Santorum is out and so is global warming

What’s new Today 

Story #1tells us Santorum is out.  Romney is the Republican standard bearer.  #2 is a fun article that shows the irony of the American left and what it does to the country.  #3 relates the abundance of natural gas.  There is a new age a dawning but we will need to get the democrats out of the way.  #4 tells us that even T. Boone Pickens realizes this.  The jobs aren’t green, but brown.  #5 looks at a revolt of scientist at NASA regarding global warming.  #6 reinforces the people at NASA.  It seems all the warming we’ve had so far has only occurred with data that has been “adjusted.”

Today’s thoughts

1.      Do you notice that we tend to get more economic progress when congress is in “gridlock” than when they are “helping” the economy?

2.      I wonder if the latest polls out of Pennsylvania indicated that Santorum was going to lose his home state?

3.      Obama will lose in November by at least the margin he won by in 2008.

4.      I have no idea of who the VP candidate will be, but I have a number of candidates that I would be happy with.  Paul Ryan is first on my list. 

5.      It’s now been 1075 days since the Senate passed a budget.  Since that time, we’ve deficit spent $4.468 trillion.  Great job, Harry Reid. 

1.  Santorum Out:  Romney’s nomination now assured

Rick Santorum suspended his presidential campaign on Tuesday, bowing to the inevitability of Mitt Romney’s nomination and ending his improbable, come-from-behind quest to become the party’s conservative standard-bearer in the fall.

“We made a decision over the weekend, that while this presidential race for us is over, for me, and we will suspend our campaign today, we are not done fighting,” Mr. Santorum said.

http://thecaucus.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/04/10/santorum-to-suspend-presidential-campaign/

Let the healing begin.  It was time for the Republicans to unite behind a standard bearer.  You will now hear about Romney not be a like the rest of us (I thought that was Obama’s claim to fame last election).  You’ll hear about him being out of touch with the common man, but that is a charge the entire Democratic Party suffers from.  Watch the momentum start building and Obama start taking a bath in the polls. 

2.  Only In America

1) Only in America could politicians talk about the greed of the rich at a $35,000 a plate campaign fund raising event.

2) Only in America could people claim that the government still discriminates against black Americans when we have a black President, a black Attorney General, and roughly 18%  of the federal workforce is black.

3) Only in America could we have had the two people most responsible for our tax code, Timothy Geithner, the head of the Treasury Department and Charles Rangel who once ran the Ways and Means Committee, BOTH turn out to be tax cheats who are in favor of higher taxes.

4) Only in America will you find people who burn the American flag and call America an "imperialist nation," but who get offended if you say they're not patriotic...

http://townhall.com/columnists/johnhawkins/2012/04/10/20_only_in_america_ironies/page/full/

If you enjoy irony, you’ll like this article.  My favorite is number nine… “Only in America could the people who believe in balancing the budget and sticking by the country's Constitution be thought of as "extremists."  I’m not sure they are thought of as being extremists.  They are simply called that by the left most of whom are actually extremists. 

3.   Natural Gas and the Future

…The EPA's proposed regulation sets allowed CO₂ emission levels at 1,000 pounds/megawatt-hour, which would stop the building of new coal-fired power plants. In Virginia, Dominion Power is already building a 1,300-megawatt gas-fired plant. Of course, it is quite possible that the EPA will try to extend their regulation to include all coal-fired plants -- and then perhaps lower their arbitrary 1,000-lb limit to go after gas-fired plants -- part of an ill-advised campaign against all fossil fuels, based on pathological fears of imagined climate catastrophes.

But it is ironic also that cheap gas will completely remove the need for electricity generated by solar or wind -- much to the chagrin of environmental zealots. And all those folks hoping that energy prices would continue to rise and that electricity costs would "skyrocket" will be sorely disappointed.

But there are also extra bonus points. "Combined-cycle" gas power plants can reach efficiencies of 60% or more, compared to heat efficiencies of nuclear power plants of 35% or coal plants of 40%.

It gets even better than that. Gas-fired electricity generation is essentially non-polluting and user-friendly, and it can be placed in close proximity to wherever power is needed, making distributed generation economically feasible. For example, a large apartment building of 1,000 units could use its own 10-megawatt power plant. But once installed, it becomes possible to consider co-generation, with the waste heat used for space heating, air-conditioning, hot water, laundry, and other process-heat applications -- and even desalination. One can imagine energy efficiencies of as much as 80%, more than double what is achieved today. It would also simplify the problem of waste-heat disposal.

