In The News
In Case You Missed It…Climate debate full of hot air
Tuesday November 22, 2005
In Case You Missed It… The Calgary Herald
Climate debate full of hot air By Tim Ball November 22, 2005 If Canadians think they’ve already heard too much about Kyoto and climate change, they’d better batten down the hatches -- the real deluge is about to begin. Delegations from 189 countries, and thousands of political leaders, government officials, scientists, businesspeople and environmentalists will gather soon for the Nov. 28 to Dec. 9 Montreal Conference on Climate. Canadian environmentalists are giddy with anticipation. Leading the activist charge to pressure the federal government into acquiescing to yet another impossible climate-change treaty is the ubiquitous David Suzuki, now wrapping up a cross-Canada speaking tour with two talks in Calgary on Wednesday and Thursday. He has been pushing hard in recent weeks for scientists to speak out about climate change, admonishing us for not “correcting misleading information in the media,” more often. However, only those who agree with official doctrine are welcome to participate. Suzuki labels those of us who explain what the latest research really tells us about climate change as merely “rogue scientists” who advocate “the opposite of the prevailing scientific opinion.” He expands the criticism to include newspaper editors who dare publish what we are saying: “Even though there is no debate about climate change in scientific circles, you still see one being played out in the editorial pages of newspapers.” We “rogues” are simply trying to practise real science -- creating hypotheses, testing them, then telling society what we find. Suzuki apparently prefers to cherry-pick science that supports the social engineering he feels Canada needs. He wrongly assumes that, because he is pushing a political agenda, any other scientist who is quoted in the press also has a political agenda. Ian Clark, a professor at the University of Ottawa, admonishes the activist: “Suzuki must accept that if scientists should be advocates, they will not all advocate what he believes. He cannot chastise us for keeping quiet, and then dismiss us when we speak out in a manner contrary to his beliefs. That is irrational.” Suzuki will undoubtedly give Calgarians more of the same this week. Audiences must not be afraid to publicly contest such a fundamentally anti-science stance. After all, the concept that human emissions of carbon dioxide are a major driver of global climate is merely a hypothesis. … Albert Einstein once said of science, “In the realm of the seekers of the truth, there is no human authority. Whoever attempts to play the magistrate there founders on the laughter of the gods.” Canadians must hold extremists to account, and ask why they seek to play magistrate, and exclude legitimate climate scientists from the debate. Do they consider themselves gods? Or is it just that their stance is so weak they fear a truly open discussion? Tim Ball is a Victoria-based environmental consultant. He was the first climatology PhD in Canada and worked as a professor of climatology at the University of Winnipeg for 28 years. Click here for the full text of the op-ed. (subscription required)
Climate debate full of hot air
Climate debate full of hot air By Tim Ball November 22, 2005 If Canadians think they’ve already heard too much about Kyoto and climate change, they’d better batten down the hatches -- the real deluge is about to begin. Delegations from 189 countries, and thousands of political leaders, government officials, scientists, businesspeople and environmentalists will gather soon for the Nov. 28 to Dec. 9 Montreal Conference on Climate. Canadian environmentalists are giddy with anticipation. Leading the activist charge to pressure the federal government into acquiescing to yet another impossible climate-change treaty is the ubiquitous David Suzuki, now wrapping up a cross-Canada speaking tour with two talks in Calgary on Wednesday and Thursday. He has been pushing hard in recent weeks for scientists to speak out about climate change, admonishing us for not “correcting misleading information in the media,” more often. However, only those who agree with official doctrine are welcome to participate. Suzuki labels those of us who explain what the latest research really tells us about climate change as merely “rogue scientists” who advocate “the opposite of the prevailing scientific opinion.” He expands the criticism to include newspaper editors who dare publish what we are saying: “Even though there is no debate about climate change in scientific circles, you still see one being played out in the editorial pages of newspapers.” We “rogues” are simply trying to practise real science -- creating hypotheses, testing them, then telling society what we find. Suzuki apparently prefers to cherry-pick science that supports the social engineering he feels Canada needs. He wrongly assumes that, because he is pushing a political agenda, any other scientist who is quoted in the press also has a political