Considering Extreme Measures

“We sleep soundly in our beds because rough men stand ready in the night to visit violence on those who would do us harm.”

The man responsible for those words is Sir Winston Churchill, a man for his times.  Notice he says “those who would do us harm,” not those who did us harm.  Many think we need a man like Sir Winston Churchill who understands our times and acts in light of that reality.

We have an interesting political battle going on as we have released our interrogation methods, yet refuse to put them into the context of the information received or circumstances in which they are used.  This unfairly politicizes the issue- trying to make things black and white when they are a little less so.

This quote from Sir Winston is at the beginning of Vince Flynn’s latest Mitch Rapp novel, Extreme Measures.   It is a novel for these times, trying to explain why it is important to have such rough men ready, for there are despicable men who hide behind religion to exploit others and protect themselves as they wage a war of terror on civilians.

Yes, Vince has found a formula that works (though he deviates from it at the very end of this novel), but I enjoy his books.  I do want that man out there protecting my family from those who would harm them simply because they live in America.

As Christians we can often confuse the issues, misapply Scripture and really be muddle headed about these issues.  Emotions can cloud the issue on both sides.

First, there is a difference in Scripture between the response of an individual to unjustice, and the response of a government.  We see that clearly in Romans 12 – 13.  The individual is not to seek revenge, but entrust such justice to God.  The government, on the other hand, bears the sword to punish evildoers.

Turning the other cheek is about insult, and again is the individual forsaking retribution.  This would not rule out self-defense should one want to physically hurt you.  Context is key.

We see something of a wartime ethic in Scripture.  Both the midwives and Rahab were blessed for deceiving those who sought to perpetrate evil.  Truth is not a black and white issue- sometimes we have to consider what will be done with the truth.  Will they use the truth to rob, steal or kill?  The context of “speaking the truth in love” is the covenant community moving toward maturity.  You can lovingly speak the truth to an evil person by calling their actions what they are, while refusing to divulge the information they want.

But we have some positive encouragements about the righteous man:

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Those who forsake the law praise the wicked, but those who keep the law resist them.  Proverbs 28(NIV)

The righteous man/person resists the wicked.  He does not stick his head in the sand and let them commit great sins against others.  This is because God is seen as the One who defends the defenseless.  As those being renewed in God’s image, we are to act like Him.  We are to defend the defenseless, protect the poor, care for the widows and orphans.

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Considering Biofuels

Even the NYT gets it, finally.  Scientific studies indicate that when you consider the process of creating the biofuels, they produce more greenhouse gases than traditional fuels.  Hah!  Congress’ great hope for not drilling anywhere in the continental U.S. and ending our foreign oil dependence has a few holes in it.

“When you take this into account, most of the biofuel that people are using or planning to use would probably increase greenhouse gasses substantially,” said Timothy Searchinger, lead author of one of the studies and a researcher in environment and economics at Princeton University. “Previously there’s been an accounting error: land use change has been left out of prior analysis.”

Of course these scientists haven’t quite figured out that temperatures are dynamic, not static, and that the models just don’t fit reality.

Then there is the “unintended consequence”. 

For instance, if vegetable oil prices go up globally, as they have because of increased demand for biofuel crops, more new land is inevitably cleared as farmers in developing countries try to get in on the profits. So crops from old plantations go to Europe for biofuels, while new fields are cleared to feed people at home.

Likewise, Dr. Fargione said that the dedication of so much cropland in the United States to growing corn for bioethanol had caused indirect land use changes far away. Previously, Midwestern farmers had alternated corn with soy in their fields, one year to the next. Now many grow only corn, meaning that soy has to be grown elsewhere.

Increasingly, that elsewhere, Dr. Fargione said, is Brazil, on land that was previously forest or savanna. “Brazilian farmers are planting more of the world’s soybeans — and they’re deforesting the Amazon to do it,” he said.

Once again we run after the elaborate, seemingly attractive solution at the expense of the simplier solutions or really understanding if there really is a problem.  So, due to the radical environmentalists and global warming alarmists have tied our hands behind our backs.  As a result of their demands, we continue to export way too much oil, which drives down the dollar, increasing the price for gas, and all the things we ship using it, shift to alternative fuels further driving up the cost of grains and all other products that rely on grains … it is a vicious cycle. 

