Alarmists still desperate to link malaria to climate change

23 May, 2010 by

Annoying little insect … and a mosquito

And the latest attempt is likely to be by none other than (drum roll please) Professor Michael “Hockey Stick” Mann:

Many researchers have predicted that rising temperatures will cause malaria to expand its range and intensify in its current strongholds. But unlike usual models, which aim to predict how climate change will affect malaria in the future, researchers looked at how warming affected the disease throughout the last century.

They used a recent epidemiological map of the global distribution of the major malaria parasite Plasmodium falciparum, and compared this with historical data on malaria’s prevalence in the 1900s.

The researchers — whose work was published in Nature yesterday (20 May) — found that despite global warming, the prevalence of malaria decreased, which they attribute to disease and mosquito control programmes.

Or so you would think. But Matthew Thomas thinks differently. Matthew Thomas said that the study “plays down the potential importance of climate [change]”.

Who is Matthew Thomas? He is a researcher at… Penn State. Matthew Thomas is a researcher… at Penn State… who has just won a $1.8 million grant to study the influence of environmental temperature on transmission of vector-borne diseases. Think he has a dog in this hunt?

Ask his co-investigator on the project. Michael Mann…

Where do we ask for a refund?

Read it here.

And more from John O’Sullivan here.

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ABC: sea temperature alarmism

21 May, 2010 by

Nothing alarmist here

They can bore us with as much evidence of warming as they like – the point is, it still doesn’t make the link to human emissions. But Radio Australia hits pay dirt with John Lyman, an interviewee who gives them all the alarmism they need in a piece about sea temperatures:

JOHN LYMAN: We can see with that uncertainty that there has definitely been significant warming, that warming as a signal is six times larger than the uncertainty we measured.

TIMOTHY MCDONALD: John Lyman says oceanic warming is in the order of 0.16 of a degree Celsius. He says that might not sound like much but it’s actually very significant.

JOHN LYMAN: Five-hundred 100-watt light bulbs per person on earth burning continuously – that would be the trend we’ve seen over the last 16 years just being sucked up by the ocean.

But I like to think of it in units of bombs that were dropped on Hiroshima and that would be over about 16 years two billion of those bombs. So it’s a heroic job the ocean does sucking up that signal at the top of the atmosphere. (source)

Gee, sounds scary. But now for some sanity from Dr Roy Spencer:

Being a believer in natural, internal cycles in the climate system, I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that global-average SSTs will plunge over the next couple of months. Based upon past experience, it will take a month or two for our (UAH) tropospheric temperatures to then follow suit.

SSTs heading south as El Nino fades

Read it here.

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Daily Bayonet – GW Hoax Weekly Round-up

21 May, 2010 by

Skewering the clueless

As always, a great read!

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"Triple crown" of global cooling

20 May, 2010 by

In a decade or two?

Rather than pointless efforts to stop the almost non-existent problem of CO2 caused warming, we should probably be preparing for the opposite, since many scientists are pointing towards a future sharp decline in global temperature caused by the unfortunate coincidence of three factors:

  • the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) flipping into its cold phase;
  • very low solar activity; and
  • volcanic eruptions in the pipeline (Eyjafjallajokull’s very, very big brother, Katla, may be on the verge of a big eruption if history is to be believed)

As Roy Spencer argues in his book, The Great Global Warming Blunder, the PDO may have significant effects on cloud cover, which may in themselves be sufficient to explain virtually all of the late 20th century warming, without any discernible effect from anthropogenic CO2. Add this to the fact that the sun is in the deepest slumber since the Dalton Minimum, and Icelandic volcanoes are kicking off and you have a recipe for significant global cooling.

All conjecture of course, but probably far more likely than the dire predictions of the IPCC’s incomplete and flawed climate models. So time to get your thermals out…

Read it here. (h/t Climate Realists)

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Rudd in deep strife

20 May, 2010 by

Five major policy backflips and counting…

The Herald Sun lays bare the problems for Kevin Rudd. He has the inverse midas touch at the moment, everything he touches turns to dust. Even his attacks on Tony Abbott’s “gaffe” have backfired, with public opinion solidly behind Abbott:

FOR the past three weeks, opinion polls have shown, decidedly and emphatically, that the prime ministership of Kevin Rudd is in dramatic decline.

The figures have come back with one clear thread – Australia’s very brief and intense love affair with Rudd has come to a screaming halt.

God only knows what sort of meltdown the PM experienced as he opened his newspapers. Unlike John Howard, who faced his executioners with a brave face each time the polls were released in his last year of power, Rudd went missing in action.

Like a bad loser, Rudd hates facing failure. There were no hospital visits on those three dark days after these polls. No hard hats, no slapping the workers’ backs, no door-stops outside the local church. Dead silence from the man who turned Channel 7’s Sunrise into his own marketing weapon during the last election campaign.

