We dodged the bullet of Palin and McCain's bad judgement of picking her.

[InvisibleDuncan]

I was under the impression that you were both, in the same way that Canada is both a federation and a democracy. Democracy has a double meaning - it is both a specific form of government (characterised by a lack of protection of the minority against the majority, which doesn't apply to you) and a general type of government (characterised by the use of democratic elections, which does apply to you).

Semantics, eh?

[capsulecorpjx]

you're right of course, since the press won't ever see your husband or children. Hillary clinton was never in the spotlight when Bill was president, so who cares how she's dressed? This stuff matters to some people. Obama's wife made headlines yesterday for "worst dressed spouse at an acceptance speech". Perhaps the democrats could have tossed some money her way. But it wasn't necessary. He was already rich from special interest groups tossing him money. Palin had to borrow money from aides. And who is saying it's "not proper"? It's not like the republican party is a federal body. It's private. But you're right. Let's dress her up in nieman marcus, and dress her husband and kids in flannel next to her. No one will notice...

And how many posts does it take to point out it was Dan Quayle? Whatever. If people don't think Al Gore is an idiot then maybe they should pay attention to his global warming movie.

as for the osama endorsement, a simple google will show you who he endorsed. He not only endorsed Obama, but he said if he was around in 1973 he would have bought mccain from the vietnamese.
http://lifethelove.wordpress.com/200...-allen-hafman/
Of course some people have flipped this around and claimed that osama clearly stating "i want obama as president" (there's a tape that was played on cnn) is reverse psychology because he really wanted mccain. That's totally ridiculous. Any link you find saying so has "humor" as a keyword. But what can you do. I wanted Hillary.

Go ahead and plug your ears and make excuses. Ignore that McCain's own disgruntled Republican Aides made these allegations, first reported on Fox News no less.

I might buy your argument about "$150k" isn't that bad, if the Republicans haven't been so angry about the 200 or 400 dollar haircuts for Bill Clinton and John Edwards in the past.

I'm on the other side of the coin. I think Global Warming is real, and that Al Gore made a good movie. I believe the vast majority of the World's Climate Scientists more than Conservatives trying to protect business interests or stick to their anti-environmentalist dogma.

[Lord Orwell]

I was under the impression that you were both, in the same way that Canada is both a federation and a democracy. Democracy has a double meaning - it is both a specific form of government (characterised by a lack of protection of the minority against the majority, which doesn't apply to you) and a general type of government (characterised by the use of democratic elections, which does apply to you).

Semantics, eh?

we don't have democratic elections. Our votes are not used for anything at all except to show a particular member of the electoral college how he should vote. There is in fact nothing in law making this person vote the way the majority voted, and in a few rare cases they have in fact went against it. A sign of a democratic election is every single vote is counted and the popular vote will always come in first. We've had three presidents win an election by electoral vote who actually lost the popular vote. Two are listed here and i believe the other was Bush vs Gore.
When you see on tv "so and so needs 270 electoral votes", what this means is he needs 270 members of the electoral college to vote for him.

This is an asinine system and we are the only country in the world that uses an electoral system to elect a president. The possibility for corruption is strong here. But let's face it, there aren't any poor successful politicians.

[DeanMc]

It really makes a mockory of the whole "land of the free" thing though doesnt it.

"Sure you can vote, sure we will count it, hell we might even respect your wishes and vote for the candidate you all asked for, but you know voting is hard work and my kids ARE going to college this year and I heard the new Hummer is out....."

[Shaggy Hiker]

I read an article on the math behind the electoral college, or else I would agree with Lord Orwell that this system is perverse. However, the article (which I obviously don't remember in enough detail to provide a reference, but perhaps somebody else can re-create the math) made a strong, if fairly depressing, case in support of the electoral college system.

The argument went something like this: In what scenario will YOUR vote actually tip an election one way or another? The only scenario is one where the election was SO close that it hung on one vote (or maybe you and your buddies got together to form a voting block). This is incredibly rare (it hasn't happened yet), so in any given national election, any one individual never makes a difference. However, if you broke the country into individual voting blocks, then the probability that any one individual would make a difference in their particular voting block goes up quite a bit simply because their probability of swinging the election goes up quite a bit. Of course, by breaking the country into blocks by state, my vote (in ultra-red Idaho) is pretty much a waste of time. However, in the 2000 election, people in FL had much greater influence on the outcome of the overall election than they would have had without the electoral college system. Technically, people in every other state did, too, but a handful of large states can swing an entire election.

