Obama, Perry, science, and the Texas wildfires
I guess (sniffle; sigh) neither Rick Perry nor Barack Obama read neo-neocon at PJ, although Obama may be a secret Thomas Friedman fan.
Here’s an excerpt from my PJ article of 9/18 [emphasis mine]:
Thomas Friedman of the New York Times jokingly calls Perry crazy for alleging that “climate change is some fraud perpetrated by scientists trying to gin up money for research.” But Friedman is so busy laughing at Perry that he doesn’t even bother to distinguish between global warming and anthropogenic global warming, although it’s the latter about which Perry made his skeptical remarks. What’s more, in citing record-setting Texas drought and wildfires in order to mock Perry for doubting the obvious reality of global warming, Friedman makes one of the most basic errors of all in the global warming debate: confusing weather with climate.
So now Obama—at the type of venue where he tends to be most hard-hitting and most controversial, a fundraiser—took a leaf from Friedman’s tired old book:
At a fundraiser in San Jose, Calif., Obama said that some in the audience might be former Republicans “but are puzzled by what’s happening to that party,” and voters should back him if they believe in a “fact-based” America.
I mean has anybody been watching the debates lately?” Obama said. “You’ve got a governor whose state is on fire denying climate change.
It would be almost amusing, if it weren’t so sad, that Obama makes the same basic error* as Friedman and yet mocks Perry for not getting the science right. And from a quick perusal of the comments to the linked article at The Hill, it seems that readers there haven’t noticed the contradiction, either (in comments such as, for example, at 3:38, “Republicans don’t like facts. They reject science and anything that comes in the way of their backwards ideas”).
I’m not sure anyone’s calling Obama on this stuff. If so I haven’t seen it so far, so I guess it’s up to me. The Perry camp has responded in a different manner, saying, ” It’s outrageous President Obama would use the burning of 1,500 homes, the worst fires in state history, as a political attack.”
But I think it’s more outrageous to confuse weather with climate, and at the same time imply that it’s your opponent who’s scientifically ignorant.
(And yes, I know Obama was making a joke. But it was a stupid and self-contradictory one, not to mention being unfunny.)
[*NOTE: Actually, there are two rather basic errors that both Friedman and Obama make. The first is the one I’ve emphasized, using localized weather (Texas drought and wildfires) as an indication of the truth of climate change. The second is their failure to distinguish between global warming and anthropogenic global warming in their descriptions of Perry’s position. For what it’s worth, he has stated in the debates and elsewhere that he believes global warming is occurring. His doubt involves the “human-caused” aspect of it.]
I’d love to know about Obama’s college science courses and the grades he received.
Concluding your opponent is scientifically ignorant based on the manipulation/distortion of science to serve an ideological bias to promote social/cultural/ideological/political objectives is Lysenkoism. The model and the modus operandi live; and dead Trofim Denisovich is dancing in his grave.
Science itself should be offended at the AGW people. Never mind the politics; that’s the art of lying in the first place. These guys don’t even understand the basic tenets of science, and that it’s *never* settled, or that science cannot rest long on assumptions. Such rampant dishonesty in the guise of intellectualism isn’t a surprise, but it’s terribly corrosive.
Then again, if they actually taught good science in the schools, maybe the American people would know enough to call out the BS. Instead, they go with the “truthiness” and swallow the poison.
I don’t understand why people believe that global warming is occurring, man-made or naturally. What is the evidence that there is any “global warming”?
As far as I know, there is no evidence right now for some or none.
This shouldn’t be a matter of “belief.” The records are just too incomplete. We all know that there is always climate change–hence the southern cacti and northern evergreen species that grow 50 miles from my house, located at the former base of a mile-high glacier.
I find it extremely annoying when a politician feels the need to say they “believe” in global warming. To me, that’s the same as declaring they believe in elves or goblins. It’s not a “belief” issue.
I live in Texas, after growing up in the California brush country. I am not amused at all.
Obama’s “joke” was, as usual, in bad taste.
Promethea: “I don’t understand why people believe that global warming is occurring, man-made or naturally. What is the evidence that there is any “global warming?”
There are pictures of glaciers in the Alps that have receded since the late 1800s. They are now finding the remnants of the Norse colonies that were settled in Greenland during the Medieval Warm Period. The colonies were destroyed by ice during the Little Ice Age and are now melting out.
Those are a couple of regional anecdotal instances that show a warming trend. They are much more convincing to me than the temperature records, which are not truly global in reach (too much water area with no records) and are often affected by changing local conditions such as buildings, paving, shade/no shade, air conditioning ducts, etc. The satellite records are much more comprehensive and less subject to local anomalies. They show a gradual warming, but nothing near what the”Hockey Team’s” computer models predict. However, the satellite records only cover about 25 years.
I am in agreement that there is gradual warming, but the evidence, thus far, does not convince me that it is caused primarily by CO2 or that it is catastrophic in nature.
My local newspaper just ran another big pro catastrophic AGW article on Sunday. Just one of a long string of such articles. It is still the same blah, blah, blah – the science is settled; why do so many Americans not accept the truth? This propaganda effort has been going on for at least the last 15-16 years. They keep telling us what to believe and are amazed that so many don’t accept it.
Obama is like all of the watermelons (green on the outside, red on the inside) who think the science is settled. Just like he thought $800 billion in porkulus would stimulate the economy. He knows not of what he speaks. I hope he keeps it up.
Let me think, what first lady advocated replacing unhealthy sugar with healthy honey? Nah, Couldn’t be Michelle, I mean that point of view is total nonsense and completely unscientific.
J.J. @ 12:15 am . . .