agenda. Ian Clark, a professor at the University of Ottawa, admonishes the activist: “Suzuki must accept that if scientists should be advocates, they will not all advocate what he believes. He cannot chastise us for keeping quiet, and then dismiss us when we speak out in a manner contrary to his beliefs. That is irrational.” Suzuki will undoubtedly give Calgarians more of the same this week. Audiences must not be afraid to publicly contest such a fundamentally anti-science stance. After all, the concept that human emissions of carbon dioxide are a major driver of global climate is merely a hypothesis. … Albert Einstein once said of science, “In the realm of the seekers of the truth, there is no human authority. Whoever attempts to play the magistrate there founders on the laughter of the gods.” Canadians must hold extremists to account, and ask why they seek to play magistrate, and exclude legitimate climate scientists from the debate. Do they consider themselves gods? Or is it just that their stance is so weak they fear a truly open discussion? Tim Ball is a Victoria-based environmental consultant. He was the first climatology PhD in Canada and worked as a professor of climatology at the University of Winnipeg for 28 years. Click here for the full text of the op-ed. (subscription required)
Climate debate full of hot air
In Case You Missed It…Activism gone awry?
Thursday November 17, 2005
In Case You Missed It… The Arizona Republic Activism gone awry? Animal tester’s plans raise violence worries By Luci Scott November 17, 2005 Should Chandler be worried about potential violence from animal-rights activists? Chandler viewers who watched a 60 Minutes report Sunday night on domestic terrorism could easily make that connection after hearing an animal-rights activist advocate murder of biomedical researchers who perform experiments on animals. Drug-testing company Covance, which uses animals in experiments and has been targeted by animal-rights groups, has bought about 39 acres on South Price Road, where it wants to build a major drug-testing facility. … Camilla Strongin, local spokeswoman for Covance, said the company takes the issue seriously. “Security is an important issue when you see that other members of your industry have been targeted and subjected to some very serious events. So Covance isn’t taking security lightly.” She declined to discuss specifics but said, “Certainly, it’s extremely disturbing that somebody could advocate killing researchers, and that they think that’s a rational decision.” 60 Minutes showed videotapes purported to have been made by members of the Animal Liberation Front. The tapes showed masked members breaking into research labs, destroying work and freeing animals. They have also been known to burn down buildings, the report said. There also is current legislation addressing the issue. U.S. Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., chairman of the Environment & Public Works Committee, has introduced Senate Bill 1926. The Animal Enterprise Terrorism Act would prohibit property damage to those who do business with an animal enterprise. The existing law, the Animal Enterprise Protection Act, covers only an animal enterprise and not those who do business with it. The proposed law prohibits veiled threats, increases penalties and broadens the definition of animal enterprise. A companion bill has been introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives by Thomas Petri, a Republican from Wisconsin. … . Click here for the full text of the article.
Activism gone awry?
Activism gone awry?
In Case You Missed It…Thin green line is bad science by Debra J. Saunders
Thursday November 17, 2005
In Case You Missed It…
The San Francisco Chronicle
Thin Green Line Is Bad ScienceDebra J. Saunders
Thursday, November 17, 2005
Web link: Thin Green Line is Bad Science
There is a myth in the American media. It goes like this: The good scientists agree that global warming is human induced and would be addressed if America ratified the Kyoto global warming pact, while bad heretical scientists question climate models that predict Armageddon because they are venal and corrupted by oil money.
A Tuesday Open Forum piece in The Chronicle, written by a UC Berkeley journalism professor and a UC Berkeley energy professor, provided a perfect example of this odd view that all scientists ascribe to a common gospel: “The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a U.N.-sponsored group of more than 2,000 scientists from more than 100 countries, has concluded that human activity is a key factor in elevated carbon-dioxide levels and rising temperatures and sea levels that could prove catastrophic for tens of millions of people living along Earth’s coastlines.” The piece also cited research by “Naomi Oreskes, a science historian at UC San Diego, who reviewed 928 abstracts of peer-reviewed articles on climate change published in scientific journals between 1993 and 2003 and could not find a single one that challenged the scientific consensus that human-caused global warming is real.”
