John Ward February 16, 2014 The less than discreet fascism of the Political Class

BRITAIN’S FLOODS: If nothing else, they have dayglo-highlighted the deranged nature of the “progressive” mentality

Ed Miliband, the Labour leader pushing hard to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory in 2015, tweeted as follows last night:

‘Climate change is a national security issue in Britain with extreme weather attacking people’s homes & livelihoods http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/feb/15/ed-miliband-stark-warning-climate-change?CMP=twt_fd …’

This morning at 10.40 am GMT he was at it again:

‘We must rebuild the consensus on climate change and tackle this as a national security issue. http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2014/feb/15/uk-floods-climate-change-disaster-ed-miliband?CMP=twt_fd …‘

Where to start in deconstructing this mindless fascism? Let’s kick off by kicking the Guardian, as Rusbridger and the odd clique he keeps around him are as dictatorially totalitaritarian as they come. The article to which the Ed Miller Band linked is beyond belief as an example of distorted, blinkered attitudes to the data thus far available on climate change. This is the bold sub to the headline:

Point by point:

1. If there is a widespread agreement about the causes of our current weather, then I’d love it if Miliband’s House Magazine would kindly show me this data, because I have no idea WhereTF it is.

2. Widespread agreement about a topic is not, and never has been, a guide to reality and foresight (see 1929, 1939, 1956, 1979, 1997, 2008 etc).

3. The weather is – as Booker pointed out this morning – far from being extreme in any realistically historical sense.

4. Government is not paralysed. Government is trying to pretend it’s paraplegic when it is merely spineless and aimless.

5. There is no security crisis as a result of British weather….unless you sign up to Planet Zog conspiracy theories about Chinese solar garden lights being fired into clouds by the Beijing politburo in order to drown a tiny island of no strategic importance. But what exists in Miliband’s compulsively tweeted codswallop is that which can only be defined as the patronising control freakery endemic among contemporary politicians.

So let us indeed turn now to Ed Miliband’s two Stepford Wife tweets…and, in the next few bullet points, ask some searching questions:

6. Is Ed expecting an extreme terrorist cell of weather to attack us, and therefore demanding we all sign up to the sort of Climate Civil Defence Force of which Nigel Farage spoke so unconvincingly last week?

7. Where is this consensus on climate change? The Guardian has the excuse of being an increasingly desperate media failure going down in a blaze of glory. But Ed’s only excuse is that he is very concerned to defend his robotic (and pathetic) performance as Environment Minister. As much as we need to remember that Jeremy Hunt has an agenda when it comes to the NHS, the precise same feat of memory is required to understand the odd assertions of the Labour Man who would be Prime Minister.

8. What is Ed Miliband’s motivation in using the same phrase – ‘national security issue’ – twice in relation to a random event like weather? What message is he trying to send about the citizenry’s inability to make their own minds up?

9. Why is he altering history to suggest that we need to rebuild the climate ‘consensus’ when there never was one in the first place? Does he harbour unconscious ambitions to be Orwell’s Big Brother? Does he want to tell Winston Smith how many fingers he is really holding up?

The Buddhists often say that good must come from bad. I think a lot of good has come from these floods. And I pray it might serve to open the eyes of the reflexively blind in Britain. We have an Establishment that is wrong-headed in its belief systems – from the maddest Friedmanite fanatic via the time-serving Eunatic to the fluffiest climate change fundamentalist.

If these gargoyles had their way, everything would be a national security issue….and anyone who questioned their definition would be mercilessly crushed.

Earlier at the Slog: Why a saved political face seems to be worth a thousand citizen lives

54Comments

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1

Logan on July 14, 2014 at 11:04 pm

Thank you!

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2

Silver Ralph on February 18, 2014 at 1:24 am

>>Le Gin
>>For people to come late to the party with their own, ill-researched ideas, is not exactly helpful.

Take a look at the rebuttal of that argument on the WUWT page I linked to.
The guy you are quoting from does not know what he is talking about.

R

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Cornelius Townedge (@seti2342) on February 17, 2014 at 5:41 pm

I’m not surprised, I don’t use the Guardian anymore either: Changed the paper, too much chafing.