Yes, I’m sick of the stupidity.

HT: The Institute

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Considering a Global Warming Conference

Surprisingly the media is not flocking to this Global Warming Conference even though it is being held in New York City, in a hotel near all the big media outlets (one is across the street).  The reason why?  It is a gathering of hundreds of Global Warming Critics, including climatologists and meteorologist among scientists of other related specialties addressing the topic.

Among those who spoke is Anthony Watts, a meteorologist who discovered that many of the newer stations used to read temperatures are compromised by poor placement (a few feet from an A/C vent which blows out hot air, next to the radio transmitter which creates heat, a car parked 2 feet away from one with the radiator giving off heat at times, to name a few).  Most of the stations his volunteers have visited are not in compliance with the NOAA’s published specifications for weather stations, including the 100 foot rule (no asphalt, concrete, cars, buildings etc. within 100 feet).  This process has been documented at here. 

In an ironic twist, Weather Channel founder John Coleman is also a critic.  About a year ago TWC’s Heidi Cullen advocated removing the credentials of any meteorologist who denied global warming.   He is wondering if a class action suit for fraud is in order since Al Gore is selling carbon offsets despite knowing CO2 does not cause global warming.  Perhaps this way the scientific evidence might actually see the light of day.

Here’s a snippet from his interview with Glenn Beck:

COLEMAN: Think about this. If we have runaway global warming as the alarmists have told us, if CO2 has continued to build in the atmosphere through this whole time, we’re burning our fossil fuel, CO2 is burning up in the atmosphere. If it were a pollutant, which it is not, if it were the driving force of global warming, which it is not, our temperatures would be climbing and instead they’re cooling. We’re seeing steadier cooling and their case is falling apart. And we now have almost 500 scientists who have spoken out in the last year calling this global warming a scam. It’s coming.

GLENN: You know, I have to tell you, John, I’ve been so impressed with these guys that I have met because it’s not just a science to them. It is not — I mean, a lot of them are saying the good name of science is —

COLEMAN: Let me tell you the great hurricane forecaster who we always hear forecasting the hurricanes from the University of Colorado made the most marvelous speech at our breakfast this morning. The president of the Czech Republic made an incredibly good speech and totally debunked global warming. These are meaningful important people. How can the media ignore us? How much longer can it ignore us?

This could be the new Scopes trial, potentially ridding us of the dogma of global warming before all the political solutions to a non-problem create bigger problems for the average person.

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Considering the Dangers of Environmentalism

The push is on to get you to buy and use compact flourescent bulbs.  They do use less energy.  But it is reductionistic to have that as the one criteria.  As one who worked in the men’s department of a store as a teenager, they make colors appear differently than they do in natural light.  Not a huge concern, but here is one that should be a huge concern.

“Compact fluorescent lamps contain small amounts of toxic mercury that can vaporize when the bulbs break, creating a potential health risk for infants, young children, and pregnant women. If a lamp does break, follow these cleanup procedures:

Keep people and pets away. Open windows, and leave the area for 15 minutes before beginning the cleanup.

Do not use a vacuum cleaner, even on a carpet. This will spread the mercury vapor and dust and potentially contaminate the vacuum.

Wear rubber gloves.

Carefully remove the larger pieces and place them in a secure closed container, preferably a glass jar with a metal screw top lid and seal like a canning jar.

Next, scoop up the smaller pieces and dust using two stiff pieces of paper such as index cards or playing cards.

Pick up fine particles with duct tape, packing tape, or masking tape, and then use a wet wipe or damp paper towel.

Put all waste into the glass container, including all material used in the cleanup. Remove the container from your home and call your local solid waste district or municipality for disposal instructions.

Continue ventilating the room for several hours.

Wash your hands and face.

As a precaution, consider discarding throw rugs or the area of carpet where the breakage occurred, particularly if the rug is in an area frequented by infants, small children or pregnant women. Otherwise, open windows during the next several times you vacuum the carpet to provide good ventilation. SOURCES: Maine Bureau of Remediation and Waste Management; Mercury Policy Project  Article copyrighted by the Globe Newspaper Company.

