Report has 'smoking gun' on climate

[cal04]

Human-caused global warming is here, visible in the air, water and melting ice, and is destined to get much worse in the future, an authoritative global scientific report will warn next week.

"The smoking gun is definitely lying on the table as we speak," said top U.S. climate scientist Jerry Mahlman, who reviewed all 1,600 pages of the first segment of a giant four-part report. "The evidence ... is compelling."

Andrew Weaver, a Canadian climate scientist and study co-author, went even further: "This isn't a smoking gun; climate is a batallion of intergalactic smoking missiles."

The first phase of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is being released in Paris next week. This segment, written by more than 600 scientists and reviewed by another 600 experts and edited by bureaucrats from 154 countries, includes "a significantly expanded discussion of observation on the climate," said co-chair Susan Solomon, a senior scientist for the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. She and other scientists held a telephone briefing on the report Monday.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070123/ap_on_sc/warming_climate_report_5

[Bjorn Against]

1. We have had so many smoking guns now you would think we could rearm the entire military

My god how many smoking guns do we need before people finally see reality.

[villager]

3. what? The dangerous "reality-based" community?

And remember: "Community" sounds like "communist!"

(sarcasm icon even needed?)

[alfredo]

13. It's all those smoking guns that are causing global warming.

Couldn't they put scrubbers on them to clean up their emissions?

[sakabatou]

20. For some, it will be after they die

If there is an afterlife.

[CoffeeCat]

2. Oh please!

Do we have to listen to this?

More liberal, wacko scientists who hate us for our freedom!

I like to get my climate news from that nice shock-jock, Rush Limbaugh. He
says the weather is just fine, and that any increase in temperatures is
normal, and not harmful to anyone.

Gotta run...I'm due for my hourly Kool-Aid injection!

(I'm sorry...sometimes dark, sardonic humor is all I have left
in these troubled times).

[WindRavenX]

4. Yet there are those on DU who deny this

There are some who have their heads so deep in the sand that nothing will wake 'em up.

Oh, but science has been wrong in the past so global warming MUST be wrong too :eyes:

[msongs]

5. so who really killed the electric car? enemies of America and the human race nt

[cal04]

6. Australia:Oil chief emerges with climate warning

FORMER fossil fuel mogul John Schubert says the nation has reached a "tipping point" on climate change, with overwhelming public acceptance of the problem making it impossible for business and government to ignore it any longer.

The Commonwealth Bank chairman credits the drought, extreme weather disasters such as Hurricane Katrina in the US and Cyclone Larry in northern Queensland, record global temperatures in 2005 and former US President Al Gore's film An Inconvenient Truth with dispelling any remaining doubts on the threat of climate change.

"I have to say that the Australian community reached a tipping point about September-October, over about a six-week period, when it was just extremely clear that the Australian community bought in that climate change was a real problem," he told The Australian.

The respected company director, who sits on the board of mining and petroleum giant BHP Billiton, has now joined calls for Australia to implement a carbon-trading scheme. His push comes just one day after BHP's great rival, Rio Tinto, said the federal Government should move ahead with emissions trading even if major polluters such as China and the US refused to be involved.

http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21102081-601,00.html

[daleo]

7. I hope they release the full report on the internet

I want to (attempt to) read it. I would like to see the evidence in one place.

[chknltl]

8. Has that smoking gun been tested for emissions?

You know...if we could just stop all them smoking guns....

[hatrack]

9. And it only took 19 years for the beginnings of a politcal awakening! Yay for humanity!

19 years this June since James Hansen went to Capitol Hill and testified that a clear warming signal had begun to emerge out of the statistical background noise.

When science barks, we would do well to look out the window.

[Lisa]

10. I saw Dr. Weaver last week ...

He was in fine form. Someone had baited him by saying that "scientists still don't understand how climate works", and he retorted, "which is warmer, summer or winter?". When the person replied "summer, of course", Dr. Weaver said "well, I guess you know basic radiative transfer -- it's what we use to make those projections".

[Harper_is_Bush]

11. That is a beautiful story. Finally the MSM is reporting the truth. n/t

[unkachuck]

12. if there's....

....a cataclysmic mass extinction of life on the planet you can blame it mainly on the United States and our pathetic capitalist controlled democracy....

....we're the worlds largest polluter, claim to be the worlds unrivaled military leader and super-power yet our political leaders do practically nothing about global warming....

....if you're twleve, I apologize for leaving you a screwed up planet and should you survive global warning, you have my permission to piss on my grave....

[Straight Shooter]

14. GOP enablers and other nutcakes refuse to believe in the global warming facts because ...

... it would mean acknowledging the horrendous contribution of the United States to this problem. It would mean showing some responsibility as a global citizen to begin making corrections for our failures. That's their real problem with it, because to accept global warming as fact means accountability for our behavior.

If global warming were a positive thing, not only would they agree that it's real, they'd all be thumping their chests at how much we contribute to it and shouting, "USA! USA! USA!"

[Kurovski]

15. K&R.(nt)

[Porcupine]

16. We are doing nothing to change this though.

The US currently burns as much oil as it can get, as much natural gas as it can get and plans to burn MORE coal not less.

We need to get the transportation sector to burn 15% less fuel every year until we are down to taxicabs, buses, trains and certified work vehicles. The airline industry needs to undergo a 90% reduction in fuel use.

That would mean a total and massive restructuring of our economy with whole areas of employment rendered moot. Those people would then have to be directed into building a mass transit system, installing a massive surge in wind and solar systems and doing energy retrofits on every occupied building in the nation regardless of the owner's ability to pay.

Then we have to restructure our entire agricultural system so that carbon sequestration is a goal co-equal with food production.

Then we have to go overseas and do these things around the world for free.

It would make the effort and sacrifice of World War II look like child's play.

We are going to watch millions die on CNN instead

[Locrian]

18. best summary I have seen posted

>>We are going to watch millions die on CNN instead

People talk about electric cars? Fuel "efficieny"? "Affecting" the economy?

You are soo right. Nobody is even CLOSE to comprehending what this will mean. We are woefully unprepared for even a best case scenario.

EVERY aspect of life - from what you wear, eat, shit will change. All those electronic toys, entertainment, travel, fast food, you JOB, everything.

[bloom]

17. This is disturbing ->

"Solomon and others wouldn't go into specifics about what the report says. They said that the 12-page summary for policymakers will be edited in secret word-by-word by governments officials for several days next week..."

[DixieBlue]

21. So the policymakers aren't going to get the raw report?

They're going to get some sanitized BuchCo signed off on version? Lovely, simply lovely.

[Massachusetts]

19. We may be able to unleash the power of the atom, but

humans will not be able to reverse this, slow it possibly.

Salinity change in the oceans, rising sea levels, thawing tundras, Mother Nature will make the correction and she'll take no prisoners.

Should auld acquaintance be forgot
and never brought to mind?
Should auld acquaintance be forgot
and days of auld lang syne?
For auld lang syne, my dear,
for auld lang syne,
we'll take a cup of kindness yet,
for auld lang syne.

-Robert Burns

[Prisoner_Number_Six]

22. Wanna bet its release is banned in the US?

And if not, all the scientific politicians will go to great length to doublespeak it into the exact opposite of what it says.

[progressivebydesign]

23. WTF? the govt OFFICIALS get to "edit in secret"??????

That just doesn't seem right, AT ALL.

[MasonJar]

24. It makes one wonder if things on the earth would be this desperate

if Al Gore had not been robbed of the presidency.