Free Republic

The Trump administration will reverse course from previous Obama administration policy, eliminating climate change from a list of national security threats. The National Security Strategy to be released on Monday will emphasize the importance of balancing energy security with economic development and environmental protection, according to a source who has seen the document and shared excerpts of a late draft. “Climate policies will continue to shape the global energy system,” a draft of the National Security Strategy slated to be released on Monday said. “U.S. leadership is indispensable to countering an anti-growth, energy agenda that is detrimental to U.S. economic...

The Trump administration will reverse course from previous Obama administration policy, eliminating climate change from a list of national security threats. The National Security Strategy to be released on Monday will emphasize the importance of balancing energy security with economic development and environmental protection, according to a source who has seen the document and shared excerpts of a late draft. “Climate policies will continue to shape the global energy system,” a draft of the National Security Strategy slated to be released on Monday said. “U.S. leadership is indispensable to countering an anti-growth, energy agenda that is detrimental to U.S. economic...

When something unusual happens weather-wise, we often hear shrieks of terror that this is all just climate change pressing in on us. And, therefore, as the mantra goes, we should shut down industrial civilization and go back to shivering in the dark beside a caveman's fire. As it happens, I’m just fine with the basic idea that climate change is happening, we’re causing it, and something should be done. Further, as someone who has actually gone and read all the reports, I believe we need a carbon tax, and that's all. This makes me deeply unpopular, as I both agree...

Extreme weather left its mark across the planet in 2016, the hottest year in recorded history. Record heat baked Asia and the Arctic. Droughts gripped Brazil and southern Africa. The Great Barrier Reef suffered its worst bleaching event in memory, killing large swaths of coral. Now climate scientists are starting to tease out which of last year’s calamities can, and can’t, be linked to global warming. In a new collection of papers published Wednesday in the Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, researchers around the world analyzed 27 extreme weather events from 2016 and found that human-caused climate change was...

California Gov. Jerry Brown and former Vice President Al Gore lead the list of those blaming climate change for Southern California’s devastating wildfires, calling them “the new normal,” but others insist the science just isn’t there. That includes climate scientists such as University of Washington meteorologist Cliff Mass, who moved to extinguish the “now normal” narrative by arguing that the data “strongly suggests there is no credible evidence” that global warming is fueling this fall’s California coastal wildfires, and that claims to the contrary are “baseless, if not outright wrong.” “The bottom line of all this is that observations and...

**SNIP** The Oscar buzz comes despite pushback from skeptics, led by University of Alabama in Huntsville climatologist Roy Spencer, a former NASA scientist who accused Mr. Gore of attributing natural phenomena to human-caused climate change. In September, Mr. Spencer published an 84-page e-book, “An Inconvenient Deception,” which blasted the film as “bursting with bad science, bad policy, and some outright falsehoods.” “An Inconvenient Truth” was similarly rebuked by skeptics — Danish academic Bjorn Lomborg challenged it in a book and film called “Cool It”—but the movie earned $24 million at the box office, making it the 11th-highest grossing documentary of...

The Vatican called pro-choice California Gov. Jerry Brown a leader who defends the “dignity and freedom of each person” in a tweet lauding the governor’s climate change crusade. Earlier this month Brown patted himself on the back for a two-week European climate change tour that included the Vatican, according to Life Site News. In his Vatican address, Brown spoke of brainwashing people in order to convince them of man-made climate change. Brown called for “…not just a light rinse,” but rather, “We need a total, I might say, ‘brainwashing.’

Pope Francis has once again underscored the perils of manmade “climate change,” urging nations to adopt practical measures to counteract its effects. After his “Angelus” message in Saint Peter’s Square Sunday, the Pope gave a shout-out to the “One Planet Summit” that will take place in Paris this week, voicing his hopes for the summit’s success in fighting climate change. “Two years after the adoption of the Paris climate agreement,” the summit will renew its commitment and “consolidate a shared strategy to counter the worrisome phenomenon of climate change,” the pontiff stated. “I strongly hope that this summit, as well...

California's governor has said that deadly wildfires in the winter will be 'the new normal', as fire crews rushed to contain the fires, with dry desert winds expected to intensify over the weekend. Governor Jerry Brown on Saturday toured Ventura County neighborhoods ravaged by a weeklong wildfire that killed at least one person and destroyed hundreds of homes and other buildings. At a news conference, the Democrat said drought and climate change mean California faces a 'new reality' where lives and property are continually threatened by fire, at a cost of billions of dollars. He added that gusty winds and...

Video link to 4:04 where he says his fight against climate change helped grow economy and create longest streak of job creation in American history (and continues to today). Then he thanks himself.

