Sammy Wilson

He's outspoken and I've made note of him here before. Northern Ireland's Environment Minister is speaking out again about the global warming hysteria.

“I think in 20 years’ time we will look back at this whole climate change debate and ask ourselves how on earth were we ever conned into spending the billions of pounds which are going into this without any kind of rigorous examination of the background, the science, the implications of it all. Because there is now a degree of hysteria about it, fairly unformed (sic) hysteria I’ve got to say as well."

You gotta respect a politician - hey, an Environment Minister no less, who's not afraid to say what many already know about global warming.

“What are the problems that face us either locally and internationally. Are those not the things we should be concentrating on?” he asked.

“HIV, lack of clean water, which kills millions of people in third world countries, lack of education.

“A fraction of the money we are currently spending on climate change could actually eradicate those three problems alone, a fraction of it.

“I think as a society we sometimes need to get some of these things in perspective and when I listen to some of the rubbish that is spoken by some of my colleagues in the Assembly it amuses me at times and other times it angers me.”

Me too Sammy. I just wish a few more politicians had the guts to speak out like you.

Global Warming Rope-a-Dope

via FrontPage Magazine:

The global warming scare has provided a field day for politicians and others who wish to control our lives. After all, only the imagination limits the kind of laws and restrictions that can be written in the name of saving the planet.

Recently, more and more scientists are summoning up the courage to speak out and present evidence against the global warming rope-a-dope. Atmospheric scientist Stanley B. Goldenberg of the Hurricane Research Division of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said, “It is a blatant lie put forth in the media that makes it seem there is only a fringe of scientists who don’t buy into anthropogenic global warming.”

Also: Larywn's Global Warming Links: Hot off the Griddle

Computer climate models are the heart of the problem of global warming predictions.

Entire global energy and climate policies are based on the Reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Their conclusions are based on climate models that don't and cannot work. This article explains how the situation developed and why the models are failures.

By Dr. Tim Ball

2008: the year man-made global warming was disproved

Via Christopher Booker in the Telegraph:

Easily one of the most important stories of 2008 has been all the evidence suggesting that this may be looked back on as the year when there was a turning point in the great worldwide panic over man-made global warming. Just when politicians in Europe and America have been adopting the most costly and damaging measures politicians have ever proposed, to combat this supposed menace, the tide has turned in three significant respects.

First, all over the world, temperatures have been dropping in a way wholly unpredicted by all those computer models which have been used as the main drivers of the scare.

(...)

Secondly, 2008 was the year when any pretence that there was a "scientific consensus" in favour of man-made global warming collapsed...

(...)

Thirdly, as banks collapsed and the global economy plunged into its worst recession for decades, harsh reality at last began to break in on those self-deluding dreams which have for so long possessed almost every politician in the western world. As we saw in this month's Poznan conference, when 10,000 politicians, officials and "environmentalists" gathered to plan next year's "son of Kyoto" treaty in Copenhagen, panicking politicians are waking up to the fact that the world can no longer afford all those quixotic schemes for "combating climate change" with which they were so happy to indulge themselves in more comfortable times.

A little music for Christmas

Now playing: Oilville Christmas Dynasty

or if you prefer, here's a cool video...



h/t

Merry Christmas

Looks like it's a white Christmas from coast to coast. Merry Christmas everyone!

Brit Hume

The end of an era at Fox News.

Dr. Tim Ball

"The only place where CO2 is causing temperature increase is in the IPCC computer models"

Origins of the financial crisis

Via Reason.tv

At Reason's 40th anniversary event, held in Hollywood on November 14 and 15, the American Enterprise Institute's Peter Wallison analyzed the roots of the current market meltdown and explained how government policies directly caused or massively exacerbated the housing bubble and the subsequent bust at the center of things.

25 minutes. Wallison quotes Reagan at the end of his talk. He's right on.

h/t

The Deniers Big List

Via Tim Blair, here's your chance to add your name to the big list of Deniers to be handed to future generations so they will know that you weren't involved with "the people that screwed the planet".

h/t.

CNN Meteorologist: Manmade Global Warming Theory 'Arrogant'

Jay Lehr of the Heartland Institute appears in this video of CNN's Lou Dobbs and Chad Myers brought to us via the Business and Media Institute:

Unprecedented snow in Las Vegas has some scratching their heads – how can there be global warming with this unusual cold and snowy weather?

CNN Meteorologist Chad Myers had never bought into the notion that man can alter the climate and the Vegas snowstorm didn’t impact his opinion. Myers, an American Meteorological Society certified meteorologist, explained on CNN’s Dec. 18 “Lou Dobbs Tonight” that the whole idea is arrogant and mankind was in danger of dying from other natural events more so than global warming.

Alarmism

Alarmism has long been a favourite method of the global warming climate change crowd. It has been used with great success to get the public to take notice of their message of human induced planetary warming. It's a lesson that has not been lost on others.

A whopping 582,000 direct and indirect jobs would be lost in Canada over the next five years if the ailing Big Three US auto makers shut down their Ontario operations, said a study Tuesday.