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Misty mindset on February 17, 2014 at 5:39 pm

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Cornelius Townedge (@seti2342) on February 17, 2014 at 5:37 pm

Maybe they’re just not looking. I’ve found plenty of extremely respected and influential scientists who think it’s baloney…

And here’s a bunch of people on the ‘Peer Review’ nonsense…

http://youtu.be/Jcp40a6IYdY

And here’s Piers Corbyn talking sense…

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6

Foucalt Tudoux Wimay on February 17, 2014 at 5:16 pm

ikidu0 (flat earth)
Exactly. Those in power didn’t like the idea that the world should be round. It didn’t fit in with their misguided readings of religious texts. The fact that everyone who watched the stars move around at night, or could see the curved ocean horizon had figured out we lived on (at least the top side of) a giant ball of rock, didn’t make a hoot of difference to the scientists who desired funding and support. So, just like nowadays, they decided on which side their butter should be spread -and sold their souls.
Don’t be surprised when they are all told to start claiming earth-cooling is man-made. 97% of ‘scientists’ then will declare emphatically that this is so.

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the ghost on February 17, 2014 at 3:53 pm

During the medieval times a concept that the Earth was flat was taught,but what really highlighted & astonished those that came after was that any other teachings was insulted & banned & even killed for their beliefs if opposite to those teachings it is this madness more than the actual teaching of the Earth being flat that made & has kept it in History. i think most would have been grateful if without the other madness it would have been forgotten like so many other teachings throughout time

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old mark on February 17, 2014 at 3:42 pm

Rowan

As Alexei has pointed out, most of the shower described by you as ‘actual climate scientists’ are Ecologists , Geographers and the like happy to show some leg to the DECC ,and its overseas equivalents, mainly in order to access research funding.

Here it is again for readers with limited comprehension skills.

‘The punditry looked for and found an alternative number to tout – “97% of the world’s climate scientists” accept the consensus, articles in the Washington Post et al. This number stems from a 2009 online survey of 10,257 earth scientists, conducted by two researchers at the University of Illinois. The two researchers started by altogether excluding from their survey the thousands of scientists most likely to think that the Sun, or planetary movements, might have something to do with climate on Earth – out were the solar scientists, space scientists, cosmologists, physicists, meteorologists and astronomers. That left the 10,257 scientists in disciplines like geology, oceanography, paleontology, and geochemistry that were somehow deemed more worthy of being included in the consensus’

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Paul J on February 17, 2014 at 2:41 pm

“Miliband’s House Magazine”

You’ve obviously not read the guardian for a while, John.

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Le Gin on February 17, 2014 at 10:57 am

In regard to Silver Ralph’s post re Tallbloke and wattsupwiththat….

http://www.eureferendum.com/blogview.aspx?blogno=84714

There has been great excitement in the groupescule department, over a possible explanation for the Somerset floods, said to be caused by the closure of the Bridgewater Royal Ordnance Factory and the cessation of pumping by the factory from the Kings Sedgemoor Drain to the Huntspill River.

That story, however, is a complete red herring, initiated by an unverified anonymous comment on Tallbloke’s Talkshop blog (“Cutting edge science you can dice with”), who argues the failure to keep pumping meant that “Somerset was flooded by E.A. (Environment Agency) Incompetence”.

Nevertheless, the report has since made an appearance on the Bishop Hill blog, initially as a comment and then upgraded to a full-blown blog post, misleading Watts up with that who has unwittingly used the material to hazard that the real reason for the flooding in Somerset Levels was that, “the pump was turned off!”

The story comes from a contributor who adopts the style: “Corporal Jones’ Ghost” (CJG). He tells us “what really has happened on the Somerset Levels”, starting with the history of the former Bridgewater Royal Ordnance Factory (ROF), which was built in 1939 to manufacture high explosives.

To ensure that there was enough water even on the waterlogged Levels, the five-mile long Huntspill River was built, which was connected to the River Brue to the North. CJG also claims that it was connected to the Kings Sedgemoor Drain (KSD) via a pipe to the South.. We are told the River Sowy was also widened, in order to get water to the factory, said (by others) to use 4.5 million gallons a day.

According to CJG, process water was then discharged directly into the sea, which was done regardless of the tidal conditions, originally by steam pumps, which pumped out at the Huntspill sluice. With the fall of Communism, however, the decision was made to run down the ROFs and, in 2000 the Bridgewater factor was scheduled for closure in 2008.

That is the background, but we are now told that, with the demise of the factory, the Environment Agency and the Drainage Boards would have to take over the pumping. But, we are told, they couldn’t afford the Ordnance Factory system as “it was very old and on restricted land”.

