Here are the thousands that turned up in Rome:

There are precisely 58 people. I just counted them. And that’s in a city of 3.7 million. They couldn’t write the message on the ground except by lying down. Here are the thousands that turned up in Kiev (pop. 2.8 million):

All the moonbat media are talking this up as if it’s a big deal, but of course, the pictures tell a different story. Here’s The Age on the protests:

Thousands of people gathered on the steps of the Opera House for an outdoor concert and formed a giant 350 with their bodies, one of more than 200 events to be staged across the continent, said spokeswoman Blair Palese.

But here’s the reality:

A few hundred at best. In Melbourne there were about half a dozen bikes, and in Darwin, the march looked more like a few lonely stragglers out for a stroll. But hang on, this is the biggest challenge to humanity since the dawn of time, isn’t it? More from Ms Palese:

“Our global emissions are now perilously high, at 387 ppm [she means, of course, the current proportion of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is 387 ppm, which has absolutely nothing to do with “global emissions”, but that is just the kind of sloppy thinking we are used to from environmentalists who do not have a clue what they are talking about – Ed],” Palese said. [And a good job she wasn’t around in the Cambrian period, when CO₂ reached seven THOUSAND ppm, or even the more recent Cretaceous, when CO₂ was still well over two thousand ppm – she would have probably expired with the shock – Ed]

“The majority of expert scientists now say this has to come down to 350 ppm to avoid dangerous climate change. 350.org is calling for our political leaders make this their target.”

Like you can just twiddle a knob and tinker with the climate. Yeah, right.

Read it here.

Another excellent article from Viv Forbes at the Carbon Sense Coalition:

The next few weeks are crucial. Australians can choose to assist the creation of the World Carbon Rationing, Tax and Redistribution Authority, administered by the United Nations, or we can take a step on the road back to energy and climate sanity.

The first step to sanity is to ensure that the opposition votes at all times to REJECT whatever Ration-N-Tax Scheme the Rudd government tries to get on the law books before the Copenhagen Climate Conclave. We must give no encouragement whatsoever to this international cabal of levellers.

Malcolm Turnbull and the warmist wing of the Liberal Party think that they are being politically savvy and achieving something useful by negotiating with the devil on a few clauses of the ETS (Extra Tax System). In matters as crucial as this, compromise is defeat.

Read it here.

Clive Hamilton, enviro-loony from the extreme Left and author of Scorcher: The Dirty Politics of Climate Change, is the Greens’ candidate for the seat of Higgins, vacated by Peter Cosello. If the electorate in Higgins are dumb enough to vote this guy in, they will surely receive their just desserts. The Canberra Times goes typically misty eyed over this brave climate warrior:

”The motivating factor was that I’m just … terrified about climate change. I think it’s a massive problem looming on the horizon and the two main parties are oscillating between being weak and being pathetic on the issue,” Dr Hamilton told The Canberra Times.
…
He became a Member of the Order of Australia this year for ”contributions to public debate and public policy”, was the ACT finalist for Australia of the Year two years ago and finalist for the Prime Minister’s Environmentalist of the Year in 2001.

Looks like you need to be a climate hysteric to win the gongs in Australia. Nauseating stuff.

Read it here. 

UPDATE: Doesn’t seem to like koalas, either… see here.

The dog-on-a-string brigade will be out in force today protesting about the lack of action on “tackling climate change”. So all the usual suspects will be there, namely the Socialist Alliance, Socialist Youth Organisation, Socialist Alternative (like here, for example), oh yes, and a few Greens for good measure. Who says climate alarmism is about social change? And the ABC churns out its usual misleading photograph of CO₂ to illustrate the story:

Australia will lead a day of international climate protests calling on world leaders to cut the planet’s pollution and deliver a climate deal in December.

More than 170 countries are taking part in today’s demonstration, with more than 3,000 events planned around the world.

Protesters are concerned that world leaders, including Prime Minister Kevin Rudd, have not delivered strong enough emissions targets to avoid runaway climate change.

The day of protests kicks off in Australia with thousands expected to attend more than 230 events organised across the country.

Read it here.

But hang on – surely they should be following us Aussies in locking in binding emissions reductions before Copenhagen, so that whatever happens in December they will be obliged to meet them. Why would they possibly want to wait until after Copenhagen? That’s cheating! Then they’ll know what the rest of the world is doing and can respond accordingly!

JAPAN cautioned that it could water down planned 2020 cuts in greenhouse gas emissions if other rich nations fail to make deep reductions as part of a UN deal due in Copenhagen in December.

In Brussels, a draft report showed that European Union states were preparing to endorse an estimate by the European Commission that developing countries will need about €100 billion($150.1 billion) annually by 2020 to tackle climate change.

Disputes over 2020 emissions cuts by developed nations and the amounts of cash to help developing nations combat global warming are among the main sticking points in sluggish UN talks meant to end in Denmark on December 18 with a new treaty. [Ha, ha, stop it! My aching sides!]

“The possibility is not zero,” Japanese Environment Minister Sakihito Ozawa said when asked if Japan could change its 2020 target of cutting emissions by 25 percent from 1990 levels if Copenhagen falls short on ambition.

He declined to say what alternative target Japan, the world’s fifth biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, had in mind for cutting emissions, mainly from burning fossil fuels.