The above report prepared for the Ontario Manufacturing Council has been at the top of the news today. But it's just another example of alarmism being used in an attempt to motivate government to act in a way it might not otherwise. In this case, the goal is to motivate government to spend billions of taxpayer dollars to "bail out" a failing segment of the automotive industry.

One does not need to be an economist to question the conclusions of this report. Let me explain.

First, we need to ask if it is even remotely likely that the "Big Three" automakers would completely shut down and lay off all of their employees? Of course not. And if you think that's a real possibility, I have some swampland in Florida that might interest you.

No, what the "Big Three" are facing is bankruptcy not total shut down. Bankruptcy is not the end of the world in business. In fact, some might argue that it's a new beginning. Bankruptcy is a process designed to assist failing companies by giving them protection from creditors while they re-organize and restructure their business, reduce their financial losses and hopefully emerge as a company that is leaner, meaner, competitive and profitable. A complete shutdown of operations is not the intent nor even a reasonable expectation of bankruptcy.

Second, with regard to a "bail out" we need to ask the questions, "would it do any good?" and "how much is enough?". The answer to the former is "no". A bailout that does not also include a restructuring will never be large enough. So the answer to the latter is there is no amount sufficient to keeping an inefficient company afloat. They'll be back for more and more and more. And then some more.

I am left wondering at the foolishness of all these proposed bailouts. It is not the government's role to provide for all of our needs. It is not the government's role to rescue every failing business. Have we become so hooked on the nanny state that we believe the government can solve all our problems?

Government cannot solve these problems and that is why it should not waste billions of our dollars investing in losing businesses. Yes, the economy is a mess. Yes, this is going to be painful. Very, very painful. But we will get through this quicker if uncompetitive businesses like the "Big Three" are made to accept their fates and get on with what they must do.

But bailout mania seems to have taken hold across the land. The only difference between the outgoing (Republican) President and the incoming (Democrat) President appears to be which has the plan to dish out the most cash the fastest.

It's all good money after bad. What infuriates me is that it's our money they're rushing to flush down the toilet. Which leads to one last question. Who will bail out the government when it fails?

Whether the goal is to control the climate (an obvious impossibility) or to control the economy (equally impossible) the alarmists' solution is always the same: massive government intervention in our free economy. But after all of our industries have been regulated and nationalized, there won't be any free economy to worry about.

And that's alarming.

MacDonald: the palace coup

L. Ian MaCDonald delivers a no nonsense postmortem on the failed palace coup in the Gazette

The party had no choice but to dump Dion after the failed parliamentary coup and the bungled delivery of his blurry videotaped address to the nation. In every coup, the first thing they do is take over the TV station. These clowns couldn't even find it.

Read the whole thing.

Iggy: I'll huff and I'll puff...

“[Prime Minister Stephen Harper] miscalculated, with nearly catastrophic results for the country,”

John Ivison asks, "What catastrophe would that have been then? A Liberal-led coalition under Stéphane Dion, with the NDP’s Jack Layton in cabinet?"

Oh well. May the "coalition of the absurd" rest in peace.

I wonder who's going to break the news to Jack and Gilles?

It's back...

The Great Global Warming Swindle.

Link:

h/t

UN Blowback

UN Blowback: More Than 650 International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims via Marc Morano at the Inhofe EPW Press Blog:

POZNAN, Poland - The UN global warming conference currently underway in Poland is about to face a serious challenge from over 650 dissenting scientists from around the globe who are criticizing the climate claims made by the UN IPCC and former Vice President Al Gore. Set for release this week, a newly updated U.S. Senate Minority Report features the dissenting voices of over 650 international scientists, many current and former UN IPCC scientists, who have now turned against the UN. The report has added about 250 scientists (and growing) in 2008 to the over 400 scientists who spoke out in 2007. The over 650 dissenting scientists are more than 12 times the number of UN scientists (52) who authored the media hyped IPCC 2007 Summary for Policymakers.

Full Senate Report Set To Be Released in the Next 24 Hours – Stay Tuned…

Out with the old...

Well, the Grits made it official today. Stéphane Dion is toast. Burnt by his own desperation, by his own blood lust for power. A lust that consumed him so much that it drove him into an unholy alliance with the socialist NDP and the separatist Bloc Quebecois.

Stéphane, what the hell were you thinking?

Were you that desperate to not go down in history as the only federal Liberal leader ever to not go on to become Prime Minister? Did you care not for the future of your own Liberal Party? Apparently not, because the damage done will surely outlast your own presence on the political stage. Canadians will not soon forget that it was the Liberal Party that tried to seize power just weeks after being soundly rejected by the voters. And we will not forget your willingness to get into bed with the socialists and the separatists to do it. It will take some time for your Party to shake the image of these ugly shenanigans in which you partook.

And then there's the irony of the anointment of your replacement, the new Leader of Her Majesty's Loyal Opposition, by what is essentially a coup d'etat within the Liberal Party. Many Liberals will remain unsatisfied with the way in which Iggy ascended to the throne, bypassing the traditional vote at a convention. But what else should we expect from a Party that was willing to oust a democratically elected government just 6 weeks into it's mandate?