CJG then “explains” that that the “ONLY pumping” was done by the Ordnance Factory, which had taken over the responsibility/control in 1940 for all high volume pumping on the Levels. Before departure, they advised that the Huntspill be automated and the KSD be pumped, “and made strong representation to that effect”.

This, however, didn’t happen and now, we are told that the connection to the Huntspill (with the KSD) is blocked, silted up. Thus, water can’t be “smeared” over all the levels as in the past, and that is why “record” [flood] levels are being experienced in certain areas whilst others are barely affected.

000a DunballClyce-016.jpg

If I understand this narrative correctly, the essence of the argument is that there have been two failures of the Environment Agency. Firstly, they have failed to pump from Kings Sedgermoor Drain to the Huntspill, using the ROF equipment. Secondly, they have failed to build a pumping station at the seaward end of the KSD, to replace the Dunball Clyse (sluice) – see above, where the drain currently discharges sea, to enable continuous discharge, even at high tide.Either or both have been the “real” cause of the flooding in the Levels.

Thus says CJG, “the poor chap who has built an Island out of his home has my sympathies, [had] the KSD pumps been in place for the last 6 years he’d not be in the predicament he is in, nor for that matter would most of the others on the levels, the water won’t be going anywhere soon”.

Far be it for myself to question this exposition, but one has to note a few tiny flaws. As an incidental point, the River Sowy, for instance, was not created until 1972, as part of the Parrett Improvement Scheme. It was then that a 7.5 mile embanked channel was carved out from the Parrett near Langport, and given the name. As part of the £1.4 million scheme, the Dunball Clyse was also rebuilt.

The key point, though, was that consideration, we are told by Wikipedia, was given to replacing Dunball Clyse with a pumping station in 2002. This would have allowed water to be discharged into the Parrett estuary at all states of the tide, but this course of action was not followed.

Here, then, there may be a germ of truth in CJG’s narrative, in that the discharge from the KSD might have been of insufficient capacity and needed upgrading. Given that this is where the Environment Agency have currently positioned high capacity pumps, hired from the Dutch, one could argue that there is contemporaneous evidence that the Dunball Clyse is of insufficient capacity.

000a Crandonbrige-015 pump.jpg

As to the rest of the story, we cannot verify it from any independent source, specifically that there was any direct connection between the Kings Sedgemoor Drain and the Huntspill river.

All we have is a report from Sedgemoor Council that the KSD provided a significant volume of water for the Ordnance Factory, with pumping operations occurring daily from the ROF owned pumping station at Crandon Bridge. We have identified the pumping station, and it is pictured above, as it stands on Google street view.

As far as we can ascertain, water was abstracted from the KSD by the Crandon Bridge pumping station, as a back-up to the Huntspill supply. After being used for processing on the site, some of that water may have been discharged into the sea at the Huntspill sluice, or even into the Huntspill River. It is not at all clear where the discharge was made.

What comes over from the picture is that the pumping station is quite small. Furthermore, it has been out of service for a long time, so this is not a question of a pump having been turned off – at least, not recently. But we also found the Huntspill Pumping Station, the exterior of which is shown below. Go to the site linked, and see what it is like inside. It has been derelict for a very long time.

000a Hunspillpump-016.jpg

Hence, since these pumping stations have not been used for a very long time, they have not been part of the modern flood management system. It seems to us that the Ordnance Factory element is a red herring – even amounting to fiction.

Crucially, even when the system existed, it was not a direct part of the flood management system. Its primary function was to extract water for processing, whence – after use – the bulk of it was pumped into the Huntspill. This pumping may have an effect, but there is nothing to indicate that it is essential for the flood management on the Levels.

Furthermore, it is wrong to say that the entire ROF pumping system was abandoned. At the western end of the Huntspill, there is a working pumping system called the Gold Corner Pumping Station (pictured top). It was originally part of the ROF system, pumping water into the Huntspill River to keep it supplied.

Now it is operated by the Environment Agency, and it is very much a major part of the flood control system. It still moves a massive amount of water into the Huntspill, where it discharges to the sea by gravity, though a sluice. This is clearly successful enough as the land in this particular area has not been flooded this time round.

Sadly, therefore, the original story – as told – simply doesn’t hold water, so to speak. It would have been nice if it had been better explained, adding to our knowledge. It would also have helped if the verification work had been done before initial publication, with additional clarification where necessary, thus avoiding wasting people’s time.

Above all else, this flooding was far more than incompetence. Even CJG states that, during the last meeting he and his colleagues attended with the Environment Agency, “we left thinking that the ‘plan’ was for the Levels to return to tidal wasteland”.

