Gore Rejects "Climate Czar" Post

The Washington Times reports:

President-elect Barack Obama's transition team is flirting with creating a White House "Climate Czar," but climate change crusader Al Gore says he doesn't want the job.

The Obama team declined to comment on such a post, even as environmentalists and power industry executives say it's being widely discussed inside the transition offices as a way to spur a clean energy industry, which Mr. Obama has promised will ween the U.S. from foreign oil and create millions of "green jobs."

Read more about Obama's transition and Obama's cabinet on the Huffington Post's Big News pages.

Comments

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

I think we understand each others points of view. I am glad you see the benefits of alternative energy. Al gore, for whatever his reasons did get us to move in that direction before the whole idea of $700B/yr to our potential enemies came up. And if it turns out that MMGW is occurring then we will be facing that challenge head on. If it turns out not to be occurring then he will be made a laughing stock but we will be getting off of imported oil and facing that challenge head on. So whatever the motivation, we are agreed that it is good for our country to get off imported oil.

Of course you may argue that we don't need to reduce our greenhouse gas emissions and that is a wasted effort and that is where our opinions diverge.

I would like to point out that if it wasn't for Al Gore we would just now be starting to consider how to move away from imported oil in a real manner and the alternative energy generation industry would still be in its infancy.

[Michale32086]

Again, I really can't argue with anything you said.

It IS true that Gore did get the ball rolling..

Michale....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

Have a good day Michale- I look forward to our future conversations.

[Michale32086]

As I mentioned before, if the environmentalists REALLY want to get their point across, they need to do two things.

1. Drop the hysterics and the bogus reporting... Every time they make a bonehead error, they lose credibility over an issue that strains credibility to begin with.

2. Phrase the argument AWAY from impending doom and gloom and emphasis the logical and rational aspects of the argument.

Example:

OH MY GOD, THE WORLD IS GOING TO END IN 10 YEARS UNLESS WE DO SOMETHING!!
.... Bad.

Look, people. We can't continue to just burn thru oil like we do. You don't want to have foreign and hostile elements to have control over our energy needs, do you?
... Good..

Michale.....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

Hi Michale-

Hey I just noticed Rush removed the page on his site that had that story? That story that started the world is going to end in 10 years..

http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/eibessential/enviro_wackos/algore10yearstodoom.guest.html

I must questions why Rush had the page removed?

Did gore really say that? If not who is saying that?

I seem to remember Gore saying:
"Today I challenge our nation to commit to producing 100 percent of our electricity from renewable energy and truly clean carbon-free sources within 10 years. "

Oh I see, the wayback machine saves the day again. Rush was quoting someone else. Weird why he took the transcript off his site? Weirder that he had his techno geeks install a robot.txt rule to block access, and only going to an older archive pulls up the original.

This is the quote from the Rush site:
"He's attending parties and posing for pictures with his fans. He's enjoying macaroni and cheese at the Discovery Channel's soirée. He's palling around with Laurie David of Curb Your Enthusiasm, who is the husband of Larry David, who drives the Prius and then flies the GV. Larry David says, "You know, Al is a funny guy, but he's also a very serious guy who believes humans may have only 10 years left to save the planet from turning into a total frying pan." "

[Michale32086]

I can't really tell you what Rush says or doesn't say.. I have never listened to him and probably have read something on his site maybe twice..

But, I do know that I have read MANY predictions from Gore et al that say at the VERY least, we hit the "point of no return" in 10 years...

Michale.....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

working archive:
http://web.archive.org/web/20070805001600/http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/eibessential/enviro_wackos/algore10yearstodoom.guest.html

not working archive:
http://web.archive.org/web/20081118235515/home/eibessential/enviro_wackos/algore10yearstodoom.LogIn.html

Is there some other source for this 10 year doom quote?

[Michale32086]

@MGhamma

}}}
When the cooling becomes a trend. The chart you provided clearly shows that the OVERALL trend is still up.
{{{

Depends on when you start the "OVERALL"...

Looking at it from 1998, which is the obvious high point, the trend has been towards cooling..