The bottom line: these things are dangerous for your health and the environment.  Some states do not permit you to put intact bulbs in the trash because they can obviously break, and spill mercury (imagine hundreds and thousands of these breaking in your local landfill).  Which is a greater threat to us, carbon gases or mercury?  Pick your poison.

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Considering a New Global Warming Paper

I haven’t done much global warming stuff recently.  There is only so much you can respond to Al Gore & Co.’s misinformation and political spinning (is he still using NASA’s old temperature numbers, or the revised/corrected ones?).  But here is some good stuff found in the International Journal of Climatology of the Royal Meteorological Society– stuff you won’t find in the NY Times or ABC News.

The article was written by David H. Douglass (professor at the University of Rochester), John R. Christy (professor at the University of Alabama), Benjamin D. Pearson and S. Fred Singer (professors at the University of Virginia).  They insist that evidence indicates many assumptions about global warming and CO2 are flat out wrong.

1. The observed patterns of temperature change can best be explained by solar variability, and don’t fit the greenhouse model predictions.  Dr. Douglass indicates “The observed pattern of warming, comparing surface and atmospheric temperature trends, does not show the characteristic fingerprint associated with greenhouse warming. The inescapable conclusion is that the human contribution is not significant and that observed increases in carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases make only a negligible contribution to climate warming.”

One of his co-authors, Dr. John Christy, added: “Satellite data and independent balloon data agree that atmospheric warming trends do not exceed those of the surface. Greenhouse models, on the other hand, demand that atmospheric trend values be 2-3 times greater.

“We have good reason, therefore, to believe that current climate models greatly overestimate the effects of greenhouse gases. Satellite observations suggest that GH models ignore negative feedbacks, produced by clouds and by water vapor, that diminish the warming effects of carbon dioxide.”

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Considering When Nations Die

When Nations Die- America on the Brink: Ten Warning Signs of a Culture in Crisis by Jim Nelson Black was written published in 1994, near the beginning of the Clinton Presidency.  That is a bit important.  But I think the cover says it all.

Black uses the research of others to identify the common factors in the demise of the great empires in history.  This is something we should be aware of, and they are:

Increased Lawlessness

Loss of Economic Discipline (both personal and corporate)

Hyper-Bureaucracy

Decline of Education

Weakening of Cultural Foundations

Disregarding of Tradition

Materialistic Mindset

Immorality run amuck

Destruction of (traditional) Religious Beliefs

Devaluing of Human Life

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Global Warming Madness

The Orlando Utilities Commission stopped construction on a coal-burning power plant.  They already spent over $22 million on the project slated to be about $500 million.  Although this new plant would be far less polluting than older coal-burning plants, it would still produce carbon dioxide increasing the dreaded carbon footprint.  This would lead to fees and taxes for releasing the cardon into the air.  This is about politics- environmental politics.

Governor Crist had this to say:  “I’m very happy for the people of Florida that’s occurring,” Crist said. “Coal is what it is and I know it’s been an important source of energy in the past. But you know we have solar, we have nuclear, we have wind and other alternative opportunities for energy in the Sunshine State.”

Does Governor Crist have any idea how much land would be required to have enough solar panels or windmills to provide power to 70,000 homes?  I’m guessing far more land than the coal plant would require.  That land would probably have to be stripped of trees and plants- the most efficient converters of carbon dioxide.  Actually, many biologists say we don’t have cardon dioxide in the air- plants and trees need a higher concentration to really thrive (this would really help those vegitarians out).  So this carbon-fear makes no sense.  It is part of the ecological system, a necessary part considering we are all carbon-based lifeforms.  Climates change, people.  But these facts are irrelevant.

Another question for Crist:  when was the last time that a permit was issued for a nuclear power plant in the States?  You can thank the environmentalists for that one too (despite the fact that their beloved France runs numerous nuclear power plants).

