"To what purpose are powers limited, and to what purpose is that limitation committed to writing,
if these limits may, at any time, be passed by those intended to be restrained?"
-- Chief Justice John Marshall, Marbury v. Madison, 1803

Friday, June 27, 2008

While I’m on the subject of right wing jerks, I’ll bash a left wing jerk again. Patrick Michaels digs up the dirt on James “crimes against humanity” Hansen.  Here’s what he was saying 20 year ago.

Hansen offered three scenarios for future warming. “Scenario A,” was business as usual, meaning carbon dioxide emissions would continue with no stringent curbs. It forecast an ever-increasing rate of emissions, but the rate of increase turned out to be constant. So this scenario predicted too much warming. Indeed, even though there was no major curb on emissions, they still didn’t increase exponentially.

“Scenario B,” which forecast a slower increase, is pretty close to what has happened, as far as global carbon dioxide emissions go. It projected that increasing CO2 concentrations would result in global temperatures about 1.48°F above the 1951-80 average in 2007. But that’s 33 percent more warming than has actually been observed, according to data published by the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

“Scenario C” stopped the growth of carbon dioxide emissions altogether in 2000, which obviously hasn’t happened.

Every climate scientist knows there’s been no — zero — net change in surface temperatures in the last ten years, as shown in the climate history of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

Unless you throw in a volcano (there hasn’t been a decent one in the last decade), none of Hansen’s valid 1988 models predict what’s actually happened. He simply predicted too much warming, especially for the last ten years. Why should we believe what he forecasts for the rest of the 21st century?

Hansen’s 1988 predictions were flatly wrong about the extent of global warming. Yet on the 20th anniversary of his original testimony, Hansen said that people “should be tried for high crimes against humanity and nature” for spreading doubts about the promised global warming holocaust. He named names, too: the CEOs of ExxonMobil and Peabody Energy.

Excuse me, Inquisitor Hansen, but what exactly are their crimes against humanity? Being demonstrably wrong about climate science?

I’ve never understood how environmental scientists can retain their credibility after being so mind-bogglingly wrong.  Paul Ehrlich is still a god to greens despite being hopelessly spectacularly wrong about everything.  Any time some environmental terror (such as overpopulation) turns out to be garbage or some environmental fad (such as food miles) turns out to harm the planet, the panic mongers just shift to the next target.  No one’s career is ruined.  No one’s credibility is shot.

Michaels also notes that Hansen is violating the Hatch Act.  But since we allow the drug czar to rip the hatch act to pieces when campaigning against marijuana decriminalization, I don’t expect the justice department to move very quickly on this.

It somewhat comforts me to know that for every right wing Fred Phelps douchebag, there’s at least three left wing James Hansen douchebags.  It makes me feel at peace with the Universe.