This Week In Climate Change

I was actually going to ask if any of you wanted to comment on this:
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http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2009/05/14/global-boiling-floods/
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It looks like a good chunk of the country was getting torn up by bad weather last weekend.

We here in west Kentucky are being told that we are in the "new" Tornado Alley". Southern Illinois is getting ravaged by winds and tornados in a way that they weren't in the past. Downtown Nashville, TN has getting hit.
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Didn't I read somewhere that there was a tornado in Canada (of all places) not too long ago?
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Something is definitely happening weatherwise.

Sorry, "has been getting hit".

Didn't I read somewhere that there was a tornado in Canada (of all places) not too long ago?
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No it was Kansas, Dorothy.
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The global warming hallucinators are yet again spouting out because since we had one of the coldest winters on record, and recent studies clearly show that for the past 10 years now, the temperature has actually fallen 3 degrees on average, now we need to hype up the spring storms.
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Lions, tigers and bears....OH MY!!

Well, that's the thing about climate change: it relocates traditional weather patterns. Here in the middle we'd take guilty pleasure in some other states being tagged with the "Tornado Alley" label – not because we want to see anyone else get whacked, but because we're pretty tired of the clichés. See above.

Oh, and KT – What we really needs right now is another aggregator of web-based content. Also.

the temperature has actually fallen 3 degrees on average, now we need to hype up the spring storms.
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Right on cue, Rusty, with the invective and sarcasm . . . you are nothing if not predictable.
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I guess that little ice storm I just lived through was just some one's hype. Had no idea that hype could be so damaging to the trees.
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Funny, I remember some sizeable snowfalls when I was growing up. Never saw an ice storm like that until recently - I've now endured two within 15 years in two adjacent states.
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But I guess they were just hype. My mistake. Maybe the trees will realize that and just grow back their tops.

"...recent studies clearly show that for the past 10 years now, the temperature has actually fallen 3 degrees on average, now we need to hype up the spring storms."
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This is absolutely disinformation and without a doubt false.
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Rusty:
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Weather is not climate!
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THIS is not only the report you misquote, but it needs only a quick perusal to realize that what is being discussed are short term changes forced by short-period variability in solar insolation and oceanic circulation:
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=va&aid=10783

"short term changes forced by short-period variability in solar insolation and oceanic circulation"
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Yes I agree. Put Global Warming Al Gore in a barrel and shove his arse out and over Niagra Falls would be a great "change", with the variability and speculation that once he hit bottom, he never comes back up again to pollute the world with HIS LIES!
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http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=62598
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http://abetterblogsite.com/public/blog/143429
In one cartoon Al Gore shows green house gas thugs ganging up on Mr. Sunshine, holding him inside the atmosphere, beating him up, and leaving him here on earth "to rot." This, Gore claims, is the cause of global warming. Nothing is said of solar activity, and the only green house gas on which the movie focuses is carbon dioxide. Almost nothing is said of water vapor, yet solar activity and and water vapor have far greater effects on global warming that does carbon dioxide.
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Which global gas has more effect? Al's bulbulous butt or the herd of Black Angus I keep? hmmmm, we should do a study on that I think.

Actually, I just read Jay's article, so I was thinking what we really need now is a press corps capable of more than "who's up, who's down," "he said-she said," "bad news for Democrats!" stenography.
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This is nice, too, though.

Rusty:
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What you think of Al Gore is irrelevant.
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Global warming is on.