This continues the maddening cycle of stupidity begun by environmental politicians and now embraced by much of the DNC (and even waffling Republican governors).  They say we must end our dependence on both greenhouse gas emitting fuel and foreign oil.  We can’t drill our own environment because we want to ruin someone else’s land/water.  But we can’t stop using oil because they won’t let us burn coal (carbon gasses are released), or build nuclear power plants (I grew up watching the endless demonstations at Seabrook, NH).  Those same politicians who want us to use windpower won’t let us do it in their backyard (yes, Sen. Kennedy for one).  So they strangle us.

Economies need energy to grow.  Limiting energy production drives up prices.

Refusing to slow or end illegal/undocumented immigration increases the demand for energy.  Drives up prices.

The people supposedly concerned with the poor are driving up energy prices making people poorer because they will not allow us to utilize the energy resources we do have until we develop newer sources of energy.  Gov. Crist initiated this OUC decision with executive orders he signed in July to reduce gas emissions.  OUC considered it a deal-breaker.  Florida’s options for energy are decreasing.  This is madness pure and simple.  Environmental and political madness.

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Today is the Day…

…, the first day of Hurricane Season.  And here is our first, much-needed tropical storm making its way up the peninsula.  The drought-parched turf and forests need it.

This day is actually depressing because in central FL we get inundated with news stories on hurricane preparedness.  Weren’t most of us here in 2004?  Don’t people talk to neighbors (assuming they moved to FL since 2004)?  Don’t people have …. never mind.

Although El Nino is now done (this greatly reduced the number of hurricanes predicted by the global warming alarmists), it has been cooler than normal (ahem, gwa’s) and maybe that will reduce our hurricane risk this year.  Here’s hoping (and praying) for a yawner of a season.

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The Great Polar Bear Hoax

We’ve probably all seen this picture.  I hear it showed up on Al Gore’s multi-media presentation.  Global Warming Alarmists have used to to show that glaciers are melting, and (sob) the bears are drowning.  Kids are weeping, afraid that they deadly but beautiful beasts will be wiped out.

The truth, this picture dates from 2004 and a Woods Hole Geographic Expedition.  The caption?  “Mother polar bear and cub on interesting ice sculpture carved by waves.”  No mention in the dispactch of needing to rescue them from this naturally occuring event.  In the midst of the Wikipedia article on polar bears (ridden with Global Warming Alarmism) you find this: “Polar bears are excellent swimmers and have been seen in open Arctic waters as far as 60 miles from land.”  That 4 drowned bears have been found would seem to be an anomalie.  Stop scaring the kids with lies and misrepresentation.  If Global Warming were true, people like Al Gore wouldn’t have to lie, twist the truth and hide facts from people.  To resort to such measure shows me this is a load of something that produces one of those greenhouse gasses called methane.

HT: Rush

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Summer of Sequels

“There is nothing new under the sun.”  Or out of Hollywood apparently.  Lots of movie ‘franchises’ are on their 3rd go around.  I’m looking forward to Spider-Man 3.  I’ve really enjoyed them thus far, and Tobey Maguire is the perfect unassuming Peter Parker struggling with the price of his gifts and responsibilities.

I’m not as excited about Pirates of the Caribbean 3: At World’s End (already?) since Dead Man’s Chest was so very long and uninteresting.  Not to mention inappropriate for children, to whom it was marketed with special fast food meals and toys. 

I’m slightly more interested in Shrek 3.  Loved the first one.  The second had some really funny stuff, but increased the ‘not-really-for-kids’ humor.  The commercials for the new one focus on the scatalogical.  I’m sure Michael Myers can do something else.  It seems Shrek may be taking the same road to vileness that Austin Powers did.

But there is more…. Matt Damon is back for the 3rd time as Jason Bourne in The Bourne Ultimatum.  I suspect we’ll see that, CavWife has enjoyed them.  He’s also in the 3rd installment of the buddy pics, Ocean’s Thirteen.  ZZZZZZZZ.   But Jackie Chan and Chris Tucker will be back for a 3rd round of chop-stick comedy in Rush Hour 3.