“It was never articulated as such”, he writes, “but we felt we were not privy to a greater plan for the area, if you can understand what I mean, a sort of ‘Yeah, don’t worry, it won’t matter’ sort of attitude”.

The flooding is a complex issue – an amalgam of the technical and the political. To address it solely at either level will never explain what went on. And, whatever the temptation, the issue does not lend itself to piling in without doing the homework. We had a pretty good idea already of what had gone wrong on the Levels and, more importantly, why it had gone wrong, the essence of which is hinted at by CJG.

For people to come late to the party with their own, ill-researched ideas, is not exactly helpful.

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11

Silver Ralph on February 17, 2014 at 10:51 am

>>Five Hundred years ago, it was believed that the Earth flat.

Cobblers.

This is a 2,000 year old Jewish zodiac from the Sea of Galilee. As you can see, the Earth was depicted here as being spherical and blue. The ancients knew a lot more than historians will admit.

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Hazel on February 17, 2014 at 9:46 am

Iain. You think Milliband is a pontificating twat? Oh dear, I call Cameron The Pontiff for the same reason. Are they in fact the same person?

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ANALYSIS: The belief systems that defy belief are challenged by rising flood waters | The Slog. on February 17, 2014 at 9:45 am

[…] Related at yesterday’s Slog: The strange case of Miliband of MI5 […]

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ikidu0 on February 17, 2014 at 9:04 am

Five Hundred years ago, it was believed that the Earth flat. To be a scientist and part of the ‘establishment’ in that day, you would have to be part of the then ‘concencus’. Up unto that day, when they decided that ‘they’ where wrong, there was plenty
of evidence that a well read and observant man would have had available to demonstrate the spherical nature of the planet.

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15

tuueyes on February 17, 2014 at 8:41 am

maybe you should start by google on analogy?

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Nhoj on February 17, 2014 at 6:47 am

Cigarette smocking, in the Uk, has been reducing over the last 40 years but deaths from cancer increasing.
Also, in 80 odd years time we will all be dead.

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17

Panopticon on February 17, 2014 at 4:03 am

Here you go:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming

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tuueyes on February 17, 2014 at 3:20 am

I could read all the tons of climate change statistics but even if I were clever enough to understand it all of course it would never give me a conclusive answer and a lot of it is distorted and politicised anyway.

But I think there is already agreement on the causes ie that CO2 is increasing, ocean temperatures are warming up, forests have been depleted etc. most of these are verifiable facts……its only for the effect where there is no consensus….in other words what will be the impact and how soon will it happen.

I keep coming back to an analogy with the debate over whether smoking cigarettes causes cancer. That one took 50 years to prove absolutely or at least to prove to the satisfaction of the defence, it was also affecting maybe thousands not millions of people.

This time do we really have the luxury of another 50 years and to wait for absolute proof? Absolute proof and we could all be dead!

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Silver Ralph on February 17, 2014 at 2:38 am

john-paul
The Royal Society is one of the most respected scientific establishments in the world. It has no political axe to grind. Please read their page “Facts and fictions about climate change”.
_____________________________

Oh, do pass me a bucket.

the fact of the matter is that every scientist is compromised by the climate scam. you could not get funding for a new alloy for turbine blades, without mentioning climate change.

“New aviation alloy research to research to reduce climate change”
“New infra-red telescope, to study the effects of climate change on mars”
“New asprin formulation, to increase pain alleviation and reduce the effects of climate change”
“New techniques for soft fruit storage, to combat climate change”

take a look at science papers, John, and show me one that does not include climate change in the abstract. the bottom line is, if you don’t tow the party line on ‘carbon’, you don’t get any funding. period.

scientists have sold their integrity and their soul to the Green climate lobby. which is sad, because nobody will ever believe a scientist for the next hundred years or so.

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Silver Ralph on February 17, 2014 at 1:09 am

The real reason for the Somerset levels flooding.

The Army used to pump 3000,000,000 litres a year, but stopped in 2008 when their factory closed down. they urged the Environment Agency to take over the task, but they refused. (The Greens want to take us back to the Dark Ages, you see.)

The result was massive flooding….
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/02/16/the-real-reason-for-flooding-in-somerset-levels-not-global-warming-the-only-pump-was-turned-of

R

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Silver Ralph on February 17, 2014 at 12:53 am

But there IS NO CLIMATE CHANGE.
Contrary to the BBC’s propaganda…..

