Rucker seems like a reasonable critic of global warming in that he does not deny the truth and that which has been scientifically determined. In that regard, he is working towards a constructive discussion of the issue.

In contrast, there are many deniers that have instead sought to spread total falsehoods and distortions in order to further their own agendas. Trouble is many people are so naive on the subject that they can not tell the difference.

However, the Scientific debate is mostly over concerning Global Warming from greenhouse gas emissions. IT EXIST! There is of course a range of possibilities for the future which is as dependant on future emissions as much as it is on the science.

AccuWeather could be part of the solution by being more educational on the issue instead of providing a pulpit for deniers to spread their deceptions. If AccuWeather were a entertainment site, I could understand the attempt to stir controversy when there should not be any. However, since AccuWeather claims to use scientific forecasting methods for the weather, it smacks of professional misconduct when proven aspects of Global warming are not defended.

Nice to hear the frank comments from Rucker.

And to think, we were told by the AGW crowd that government is the solution and that the consensus scientists out there had nothing to gain from patting each other on the back.

The comment about the Mars polar cap cracks me up. I thought that it was the SUVs on Earth causing the problems on Mars, right AGWers?

I do wonder about the comment about how everyone has a right to clean air and have safe lives without buring dung for fuel. Granted it is important, but that is an issue for other countries, not the US.

He makes a good point though, the US is the leader in these areas and knocking the economy down by adding taxes is bad. Did anyone note that the legislature has authorized new taxes on oil companies? Guess who will be paying those?

The letter that was written to the climate change skeptic was extremely inapropriate. I don't believe AGW is real but I would never do that to a believer, they have the right to think what they want. And besides, I like talking to people on both sides of the issue with different mind sets. It makes it more interesting, what would I do without Mark and the others? This blog would be sooo boring.

Regarding the purported Hurricane/AGW connection, here is a link to an article by Dr. Chris Landsea, Science & Operations Director at the NHC. Dr.Landsea is also conducting the Hurricane Reanalysis and Data (HURDAT) project which is a reevaluation of all Atlantic basin hurricanes since 1851 (when reliable records begin.)

http://www.aoml.noaa.gov/hrd/Landsea/landsea-eos-may012007.pdf

Furthermore, Dr.Landsea resigned his position from the IPCC with a public press conference citing pressure to include a link between hurricanes and AGW while in his scientific judgement, there is no evidence to support said link. That is quite clear in the above article, and while Dr. Kerry Emanuel has claimed there is a definite connection between H's & AGW, Dr.Landsea disputes his conclusions.

Andrew,

"There is of course a range of possibilities for the future which is as dependant on future emissions as much as it is on the science".

Nice stick handling to cover all your bases if your nor right.

"AccuWeather could be part of the solution by being more educational on the issue instead of providing a pulpit for deniers to spread their deceptions".

Andrew, this is everyones pulpit, not just yours and those who think like you. It sounds like the final, frustrated blurtings of a desparate man, about to come to the realization that he may be wrong.

There's this thing called democracy at work here. No one gets sent to Siberia, or is put to death for speaking out against something they believe is flawed. Men have died to give us both the right to speak freely, without the fear of oppression.

You have placed yourself in the same catagory as any dictator, who will only allow his version to be heard and taught. No person shall learn anything about what goes on outside our borders, because it is evil. Idi Amin, Saddam, the Taliban, the President of Iran and Branch Davidian come to mind.

That is how AGW peer review works. Ostracize anyone who disagrees, then you can be sure that all the remaining "peers" will agree to help keep the funding coming in.

A bit like the mafia....

This is a little off-track but may lighten the load some. A friend of mine, an environmentalist of all things yet a staunch realist wrote this prayer:

Thank you Exxon Mobil for all things plastic and nylon that are in my Dad's pacemaker, my mountain bike, my running shoes, my hybrid car, band-aids, my plastic deck, my cellphone, my childrens braces, their beachball, my rainsuit, my mothers new hip, my computer, and diapers and depends for when I'm older.

Thanks also for my son's action figures, my daughters Barbie doll, for putting the main ingredient in vaseline or asphalt shingles that keeps the rain out of my house, and parts of the pavement, so it takes less time to drive my kids to the hospital in an emergency, as the horse died from sunstroke last month.