In the great majority of cases, the electoral vote reflects the popular vote, so it really makes no difference whether there is an electoral vote or not. It's just that in some rare, close, races, the individual vote of some people is amplified by the electoral college system.

Regardless, I'm opposed to the whole system of one person one vote. People should keep in mind that being an informed voter is important. You should keep abrest of all the issues and keep informed about the candidates. By doing this, you will become an informed voter and have exactly as much impact on the outcome of the election as some drunken imbecile who votes for a person because their name sounds funny.

[Lord Orwell]

I read an article on the math behind the electoral college, or else I would agree with Lord Orwell that this system is perverse. However, the article (which I obviously don't remember in enough detail to provide a reference, but perhaps somebody else can re-create the math) made a strong, if fairly depressing, case in support of the electoral college system.

The argument went something like this: In what scenario will YOUR vote actually tip an election one way or another? The only scenario is one where the election was SO close that it hung on one vote (or maybe you and your buddies got together to form a voting block). This is incredibly rare (it hasn't happened yet), so in any given national election, any one individual never makes a difference. However, if you broke the country into individual voting blocks, then the probability that any one individual would make a difference in their particular voting block goes up quite a bit simply because their probability of swinging the election goes up quite a bit. Of course, by breaking the country into blocks by state, my vote (in ultra-red Idaho) is pretty much a waste of time. However, in the 2000 election, people in FL had much greater influence on the outcome of the overall election than they would have had without the electoral college system. Technically, people in every other state did, too, but a handful of large states can swing an entire election.

In the great majority of cases, the electoral vote reflects the popular vote, so it really makes no difference whether there is an electoral vote or not. It's just that in some rare, close, races, the individual vote of some people is amplified by the electoral college system.

who told you it hadn't happened yet?
We've had a president elected because of one vote. But if current laws were in effect, would the result have been the same? Back then, only white people 21 and older who could read got to vote.

And here's a state-level result:

In 1839, Marcus "Landslide" Morton was indeed elected governor of Massachusetts by one vote. Of the 102,066 votes cast by the good people of that state, he received exactly 51,034. Had his count been 51,033, the election would have been thrown into the Legislature, where he probably would not have won.

"Landslide" also made the record books in 1842 when he won the same office again by one vote, this time in the Legislature. (In those days, Massachusetts governors were elected for terms of one year.)
</UL>

also i was wrong earlier. History channel's website has stated we have four presidents who lost popular vote, not three. And it's interesting to note that florida's vote count was too close to call in the bush/gore election but the supreme court overruled a recount.

also read this one:
http://www.history.com/minisite.do?c...5&mini_id=1045

[Xanith]

Go ahead and plug your ears and make excuses. Ignore that McCain's own disgruntled Republican Aides made these allegations, first reported on Fox News no less.

Actually it wasn’t started by any of McCains own aides as originally pointed out by MSNBC or Fox News. It turns out this was a hoax:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081113/...v/palin_hoax_1

It doesn’t surprise me that so many people believe this because most people never care to look further into anything and choose to believe everything they are spoon fed on the internet and the main stream media. Then again some people don’t care about the truth anymore, they only choose to believe what they want to believe because it fits into their world view.

I might buy your argument about "$150k" isn't that bad, if the Republicans haven't been so angry about the 200 or 400 dollar haircuts for Bill Clinton and John Edwards in the past.

The problem with John Edwards getting his expensive hair cuts on his private jet is he put forth this image and rhetoric of being able to relate to the poor and the common man. Most people felt that paying more for a haircut than most people pay for food every month kind of makes it hard for you to relate to the common man. It wasn’t the cost that people cared about, but the perception of this rich guy putting forth this image that was obviously a tad hypocritical. That’s why this made such a good story.

I'm on the other side of the coin. I think Global Warming is real, and that Al Gore made a good movie. I believe the vast majority of the World's Climate Scientists more than Conservatives trying to protect business interests or stick to their anti-environmentalist dogma.