Cheap gas will encourage the petrochemical industry to invest $30 billion in new U.S. plants over the next five years, according to Chevron-Phillips Chemical Co. Plastics producers will get a double-boost -- from cheaper feedstock gas, the raw material for their product, and lower electricity costs. When natural gas becomes really cheap -- say, less than $2 per mcf -- it will become more like nuclear energy, where the main cost is not fuel, but the capital cost of the power plant.

So what needs to be done? The first step is to have a White House that strongly believes in the need for low-cost energy to promote economic growth, increase prosperity, and fight poverty. Electricity costs should "skyrocket" downward, not upward. While new gas-fired combined-cycle plants are being built, existing coal-fired and nuclear plants, representing "sunk costs," should be kept in operation for as long as possible…

http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/04/cheap_natural_gas_heralds_an_energy_revolution.html#ixzz1rj2UP04W

This revolution is astounding.  The current administration is trying to do everything it can to derail it.  That is only one of the reasons Obama and the Democrats need to be voted out of office. 

4.  Where the Jobs Are

Oilman T. Boone Pickens made a statement on MSNBC's Morning Joe Wednesday that should make every green jobs advocate including Barack Obama, Al Gore, and Van Jones sit up and take notice.

"I've lost my a--" in wind power. This came moments after he said, "The jobs are in the oil and gas industry in the United States"…

…With this in mind, Barnicle asked about so-called “green jobs” in America. “Are there jobs in this?”

“Sure,” answered Pickens, “if you go out and subsidize some of these things to develop them – yeah, you get jobs out of them, of course. The jobs are in the oil and gas industry in the United States. I mean, that’s where it is. You have an industry that is superb in comparison of oil companies around the world. They are the best.”

Pickens continued, “They found the oil the cheapest, they found the gas the cheapest for you and all, and you have somebody saying, ‘Hey, they’re not paying their fair share, and they make too much money, they need to be taxed more.’ Hey, they’ve gone out and done exactly what you wanted. They got jobs for you, they got the oil and gas cheaper for you. The problem is nobody understands energy in America. If they understood energy, they would know that, hey, something good is happening here.”…

… Pickens continued, “Obama needs to go in, study it, look at it, and decide what an energy plan is, and then go forward with it. He needs to explain to his people, ‘Hey, we can get on everything green. We can get on everything renewable. Then the cost of power will go up ten times.' So be careful when you start fooling with it. Know what you’re working with.”

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2012/04/11/t-boone-pickens-ive-lost-my-wind-power-jobs-are-oil-and-gas-industry#ixzz1rkqcNOY6

Pickens is telling the truth.  What Obama and the greenies want to do will cost every American as much as 10 times what they are spending now on energy which will translate into higher prices for everything and a lower standard of living for the poor and the middle class.  The left is not the friend of the working man.

5.  Revolt at NASA

49 former NASA scientists and astronauts sent a letter to NASA Administrator Charles Bolden last week admonishing the agency for it’s role in advocating a high degree of certainty that man-made CO2 is a major cause of climate change while neglecting empirical evidence that calls the theory into question.

The group, which includes seven Apollo astronauts and two former directors of NASA’s Johnson Space Center in Houston, are dismayed over the failure of NASA, and specifically the Goddard Institute For Space Studies (GISS), to make an objective assessment of all available scientific data on climate change. They charge that NASA is relying too heavily on complex climate models that have proven scientifically inadequate in predicting climate only one or two decades in advance…

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/04/10/hansen-and-schmidt-of-nasa-giss-under-fire-engineers-scientists-astronauts-ask-nasa-administration-to-look-at-emprical-evidence-rather-than-climate-models/

Hansen stopped being a scientist a long time ago and is now an advocate.  His constant “adjusting” of temperature history is actually an embarrassment to the climate science establishment.  His temperature records change more often than pictures of fallen soviet commissars in the old USSR. 

6.  Where the Warming is coming from

Since NOAA encourages the use the USHCN station network as the official U.S. climate record, I have analyzed the average [(Tmax+Tmin)/2] USHCN version 2 dataset in the same way I analyzed the CRUTem3 and International Surface Hourly (ISH) data.

