If Mann, et. al. agree that co2 is a minor factor then what are they arguing?
Political control over the global economy.
The 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) defined "climate change" as follows:
"Climate change" means a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable time periods.
( http://unfccc.int/index.html )
The underlying polictical drive has been clearly expressed by those behind the above political definintion of he term "Climate Change."
"What we've got to do in energy conservation is try to ride the global warming issue. Even if the theory of global warming is wrong, to have approached global warming as if it is real means energy conservation, so we will be doing the right thing anyway in terms of economic policy and environmental policy."
-- Timothy Wirth, former U.S. Senator (D-Colorado)"No matter if the science is all phony, there are collateral environmental benefits…. climate change [provides] the greatest chance to bring about justice and equality in the world."
-- Christine Stewart, Canadian Environment Minister, Calgary Herald, December 14, 1998"The answer to global warming is in the abolition of private property and production for human need. A socialist world would place an enormous priority an alternative energy sources. This is what ecologically-minded socialists have been exploring for quite some time now."
-- Louis Proyect, Columbia University" The only hope for the world is to make sure there is not another United States: We can't let other countries have the same number of cars, the amount of industrialization, we have in the U.S. We have to stop these Third World countries right where they are. And it is important to the rest of the world to make sure that they don't suffer economically by virtue of our stopping them." -- Michael Oppenheimer, Environmental Defense Fund
Ok. Thank you very much. Good bye.