By hiding, and sending Julia Gillard and Wayne Swan out to do his dirty work, Rudd told us even more about himself than if he had held dozens of press conferences.

His prime ministership was built on populism. But his backflips on the ETS, immigration policy and on the roof insulation scheme proved to many of us who voted for him that Rudd does not stand for much at all.

If there is one thing Australians can’t stand, it is a fake.

Is it too much to hope that Rudd will be a one-termer?

Read it here.

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Will Alexander: RIP climate change

20 May, 2010 by

South African UN scientist Will Alexander writes the death notice for “global warming” hysteria in his final memo:

CLIMATE CHANGE

may it

REST IN PEACE

1. Provably false assumption that human activities can influence global climate for which there is no scientifically believable evidence.

2. Provably false assumption that the increases in global temperatures are the cause of climatic changes. Multiyear variations in global climate are driven by variations in the receipt and poleward redistribution of solar energy via the atmospheric and oceanic processes, not temperature variations. This is high school physics.

3. Complete lack of numeracy skills and logical deductions by the climate change adherents.

4. Deliberate manipulation of climate change science to suit political objectives.

In memoriam

Read it here (PDF) h/t Climate Realists

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Opposition budget ditches green tokenism

19 May, 2010 by

Spending on "green initiatives"

The Opposition will slash millions of dollars of pointless climate change spending promises by Labor if it regains power:

  • $200 million off reducing emissions on coal-fired power stations (spend it instead on reducing emissions of toxins and particulates, which would actually achieve some environmental benefit, rather than removing, at vast expense, a harmless trace gas essential for life)
  • $193 million off “climate aid” to poor countries (no global socialism here, thanks very much)
  • $76 million off funds encouraging individuals to reduce emissions (pointless tokenism)
  • $30 million ad campaign on climate change scrapped [BRAVO – Ed]
  • $278 million off a plan to develop “greener cars” (no, we need more cars like the Prius…)
  • $653 million off renewable energy schemes (which need massive government support to be even barely competitive)

All of these policies are predicated on CO2 being the primary and dominant driver of climate change, which $70 billion of research since 1990 has failed to establish. If it isn’t, every single one of them is completely, utterly, totally, and 100% pointless.

Read it here.

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Quote of the Day: Richard Lindzen

19 May, 2010 by

Quote of the Day

QOTD goes to MIT professor Richard Lindzen, who advises us all to abandon the use of the word “skeptic”:

“As far as I can tell, skepticism involves doubts about a plausible proposition. I think current global warming alarm does not represent a plausible proposition.”

Read it here.

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More taxpayer-funded indoctrination of our children

19 May, 2010 by

Government-funded indoctrination

A new government web site has been launched, catchily entitled Shout Out for Climate Change, encouraging students from primary to tertiary to create TV adverts or artistic works that “raise awareness of climate change”. As if that isn’t scary enough, it’s fronted with a video of Penny Wong – run for the hills! Indoctrination Alert:

The Shout Out for Climate Change competition offers young Australians the opportunity to share their thoughts and views on climate change.

If you are an aspiring film director, actor, advertising executive or just have a creative flair and care about the future of our planet [since because if you don’t subscribe to the hysterical climate alarmism of the Labor government, you don’t “care about the future of the planet” – Ed], we are counting on you to shout out for climate change in the 2010 school and university competition.

All Australian primary, secondary and tertiary students living and studying in Australia are eligible to enter the Shout Out for Climate change competition.

Through this competition you will have the opportunity to ‘shout out’ your ideas about combating climate change – and we will help you share them with Australia.

Climate propaganda, pure and simple, paid for by your taxes. Be angry, be very angry.

The whole gory web site is here. (h/t Andrew Bolt)

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Climate change to increase weeds… no, wait…

18 May, 2010 by

Killer weeds killed off?

Way back in October 2008, ACM ran the following story:

Invasion of the killer weeds

“Scientists have warned that more government funding is needed to protect Australia against a climate-driven weed invasion.” (ACM, 17 October 2008, link)

But hang on, now it’s all change, because the Sydney Moonbat Herald reports that climate change will actually eradicate some weeds:

Climate change may have an upside in helping Australian scientists put the squeeze on some weed species.

A CSIRO report has found that hotter temperatures and reduced rainfall in South Australia could lead to changes in the type and number of weeds growing in areas across the state.

It said existing weed problems in northern districts may shift south and landholders may have to deal with species they haven’t encountered before.

But it also found that as the climate warms the geographic range of some weeds that prefer cooler conditions may be reduced.

“If we can prevent the replacement with other weeds we may be able to put the squeeze on some weeds, particularly the notoriously destructive weeds Bridal Creeper and Scotch Broom,” lead author Darren Kriticos said. (source)

More weeds, same weeds, fewer weeds, different weeds. Who cares? As long as we can write mind-numbing stories about “climate change” to keep our editors happy.

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