I didn’t think Morgan Freeman was the star of Bruce Almighty, but he revises his role in Evan Almighty.  Jim Carrey made the movie, so I expect this one to stink mightily.  Also up is a sequel to the underwelming Fantastic Four called Rise of the Silver Surfer.  Wait, didn’t we already have a comic book hero this summer?

But we also have the long-awaited 4th installment of the Die Hard series, Live Free or Die Hard.  It may even have 4x as much cussin’ as the original.  But could you really out-do Die Hard with a Vengeance with Samuel L. Jackson providing profanity supplements.  And not to be outdone, the 5th installment of Harry Potter.  He’ll probably keep his clothes on for Order of the Phoenix.

Sadly, Michael Moore is back with Sicko.  Please…. go away.  This might be a great summer to enjoy global warming outside playing ball or riding bikes.  That’s if the northeast, and other parts of the country, can dig out of the snow in time for this summer releases.

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The Global Warming Swindle

Here is a lengthy documentary exposing the great global warming swindle.  The various parts of it are also found on YouTube.  Sadly, you found this in our public schools- just Al Gore’s manipulations of data and alarmist hyperbole.

Update: Apparently an improved DVD version will be released, we think.  The producers are being opposed, and persecuted, for not towing the environmentalist line.  So much for freedom of thought.  I thought it was the conservatives that didn’t like free speech?  Oh, well.  The director was on the Glenn Beck show (CNN Headline News).  He had no agenda, but was asked to do the documentary for BBC.  They are trying to discredit him by calling him a Nazi.  He has met many scientists who have received death threats.

I think it may have been removed from You Tube.

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Off-Put by Offsets

Some of the people purchasing carbon offsets have been doing research into what they money went to.  Some of them were very disappointed with what they discovered. 

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Eschatalogical Cage-Match

I’m just being playful there.  Discussions of eschatology often bring out the worst in Christians (strawmen, attacks on the man, inflammatory comments).  Sometimes you wish this could be settled by sending a champion from each side into the steel cage to settle this like ancient, ungodly men.   John MacArthur’s comments have opened some communication as he desired.  Some of that has been good.  And some not as good. 

Justin Taylor has done us two good services.  First, he provided links to Samuel Storms’ explanations of the amillenial position.  I did not realize that both Justin and Samuel are amil-brothers.  Sometimes you get the feeling that only Presbyterians and Dutch Calvinists are amillennial these days.  I’m sure Sam Storms does a better job than I could in explaining the position.  (I do have a large chapter in yet another unpublished book on Matthew 24- 3 books and counting!.  Maybe one day I’ll put that, and some evalutations of the history, doctrine and critique of dispensationalism on the blog.) 

Monergism has a short response to John MacArthur’s assertions.

Additionally, since some people were having problems with the links he provided, Justin got permission to post Sam’s list of “problems” necessarily found in both varieties of pre-millennialism.

His first post on the topic, with all the links, has some great discussion on the matter.  People are disagreeing graciously, so we are able to put away the steel-cage.  But, if some of you get unruly…. we’ll have to toss you back in.

I don’t want to spend lots of time on this issue- as if this were a eschatology blog (like a self-respecting Calvinist I’m focusing on all of providence, not just the tail end 🙂  ).  I’ve seen too many people be obsessed with this stuff, particularly in a way that makes them unproductive for the kingdom now.  So go out there and solve global warming by eating your veggies, biking to work and buying those indulgences- ah, offsets.  I booked a flight Monday, for business, on Expedia and had the opportunity to purchase offsets.  I thought it was pretty funny.  But really, as a Christian & Calvinist I love creation- viewing it as neither the object of exploitation nor worship.  Stewardship- filling the earth to subdue it and bring it under God’s rule because we are made in His image.  Yeah!

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Inconvenient Inaccuracies

It is always interesting when I agree with the NY Times.  Today is one of those days.  Finally, after Gore and his enviro-lapooza tour film has penetrated many of our public schools and won 2 Oscars… they decide to let the public know that actual, real scientists think the movie is inaccurate and over-heated.  Some portions:

“Criticisms of Mr. Gore have come not only from conservative groups and prominent skeptics of catastrophic warming, but also from rank-and-file scientists like Dr. Easterbook, who told his peers that he had no political ax to grind. A few see natural variation as more central to global warming than heat-trapping gases. Many appear to occupy a middle ground in the climate debate, seeing human activity as a serious threat but challenging what they call the extremism of both skeptics and zealots.”

