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There are many facts and little speculation at this point. The evidence for GW is piling up pretty fast. I doubt there are any credible, accredited scientists that will flatly and completely deny man's contribution to GW. (not weathermen, not Ben Stein, but scientists). Reason? They'd have a hard time arguing that on evidence. They could only argue on absence of evidence, which is weak and does not support a TOTAL type of denial of anything.
What will take a bit more time is determining the EXTENT of man's contribution and whether it is truly significant.....which is to say, if it's not significant, why stop it? And if it is, why continue it?
I will certainly agree, though, that trying to force Detroit to make EVs is not going to help them or us very much, since EVs are actually propelled by coal.
So here is one little real clue. The confluence of environmental, union, and regulatory factors, etc. etc., babble has brought the big three to literally (if they are correct) to the death bed, and on life support. The whole time the UAS gravy train aka love boat (SUV's/pick up trucks to stay on topic) has literally been excoriated/vilified. The demos have been trying to get rid of North American manufacturing for literally generations. Now that they are the CLOSEST to the goal of eliminating this "scourge of WORLD WIDE civilization as we know it, by shutting OFF life support; now suddenly it is CODE CODE CODE to save the entire industry !? To say the system is bi polar might be an extreme understatement.
With that statement I can agree. My whole skepticism is directed at those folks that claim it is a done deal. Man is the primary cause of climate change. I have no doubt that man can contribute to some climate change both locally and globally. When Sadam lit off 1500 oil wells in the first Gulf War it was bound to cause problems. Our bombing of Japan in WW2 was also significant. Where I get upset is when jokers like Al Gore say we need to do away with the internal combustion engine. He offers no alternatives except we should all be driving EVs by 2020. How ignorant is that? I am against radicalism in either direction. I would have been happy 10 years ago to drive as my primary vehicle a small diesel PU getting 40-45 MPG. Thus cutting my carbon footprint by more than half over the Suburban I bought. The radicals running the EPA and CARB says no to cutting CO2 with high mileage diesel vehicles. So what's a person to do? I say screw all the leftist swine in government, I will drive a "legal" porker gas guzzling C02 spewing SUV .
Indeed with the BIG IV auto bail out, down payment (many more payments to follow) not only is the writing on the wall, it is now in the monument shop being engraved in STONE. Not one of the 4 has identified the new cash cow, and by default it WILL remain the SUV/pick up truck.
"Burning more while professing that folks should burn less" will remain the policy as well as the reality. Seriousness will be demostrated when SUV's/Trucks are on the market that can actually get 30-35 mpg and UP: be it turbo diesel or other.Turbo diesels are just the most logical and actually stand the best chance of achieving the actual goal of... using less (20-40% currently over RUG to PUG) .
It makes now all the sense in the world to keep a 15 year old SUV,... 15 more years!!! By then maybe there WILL be an SUV on the market that will get 30-40 mpg or better. I was hoping for an SUV/pick up truck that runs on H20 by that time frame !!!!...NOT !!!
It's the very CONFUSION about the "right answer" that worries me the most---what do we do, if anything, until we find out what's really going on? And, will we find out too late what's going on? Or will we go off in the wrong direction of what's going on?
This is why I trust science in matters of this particular sort (matters in which science is appropriate) ---the truth will out and cut across any political or attitudinal lines eventually.
it all takes time. Mankind doesn't learn easily or quickly.
As for the Big Three, even if their corporate boards have no believe whatsoever in global warming (that's fine), they had best pay attention to changing attitudes about clean technology and fuel efficiency.
The GW debate has sparked an increase in consciousness about man's effects on the climate and the environment so I see it ALL as a good thing.
The question is not how many of X you sell---the questions are: a) did you make any profit? and b) was the product good enough to inspire a repeat buyer? and c) is your competition catching up with you?
To borrow an Iaccocca line: we have jobs @ lower per hour rates and NONE at higher per hour rates! The Congress pretty much said you have a job at the HIGHER dollar rates, just higher the newbies at the lower rates!!!! WE OK NOW !!!!???? :sick: :lemon:
So yeah I am just waiting to buy my American car with a IRS tax credit $15,000 and a discount voucher for 10-15k. Why shouldn't the real owners get the bene's !???
I didn't notice that AIG had any labor rate restrictions placed on them when they got their $$$.
the government forced business into being health car providers in the first place, way back when.
The problem is that America does not view health care as a basic human need or right, and so this problem will just continue to fester.
Personally, I think a healthy and contented workforce is going to be absolutely necessary in the 21st century's struggle for economic success among nations.
Socialism works great for the NBA and NFL. I don't see why the Big Three can't do it.
Well comrade, shoots down the evolution theory eh?
