lives and live longer. They are there to explain to the public that if they don’t spend that money they’re not going to live as long and not going to be as healthy. And then convince them to come along, reach into their pockets, pay their taxes, change their policies.

Gee, it's too bad Bloomberg isn't running for President. I can just picture the bumper sticker:

Bloomberg 2012: Reach Into Your Pockets, Pay Your Taxes, Obey My Commands

He'd be a shoo-in!

Via Bluegrass Pundit.

Cross-posted.

Nothing Headline of the Day: 'Tennessee Climate Change is So Subtle It's Hard to Gauge'

Gee, I wonder why that is?

Could it be because "climate change" - what people in the old days used to call "the weather" - is a completely concocted threat to the environment?

Nah! There must be a more sophisticated explanation.

The U.S. Department of Agriculture chief calls climate change "one of the greatest threats facing our planet," but little attention is being paid to it in Tennessee's farming world.

More rain is falling in autumn in the Southeast than a century ago. Droughts have increased in spring and summer, and the temperature has made a slight move upward, particularly since 1970.

It's projected to continue to rise, according to the U.S. Global Change Research Program. Increasingly extreme weather is likely, such as heavier downpours and more intense droughts in some areas.

Yet change in Tennessee could be difficult to tabulate, according to Joanne Logan, an associate professor of biosystems engineering and soil engineering at the University of Tennessee.

"In Tennessee, everything is pretty subtle," she said, adding that research has not been plentiful when it comes to agriculture and climate change here.

If small changes are occurring under the radar, a trigger point could be reached suddenly where ecosystems as a whole could fail, unable to make changes quickly enough to keep up, she said.

On the other hand, it's entirely possible that the ecosystem will continue to function pretty much like normal. So, you know...

Cross-posted.

Typical Poverty Pimps

Upfront money needed to ease UN climate deal
Money on the table — perhaps $10 billion a year or more — could help close a deal in Denmark next month and keep climate talks moving toward a new global treaty in 2010. But if poorer nations see too little offered up front, the U.N. conference could end in discord.

The money would help developing countries cope with ocean flooding, drought and other effects of climate change, while also helping them cut down on emissions of global-warming gases. The funds might eventually come from new sources, such as a tax on airline flights, but negotiators for now are seeking quicker infusions.

"Rich countries must put at least $10 billion a year on the table to kick-start immediate action up to 2012," the U.N. climate chief, Yvo de Boer, told reporters last week in a preview of the two-week conference opening next Monday in Copenhagen.

His goal gathered backing in recent days, including from French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Britain's Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who said his nation would contribute $1.3 billion over three years.

"The rest of Europe will do so," Brown told a Commonwealth summit in Trinidad on Friday. "And I believe America will do so as well."

U.S. President Barack Obama and the Chinese leadership energized lagging climate talks last week by announcing modest targets for controlling their countries' emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases blamed for warming the atmosphere.

Although talks will now be extended, Copenhagen was originally meant to culminate years of negotiation centered on two pillars: emissions reductions and financial aid for developing countries to adapt to climate change.

The proposed emissions targets by industrialized nations for 2020 — and China's plan to slow emissions growth — fall short of what scientists say is needed to head off damaging climate change. But if developing nations accept the quick-start financing, a deal might be reached at Copenhagen on a framework for putting all elements in a binding agreement next year, with an eye toward deeper emissions cuts and heftier financing beyond that.

"Short-term finance would be used as an opportunity to get a political buy-in for the other elements of an agreement," said Athena Ballesteros, a climate-finance expert at the Washington think tank World Resources Institute.

The needs are becoming increasingly clear.

An international scientific update last week said changes are happening faster than anticipated. Global temperatures are rising by 0.19 degrees C (0.34 degrees F) per decade, pushing the world into a time of climate disruption, species die-off and expanding seas. Oceans are rising by 3.4 millimeters (0.13 inches) per year, faster than predicted.

"It threatens to submerge the Maldives. My country would not survive," Mohamed Nasheed, president of that low-lying Indian Ocean island nation, told a conference of vulnerable nations earlier this month.

Offers of assistance thus far have been "so low, it is like arriving at an earthquake zone with a dustpan and brush," Nasheed said.

In scores of nations, money will be needed to build coastal protection, modify or shift crops threatened by drought, build water supply and irrigation systems, preserve forests, improve health care to deal with diseases spread by warming, and move from fossil-fuel to low-carbon energy systems, such as solar and wind power.