The authors then attacked best-selling author Michael Crichton because Crichton accepted an invitation to testify from Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., “who is heavily supported by oil and gas interests” and who -- horrors -- dared to ask whether the global-warming scare is a hoax. That is the sort of McCarthyist guilt-by-association that one would not expect to encounter in the name of science.
Crichton spoke at an Independent Institute event Tuesday night with three apostate scientists.
It’s odd that Oreskes couldn’t find a single article that didn’t follow the thin green line on global warming. Panelist and Colorado State University professor of atmospheric science William M. Gray, a hurricane authority, announced that he thinks that the biggest contributor to global warming is the fact that “we’re coming out of a little ice age,” and that the warming trend will end in six to eight years...
On Tuesday, Inhofe issued a statement from Capitol Hill that noted how scientists with independent views don’t get on too well with the IPCC. Witness Chris Landsea of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who resigned from the IPCC this year because he believed an IPCC top hurricane scientist wrongly linked severe hurricanes to global warming; as a result, he wrote, “the IPCC process has been subverted and compromised, its neutrality lost.” … .
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Energy “Poll-oney”
Monday November 14, 2005
Fact of the Day: Monday, November 14, 2005 Energy “Poll-oney” Would Americans Embrace Socialized Gas Production As The Answer To High Gas Prices? That’s What Hill Democrats Are Proposing As Their “Solution.” Late last week, an NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found that those polled prefer Democrats to Republicans by 28% on the issue of high energy prices. Fact: Republican members of the Senate Committee on the Environment and Public Works (EPW) have offered a sensible solution to high gas prices, the Gas PRICE Act, which improves permitting and provides prioritized financial assistance, through the Economic Development Administration, to communities that have lost jobs through a BRAC closure or realignment to encourage the construction of refineries. The Gas PRICE Act also increases the nation’s fuel mix by broadening the concept of a “refinery” to include CTL (“coal to liquid”) and biofuel production, and ultimately ensures increased gas supply through expanded refinery capacity. Other than obstruction and boilerplate rhetoric, the only solution Democrats in both chambers of Congress have offered provides for the socialization of gas production in the United States with the construction and operation of government refineries: At the behest of House Democrats, the GAS Act, passed by the House and referred to the Senate Energy and Natural Resources Committee, contains a provision that would place the Department of Energy in charge of building and operating refineries. The eight Democrat members of the Senate EPW Committee voted unanimously to substitute the original Gas PRICE Act language with a mandate for the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to design, construct and operate refineries to control gas prices, a concept that at least one newspaper – and perhaps the only one that, thus far, has written about the Democrats’ scheme – characterized as “bizarre.” And finally, other Senate Democrats recently announced an amendment to the pending Defense Department authorization bill to call on the Department of Energy, in consultation with the Department of Defense, to construct and operate refineries. As college professor Gregory L. Schneider wrote last week in the Topeka (KS) Capital-Journal, “Politics played the crucial role in Democrat opposition [to the Gas PRICE Act]. If gas prices are high next year, the GOP will be blamed and that will allow Democrats to gain seats in Congress. It is a bold strategy, but it is not a solution. Doing something about regulation is better solution [sic]. As long as governmental regulation prevents the construction of new refineries, high gas prices -- and high prices for detergent and toothpaste -- will continue to be a problem.”