“While reviewers tended to praise the book and movie, vocal skeptics of global warming protested almost immediately. Richard S. Lindzen, a climatologist at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and a member of the National Academy of Sciences, who has long expressed skepticism about dire climate predictions, accused Mr. Gore in The Wall Street Journal of “shrill alarmism.””

This next one is particular interesting since people weren’t using fossil fuels 400 years ago-

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The Green President

Al Gore thinks he can explain away his outrageous use of energy by “buying carbon offsets”.  He thinks florescent bulbs will save the environment.  Maybe, he houses are really big and probably have hundreds of lightbulbs :-).

There is a home in Texas that sounds like the home Al Gore SHOULD have if he really cared for the environment.  This house “has 25,000 gallons of rainwater storage, gray water collection from sinks and showers for irrigation, passive solar, geothermal heating and cooling. “By marketplace standards, the house is startlingly small,” says David Heymann, the architect of the 4,000-square-foot home.”

Is it owned by one of the Hollywood enrivo-activists?  No.  A climatologist?  No.  A George Soros wanna-be?  No.  This home is the Crawford, TX ranch owned by President George W. (I’m an Evil, Environment-Hating Conservative) Bush.  Congratulations to George Bush for doing more than paying for offsets.  He actually conserves energy and other resources.  Sadly, this gets NO coverage by the press.  Why?  Is it an inconvenient truth that could destroy the image of him they have created?

Here is the problem: most people can afford to buy offsets like Al Gore.  And most people couldn’t afford to build such an environmentally-friendly home either (though, note he didn’t build it as big as most people with that kind of wealth).  You used to get a tax-break for installing solor panels, a long time ago.  So, what is the average American supposed to do?

(HT: Glenn Beck)

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Environmental Indulgences & the Carbon Bigfoot

Oscar presenters received environmental indulgences paid to TerraPass for $100,000 of CO2 emissions.  You can buy your way out of your environmental guilt- way cool.

I put my car in their little emissions calculator.  My car (if I drive 12,000 miles) emits 9,000 lbs of CO2 each year.  Wow, 9,000 lbs. of guilt is a heavy burden to bear.  But- there is TerraPass to bail me out.  They off me an “Out of Towner” TerraPass for $50 to “clean up” after my car.  This would be an annual deal, so… for $50/year I get a decal, a bumpersticker, and a logo decal.  After you pay the employees & cost of TerraPass, the money is invested in cleaner fuels.  You can even give this as a gift.

This sounds like Tetzel and pre-Reformation indulgences.  Continue to emit CO2 at your current rate, but pay them money to invest in cleaner fuel options (rather than… using them) so YOU FEEL BETTER. 

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Friday Photo: 2/23/07

My in-laws’ place in the Airdondack after the Big Storm last week.  Notice the car on the right.

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Global Warming and the Media

The Boston Globe (Boston.com) has never been accused of being even remotely conservative.  But occasionally, some common sense slips through.  Such is the case with Jeff Jacoby’s column Chicken Little and Global Warning.

He lets the cat out of the bag: “Oddly enough, most of the news coverage neglected to mention that the document released on Feb. 2 by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was not the latest multiyear assessment report, which will run to something like 1,500 pages when it is released in May. It was only the 21-page “Summary for Policymakers,” a document written chiefly by government bureaucrats — not scientists — and intended to shape public opinion. ”

The average person does not know this, and gets confused regarding what there is and is not “scientific consensus”.  The problem is the media, which obscures important little details in order to sell us fear.

“In years past, scientists contributing to IPCC assessment reports have protested that the policymakers’ summary distorted their findings — for example, by presenting as unambiguous what were actually only tentative conclusions about human involvement in global warming. This time around, the summary is even more confident: It declares it “unequivocal” that the Earth has warmed over the past century and “very likely” — meaning more than 90 percent certain — that human activity is the cause.

