Carolina Politics Online

It appears that “Earth Hour” has come and gone, so in case you missed it, here’s a recap: a bunch of liberal pussies turned their lights off for an hour last weekend. When they turned their lights on again, all their stuff had been stolen.

No, not really. But it would have been deliciously ironic, wouldn’t it? Instead, the lights came back on and they patted themselves on the back and got to feel really good about doing absolutely nothing. I suppose I should be thankful- unlike a lot of other liberal ideas, “Earth Hour” isn’t gonna take away my freedoms or put my grandkids in debt.

Still, in celebration of “Earth Hour”, I’ve decided to post something I wrote about two years ago. If you really believe that human activity is causing the Earth to heat up… well, I hope  this post smacks some knowledge into your head.

The planet is in trouble, gentle readers. As we speak, CO2 is pouring into the atmosphere, and the planet’s temperature is rising precipitously with no relief in sight. Polar ice caps are melting. The impact of global temperature change could be disastrous, and has consequences that we can’t even imagine. Why, I wouldn’t be surprised if that giant Martian face starts shedding tears soon.

Oh, wait… you thought I was talking about the Earth? No, silly liberal… I’m talking about MARS! You see, in cased you missed this tiny news story wedged in between 24/7 gloom-and-doom horror stories about global warming, Mars is currently undergoing its own global warming scenario.

Don’t you find it odd that when the Earth starts warming, it’s automatically deemed to be a man-made apocalypse? But when Mars starts doing the same thing, it’s just some natural phenomenon that doesn’t even make the news.

It’s sad that we can’t even have a civil discussion about global warming anymore. Scientists (and there are plenty) who dispute the idea of man-made global warming are threatened with sanctions and loss of funding. Global warming skeptics are shunned and ridiculed. Meanwhile, global warming propagandists, their shrill voices carrying through the echo-chamber of thoughtless fear-mongering, are revered and rewarded. How pathetic is it that the same week Al Gore won a Nobel Peace Prize (!?) for his “anti-global warming” work, a judge in England ruled that any school that forces students to watch An Inconvenient Truth also has to point the (at least) nine blatant and egregious scientific errors the film contained. The judge would have done better to fine the schools in question for cruel and unusual punishment

Look, you want the truth? Can you handle the truth? Are you sure? OK, here we go… the Earth IS warming. Best estimates are that the Earth has warmed 0.8C over the last 100 years. It has not warmed appreciably in the last 10 years. The hottest years on record in the last century remain back in the 1930’s, not the 2000’s. These are called facts.

So in this sense, I believe in global warming. It’s impossible not to, looking at the evidence.

The real question is what’s causing the warming. A lot of people are now telling us that big mean evil cold-hearted capitalistic countries like the U.S. are causing global warming with oil, smokestacks, and Walmart. But the truth is much simpler: We don’t know. Honestly, we don’t know what’s causing it. It might be CO2. It might be pollution. It might be Death Rays from Planet Boingo. And it might also be the natural processes that the Earth has been undergoing for the entire 4.5 billion years of its existence!

I opened this blog talking about Mars. Let’s return there for a second. Over the past few years, Martian Polar Ice Caps have been shrinking while the planet slowly warms. There’s still no word on how many Martians drive SUV’s. But I can tell you that all this is happening during a period of heightened solar activity. You see, according to NASA, the Sun (which for those of you who may have forgotten, is a giant ball of fire around which our tiny rock orbits) is going through a period of heightened activity. There are more sunspots, more solar flares, and its magnetic field is fluctuating. The sun has done this before. So do you think it’s possible that maybe, just maybe, the Earth (and Mars) could be warming because of higher solar irradiance? I wonder why Al Gore forgot to mention that.

But Celtic, you ask. Wouldn’t OTHER solar system objects also be warming too?

Well, thank you for asking, curious reader. Collected here is a series of actual quotes from actual scientists who have actual knowledge of this stuff:

 ”The latest [Hubble Telescope] images could provide evidence that Jupiter is in the midst of a global change that can modify temperatures by as much as 10 degrees Fahrenheit on different parts of the globe.”

-Space.com

 

“At least since 1989, Triton (Neptune’s largest moon) has been undergoing a period of global warming. Percentage-wise, it’s a very large increase.”