Thanks, you dirty strip-mining companies for supplying the metal that went into the scalpel, retractors and clamps that saved my buddy's life, my barbeque, my rare coin collection, the windmills in the field outside of town, forks and spoons so we don't drink soup directly from the bowl and stainless appliances that are so much cleaner than the old wood fired ones.

Thanks also for supplying all the electrical wiring for the house so my mother won't have to ride the bicycle generator anymore with her bad hip, to make toast.

Thank you logging companies for supplying the power poles that bring the wires to my house, the house itself, my rowing skiff and oars, my dining room table and chairs, the grandfather clock, decorative handrails, my baseball bat, and my guitar and cello.

Thank you manufacturing plants for putting together and shaping all of the above into useable items.

Thank you farmers for my daily bread and although I am a vegetarian, for raising enough beef and hogs to keep the people of this country alive for yet another day.

And finally, I thank all of the above for the millions of jobs they have provided and for getting us out of the stone age with only a minor rise in the worlds temperature.

Amen!

The characterization of CFACT as "a non-profit public policy organization focusing on issues of environment and development" is accurate as far as it goes but it doesn't tell the whole story. CFACT if primarily funded by oil companies and Scaife Foundations. It comes to the table with an ideological axe to grind. I think it is appropriate to hear all viewpoints but disingenuous not to disclose the economic and political affiliations of these groups. That applies to pro climate change voices as well as those expressing doubts.

"AccuWeather could be part of the solution by being more educational on the issue instead of providing a pulpit for deniers to spread their deceptions."

There is nothing wrong with debate Andrew. Those who shun debate or try to shut it down usually fear having their opinions scrutinzed, which leads to one to believe that something is seriously amiss. I'd love to know your defintion of "deceptive". Is it something that only the "non-believers" are guilty of? Seems to me that there has been plenty of deception by those promulgating carbon dioxide's role in climate change.

The letter that was written to the climate change skeptic was extremely inapropriate. I don't believe AGW is real but I would never do that to a believer....

REPLY: Of course you wouldn't Darren. Because unlike these Global Warming fear mongering Obee Wan Jabronees with their controling political agenda, you sir are a rational individual. Disagree with a member of the MoveOn.org crowd, and all of that liberal love and tolerance goes out the window! Be sure to guard your automobile.

DENY DENY DENY THE GLOBAL WARMING LIE!!!!!!

How come the AGW crowd keep insisting the scientific debate over GW is over?

Study of any issue is the very soul of true science. It seems that the desire to bolster their agenda trumps the whole science of the issue. Funny how they, who espouse to be the ones more deft at understanding the science of GW, are the ones hellbent on stopping it.

Andrew,

The proponents of AGW are about science, and don't spread falsehoods and distortions, use scare tactics?

Think again:

http://climateprogress.org/2007/08/06/did-climate-chage-contribute-to-the-minneapolis-bridge-collapse/#more-1120

One thing that really annoys me are the distorted maps commonly used to show global warming - so I wrote up a short visual description of what is wrong with the maps and what they look like corrected.
http://patrickphenry.blogspot.com/2007/08/correcting-global-warming-maps_07.html

like ur maps mr henry...but did you honestly think you can get an emotionally driven, nonscientific, AGW scammer to think in three dimensions?...i do however think an openminded individual would appreciate your plots...AGW is a money robbing game invented by people of little conscience, just like mr. oiznop's name suggests spelled backwards...have a nice sunny and warm day...its a good thing!!!

Good find Patrick. I agree, these maps give a better representation of SST anomalies. I would like to know what happened to the darker green area southeast of Australia though. It was more than -1 below normal, but doesn't appear on the other two maps. Are both taken from the same time frame? Also, can you provide a link to the site? I'd like to see if NOAA has that data over a longer range. Thanks.

Patrick,

I also think the maps provided would be more useful if they could be rotated so that one could focus on a particular area of interest. For instance, the two pictures of either side of the world makes it difficult to see clearly what is going on at either pole, or at the edges (look at Europe, for instance--it doesn't show up particularly well on either picture).