In Case You Missed It… Los Angeles Times Animal Rights Leader Justifies Violence
Monday November 14, 2005
In Case You Missed It… Los Angeles Times Animal Rights Leader Justifies Violence In a ‘60 Minutes’ interview, the L.A. area activist says those who harm ‘innocent beings’ should be stopped by any ‘means necessary.’ By Steve Hymon November 13, 2005 One of the leading animal rights activists in the Los Angeles area has taken his campaign to the national stage in recent weeks, saying that it may be “morally justifiable” to kill people to stop medical research on animals. In recent U.S. Senate testimony and in a “60 Minutes” interview that will air tonight on CBS-TV Channel 2, Dr. Jerry Vlasak, a trauma surgeon, said he believes that researchers, slaughterhouse workers and others who kill animals “should be stopped using whatever means necessary.” Vlasak is a board member of Animal Defense League, which has held raucous protests in the last few years outside the homes of city animal services employees and the residences of Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa and former Mayor James K. Hahn. The group has demanded that the city stop euthanizing animals at the city’s six shelters — nearly 25,000 dogs were killed in the last fiscal year — and that Villaraigosa live up to his campaign promise to fire Guerdon Stuckey, the general manager who oversees the animal services department. The “60 Minutes” segment focuses on the role of activists, including Vlasak, in fighting medical research on animals. The segment is not about the situation in Los Angeles. According to a transcript provided by CBS, when reporter Ed Bradley suggests that Vlasak is advocating murder, Vlasak replies: “I think people who torture innocent beings should be stopped. If they won’t stop when you ask them nicely, they don’t stop when you demonstrate to them what they’re doing is wrong, then they should be stopped using whatever means necessary.” Vlasak also tells Bradley that he would not resort to violence. “My role in the movement is not to go out and do that,” he says, “but to explain to the mainstream media and to the public in general why these people are doing what they’re doing.” Last month, at a Senate committee hearing on medical research on animals, Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) asked Vlasak to clarify if “whatever means necessary” included murder. “That would be a morally justifiable solution to the problem,” Vlasak responded. He has made similar remarks in the past. Last year, Vlasak was banned from Britain because officials there said he was endorsing violence. In an interview with The Times, Vlasak, 47, said he is on the staff of several hospitals, but declined to name them. … Informed of Vlasak’s comments on “60 Minutes,” Stuckey, the city’s animal services chief, said he feared that activists might harm one of his employees. “It’s no different than Osama bin Laden,” Stuckey said. “He doesn’t strap a bomb to his chest and kill people on the bus, but he’s the catalyst that encourages others to do that.” Stuckey also said that neither Vlasak nor the defense league is doing anything to cure animal overpopulation, provide spay and neuter services or combat illegal breeding. The mayor’s office declined to comment on Vlasak’s remarks. In late October, Villaraigosa met with Vlasak, Ferdin and another league member in his City Hall offices. In a contentious 45-minute session, the mayor criticized the protests and refused to fire Stuckey as long as activists continued to demonstrate near the homes of city employees. Eight days later, the group protested outside the mayor’s Mount Washington residence. The league mailed graphic videos of dogs being killed at shelters to the homes of City Council members. That week, the council decided to lend surveillance equipment to city employees threatened by animal activists. While the Animal Defense League harasses city officials, another group known as the Animal Liberation Front has claimed responsibility for several acts of vandalism at the home of shelter employees. The front also has claimed responsibility for arsons across the United States and is listed as a terrorist organization by the U.S. Department of Justice. Most recently, the group took responsibility for throwing smoke grenades into the hallway of the Bunker Hill apartment building where Stuckey lives. … . Click here for the full text of the article.
Animal Rights Leader Justifies Violence
Animal Rights Leader Justifies Violence
In Case You Missed It......Murdering researchers
Monday November 7, 2005
In Case You Missed It... Chicago Sun-Times Slowing down Alito By Robert Novak November 6, 2005 ...Murdering researchers Sen. James Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, at an Oct. 26 hearing drew from an animal rights activist an admission that he advocated murder of medical researchers who performed experiments on animals. Dr. Jerry Vlasak of North American Animal Liberation was quoted as saying at an animal rights convention: "I don't think you'd have to kill, assassinate too many. I think for five lives, 10 lives, 15 human lives, we could save a million, 2 million, or 10 million nonhuman lives." Questioned by Inhofe whether he was "advocating the murder of individuals," Vlasak replied: "I made that statement, and I stand by that statement." Click below for the full text of the column.
