A climate change I can believe in (From Cafe Magazine March 12, 2010)

By now the reasonable, the rational, should know that there are serious problems with the whole “climate change” agenda.

We have recently seen how leading scientists and institutions who have been promoting the “climate change” agenda have been caught, and have admitted, to fudging data in order to establish “scientific” evidence of global warming. If one thing has change it is the climate of the debate itself.
 
Resignations from East Anglia University, the leading institution in the “climate change” debacle, to resignations at the United Nations point to serious problems. A serious problem is how science has been used for political purposes. We were first told we faced a problem of “global warming” but, when dissident voices within the scientific community began not only to question but to expose serious problems with the conclusions, the terms then changed. It became no longer politically feasible to keep calling the problem “global warming”. “Climate change” became the new call to arms.
 
“Climate change” is such a general concept that it really means nothing to those who deal with the weather on a professional basis. Yet, to the general public it is a concept so vague that it can include anything that the “global warming” prophets want it associated with. But as any airline pilot will tell you there is “climate change” every day, indeed, every hour, and every minute.
 
For many people “global warming” has become a religion. But what we need is reliable, non-politically driven scientific research to determine first of all if there is global warming occurring, and then to find out what the real cause or causes may be. The division is really not between those who think that humans may have an impact on the environment and those who do not, but whether current claims that current global warming is caused by humans is true or not.
 
There is a narrative attached to the whole debate that seems to go beyond the mere climatological inquiry and it has political undertones. The bottom line is that a connection is being made or attempted to be made between global warming and human progress, especially as led by capitalist, free-market societies. The conclusion, judging by some of the solutions being proposed, seems to be ahead of the scientific determination of the problem: curtail life in developed nations, make them pay for global warming, excuse developing nations.
 
What became more telling about the whole debacle and scandal of “climate change” was the actors who most pushed for adoption of a Copenhagen accord. At that gathering the international leader who received the longest standing ovation was Hugo Chavez of Venezuela. His anti-U.S., anti-capitalism rant was applauded extensively. A few weeks later Osama bin Laden joined the cause.
 

We need to ask—regardless of any scientific merits—what is really driving those who have found in “climate change” a new political home?

A leading global warming scientist Dr. Phil Jones, of the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit in Britain, just recently stepped down as director. It was discovered they were manipulating data to strengthen the argument for man-made global warming. That data was been used by the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) to demand of governments to cut carbon dioxide emissions. It was also used to produce the “graph” showing temperatures relatively stable for centuries as counterpart to dramatic rise in recent decades. Yvo de Boer, the U.N.'s top climate official, has also resigned.

 

I do not need a new religion-like belief—the global warming or climate change religion—to be a concerned and responsible citizen toward the environment. But I do want to believe that science should remain above political agendas.