-James Elliot, professor of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences at Massachusetts Institute of Technology

 

 ”Pluto is undergoing global warming, as evidenced by a three-fold increase in the planet’s atmospheric pressure during the past 14 years, a team of astronomers from Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), Williams College, the University of Hawaii, Lowell Observatory and Cornell University announced in a press conference today…

So is the sun causing all this? Maybe. It is, after all, a giant ball of fire accounting for over 98% of all mass contained in the solar system. It’s kinda important. But hey, I have an open mind. Let’s look at other possibilities.

Dr. William Grey, a meteorologist who is considered the father of hurricane forecast research, believes that a natural cycle of ocean water temperatures – related to the amount of salt in ocean water – is responsible for global warming. “We’re brainwashing our children,” he laments. “They’re going to the Gore movie (An Inconvenient Truth) and being fed all this. It’s ridiculous.” Dr. Gray, by the way, is a highly regarded and long-time professor of meteorology at Colorado State University. Al Gore is a smarmy loser politician with no scientific pedigree whatsoever. Just so you know…
Here’s the deal, folks. The Earth changes all the time. Try to imagine all the changes that have taken place during the 4.5 billion years this planet has been around. Over 99% of all plant and animal species that have ever lived have died out. Continents have drifted apart. Comets and asteroids have hit it. Atmospheric CO2 levels have been much higher than they are now. And the temperature has fluctuated wildly all the time. Ever hear of the Ice Ages? How’d that happen? Think it sucked when the Dinosaurs died out? That was nothing compared to the Permian-Triassic extinction event which remains the most massive “die-off” in terrestrial history. It happened over 250 million years ago and nearly 75% of all plants and animals died off. It actually paved the way for the rise of the Dinosaurs. Scientists still have no idea what caused it, but they’re pretty sure that Dick Cheney and smokestacks had nothing to do with it.

Oh, and don’t think that our ancestors have never seen temperature changes before, either. Take a look at the “Medieval Climate Optimum” and the “Little Ice Age”. Back during the 1000’s, things were pretty toasty in Europe. We have written and scientific evidence that proves that between 800 and 1300, Europe specifically (and most of the rest of the world too) went through a temperature rise that makes our current “global warming” situation look downright chilly. Climatologists call this the “Medieval Climate Optimum”. Then around 1300 and lasting to the 1800’s, the temperature decreased to such an extent that scientists have nicknamed it the “Little Ice Age”.

So? Well, within the last 1,000 years, England went from being able to sustain vineyards to holding “Frost Faires” on the frozen Thames. During the warm period, Alpine villages could exist way up on the mountains. Then we had written eyewitness accounts of Alpine glaciers expending so quickly that they swallowed those villages. Those glaciers are now receding, and guess what? We can see (relatively) recent human habitation in their wake. Greenland was warm enough to sustain Viking farming settlements until it suddenly cooled down at around 1300. The settlements were later abandoned.

We make a big deal out of temperature change because for the first time, we’re not only around to observe it, but we have 24-hour news channels and propagandists and scare-mongers who can take advantage of it like never before. When the Little Ice Age hit, people turned to their priests and other figures to pray the glaciers away. Now we turn to charlatans like Al Gore who tell us if we all follow him, we’ll be fine. But even The Goreacle can’t explain why the northern hemisphere got warmer, then cooler, and now warmer again long before the Industrial Revolution.

Alright, I’ve got a lot more to say about this, but I’ve gone on long enough to make my point. The Earth changes ALL THE TIME. To automatically say that this particular change is humanity’s fault is foolish and short-sighted.

The environment is important, but environmental scaremongering is dangerous. The Earth should be protected, but it needs to be done responsibly and with foresight, not as a reaction to questionable science. I want to protect the environment too. I want to get a hybrid car. I want to use clean renewable energy. I want to make sure my kids can someday breathe clean air and drink clean water. But we need to protect the environment for the right reasons, not because some charlatan like Al Gore tells us that we’re all gonna die unless we listen to him. There is no scientific proof that mankind is causing global warming, so let’s set aside the apocalyptic apologias for a while and concentrate on meaningful environmental discussion instead.

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