Slowing down Alito
You are now leaving the Senate Website Click here for the full text of the column.
Slowing down Alito
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In Case you Missed It....The Weekly Standard New Republic, Miers, the craven NYSE by The Scrapbook
Tuesday November 1, 2005
The Weekly Standard New Republic, Miers, the craven NYSE by The Scrapbook November 7, 2005 …Animal Update As Wesley J. Smith reported in these pages three weeks ago (“Wall Street Goes Wobbly”), animal liberation extremists have declared war on Life Sciences Research because the company engages in medical testing on animals. Their main tactic is known as “tertiary targeting.” Liberationists threaten employees of companies doing business with Life Sciences, such as insurers and bankers. And the mere threat of being so targeted apparently drove executives at the New York Stock Exchange to “delay” plans to list Life Sciences on the Big Board. Adding credence to the charge of appeasement by the NYSE, the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works held hearings on the matter last week in which an Exchange lawyer refused to explain the NYSE’s sudden change of plans. Meanwhile, Jerry Vlasak, a spokesperson for the “liberationists,” claimed that “murdering” people “who hurt animals and don’t stop when told to stop” is a “morally justified solution to the problem”--as chilling an apologia for terrorism as you will ever hear in a Senate hearing. The NYSE’s buckling under to such threats should be huge news but instead has barely been covered. The Scrapbook can only imagine the font size of the headlines if these animal-rights terrorists were seeking to stop abortion or illegal immigration. Click here for the full text of the article. Click below for the full text of the column.
Animal Update
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Animal Update
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In Case You Missed It… New York Post Terror Road Show By Christopher Byron October 31, 2005
Monday October 31, 2005
In Case You Missed It… New York Post Terror Road Show By Christopher Byron October 31, 2005 … In Room 406 of the Dirksen Office Building last Wednesday, Oklahoma Republican James Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Committee on Environment & Public Works, called a hearing to shed some much-needed light on the NYSE’s apparent willingness to be bullied and pushed around by the animals rights crowd. The animal crazies had been demanding for weeks that the Big Board reject a listing application from a New Jersey company called Life Sciences Research Inc. that engages in drug testing on animals. Life Sciences has been in the crosshairs of extremists for years. In 2001 its CEO was beaten nearly to death in Britain by animal rights thugs wielding pick ax handles. Two years later, Deloitte & Touche dumped the company as an audit client after extremists stalked and harassed Deloitte employees for weeks. Marsh & McLennan quit as Life Sciences’ insurance broker, and Citicorp no longer serves as the company’s banker, for the same reason. Aetna no longer writes insurance coverage for the company; Johnson & Johnson and Merck have stopped doing business with it as well. Exchange officials paid no attention, distracted by their struggle to merge the Big Board with electronic trading platform Archipelago. But the animal rights nuts were on a roll, and when the exchange said that Life Sciences had been accepted for a Big Board listing, the wackos simply intensified their campaign. Within weeks, they got what they wanted. On Sept. 7, minutes before the company’s shares were to begin trading, the NYSE reversed itself. According to one rumor, the flip-flop came after floor specialists said they’d received threats of violence if they dared to trade the Life Sciences shares. News of the NYSE flip-flop was delivered to the Life Sciences brass personally — but with no explanation — by the exchange’s president, Catherine Kinney, and the stonewalling has gone on ever since. When one of America’s best known and highly regarded institutions soils itself in this way, the public has a right to know why — which is what last week’s Senate hearing was all about: To force the NYSE to come clean. … After all, if the “mighty” Big Board can be buffaloed by a handful of puppy-preferring psychos, what happens when other extremists, who think trees and other forms of plant life also have rights, see for themselves that the exchange can be pushed around? If the resulting threats get severe enough, will the Big Board’s President Flip-Flop agree to de-list International Paper Co., or perhaps Georgia Pacific? …. Click below for the full text of the column.