I think its fine to believe in man-made global warming but to totally dismiss opposing view-points from many credible scientists seems to be rather ignorant. Consensus is not science, without definitive proof I see no reason to spend billions of dollars supposedly cleaning up something that isn’t a problem, or imposing billions in new carbon taxes on people on simple consensus. This from the same crowd screaming about the new Ice Age during the 70’s, sorry but just looking at the history of climatologists and scientists and how wrong they have been its very difficult to believe much of anything without definitive proof. I mean after all they have a hard time telling us what the temperature is going to be tomorrow locally, do you really trust them to tell you what the global temperature is going to be 10 years from now?

X

[homer13j]

sorry but just looking at the history of climatologists and scientists and how wrong they have been its very difficult to believe much of anything without definitive proof.

It's difficult to believe much of anything they say even with so-called "proof."

Interesting how their errors always show more warming, not less.

[Lord Orwell]

I think its fine to believe in man-made global warming but to totally dismiss opposing view-points from many credible scientists seems to be rather ignorant. Consensus is not science, without definitive proof I see no reason to spend billions of dollars supposedly cleaning up something that isn’t a problem, or imposing billions in new carbon taxes on people on simple consensus. This from the same crowd screaming about the new Ice Age during the 70’s, sorry but just looking at the history of climatologists and scientists and how wrong they have been its very difficult to believe much of anything without definitive proof. I mean after all they have a hard time telling us what the temperature is going to be tomorrow locally, do you really trust them to tell you what the global temperature is going to be 10 years from now?

X

There is almost no error in one day weather forecasting. You don't get errors introduced into the calculations until you go past three days. This is a commonly known threshold for accuracy within three degrees, and there is a very good reason for this. The atmosphere of the earth on average circles the planet every three days. And it's meteorologists that predict temperature tomorrow, not climatologists. Reference
Climatologists don't do day-to-day predictions. They look at data over the course of years and show trends. If you look at the climate average temperature (average over the whole planet), you can see a definite, accelerating average rise.

you will notice a couple of drops here and be tempted to ask why. The answer is volcanic eruptions spewing ash into the air.
Now imagine this: How many miles do you need to travel north from where you are right now, to see an average sea temperature drop of one degree?

about a hundred miles by my guess by this map:
http://weather.unisys.com/surface/sst.gif
now obviously by common sense you are going to lose that many miles of ice cap because you've raised that many miles of 32 degree water to 33 (although this isn't actually the freezing point of salt water). That's how much ice cap you lose for each degree of temp change. And proof shows that due to the size of the ocean and the amount of heat it's capable of retaining that stabilizing greenhouse gas production right now will not stop the temperature rise (various sources). It is expected to continue a rise of temperature of the next thousand years.

Now on to your ice age: This is in fact caused by rising temperaturs, not lowering ones. http://www.thenakedscientists.com/fo...?topic=16733.0
I hope this helps show you the truth.
Now what's actually up in arms among scientist nowadays is not whether ornot global warming exists, but exactly how much of it is natural and how much caused by us. Google and come to your own decision. But at least keep an open mind. I don't really like the idea of the lower united states turning into mexico's climate. Nevermind the fact that the adjusting temperature of the ocean is adjusting the currents and a side effect of this is a significant increase of category 4 and 5 hurricanes.

[homer13j]

[Shaggy Hiker]

Actually it wasn’t started by any of McCains own aides as originally pointed out by MSNBC or Fox News. It turns out this was a hoax:
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20081113/...v/palin_hoax_1

It doesn’t surprise me that so many people believe this because most people never care to look further into anything and choose to believe everything they are spoon fed on the internet and the main stream media. Then again some people don’t care about the truth anymore, they only choose to believe what they want to believe because it fits into their world view.
X

The link you posted explicitly states that the only item that was debunked was the person who was reported to have leaked the story, not the story itself. They go to great lengths to make it clear that their article doesn't address the veracity of the story, just the identity of the leak. So what was a hoax?

