Bad Timing for Climate Critic

We don't usually publish criticisms of ourselves or the blog. No, we don't think we're perfect, but we don't owe anyone a forum to attack us. And then sometimes, we allow it just so we can poke fun at the lack of knowledge displayed. Here's an example:

• SCC,
  
  I like your take on nuke power, but you are a dolt when it comes to global warming. 30 year cycles, my ass. The north pole will be a navigable waterway next year.
  
  Here's a suggestion, go to the Tetons in Wyoming or the Canadian Rockies. Take a look at the deterioration of all North American glaciers over the course of the 20th century. You science-deniers are really becoming a problem in the U.S.

Gee, your timing couldn't have been any worse on the first comment. Try this on for size:

• An abnormally cool Arctic is seeing dramatic changes to ice levels. In sharp contrast to the rapid melting seen last year, the amount of global sea ice has rebounded sharply and is now growing rapidly. The total amount of ice, which set a record low value last year, grew in October at the fastest pace since record-keeping began in 1979.

Boy, we'll bet your face is red. The record keeping itself only began in 1979 - thirty years ago. Thirty years mean zip, zero, nada in the climate debate. To see trends, you need to research hundreds of years, maybe thousands. And then there's this picture:
Note the date? 2008. Note the seal? National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. And note where the Tetons fall just south of Yellowstone on the Wyoming/Montana border? Record cold temps this year. In fact, record and near record cold temps across 80% of the country. Glaciers run in cycles, too, cycles covering thousands of years. If we aren't mistaken, a large body of water located due east of Chicago was carved out by one a few thousand years ago.

And then there are these Time Magazine covers from 1973 and 1979 (thirty years ago by the way):



Are you beginning to see the picture? The science isn't settled and hasn't been settled in 30 plus years. Accurate measurements exist only for the last few decades. Sunspot activity, the most reliable indicator of global climate change (and currently ignored by Gore and the left) is at a 11-year low and according to this article, might herald a period of cooling unseen in 350 years.

Instead of closing off all debate, pouring this country's resources into unproven and unprofitable energy sources, and calling those who disagree "dolts," we need to view the science in a calmer light and see what, if anything, it tells us. Most of what it tells us is we don't know shit where the earth is concerned.