Tropical cyclones have been decreasing in strength for 20 years:

Antarctic temperatures have been decreasing for 30 years:
http://c3headlines.typepad.com/.a/6a010536b58035970c0162ffab1459970d-300wi

And there is no relationship whatsoever with CO2. The black line on the second graph is CO2. See any correlation with cyclone strength or Antarctic temperatures?? Me neither…..

The BBC ‘dangerous climate change’ meme is pure propaganda, designed to scare you into paying more taxes.

R

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AJC on February 16, 2014 at 11:19 pm

An interesting insight on the Levels and their drainage …

Forget AGW: Somerset was flooded by E.A. Incompetence
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2014/02/14/forget-agw-somerset-was-flooded-by-e-a-incompetence/#more-15855

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ikidu0 on February 16, 2014 at 11:14 pm

Wee Fat ‘Eck Salmond and his side-kick, ‘Wee Trite Mouth’ Sturgion are Nationalists and EUrophiles, a true story. Disappointed, as I was so looking forward to living in Region 325 — formerly called Scotland. Another true story….
But, worse to come….we won’t get the pound. You know what that means! We will be lost, without Carney and his crew printing the Kween’s heid on handy wipes and then charging us huge amounts to keep us in debt for ever….NOOOOOOO.
What a potential DISASTER: NO EU AND NO DEBT RIDDEN CURRENCY —- SOB SOB.

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At the End of the Day | The Slog. on February 16, 2014 at 10:26 pm

[…] Earlier at The Slog: The progressive deterioration in Ed Miliband’s mentality […]

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JC on February 16, 2014 at 10:26 pm

they suck big time. no use descending to their execrable non-level.

you as Brits should consider yourselves lucky, but only by comparison with something seemingly vaster and worse.

And that is (as though no one would ask) the good ole USA, the land where I was born and raised.

I think the USA and UK have now gotten to the point where preservation planning of a more serious nature than previously contemplated in public cannot be avoided. Not no way. Not no how.

It’s like when we somehow or other beat the Germans (with indisputable help from Mother Russia).

Point is, they sucked, and we did it, however prevaricatingly.

I am not interested in Tories, Republicans, or gangster-journalist ‘expose’ paragraphs of pirates of the pen.

These days no one seems to appreciate where they come from or who they owe.

And the horse you rode in on.

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ErictheRed on February 16, 2014 at 9:52 pm

Rowan, I have no problem with ScepticalScience other than it seems to be a bit happyclappy science other than the traditional type.

ie. I produce a theorum and you disprove it (proper science)

If you produce a theorum and I can’t disprove it then to me, you win and I will uphold your theory until someone else can disprove it

If you can’t put forward a disprovable theory then you are a snake oil salesman

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kfc1404 on February 16, 2014 at 9:47 pm

O/T but makes me smile, just demonstrates how devious these scumbags (oops, there’s that word again) are, I read that Emperor Barroso says that ‘Scotland joining the EU would be difficult’ Lying fat Twat, He would let China join the EU given half a chance. Oh, and Fred Carno says that ‘A referendum would be bad for investment’ Lying Twat.

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kennnyboy on February 16, 2014 at 9:44 pm

Years ago I used to believe in man-made global warming. I read my copy of David Icke’s “It Doesn’t Have To Be This Way”, when DI was spokesman for the Green Party and I dutifully passed it around to every friend and colleague I could persuade to peruse it. It’s still a remarkable book with tons of commonsense statements and ideas, and at one of Icke’s north-of-England public meetings, I asked why he had quit the Greens and didn’t mention his book anymore.
The response was that although many of the things he had written were just as relevant, the people actually pushing the green agenda had much darker motives.

Over the years, I’ve kept a not-disinterested watching brief on the Green Party, even voting in a local election where a Green candidate was the best of those standing. I’ve also kept an eye on Caroline Lucas, the only Green MP and up to recently, the party leader. She always spoke calmly, convincingly and with genuine belief in what she said.
I’m sorry to say that all that has changed. Lucas decided to step down and was replaced by a “leader” who has a gob bigger than a kangaroo’s pouch. That woman is Natalie Bennett. I saw her mouth off, big-time, on Question Time (and IIRC, Newsnight) and no more repulsive a character could you ever wish to meet. If you remember Robert Kilroy-Silk’s shill game with VERITAS, and Tommy Robinson likewise with the English Defence League, you will eventually come to remember Natalie Bennett as the marsupial who shilled the Green Party.
Her leadership (????) has already seen Brighton Council’s Green Party rent asunder and she’ll certainly kill off any hope of a national breakthrough. Just as with Nigel at UKIP, it will be “Mission Accomplished” by the time the public wake up.