The World Bank estimates adaptation costs alone will total $75 billion to $100 billion a year over the next 40 years. The cost of mitigation — reducing carbon emissions in poorer nations — will add tens of billions to that. China and other developing countries say the target should be even higher, in the range of $350 billion.

De Boer's $10 billion a year to 2012 is barely a start. But "kick-start finance is so important because such finance will allow developing countries to plan," he told The Associated Press.

In fact, much of the funding would go to "capacity building" — training, planning, getting a fix on needs, local emissions and related concerns.

Upfront money would also help rebuild trust between the rich north and poor south, eroded by years of relative inaction on climate, particularly by the United States.

Climate conference observers expect the European Union to offer most at Copenhagen, perhaps $5 billion a year or more. Japan might contribute $1 billion or more, as would the United States. Appropriations for 2010 totaling some $1 billion to $1.3 billion related to international climate aid are making their way through Congress.

"Quite simply it's the bottom line for getting a deal," New Zealand's Prime Minister John Key said of the financing package, as he pledged up to $50 million on Sunday at a Commonwealth summit in Trinidad.

Obama might use his Dec. 9 drop-by at the Copenhagen conference — on his way to receive the Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo, Norway — to announce a U.S. offer on financing. Some 80 other presidents and premiers are expected to attend the final days of the conference Dec. 17-18.

Finance expert Ballesteros expects Copenhagen to narrow the focus of talks next year on sources for longer-term, richer adaptation funding, such as a levy on international air transport, sharing in proceeds from the growing trade in carbon emission allowances, or even a global levy on carbon emissions.

Most important is that such revenue be "stable and predictable," not dependent on vagaries of budget-writing in national capitals, she said.

Emissions reductions, adaptation finance and other elements would be part of a hoped-for treaty or set of internationally binding agreements next year to succeed the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Its limited emissions reductions expire in 2012. The U.S. was the only industrial nation not to accept Kyoto.

Not surprisingly, no mention as to why the US didn't accept Kyoto: William Jefferson Clinton never submitted the treaty to the Senate for ratification.

Via Google/The AP

I agree with Professor Richard Lindzen from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, who said: “future generations will wonder in bemused amazement that the early 21st century’s developed world went into hysterical panic over a globally averaged temperature increase of a few tenths of a degree, and, on the basis of gross exaggerations of highly uncertain computer projections combined into implausible chains of inference, proceeded to contemplate a roll-back of the industrial age”. ― Vaclav Klaus, President of the Czech Republic

Al Gore Responsible for Global Warming

I believe the headline says it all.

Do Fat People Cause Global Warming?

The rising number of fat people was blamed for global warming on Monday.

Scientists warned that the increase in big eaters means more food production — a major cause of CO2 gas emissions warming the planet.

Overweight people are also more likely to drive, adding to environmental damage.

Dr. Phil Edwards, of the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, said: "Moving about in a heavy body is like driving in a gas guzzler."

No word whether hypocrisy also caused global warming.

H/T The Trading Post.

The 12 Days of Global Warming

Nothing says Christmas like the sight of polar bears drowning in the aftermath of the polar ice caps melting under the canopy of thick black smog.



C'mon, admit it, even some of you Al Gore acolytes at least smiled.

Merry Christmas.

Common Rocks Can Absord Greenhouse Gases; Noted Rockhead Algore Unavailable for Comment

A solution so simple and we've been sitting on top of it all this time.

A ROCK found mostly in Oman can be harnessed to soak up the main greenhouse gas carbon dioxide at a rate that could help slow global warming, scientists say.

When carbon dioxide comes in contact with the rock, peridotite, the gas is converted into solid minerals such as calcite.

Geologist Peter Kelemen and geochemist Juerg Matter said the naturally occurring process can be supercharged one million times to grow underground minerals that can permanently store two billion or more of the 30 billion tons of carbon dioxide emitted by human activity every year.

Their study will appear in the November 11 edition of the Proceedings of the Natural Academy of Sciences.

Peridotite is the most common rock found in the Earth's mantle, or the layer directly below the crust. It also appears on the surface, particularly in Oman, which is conveniently close to a region that produces substantial amounts of carbon dioxide in the production of fossil fuels.

"To be near all that oil and gas infrastructure is not a bad thing," Mr Matter said.