Off topic disclaimer:

New 'prisoner abuse' photographs emerge despite US bid to block publication
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/northamerica/usa/barackobama/5325444/New-prisoner-abuse-photographs-emerge-despite-US-bid-to-block-publication.html

No surprise, rusty is once again 100% wrong:
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2009
April 25 At a surprisingly early date in the Spring, an F0 tornado touched down in Ottawa, Ontario, at around 7:00 PM, after a very warm and sunny day. Despite the weakness of the tornado, some roofs detached from houses, and trees and electricity poles broke, causing electrical shortages. In Gatineau, Québec, severe damages were reported, including detached roofs from a school in Gatineau sector and a commercial building in Hull sector, as well as many trees and electricity poles falling down, which were more likely the results of a microburst or strong winds alone, as no tornado has been reported by witnesses.[45][46]. The same storm system also caused a minor F0 tornado in Downtown Windsor, ripping part of the roof off of the local CUPE union hall, damaging some windows on neighbouring homes, and blowing out the windows on an automobile in the union hall's parking lot. The funnel cloud was first spotted over the western part of Windsor, near the University of Windsor, drifting southeast. Damage is reported to be low, with no injuries or deaths.

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_tornadoes#2000s

afguy
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You were right, a tornado did touch down in Canada recently.
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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Canadian_tornadoes

Dammit Cliff, you beat me by 3 minutes lol.

Ha!

"Almost nothing is said of water vapor, yet solar activity and and water vapor have far greater effects on global warming that does carbon dioxide."
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Hate to clue you in hear, but residency rate factors in here. For water vapor, the evapotranspiration cycle is only a matter of weeks long. In other words, water vapor is itself forced by the primary forcing:
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CO2
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Why?
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There are two carbon cycles, one is the biogenic cycle with cycling times of centuries to thousands of years and the goelogic cycle, with cycle times on the order of 30,000,000 years.
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Hence, both the biogenic carbon cycle, influencing short term climate change (in that study), and the evapotranspirative water vapor cycle are entrained in the geoligic cycle's influence. Don't forget methane, which you are producing a lot of right now.
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It's residency time is about nine years...

These right wing guys keep mistaking weather for climate.
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Won't they ever learn?

Won't they ever learn?
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53_3,
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Do they REALLY want to?

These right wing guys keep mistaking weather for climate
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Unfortunately I think the folks over at ThinkProgress are making a similar mistake. While anecdotes are helpful in stressing the importance of the subject, they're actually counterproductive to the scientific arguments.

It's the biggest single stupidity they pull.
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Increasing global temperature increases the rate of evapotranspiration, which, incidentally, can locally counter, on scales of weeks to centuries, general trends*1*2.
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*1 The human race is simulating the 30MY tectonic (geologic) carbon cycle by digging up fossil fuels which has the effect of accelerating that cycle by 100,000 times. Normally, fossil fuels would be subducted, then the CO2 generated by tectonic heating would be spewed out of volcanoes.
*2 Water vapor is a very, very efficient greenhouse gas if it could stay in the atmosphere long enough to build up. This is why it's entrained in the primary forcing cycle, which, as stated in *1, is being greatly accelerated.

Paul Dirks
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I disagree about the folks at ThinkProgress. I think they just point out the consequences that global warming has on the weather. Something that a federal report just delved into.
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http://wonkroom.thinkprogress.org/2008/06/19/global-boiling-report/

While anecdotes are helpful in stressing the importance of the subject, they're actually counterproductive to the scientific arguments.
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Yes, and pieces like what I linked to tend to be on the hysterical side.
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But they're useful in that they drive home the effects of global warming. And with a largely scientifically illiterate populace, that's essential.
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For instance, I think that I'm somewhat fairly educated on the matter, but when 53_3 gets going about global warming I realize just how much I don't know about it.

Climate change will be a more pressing issue as time goes on, until it is the consuming issue - it's just not clear when it will be the consuming issue. 20 years? 30 years?
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Weather is not climate, and yet nothing has happened over the last few years that is not consistent with a generally warming climate.
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I've gardened in the same place for 50 years, and now have about 5 weeks more growing season than in my childhood - some years more than that. It appears we are about to have the first frost-free May in Northwest Vermont in my lifetime.
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Even these short-term climate changes would not be significant if it weren't for the much more important and larger phenomena such as the melting of the polar ice.

OT -- As an ex-smoker I'm well aware that whenever we look for additional revenue to fund things no one seems to object an increase in cigarette taxes, so has anyone ever heard of anyone trying to promote an excise tax on guns?