Since we are on vehicles, hard to be profitable when labor is 2x the competition eh? Again really not a problem if they can sell the typical (there is no typical) for discussion purposes 40k suv for 80k and the competition (you know the ones with the lower labor rates) keeps selling theirs at 40k???? I am sure it does not take much explanation to know where that would go...????
Well those examples are already monopolies and the unions, aka UAW are also. How far do you think you'd get as an "independent" union if say the UAW was YOUR competition!?
Well if science wants an issue, and we want to throw money at something, Maybe people on the East Coast would like something done about this.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/science/horizon/2000/mega_tsunami.shtml
Or something more serious which all you have to do is look at the moon. GW is insignificant compared to the environmental change a major comet or asteroid impact would make. I'd rather see the money that is and would be spent on GW put towards finding and defending against these hazards.
These are known, proven hazards, not a minor issue of warming a few degrees - which I for one would find beneficial.
Just like a politician. They have been promising it would get warmer for close to 20 years. All we get is snow in Vegas and Malibu. Big Liars. How many people were killed in the earthquake and tsunami back in 2004. Many of those countries did not even have Tsunami warning systems in place. So more than 225,000 people died as a result of poor planning. There is no need to plan for a rise in water levels from GW. If it starts to rise and it is filling your basement. Sell the house and move to higher ground. No reason for anyone to die as a result of GW. The same sort of people that push the GW alarmist theory, also like the diminishing oil theory. So if they are right about fossil fuel running out that should solve the CO2 problem. No need to do anything about GW. Many scientist say it is too late to avoid the GW problem. So why waste money we as a government DO NOT HAVE TO WASTE?
As you say we keep getting colder and not warmer.
I don't think huge industrial countries have the luxury of letting nature decide issues for us.
When nature decides for us, it's never pretty.
But maybe America needs to spend some time in the Dark Ages. Might do us some good.
There might be some truth to this. For example the northeast for all they squawk about C02 emissions and energy consumption etc are THE biggest users of energy and C02 emissions. It has been more than obvious Hurricane Katrina (LA, MS) almost curtailed the oil supply to the N/E !!
Not to let algae grow under them, "environmentalists" like Sen Ted Kennedy put the kybosh on wind turbine farms foundationed in salt water. GW/GCC advocates instead of getting ready for the FLOOD OF NYC (their crisis, not mine) continue to build! in the EXACT areas projected to FLOOD! ? Kyoto Accord green lights China (India also) goal of a min of 300 M new vehicles that have lower emissions standards and higher fuel consumption than Europe or the USA! The list goes on and on.
But indeed these pale in comparison to stuff that truly have not happened yet like say the dormant HUGE volcano aka Yellowstone National Park decides to erupt! The Indonesian Tsunami was indeed caused by undersea earthquakes (non GW/GCC)
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The earth just keeps on rolling, and it goes where it wants to go.
The idea, were it espoused by some, that complete reckless devastation of the environment leads to no consequences whatsoever strikes me as....um.....kinda nuts.
Equally mystifying would be the notion that what happens to our fellow Americans on the other side of the country has no meaning whatsoever for us.
Global Climate and its processes, as vast and complex a problem as it presents to scientists, is but a subset of even larger issues.
It's possible that it really is too big for mankind to get ahold of at this point. More dramatic results may need to occur.
It's also possible that we don't destroy ourselves at all, but merely have fewer people and animals in a somewhat diminished, but by no means disagreeable, Life on Earth.
A life where we all drive a hybrid Toyota Yaris? Cruel but not unbearable, given the option of a donkey.
Well, I don''t think the GW/GCC's are ready for the real answers. However the very same folks who claim this stuff DOES make a difference in fact do not practice what they preach and if fact it DOES have nothing to do with anything !!!!!
For discussion purposes it is a simple case of do what I say, not as I do.
..."A life where we all drive a hybrid Toyota Yaris? Cruel but not unbearable, given the option of a donkey."...
Sorry man, that is not good enough for "THE CULT". EVs or electric mass transit. All powered by the sun or wind. As luck would have it, If I take care of this Sequoia it should easy last 20 years. By then I will probably be too old to be out on the highway driving.
Boy, the 'ol Jipster can spot a con a mile away. You are right, of course. Without any context that figure is meaningless. Maybe a trillion tons melts EVERY year only to reform in the winter. Maybe TWO trillion tons melt in an average year and one trillion shows global COOLING.
But the average "reality show" mentality of people today wouldn't know to ask the question.