I did go wandering around the internet to see whether I could verify/refute the story. Not surprisingly, all I found were various sources reiterating the same thing. That is neither proof nor refutation of veracity. The best that I can say, not having been there, is that if Fox is reporting something negative about a conservative, then it certainly seems like it is probably true. Of course, they are presenting anecdotes about alleged events, so there are at least three different levels of 'truth' just within that story alone. The facts could be wrong, yet the leak was faithfully reported (Fox accurately represented what was told to them, but they were told something false), the facts were right, but Fox reported them in error, or the whole thing is true. There is also the fourth alternative, that the whole thing is false, but in any of the first three, Fox can claim to be correct, while in the last case, Fox would be clearly incorrect.

So what kind of proof would be sufficient? Probably a time machine coupled to a teleporter, and nothing less.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Homer: The number of pirates in your graph is wildly innaccurate. Piracy is an ENORMOUS business these days. In fact, there may be more pirates today than would show on the left side of your graph.

[mendhak]

To properly display the pirate statistics, though, you'd need the Arrr axis.

[penagate]

Lord Orwell, it's all very well to present a graph in support of your argument, but what does this graph mean? I can see how it would back up your argument if the y-axis were labelled 'Global Average Temperature" (although I'd be worried about the accuracy of the figures!) but it is labelled "Temperature Anomaly". In my understanding, the word 'anomaly' means 'deviation from the norm', and I cannot see the correlation between this and the theory of global warming. Can you explain to a person who knows nothing of the fields of climatology and meteorology exactly what this plot represents?

[homer13j]

Homer: The number of pirates in your graph is wildly innaccurate. Piracy is an ENORMOUS business these days. In fact, there may be more pirates today than would show on the left side of your graph.

That's why I added the second graph which clearly shows the recent pirate-related cooling.

[Xanith]

The link you posted explicitly states that the only item that was debunked was the person who was reported to have leaked the story, not the story itself. They go to great lengths to make it clear that their article doesn't address the veracity of the story, just the identity of the leak. So what was a hoax?

I did go wandering around the internet to see whether I could verify/refute the story. Not surprisingly, all I found were various sources reiterating the same thing. That is neither proof nor refutation of veracity. The best that I can say, not having been there, is that if Fox is reporting something negative about a conservative, then it certainly seems like it is probably true. Of course, they are presenting anecdotes about alleged events, so there are at least three different levels of 'truth' just within that story alone. The facts could be wrong, yet the leak was faithfully reported (Fox accurately represented what was told to them, but they were told something false), the facts were right, but Fox reported them in error, or the whole thing is true. There is also the fourth alternative, that the whole thing is false, but in any of the first three, Fox can claim to be correct, while in the last case, Fox would be clearly incorrect.

So what kind of proof would be sufficient? Probably a time machine coupled to a teleporter, and nothing less.

To me this said it all, "Eisenstadt's "work" had been quoted and debunked before. The Huffington Post said it had cited Eisenstadt in July on a story regarding the Hilton family and McCain."

If the guy made stuff up before it is likely he is making it up again. You might be inclined to believe liars, I am not.

Also saying that just because Fox reported it against a conservative it has to be true is about the weakest argument I have ever seen you put forth, even you must realize that.

X

[NotLKH]

There are some interesting graphs found at:

http://www.asinglevoice.us/Environme...balWarming.htm

these definetely do support we've been growing warmer for the past century or two, since 1800!



Before you know it, we'll be as warm as it was in 1180 or so!

[Lord Orwell]

Lord Orwell, it's all very well to present a graph in support of your argument, but what does this graph mean? I can see how it would back up your argument if the y-axis were labelled 'Global Average Temperature" (although I'd be worried about the accuracy of the figures!) but it is labelled "Temperature Anomaly". In my understanding, the word 'anomaly' means 'deviation from the norm', and I cannot see the correlation between this and the theory of global warming. Can you explain to a person who knows nothing of the fields of climatology and meteorology exactly what this plot represents?

why yes, yes i can.
It's considered an anomaly if it's not exactly on the average for a time span. The time span in question here is 140 years. I may not be the best person to explain it so here's a better description of it showing the same data.

[Lord Orwell]

The link you posted explicitly states that the only item that was debunked was the person who was reported to have leaked the story, not the story itself. They go to great lengths to make it clear that their article doesn't address the veracity of the story, just the identity of the leak. So what was a hoax?

