Friday, March 14, 2008
Climate change is back, baby! | Gristmill: The environmental news blog | Grist
Climate change is back, baby! | Gristmill: The environmental news blog | Grist
right. so what is it about climate change that turns rational people into raving anti-science assholes? i've noticed a trend amongst "soft" global warming deniers (non-scientist fox news watching folk) and the "hard" ones--the CEI types, the Bjorn Lomborgs etc. they all tend to be older white males, typically wealthy or at least upper middle class. perhaps there's something there: perhaps these older relatively wealthy men know something. they know they have lived off the fat of the land, and that rather than handing their children and their grandchildren more land and more fat, i think they know on a deep level they've stripped the land bare. and you know what? denial is a perfect way to deal with the fact that your lifestyle has done a ton to contribute to the potential charred hellscape of your grandchildren. because (and here i'm speaking from personal experience) even wealthy white men who watch fox news 24/7 love their grandchildren. so rather than deal with reality, it's easier to make nonsensical claims about climate, rejecting science in most cases for the first time in their adult lives.
it's sad, but if the cause of this stupidity is a sense of hopelessness, then they should get over it. there are things that can be done, and i've noticed that wealthy older white men wield a lot of power in this world.
so--get over yourselves, and get on the stick. because otherwise the kid below is going to smother you in your sleep when he gets a bit older.
Let's start with the temperature. NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies has their monthly global temperature dataset out through Feb. 2008 (it starts in Jan. 1880). January was only 0.12 degrees C above the 1951-1980 mean (for that month) and a full 0.74 degrees C colder than Jan. 2007 (the warmest January record).
But Feb. 2007 was 0.26 degrees C above the monthly mean, and a mere 0.37 degrees C colder than Feb. 2008. The "legitimate science writer" David Appell explains the staggering implications (if we used the same reasoning as typical delayers):
... the world is warming up at 0.14 degrees C/month, or 3 degrees F per year, or a dramatic 30 degrees F per decade! By 2018, Fairbanks Alaska will be like Atlanta was this year. Atlanta will be ... well, like Hell ...More seriously, this February ripped the tornado record books to shreds as if they had been caught in a giant whirlwind whose intensity had been amplifed by global warming. The country suffered through a stunning 232 tornadoes -- almost triple the previous record, a mere 83 tornadoes in 1971. (Reliable records go back to 1950.)
right. so what is it about climate change that turns rational people into raving anti-science assholes? i've noticed a trend amongst "soft" global warming deniers (non-scientist fox news watching folk) and the "hard" ones--the CEI types, the Bjorn Lomborgs etc. they all tend to be older white males, typically wealthy or at least upper middle class. perhaps there's something there: perhaps these older relatively wealthy men know something. they know they have lived off the fat of the land, and that rather than handing their children and their grandchildren more land and more fat, i think they know on a deep level they've stripped the land bare. and you know what? denial is a perfect way to deal with the fact that your lifestyle has done a ton to contribute to the potential charred hellscape of your grandchildren. because (and here i'm speaking from personal experience) even wealthy white men who watch fox news 24/7 love their grandchildren. so rather than deal with reality, it's easier to make nonsensical claims about climate, rejecting science in most cases for the first time in their adult lives.
it's sad, but if the cause of this stupidity is a sense of hopelessness, then they should get over it. there are things that can be done, and i've noticed that wealthy older white men wield a lot of power in this world.
so--get over yourselves, and get on the stick. because otherwise the kid below is going to smother you in your sleep when he gets a bit older.
Thursday, March 13, 2008
Bush Tied to Child Prostitution - Resignation or Impeachment Expected! | Democrats.com
Bush Tied to Child Prostitution - Resignation or Impeachment Expected! | Democrats.com
eliot spitzer--asshole, hypocrite, and self-destructive fool.
george bush, war criminal.
it's all about emphasis.
eliot spitzer--asshole, hypocrite, and self-destructive fool.
george bush, war criminal.
it's all about emphasis.
Monday, March 10, 2008
U. of North Carolina students say no to Smithfield pork | Gristmill: The environmental news blog | Grist
an inspiring story of how students can be the engine of their own change (just like we were in the 80s with apartheid). living the change you believe in--a beautiful thing.
an inspiring story of how students can be the engine of their own change (just like we were in the 80s with apartheid). living the change you believe in--a beautiful thing.
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