Just to whet your appetite for Natalie, on Friday she announced that all members of all three parties who were not Climate Change believers should be dismissed. I never heard Lucas come out with anything like that, nor Icke. The shills aren’t getting better, it’s just that there are more of them, strategically placed throughout the parties, ready to sink their host when triggered.

For a full read of Bennett’s demands, go over to http://www.express.co.uk/

As to who to vote for? It’s even more difficult now. Each party is just a different head of the Hydra.
Kennyboy

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Redgoblin on February 16, 2014 at 9:38 pm

Reblogged this on Pillow Walker and commented:
Good analysis on how politicians milk the issue for their own political ends, left included.

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PhilE on February 16, 2014 at 8:28 pm

There was a consensus on climate change until a decade or so ago. Then the scientific evidence was given propaganda trashing by corporate funded front organisations of a kind that specialise in misleading the sheeple to get their policies through. The arctic is warming, the Greenland icecap is melting, the oceans are absorbing most of the heat and acidifying too. Predictions on how this all impacts on our weather are unreliable because we don’t really understand fully how our climate works. The precautionary principle ought to apply but most of the rich world love money too much to do anything serious about it. It used to be called fiddling while Rome burns.

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John-Paul Coetzee on February 16, 2014 at 7:58 pm

And notice that when the BBC tries to present a balanced view they can always find a scientist who believes in climate change, but for the opposite view they have to rely on the likes of Nigel Lawson. They cannot find a scientist.

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John-Paul Coetzee on February 16, 2014 at 7:56 pm

The Royal Society is one of the most respected scientific establishments in the world. It has no political axe to grind. Please read their page “Facts and fictions about climate change”.

“This document has been endorsed by the Council of the Royal Society, and draws primarily on scientific papers published in leading peer-reviewed journals and the work of authoritative scientific organisations, such as the IPCC and the United States National Academy of Sciences.”

http://royalsociety.org/News.aspx?id=5298

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alexei on February 16, 2014 at 7:32 pm

Ah, SkepticalScience – the fount of all wisdom on Climate, created and maintained by John Cook and is devoted to skepticism about global warming skepticism! His bio describes him as: “Climate Communication Fellow from the Global Change Institute at the University of Queensland. He is not a climate scientist.” After graduating, he spent over a decade working in graphic design and web programming. Between 1995 and 2010, Cook was the creator of a popular web-based comic strip. In 2011, the Australian Museum recognized the contribution Cook’s SkepticalScience website has made to the “Advancement of Climate Change Knowledge.” and awarded him $10,000. On the official web page where the awarding of that prize is announced, it says:

” Climate-change deniers have nowhere to hide thanks to an ingenious piece of software that detects inaccurate statements on global warming that appear on the internet and delivers an automated response on Twitter citing peer-reviewed scientific evidence.
The so-called ‘Twitter-bot’ is the brainchild of Australian webmaster John Cook and software developer Nigel Leck, and is part of an armoury of tools Cook has developed to rebut common myths and inaccuracies about climate change.” No doubt the route by which you were alerted to the Slog’s article……….

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salialioli on February 16, 2014 at 6:42 pm

What about a different view?

and if you go to Michel Chossudovsky’s Global Research.ca you will find footnoted and fully researched papers on the US Army’s stated ambition to “own the weather” by 2025.

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salialioli on February 16, 2014 at 6:26 pm

Steve Lloyd I think you should attribute your lines where appropriate:

http://www.ishtarsgate.com/forum/showthread.php?4882-The-deliberate-flooding-of-the-Somerset-Levels&p=27845#post27845

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Rowan on February 16, 2014 at 6:19 pm

It is called GLOBAL warming because it is GLOBAL.

The oceans are warming at an unprecedented rate.
Artic sea ice has declined massively in25 years (and no, the slight increase in Antartic sea ice doesn’t offset this in the slightest.)
Australia has seen some of the highest temperatures ever recorded.

But no, the USA is cold, it must all be a lie. Except, um, the USA used to get a lot more cold spells like the ice storm. Like, they used to be quite regular. Not uncommon, one would say. Doesn’t THAT tell you something???