Maybe as a practical matter. when people start lecturing us on the perils of global warming we can hurl some rocks their way.

Media Bias: It's Not Just an American Problem

Those of us here in America who have to suffer through the relentless bias of CBS, NBC, ABC, PBS, CNN and MSNBC have it bad enough. The folks over in the U.K. also are subjected to it as well, though they have fewer viewing options.

Prime case in point is this propaganda piece disguised as a comprehensive look at "global warming," or whatever it is the doomsayers are calling it these days.

The BBC is being investigated by television watchdogs after a leading climate change sceptic claimed his views were deliberately misrepresented.

Lord Monckton, a former adviser to Margaret Thatcher, says he was made to look like a ‘potty peer’ on a TV programme that ‘was a one-sided polemic for the new religion of global warming’.

Earth: The Climate Wars, which was broadcast on BBC 2, was billed as a definitive guide to the history of global warming, including arguments for and against.

During the series, Dr Iain Stewart, a geologist, interviewed leading climate change sceptics, including Lord Monckton. But the peer complained to Ofcom that the broadcast had been unfairly edited.

‘I very much hope Ofcom will do something about this,’ he said yesterday.

‘The BBC very gravely misrepresented me and several others, as well as the science behind our argument. It is a breach of its code of conduct.

‘I was interviewed for 90 minutes and all my views were backed up by sound scientific data, but this was all omitted. They made it sound as if these were just my personal views, as if I was some potty peer. It was caddish of them.’

Ofcom confirmed it was looking into a ‘fairness complaint’ about the documentary.

A BBC spokesman said: ‘We stand by the programme.’

Lord Monckton, 56, a former journalist and Cambridge graduate, says scientific data shows the world is cooler today than in the Middle Ages.

Such scientific data is to be squelched since the proponents of the global warming theory have invested so much and can never admit they're been promoting a fraud.

The BBC should be held accountable, but probably never will be. The bias is too entrenched.

Great Tits Endangered By Global Warming

It's official. Nonexistent global warming affects everything, even great tits.

Rising temperatures are making our best-loved birds lay their eggs earlier, say conservationists.

This change could eventually threaten the survival of many garden species such as robins, chaffinches, swallows, blue tits and great tits.

They are laying earlier, with some nests filling up with eggs almost ten days sooner than in the 1960s.

It is thought the phenomenon is being driven by climate change, with the caterpillars needed to feed their chicks disappearing earlier in the year.

So far, our garden birds have kept pace with the changes to the caterpillars' lifecycles, but in time they could be left behind.

'The caterpillar lifecycle has the potential to shift even further and they could get out of synch which would be very bad news,' said Dr David Leech, of the British Trust for Ornithology.

Climate change is also taking its toll on many species of ducks, geese and wading birds which migrate to the UK each winter from their northern and eastern nesting grounds.

Monday Doom and Gloom: Kyoto Has Failed, We're All Doomed

A little unbridled hysteria to get your week off on a positive note.

Now that the vaunted Kyoto protocol has been established as worthless (hey, there's a reason it got zero votes in the United States Senate), it's time for--you guessed it--Kyoto 2!

But what are we to do? All our policies to date to tackle global warming have been miserable failures. The Kyoto protocol has created a vast carbon market but done little to reduce emissions. The main effect of the EU's emissions trading scheme has been to transfer about €30bn or more from consumers to Europe's biggest polluters, the power companies. The EU and US foray into biofuels has, at huge cost, increased greenhouse gas emissions and created a world food crisis, causing starvation in many poor countries.

A vast carbon market where certain obese hucksters (I won't name name, but you know who I'm talking about) get rich while children starve!

So are all our efforts doomed to failure? Yes, so long as our governments remain craven to special interests, whether carbon traders or fossil fuel companies. The carbon market is a valuable tool, but must be subordinate to climatic imperatives. The truth is that to prevent runaway greenhouse warming, we will have to leave most of the world's fossil fuels in the ground, especially carbon-heavy coal, oil shales and tar sands. The fossil fuel and power companies must be faced down.

Global problems need global solutions, and we also need an effective replacement for the failed Kyoto protocol. The entire Kyoto system of national allocations is obsolete because of the huge volumes of energy embodied in products traded across national boundaries. It also presents a major obstacle to any new agreement – as demonstrated by the 2008 G8 meeting in Japan that degenerated into a squabble over national emission rights.