Massachusetts Attorney General Maura Healey wants gas station owners to post warnings at the pump that say customers are spurring climate change by filling up their tanks. The idea came up in oral arguments in Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court Tuesday in a case challenging Exxon Mobil's record on addressing the threat of global warming and the attorney general's claim that the company misinformed the public over the threat. Justice Frank Gaziano asked how gas stations are involved in "deception or fraud related to climate change." "Because, your honor, the gas sold at those gas stations is among the premier contributors...

California Gov. Jerry Brown (D) says President Trump's stance on climate change demonstrates that he does not appear to fear the "wrath of God" or have any regard for the "existential consequences" of his environmental policies. “I don’t think President Trump has a fear of the Lord, the fear of the wrath of God, which leads one to more humility ... this is such a reckless disregard for the truth and for the existential consequences that can be unleashed,” Brown said in an interview on CBS's "60 Minutes," which is set to air on Sunday. Brown, who studied to become...

Several years ago, we were warned that bears were starving due to global warming and would be irretrievably lost. I recall the first interview I did with Alaska's then-governor, Sarah Palin, about the polar bear situation in 2008, before she got famous. I asked her if the news reports were right that polar bears were starving. I only have a reference to the link, unfortunately, but I vividly recall her most memorable quote: "Our bears are healthy bears!" She added that maybe that could be the situation in Canada, but it certainly wasn't in Alaska. Now ABC News and NBC...

However, when researchers considered how environmental and genetic limitations combined may affect the ability for us to reach these upper limits, our effect on the environment was found to play a key role. "This will be one of the biggest challenges of this century as the added pressure from anthropogenic activities will be responsible for damaging effects on human health and the environment." Prof. Toussaint predicts. "The current declines in human capacities we can see today are a sign that environmental changes, including climate, are already contributing to the increasing constraints we now have to consider."

As the hysteria over global warming heats up, carbon taxes have become the “cool” option. Environmentalists love them. So do politicians, who are more than happy to raise taxes while scoring political points. Carbon taxes, or other analogous pricing schemes, are now prevalent in Western Europe, and are making headway in North America. For example, California recently joined forces with the Canadian Provinces of Ontario and Quebec to create an integrated cap-and-trade carbon market. On top of this, many well-known economists support carbon taxes, thinking they’re the best way to mitigate man’s contribution to climate change. A new report written...

Climate change, like every hot-button issue facing the nation, divides Americans along party lines. Democrats are a lot more likely than Republicans to acknowledge Earth is heating up. But a new study from Yale University reveals that even among Democrats, opinions vary nationwide depending on the region in which people live. And nowhere is acceptance of global warming more pervasive than in the Seattle area. Among 425 congressional districts in the United States, Washington’s 7th District ranks No. 1 for acceptance of climate change among Democratic voters. About 93 percent of the ones who live in the district say they...

NEW DELHI – When former President Barack Obama spoke to a leadership forum in India's capital, he never once used the words "Donald Trump" and was careful to avoid any direct reference to his successor in the White House. Yet he made plenty of veiled references, many of which drew laughter from the audience. He talked about the importance of thinking before posting on social media, pointing out he had more Twitter followers than other people "who use it more often." He said if somebody told him climate change was a hoax he couldn't bridge that difference of opinion. And...

Reframing the situation from one of despair to one of opportunity could help to resolve the conflicts over climate change. About 80 percent of media coverage of climate change, and 90 percent of coverage of reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, framed the subject in terms of disaster, according to a 2013 study by James Painter, head of the Journalism Fellowship Program at the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism. Some particularly hysterical recent pieces have even proclaimed that changes will occur so rapidly that the world will be uninhabitable (and we will all be dead) in...

The climate is changing — the thing is, it isn’t just due to humans. Natural forces beyond human control are also gradually affecting our climate. These geophysical forces are vital to understanding global warming. Man is indeed responsible for a large portion — possibly even a majority — of global warming. But also in play are complex gravitational interactions, including changes in the Earth’s orbit, axial tilt and torque. This fact needs to be included in the public debate. Because these gravitational shifts, occurring over millennia, can influence climate patterns and ultimately lead to noticeable variations in seasons. Interestingly, research...

After 30 Years, Alarmists Are Still Predicting A Global Warming ‘Apocalypse’ Michael BastaschFor at least three decades scientists and environmental activists have been warning that the world is on the verge of a global warming “apocalypse” that will flood coastal cities, tear up roads and bridges with mega-storms and bring widespread famine and misery to much of the world.The only solution, they say, is to rid the world of fossil fuels — coal, natural gas and oil — that serve as the pillars of modern society. Only quick, decisive global action can avert the worst effects of manmade climate change,...