I did go wandering around the internet to see whether I could verify/refute the story. Not surprisingly, all I found were various sources reiterating the same thing. That is neither proof nor refutation of veracity. The best that I can say, not having been there, is that if Fox is reporting something negative about a conservative, then it certainly seems like it is probably true. Of course, they are presenting anecdotes about alleged events, so there are at least three different levels of 'truth' just within that story alone. The facts could be wrong, yet the leak was faithfully reported (Fox accurately represented what was told to them, but they were told something false), the facts were right, but Fox reported them in error, or the whole thing is true. There is also the fourth alternative, that the whole thing is false, but in any of the first three, Fox can claim to be correct, while in the last case, Fox would be clearly incorrect.

So what kind of proof would be sufficient? Probably a time machine coupled to a teleporter, and nothing less.

They clearly stated that their source was a blog, and the blogger is not only a known liar but was shown to have actually made this story up. Fox gave a retraction mere minutes after the story was shown. Plus Sarah Palin has clearly stated that she never made the mistake. She would never state that when public record could be used to show her a liar as that would be counterproductive. Weighing all the evidence together, i would say it shows that the entire story was made up, and people like this guy are the exact reason the better candidate lost the election.

[FunkyDexter]

Consensus is not science

Actually, yes it is. It's been the basis of science for hundreds of years. A scientist proposes a hypothesis which is subsequently tested by their peers. If the peers find the hypothesis to be robust a consensus devlops and the hypothesis becomes accepted as the basis for further research and action.

What consensus isn't is conclusive proof of a hypothesis. But when you have such a huge consensus across the scientific community as exists over man-made climate change you'd have to be seriously stubborn to continue to advocate the opposing view without some sort of conclusive evidence (particularly as the opposing view could result in catastrophic changes to our planet should it prove to be wrong). There is currently no conclusive evidence to prove either side of the debate and it would therefore seem sensible to adhere to the view that man is responsible for global warming on the basis that such a huge consensus has been borne out of a very robust hypothesis.

[homer13j]

There is currently no conclusive evidence to prove either side of the debate and it would therefore seem sensible to adhere to the view that man is responsible for global warming on the basis that such a huge consensus has been borne out of a very robust hypothesis.

So what you (and many others) are saying is since there is no conclusive evidence was should still choose one side over the other. Good luck on that.

[Shaggy Hiker]

That's why I added the second graph which clearly shows the recent pirate-related cooling.

Ah, I see it now. The scale is so small I barely saw those bumps.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Also saying that just because Fox reported it against a conservative it has to be true is about the weakest argument I have ever seen you put forth, even you must realize that.

X

You're right, of course. The comment was entirely flippant. I couldn't find anything other than the one report, which is hardly a strong basis for anything, so I resorted to flippancy as the whole thing comes down to anecdotes.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Plus Sarah Palin has clearly stated that she never made the mistake. She would never state that when public record could be used to show her a liar as that would be counterproductive.

Nice reasoning, but recent history doesn't support it. Bush repeatedly tried to re-state his own record, and Palin certainly made plenty of incorrect statements as is, such as stating that she could see Russia from Alaska or her home, or whatever, which is impossible. They let her do one public interview and she fell on her face when handed softball questions. Are you so certain that she was otherwise on the ball? The only times she spoke in un-scrpited situations, she didn't come out so well, and tended to be inaccurate or incorrect. Frankly, all of those revelations except the Africa bit seemed entirely plausible.

[Lord Orwell]

but you can see russia from alaska (or at least the continent). Curvature of earth gives you a horizon line of 10 miles from sea level to sea level (i was in the Navy) and when you add elevation to this, the visible termination is extended quite a bit. I know someone who used to live in Alaska on a military base and he said the same thing. They can be seen.

as for those "softball questions"...
http://slog.thestranger.com/2008/09/...ns_sarah_palin
this is the actual interview and the only thing that sarah palin answered unsatisfactorally is "please give me a list of examples of John Mccain's actions in the senate from the last 26 years where he led the charge in reforming ... etc etc..."
How on earth would anyone possibly know the answer to that that wasn't there at the time? And Katie asked this question three different times. Finally sarah said "i'll bring you a list". Who can blame her? Besides obviously being incredibly uncomfortable in front of the camera, she did a wonderful job. I challenge you to come up with a question HARDER than this question.