The answer? Scrap national allocations and place a single global cap on greenhouse gas emissions, applied "upstream" – for instance, at the oil refinery, coal-washing station and cement factory. Sell permits up to that cap in a global auction, and use the proceeds to finance solutions to climate change – accelerating the use of renewable energy, raising energy efficiency, protecting forests, promoting climate-friendly farming, and researching geoengineering technologies. And commit hundreds of billions of dollars per year to finance adaptation to climate change, especially in poor countries.

Such a package of measures would allow us to achieve zero net greenhouse gas emissions by 2050, and long-term stabilisation at 350 parts per million of CO2 equivalent. This avoids the economic pain that a cap-and-trade system alone would cause, and targets assistance at the poor, who are least to blame and most need help. The permit auction would raise about $1 trillion per year, enough to finance a spread of solutions. At a quarter of the world's annual oil spending, it is a price well worth paying.

Better yet, make the worst polluters (China, for example) pay their fair share.

But no, we can't do that. We have to make Western nations bear the brunt of this transfer of wealth instead, while lining the pockets of fat hucksters who live large on the gullibility of naive people.

It's Official: Everything Causes Global Warming

I wonder how many plasma televisions the bloated Al Gore has in his mansion?

A gas used in the making of flat screen televisions, nitrogen trifluoride (NF3), is being blamed for damaging the atmosphere and accelerating global warming.

Almost half of the televisions sold around the globe so far this year have been plasma or LCD TVs.

But this boom could be coming at a huge environmental cost.

The gas, widely used in the manufacture of flat screen TVs, is estimated to be 17,000 times as powerful as carbon dioxide.

Ironically, NF3 is not covered by the Kyoto protocol as it was only produced in tiny amounts when the treaty was signed in 1997.

Levels of this gas in the atmosphere have not been measured, but scientists say it is a concern and are calling for it to be included in any future emissions cutting agreement.

The comments following this story are amusing, including this gem:

Look on the bright side, at least we'll be able to see the end of the world in High Definition and Widescreen :)

Fatman-made Global Warming

In today's installment of things to blame for global warming: fat people.

Obesity contributes to global warming, too.

Obese and overweight people require more fuel to transport them and the food they eat, and the problem will worsen as the population literally swells in size, a team at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine says.

This adds to food shortages and higher energy prices, the school's researchers Phil Edwards and Ian Roberts wrote in the journal Lancet on Friday.

"We are all becoming heavier and it is a global responsibility," Edwards said in a telephone interview. "Obesity is a key part of the big picture."

At least 400 million adults worldwide are obese. The World Health Organization (WHO) projects by 2015, 2.3 billion adults will be overweight and more than 700 million will be obese.

Of course tomorrow we'll see another tear-jerking story on how many people are hungry.

The silliness just never ends.

Despite Record Numbers, Polar Bears Now 'Threatened'

Moonbattery has enveloped the Bush Administration, as they've made the absurd move of listing polar bears as threatened in spite of recent news that they're now at record numbers.

The U.S. government has decided to list polar bears as a threatened species under its Endangered Species Act — a decision that could deal a severe blow to the lucrative sport hunt in Canada's North.

The decision follows concerns from scientists that two-thirds of the polar bears could disappear by mid-century because of sea ice loss due to global warming.

This is a lose-lose. The eco-nuts are going to flip out since they won't be listed as endangered and the Republicans continue to lose credibility by giving credence to this global warming nonsense.

Just get a load of this drivel.

Not content to sit back and let global warming slowly melt the polar ice cap - forcing the drowning and starvation of polar bears - the Bush administration (along with six oil companies) has, it seems, declared all-out war on the species. Not only has the White House refused to place polar bears on the list of endangered species, it has also opened the Chukchi Sea (an important habitat of the species), and is trying to open the Beaufort Sea (another important habitat) to oil drilling.

Faux conservative pundit Stephen Colbert of Comedy Central's "The Colbert Report" must be positively giddy over this news. After all, as he often says, bears are "godless killing machines" (as opposed to the Bush administration, who might aptly be referred to as "God-fearing killing machines").

Dude, step away from the crackpipe already.

Despite the evidence of record numbers of polar bears, the left still demagogues and lies with impunity.

"We are now beginning to see declines in a number of populations of polar bears, and that's because of global warming," says John Kostyack of the National Wildlife Federation. "Effectively, the polar bears are starving."

