Let us put aside seriousness for a few minutes. This opinion piece, linking global warming and obesity, had me laughing out loud. Leave it to the Australians. Just the pseudo-science graphic at the top of the article is worth clicking the link. I'd include it here, but the legal department would not be happy with me!

The Wall Street Journal online has a free feature today on the state of California's lawsuit against the 6 largest auto manufacturers over the GHGs emitted by the cars. It gives a pretty concise definition of the sort of suit it is (public nuisance rather than manufacturer liability), then features a debate between Russell Jackson, a defense-side lawyer who has worked on class-action and public nuisance suits, and David Bookbinder, a senior attorney at the Sierra Club in Washington, D.C.

I'm not sure how many of the readers of this blog follow up and read comments, so I thought I would add this link to an entry on the main page. Thanks to Sarah Fortner for adding it to our discussion. This is an op-ed piece from Peter Doran, an associate professor of earth and environmental sciences at the University of Illinois at Chicago. It was his research which discovered the regional cooling in portions of Antarctica. The op-ed addresses how this research has been mis-used by the media and others as "evidence" against global warming. It makes a very interesting read.

I'll be honest - I felt a little lost last week reading the oral arguments from the Supreme Court. I'm no lawyer, and while I understand the basics of the case, I knew there were a lot of subtleties I was missing. So today I found a commentary from Michael C. Dorf which clarifies some of the legal jargon. In particular, it does a really good job explaining the standing doctrine, which comes out of Article III of the Constitution. Here's a paragraph that summarizes the standing rules:

The standing rules that the Supreme Court has located in the case-or-controversy requirement are complex, but three requirements stand out as particularly strange in a case like Massachusetts v. EPA. The plaintiff must show: first, that the injury alleged by the plaintiff is imminent; second, that the alleged injury is "concrete and particularized," rather than a "generalized grievance;" and third, that it is "likely," rather than merely "speculative," that the alleged injury will be redressed by a favorable judgment.

And from there the author goes on to expand on each of those three points. It's still written in "lawyer," but it does help to clarify the case.

A couple of quick pieces to touch on this afternoon from New England. First, global warming will be on the ballot in New Hampshire. At least 50 towns will vote by ballot on the New Hampshire Climate Change Resolution, which calls for reducing greenhouse gas emissions and other steps to slow warming. The towns participating use ballot voting rather than Town Meetings. This is a grassroots effort to push global warming as a major issue in the 2008 presidential primaries.

Second, I appreciated a piece on Boston.com from Cathy Young on the politicization of the science of global warming. The piece rightly points out that as many on the right are quick to dismiss global warming based on economic motives, many environmentalists are equally quick to believe the worst in order to press for their own agenda. That agenda virtually never includes what may be the easiest current technology to produce electricity without greenhouse emissions, nuclear power.

Ms. Young's piece concludes:

Most journalists and pundits have limited knowledge of science; as a result, they tend to pick whichever science best suits their political prejudices. Both science and journalism deserve better. Perhaps we can start by remembering that an ideological crusade can be as strong an inducement to bend the truth as the profit motive.

I'm sure many of you who read extensively on the issue of global warming have already seen Ellen Goodman's Boston Globe Op-Ed piece from February 9. I realize op-ed's are supposed to be thought-provoking, sometimes even inflammatory, but I wonder if anyone has told Ms. Goodman that paragraphs like this:

I would like to say we're at a point where global warming is impossible to deny. Let's just say that global warming deniers are now on a par with Holocaust deniers, though one denies the past and the other denies the present and future.

are not the way to win friends and influence people.

The ironic thing to me is that while that paragraph turned me off completely, I agree with most of the rest of the piece. Doing what I can personally to reduce my carbon footprint, check, ranting against the politicization of the global warming issue, check, making the point that alarmism leads to inaction, check - all that seems very familiar. But couched in terms of "if you have any questions left in your mind, you are the equivalent of a Holocaust denier" - it just sets my teeth on edge. Is it not possible to be inclusive in today's society?

Recently, AccuWeather.com Expert Senior Meteorologist Elliot Abrams raised questions about this winter's weather and asked his readers whether they believed global warming played a role in the extremes. Many of the answers he received were well thought out, and I thought it would make sense to provide a link to them here.

The results ofan international poll on climate change were released today. The survey included 17 countries representing more than 55 percent of the world population.

Is global warming a critical threat? Should steps be taken now even if it involves significant costs? Should less developed countries (with substantial aid) make a commitment to limit their greenhouse gas emissions. These are some of the questions posed in the survey.

Full survey results along with the methodology of the research are linked from the press release.

Sir Bob Geldof, knighted for organizing the Live Aid and Live 8 concerts that raised money and aid for the Third World, wonders what the point of Al Gore's Live Earth concerts is (caution, link contains profanity). Geldof is irritated because people think he is part of the team organizing the global event. He also thinks without action on global warming from the United States, the concerts are meaningless. It's just another pop concert. He has a point. Global warming has permeated the conscious of the nation over this past year, and most of the world is a couple of steps ahead of the U.S. on the issue. Do we need to raise more awareness?

An interesting editorial appeared in the Sacramento Bee last Friday. It discusses the great divide in the United States over global warming policy, not the divide between Republicans and Democrats, but the divide between representatives of states dependent on carbon - either producers of fossil fuels or of automobiles, and representatives of states not so dependent, especially California, with its leading edge legislation on greenhouse gas emissions.

Noted hurricane expert Dr. William Gray of the Colorado State University has just authored a new piece in the Wall Street Journal Wednesday called Hurricanes and Hot Air. In the commentary, Dr. Gray states that the increase in hurricane frequency since 1995 is attributed to a speed-up of water circulating in the Atlantic Ocean and not due to global warming. Check out the link for his explanation, it is just one page.

In the Financial Times article "The steamrollers of climate science ", author Clive Crook says that the IPCC is a seriously flawed enterprise and unworthy of the slavish respect given by most governments.

In the article, Crook brings up a piece in the current issue of World Economics by David Henderson, a distinguished academic economist who believes that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) should never have been given the amount of authority it currently has on the global warming policy decision process of certain governments.

Henderson points out some of his issues with the IPCC below....

--Earlier studies on emissions standards were miscalculated by the IPCC.
--Reluctance to disclose data and methods.
--Lots of errors and a failure to correct those errors.
--The panel has numerous scientific contributors, but they are drawn from a narrow professional circle.

Henderson believes if governments are to get the best advise, they need information and analysis from an open and disinterested source or multiple dissenting sources.