Michale....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

I am heading out for the day.

[Michale32086]

Have a good one... Be careful out there.. :D

Michale.....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

Was a good one, sunroof down on the peninsula. Sorry to hear your weather is so cold...

Maybe that is our difference, you are experiencing cooler than normal and I am experiencing warmer than normal...

[Michale32086]

But if you want to look at Global Temps..

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/uah_october_2008-520.png

As you can see, we're way WAY down from where we peaked in 1998, globally..

This clearly shows that, since 1998, the GLOBAL temps have been falling..

Michale.....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

Sad to report the Geophysical Research Letters have rejected Dr. Christy’s latest papers and furthermore they told him not to resubmit. Shame on them.

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

The corrected temp anomaly now posted at the GISS site is 0.68C
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata/GLB.Ts.txt

The temp anomaly for October according to the UAH Satellite data is 0.167C
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2008/11/uah_october_2008.pdf

A big difference.

[MGhamma]

Interesting chart Michale. I do have one observation though. Since current temps are almost .4 Degrees warmer than the year 2,000 bottom, what were actually seeing is rapid warming.

[Michale32086]

I would agree within that particular context..

However, the overall trend since 1998 has been one of cooling.

And, on a personal note.. In St Augustine, FL we're under a freeze warning with a projected temp in the high 20s tonight..

Kinda hard to see Global Warming in that. :D

But, by all indications, we DO seem to be in a cooling trend.

My question is, if this trend DOES continue for the next 20-30 years, as many scientists are predicting, what does that mean for the Global Warming crowd??

Indulge me in a little "what if"...

Michale....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

Oh geez, back on the global cooling subject again are you?

That report is for the US and based on preliminary data. You are either not reading the data, or using your selective reasoning to only home in on the parts that re-inforce your anti gore persona, or deliberately trying to be deceitful

Furthermore, if the data did represent a globally cooler October it would not signify that Climatic Global cooling is occurring. If it did for 5 years in a row perhaps we could start talking about it

It is only you and I on this blog. You were sounding so sensible the other morning. What happened?

[Michale32086]

Oh the sensible one is still here..

And I am still convinced that Global Cooling is the reality of what we face in the here and now.

Let me ask you... What would it take to convince you that your planet is now in a cooling trend? How many months/years of lower than average temps would you feel is necessary to change your opinion that we are now in a cooling trend??

Michale....

[Michale32086]

DOH!!

"What would it take to convince you that your planet is now in a cooling trend?"

That should read 'OUR planet', not 'your planet'. Dunno how that pesky lil 'y' got in there...

Michale......

[MGhamma]

When the cooling becomes a trend. The chart you provided clearly shows that the OVERALL trend is still up.

[Michale32086]

The average temperature in October 2008 was 54.5 F. This was -0.3 F cooler than the 1901-2000 (20th century) average, the 44th coolest October in 114 years. The temperature trend for the period of record (1895 to present) is 0.1 degrees Fahrenheit per decade.

[Michale32086]

Looks like the vultures are circling..

http://www.irishtimes.com/newspaper/weekend/2008/1115/1226408678797.html

One quote really struck me..

"The idea of dramatically altering the way we live would be a mistake until more information has been gathered."

Now where have I read something like that?? :D

Michale.....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

ah now your just playing games....

there previous endeavor...
it was 70 per cent funded by Gabriel Resources, the Canadian mining company that wanted to develop an open pit gold mine in an impoverished village in Romania. This surely compromised the editorial objectivity of the film.

This line stood out for me:
They say they were acutely disappointed at being turned down for funding by the Irish Film Board, especially its conclusion that it was "repetitive and creatively thin".

Good for them, I hope they get to release it. Rickety information, i like that.

[Michale32086]

No more rickety than An Inconvenient Truth.. A film so rickety that a British judge would not let it be shown to school children..

But the point is valid. We simply DON'T know enough to go fracking around with things... If the current science is to be believed, the planet is heading for a cold spell unseen for over 140 years...