No amount of evidence will ever get through to these morons. Which begs the question: Why does anyone pay attention to them?

Update: Kempthorne claims it's not about global warming. Good luck with that.

Notwithstanding the secretary's disclaimers, this is the first time the Endangered Species Act has been used to protect a species threatened by the impacts of global warming. There has been concern within the business community that such an action could have far-reaching impact and could be used to regulate carbon dioxide.

Quest to Raise Awareness of Global Warming Halted by Blizzard

Oh, the hilarity of it all.

First of all, is there a person alive who isn't already aware of this global warming scam? It amuses me to no end when these pinheads seek to raise awareness of something that's been pounded over our heads for years.

Second, you may want to check the long-range forecast before you try and cross an ice-covered landmass.

What a tool.

South African snow adventurer Correne Erasmus-Coetzer has been forced to abandon her dream of becoming the first African woman to cross the icy continent of Greenland on foot.

The dream came to an end this week when the expedition of nine men and women came up against a ferocious wind and snow storm, and rapidly dwindling food supplies, as they approached the quarter-way mark of their 550km slog from the east to west coast of Greenland, across the Arctic Circle.

Erasmus-Coetzer was hoping to create awareness about global warming and raise money for the Durban-based Wilderness Leadership School.

If I were dumb enough to fall for the global warming hoax, I'd at least try some lame stunt like this in a warmer climate. Hello, Correne, it's a little cold up in the Arctic.

Erasmus-Coetzer said the conditions in Greenland were worse than anything she had experienced during previous expeditions to the North and the South Poles.

It was a bit like "walking in milk" she said, explaining that the sky was full of snow and this made it impossible to distinguish between the horizon and the sky.

I guess she relied too much on the fraudulent Al Gore schlockumentary and figured everything up there had melted already.

There truly is no end to the stupidity of some people.

H/T Pat via the LGF links.

Speaking of the globwarm scam, curious how a chilly April received such scant attention, no?

Thanks to Ace for the link!

Global Warming Blamed for Shark Attacks

Here we go again, blaming a natural occurrence on global warming.

It just doesn't get any dumber than this.

Three decades have passed since the movie Jaws sent terrified bathers scrambling out of the ocean. But as any beach lifeguard knows, there's still nothing like a gory shark attack to stoke public hysteria and paranoia.

Two deaths in the waters off California and Mexico last week and a spate of shark-inflicted injuries to surfers off Florida's Atlantic coast have left beachgoers seeking an explanation for a sudden surge in the number of strikes.

In the first four months of this year, there were four fatal shark attacks worldwide, compared with one in the whole of 2007, according to the International Shark Attack File at the Florida Museum of Natural History in Gainesville.

'The one thing that's affecting shark attacks more than anything else is human activity,' said Dr George Burgess of Florida University, a shark expert who maintains the database. 'As the population continues to rise, so does the number of people in the water for recreation. And as long as we have an increase in human hours in the water, we will have an increase in shark bites.'

Some experts suggest that an abundance of seals has attracted high numbers of sharks, while others believe that overfishing has hit their food chain. 'I'm not saying it doesn't happen, but it's a convenient excuse,' Burgess said. Another contributory factor to the location of shark attacks could be global warming and rising sea temperatures. 'You'll find that some species will begin to appear in places they didn't in the past with some regularity,' he said.

This is so ridiculous. The recent fatality off Solana Beach in California was more an anomaly than anything. For one, there weren't exactly too many people in the water that morning and the Pacific Ocean isn't exactly like warm bath water.

I was on that beach two weeks prior to that attack and believe me, the water was freezing. I was one of the few people who actually went in the water without a wetsuit.

Junk journalism like this should be rejected by the editors at the newspapers. Such irresponsible reporting does nothing but bring discredit upon the news business.

To use a well-worn phrase, you could say this global warming hysteria has jumped the shark.

Profess a View That Global Warming is a Hoax and Lose your Job

Or at least Dr William Gray of Colorado State University is being sent that message.

A pioneering expert on hurricane forecasting says he may soon lose funding due to his skepticism about man-made global warming, according to a report in the Houston Chronicle.

Dr. William Gray, who once said that pro-global warming scientists are "brainwashing our children," claims that Colorado State University will no longer promote his yearly North Atlantic hurricane forecasts due to his controversial views.

