Reality continues to intrude on the “global warming” hysteria

It was roughly at the turn of the millennium that I remember hearing talk the debate on “global warming” was “over.”  Supposedly, the scientific consensus was at hand – the Earth was heating up; we were to blame; and without dramatically reducing our “carbon footprint” (i.e., taxing and regulating ourselves into near-automaton status) we were all toast.

I always wondered what led to the dramatic shift in rhetoric – after all, the notion of a scientific consensus is truly specious (at best).  I suspected ulterior motives – you know, something like a leading politician desperately looking to protect his investments (NewsBusters via Brutally Honest).

I had no idea just how right I was; turns out that the millennial crossing was just about when the Earth’s supposedly inevitable carbon-driven warming came to a screeching halt.  Check out David Whitehouse (BBC Science journalist for nearly two decades) at The New Statesman (via Small Dead Amimals, emphasis added):

With only few days remaining in 2007, the indications are the global temperature for this year is the same as that for 2006 – there has been no warming over the 12 months.

But is this just a blip in the ever upward trend you may ask? No.

The fact is that the global temperature of 2007 is statistically the same as 2006 as well as every year since 2001. Global warming has, temporarily or permanently, ceased. Temperatures across the world are not increasing as they should according to the fundamental theory behind global warming – the greenhouse effect. Something else is happening and it is vital that we find out what or else we may spend hundreds of billions of pounds needlessly.

. . .

For the past decade the world has not warmed. Global warming has stopped. It’s not a viewpoint or a sceptic’s inaccuracy. It’s an observational fact.

I remember when 1998 was dubbed “the hottest year on record.”  I also remember that we were told over and over again that this wouldn’t be the case for long – that 1998 would quickly lose its record status.

In fact, 1998 did indeed fall from the top spot this past year, but it was passed by 1934, after NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies was forced to correct a long-running measurement error (Climate Audit via SDA).  In fact, none of the last nine years have matched 1998, despite increasing carbon output.

Yet Al Gore is still out there, insisting on a “consensus.  The green-tinged McCarthyist has even asked MSM to join him in silencing those who disagree (Las Vegas Review-Journal).   Have you no sense of decency, Al?