[Shaggy Hiker]

There were a couple funny things about that.

1) She said pretty much nothing in that interview. That's not a bad strategy for a politician, and I don't fault her any for it. However, the one thing she DID mention was about people watching McCain on the bailout. That was incorrect. His own party was asking him to leave because he was such a disruptive force. She talked about them not wanting the bailout as is, but McCain left off campaigning to push the original bailout through the senate. Not only was he for it, but until it failed, he was trying to appear to be leading the charge. In the interview, Palin stated that they were opposed to the bailout as it stood.

2) That wasn't the interview I have seen before, so I went searching. There are actually so many Katie Couric / Sarah Palin interviews that I gave up watching them after the first three (four actually, but I skimmed one, and it was pretty much the same one you posted). This doesn't help the situation. There were either multiple interviews, or, more likely, multiple pieces to one interview (the setting kept changing, even in the link you posted). Therefore, if you take just a few pieces, you can pretty much support whatever view you want.

Why are there so many pieces of that interview floating around? Some show Palin in a bad light, some in a muddled light. I didn't feel that she did a good job in all but part of one of the clips I watched, but then again, I'm openly biased. Still, she was distorting facts in two of them. In both cases, I felt the distortions were unsurprising for a politician, such as trying to change McCains initial position on the bailout, but others, such as her interactions with Russia, were remarkably ham handed. Surely, to reach governor of any state, even Alaska, she must have done some off-the-cuff speaking, yet she's remarkably bad at it. Find the clip on her discussing her relationship with Russia, it's nothing but a bad school-boy lie. I've been involved with politics for most of my life (I used to hang out in the state house), and have heard lots of political talk. I've never heard a politician at that level handle questions like that one on Russia so poorly. In her defense, she was dealing with a false position that she may have been placed into by her handlers.

[Lord Orwell]

i don't think your data on mccain leaving campaigning to support the bailout as-is is correct. I watched it as happening on television and both him and obama stopped campaigning obstensibly to come up with a plan to save wall-street. After the plan was conceived, he then said he was against the version that was finalized and he thought it needed some huge changes, such as something that would benefit consumers (the refinancing of bad mortgages). It was a plan that was almost exclusively voted on along party lines (all 25 against were dems) but both candidates were against it as-is, although they were both for a bailout of some sort. So if you are going to fault McCain for being against something he really didn't have any say in making (one vote of 100), you have to fault Obama for the exact same issue. But they were both also there supporting the final result to ease the incredible public outcry against the bill, despite the huge stock plunge directly attributable to the defeat of a similar bill in the House of Representatives.

[FunkyDexter]

So what you (and many others) are saying is since there is no conclusive evidence was should still choose one side over the other

What I'm saying is that when there's no conclusive evidence but there is a huge consensus across the scientific community based on a massive amount of compelling (if not conclusive) evidence it would be foolish to ignore that consensus.

It's actually pretty rare to find anything in science that conclusively proves any hypothesis. But when there's enough compelling data to create the sort of consensus we currently have on climate change it's as safe a bet to accept it as truth as you're likely to find.

[Shaggy Hiker]

i don't think your data on mccain leaving campaigning to support the bailout as-is is correct. I watched it as happening on television and both him and obama stopped campaigning obstensibly to come up with a plan to save wall-street. After the plan was conceived, he then said he was against the version that was finalized and he thought it needed some huge changes, such as something that would benefit consumers (the refinancing of bad mortgages). It was a plan that was almost exclusively voted on along party lines (all 25 against were dems) but both candidates were against it as-is, although they were both for a bailout of some sort. So if you are going to fault McCain for being against something he really didn't have any say in making (one vote of 100), you have to fault Obama for the exact same issue. But they were both also there supporting the final result to ease the incredible public outcry against the bill, despite the huge stock plunge directly attributable to the defeat of a similar bill in the House of Representatives.

Might as well drop it at this point. I found loads of sources as to the sequence of events, but every one of them has what appears to be a political agenda at this point. The thing is, though, that at the time the articles were written, without the benefit of hindsight, the agenda that they appear to have now is probably not the same agenda as they would have appeared to have at the time they were written.