The Gore-bots who are acting like sharks in a feeding frenzy at the trough of the Global Warming hysteria act like all good little liberals when they run into an opinion or facts that run counter to their gospel, they attempt to silence it.

While parts of the country are still covered in inches of the white global warming stuff here late into April those diehard, sold-their-souls to the apostle Al Gore and worship on the altar of Global Warming are finding it harder and harder to support their position or their cause. They have tried to link global warming to everything from male urinary disease to missing honey bees in the Arctic and each time the arguments get shot full of holes.

Gore, on the other hand, is making out quite well as the possibly the first American Vice President to successfully hoodwink an entire world and earn millions in the process. Between setting up businesses which sell "Carbon Credits" to speaking engagements and numerous awards, I would love to see his 2008 tax returns. He is probably in a position to rival Bill Gates in the wealth category.

Do I think there is climate change? Well, duhhhh, there always has been. Ask any geologists or anthropologist and they will confirm that. Do I think man is the root of evil when it comes to changing weather patterns on the planet? No. You are ascribing far more power to humans then they should be given credit for.

I do believe this whole climate change, global warming, enviro-wacko stuff has turned into mass hysteria for many of the feeble-minded and others anxious to be able to tie they favorite cause to it in an attempt to gain some sort of credibility.

People, snap out of it. The world ain't going to end tomorrow, and when it does, I doubt very seriously humans are going to have an impact one way or the other.

Besides, the Mayans give us until December 2012.

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.

Grim News: New Ice Age Coming

Maybe Algore can get some bogus new footage for his next science fiction schlockumentary.

Read it and weep.

Disconcerting as it may be to true believers in global warming, the average temperature on Earth has remained steady or slowly declined during the past decade, despite the continued increase in the atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide, and now the global temperature is falling precipitously.

All four agencies that track Earth's temperature (the Hadley Climate Research Unit in Britain, the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York, the Christy group at the University of Alabama, and Remote Sensing Systems Inc in California) report that it cooled by about 0.7C in 2007. This is the fastest temperature change in the instrumental record and it puts us back where we were in 1930. If the temperature does not soon recover, we will have to conclude that global warming is over.

There is also plenty of anecdotal evidence that 2007 was exceptionally cold. It snowed in Baghdad for the first time in centuries, the winter in China was simply terrible and the extent of Antarctic sea ice in the austral winter was the greatest on record since James Cook discovered the place in 1770.

It is generally not possible to draw conclusions about climatic trends from events in a single year, so I would normally dismiss this cold snap as transient, pending what happens in the next few years.

This is where SOHO comes in. The sunspot number follows a cycle of somewhat variable length, averaging 11 years. The most recent minimum was in March last year. The new cycle, No.24, was supposed to start soon after that, with a gradual build-up in sunspot numbers.

It didn't happen. The first sunspot appeared in January this year and lasted only two days. A tiny spot appeared last Monday but vanished within 24 hours. Another little spot appeared this Monday. Pray that there will be many more, and soon.

The reason this matters is that there is a close correlation between variations in the sunspot cycle and Earth's climate. The previous time a cycle was delayed like this was in the Dalton Minimum, an especially cold period that lasted several decades from 1790.

Northern winters became ferocious: in particular, the rout of Napoleon's Grand Army during the retreat from Moscow in 1812 was at least partly due to the lack of sunspots.

That the rapid temperature decline in 2007 coincided with the failure of cycle No.24 to begin on schedule is not proof of a causal connection but it is cause for concern.

It is time to put aside the global warming dogma, at least to begin contingency planning about what to do if we are moving into another little ice age, similar to the one that lasted from 1100 to 1850.

There is no doubt that the next little ice age would be much worse than the previous one and much more harmful than anything warming may do. There are many more people now and we have become dependent on a few temperate agricultural areas, especially in the US and Canada. Global warming would increase agricultural output, but global cooling will decrease it.

Millions will starve if we do nothing to prepare for it (such as planning changes in agriculture to compensate), and millions more will die from cold-related diseases.

Good thing the doomsayers conveniently changed their mantra from global warming to climate change. Now they get to have it both ways.

Plus, on the upside, we may not freeze our asses off for another 1000 years, so we have time to stock up on firewood. Unless, of course, we continue to greedily ravage the planet and there's no more wood left.