Again, go read the actual work of actual climate scientists ( NOT Watts or Monckton) – there’s plenty of it out there.

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Rowan on February 16, 2014 at 6:12 pm

Strange how many lies and half- truths one can get into a comment, Alexei.

Now please go read the many posts about this research, found at SkepticalScience, and educate yourself.

Or are you like John, too fond of your own misbeliefs and delusions?

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Rowan on February 16, 2014 at 6:09 pm

To be clear, my +100 was for Bar4U (the stupid nesting on wordpress doesn’t make it clear who I agreed with)

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alexei on February 16, 2014 at 6:07 pm

@Bar4U –

Question – How does the theory of AGW explain why global temps. have not increased in the past 16 years whilst production of C02 has massively increased?

“With most of the states in the U.S.A. covered by snow, climate alarmists have been quick to blame the extreme Northern Hemisphere winter on man-made global warming. Sounds like the biggest oxymoron in history and probably is. Worse still, the eco-fearmongers remain totally oblivious, or conveniently unaware as to what the climate experts assured us that a warming climate would bring – milder winter temperatures and less snow. –Catastrophic Anthropogenic Climate Alarmism, 15 February 2014

“The Great Lakes are on the cusp of a record for ice cover. The ice cover on the lakes increased from 79.7% to 88.4% just in the past week, putting the region close to the record of almost 95% set in February 1979, according to data compiled by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory in Ann Arbor. The winter of 2013-14 also is shaping up to be one of the five coldest, at least in Michigan’s recorded history. –Eric D. Lawrence, USA Today, 14 February 2014

One of the Met Office’s most senior experts yesterday made a dramatic intervention in the climate change debate by insisting there is no link between the storms that have battered Britain and global warming. Mat Collins, a Professor in climate systems at Exeter University, said the storms have been driven by the jet stream which has been ‘stuck’ further south than usual. He told The Mail on Sunday: ‘There is no evidence that global warming can cause the jet stream to get stuck in the way it has this winter. If this is due to climate change, it is outside our knowledge.’ –David Rose, Mail on Sunday, 16 February 2014

“It is outside our knowledge” – perhaps a little bird should pass this inside info to Miliband………

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Rowan on February 16, 2014 at 6:07 pm

+100

Although one minor correction, it’s 97% of climate scientists who have published research on the climate (I.e. experts) agree that the dominant cause of global warming is caused by humans. See posts on this at ScepticalScience.

There are unfortunately many scientists out there, who may be experts in other non related fields, that seem to think they are also experts in climate. This would be like relying on your GP to teach brain surgery. Or your car mechanic to fix your elderly mother’s life support machine.

Even most deniers these days admit that the world is warming, they just disagree that humans are the cause.

Denying that the world is warming and hence changing the climate – despite all the evidence – is akin to being a Flat Earther.

John – I have mentioned websites such as SkepticalScience and RealClimate many times now, yet you obviously haven’t read them and persist in spouting nonsense such as lack of consensus on climate change. I think you should replace the picture of you looking thoughtful and pensive with one of you sticking your head in the sand, next to a large sign saying “Na na na I won’t hear you”.

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william on February 16, 2014 at 5:58 pm

Try looking at the Southern Oscillations. Try also looking at the shifts in the Jetstream, which have been going on for centuries. The climate does change and has done for ever.There is no proof that the level of CO2 in the atmosphere affects the temperature of the Pacific or the Jetstream. In any case,the last 17 years provide no evidence of so called global warming.

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alexei on February 16, 2014 at 5:57 pm

@Bar 4U — Let’s see –

Fascinating how myths are created – The so-called 97% “consensus of scientists”. How do we know there’s a scientific consensus on climate change? Pundits and the press tell us so. And how do they know? To start with, they typically pointed to the number 2500 – the number of scientists associated with the United Nations IPCC whom they believed endorsed the IPCC position. But those 2500 scientists hadn’t endorsed the IPCC’s conclusions, they had merely reviewed some part or other of the IPCC’s mammoth studies. In fact many of those reviewers from within the IPCC establishment actually disagreed with the IPCC’s conclusions.