If you would care to see a load of links (there are more than you have time to read in the remainder of this year, of course), I'll hunt them up again. A few of them are actually credible, while others are not. The trick is to find articles written after the first vote (where McCain took credit for bringing the Rs even as the bill was going down to defeat), but before the bill ultimately passed. Articles written about the candidates positions after the passage of the bill appear to be generally skewed negative towards BOTH candidates, but they are well laden with hindsight induced wisdom as to what either candidate SHOULD have done.

[homer13j]

there is a huge consensus...
it would be foolish to ignore that consensus...
the sort of consensus we currently have...
accept it as truth

Over 400 Prominent Scientists Disputed Man-Made Global Warming Claims in 2007

EPA Chief Vows to Probe E-mail Threatening to
‘Destroy’ Career of Climate Skeptic

The Great Global Warming Blunder: How Mother Nature Fooled the World's Top Climate Scientists

UK Astrophysicist: Global Warming Theory has ‘failed consistently and dramatically'

Global sea ice area: now same as in 1979

Freeman Dyson Debunks Dire Forecasts on Global Warming and Other Tenets

Climate change momentum fading: Asia-Pacific survey

Global Cooling is Here: Evidence for Predicting Global Cooling for the Next Three Decades

Global warming predictions are overestimated, suggests study on black carbon

Meteorologist rejects 'fear mongering clap-trap about human-caused global warming'

Global warming ideas disputed by PSU prof

Opinions clash in global warming debate

The projections of the IPCC are simplistic, superficial, and now proven wrong

What is really happening to Greenland icecap?

Thirty years of warmer temperatures go poof

Researchers find arctic may have had less ice 6000-7000 years ago

Scientists Counter Latest Arctic 'Record' Warmth Claims as 'Pseudoscience’

Physicist predicts man-made global warming bubble to burst in 2008

We can't think of any other cause, it must be us

Corrupted science revealed

Climate theory 'like Y2K scam'

BBC SHUNNED ME FOR DENYING CLIMATE CHANGE

I would post more, but I'm at work...

[Xanith]

Careful.....for some people man made global warming is a religion. You could be tried for heresy.

I'm still waiting for them to change to man made global cooling again or tell us that the ozone layer is shrinking again, maybe acid rain will make a comeback too *crosses fingers*.

X

[Lord Orwell]

anyone can claim anything they want about mccain and the first vote, but he had absolutely nothing at all to do with it. It was a house bill and he's a senator.

[Shaggy Hiker]

Well then, if anybody can claim anything they want, then it shouldn't bother you any that his campaign announced to Fox news that he had delivered the Rs in support of the bill, even as it was going down to defeat. Generally, when you oppose a bill, you don't announce that you have delivered your party vote in favor...though that isn't always the case in Congress.

My only comment on the global warming debate is this: We can comfotably predict that no crisis will ever threaten the existance of humanity to such an extent that there will not be people who will argue forcefully that it is all a myth. Sometimes they will be right...and only one time will they be wrong.

I made this point in regards to a fish that went extinct several decades ago. We had about 100 years of data regarding the population numbers of that particular fish prior to its extinction in the 70's. Some people were claiming that the population numbers were sufficient to have allowed us to prevent the fish from going extinct (and wiping out a valuable fishery), but when you looked at all the data, it was clear that we never really had a chance. The fish went through wild cycles of boom and bust. The fact that it would dip to zero on that final cycle could not have been predicted confidently by anyone. The changes necessary to prevent the extinction of the fish could have been successfully challenged by the economic interests who would have had to change their ways, because they would clearly have had the data to do so.

Similarly, no amount of evidence will sway more than a handful of people on the climate issue. Those who have a stake in one side or the other being right will have plenty of ammunition to keep the fight going for as long as they need to.

Mankind may well die with a bang, or it may die with a whimper, but either way it will certainly go to its death proclaiming that they were right and the other guy wrong.

[Lord Orwell]

That's a good point. How many millions of people have died in the name of religion, for example?

[FunkyDexter]

I would post more, but I'm at work...

...and I could just as rapidly find a bunch of links advocating climate change but it wouldn't be particularly useful as we all know how many folks are out there posting partisan views. It really isn't difficult to find links to them.