“That climate change is taking place no one doubts; the Earth’s climate is always in flux. But is it really so clear-cut that the current warming, which amounts to less than 1 degree Celsius over the past century, is anthropogenic? Or that continued warming will lead to the meteorological chaos and massive deaths that alarmists predict? It is to the media. By and large they relay only the apocalyptic view: Either we embark on a radical program to slash carbon-dioxide emissions — that is, to arrest economic growth — or we are doomed, as NBC’s Matt Lauer put it last week, to “what literally could be the end of the world as we know it.””

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The Politics of Global Warming

It’s been awhile since I talked about this one.  Can across an interesting bit by conservative Canadian columnist Klaus Rohrich on the politics of global warming.

“What do you get when you combine leftist politics with science? Man-made global warming. … While there is no doubt that the earth is currently in a warming trend, the junk scientists would have you believe it’s all because of so-called ‘greenhouse’ gases produced by humanity. And they are not just referring to humanity in general, but Western nations that are enjoying a higher standard of living than the rest in particular. ”  He’s hit the nail on the head there.  Remember (!) the question is about the cause, effect and possible solutions to the climate change that may be happening.  This is where the disagreement lies, and where there is NO concensus (MSM be condemned).

“The best thing anyone could do to maintain his or her sanity in this age of global warming hysteria is to remember that the entire global warming scare is driven by an agenda. One has only to examine the Kyoto Treaty to know that it isn’t about decreasing greenhouse gases. It’s about the redistribution of the world’s wealth.”

The Kyoto Protocol certainly seems more concerned with redistribution of wealth and solving any supposed environmental crisis since it punishes the West and not the other-world nations that are among the biggest polluters (I can think of 2 huge economies now).

I love this tidbit: “Neither Time, nor ABC, nor any of the other former mainstream news outlets will deign to provide evidence that belies the current global warming hysteria. Swiss and German scientists found an alternative explanation for global warming in 2004, with a study that suggests an increase in the sun’s radiation isn’t only affecting earth’s climate, but also that of our neighboring planets. NASA’s Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) Extended Mission has documented significant shrinking in the Martian ice caps at a rate of approximately 10 feet per year.

“‘A study of the ice caps on Mars may show that the red planet is experiencing a warming trend. If both Mars and Earth are experiencing global warming, then perhaps there is a larger phenomenon going on in the Solar System that is causing their global climates to change.’–Current Science and Technology Centre Satellite measurements of the Greenland ice shield as well as the arctic and arctic icecaps show that they are actually thickening to the extent of approximately 5.4 cm (2 inches) per year between 1992 and 2003. ”

Oh, here is a review of Gore’s Inconvenient Truth by Dr. Bob Carter, a researcher at the Marine Geophysical Laboratory at James Cook University (Australia).

Meteorologist James Spann exposes the global warming politics driving the Weather Channel.  Sounds like the UN: We will tolerate all things except intolerance.

Okay… I’ve had my global warming fix for the quarter.

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The ECI and the ISA on Global Warming

17 The first to present his case seems right, till another comes forward and questions him. Proverbs 18 (NIV)

By Faith Magazine has an excellent article by Mark Bergin on the division in the evangelical community on the issue of global warming.  Mark is a sports reporter in Seattle, and a member of Mars Hill Church.  But Global Warming & Christian Stewardship shows he’s no jock.

The issues between the 2 groups aren’t on the question of climate change itself, but rather what are the causes(s), what are the expected consequences, and therefore the best possible solutions.  The ECI document assumes that the primary cause is human activity, the results will be catastrophic and that the political solutions put forth in the Kyoto Protocol or Al Gore’s movie An Inconvenient Truth are appropriate.  They were the first to speak for evangelicals.  And many influential Christians signed the document.  As a result, many Christians think this is the way to go.

As I’ve written in other places on this blog, well-respected climatologists like Richard Lindzen, Roy Spencer, and John Christy disagree.  It would seem like some of the leaders who signed it aren’t completely on board.  Some signed because they view this as an issue Christians need to speak to (and no other Christian group was), some didn’t realize that it would advocate the policy changes it does.

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