XDA

There has been in recent times, an 11 year sunspot cycle on our sole source of warmth, the sun, and a 22 year cycle of reversing magnetic polarity. What has followed here on Earth, at least in this western part of the country, was a 22 year cycle of major drought--easily seen from Dust Bowl days in the early 30s, mid-50s, late 70s to just recently. Of course changes in the heat output from the sun causes a direct reaction here on Earth. Even the looniest of the Warmies could see that, I think.

So are there longer term sunspot cycles which cause measurable warming and cooling here on Earth? I don't know. I'm vaguely aware of a period of no blemishes on the sun during the Little Ice Age, but that's about it. Fortunately, there are scientists out there who do know. One of them is Nigel Weiss from South Africa, former head of the Royal Astronomical Society. He thinks that sunspot and other solar activity overwhelms the slight differences caused by traces of trace gasses in the troposphere, and that we are about to enter a period of no sunspots which will mean a major cooling period.

He's not the only solar scientist who is talking about cooling, as this Canadian paper, the conservative National Post, lays out. Other scientists (and popularizers) have branded these dissenting scientists as tools of the big energy hegemony (or whatever--ExxonMobile has been named by Mother Jones as a buyer of opinions for sale) but there is no real connection I can see and no, absolutely no, proof of any improper influence. Maybe the Warmies will help to enlighten us about this new, evil corporation conspiracy. I do see one of the Warmies, Heidi Cullen, embracing another Stalinist tactic of seeking to punish those who do not fully accept the Warmie dogma.

My paper yesterday had a big story on the expected report of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) which will "...provide the most compelling evidence to date that climate is changing and that mankind is responsible for that change." The report, which will be released on February 2 (and if it sees its shadow, we well have 6 more weeks of Warmie hysteria), is based on apparently cherry picked anecdotal evidence of warming here, and on 23 computer models. The sun scientists have flat out ruined the report for me by stating that none of the computer models take into account the changing heat output of the sun from the longer term cycles. (Not to mention the lack of accounting for water vapor "feedback" reaction).

Debate over the role of the sun in forcing temperature change is nothing new. Professor Ian Clark of the Department of Earth Sciences, University of Ottawa, wrote on this theme on this page in 2004. The climate models used by the United Nations' Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change do not take adequate account of solar activity, Mr. Clark said. "Past and recent climate warming can be explained by changes in solar activity," he said.

I'm having trouble explaining why skepticism about Global Warming (caused primarily by human activity) is largely on the right side of the political aisle. Is it some sort of influence from the aforementioned big energy hegemony ? Is it that lefties, merely to be lefty, have already shown an ability to swallow whole incredible theories which history has debunked time and again (like socialism, for example)?

I'm going to have to look harder at that question.

I'm certainly not the only skeptic. Here is a good article from Australia with a blast from the past from Newsweek.

On April 28, 1975, Newsweek published an article stating: "There are ominous signs that the earth's weather patterns have begun to change dramatically..." and "climatologists are pessimistic that political leaders will take any positive action to compensate for the climate change, or even allay its effects".

These are strong words, and equally applicable today. Or maybe not. For the article was entitled "The Cooling World", and shows a graphemphasizingg how the average temperature had dropped 0.6 degrees Fahrenheit from 1940 to 1970. And so it seems, the media and science-supported climate cycle has fully turned in 30 years, but is still projecting disaster.

Voila, Les.