It remains to be seen where Michael Ignatieff will take the Liberals. The word is that Iggy was luke warm to the ill advised coalition of the 3 stooges. He was said to be the last Liberal MP to sign the agreement. But the important thing is he did sign it. Don't expect to see Iggy distance himself from the coalition agreement right away. Looks like he wants to keep that one in his back pocket for now. A good bargaining chip against the Prime Minister, he thinks.

But it's a risky strategy. The coalition was very unpopular with Canadians. A change in leadership won't make it any more palatable. But for now, Mr. Ignatieff seems content to keep it alive. That is his first mistake as the new leader. Bad judgement there Iggy. Better drop it faster than a shifty green carbon tax.

Expect Ignatieff to move the party back towards the political center. It's a place where the Liberals have traditionally been successful. Their drift in recent years to the left has coincided with their worst electoral results in memory. No coincidence there. Some of the lefties like Bob Rae who were attracted to the Liberals of late will find themselves out of step with the new leader and will drift away, back to the NDP where they belong.

PS: with the departure of Stéphane Dion, you can expect to see some changes around here. Just a bit of redecorating, some new curtains, etc. The Stéphane Dion is not a leader banner will be the first thing to go.

The clock is ticking for Stéphane

It seems to be just a matter of time now before the Grits turf their hapless leader.

A movement to dump Stéphane Dion immediately has mushroomed within Liberal ranks, with former deputy prime minister John Manley calling for him to resign, and Grits from nearly every faction of the party exploring ways to pressure him to leave as early as next week.

Meanwhile, Michael Ignatieff, the front-runner to replace Mr. Dion, said the party is exploring ways to accelerate the choice of a new leader.

In an opinion piece published in The Globe and Mail Saturday, Mr. Manley calls for Mr. Dion to resign immediately so that a new leader can be chosen before Christmas.

Mr. Manley dumps cold water on the idea of a coalition with the NDP, arguing the Liberals must instead offer to co-operate with Prime Minister Stephen Harper to cope with the economic crisis, and prepare for an election in case he doesn't.

Manley also said that the "notion that the public would accept Stéphane Dion as prime minister, after having resoundingly rejected that possibility a few weeks earlier, was delusional at best" and...

Liberal MP Michael Ignatieff, a candidate to replace Stéphane Dion, says the party may decide to select a new leader much sooner than the scheduled May convention.

"I have been informed that discussions are ongoing," he told the Toronto Star when asked about expectations that Dion, the caretaker leader, might step down imminently.

We can expect Dion to be ousted as early as next week and an interim leader appointed by the Liberal caucus. An accelerated leadership convention could be held and a new leader in place by the time Parliament resumes on January 26th.

This should be the final nail in the coffin of Dion's ill advised coalition with the socialist and the bloc-head, Jack and Gilles.

Justice

Nevada style.... Video here.

Dion's days are numbered

As much as Conservatives would like to see the inept Stéphane Dion stay on as Liberal leader, it appears that his bumbling has led key Liberals to thinking it would be best for the party if M. Dion departed sooner rather than later.

Enter John Manley in this special comment in Saturday's Globe and Mail:

As a Liberal, I believe the first step for my party is to replace Stéphane Dion as leader with someone whose first job is to rebuild the Liberal Party, rather than leading a coalition with the NDP.

It seems clear that M. Dion is about to become the latest victim in this blood sport called politics. His desperation move to form a "coalition of the absurd" with his new best friends socialist Jack and Bloc-head Gilles and to then attempt to stage Canada's first ever coup d'etat has done far more damage to the Liberal Party brand than Liberals had anticipated. On the heels of their worst ever showing in the Oct 14th election under Dion's "leadership", the Liberals have now sunk even further in the polls.

As with the stock market, fearful Grits must be asking, "where's the bottom?"

Liberals don't like being on the outside looking in when it comes to government. They need to have their hands on the reigns. But Dion's latest shenanigans have done serious damage to the possibility of anything like that happening soon.

Liberals such as Manley know that their party needs to renew itself, to distance itself from both the socialist NDP and the separatist Bloc Quebecois. They know that the party needs to move itself back to the center. And they know it will be a process that will take some time.

And that process cannot begin until they rid themselves of their major problem.

2008 coldest year of the decade

But of course, it's no proof that global warming is over according to the Guardian.

This year is set to be the coolest since 2000, according to a preliminary estimate of global average temperature that is due to be released next week by the Met Office. The global average for 2008 should come in close to 14.3C, which is 0.14C below the average temperature for 2001-07.

Fred

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Jack and Gilles... and Dion

Jack and Gilles went up the Hill
To plot a scheme of takeover... (audio)


Little ditty about Jack and Dion,
2 Canadian kids growing up in fantasy land,
Jacky's gonna be a political star,
Dion a debutante back seat of Jacky's car.

With apologies to John Mellencamp.



Stephane Dion. Still not a leader.