The Climate for Change [By AL GORE......]

New York Times ^

[Sub-Driver]

The Climate for Change By AL GORE

THE inspiring and transformative choice by the American people to elect Barack Obama as our 44th president lays the foundation for another fateful choice that he — and we — must make this January to begin an emergency rescue of human civilization from the imminent and rapidly growing threat posed by the climate crisis.

The electrifying redemption of America’s revolutionary declaration that all human beings are born equal sets the stage for the renewal of United States leadership in a world that desperately needs to protect its primary endowment: the integrity and livability of the planet.

The world authority on the climate crisis, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, after 20 years of detailed study and four unanimous reports, now says that the evidence is “unequivocal.” To those who are still tempted to dismiss the increasingly urgent alarms from scientists around the world, ignore the melting of the north polar ice cap and all of the other apocalyptic warnings from the planet itself, and who roll their eyes at the very mention of this existential threat to the future of the human species, please wake up. Our children and grandchildren need you to hear and recognize the truth of our situation, before it is too late.

Here is the good news: the bold steps that are needed to solve the climate crisis are exactly the same steps that ought to be taken in order to solve the economic crisis and the energy security crisis.

Economists across the spectrum — including Martin Feldstein and Lawrence Summers — agree that large and rapid investments in a jobs-intensive infrastructure initiative is the best way to revive our economy in a quick and sustainable way.

[kickonly88]

Well, yes, Mr. President, I accept the position of “climate czar”,thank you. Oh,uh, by the way, I have the perfect company to use for...

[saganite]

No need to apologize. Most folks think just like you. When they think of hurricanes they generally tend to limit it to storms that directly affect us.

[SteamShovel]

Of the many goofy ideas that could take down this nation if truly implemented this “save the world” thing may be the worst.

I have been saying this for years and everybody I know thought I was just crazy for thinking it. Some are just now waking up to the truth, but with Obama in as Pres., it's probably too late.

AGW, Climate Change, et. al. are nothing more than Trojan horses for totalitarian control of the USA.

Once they have us freezing to death in the winter, sweating to death in the summer, walking to work (if we have a job), and having to shop every day at the empty supermarket like the Soviets used to do, they will have achieved their Utopian goal.

[BenLurkin]

F.U.B.O.

and

F.U.A.G.

[sazerac]

Did he just kill Kyoto?

“We need to replace it next year in Copenhagen.”

[RightWhale]

It’s -5 this morning again, over a month of this Global stuff. The weatherman has been promising warmer (+20) for several days, so maybe this Algore globarama will do it.

[American in Israel]

The SKY is FALLING! The SKY is FALLING, send me MONEY and I will save you alll.......

[American in Israel]

Oh great, the cause of global warming is water. Now we all have to live in a desert as they tax us for taking a pi$$.

Now that it is getting colder due to the lack of sunspots, are they going to demand we nuke our own sun to warm things up? You figure a way to make money at it, they will do it.

[ETL]

Now that it is getting colder due to the lack of sunspots, are they going to demand we nuke our own sun to warm things up?

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If you look at the chart below, you will see that sunspot activity (during solar maxes--the individual peaks) has been relatively high since about 1900 and almost non-existent for the period between about 1625 and 1725. This period is known as the Maunder (sunspot) Minimum or "Little Ice Age".

From BBC News [yr: 2004]:
"A new [2004] analysis shows that the Sun is more active now than it has been at anytime in the previous 1,000 years. Scientists based at the Institute for Astronomy in Zurich used ice cores from Greenland to construct a picture of our star's activity in the past. They say that over the last century the number of sunspots rose at the same time that the Earth's climate became steadily warmer."..."In particular, it has been noted that between about 1645 and 1715, few sunspots were seen on the Sun's surface. This period is called the Maunder Minimum after the English astronomer who studied it. It coincided with a spell of prolonged cold weather often referred to as the "Little Ice Age". Solar scientists strongly suspect there is a link between the two events - but the exact mechanism remains elusive."
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3869753.stm

It's really hard to imagine how this little ball of fire could have any impact on our climate at all.

But the main arguments being made for a solar-climate connection is not so much to do with the heat of the Sun but rather with its magnetic cycles. When the Sun is more magnetically active (typically around the peak of the 11 year sunspot cycle --we are a few yrs away at the moment), the Sun's magnetic field is better able to deflect away incoming galactic cosmic rays (highly energetic charged particles coming from outside the solar system). The GCRs are thought to help in the formation of low-level cumulus clouds -the type of clouds that BLOCK sunlight and help cool the Earth. So when the Sun's MF is acting up (not like now -the next sunspot max is expected in about 2012), less GCRs reach the Earth's atmosphere, less low level sunlight-blocking clouds form, and more sunlight gets through to warm the Earth's surface...naturally. Clouds are basically made up of tiny water droplets. When minute particles in the atmosphere become ionized by incoming GCRs they become very 'attractive' to water molecules, in a purely chemical sense of the word. The process by which the Sun's increased magnetic field would deflect incoming cosmic rays is very similar to the way magnetic fields steer electrons in a cathode ray tube or electrons and other charged particles around the ring of a subatomic particle accelerator.-ETL

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There's a relatively new book out on the subject titled The Chilling Stars. It's written by one of the top scientists advancing the theory (Henrik Svensmark).

http://www.sciencedaily.com/books/t/1840468157-the_chilling_stars_the_new_theory_of_climate_change.htm

