Saturday, August 6, 2011

Comparing the WMD hoax, with the alleged AGW hoax

I participate over at SkepticForum.com where I found myself inspired to write this post. Maybe it’s just a rant, but it’s a rant I now feel like depositing at this website. If anyone is curious about the discussion please do visit SkepticForum.com.
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quoting CC:
Amazing paragraph, no conspiracy: "does have big budget," "doesn't pay credible scientists," "instead paying the media" (to misreport?)... not a hint of conspiracy thinking to be found. :?
quoting M.B.:
No. The mind numbingly predictable reporting of an infotainment industry, as well as the political class, peddling anything exciting the basest emotions is not a conspiracy. It's only what I've learned to expect. AGW hysteria is only more of the same. Maybe you've forgotten "weapons of mass destruction" already. I haven't.

How strange that you would bring up the Weapons Of Mass Destruction. OK, it’s off topic but why not look at this WMD hoax... the one that compelled the abandonment of tracking down the true 9/11 perpetrators, in favor of an invasion of choice into a country that had nothing to with USA’s real target, Bin Laden. Thus, leaving the 9/11 perpetrators to organize and recruit a world wide army of frustrated people while filling them with self-righteous hatred and a storyline. . .
One that USA only encouraged and fueled with it’s childlike ‘shock’n awe’ yeehaa gonna play with bombs mentality that rained down utter destruction on a country... that is cities and towns and neighborhoods and lives of innocent people. While the kids of Iraq were getting their body parts blown apart, Bin Laden was cozy in his head-quarters knowing he actually had succeeded beyond his wildest dreams.



Consider the cast of characters in that “WMD debate”

Let’s be honest it was the Bush/Cheney’s and the right wing “think tank”/media types that were out there boostering and marshaling the “WMD and the mushroom cloud,” “We gotta invade NOW” meme. All for an invasion/war-of-choice - that clear thinking people, or should I say folks with a broader more world-aware perspective {As opposed to ideology shackled tunnel vision} - recognized would be the disastrous and ultimately self-destructive act it turned out to be.

The “lefties” were the one’s pointing out that the Iraqi pro-invasion WMD evidence was flimsy at best, downright fraudulent at worst; plus the people involved in the planning were way too emotionally and financially involved to think clearly. The “lefties” were trying to remind everyone, Osama bin Laden and his thugs were the SOBs we needed to vanquish. That would have given the US people closure and a victory to be proud of; and impressed the world to no end. Instead, Bush/Cheney et al. made their counter-move of personal {not national interest} choice, the one Osama was praying for, and the rest has been sheit on a slippery down hill slope ever since.


So here we are again, in a different, yet similar political ball game. With many of the same cast of characters.

We got these incestuous right wing “think tanks” developing their agenda driven memes, and lesson plans, and ad/media distribution strategies (that “movement” thing I alluded to in another post) trumpeting headlines that misrepresent the essence and content of only those few “skeptical” studies that fit their tune, while fixedly ignoring the full breath and scope of the scientific evidence.

And we got the “lefties” pointing at melting glaciers, warming oceans, qualitative alterations in global weather systems {But, M wants escalating rates, well what about last year’s “heat dome” that sat over Russia, and the million square mile “heat dome” sitting over USA right now. How much more escalation will be needed to shake the certitude of folks under the spell of a manufactured politically motivated anti-science movement?}


Then the “righties” will fire back with argument focused on carefully selected graph line minutia that seem to me little more than distractions when presented selectively.

M says “at current rates", predicted warming for century can’t possible happen.
How do you know the current rate will, or is expected to, continue?
What is your source?
What about considering that the Arctic Ocean is going to becomes a summer long solar absorption plate in two to three decades, from there evolving into an increasingly year around feature? Or, the extra kick warming is going to get as the tundra and permafrost continues it’s serious melting? There are more cascading warming amplifiers all being ignored, like that tree that silently fell in the forest.

M might counter: show me your numbers, prove that these latest numbers on such and such study are absolutely accurate, etc., etc.

Well to be honest I myself don’t worry about those tiny details because I appreciate they don’t change the big picture. Or, the fact that for the past forty years of actively observing/paying attention to our planet’s weather and climate changes. I know they have been big and one directional ~ yea, yea, fluctuating a bit ~ nonetheless with relentless momentum in one direction. It’s why I’m more passionate about this than your average bear. But, I know that’s just me and myself.


What drives me to all this writing or whatever you want to call it, is that the studies year after year continue to pile up. That is, the scientists, the ones who have done the training to actually understand the complexities of data collection and processing and graphing. The folks who not only care about every bit of minutia, but study and understand it. What those folks have collected and the studies they’ve produced overwhelmingly supports my gut feeling {which is based on my observations along with the knowledge I’ve gleaned over the years}, while refining my knowledge of how our climate works. And it’s fun and full of surprises and regular readjustments of what I know in light of new information. That’s what learning and experiencing life is all about.

Heck, it’s been one of the benefits of the back and forth here at SkepticForum, it exposes me to new info. encourages new reading, and modifies or refines my understanding. Can’t help it if much of the "skeptical claims" doesn’t stand up to thoughtful critical review.

But, that shouldn’t stop folks from sharing studies, I love to see what’s out there. Still, the sad thing is, the longer the political debate continues, the more the global weather/cryosphere reports reinforce the weight of my perspective. And the more momentum our AGW monster gathers.

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