Japan’s 25 per cent offer made last month is tougher than that put forward by the previous government and among the deepest by any rich nation.

“As environment minister, I want to go ahead with this pledge, but the government announced it with a precondition at the United Nations (climate change summit last month) so of course it could change,” he said.

Gee, waiting until after Copenhagen? That seems sensible. Maybe Krudd & Co should consider it…

Read it here.

Yet another Indoctrination Alert, and the fall from grace of another once great British institution. Only last month it was the Natural History Museum, unveiling a hysterical “Climate Change Wall” (see here), and now it is the Science Museum which has joined the alarmist bandwagon, and will be indoctrinating the thousands of school age children that pass through its doors each month:

BRITISH Foreign Secretary David Miliband has unveiled an interactive map demonstrating the impact of global warming in decades to come, to underline the looming threat. 

 

The map, presented at London’s Science Museum, shows graphically how climate change could lead to water and food shortages, mass migration and conflict if action is not taken at a landmark summit in Copenhagen in December.

“The reason for publishing this map is that for many people, not only in our own country but around the world, the penny hasn’t yet dropped that this climate change challenge is real, it’s happening now,” Mr Miliband said.

The effects of climate change are not in “some far flung future” but would affect hundreds of millions of people within his lifetime, he added, unveiling the map with his brother Ed, Britain’s climate change minister.

A 4 degree celsius increase could happen in his children’s lifetime, Mr Miliband warned.

“The penny hasn’t dropped that Copenhagen is the chance to address – on a global scale – the challenge,” he said.

The map shows sea level rises and storm surges with temperatures rising up to 15 degrees, bringing increased risks of forest fires and droughts in Europe, and slashing harvests by up to 40 per cent in southeast Asia and Africa.

Vicky Carroll of the Science Museum said: “We thought it was important for visitors to understand the whole picture. [Only the alarmist side of the whole picture, clearly – Ed]

“There’s so much information about climate change but many people are still confused, so this gives them the evidence in a clear and accessible way.”

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown warned on Monday the world faces “catastrophe” if action is not agreed to curb the greenhouse gases held resposnible for global warming at the UN talks in Copenhagen.

To think I used to adore the Science Museum as a kid, and now look at it… tragic.

Read it here.

More climate lunacy from the intellectually challenged minister assisting the minister for climate change, as the ETS bill is re-introduced into Parliament:

“If we do not act, average temperatures across Australia are expected to rise by over five degrees compared to 1990 by the year 2100,” he said.

“To put this in perspective, a one degree [rise] in temperatures risks a 15 per cent reduction in stream flow in the Murray-Darling Basin.

“Australia is highly exposed to the impact of climate change, the impacts of Australia’s environment and economy will be serious, the health of our population, the security of our water and energy supplies and impacts on coastal communities and infrastructure all face unprecedented tests.”

Five degrees? Where does that come from? But at least Barnaby Joyce is not standing for this nonsense, by asking the very simple question: what will the Australian ETS do for climate? Answer: nothing at all.

“They have said behind this is this feeling that if the ETS comes in, you’ll save the Great Barrier Reef, there’ll be no more droughts,” he said.

“That’s all just a load of rubbish. That is just a second hand vacuum cleaner salesman guilt trip that they’re putting you on to try and get you to get behind the ETS, when really what it is, is just a massive tax grab.“

Read it here.

We reported here about a new study by Yarrow Axford that “proved” that the warming in the last 50 years was unusual and man-made. The study relies on investigating midge larvae in sediment cores on Baffin Island as a proxy for temperature. Watts Up With That has posted several rebuttals, including this latest one:

As I’ve pointed out on WUWT several times, the study is terribly flawed, because they haven’t considered other possible factors, such as DDT and other pesticides being transported into the lake from nearby military outposts and settlements, plus the tendency for transport or organotoxins into glacial ice which ends up in meltwater lakes. Plus the nearby weather station shows no significant warming.

WUWT reader “Ecotretas” points out this July 2009  peer reviewed study Evidence for a warmer period during the 12th and 13th centuries AD from chironomid assemblages in Southampton Island, Nunavut, Canada by Nicholas Rolland et al, which uses the same techniques, but just one island west of Baffin… The Rolland et al study temperature reconstruction shows a significantly different result than that of Axford.

Read it here.

We reported here about a disgraceful TV advert in which a child is scared witless by a fictional Armageddon caused by climate change. Due to the number of complaints received, it has been referred to the UK Advertising Standards Authority for investigation:

A £6m government ad warning about climate change is to be investigated by watchdogs over claims it is misleading and too “scary” for children.

The Advertising Standards Authority has received 357 complaints about the Department of Energy and Climate Change’s “bedtime stories” ad.

The ad aims to make adults feel guilty about the impact their carbon emissions are having on their children’s future.
…
The government has already been prevented from screening the ad during children’s programmes.

But the ASA has still received complaints from parents saying it is too frightening, although most complainants questioned the scientific basis of the claim that climate change is man-made.

An ASA spokeswoman said: “It is not just about the issue of climate change in this particular case. We have had a huge number of complaints about the science but also whether the ad itself is scary for children.”

She said the watchdog would be investigating whether the claims about climate change could be substantiated and whether the ad complied with taste and decency rules.

That will be an interesting decision to read.

Read it here.