The next descent into an ice age is inevitable but may not happen for another 1000 years. On the other hand, it must be noted that the cooling in 2007 was even faster than in typical glacial transitions. If it continued for 20 years, the temperature would be 14C cooler in 2027.

By then, most of the advanced nations would have ceased to exist, vanishing under the ice, and the rest of the world would be faced with a catastrophe beyond imagining.

Australia may escape total annihilation but would surely be overrun by millions of refugees. Once the glaciation starts, it will last 1000 centuries, an incomprehensible stretch of time.

If the ice age is coming, there is a small chance that we could prevent or at least delay the transition, if we are prepared to take action soon enough and on a large enough scale.

For example: We could gather all the bulldozers in the world and use them to dirty the snow in Canada and Siberia in the hope of reducing the reflectance so as to absorb more warmth from the sun.

The fear mongering ends with an urgent plea.

All those urging action to curb global warming need to take off the blinkers and give some thought to what we should do if we are facing global cooling instead.

It will be difficult for people to face the truth when their reputations, careers, government grants or hopes for social change depend on global warming, but the fate of civilisation may be at stake.

Good luck with that.

The last thing a fraud like Gore will do is admit he's been part of the greatest hoax ever.

Good News: Clean Air Means More Global Warming

Talk about bamboozling the tree-huggers.

OK, I'm not promoting pollution, but maybe we can pin alleged global warming on the environmentalists themselves now.

If anything, it will be amusing to see the reaction.

Europe is heating up much faster than climate researchers expected, and now they think they know why: air made dramatically cleaner by anti-pollution programs. With less particle pollution clouding the air, more sunlight is coming through and the continent is getting warmer.

The 1970s were a hazy time: Cars ran on sulfur-rich gasoline, power plants and heavy industry burned sulfur-rich coal. Europe lay under a blanket of fumes filled with sulphate particles. Acid rain brought the particles back to earth, ravaging the continent's forests.

That was then. The situation today is considerably different. Auto emissions are low in sulfur, power plants only run with smoke filters and acid rain is no longer an issue. But the success of efforts to restore Europe's air quality have had an unintended side effect that is just now coming to light. Because the atmosphere over Europe is increasingly clean, global warming is impacting the continent more quickly than other regions of the world.

The dwindling clouds of pollution are apparently the reason that Europe is heating faster than other mid-latitude regions. Since 1980, the average surface air temperature between the Bosporus and the Bay of Biscay has risen by almost an entire degree Celsius -- twice as much as expected. The reasons for this were until recently a matter of heated dispute. Greenhouse gases could explain half that increase, at best. But now climate researchers in Germany, Switzerland and the United States, using data and computer simulations, claim that the rise in temperatures has been caused most directly by a decline in sulfate aerosols in the atmosphere.

The Goracle was unavailable for comment.

More Global Warming Horrors: Minorities, Indigenous People Hardest Hit

Earlier today we noted how the global warming scam was now an official religious principle.

Now comes word that this hoax has hit particular groups hardest.

Naturally, this Reuters item makes no effort to even question the doomsday scenarios.

Minorities and indigenous people frequently bear the brunt of the ravages of climate change but also often come last on the aid list because they are on the margins of society, a report said on Tuesday.

Some are even the victims of efforts to tackle global warming such as clearing tracts of land and forest for growing biofuels, according to "State of the World's Minorities 2008" report from Minority Rights Group International (MRG).

"Climate change has finally made it to the top of the international agenda at every level but...recognition of the acute difficulties that minorities face is often missing," said MRG's policy chief Ishbel Matheson.

"From the immediate aftermath of a disaster to the point of designing policy on climate change -- the unique situation of minority and indigenous groups is rarely considered."

Scientists say global average temperatures will rise by between 1.8 and 4.0 degrees Celsius this century due to carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels for power and transport.

This will melt ice caps, raise sea levels and cause more floods, droughts and storms, putting millions of people at risk.

The MRG report said forgotten minority groups often live in areas rejected by the wealthy because of their riskier location.

Indigenous peoples also often inhabit marginal lands and, because they depend on nature for their survival, face double jeopardy from the changing climate which is altering growing seasons and rainfall patterns, it said.

And when disasters hit and relief efforts swing into action, these same groups are often the worst affected but the last to be helped, the report said.

Naturally, one of the donors to the MRG is none other than George Soros and his Open Society Institute.

Shocking, no?