The main conclusions are:

1) The linear warming trend during 1973-2012 is greatest in USHCN (+0.245 C/decade), followed by CRUTem3 (+0.198 C/decade), then my ISH population density adjusted temperatures (PDAT) as a distant third (+0.013 C/decade)

2) Virtually all of the USHCN warming since 1973 appears to be the result of adjustments NOAA has made to the data, mainly in the 1995-97 timeframe

… Given the amount of work NOAA has put into the USHCN dataset to increase the agreement between neighboring stations, I don’t have an explanation for this result. I have to wonder whether their adjustment procedures added more spurious effects than they removed, at least as far as their impact on temperature trends goes.

And I must admit that those adjustments constituting virtually all of the warming signal in the last 40 years is disconcerting. When “global warming” only shows up after the data are adjusted, one can understand why so many people are suspicious of the adjustments.

http://www.drroyspencer.com/2012/04/ushcn-surface-temperatures-1973-2012-dramatic-warming-adjustments-noisy-trends/

This phenomenon is something that really makes you not simply suspicious of the adjustments but of the scientists involved in the global warming movement.  It appears that this may be the biggest scientific scandal of the last 50 years.   

Jobs, deficits and taxes

Are the job numbers real?

DECEPTION IS A DANGEROUS THING. You never really know when a lie may turn on you.

Take, for instance, the Labor Department's annual springtime boost in the faux jobs market. While it's nice that the government thinks there is an employment boom coming, this won't be a good development if that boom turns out to be imaginary yet still causes the Federal Reserve to prematurely tighten credit conditions.

Let's start from the beginning.

EARLY THIS MONTH LABOR REPORTED THAT 216,000 NEW JOBS WERE CREATED IN MARCH. It was better than Wall Street expected.

BUT THE FIGURE INCLUDED 117,000 JOBS THAT THE DEPARTMENT THINKS, BUT CAN'T PROVE, WERE CREATED BY NEWLY FORMED COMPANIES THAT MIGHT NOT EVEN EXIST. In fact, the department is getting so optimistic about the labor market that it increased this imaginary job count from just 81,000 in March, 2010.

As I've been telling you for months, THE SPRING ALWAYS CAUSES THE LABOR DEPARTMENT TO GOOSE ITS JOB-CREATION NUMBERS. And maybe sometime in the future this process will be warranted. But DURING 2009 AND 2010 THESE SPRINGTIME ASSUMPTIONS -- WHICH ARE OFFICIALLY CALLED THE BIRTH/DEATH MODEL BY LABOR -- LED TO MAJOR ERRORS IN THE ANNUAL JOB COUNT.

http://www.nypost.com/p/news/business/faux_job_numbers_could_lead_to_real_3zKnIS84fd4XYOLbEK48GL#ixzz1JJc0qZ1S

These jobs numbers are going to come back and bite the Democrats. As actual new jobs are created, more people will come back into the job pool and you will see real progress being made even while the unemployment rate increases.



The Ryan Plan: A good plan

Ryan’s alternative to Medicare hardly seems as terrible as Paul Krugman makes out. Seniors would enter the health care world the rest of us live in, with co-payments, deductibles and managed care. EVENTUALLY, COST CONTROL WOULD REQUIRE SOME TOUGH DECISIONS ABOUT END-OF-LIFE CARE AND THE RATIONING OF HIGH-TECH TREATMENTS THAT HAVE LIMITED EFFICACY. But starting with a value of $15,000 per year, per senior—the amount government now spends on Medicare—RYAN’S VOUCHERS SHOULD PROVIDE EXCELLENT COVERAGE. His change would amount to a minor amendment to the social contract, not a fundamental revision of it.

Effectively constraining the growth of Medicare could make it possible for Democrats to do a lot else that’s important to them in the future. … Growing at more than 7 percent a year, MEDICARE IS PROJECTED TO EVENTUALLY CONSUME NEARLY ALL FEDERAL TAX REVENUES. It is crowding out everything else that Washington does or might want to do. Conversely, cutting Medicare’s growth rate to near the overall rate of the economy would do more than anything else to enable the kind of activist government liberals support—investment in kids, education, jobs, and infrastructure. …

http://www.slate.com/id/2290509

Rather than “death panels” this plan would allow the individual to decide when they didn’t think it was wise to continue heroic medicine. I expect to see Obama castigate this plan tomorrow night and try to scare seniors with his rhetoric.

