Voice For Liberty

Tag: Global warming alarmism

  • Kansas news digest

    News from alternative media around Kansas for October 19, 2009.

    Letter from the Newsroom: National Security Edition

    This week State of the State Kansas takes an in-depth look at national security, with interviews of Mike Pompeo, Bob Beatty, Dennis Farnsworth, and news stories as well.

    Film and Mike Smith Debunk Global Warming

    (Kansas Watchdog) Coverage of “Not Evil Just Wrong” and the presentation before the film. “A 50-minute presentation by atmospheric scientist Mike Smith of Wichita preceded the presentation. Smith, CEO and Founder of WeatherData Inc., talked about the science and opinion behind manmade global warming theory. Smith, like the film that followed his presentation, debunked many claims of global warming theorists who are calling for major changes in environmental and economic policy.”

    Eye on the Stimulus: 209 New Jobs in Kansas

    (Kansas Watchdog) “On Thursday Recovery.gov released its first hard data on stimulus jobs.”

    CPA Steve Anderson talks about Performance Review of Johnson County Government

    (Kansas Watchdog) “At the October meeting in Overland Park of the Sunflower Republican Club,which was open to the public, CPA Steve Anderson talked about the Performance Review he conducted of Johnson County Kansas government for Americans for Prosperity Kansas. … Anderson said a standard performance review was a look at a single point in time, where his ‘enhanced finanical reporting’ attempted to look at trends in five-years of data and added cost-benefit analysis. Anderson pointed out several issues he had with Johnson County Government, and suggested a ‘second set’ of books detailing true cost and benefits would give better government transparency and accountability.”

    Roberts: Baucus plan would raise taxes and cut benefits for seniors

    (Kansas Liberty) “Before the vote, Roberts cautioned his fellow committee members that the ‘so-called moderate’ Baucus plan would become ‘radically’ different once it was voted out of the committee.”

    Report recommends changing the way schools can spend special-ed funds

    (Kansas Liberty) “So-called ‘catastrophic’ funding to be made more flexible. One big question: How did Shawnee Mission schools go from zero claims to 333 — in one single year?”

    State Financial Mess; Please Not the Same Old Thinking

    (Kansas Free Press) The case for more taxes in Kansas is made: “I believe we must look at tax fairness. Make sure everyone is paying their fair share. This will mean some who have received tax breaks in the past will need to step up.”

    Cerner-Kansas City Wizards Development in Village West Advances

    (Forward Kansas) “Great first step in bringing new jobs to Kansas! This a great opportunity for Wyandotte County and Kansas as a whole!”

  • Kansas should not repeat Europe’s mistakes

    By Ann McElhinney

    Not for the first time, the prosperity of thousands of Kansans rests in the hands of politicians more than 1,000 miles removed in Washington, D.C. In the next few weeks politicians will decide whether to embrace the hype about manmade “climate change” and impose a costly global warming tax to address it.

    Some Americans believe the country needs to adopt more “European” policies such as “cap and trade” which would ration the use of fossil fuels and drastically push up energy prices. But many other Americans fear the legislation now before the Senate will spell an end to the American dream.

    They are right to be nervous — and Kansans should be particularly nervous. Midwestern states generate most of their electricity from coal-fired power plants that would feel the brunt of cap-and-trade. Two studies released last month show just how destructive the cap-and-trade regime would be for Kansas. The Heritage Foundation predicted that House-passed bill could kill 16,000 jobs in 2012; the National Association of Manufacturers said the number could reach up to 29,000 by 2030. The Heritage study also found that electricity prices in the state would jump $928 a year, and gas would cost $1.31 more per gallon.

    As a European, I can’t understand the contempt for coal and other fossil fuels in America. (Al Gore is campaigning to end their use within ten years.) This country is blessed with an abundance of natural resources that produce cheap energy and drive economic progress.

    Jobs already are at stake in western Kansas, where global warming hysteria has delayed Sunflower Electric Power Corp.’s plans to construct a coal-fired generator. The project is essential to meeting Kansas’ power needs over the next 10 to 20 years, and it will keep energy rates lower for the state’s residents.

