This article sums up what I've been saying about the sun.

It will be interesting to track what come of the sunspot cycle.



http://ibdeditorial.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=287279412587175

yet another article on the latest trend in global temps.

The comments on the article are hilarious..


http://www.dailytech.com/Temperature+Monitors+Report+Worldwide+Global+Cooling/article10866.htm

An easy-to-understand explanation on why "the science is not yet settled":

http://www.middlebury.net/op-ed/global-warming-01.html

Hiiiiiiiiiiii There!

I must say I did find the comments on that first article to be "hilarious!"

However, I did prefer the article that K027 posted to be the more "fascinating!"

I do NOT think it is TMI (=too much information) !!!

What would be the most baffling premise to a liberal of Your stripe, HandoMatic? I am intrigued to say the least or most?

Love,
Respect,
Most Warmly Yours,
JoAnn

Moving my reply to JoHandCQ to a new thread. Its pretty much off topic.

Being new to this forum I don't want to step on any toes but I find your comments about the attention span of Liberals to be condescending and frankly offensive.

Both sides of my extended family would be characterized as “Liberals”. I will try to keep this brief due to the short “conservative Libertarian” attention span (J).

I would categorize my father and his two brothers as Liberal. Sons of immigrants, father was a union man, etc.

The oldest became a medical Doctor, doing renal research at Yale, Ohio State and The University of Minnesota.

My father, the youngest, was educated at Georgetown served in the Navy and became a successful business executive.

The middle child also served in the Navy and then went on to Law school. He eventually served as Senator Mansfield’s lead Counsel for 20 years and was actively involved in helping to write the Civil Rights legislation passed under President Johnson (by the way, the License plate on his car is DMCRT).

I can assure you that none of the three have a short attention span.

I think (or hope) that your comments about the Liberal attention span refer more to your perceived lack of their interest in listening to a differing opinion rather than lack of intelligence or quest for knowledge. And I could say the same thing about Conservatives and Libertarians – they have a short attention span when exposed to information that differs from their beliefs.

The fact is, for all of the articles in this topic I can find similar articles from scientific journals that refute these opinions. And then you could find more strengthening your opinion and I could continue to do the same.

While I may disagree with some of your opinions, your arguments are obviously well thought out. So why the need to be so condescending? I tend to lean Liberal, but have many Conservative and Libertarian friends and we enjoy discussing our differences without offending one another.

In the interest of full disclosure, I think global warming is a major issue and carbon emissions are a major problem and that we should take steps to reduce them. What I don’t know, due to the lack of scientific consensus, is how much we as a race have contributed to this, though I suspect a great deal. So why not try to make the planet safer for our children and us.

Peace

If you want to play, put your articles of refutation in your posts and we can discuss them. I love science and physics and would enjoy a conversation about GW along those lines.

If all you want to do is complain about someone calling liberals attention span challenged, then we can talk about that too, but lets start another thread. I have loads of things to show you in that area to make my point.

Besides, I have been told that my use of the label of liberal is not really correct and I guess I have to use the term progressive or leftist.

It is rather puzzling since the troika of:
1. wikistan definition of liberal
2. The common use of the term by everyone but liberals and
3. The reaction that a liberal has to being called one

seem to be at odds with one another.

I ended up starting another thread that touched on that topic. Feel free to post or start any topic. Its all fair game.

Its funny how global cooling can be called natural, but global warming can only be man made.

http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2008/05/several-decades-of-global-cooling.html

Wow, no I don’t want to “play”. I thought this forum was intended to spur intellectual debate. You’d rather stoop to a lowbrow level, fine.

Your condescending attitude is disturbing. I think your attention span is limited my friend – you wear blinders and see no other opinion than your own. You continue to mention the short attention span of Liberals, yet ignored all of my points about the successes of my “Liberal” family. Is that because it didn’t fit within your argument?

You have loads of things to show me -- from where -- the Internet? Old college text books? You appear to me to be a guy that thinks he’s smarter than everyone else. That’s scary.

If it were worth it I’d find information to refute your articles but it’s not. You wouldn’t pay attention. And frankly my time is more valuable to me than to indulge someone like you.

Global warming/cooling -- do you honestly feel we've had no impact on the environmeht?

Hello ferrisdp,

With all due respect, all thoughts in my 2 posts are my own, no one else's. In addition I re-read both posts and see no "sloganeering" as you put it. So I quite object to your characterization of my thoughts.

I'll gladly take your criticism to heart if you could be more specific but you were not. I will not get personasl with criticisims of your thoughts as you did with mine.

The point of my post was to object to the "banal" characterization of Liberal's as a group with a short attention span.

My statement about global warming was intended to let the original poster know where my thoughts and leanings lie. It was by no means intended to be a comprehensive discussion of my thoughts on global warming. I'd be the first to admit that there are differing viewpoints on this complicated issue, and I certainly don't have the answers.

But to address your points, please define "most yardsticks". I think that there are many knowledgeable people with a differing opinion about the safety of the planet that you express (as there are many knowledgeable people who share your opinion). Your use of the word most implies otherwise.

You say we have restored many ecosystems -- okay but others are being destroyed. The coral reefs come to mind.

In terms of a warmer climate, your point makes sense. However, will it create inhospitable conditions in areas where the climate is warm now (I have no scientific basis for this it just seems logical to me)?

Finally, with regard to biofuels, I tend to agree with you. It seems the jury is sill out but you are right about the clearing of forests. In addition one could argue that the use of biofuels in the long run is more inefficient than fossil fuels and could potentially lead to more energy use rather than less due to transportation issues. I do think that the scientific community has differing opinions on this issue.

With that said I do think we need to more vigorously pursue the use of alternative energy sources like solar, wind and nuclear energy. To my knowledge the burning of fossil fuels is bad for the environment and with the growing population this will get worse.

These are complicated issues. I'm not saying that one "side" is right and the other is wrong. The truth is probably somewhere in the middle.

I've already gone off topic so I won't continue this