Some glaciers in the Alps may be receding, but there is also evidence (somewhere, too lazy to google) that there are places in Antarctica that are now colder.
The point is: no one knows what the earth is “supposed to be” or how to measure it. Glaciers are not the only measures. What about sea temperatures, atmospheric temperatures, solar output? There are so many variables.
Sergey, one of neo’s commenters, wrote several comments discussing the fact that there is very little information about the nature of the earth as a mainly liquid body.
BTW, I saw a very informative map on wattsupwiththat showing how little is known about temperatures over time on the earth. This map convinced me that there is almost no historic evidence about anything related to earth’s temperatures besides vegetation (like the cactus near Chicago).
Also, near Juneau is a glacier that has been receding for about 300 or 500 years, and the glacier was caused by what they think was a “Little Ice Age” in the area.
Check out wattsupwiththat.com for lots of information about the science or lack of it behind global “warming.”
wattsupwiththat.com is an excellent site; I’d also recommend climateaudit.org. Jimmy J. is correct in mentioning the remnants of pre-Little Ice Age settlements now coming to view in the Alps and Greenland. Geologists know that we’re in an inter-glacial period, so it’s not surprising that there should be warming going on.
For some time I’ve had kind of a pet idea about the AGW guys: They’re caught up in a case of infantile egoism. We’re all familiar with the little kid who sees himself as the cause of everything around him–for example, it’s well-known that when parents divorce, the little kid will often see himself as the cause of the break-up, and wonder guiltily what he did to make it happen. In a similar fashion, I think humans tend to see themselves as the cause of many natural phenomena they see. There are lots of examples: Changes in honey-bee or tree frog populations? Maybe it’s cell phone signals or pesticide use–the established fact of mathematically chaotic population changes or subtle, unknown viruses, while more likely are never even considered. We’re too wrapped up in the notion of how bad humanity is for nature–and in the process, we implicitly deny that humanity is even PART of nature. To quote Algore in a slightly different, but related, contest, it’s “bullshit.”
It does not matter one bit whether BO deliberately chose to say “global warming” or “man-made GW” to the audience. The only point was to attack and ridicule Gov. Perry during a campaign speech. Nuance, attention to detail and class are not part of BO’s repertoire nor can they be when appealing to his supporters who are desperately “clinging” to their guns (verbal attacks on Conservatives) and their religion (adoration of BO). He’s given them nothing else to hold up with pride – nothing.
Back in February 2010, Texas was experiencing record snowfalls. Someone should ask out esteemed scientist-in-chief if they were due to global warming. The fact of the matter is that any warming that has been observed in the last century is within the bounds of natural variation. CO2 concentrations have been 10 times higher in geologic time. Where did all of the ancient CO2 go? A lot of it got buried in the form of oil and coal. In other words, the evil carbon in fossil fuels came from the atmosphere. Burning fossil fuels can be seen as the greenest of all activities; it is recycling carbon back into the atmosphere. Think of it is plant-food in the sky.
I’d love to ask President Obama or Lisa Jackson whether it would be a good thing to eliminate all CO2 from the atmosphere.
Promethea and betsy,
I’m a regular reader of WUWT and Climate Audit as well as several other climate sites. Anthony Watts is doing a great job of showing the new developments from all over the place. He’s kind of the Instapundit of climate. McIntyre’s Climate Audit has been doing great work on keeping the Hockey Team honest. In fact, I sometimes wonder if I couldn’t call myself a serious student of climatology since I spend several hours a week keeping up with the latest developments.
Dr. Roy Spencer is my favorite climatologist.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/
He’s a voice of reason in what has become a very vociferous debate. The Hockey Team attacks Spencer viciously, but he just keeps plugging along doing his work and is always open minded.
Of course, no one can understand the Hockey Team’s ideas and methods without reading their blog, Real Climate.
http://realclimate.com/
I used to comment there until they quit publishing my comments. Sigh! Only watermelons are welcome.
The point of the “anti-science” meme that Democrats are pushing so hard is to try to imply that the GOP is not rational and will elevate faith or ideology above logic. Of course, this came from someone who visited 57 states, double-counted hundreds of billions of alleged savings from the same source, and claimed to have saved or created 900 jobs at an establishment that employed fewer than 600 people.
Someone at one of the think tanks has been having a great deal of fun pointing out all the junk science that the left has embraced over the last few years. I think it would be easier and more fun to simply show that they can’t add or subtract or even count.
J.J. at 11:06 am . . .
Thanks for the Roy Spencer website. It’s always good to have a few handy websites to send to the antiwarmanist deniers. 😉
betsy b. @ 7:40
“We’re too wrapped up in the notion of how bad humanity is for nature—and in the process, we implicitly deny that humanity is even PART of nature.”
Just so. Yesterday I visited a shellfish farm on Samish Bay. They have a 4 square mile area of the bay where they raise oysters, clams, and mussels. We were given a 45 minute lecture on how it’s all done. It is wonderful, but it is much like the genetically modified field crops. They spawn the fish artificially, ship the tiny seed shells to Hawaii for a period where they need warm water, then back to Washington where they are “planted” out in the bay. They purposely raise sterile shellfish because they don’t want them spawning as it messes up the growing and harvesting, which can now take place year round. It is the natural process but is improved and has a lot to do with science and the hand of man. The shellfish are bigger, healthier, and they reap a bigger harvest than if it was left to nature. I say, “Good on “em.” Yet the charming young woman who gave the lecture, a WSU graduate in shellfish husbandry, is very much against GMO crops because they are UNNATURAL. I got quite a chuckle out of that.