Do we REALLY want to start artificially cooling down the planet on TOP of that??

I am reminded of the old Twilight Zone episode where a woman is living in a world with unbearable heat. Everything is burning up... We then come to find out it's all a dream and the world she REALLY lives in is freezing...

Michale.....

Michale.....

[Michale32086]

And, just for the record, the I wasn't tying the Global Warming to religion, SOLELY to piss people off.

It's a fact that Al Gore himself has, on MANY occasions tried to invoke religion in his crusade.. How fighting Global Warming is a "spiritual crisis"

Just another silly aspect in Al Gore's entire repertoire of silly aspects...

Michale......

[natureman]

Good ol Gore. I wonder what he thinks about the latest news of Global cooling! hahahaha

http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=EAS20081101&articleId=10783 and http://www.usatoday.com/weather/news/2008-09-09-farmers-almanac_N.htm

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

Will Whitehorn, head of Virgin Galactic, said White Knight Two would be the world's most fuel efficient high-altitude jet in the world.

Sir Richard also stressed the flight programme would be about more than just space tourism – unveiling plans to open up the craft to scientific researchers, offering to launch research tests into the atmosphere at much cheaper rates than those by mainstream space institutions such as NASA.

The craft could also one day be able to ferry passengers around the world outside the earths atmosphere, so cutting down on pollution from jet fuel.

[Michale32086]

}}}
Will Whitehorn, head of Virgin Galactic, said White Knight Two would be the world's most fuel efficient high-altitude jet in the world.
{{{

I am sure he does... But he is hardly objective and has every reason not to be completely honest about it...

Regardless, Branson's committment to biofuels is not realistic..

http://my.barackobama.com/page/community/post/rickbaraff/CvyG

Michale.....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

While ethanol is a biofuel it is not the ONLY biofuel-

I agree with the author that ethanol is counter productive. However if you consider a radical change for our car transportation industry to electricity that can be created cleanly and without the need for importation..

Then you look at the heavy lifters of the transportation industry, the trucks, planes, and even the ships... Electricity is not going to work for them in the forseeable future unless you go nuclear or something.

We need something to power those. Algae looks to be promising.
http://www.nrel.gov/biomass/algal_oil_workshop.html

We dont have all the asnwers, but we are working on them.

But back to my point, if you remove the demand of car transportation placed on biofuel all of a sudden you reduce the amount of biofuel needed to power us going forward. and I mean that from a transportation pov.

For electricity for the cars we need clean electricity- all of the above, though I am not a proponent for Nuclear and am skeptical about clean cola but willing to look at it for sure.

[Michale32086]

As I said, if you want to discuss this issue in the context of curbing pollution, then we would be in COMPLETE agreement..

If you want to discuss this issue in the context of getting us off of our oil (whether foreign or domestic) addiciton then I am right there with you. I am building one of those Hydroxy additions for our '96 Explorer to help conserve gas..

But, I simply cannot accept the fear mongering and hysterical prognostications of the likes of Al Gore and Richard Branson, ESPECIALLY when they only talk the talk, but refuse to walk the walk..

Michale....

[JohnFromCensornati]

Michale32086 See Profile I'm a Fan of Michale32086 I'm a fan of this user permalink

I don't drive...

Michale.....

[Michale32086]

But my lovely wife does....

Hello???? McFly???

Michale......

[Michale32086]

@ OneVoiceInACrowd

}}}}
Sorry about your team, I was fortunate and my team kicked some royal butt.
{{{{

Please don't say Titans, Please don't say Titans... :D

}}}}
Yet none of that means anything to you because you are emotionally reacting to their use of SUV's or private planes.
{{{{

No, I am emotionally reacting to their hypocrisy...

Let me ask you this. There are documented cases the heads of oil companies getting swept up in the Human Caused Global Warming(Yet The Planet Is Cooling) religion. Making grand donations and great "strides" to become green, etc etc..

So, why are they still the villains and the likes of Branson is the "prophet"???

Each make MILLIONS by polluting the planet..

