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Thursday, February 28, 2008
A change in the climate discussion
By Dan Gainor
Poll
Will Hillary Clinton fight for the nomination past June 1st?


The network new shows talk endlessly about our changing climate. On March 2-4, a huge group of scientists and public policy experts is gathering in New York for the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change to talk about what the networks leave out. The conference will present a counter to the global warming hysteria so prominent in our society.

Much of what we get on the networks is one big snow job. This year, I mean that literally. In China, they are having epic blizzards. Millions are stranded in train stations because of the snow. Now, any smart person will tell you that there is no connection between an individual weather event and long-term climate change.

Of course any smart person doesn’t necessarily work for the network news. Network stories on cold weather, which goes against the Al Gorean principles of climate change, merit no mention of global warming. Hot weather, however, earns a ridiculous 100-year prediction of disaster from CNN’s Tom Foreman as the network promoted its “Planet in Peril” report.

Sometimes climate change hysteria has its amusing side. The U.S. Senate held its global warming debate on a snowy day in December. NBC actually turned off its studio lights during a Sunday night football broadcast, as if turning off a few bulbs would detract from the millions of people powering their TVs. And last April’s Vanity Fair depicted an afterlife where “environmental sinners” go from global warming to a slightly hotter hereafter. Sort of out of the frying pan, well, you get the idea.

Unsurprisingly, Paradise had Al Gore and a Prius. And while The Washington Post didn’t deify the Jolly Green Giant, it called him "Al Gore, sexy man. The thinking girl's thoroughbred."

According to the December 12 Style section, part of Gore’s Nobel award included worship by a parade of demented pop stars. Scottish singer KT Tunstall gushed over Gore’s “expressive, arched, well-groomed” eyebrows. Actress Uma Thurman, who called him "adorable and sexy," said watching the “Inconvenient Truth” star “following his calling” was “like watching a beautiful racehorse run.”

OK, enough of Al Gore running. Thankfully we were saved from that. But Al Gore flying is another matter. Between climate summits and Nobel Peace Prize ceremonies, Gore jetted from Bali to Stockholm and back.

Not to be outdone, network journalists adopted this strategy of flying around the globe to complain about people damaging the environment.

ABC’s “Good Morning America” gang celebrated their first anniversary together by highlighting how they had flown around the globe to “bring you the day’s most important stories,” said anchor Robin Roberts. That globetrotting included countless segments about everyone doing his or her part to curb the threat of global warming. “I tallied it up and we have circled the globe 12 times, 12 times in one year, 315,688 miles,” Roberts said.

Al Gore’s Climatecrisis.net Web site says just one person flying that much is equal to the entire carbon output of eight people for a whole year. And TV people rarely travel alone. They take crews and producers and everything but sherpas. Continued...

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About The Author
Dan Gainor is The Boone Pickens Free Market Fellow and director of the Media Research Center’s Business & Media Institute. He can be seen Thursday afternoon each week on the new Fox Business Network.
 
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The truth will out
I for one look forward to seeing the outcome of this conference. After downloading and looking at the credentials of the speakers and sponsors, it is clear that they are uniformly predisposed to dismiss AGW as a problem, however if their science is good then that is all that counts, and the truth will out.

If this conference causes a paradigm shift amongst scientists, then I am willing to go along with the consensus as to the *fact* (or otherwise) of AGW, as (I think) all non-experts should. Not being an astronomer, I go along with the heliocentric theory; not knowing much biology, I go along with Darwinism; etc.

Politics is an entirely different matter. I can live with any reasonable decision, provided they don't try to convince me that "science is on their side". The role of science is to speak truth to power. What power does with that truth is the peoples' real concern.


Regularly Scheduled Winter
As February winds to a close, we in the Greater Toronto Area have had more snow this month than ever in recorded history -- and more is coming this way by noon! We have officially had twice the snow that we had in the last two years combined. It is -12 this morning. This is what we would call a regularly scheduled Canadian Winter. True, it was accompanied by people who had somehow gotten the idea that we live in Hawaii, or that Global Warming was actually true, and completely forgot about boots, thick coats, antifreeze, skis and outdoor hockey.

Like all other fads, this one has run its course. Thank heavens I am old enough to ignore all these alarums and excursions and just go on living my regular life until they slink away.
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