Travis,

I put a video on You-Tube which shows 360 degree rotation.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RAp4WmMess4

The NOAA site is
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/sst/ani-weekly/5.gif

Patrick,

If you have time, can you also do a polar animation (rotating the map North-South instead of East-West)? Thanks. The first one is very helpful.

Travis,

I put polar views at-
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JsmIqduqwcw

The warm anomaly around the Bering Strait makes me wonder if oil development (burning excess hydrocarbons at drill sites) in Siberia isn't contaminating the snow and causing it to melt faster.
http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2007-06/uoc--dsm060607.php

Darren: How come the AGW crowd keep insisting the scientific debate over GW is over?

Because they have no science to back them except what they cherry picked or created out of whole cloth by making wild arse guesses about what is causing the warming (but it won't be anything that can be labeled as nonanthropogenic). Which is why they resort to lawsuits, orchestrated media propaganda, threats of harm and other thuggish behavior. They must shut down all dissent to their Luddite faith.

That is the biggest problem with the "reasonable" position of Accuweather in showing "both sides without bias.", then failing to vet the data flowing in. That is scientifically most unreasonable. Of course, you know what will happen to them, thuggish behavior.

In the meantime, despite ironclad proof from the NOAA and IPCC websites that the nonanthropogenic people are correct and that the data is being manipulated, AGWers continue to crow each time that data set is massaged yet again to force "warming" to find a result they like.

Patrick,

It's certainly a possibility. I'd be shocked if drilling activity didn't factor into the Arctic melt. At the same time, wouldn't the anomaly be relatively consistent as time goes on? Back in January, SSTs in the Bering Strait were normal to slightly below normal.

I had the same idea about China because the large anomaly there is right at the mouth of the Yangtze River, which is home to a large portion of China's industrial activity. But there too, the anomaly changes over time. There's obviously a lot more going on than we know.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/sst/weekly-sst.php?year=2007&month=01&wed=3&submit_form=Submit&_submit_check=1

Thanks for the polar animation.

~Travis

The warm poleward SSTs are a result of 30 years of Tropical Pacific warming. Warmth accumulating at the tropics (both oceanic and atomospheric) flows poleward. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation has been in a positive mode since 1976. The anamolies at the poles reflect this condition.

The global warming signal should be first seen at the mid tropespheric levels of the tropics, which incidentally has yet to occur. Globally, the planet has seen the results of 30 years ofa positive PDO and 12 years of a positive AMO (Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation). How and why these 2 teleconnections behave as they do is still open to debate. In any event, IMHO almost all of the recent warming (since 1980) we've seen can be attributed to the PDO. A warm Atlantic just exasperates matters -especially for Europe.

Travis,

In January, the Bering Strait and northward are frozen - so SSTs are relatively fixed. During the summer the icepack has been melting earlier than normal in that region, causing high SST anomalies in July and August.

Given the proximity to the oil field development, I have to wonder if dirty snow around the Bering Strait isn't the dominant factor. We don't see as large anomalies like this in Antarctica or in the rest of the Arctic, though there is also a lot of oil production in the North Sea.

Travis,

Good call on the Yangtze River. I hadn't considered that idea, but it certainly looks right on the map.

Patrick,

Thanks for the explanation; given the consistency in winter SSTs from 2003-2007, it makes sense.

However, if oil drilling activity was the driving force behind the accelerating melting in the Bering Strait, wouldn't the anomaly be relatively consistent at its peak from year to year? The peak anomaly in 2003 was relatively weak (July 23), followed by two relatively strong anomalies in 2004 and 2005 (August 18, 17), then a practically non-existent anomaly last year (follow the link), and finally the extremely high anomaly this year (peak on July 18, though still very high at present).

If I'm missing something, let me know.

Last year's peak anomaly:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/sst/weekly-sst.php?year=2006&month=08&wed=16&submit_form=Submit&_submit_check=1#form

This year's anomaly:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/sst/weekly-sst.php?year=2007&month=07&wed=18&submit_form=Submit&_submit_check=1#form

I had never heard of Headline Earth until today. It was refreshing for me to hear BOTH sides of the global warming issue. I am still waiting for Accuweather to launch its own TV channel! Move over TWC!

Reply: The AccuWeather Channel is now available on certain cable systems across the country.