Economic Alarmism

Krugman:

The truth is that there is no credible research suggesting that taking strong action on climate change is beyond the economy’s capacity. Even if you do not fully trust the models — and you shouldn’t — history and logic both suggest that the models are overestimating, not underestimating, the costs of climate action. We can afford to do something about climate change.

Deep thought

I wonder if am April heat wave also disproves global warming.

Weather and climate

Joe "goes there." But someone had to point that out, especially after the media coverage of Sen. Inhofe's snowstorms = no global warming stupidity earlier this season.

It's a moderate el niño year which might have been made more extreme by climate change. No one really know yet.

Drill Baby Drill

At first glance, this is an incredibly short-sighted capitulation:

The Obama administration is proposing to open vast expanses of water along the Atlantic coastline, the eastern Gulf of Mexico and the north coast of Alaska to oil and natural gas drilling, much of it for the first time, officials said Tuesday.

Why give up the ultimate bargaining chip in the climate legislation debate so soon in the process? Maybe because the real bargaining chip is state revenue sharing:

One major flashpoint in the negotiations has been whether to share drilling revenue with states and to allow states to opt in or out of drilling along their coastlines.

It was unclear late Tuesday whether Obama endorses revenue-sharing for states.

This way Obama has taken a Republican talking point out of the way (if one can even call "drill baby drill" a talking point), and dangled a carrot in front of each of those Senator's heads where drilling will be allowed. Notice that it won't be allowed along the West Coast or the Northeast, where most Senators are already on board with energy policy reform.

That being said, this seems like an incredibly risky strategy. Hopey the changey works!

Conservative reasoning

Deep thought

A couple of years ago we burned through a trillion dollars of the US economy for petroleum, helping plunge us into recession. The same people in power then are now telling us the economy will be DOOMED if we use free-market mechanisms to reduce the amount of petroleum we use.

Jon Swift, RIP

Al Weisel has passed away. Obviously a great writer. Always loved visiting the site. And he linked here a time or two (he knew how to find the small blogs). He will be missed.

Ron Gettelfinger's column's title might be a bit too forward thinking.

've heard a lot about advanced technology vehicles such as hybrid, pure-electric, natural gas and biofuel-powered, which the UAW supports. But even the most ardent advocates acknowledge these technologies won't be fully a part of the American mainstream for many decades. Until then, Americans will be using the reliable internal-combustion engines for the majority of their transportation needs.

Until then, you're going to drive our gas guzzlers and you're going to like it! Yes we can!

Labor has always sided with industry to screw over environmentalists. Wouldn't it be nice if this were to change some day?

95% political confidence level

Rep. Burton's wankery is trending towards statistical significance:

You know, science is verifiable. Science is something that can be replicated. This whole theory of global warming is just that: It’s a theory. It’s based on models. Models are based on variables, and conditions that the modelers that develop the models put into them. And the models don’t replicate what’s happened. So they need to go back to square one, look at the empirical data, look at alternative theories, and see if they can find a theory that actually fits the facts.

Can't make this stuff up

South Dakota State House writes my parody blog posts for me:

A CONCURRENT RESOLUTION, Calling for balanced teaching of global warming in the public schools of South Dakota.
WHEREAS, the earth has been cooling for the last eight years despite small increases in anthropogenic carbon dioxide; and
WHEREAS, there is no evidence of atmospheric warming in the troposphere where the majority of warming would be taking place; and
WHEREAS, historical climatological data shows without question the earth has gone through trends where the climate was much warmer than in our present age. The Climatic Optimum and Little Climatic Optimum are two examples. During the Little Climatic Optimum, Erik the Red settled Greenland where they farmed and raised dairy cattle. Today, ninety percent of Greenland is covered by massive ice sheets, in many places more than two miles thick; and
WHEREAS, the polar ice cap is subject to shifting warm water currents and the break-up of ice by high wind events. Many oceanographers believe this to be the major cause of melting

polar ice, not atmospheric warming; and
WHEREAS, carbon dioxide is not a pollutant but rather a highly beneficial ingredient for all plant life on earth. Many scientists refer to carbon dioxide as "the gas of life"; and
WHEREAS, more than 31,000 American scientists collectively signed a petition to President Obama stating: "There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, or methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the earth's atmosphere and disruption of the earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide will produce many beneficial effects on the natural plant and animal environments of the earth":
NOW, THEREFORE, BE IT RESOLVED, by the House of Representatives of the Eighty-fifth Legislature of the State of South Dakota, the Senate concurring therein, that the South Dakota Legislature urges that instruction in the public schools relating to global warming include the following:
(1) That global warming is a scientific theory rather than a proven fact;
(2) That there are a variety of climatological, meteorological, astrological, thermological, cosmological, and ecological dynamics that can effect world weather phenomena and that the significance and interrelativity of these factors is largely speculative; and
(3) That the debate on global warming has subsumed political and philosophical viewpoints which have complicated and prejudiced the scientific investigation of global warming phenomena; and
BE IT FURTHER RESOLVED, that the Legislature urges that all instruction on the theory of global warming be appropriate to the age and academic development of the student and to the prevailing classroom circumstances.