Instead I'll post just one link. It's to google questions where some asks what percentage scientists belive in global warming. The answer comes back that it's very difficult to quantify but 95% is a fair estimate of those scientists who believe that man does contribute in some way to global climate change. Now, I'll freely acknowledge that this isn't a reliable source (for a start, how do you quantify who is and who isn't a scientist) but I'd arugue that it is, at least, impartial. And allowing for a wonderfully generous margin of error of say 15% that would still give us a whopping 80% of the scientific community who are in consensus. That seems pretty broard to me.

Let me ask you a serious and straight question. Do you believe that there isn't a strong consensus across the scientific community? That doesn't mean, are you unable to find a single dissenting voice (you will always find some - I can still find some who declare smoking doesn't affect your health). It doesn't mean can climate change be empirically proven (it never will be). It simply means, do you believe that a significant majority of scientists do not believe that man contributes in some way to climate change.

Oh, and nice selective quoting of my last post by the way. I particularly liked the way you turned 'accept it as truth' from a clause within a sentence to a single line imperative in a slightly childish attempt to portray me as some kind climate nazi. Allow me to respond in kind. From your post 67:-

i don't think

[Lord Orwell]

...and I could just as rapidly find a bunch of links advocating climate change but it wouldn't be particularly useful as we all know how many folks are out there posting partisan views. It really isn't difficult to find links to them.

Instead I'll post just one link. It's to google questions where some asks what percentage scientists belive in global warming. The answer comes back that it's very difficult to quantify but 95% is a fair estimate of those scientists who believe that man does contribute in some way to global climate change. Now, I'll freely acknowledge that this isn't a reliable source (for a start, how do you quantify who is and who isn't a scientist) but I'd arugue that it is, at least, impartial. And allowing for a wonderfully generous margin of error of say 15% that would still give us a whopping 80% of the scientific community who are in consensus. That seems pretty broard to me.

actually i have seen a investigation that is up in arms still, despite common sense. Studies by the FDA have shown that 2nd hand smoke gives you a negligible increase in the chance of getting lung cancer. it's something like .04%, which statistically could fall in the margin of error. But the bandwagon has jumped on to this issue and quoted individual lines from the report and used it as a basis to ban 2nd hand smoke. And no i don't smoke, but anyone with real investigative skills can not only see what has happened, but how it happened.

[FunkyDexter]

Actually, I agree with you on that. There's a consensus on first hand smoke being bad for you and anyone left arguing that actually smoking isn't bad for you (and there are some people still willing to argue this) either has their head in the sand or their snout in a trough.

The case for second hand smoke being bad for you is far less cut and dried at this stage. Certainly second hand smoke is bad for you, that's just common sense, but whether we ingest it in suficient quantities to have any noticable effect is far from proven. In the UK I think that the move ban smoking in pubs and clubs seemed to me to be driven more by political expediancy than by scientific analysis. That said, as a non smoker, I don't regret the ban. It means my nights out tend to be a bit more enjoyable than they were.

[capsulecorpjx]

Careful.....for some people man made global warming is a religion. You could be tried for heresy.

I'm still waiting for them to change to man made global cooling again or tell us that the ozone layer is shrinking again, maybe acid rain will make a comeback too *crosses fingers*.

X

I heard the same thing about Gravity. All these nut-job scientist egg-heads claim that some magical physics law is holding us down. When we all know it's God's love that doing it.

[Xanith]

I heard the same thing about Gravity. All these nut-job scientist egg-heads claim that some magical physics law is holding us down. When we all know it's God's love that doing it.

Really? I didn't know they were changing the theory of gravity every 20 years or so like they were doing with global climate change.

No offence but comparing the unproven theory of man made global warming to the theory of gravity is laughable. There have been plenty of instances where these climatologists have been wrong in the past. I'm not buying into their latest theory without conclusive proof, and so shouldn't you.

X

[Shaggy Hiker]

Why do you care? Every proposed change that I have heard has been beneficial to America. If this spurs technological innovation then it's a good thing, regardless of whether it is true or not. Most of the crying I hear comes from industries that don't want to change and want to scare everybody to keep the status quo.