Global Warming or something like that!

[thekfc]

There have been talks about Global Warming.
Let see what kind of "warm" weather we are having or had this Winter.

The last several days have been one of the longest and most intense periods of cold ever recorded in Key West. On Monday, the coldest temperatures were recorded, with a low of 42 degrees -- shattering the previous record by six degrees. It was also the second-coldest day ever recorded in Key West, with temperature records dating back to 1873.

Some days last week were colder in some parts of Texas than here in NYC.

Memphis, TN hit 10 degrees last week.

Here is a quote from one of the weather channels:
"Wind chills across the United States are bringing our sub-freezing temperatures as low as 50 degrees below zero, making large swaths of the country substantially colder than either pole."

In Germany, rescue workers had to push through over 2 meters of snow and ice to free the travelers stranded in their vehicle. Also more than one thousand car accidents have been reported across Germany.

On Saturday, I turn on the TV to watch my fav Soccer team Chelsea play - game postpone - almost an inch of ice on the field.

Bus engine oil is freezing in Norway.

Ireland is reporting its lowest temps in 50 years.

Paris, France had it first snowfall in 3 years.

In Britain, the Army got called out to tow drivers caught in snow drifts.

The deaths from the cold include 122 people in Poland, 22 in Britain, nine homeless men in Germany, and 22 people who were killed by avalanches in the Swiss Alps. That was as of last week.

Yep, it must be that Global Warming they keep talking about.

Didn't somebody, I forgot his name got a Noble prize or something for his piece on global warming? I wonder what are his views now?

[Ray]

Al Gore and all of the other lying weather hustlers don’t give a damn if the real evidence shows that global temperatures have been declining.

They simply changed the mantra from Global Warming to Climate Change.

The global warming crowd is mostly a bunch of far-left loons looking for another excuse to redistribute the wealth.

Anyone who automatically believes this nonsense needs to have his head examined…IMHO

Ray

[Bob_S]

There have been talks about Global Warming.

What, haven't you heard?  The new buzz word is Global Climate Change, a sufficiently fuzzy term that can encompass ANY fluctuation in temperature, up or down, as if:
1. previously, in the entire 4.5 billion history of the planet, the average temperature has been the same, continuously, up until the start of the Industrial Revolution;
2. Mankind is the only significant impactor on global weather patterns;
3. there is anything at all we can realistically do to change current trends even if we are a major cause of recent rises in ocean levels.

Didn't somebody, I forgot his name got a Noble prize or something for his piece on global warming? I wonder what are his views now?

The same: Send me money and I will plant some trees to absorb all the CO2 you are chugging out!

So, last month, while I was in Japan, I was watching a kids' science show.  And the big boom right now is COP15 (the Copenhagen conference), so they were going over how to supposedly reduce your carbon footprint.  But all the things they mentioned were electrical usage.  And they were ridiculously impractical things!  No more showers.  Toddlers somehow magically remember to turn off lights without being reminded.  People will put up crappy plastic film over their windows.  Yeah, like any of that is going to happen.  But with this type of show, nobody asks any realistic or critical questions, they just nod and mutter "so desu ne, so desu ne." 

[Jeff S]

Isn't about 80% of the electricity in Japan supplied by nuclear power? How could not using nuclear generated electricity reduce a person's carbon footprint? Baka desu ne!

[Bob_S]

Isn't about 80% of the electricity in Japan supplied by nuclear power?

Close.  France is around 80%.  Japan is closer to 67% nationwide, with some areas greater than others (the Kansai region being over 90%).

[Ray]

[piglett]

The truth is always hard to get out of lying politicians & main vain media types.


piglett

[robert angel]

"politicians are like diapers--they should be changed often"

Except that after ONE term served in office, if you change them out, the congressmen and senators are guaranteed a full pension for life with guaranteed yearly income raises (they don't have social security--they have a MUCH better private retirement program) and ultra deluxe health care our military our could only dream of. Oh--almost forgot--those 'serving in the congress and senate just voted them selves hefty (hefty to me, anyway) pay raises.

If this is "government by the people, FOR the people" it seems we increasingly live in a caste society that makes old India's look progressive in some ways. At least they drew the lines clearly. Our middle class is being squeezed hard, with millions of people--Mom and Pop families, both parents once working before their jobs went to Mexico and then from Mexico to China, Americans who once upon a time, made THINGS--Levis, Wrangler jeans, underwear, nuts and bolts, gizmos and gadgets, electronics, automobiles--their jobs are GONE. They might have each made $20,000 to $40,000 a year, but they got by and felt secure that their future would get even brighter.


Personally, I can't see anything wrong with developing new technologies for creating energy, including safely using our vast remaining sources of coal and natural gas without making our air, water and human--environmental health worse. We are still a 'can do' nation--we just need an impetus to jump start us back to greatness.

Nuclear power may not be perfect, but if we could standardize an excellent plant design, instead of making each one differently at huge costs, plus the seemingly inevitable huge cost over runs, it'd be a source that's hard to deny.

I tell people in the Philippines that yes, it certainly appears that they have some major corruption, poverty problems and disparities in the distribution of wealth, but so does the USA. We just have more money to go around. To those who know how to 'work the system' The difference is that a lot of our 'corruption' is legal, in terms of lobbyists influencing legislation by providing favors in exchange for the same, politicians able to take campaign donations (warchests) and slush fund moneys for their own use after leaving office.

 Also, for those who can utilize govt. aid services, many of our poor can get air conditioned govt. housing for cheap, even have old cars to drive, cable TV, cell phones, etc. When my wife saw areas of our city that are considered the poorest run down neighborhoods, she commented that with things they had--air con, cable TV, many with cars and decent clothes, many obese, that a lot of Filipinos would be more than happy to have such luxuries. She sees the kids in school--so poor that they get free breakfast, lunch and school uniforms, wearing $200 air jordan basketball shoes with dollars in their hands, cutting to the front of the line to buy ice cream treats not included in any of the kid's school lunches ---unless they have extra spending money. What's wrong with this picture? Their often unemployed parents are usually the first to bitch and moan that the teachers and staff are too hard on their kids. The higher up educational 'leaders' tell us not to criticize , lest we damage the poor children's self esteem or upset the parents.

And we see it in every ethnic group, except from the more recently arrived immigrants.

That said, I nonetheless still have to agree with what Winston Churchill reputedly said--in reference to the United States Govt:

November 11, 1947
"Democracy is the worst form of Government except all those other forms that have been tried from time to time."

We just need to reassess our priorities and values.

I love my country, especially the opportunities it afforded  my parents and grandparents, but we're losing our ways, our middle class is disappearing and we need to take action and not sit idly by. I think my parents had somewhat of a more promising (post world war two) period of hope and prosparity. My immigrant Grandparents came here with nothing---they didn't have "A pot to piss in or a window to throw it out of". No work? There were signs in store and factory windows stating "Helped wanted--no Irish or Italians need apply". They faced discrimination and hardship, but they sucked it up, learned the language, embraced this nation and did OK.

I worry that my children may not have it as good as I've had it. I missed the era of where if you had a good record at work, you were guaranteed '30 years and a gold watch' and a comfortable retirement. I think my kids may have even less, unless they work harder and make the right moves...