(registration required) TERROR ROAD SHOW
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(registration required) TERROR ROAD SHOW
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The True Cost of CO2
Friday October 28, 2005
Fact of the Day: Friday, October 28, 2005 The True Cost of CO2 EPA’s Clean Air Modeling Relies on Low Assumptions for Natural Gas Prices, But Also Unrealistically Low Prices for CO2 Trading Members of the Environment & Public Works Committee participated in a briefing yesterday by Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Steve Johnson on additional modeling of pending clean air legislative proposals. Following the briefing, Senator Inhofe issued a press release stating, “I would note that the modeling seems to make some unrealistic assumptions about the future cost of natural gas. With those low assumptions in mind, I’d urge caution in jumping to conclusions about the electricity costs transferred to the consumer in the proposals we’re considering. With a low domestic supply of natural gas due to current regulations and the hypocrisy of environmental special interests who advocate clean air but strongly oppose domestic exploration, we can realistically expect that natural gas prices will stay at their current high levels, if not increase even more.” As with the assumptions related to natural gas, EPA’s modeling also seems to make similar unrealistic assumptions about the costs related carbon dioxide (CO2). John Stanton of the National Environmental Trust took full advantage of these unrealistic numbers today in a New York Times article pointing out that the EPA analysis shows controls for carbon dioxide in Senator Carper’s Clean Air Planning Act would cost only US $1 per ton. Fact: The trading price for CO2 emissions in Europe closed today at 21.98 Euros (US $26.51) per ton (up .18 over yesterday’s price, with a 30-day high hovering around 24 Euros [US $28.95] per ton according to pointcarbon.com). (source: PointCarbon.com) That figure is more than 20 times the value assumed for CO2 control costs in EPA’s analysis of the Clean Air Planning Act, which assumed that one could purchase unlimited carbon permits from outside the power sector at a low price, not the real prices in today’s markets. If that assumption doesn’t hold (and based on the EU’s experience, it would not), the costs of the Clean Air Planning Act’s CO2 controls would skyrocket. Furthermore, the Reuters article, European Countries Trade “Emissions Credits”, shows that the cost of CO2 on the market has tripled just this year. As EPA stated in its press release yesterday, the “Clear Skies cap and trade approach will give states the most powerful, efficient and proven tool available for meeting new, tough, health-based air quality standards for fine particles and ozone. Most counties will be able to meet the new standards without having to take any new local measures beyond the Clear Skies power plant reductions. The market-based trading approach will substantially cut the overall cost of compliance that is passed on to consumers and shareholders.”
In Case You Missed It… Daily Mail (London) Terror laws ‘cover animal protests’
Tuesday October 25, 2005
In Case You Missed It… Daily Mail (London) Terror laws ‘cover animal protests’ People who try to justify violence, such as arson, by animal rights activists, could fall foul of the Government’s proposed new anti-terror legislation, Home Secretary Charles Clarke has warned. The Terrorism Bill, which is due to get its second reading in the House of Commons later this week, will make glorifying or indirectly encouraging terrorism an offence carrying up to seven years’ imprisonment. Mr Clarke was asked by Oxford West and Abingdon Liberal Democrat MP Evan Harris whether “domestic terrorism” by animal rights extremists would be covered by the bill. Mr Clarke told the Joint Committee on Human Rights: “It’s not targeted specifically at that sort of terrorism but I certainly think that animal rights terrorism is something that has to be attacked. … Dr Harris then asked whether those who sought to condone such actions by arguing that violence against animals justified a violent response could be hit by the legislation. “Those who argue that committing terrorist acts to promote the cause of ‘animal rights’ and to justify it by reference to a phrase such as ‘violence begets violence’ is illegitimate and would be covered by this legislation, as I understand it,” Mr Clarke answered. … . Click here for the full text of the story.
