King Tut's Hummer: ABC Says Temp Increase 'Greatest in Thousands of Years'

NewsBusters ^ | Mark Finkelstein

[governsleastgovernsbest]

GMA's segment this morning on the big global warming confab in Paris was filled with predictably alarmist rhetoric. But one factoid slipped through the MSM filter that could put a chill on the "it's-all-man's-fault" view of the matter.

First, the alarmism. Reporting from Paris, ABC weatherman Sam Champion informed us:

• "It's really kind of frightening stuff, the stuff that science fiction books and movies are made of. Melting ice, heat waves and even stronger storms."
• "Global warming is with us, and it's going to be with us for centuries."
• "It is the definitive report on global warming, and it's frightening."

Champion ran a clip of a panel member with an urbane European accent stating that February 2nd, 2007 "will perhaps be remembered as the day when the question mark was removed from behind the debate on whether climate change had anything to do with human activity on this planet."

Champion: "They're confirming the warming is very likely man-made. . . More than 90% certainty that man's burning of fossil fuels is heating up our planet."

Added Champion: "One result of global warming -- fewer, but even stronger hurricanes." What? Global warming results in fewer hurricanes? How many charts did the MSM treat us to a year or so ago trying to demonstrate that global warming was responsible for more hurricanes? Is this the global-warming lobby trying to explain away the embarrasssing lack of Atlantic hurricanes this season?

Champion then claimed that "among the shocking conclusions of this report, sea levels could rise nearly two feet, swamping areas world-wide by the end of this century." Champion didn't let viewers know that the report actually gave a range: 7-23 inches. Why did he emphasize only the higher end?

Moreover, as he spoke ABC displayed an animation showing islands sliding into the sea with the graphic "2030" on the screen. So what is it? Seven inches by 2100, or islands disappearing in 23 years?That's when Champion let slip what you might call . . . an inconvenient truth: "the report predicts that the temperature increase this century could be the greatest in thousands of years."

Wait a second! Some time thousands of years ago, temperatures were increasing faster than they are now? Yes. A little Googling bears that out. Have a look at this government paper on the ice age, which includes this statement:

"About 11,500 years ago . . . forests quickly regained the ground that they had lost to cold and aridity. Ice sheets again began melting, though because of their size they took about two thousand more years to disappear completely. The Earth entered several thousand years of conditions warmer and moister than today; the Saharan and Arabian deserts almost completely disappeared under a vegetation cover, and in the northern latitudes forests grew slightly closer to the poles than they do at present. This phase, known as the 'Holocene optimum' occurred between about 9,000 and 5,000 years ago."

Perhaps even more signicantly, the paper paints a picture of mammoth climate changes going back hundreds of thousands of years, repeated cycles of heating and cooling that as recently as 18,000 years ago - a blink in geological terms - had my hometown of Ithaca, NY covered under a huge sheet of ice. Something melted it since then -- and it wasn't man's doing.

We can joke about the Pharoahs' SUVs, but it is obvious that man had no impact on those epochal changes. Is the man's-to-blame movement of today good science, or hubris about the ability of man to influence events?

Pet Peeve: Is their any cheaper shot than the MSMs tendency to show footage, as GMA did here, of the calving of glaciers? While used to suggest dramatic global warming, calving is a phenomenon that has occurred since time immemorial. It's what happens when glaciers reach the sea. In fact, as per this Harvard report, calving occurs when glaciers . . . grow, not shrink!

Mark lives in Ithaca, NY, where the temperature is not forecast to get above freezing any time in the next ten days. Contact him at mark@gunhill.net

[sawoody]

A massive collection of the world's foremost scientific minds...Yeah, right.

A massive collection of the world's CLIMATOLOGISTS would result in a far different report. There is no scientific consensus that current warming trends are due to mans activity.

There'll be one final judge of those actions, and I take it that he might not look very kindly on them.

Yes, God will not look too kindly on those who invent an environmental crisis so they can impose socialist/communist ideas (responsible for the murder of millions) on humanity.

You can bet that the people pushing this man-made global warming crisis could care less what God thinks!

[Paloma_55]

I find it VERRRRRY interesting that this chart is kept out of the public view. I would love to see Bill OReilly or one of the Fox News folks play this every day for a month

[Paloma_55]

Looks like CO2 content of the atmosphere is driven by temperature.

---

Yes. It does.

There is clearly an increase since the burning of fossil fuels has taken place, but ZERO evidence this causes additional warming.

[terycarl]

why do so many assume that global warming is bad??

[Minnesocold]

Dittos from Minneapolis: It's "warmed" up to -6 here at 12:52 pm.

[lormand]

"why do so many assume that global warming is bad??"

Great point

Early this winter, it was so mild, that gas/heating oil prices dropped, and there was a significant increase in economic activity.

However, we can all wish for snow up to our ears, miss days of work, pour tax money into snow removal, etc.

[Echo Talon]

Minnesocold... more like tod*mncold... ;)

[Chances Are]

Nice desktop picture. Where'd you get it? I might like to put one of those on my desktop.

Thanks.

CA....

[Chances Are]

The Kush civilization in Africa was launching space shuttles back then - in between teaching Egyptians how to build pyramids (or so black studies professors tell us). So clearly, they caused the warming and it destroyed them. ;)

Do tell us more about this phenomenon that has heretofore been hidden from me! I really want to know about this! Imagine how I can impress my friends!

CA....

[Arrowhead1952]

Why is Mars getting warmer too? Do you libs not realize the SUN is getting hotter? See my tagline below.

See the results for an FR search of Mars getting warmer.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/search?m=any;o=score;s=mars%20getting%20warmer

[Arrowhead1952]

After you finish checking those threads, take a look at this. Notice the ice shelf is getting THICKER at the right hand side of the picture. More info at the link above the picture.

Antarctic Ice: The Cold Truth

[ozzymandus]

There used to be farms on Greenland. We've still got a ways to go, especially as it's 12 degrees outside as I type.

[ancient_geezer]

Outstanding graphic. You might like to add this little ditty to go along with it.

The sun and actual science marches onward not standing still for even Global Warming theory.

Solar Resonant Diffusion Waves as a Driver of Terrestrial Climate Change

Authors: Robert Ehrlich
Comments: in press with The Journal of Atmospheric and Solr Terrestrial Physics
http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0701117v1

A theory is described based on resonant thermal diffusion waves in the sun that appears to explain many details of the paleotemperature record for the last 5.3 million years. These include the observed periodicities, the relative strengths of each observed cycle, and the sudden emergence in time for the 100 thousand year cycle. Other prior work suggesting a link between terrestrial paleoclimate and solar luminosity variations has not provided any specific mechanism. The particular mechanism described here has been demonstrated empirically, although not previously invoked in the solar context. The theory also lacks most of the problems associated with Milankovitch cycles.

[RipSawyer]

When one hears all that propaganda about climate warming today, think Greenland. When the Vikings discovered Greenland, they named it because of the trees growing there. Now one would not call it Greenland because of trees. There are none. Conclusion: it once was warmer, now it is colder. Period
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Iceland has always been warmer than Greenland. I think there is something else involved in the naming.

[Paloma_55]

Thanks for the link.

I am adding it to my "Human Caused Global Warming - NOT!" file.

[Gosh I love this neighborhood]

I'm in Michigan and it was -10 when I got up this morning.
I liked it better when we had global warming last month.