Global Warming Debate Gets Strange

Originally posted at www.thegreengrok.com.

Someone tell me ... which is the real news and which is fake?

Walkout at the OK Chamber

Senate Republicans on the Environment and Public Works (EPW) Committee boycotted markup of the Clean Energy Jobs and American Power (CEJAPA) climate bill sponsored by Senators Barbara Boxer (D-CA) and John Kerry (D-MA). What happened to just voting "no" after doing the, um, work of legislating each and every one was elected to do?

Hedging One's Bets in the Climate Bill Sweepstakes

While (some on) the EPW Committee got to work on the climate bill, three Senate colleagues announced that they were crafting an alternate climate bill. In an odd twist Sen. Kerry is a sponsor of both. Perhaps he just wants his byline on whatever bill comes out of the Senate?

Key U.S. Business Trade Group Now Favors Kerry Bill While Opposing Kerry Bill

After taking heat from some of its membership for its high profile opposition to the Waxman-Markey America Clean Energy and Security (ACES) and Kerry-Boxer CEJAPA bills, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce urged a Senate committee to adopt climate change legislation that includes the proposals advanced by Senators Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Kerry.

Walkouts Go International

Amid growing frustration with the United States and other developed nations, delegates from some 50 African countries walked out of the last series of climate negotiations being held in Barcelona in preparation of next month's main climate talks in Copenhagen. Not to worry though, their retreat was short-lived. The African delegates were back at it a day later, after the agenda was revamped to focus much of the remaining time on how to get significant carbon-cutting commitments from Annex I countries.

Cabinet Makes Like Lloyd Bridges

Other Cabinet Plans to Climb Not Just Any Mountain

Not to be outdone, the government of the tiny Himalayan nation of Nepal has announced a new venue for its upcoming meeting. Nepal's cabinet plans to meet on Mt. Everest later this month to highlight the impending catastrophe it faces from rapidly disappearing glaciers.

Glacier Man to the Rescue?

Instead of just fretting over vanishing ice, perhaps the Nepalese government should call on Chewang Norphel AKA Glacier Man. For a quick fix to its growing water problems, all Nepal would have to do is scale up Norphel's system of man-made glaciers "using stone embankments and a few hundred metres of iron pipe." I have not actually seen the system, but wonder if the time isn't ripe to buy futures in the stone commodity market, because constructing glaciers for all of the Himalayas would take a whole lot of rocks.

American Public Takes a Rational Approach

According to the latest poll by the Pew Research Center for the People and the Press, the percentage of Americans who believe that climate change is caused by human activity has fallen to 36 percent. At the same time, 50 percent want Congress to address climate change by limiting carbon emissions via cap and trade even if it means higher energy prices.

Inuits Get Tour of New Home

Finally. The high-profile climate skeptics' group the American Association of Skeptic Societies (AASS) flew a group of Alaskan Inuits along with several polar bears to the semi-arid grasslands of Arkansas as part of a week-long campaign to highlight the "good side" of climate change. The spokesperson for AASS was quoted as saying that, "Once the Inuit have had a chance to hunt elk in a more temperate climate, they won't even want to return to their thawing, soggy homelands."

So which are true and which false?