    It also will boost the economy and create thousands of jobs in construction and during many many years of operation. That’s real money for real people — and income in the form of tax revenue for the state. Kansas is being deprived of the prosperity that will come from the Holcomb power plant because of environmentalists who use alarmism to win support for economically devastating rules.

    There is no scientific basis for the current climate hysteria. Our new film soon to be released titled, Not Evil Just Wrong, shows how it has been warmer in the past — a past that had no SUVs or mass industry. The film also shows how it has not warmed in the past 13 years — despite the dire predictions of climate models.

    Not Evil Just Wrong also details how the British High Court ruled that Al Gore’s documentary An Inconvenient Truth had nine significant errors and exaggerations. Being from Ireland, I will admit that historically the British justice system has had its flaws but I urge you to read the judgment on our website www.noteviljustwrong.com. It is a devastating summary of the half-truths and misinformation that pass for science nowadays.

    Because Not Evil Just Wrong reveals these untold stories, elites from New York to Hollywood want to stop you from learning the truth about this issue. So we are bypassing Hollywood to get the message out. We are having a “people’s premiere” at 8:00 pm on Sunday, October 18.

    You can order a premiere pack through our website noteviljustwrong.com. We will send you a dvd, a movie poster for your home theater and a piece of red carpet for your home premiere. It will be a national movement with everyone not pressing PLAY until 8:00 pm eastern (7:00 pm for most of Kansas) on October 18.

    It will be a world record largest ever simultaneous movie premiere — the first cinematic tea party.

    Americans need to take a stand because environmentalists are pushing for cap-and-trade legislation that will increase energy costs and drive jobs out of America during one of the biggest recessions in living memory. It is nothing more than a stimulus bill for China, a country that will continue to emit carbon regardless.

    Many environmentalists are desperate to suppress that news. But it paints the painful reality of America’s future.

    Ann McElhinney is an Irish filmmaker and journalist. She is the director of Not Evil Just Wrong: The True Cost Of Global Warming Hysteria (www.noteviljustwrong.com). For coverage of her talk in Wichita, see ‘Not Evil Just Wrong’ filmmaker tells of harms of radical environmentalists. For my review of Not Evil Just Wrong, see “Not Evil Just Wrong” a powerful refutation of Al Gore, environmental extremism.

  • ‘Not Evil Just Wrong’ filmmaker tells of harms of radical environmentalists

    Update: for my review of the film, click on “Not Evil Just Wrong” a powerful refutation of Al Gore, environmental extremism.

    Watching the film she made, I became angry. After talking with her, I feel better, but I’m still angry.

    She’s Ann McElhinney. The film she made is Not Evil Just Wrong. It’s a very powerful antidote to former vice president Al Gore’s film An Inconvenient Truth and the extremism it has generated.

    McElhinney was in Wichita yesterday to speak to a civic group. I attended her talk, and then spoke with her afterwards.

    So why am I angry? Over and over, Gore and other radical environmentalists disregard facts and science, while at the same time proclaiming that the scientific debate is over. And it’s not just an academic debate. As Not Evil Just Wrong illustrates, millions of lives are at stake, as well as our standard of living.

    An important episode in the film isn’t directly related to the global warming debate, but it serves to illustrate the ways we’ve been wrong before, and it gives us insight into one of the most visible personalities driving global warming extremism.

    “Who here has played in the fog behind DDT trucks,” McElhinney asked the audience in Wichita. The widespread use of DDT led to the eradication of malaria in America and large parts of the world. But then a book — Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring — made a connection between DDT and danger to animal and human life. A worldwide ban on DDT followed, and malaria returned, especially to parts of Africa. Millions have died of malaria since then. In Uganda alone, 370 children per day die from malaria. She asked: if this was happening in Kansas, wouldn’t we do anything to stop it?

    Everyone believed Carson’s story about DDT. But it was based more on speculation than good science.

    In 2006, the World Health Organization said that Carson was wrong. But Gore still defends Carson. He wrote the introduction to an edition of her book. He visited her homestead.

