Tag Archives: Global Warming

Three Reasonable Questions on Climate Change

Walter Russell Mead has been giving us a lot to think about lately — especially on global warming scandals. My hat is off to him for some thoughtful writing — especially given that he claims he personally accepts anthropogenic global warming as fact. He is however disappointed by sloppy science and sloppy reporting on the issue. Aren’t we all.

In the spirit of Mead’s “let’s be reasonable approach,” allow me to offer a few observations.

I am admittedly a climate skeptic. Like Mead I think skepticism is healthy — especially in someone who wants to be taken seriously as a journalist. I think skepticism is a survival instinct honed over many generations of human existence. Gullible types tend not to survive in the long run.

Here are a series of really basic questions I think any healthy skeptic ought to have about climate change — questions that our so-called journalist protectors should have insisted on being settled long ago, instead of playing cheerleaders for climate alarmism.

Fisking Foreign Policy’s Guide to Climate Skeptics

The latest issue of Foreign Policy includes an “FP Guide to Climate Skeptics” as compiled by Christina Larson and Joshua Keating. It’s an interesting collection both for what it says and what it leaves out regarding the current climate debate — the perfect candidate for an old-style fisking.

Let’s begin at the beginning:

My Weird Question Of The Day

Are we going to start subsidizing carbon emissions now?

The Verdict On Copenhagen

“A crushing disappointment.”

Kinda Consensus In Copenhagen

Yesterday, Fred Barbash of the Arena asked those of us who are contributors what we thought of the President’s address in Copenhagen.

Goings On In Copenhagen

I think that it is worth noting that a split has occurred in Copenhagen over the existing Kyoto Protocols.

The Problems Of Today Matter Too

Bjorn Lomborg–who is not a climate skeptic by any stretch of the imagination–reminds us that there are a whole host of pressing concerns to worry about if we are interested in improving the quality of life for others:

Science and its Enemies on the Left: Copenhagen Edition

Because the Left provides greater scope than the Right for the exercise of power over civil society in the name of what science says is good for us — and because it denies the sources of moral remonstrance that can stand as a bulwark against scientific hubris — it will continue to offer the greatest temptations for scientists to be seduced by power.

ClimateGate Explained

Here is a good statement of the problem raised by the e-mails from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit:

A Benefit Of Global Warming

If we get the oceans to rise, there will be beachfront erosion. That will leave less sand for Democrats to stick their heads in when confronted by inconvenient scandals.

The First CRU Casualty

As a consequence of the leaked e-mails from the University of East Anglia, Phil Jones, the director of the university’s Climate Research Unit, has been forced to step aside.

Climategate: The Plot Thickens?

Possibly. Scientists in New Zealand are alleged to have cooked the books as well. Whether this turns out to be the case or not, it is clear that the leaked e-mails from the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia have caused significant credibility problems for the climate research community.

- March 21, 2010 -

MORE LEDGER

ELSEWHERE ON TNL

DAILY READS

MARKETS & POLICY

The WHIP

HEGEMON

CHEQUER BOARD