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The Business & Media Institute’s new but not particularly special report

I'm sure there's at least a chapter devoted to the two decades of TV broadcasts in which, no matter how irrelevant the context, the words "global" or "climate" or "change" or "warm" were inextricably linked to the words "scientists disagree."

No?

Instead, they offer us John Coleman's Medienkritik:

Coleman told an audience at the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change on March 3 in New York that he is highly critical of global warming alarmism.

"The Weather Channel had great promise, and that's all gone now because they've made every mistake in the book on what they've done and how they've done it and it's very sad," Coleman said. "It's now for sale and there's a new owner of The Weather Channel will be announced -- several billion dollars having changed hands in the near future. Let's hope the new owners can recapture the vision and stop reporting the traffic, telling us what to think and start giving us useful weather information."

John Coleman, providing useful information in a place where the weather can change from a comfortable day at the beach to a comfortable day at the beach in an instant:

Arctic expert predicts I will win $1000 this year

OK, he didn't say that directly:

The polar cap in the Arctic may well disappear this summer due to the global warming, Dr. Olav Orheim, head of the Norwegian International Polar Year Secretariat, said on Friday.

I originally wasn't going to post on this, but a number of people, including Earthbeat's Mike Tidwell (on whose show I will be appearing today) have sent it to me.

I am skeptical the Arctic will be ice-free this year, but I'm open to any other takers for my bet that it'll happen by the end of 2020.

Should be a no-brainer for you global coolers out there.

McCain’s environmental record

Don’t miss Brad Plumer’s excellent review of John McCain’s environmental record in The New Republic. He covers a lot of the same ground I covered in my piece on the same subject, only with more of the entertaining details and anecdotes that make him a magazine feature writer and me a mere blogger. On the […]

Why the disaster trust fund is bad news

The following is a guest essay by Britt Lundgren and Jason Funk. Britt Lundgren is an agricultural policy fellow at Environmental Defense Fund. Jason Funk is a Lokey Fellow in the Land, Water and Wildlife program at Environmental Defense Fund.

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The recent fires in California and the severe drought in the Southeast are just two of the litany of disasters that have hit agriculture in recent memory. When natural disasters happen, members of Congress (at least those who want to get reelected) want to respond quickly, with cash for those that are affected.

Currently they must go through the clunky and often-slow process of getting disaster dollars for their district by passing an emergency supplemental appropriations bill (PDF). For this reason, the Senate approved a farm bill that includes a new $5.1 billion piggy bank, called the Agricultural Disaster Assistance Trust Fund, for the seemingly innocuous purpose of having money set aside in advance to help farmers out when they're struck with calamity.

Unfortunately, there are many reasons to think that this new trust fund is itself going to be a disaster for taxpayers, most farmers, and the environment.

How to green your car

It doesn’t take a paint job to make your car greener. Photo: iStockphoto Wherever you are at this moment, you probably won’t stay there long. Most of us don’t like staying. We like leaving — in our cars. Americans, the owners of nearly 250 million vehicles, take about 356 billion trips in them every year. […]

Company creates global map of wind patterns

Any way the wind blows, weather-consulting service 3Tier wants to map it. The company has created a global map of weather patterns that’s available free on the internet, allowing anyone to check whether there’s strong enough air movement — and transmission capacity — to power property in a certain area. 3Tier plans to do a […]

The next generation of infrastructure should help more Americans go carless

It appears that oil has reached a new all-time high in real terms. Given that gas prices normally peak during the summer season, the stage could be set for some ugly pump prices this year, although expensive oil may not be the most painful part of the current commodity price boom for consumers (an honor […]

The plot to destroy America

Suppose you knew about a plot whose inevitable outcome would be to undermine the health and well-being of your children, their children, and the next 50 generations. Yes, hundreds of educated people -- mostly Americans -- are assembling in New York right now for just two purposes:

1. Sharing the techniques needed to block vital action that could save billions of people from suffering and misery.
2. Spreading long-debunked disinformation while masquerading as experts who believe in the scientific method.

Well, of course, if you were Fox News, you'd be celebrating the event.

What can the rest of us do about this dangerous plot? Three things:

1. Get the facts from real climate scientists at RealClimate.
2. Keep a watchful eye on the conspirators with the help of DeSmogBlog.
3. Give your children an extra hug tonight.

Remember, it's all about the children! If you don't stand up for them, who will?

This post was created for ClimateProgress.org, a project of the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Encyclopedia of Life up, but empty

A tip from Canis sent me to the Encyclopedia of Life, which came online last week. I posted on this project about nine months ago. I was skeptical that it would amount to much back then, so I was curious to see if I had missed the mark (as usual). I typed in a bunch of species and found nothing but placeholders for them. The site is still an empty shell, about 99.999 percent short of its goal. They have the categories in place, ready for armies of professional, hand-selected curators with nothing better to do than volunteer their free time to fill in the information.

Yes, I'm still skeptical. The whole idea behind Wikipedia is bottom-up data acquisition. In a sense, it is analogous to a free market: iterative and imperfect, but productive and useful. If every article in Wikipedia had to pass muster from an appointed expert on each subject, there would be no Wikipedia. The EOL will never see the success of Wikipedia with its present top-down, command-and-control structure.

Climate skeptics hold conference in New York City

A conference of climate-change skeptics gathered in New York City this week to congratulate each other for daring to challenge the accepted science of global warming. A range of high-profile deniers painted themselves as put-upon independent thinkers branded as heretics by the church of climate-change dogma. Films were shown. Speeches were made. Al Gore jokes […]