2019 Kia Soul+, 2015 Mustang GT, 2013 Ford F-150, 2000 Chrysler Sebring convertible
SEVERE COLD WAVE TO HIT EUROPE
While it has been "chilly" so far, what is about to come is the worst in many a winter, perhaps the sign that the warm AMO is reaching its maturity. The US winter has been much like those around 1950 which was the benchmark winter in the pac northwest of the US and was the warning shot that the warm cycle of the 30s 40s and 50s was starting its end game. It should be comforting to people worried that we are pushing our planet over the edge that things that happened before are happening again, though the discomfort caused by cold is a big problem
I wish to point out, with no malice intended, that the two countries who have major scientific organizations that have been pushing the global warming idea, Britain and the UKMET and the US with NOAA have been burned by the cold that has developed here. NOAA had a December forecast for a warm central US for November that they were forced to revise and the UKMET forecast for a rather bland winter for Europe speaks for itself. Its anything but bland, whether it averages out near the average or not, because what is coming has not been seen in years.
http://www.accuweather.com/ukie/bastardi-europe-blog.asp?partner=accuweather
The real issue is what will Al Gore do with those warehouses full of Carbon Credits he was wanting to sell? Will his millions be gobbled up in storage fees? :shades:
Your quote really puts the cap on the thought the GW/GCC marketing drives has ALWAYS been on increasing the price/cost of energy ALL ALONG !!! The hope has been to use LESS and increase percentages, prices AND TAXATION !!?? They are just content using the so called "pendulum and ratchet" methods. They have had the traditional boogie men: MONSTER/S OIL !!!! AH !!!!! monsters !!! Anybody who mentions that governments/states/nations make MORE money than the MONSTERS somehow some way do not get the time of day. The real tragedy goes unreported unheralded. Now there is and has ALWAYS been a place for taxation. But money spent in the free market system locally has at the LEAST an 8-1 multiplier effect; while taxation is a 1 dollar taxation= 2 dollars you have to earn proposition. So taxation deployment has to (should, but NOT) be ever so judiciously applied and hopefully for obvious reasons.
What has actually happened if this economic scenario is any example is less use and record LOW PRICES. When taxation is the same, low prices actually almost exponentially increase TAXES. For those that have a hard time visualizing this: CA for example has an excise taxation of .18 cents each: RUG to PUG/D2. (this is only ONE level of taxation at the pumps) Do the math at 4 dollars per gal vs 1.60 per gal. So for example there is talk in the CA legislature of upping the per gal fees/taxation or whatever they wish to call it to skirt the 2/3rds majority vote on taxation to $1.00 per gals. The percentage rise will be EXPONENTIAL while a $1.00 RISE will seem "reasonable" under so called "extreme" conditions !!!
We suspect you have been living your life unaware of the articles by Loehle and McCulloch. The reason is obvious – they found evidence that temperature variations over the past 2,000 years indicate that the earth’s average temperature bounces around naturally to a larger degree than other paleo-reconstructions indicate, and further, that temperatures about 1,000 years ago were not that dissimilar to today’s temperatures. This suggests that the earth’s ecosystems are more resilient (and adaptive) than some pessimists give them credit for—not a favorite topic in the mainstream press.
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2008/02/11/a-2000-year-global-temper- ature-record/
Fact is, no one can know the complete, full, true impact of man's activities on the global climate.
Thus we have the "debate" part.
As 2008 nears an end, there are a lot of folks waiting to see where the final number is going to come in for this year’s global average temperature. It’s likely that the average temperature for 2008 will fall below the value for 2007 and quite possibly be the coldest year of the (official) 21st century. 2008 will add another to the growing recent string of years during which time global average temperatures have not risen. Does this mean that pressure of “global warming” fuelled by increasing greenhouse gas emissions from human activity has abated?
The answer is a qualified “no”—it seems that natural variations have been flexing their muscles and offsetting anthropogenic warming.
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2008/12/17/recent-temperature-trends- -in-context/#more-355
It looks like this year your "Hockey Stick" GW chart will get a workout. Lots of frozen places to play hockey.
You can discount solid evidence all you like. That is what debate is all about. I am just a voice for reality. It is only the global warming fanatics that are not interested in facts. The rest of US want to see data backed up by more data. Even then the issue is so large that it will be difficult to make any kind of judgment that is without room for debate.
So in response. No one can truly know how little man contributes to the changes in Global Climate. I personally would be surprised if it is more than 5%. Which means all the hand wringing and wasted resources will have less than a negligible affect on the Arctic ice melting.
Just following your lead.
You refuse to even admit that historical temperature records are correct !!! How's that for "discounting solid evidence?"
We all may as well take a 4 week breather - assuming Obama's science appointments are all confirmed, there's going to be a lot of fresh arguments on the table.
