I found this statement on my favorite liberal blog (yes, I read Libs and Progressives, too -- don't want to miss anything). Political Pundit wrote: "A parcel of studies looking at the oceans and melting Arctic ice leave no room for doubt that it is getting warmer, people are to blame, and the weather is going to suffer. Also, a report produced by Senator Olympia Snowe (R-Maine) found that global warming is reaching the point of no return, with widespread drought, crop failure and water shortages the likely result."
OH, Pol, Pol, Pol, Pol! Why do you, especially you really smart Libs, persist in this nonsense?
Of course there's Global Warming. It's been going on to some degree (if you'll pardon the pun) since the end of the last ice age. Those dinosaurs with their SUVs, you know!
You really need to do some research into the subject -- check out the scientific community instead of the politicians.
The Truth: Computer models forecast rapidly rising global temperatures, but data from weather satellites and balloon instruments show no warming whatsoever. Nevertheless, these same unreliable computer models underpin the Global Climate Treaty, negotiated at the 1992 Rio de Janeiro "Earth Summit," and are the driving force behind United Nations efforts to force restrictions on the use of oil, gas, and coal. The Third Conference of Parties (COP-3) to the Framework Convention on Climate Change (FCCC) (a.k.a. Global Climate Treaty), meeting in Kyoto, Japan, in December 1997 agreed to set mandatory limits and timetables. Politicians were told that the science is "settled" and "compelling," when in reality, scientific experts still strongly disagree on the evidence.
And why would something like this happen? In an interview published in Environmental Science, Dr. Malcolm Ross, a recently retired research mineralogist with the U.S. Geological Survey who holds a Ph.D. in geology from Harvard University, is past president of the Mineralogical Society of America and has published 84 papers and 63 abstracts in peer-reviewed journals, is currently affiliated with the Science and Environment Policy Project in Fairfax, Virginia and is a research associate with the Environmental Sciences Laboratory, Brooklyn College, Brooklyn, New York says:
Cohen: How serious is the politicization of science in the United States?
Ross: It is very serious. Having 40 years experience as a research scientist with the United States Geological Survey, I am appalled at what I refer to as "politically correct science."
Scientific investigation continually asks the question - is it true? The role of science is not only to discover new facts and phenomena, but to uncover errors appearing in previous investigations. Science is continually in the process of correcting previous work; no study is fixed forever in time. As the late Nobel Laureate Richard Feynman stated (if I may paraphrase him), the highest calling of a scientist is to show that his or her previous investigation is incorrect.
But this is not what happens in politically correct science. Once a political policy initiative has been introduced, sometimes but not always based on scientific investigation, the initiative persists even when new studies indicate that the premise on which the policy was based is incorrect.
Cohen: Could you give us some examples of junk science at work?
Ross: Examples of the misuse of science abound. My own experience is with asbestos and acid rain and how they relate to human health, both of which subjects I worked on as a U.S. government scientist. We have spent nearly $100 billion to remove asbestos from schools and other buildings, despite warnings by many of us that there was no nsk to the health of the building occupants. In 1990, EPA finally agreed with our risk estimate, but the damage had already been done, most of it by EPA.
Acid rain is another example. After nearly $600 million in scientific research by many scientists, it was found that acid rain has little or no effect on lakes or forests—despite the efforts of some environmentalists to promote the "politically correct" conclusion that acid rain is poisoning our lakes and killing our forests.
Other examples of the misuse of science are found in the propaganda promoted by the apocalyptics: that trace amounts of pesticides cause cancer, that radon and lead in homes are a serious health hazard, that electromagnetic fields pose risks to those around them, and that the manufacture of chlorinated organic compounds must cease because they pose a risk to human health and destroy ozone.
There's so much really good science out there that the media ignores and the politicians sneer at that it is up to each of us to get serious and study these issues to find out what the truth really is.
For other scientific resources check out sites like:
**American Science of Life and Health
** The Cato Institute
** The Atlas Economic Research Foundation
** Envirotruth
** National Center for Policy Analysis
** American Meterorological Society
** NASA Space Science Missions
** Nature.com
** New Hope Environmental Services, Inc.
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