    So when Gore says that carbon dioxide is going to ruin the planet, should we pay him much attention? His film An Inconvenient Truth has received a lot of attention, including winning an Oscar. But McElhinney played a clip from Not Evil Just Wrong that showed how the British High Court found that the film contains nine significant exaggerations or scientific errors.

    One of these exaggerations is Gore’s claim that sea levels will rise by 20 feet in the near future. The IPCC says this might happen over thousands of years. But schoolchildren in Ireland still get Gore’s erroneous message, and they fear that they will drown.

    McElhinney says that “it’s an extraordinary position for Al Gore to take — as a Nobel Laureate, Oscar winner, Emmy winner — to not go back and re-edit the film and take out the errors.”

    One of the loudest things we hear from the left, McElhinney says, is that “the discussion is over.” Greens say that global warming is settled scientific fact, humans are at fault, and we have to change the way we live. Her film, she says, shows that this is not conclusive. The scientific method calls for continued checking and debate, and those who call for an end to the debate are anti-scientific.

    Energy, especially inexpensive energy, is a wonderful thing, she said. “People in America are very lucky to have the energy that you have. … People get to live long, and get to do really exciting things and make loads of choices, and this doesn’t happen everywhere. … The freedom that people have in America is because of energy. The idea that we would take away energy is, that we would reduce the amount of energy is the most crazy thing I’ve ever heard.” She cautioned us to be careful not to throw away our advantage of inexpensive energy.

    Responding to a question from the audience, McElhinney reminded the audience of the existence of radical environmentalists who are opposed to chemicals and pesticides because they want everything to be “natural.” But disease and short life, she said, is the natural state of man.

    After her talk, I asked McElhinney about the motivations of people like Al Gore. Does he know the facts, that the famous hockey stick graph is wrong and that the DDT ban has cost millions of lives? Does he know these things and decides to ignore them, or is he just innocently mistaken? She said she thinks that he does know the truth, but he is ideologically driven. Those who are so ideologically blinkered have to stay with their story, even though the facts disagree with them.

    Also, Greens (radical environmentalists) think that animals are more important then people. Being elitists, too, the harmful effects of a misplaced war on carbon dioxide won’t affect them on a personal level as it will the masses of people.

    I’ve seen Not Evil Just Wrong, and it uses a powerful technique of putting a face, a person, on the issues. McElhinney said that while it’s hard to comprehend of millions of children dying of malaria, “it’s very easy to understand the death of one child.”

    Responding to another question, she said that the war against carbon emissions also a war against capitalism, and is also anti-American, with many initiatives directed against America. The wealth generated by capitalism allows people to cultivate gardens, for example, instead of doing whatever is necessary — including damaging the environment — to stay alive.

    Coverage from Kansas Watchdog is at “Not Evil, Just Wrong” Counters Environmental Extremism.

    Not Evil Just Wrong will be shown in Wichita on Sunday, October 18, as part of its nationwide premier. This free event will be at the CAC Theater at Wichita State University. It starts at 6:00 pm, with meteorologist Mike Smith presenting “An Atmospheric Scientist’s View of Global Warming” at 6:15. The movie will start at 7:00 pm. It runs 85 minutes. I’ll have my review of the movie next week.

  • Cap-and-trade admitted to be tax

    Thinking people have known this all along, and now we know that the Treasury Department believes that proposed cap-and-trade legislation — the Waxman-Markey bill — is really a tax in disguise.

    A Washington Times article gives more detail. It’s based on the work of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, a think tank that’s done some great work on the issue of global warming alarmism.

    The memo that CEI received indicates that a cap-and-trade program could generate revenues to the federal government of $100 to $200 billion annually.

    The memo, captioned “Domestic Climate Policy” contains this sentence, referring to President Obama’s proposed cap-and-trade program: “While such a program can yield environmental benefits that justify its costs, it will raise energy prices and impose annual costs on the order of xxx dollars.”

    “xxx” is a placeholder to represent a number that was redacted or withheld from the CEI — and by extension the American public — in this document that was obtained under the federal Freedom of Information Act. We have to wonder why someone thinks it’s necessary to keep this number secret. I think this is an indication that such a program would be terribly expensive. At the same time, the program would produce negligible benefit, as far as reducing or slowing the growth of global temperatures.