My problem is with those that think we can change the Global temperatures significantly. I also detest the alarmist that would have me drive a Yugo so they can live in an 11,000 square foot mansion and use 10 times as much electricity as I do. Or have a 100 foot long house boat with many times the carbon impact as my modest home. It is not the Larsb's of the country I have a problem with. It is the "Do as I say, Not as I DO" GW alarmists from NYC, Washington DC and Hollywood, I have an issue with.
So now (since we kilt GOD) it's mudder hood, muddled nature, apple pie, global climate change. Again I have no problem with a passenger vehicle that runs on H20 and a tank lasting almost a lifetime. It is just not on the market and for obvious reasons. Our continuing to ignore the US being literally exponentially better than the Saudia Arabia of COAL: we do at our own peril and @ extreme threat to our own national security.
http://www.unionleader.com/article.aspx?headline=Deroy+Murdock%3a+Baby%2c+it%27s- +cold+outside%2c+no+matter+what+Al+Gore+says&articleId=b5668d53-404e-4f91-9356-9- 1cba0117933
Because of this continued "GW"
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People just can't start presenting theories and misinformation as scientific fact and expect others not to oppose/expose them. Don't you agree?
2013 LX 570 2016 LS 460
But so is "Poo Poo, Man has no effect at all" the wrong attitude.
What got me leaning the "Pro-GW" way in the first place was not AlGore or any of his ilk. ( He and his Carbon Credits can bite me.)
It was simply reading the NASA temperature records and noticing how from 1980-2007, 23 of the 28 years had been "above the norm" since measurements started in 1880.
And yes, I KNOW THAT'S A SMALL SAMPLING. I'm not going to get into that fact.
What it DOES show me is a trend of warmth. I'd like to know the cause of the trend. If it's something Man is doing, then let's try to fix it. If not, let's find out what it is.
Regardless, we need to be better stewards of our planet, or the aliens might send Klaatu and Gort down to erase us.
And yet there are some who would bankrupt us individually and our country as a whole based on this incomplete and most likely, bogus theory.
Let's put it in to another context.
Let's say that creation scientists proclaim that if we all don't fall in line behind their theory, the earth will be doomed. In addition these creationists say we should levy an "evolution tax" upon all people even if this means some of them will starve. It's for their own good, they will say, because "we creationists have a consensus that our way is the right way".
Now let's say that the creationist's friends in the news media label everyone who disagrees as a "denier" and dismisses everything they have to say.
Wouldn't it be frightening to live in a world like that?
2019 Kia Soul+, 2015 Mustang GT, 2013 Ford F-150, 2000 Chrysler Sebring convertible
2013 LX 570 2016 LS 460
Food for thought. I would say more people in the World believe in Creation by a higher being than believe in GW/CC caused by man. In fact the very small minority that believe we are doomed if we don't all pay into the Carbon Credit scam, are wielding a mighty big stick over the rest of us. Anyone claiming a consensus of opinion, is not to be trusted. It just means they, and a few friends have this theory. I am sure that many of the scientist that believe in the CC by man theory are sincere. That does not make them right.
In case I don't post before..............may I wish a Merry Christmas and a Happy, Healthy and Peaceful New Year to all you fellow CC heretics, (oh, O.K., and the rest as well).
'Cash For Clunkers' Program Would Make Sense -- If Approached Sensibly (Green Car Advisor)
The other side of this is what is the cost (dollars and greenhouse gas emissions, etc) to manufacture something (new) EVERY year rather than keeping something 10 years (and beyond) ? So for example if I decided to buy say new every 5 years I would have bought 6 vehicles instead of 2
This might fall into the current heretical articles, but the current (dismal) new car market is really telling how many new cars are a tad over "necessary" again for example 10 M yearly/254.1 M US market= app less than 4%. Bascially 6M to 6.5 M folks would find it a no brainer to keep their current cars for at least another 6 months.
This forum is candidate for closing and putting in the archives!!
(Or change the title of this forum...)
But all those headlines seem to be from opinion pieces.
Meanwhile, 2008 Among the 10 Warmest Years - Marked by Weather Extremes and Lowest Level of Arctic Ice Cover. (Yubanet)
Also, it is now realized that the SOUTH pole ice is increasing faster than previously.... again, what we see as a loss at the NORTH pole is apparently being made up on the SOUTH pole.
Mother Nature stays in equalibrium in spite of what us puny humans can do. How can any educated person honestly beleive humans can have a lasting effect on the climate? (besides cutting down the rainforests) We need to stop feeding the notion that humans are CAUSING climate change and especially stop the politicians trying to "FIX" it!!
Just a single volcano eruption puts more cr@p into the atmospehere than any humans ever can with a 10million cars.