Public Financing and Obama’s hypocrisy

In 2008, candidate Barack Obama didn't just ask for donations. His website asked donors to "declare their independence from a broken system by supporting the first presidential election truly funded by the people." At the time, NO ONE EXPECTED THAT BY "THE PEOPLE" HE MEANT A BUNCH OF MILLIONAIRES, BUT THIS IS THE CONCLUSION WE DRAW FROM OBAMA'S LATEST CAMPAIGN INITIATIVE. Politico reported last week that Obama, having raised three-quarters of a billion dollars in his 2008 race, IS NOW SEEKING OUT 400 ELITE CAMPAIGN CASH BUNDLERS TO RAISE $700,000 APIECE FOR HIS 2012 RE-ELECTION. If the plan succeeds, it will raise $280 million in seed money for his campaign, which will be plowed into raising more money on the Internet from old campaign lists. This guarantees that Obama will reject public funding in election 2012, just as he did in 2008.

OBAMA'S HYPOCRISY ON THIS ISSUE IS MANIFEST. He once declared he was "a big believer in public financing of campaigns," and even CHALLENGED HIS POTENTIAL REPUBLICAN OPPONENTS TO PLEDGE THEY WOULD ACCEPT FEDERAL MATCHING FUNDS AND THE SPENDING LIMITS THAT COME WITH THEM. He also promised to "aggressively pursue an agreement with the Republican nominee to preserve a publicly financed general election." BUT ONCE HE REALIZED HE COULD RAISE NEARLY A BILLION DOLLARS ON HIS OWN, THOSE PROMISES ALL WENT OUT THE WINDOW.

http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/editorials/2011/04/examiner-editorial-fix-public-campaign-financing-ending-it#ixzz1JJk2ZSED

This should have been a huge warning sign for the supports of BHO. President Obama is not a pragmatist or a realist. He is an opportunist. Well he says he missing anonymity and with the 2012 election coming up, we have an opportunity to give him back his anonymity.



President Obama's two minds on the deficit

When it comes to deficit reduction and entitlement reform, PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA HAS BEEN A MASTER OF MIXED SIGNALS, his critics say.

As a candidate, OBAMA PROMISED TO DEAL WITH THE EXPLODING DEFICIT – so committed to tackling the underlying issue of entitlement reform that HE TOLD THE WASHINGTON POST HE’D MAKE THE “HARD DECISIONS… UNDER MY WATCH” shortly before his inauguration almost 27 months ago.

But as president, such high-minded goals have run headlong into a tanking economy and more mundane political imperatives, like positioning himself for his 2012 re-election campaign…..

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0411/52980.html#ixzz1JJlX0mYC


Yet another bit of hypocrisy.


A “People’s Budget” is proposed by Democrat Progressives

….The "People's Budget" is the liberals' answer to House Budget Committee chairman Paul Ryan's 2012 budget proposal, which is "leading us down a road to ruin," according to caucus co-chairmen Reps. Raul Grijalva and Keith Ellison. THE "PEOPLE'S BUDGET," GRIJALVA AND ELLISON CLAIM, WOULD ELIMINATE THE DEFICIT IN JUST 10 YEARS (RYAN'S PLAN WOULD TAKE MORE THAN 25 YEARS) WHILE EXPANDING, NOT CUTTING, MEDICARE, MEDICAID AND SOCIAL SECURITY. "This budget saves the American people from the recklessness of the Republican majority," Grijalva and Ellison write in a letter to Rep. Chris Van Hollen, senior Democrat on the House Budget Committee.

How can such fiscal miracles be accomplished? By tax increases that would make even some top Democrats gasp. Perhaps the most extraordinary is the caucus plan to raise the Social Security tax to cover nearly all of a taxpayer's income. Right now, the tax is imposed on the first $106,000 of earnings. For people who make more than that, the caucus would tax a full 90 percent of income -- no matter how high it goes. The caucus would raise the Social Security tax that employers pay as well.

The caucus would create THREE NEW INDIVIDUAL TAX BRACKETS FOR THE HIGHEST INCOMES, topping out at 47 percent. It would also raise the capital gains tax, the estate tax and corporate taxes. It would create something called a "financial crisis responsibility fee" and a "financial speculation tax." And of course it would repeal the Bush tax cuts.