The upshot? The punditry looked for and found an alternative number to tout – “97% of the world’s climate scientists” accept the consensus, articles in the Washington Post et al. This number stems from a 2009 online survey of 10,257 earth scientists, conducted by two researchers at the University of Illinois. The two researchers started by altogether excluding from their survey the thousands of scientists most likely to think that the Sun, or planetary movements, might have something to do with climate on Earth – out were the solar scientists, space scientists, cosmologists, physicists, meteorologists and astronomers. That left the 10,257 scientists in disciplines like geology, oceanography, paleontology, and geochemistry that were somehow deemed more worthy of being included in the consensus. The two researchers also decided that scientific accomplishment should not be a factor in who could answer – those surveyed were determined by their place of employment (an academic or a governmental institution). Neither was academic qualification a factor – about 1,000 of those surveyed did not have a PhD, some didn’t even have a master’s diploma. The questions they asked in their survey were :

Do you believe :-
• that carbon dioxide (CO2) is a greenhouse gas
• that human activities have warmed the planet to some unspecified extent.

Since many involved in the climate debate, including many sceptics, accept these propositions, it says very little. The survey results must have deeply disappointed the researchers – in the end, they chose to highlight the views of a subgroup of just 77 scientists, 75 of whom thought humans contributed to climate change. The ratio 75/77 produces the 97% figure that pundits now tout.

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Ed P on February 16, 2014 at 5:43 pm

It takes a special sort of nut to include some many falsehoods in one comment!

Believing in climate change is not the same as accepting the IPCC’s political statements. (And if 10% of scientists do not believe in it, they must be insane – surely no-one, but no-one disputes the climate changes).

Ad hominem attack on Lawson complete with a funding slur – well done!

American winter due to polar vortex variations, well within previous such variations – it’s weather, stupid!

Must try harder.

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dofornow on February 16, 2014 at 5:03 pm

My turn to be off on a tangent:
“soil polluted with sewage ..no longer usable” One of our local lads did his NS in Korea… one of things he kept on about they used it as fertilizer..the hole country smelt of it!

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Bar4U on February 16, 2014 at 4:27 pm

Well you could try the 90% + of scientists who believe in climate change- but do carry on burying your collective heads in the sand. You’re in the good company of the right wing Australians who have had several rather unpleasantly hot summers , and of course our very own oh so knowledgeable Nigel Lawson. Have you found out who is funding his set up? Then America seems to be suffering a rather grim winter. Artic ice melting rapidly etc etc – still lets just carry on burning fossil fuels and luxuriate in our profligate lifestyles and sod the grandchildren.

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Steve Lloyd. on February 16, 2014 at 3:52 pm

What will happen next is that the carpet baggers will move into the Levels to buy up the land at rock bottom fire-sale prices, which is all the farmers will be able to charge now that the land has been contaminated from overflowing sewerage and their farms are virtually uninsurable. The carpet baggers will probably make a killing in selling that land on to the frackers, as it stands over a huge shale gas field which they’ve been slavering over for some time.

Greenpeace confirm that licences are being offered to Frackers on land in the Somerset levels that are currently under deep water.

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me3 on February 16, 2014 at 3:44 pm

Just think how many flood defences we could build for the billions wasted on wind turbines.

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Iain on February 16, 2014 at 3:40 pm

Difficult to rebuild a consensus unless it had at one time existed. The guy is a pontificating twat and seems to have a problem understanding plain english..

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the ghost on February 16, 2014 at 3:37 pm

Well we must nuke the rain then,or does he mean he intends too start up a new army battalion of squeegees carried out by the home guard ,don’t panic Mister Ward he thinks he’s twenty one & come handy ready with his mop
I keep telling you this is the election everyone wants to lose

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devonseaglass on February 16, 2014 at 3:26 pm

Well done mate. Off now to rebuild my consensus on drinking wine.

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Jim on February 16, 2014 at 3:17 pm

Even the Met Office’s own scientists are calling BS on the ‘Extreme weather due to Climate Change claims’:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2560310/No-global-warming-did-NOT-cause-storms-says-one-Met-Offices-senior-experts.html#ixzz2tRdMB4oB

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Luther on February 16, 2014 at 3:07 pm

Only now does a faint thought cross The Milibandit’s mind that he had something to do with the Climate Change Act.

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John Ward – Britain’s Floods: If Nothing Else, They Have Dayglo-Highlighted The Deranged Nature Of The “Progressive” Mentality – 16 February 2014 | Lucas 2012 Infos on February 16, 2014 at 3:06 pm

[…] http://www.hat4uk.wordpress.com / link to original article […]

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kfc1404 on February 16, 2014 at 2:53 pm

Pompous twat trying to sound important. Maybe he thinks that if he uses language like ‘National Security’ somebody will listen to him. Wrong.

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