Astrological dynamics? That's why this is all one big hoax!

Weatherization

Remember the big weatherization scandal yesterday in the blogosphere?

The GAO report cites figures from September 2009 -- almost five months out of date. Since then, we have resolved Davis-Bacon wage issues in all 50 states, clarified how states should handle historic preservation and worked with states to resolve any remaining barriers. As a result, by the end of 2009, our programs had weatherized about 124,000 homes in total, and we are on track to weatherize more than 250,000 this year. In fact, since September 2009, we have tripled the pace of Recovery Act funded home weatherization. The report also erroneously implies that our goal was to weatherize 593,000 homes in 2009. That is wrong. The goal has been to weatherize that number by March 2012, and we are on track to meet that goal.

Another thing I found weird was that they basically take the fact that only $522 million of the stimulus money has been spent on weatherization thus far, divide it by the 9000 homes that have been weatherized and come up with $57,362 per home.

Thing is, much of the early stimulus money designated for weatherization has been spent on low income housing and low income housing usually isn't single-family housing. So I wonder what is meant by 9000 homes. Searched around the internet a little yesterday but couldn't figure it out.

Either way, stupid LATimes blog post.

Let's say...

...the suicide note had talked about the evils of mountaintop removal and clear-cutting and SUVs and ended with something about the ELF creed. I'm guessing then he'd be called a terrorist.

...adding: Atrios just posted this. Brown has two years before his re-election (Kennedy was up for re-election in 2012). Presumably in the first year, he'll act as the 41st "no" vote for anything that is dealt with by the Senate. His second year, however, should be interesting. He could either say eff-it and run for President, or vote for for federal goodies for MA thereby alienating the tea-partiers, or stick with the Republican/tea party line thereby alienating the majority of MA voters who aren't tea-partiers. In making a statement like this, he offers us a glimpse into his persona, and thus makes it appear as though he'll go with the tea-partiers. Good luck with that, Brownie!

Noookular

Free market! If wind and solar are so great, why do they need such massive subsidies and government loan guarantees?

What's that? Nuclear plants need government help too? Well, that's something entirely different.

...Carry on...

Liberal envirosocialists using alternative energy to suck off the taxpayer's teet!

Let's Start The Legal WAR Against Obama - Nation

Coolest web site ever. No?

consensus v. certainty

Uh, Rich:

In the Boston Globe, MIT climate scientist Kerry Emanuel marshals what will have to be the fall-back argument for fighting warming: “We do not have the luxury of waiting for scientific certainty, which will never come.” Really? That’s not what we were told even a few months ago — before climate alarmism acknowledged doubt.

There's a difference between consensus and certainty. E.g.: though there's general consensus Rich Lowry is stupid, we can never be entirely certain if he's just stupid or likes making stuff up.

Yes, but...

...quite possibly the bigger problem may be that the environmental movement was almost forced to justify reducing carbon emissions using economics arguments. Through all of the long public debate starting in the 1990s and going right on through today, it is assumed that reducing carbon emissions is always costly and no other benefits might ever arise from that. And thus, in a media world of allowing "both sides" of any issue discussed, the "debate" was never about whether mass species extinction due to reduced ecosystem viability is something that will happen or not and how we can or should deal with that problem. And it was also not about whether it is wise for us as a society to continue to support a system of inefficient energy and transportation infrastructure resulting from the status-quo regulatory uncertainty vs. the cost associated with businesses having to change how they operate.

The "debate" was framed as 'you want us to do something horribly expensive so show us that not doing anything will cost us way more.' Al Gore and the IPCC did a brilliant job of stepping up to that challenge. But it'd probably be wise to talk about all the other things associated with the way that we produce electricity and transport ourselves around every day and which ecosystems we're willing to give up down the road. That debate will probably never happen.

Jounamalism

Via.

Step 1, scientist answers serious questions seriously:

B - Do you agree that from 1995 to the present there has been no statistically-significant global warming

Yes, but only just. I also calculated the trend for the period 1995 to 2009. This trend (0.12C per decade) is positive, but not significant at the 95% significance level. The positive trend is quite close to the significance level. Achieving statistical significance in scientific terms is much more likely for longer periods, and much less likely for shorter periods.

Step 2, wingnut tabloid writes headline:

Climategate U-turn as scientist at centre of row admits: There has been no global warming since 1995

Step 3, wingnut bloggers run with it:

The entire theory of anthropogenic global warming is built off data that is conveniently lost. We’re supposed to just believe even though there has been no actual warming in 15 years. We’re supposed to just submit to radical social engineering experiments based on our trust in scientists who have been actively lying to us for the past decade and a half.

Nice try...

This might be true if Washington DC would normally receive over 5 inches of rain in February [each inch of rain translates to about a foot of snow]. But DC doesn't.

SCYUNCE!

Senator Inhofe's new home

A house built of awl industry money.

Continued coverage of snow disproving climate change