America’s affliction with climate
alarmism is shaped by two facts:
First, the main instigators have
crossed the Rubicon and have no choice but to fight. How has this
happened? Nature was one cause: the short-term natural warming in
1978-1998 was mistaken for anthropogenic warming through the confirmation bias.
Natural cooling from 1999 onward has canceled the expected anthropogenic
warming (which is small, beneficial, and caused by a variety of factors -- not
just carbon dioxide release).
But
other causes were entirely manmade. In hindsight, it is clear that for
almost two decades (approximately 1988 -- 2004) multiple groups of climate
“scientists” have been fabricating results in parallel, unaware that others
were doing the same. Mann with his hockey stick got the most fame, but he
was just one among many. Computer models, descriptions of the carbon cycle, and
even instrumental temperature records were forged to exaggerate climate
sensitivity to carbon dioxide, to hide past climate variations, to argue that
carbon dioxide release is irreversible, etc. The environmental movement,
encouraging and encouraged by this perversion of science, made global warming
its central theme. And so did many mainstream politicians. Al Gore was the
towering figure among them. He used his two terms as vice president to gut
American science, replacing scientists with environmentalists and lawyers (see
the book Politicizing
Science: The Alchemy of Policymaking, which contains essays by William Happer,
Bernard Cohen, Patrick Michaels, Fred Singer and
other scientists who experienced or witnessed this process). A vicious spiral
developed: alarmist politicians handpicked scientists supporting the alarm,
then they believed their claims, and so it went. A hardened core of
climate alarmism was formed from such politicians and their quasi-scientists.
This core attracted multiple layers of followers, ranging from ordinary profiteers
and leftist extremists to totally innocent duped believers………
The second problem can be
illustrated by the words of former Senator Timothy Wirth, which he said no
later than 1993: "We've got to ride the global warming issue. Even if the
theory of global warming is wrong, we will be doing the right thing, in terms
of economic policy and environmental policy." Too bad he did not ask where the ride was heading and who
was at the wheel. The result was that many liberal or left-leaning
institutions, including the whole Democratic Party, hitched themselves to the
hostile agendas of the UN and
European Greens. Timothy Wirth became the Chairman of the UN Foundation.
Unable to get off this hellish ride, some of his allies effectively became
tools of foreign governments and NGOs. An example of such behavior at the
highest level is the joint
climate change statement with China, in which the U.S. promised to
decrease carbon dioxide emissions, while China promised to increase them! This
document was signed by Obama and praised by the formerly mainstream media as a
breakthrough agreement…….
The
forecast is not comforting: the alarmist core has no choice but to escalate its
assault on society, and to push its powerful followers (including the Obama
administration) to more and more desperate acts.
Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2016/02/the_current_state_of_climate_alarmism.html#ixzz41aWudcU2