Yet, the oil companies are the bad-guys and Branson is the good guy.

Surely you can see the illogic of that...

Michale......

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

Some of the oil companys images are changing because a result of that. Most aren't however, because they are still holding on to their core principles and only paying lip service, while at the same time making the largest profits ever seen.

But industry does take time to change, and we do need the giants of industry. However if they are unable to adapt they will be going the way of the 3 US automakers.

[Michale32086]

And, apparently, Branson is unable to adapt, as he is building spaceships for tourists that grossly pollute the atmosphere.

My point is that Branson pays a lot of lip service to the idea of being ecologically responsible.

But when one views his actions, one clearly sees that that is all it is. Lip service.

Same with Al Gore. He surely can talk the talk. But he simply can't walk the walk.

Personally, I hope the automakers DO go bust. Then we can rebuild them from the ground up, with the idea that fuel economy and non-polluting is the MOST important aspect..

You ever watch that old TV show, Quantum Leap?? There was an episode that was funny in that regard.

But I digest...

Michale.....

Michale....

[Michale32086]

@OneVoiceInACrowd

}}}}
Once again Michael, it is refuted by a small group of scientists
{{{

No, the items I listed above have been refuted by FACTS..

October 2008 was NOT the hottest October on record. It was the 70th hottest October on record.

There was no Arctic "hot spot" and satellite images show that the ice is 30% MORE extensive in the Arctic then this same time last year.

The 1990-1999 was NOT the hottest decade in the 20th century, 1930-1939 was.

Robins have always been north of the Arctic Circle.

You can read about the false claims re: the snows of Killamanjaroo here: http://freestudents.blogspot.com/2007/06/global-warming-may-save-snows-of.html

The Greenland Glaciers have been melting for hundreds of year, un-influenced by human kind. Further, even if the Greenland Glaciers melted, that would not have ANY impact on the sea level.

Polar Bears have always been cannibalistic. This is documented.

As I said. All the hysterical claims of the Human Caused Global Warming(Yet The Planet Is Cooling) religion refuted by the FACTS....

Michale.....

[OneVoiceInACrowd]

I will nto read a blogspot post, dont have the time to go down that road with ya. 2007 has the least ice, 2008 was a close 2nd to that. Saying that year over year it was cooler this year than last does not mean anything to me. Looking at the overall trend does. I believe their are natural cycles that last longer than years and sometimes those cycles make the results of GW more apparent and sometimes not so apparent. But I also believe that the greenhouse affect is not debateable. CO2 is a green house gas. And we are introducing large amounts of it.

[Michale32086]

I can agree with most of this...

CO2 is a NATURAL gas.. You produce CO2 every time you breath.. If it makes sense to you to tax companies that produce CO2, then it simply HAS to make sense to you to tax individuals simply for breathing..

All I am saying is that the science is NOT absolute. We don't know enough to start fracking around blindly..

Say that the Global Cooling phenomenon had really caught on in the 70s and massive programs were undertaken to warm the planet and melt the ice caps. What effect would that have on us when the planet started warming up?? It would have been a REAL disaster.

So, say now that we take huge measures to start cooling the planet.. And that this cooling trend we are experience continues as the Farmer's Almanac claims it will..

The Global Warming crowd COULD be responsible for pushing this planet into a new Ice Age..

Would that be preferable??

Michale.....

[Michale32086]

@MGhamma

}}}}
Michale, when you rant on and on about how Al Gore ( not a scientist ), and Richard Branson, ( also not a scientist ) spend their money,
}}}}

You really have a problem with unfounded accusations, don't you?

I am not "ranting" on how the con-men, Gore & Branson spend their money. I am "ranting" on how Gore & Branson MAKE their money.

They make it by spewing thousands and THOUSANDS of tons of pollutants into the atmosphere each and every month and they make it by con'ing people with their hysterical fear mongering. They make MILLIONS of dollars a month by con'ing people into thinking that civilization is going to end in 10 years...

And, I am truly gabberflasted that there are allegedly intelligent people out there who DEFEND these practices.

Michale.....