As if anyone needed reminding, THE "PEOPLE'S BUDGET" IS PROOF THAT THE LIBERAL IDEA OF BUDGET BALANCING IS TAX, TAX, TAX. IF YOU'RE LOOKING FOR SPENDING CUTS, YOU'LL FIND JUST ONE REALLY BIG ONE: NATIONAL DEFENSE. The liberals would end "overseas contingency operations" -- the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan -- starting in 2013. They would save more money by "reducing strategic capabilities, conventional forces, procurement, and research & development programs." In other words, they would gut the United States' ability to defend itself, today and long into the future.

What would the liberals spend money on? The "People's Budget" is essentially a newer and bigger stimulus bill. Grijalva and Ellison pledge TO "INVEST $1.45 TRILLION IN JOB CREATION, EARLY CHILDHOOD, K-12 AND SPECIAL EDUCATION, QUALITY CHILD CARE, ENERGY AND BROADBAND INFRASTRUCTURE, HOUSING, AND RESEARCH AND DEVELOPMENT," along with billions more for stimuluslike road and other transportation programs…..

http://washingtonexaminer.com/politics/2011/04/liberals-plan-gut-defense-and-tax-tax-tax#ixzz1JJmxgRIR

This is a liberal nirvana and a conservative’s hell. Fortunately 42% of the population identify as conservative and only 20% identify themselves as liberals. It doesn’t stand a chance of being passed.



California in the Balance

We calibrate California’s decline by its myriad of paradoxes. THE NATION’S HIGHEST BUNDLE OF GAS, SALES, AND INCOME TAXES CANNOT CLOSE THE NATION’S LARGEST ANNUAL DEFICIT AT $25 BILLION. TEST SCORES ARE AT THE COUNTRY’S NEAR BOTTOM; TEACHERS’ SALARIES AT THE VERY TOP. Scores of the affluent are leaving each week; scores of the indigent are arriving. The nation’s most richly endowed state is also the most regulated; the most liberal of our residents are also the most ready to practice apartheid in their Bel Air or Palo Alto enclaves.

We now see highway patrolmen and city police, in the manner of South American law enforcement, out in force. Everywhere they are monitoring, watching, ticketing — no warnings, no margins of error — DESPERATE TO EARN TRAFFIC FINES THAT MIGHT FEED THE STATE THAT FEEDS THEM. I could go on. But you get the picture that we are living on the fumes of a rich state that our forefathers brilliantly exploited, and now there is not much energy left in the fading exhaust to keep us going.

I see CALIFORNIA IN TERMS NOW OF THE RAZOR’S EDGE WITH DISASTER NOT FAR IN EITHER DIRECTION. A postmodern affluent lifestyle hangs in the balance here without a margin of error....

http://pajamasmedia.com/victordavishanson/the-razors-edge/

California demonstrates the ills of liberalism. It is the state most like the EU’s PIGGS where people turn down tax increases but want to continue the benefits California has given them. In fact, that is the attitude the left is trying to instill in the rest of the country. Fortunately we aren’t there yet.



Ideological intransigence

IN THE END, PRESIDENT BARACK OBAMA WAS THE ONE WHO REFUSED TO BLINK ON PLANNED PARENTHOOD. Another way of saying it is this: THE PRESIDENT WAS WILLING TO SHUT DOWN THE ENTIRE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT RATHER THAN SEE PLANNED PARENTHOOD’S FEDERAL FUNDING CUT.

According to press accounts leaked by Democratic aides, House Speaker John Boehner argued for the funding cut late into the evening. THE PRESIDENT ANSWERED, “NOPE, ZERO.” He then said, “John, this is it.” Mr. Boehner accepted the budget deal without that cut.

A Republican aide confirmed more or less the same account to me. He said it was “chilling” to see how inflexible Mr. Obama was. You might call it ideological.

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/264468/re-culture-life-win-thanks-house-kathryn-jean-lopez

You can only have a fight over an ideological position if both sides have an ideological position.



Now Elections don’t matter

From Nancy Pelosi’s speech at Tufts University

To my Republican friends: take back your party. So that it doesn’t matter so much who wins the election, because we have shared values about the education of our children, the growth of our economy, how we defend our country, our security and civil liberties, how we respect our seniors. Because there are so many things at risk right now -- perhaps in another question I'll go into them, if you want. BUT THE FACT IS THAT ELECTIONS SHOULDN'T MATTER AS MUCH AS THEY DO...But when it comes to a place where there doesn't seem to be shared values then that can be problematic for the country, as I think you can see right now.

http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/nancy-pelosi-elections-shouldnt-matter-much-they-do_557307.html

It appears elections only matter if you are a liberal and you win. All you have to do is to look at what is happening around the country. In Wisconsin you had all the Democrat Senators flee from the state to keep last November’s election from counting. And here we have the ex-SOTH proclaim that elections shouldn’t matter as much as they do. It also seems to me that Pelosi is calling for the congress to be more conservative and to not change the status quo.