    Earlier this year, CEI uncovered evidence of science taking a back seat to politics in the global warming debate. Its site GlobalWarming.Org is a good place to keep up-to-date on the latest information in this field. Now CEI has launched Freedom Action, a site designed to help citizens take action by communication with elected officials.

  • Waxman-Markey costly, ineffective

    The Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation that is working its way through Congress is ineffective in its stated goal, and will harm the American economy.

    The goal of this bill is to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide emitted into the atmosphere, thereby reducing the threat of global warming. The amount of temperature reduction Waxman-Markey might produce is a matter of dispute, but most sources cite a decrease so small that it will be difficult to measure it. Its effect could easily be overwhelmed by something else over which we have no control.

    As bad as this is, the economic effects of this bill are certain, and they are devastating. The Science Applications International Corporation, at the request of the National Association of Manufacturers (NAM) and the American Council for Capital Formation (ACCF), has produced an analysis of the effects of this legislation on the United States as a whole, and on each state. The reports may be read by clicking on Economic Impact of the Waxman-Markey American Clean Energy and Security Act.

    At the national level, the economic effect of the Waxman-Markey bill would be to reduce employment by around two million jobs by 2030. Household income would go down, and energy prices would go up. From 2010 to 2030, the nation would lose from two to three trillion dollars of national income.

    For Kansas, the report notes that transportation manufacturing will show decreases in output of 8.0% to 8.4% by 2030. That’s a larger decline that what general manufacturing will experience. Transportation manufacturing, of course, includes the aircraft industry that Wichita depends on.

    This legislation is so bad that even global warming alarmists are necessarily fans of Waxman-Markey. The liberal magazine Mother Jones says this: “First, Waxman-Markey is a kludge of a bill. It’s possible that its cost-benefit is negative, and it’s almost certain that, by itself, its cost benefit is quite small even if it is positive. Second, W-M’s carbon caps by themselves will probably have only a tiny effect on rising temperatures. Third, global warming is a hopeless problem if we don’t get the rest of the world to address it too. If China and India and the rest of the developing world don’t play along, nothing the U.S. and Europe do by themselves will be enough to halt it.”

  • Global warming testimony released

    In May, Wichita geophysicist Dennis Hedke traveled to Arlington, Virginia to deliver testimony at a public hearing conducted by the Environmental Protection Agency, or EPA. In June he delivered written testimony as part of the procedure for collecting public comment. You can read this document in its entirety at the end of this article. Here are some highlights.

    Regarding the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, perhaps the main organization contributing to global warming alarmism, Hedke writes this:

    The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), as you know, actually has nothing whatsoever in place that would mimic actual “peer-reviewed” architecture. Instead, it operates in total vacuum, and when a real scientist actually raises a challenge, based on factual evidence, he or she is virtually shut out of the ongoing, ultimately published “findings.” … a multitude of highly regarded and internationally respected scientists have chosen to withdraw from the organization because they could no longer tolerate the ongoing wrongdoing that became ever so obvious.

    A major section of the document deals with comparison between EPA findings and the actual data. Hedke presents evidence that “human-induced factors related to the greenhouse effect are minimal.” That’s contrary to the EPA’s findings.

    What about the “hockey stick” graph made famous by Al Gore in his movie? Hedke writes:

    As I’m sure you are aware, [graph creator] Mann’s filtering of the real data was caught by astute researchers Ross McKitrick and Steven McIntyre, both Canadians who just happened to be in the right place at the right time to actually critically review the “science” that the IPCC was only too anxious and willing to share with the world. The eventual removal of the highly fabricated graph by the IPCC was a major source of embarrassment to that political body, proving that it was, indeed, junk science.

    One of the conclusions Hedke states is: “In the broadest sense, I would conclude that the political drivers behind the wheel of this “findings” vehicle have completely overwhelmed any sense of scientific support, or lack thereof, for the myriad of complex conclusions drawn and implied to “endanger” the citizens of this country.”

    The document contains many charts and graphs, along with many references to the sources Hedke uses.

    (This is a Scribd document. Click on the rectangle at the right of the document’s title bar to get a full-screen view.)