And here is the website for the place where he does his research:
2008: "The Center for Sun-Climate Research at the DNSC investigates the connection between variations in the intensity of cosmic rays and climatic changes on Earth. This field of research has been given the name 'cosmoclimatology'"..."Cosmic ray intensities – and therefore cloudiness – keep changing because the Sun's magnetic field varies in its ability to repel cosmic rays coming from the Galaxy, before they can reach the Earth." :
http://www.spacecenter.dk/research/sun-climate

100,000-Year Climate Pattern Linked To Sun's Magnetic Cycles:
ScienceDaily (Jun. 7, 2002) HANOVER, N.H.
Thanks to new calculations by a Dartmouth geochemist, scientists are now looking at the earth's climate history in a new light. Mukul Sharma, Assistant Professor of Earth Sciences at Dartmouth, examined existing sets of geophysical data and noticed something remarkable: the sun's magnetic activity is varying in 100,000-year cycles, a much longer time span than previously thought, and this solar activity, in turn, may likely cause the 100,000-year climate cycles on earth. This research helps scientists understand past climate trends and prepare for future ones.
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2002/06/020607073439.htm

From a well-referenced wikipedia.com column (see wiki link for ref 14):
"Sunspot numbers over the past 11,400 years have been reconstructed using dendrochronologically dated radiocarbon concentrations. The level of solar activity during the past 70 years is exceptional — the last period of similar magnitude occurred over 8,000 years ago. The Sun was at a similarly high level of magnetic activity for only ~10% of the past 11,400 years, and almost all of the earlier high-activity periods were shorter than the present episode.[14]"

[14] ^Solanki, Sami K.; Usoskin, Ilya G.; Kromer, Bernd; Schüssler, Manfred & Beer, Jürg (2004), “Unusual activity of the Sun during recent decades compared to the previous 11,000 years”, Nature 431: 1084–1087, doi:10.1038/nature02995, . Retrieved on 17 April 2007 , "11,000 Year Sunspot Number Reconstruction". Global Change Master Directory. Retrieved on 2005-03-11.

"Reconstruction of solar activity over 11,400 years. Period of equally high activity over 8,000 years ago marked.
Present period is on [the right]. Values since 1900 not shown."
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_variation

[xtinct]

Gore's back... like a bad penny... talkin chit again...

Even at a time where there is a global financial crisis, he ignores it to spew blather about a non--> problem...

[cgk]

I must have read a different article! I was completely creeped out by what appeared to be ALGORE quoting Abraham Lincoln and possibly complimenting Richard Nixon as an energy visionary:

“As Abraham Lincoln said during America’s darkest hour, “The occasion is piled high with difficulty, and we must rise with the occasion. As our case is new, so we must think anew, and act anew.” In our present case, thinking anew requires discarding an outdated and fatally flawed definition of the problem we face.

Thirty-five years ago this past week, President Richard Nixon created Project Independence, which set a national goal that, within seven years, the United States would develop “the potential to meet our own energy needs without depending on any foreign energy sources.” His statement came three weeks after the Arab oil embargo had sent prices skyrocketing and woke America to the dangers of dependence on foreign oil. And — not coincidentally — it came only three years after United States domestic oil production had peaked.

At the time, the United States imported less than a third of its oil from foreign countries. Yet today, after all six of the presidents succeeding Nixon repeated some version of his goal, our dependence has doubled from one-third to nearly two-thirds — and many feel that global oil production is at or near its peak.”

Dark days when ALGORE is quoting & complimenting Republicans.

[RipSawyer]

if he takes Gore seriously, he will make Carter look like a genius.
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You misunderestimate him! He has already accomplished that mission.

[RipSawyer]

The inmates have indeed taken over the asylum.

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Yes, and they are busily mounting it on wheels to transport it to the nearest seaport where it will be loaded on huge barges for transport to the Mariana trench where it will be dumped into the deepest waters on the Earth. Is there NO way to stop this idiocy?

[AU72]

Gotta find a way to trap Gore and Senator Imoffe in an elevator for 3 hours.

[American in Israel]

All true, but as of right now, NO sunspots last I heard. Unusual isn’t it. Going to be one COLD winter.

[ETL]

The Sun is just now (finally) moving out of the ‘minimum’ phase for its 11-year sunspot cycle. Max is supposed be around 2011 or 2012. However, the cycle, at max, for the past 60 or so years (ie, during the increased warming phase) has had a remarkably high level of activity. I think it’s still up in the air, in terms of predictions, as to whether this next cycle (cycle 24) is going to be above normal or not.

[American in Israel]

Thanks for the info. I find this very interesting.

[ETL]

From spaceweather.com for Wednesday, Nov 12, 2008:

"The sun is waking up and winking at us today," says Wainwright.

The "smile" is a filament of plasma connecting the two magnetic poles of sunspot 1008. Magnetograms of the active region reveal a N-S polarity characteristic of Solar Cycle 24: this is a new-cycle sunspot. The appearance of 1008 continues a recent trend of increasing new-cycle sunspot counts, which began in Oct. 2008. Solar activity is on the rise

Nov 12, 2008: New-cycle sunspot 1008 is growing rapidly. The sun is purple today because the picture was taken through a violet Calcium-K filter, which reveals bright magnetic froth around sunspots. Photo credit: David Leong of Hong Kong

See spaceweather.com for Wednesday, Nov 12, 2008:
http://www.spaceweather.com/
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More current images from NASA's SOHO, in higher electromagnetic frequencies:
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime-images.html

Magnetogram (black and white areas denote regions of opposing magnetic polarity):
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime/mdi_mag/512/