Liberalism: Black America’s greatest enemy

…. In the 1950s when racism truly was a problem for blacks in America, MOST BLACK KIDS GREW UP IN TWO PARENT HOMES. TODAY, AFTER 60 YEARS OF LIBERAL DEMOCRAT ENTITLEMENT PROGRAMS, MOST BLACK KIDS ARE GROWING UP IN FATHERLESS HOMES. No matter how you slice it, something is seriously wrong in the black community. And it has nothing to do with white folks nor Republicans.



These fatherless black boys make babies and join gangs. Typical of liberal screwed up thinking, I HEARD A PHD ON TV SAY, "THERE IS NOTHING A FATHER CAN TEACH HIS SON WHICH THE CHILD CANNOT LEARN FROM HIS SINGLE MOTHER." I thought, "Good lord, this woman went to college to learn this crap!" Newsflash libs: males crave male bonding and leadership. Why do you think they join gangs? This is not rocket science!...

http://www.americanthinker.com/2011/04/liberalism_black_americas_grea.html


This was from a black journalist who sees the truth.



T Boone Pickens makes his case

…..Hence the allure of natural gas: Pickens claims the U.S. HAS NATURAL GAS RESERVES EQUIVALENT TO THREE TIMES THAT OF SAUDI ARABIA’S KNOWN 260 BILLION-BARREL OIL RESERVE when you use a Barrel of Oil Equivalent (BOE) comparison.

– Using BOE, NATURAL GAS, AT ITS CURRENT PRICE, WOULD BE ABOUT $1.50 PER GALLON CHEAPER THAN DIESEL FUEL.

– Using BOE, natural gas emits 30% less carbon

Boone Pickens wants to convert America’s 140,000-unit fleet of 18-wheel truckers to run on natural gas. Pickens says the cost of converting the next-generation fleet of 18-wheelers would be about $60,000 per vehicle – or roughly $9 billion for the entire 140,000 fleet. Where will that money come from?....

http://blogs.forbes.com/richkarlgaard/2011/04/11/what-i-learned-about-natural-gas-from-boone-pickens/

America is awash in fossil fuels and natural gas is one of the best. But it seems to environmentalists, nothing really works other than solar and wind power. Natural gas and nuclear are the real choices if you want to decrease the amount of carbon we are putting in the air.

Chronicles of Failed Doomsaying

Gregg Easterbrook, author of one of the better books on the environment over the last 20 years (1995's A Moment on the Earth: The Coming Age of Environmental Optimism) COINED WHAT HE CALLED "EASTERBROOK'S LAW OF DOOMSAYING"--"PREDICT DREADFUL EVENTS WHOSE ARRIVAL IMPENDS NO SOONER THAN 5 YEARS HENCE, NO LATER THAN 10. THAT TIME WINDOW IS NEAR ENOUGH TO CAUSE WORRY, FAR ENOUGH OFF THAT WHEN IT ACTUALLY ROLLS AROUND EVERYONE WILL HAVE FORGOTTEN WHAT YOU PREDICTED."

But in the age of Google, it is easier to go back and check on these serial blunders. So as Britain was paralyzed with huge snowstorm a few months ago a number of folks went back and dredged up the climate campaign's predictions that winter snowfalls in Britain would soon (as in, by now) be a thing of historical memory.

Yesterday, GAVIN ATKINS OF ASIAN CORRESPONDENT.COM NOTES THAT JUST A FEW YEARS AGO THE UN ENVIRONMENT PROGRAMME PREDICTED THERE WOULD BE 50 MILLION CLIMATE REFUGEES BY THE YEAR 2010. And so Atkins sensibly asks, um. . . WHERE ARE THEY? He noted we have census figures for THE AREAS IDENTIFIED AS MOST VULNERABLE, SUCH AS THE TUVALU ISLANDS, AND FINDS IN EVERY CASE THAT POPULATION IS STILL GROWING.

http://nlt.ashbrook.org/2011/04/chronicles-of-failed-doomsaying.php

Making predictions is tough work especially if it’s about the future.