Is carbon being held hostage by politician? It would certainly seem so given the ground swell of popular political action in favor of reducing human activity that produces carbon dioxide. However, there is an ever growing number of reputable and heavily credentialed scientists who take issue with the popular pronouncements of doom from carbon.
I am not a scientist and therefore, not qualified to pass judgment on the conclusions of qualified scientists. But as a fairly intelligent person, a taxpayer, and a voter, I have to ask questions about expensive public policy based on less than agreed upon science.
We are witnessing a time of ecopolitics where human emotions and political preferences are trumping the scientific method. Consider the following:
The famous "hockey stick" graph that launched this global warming panic and was largely the underpinning of Al Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" has since been totally discredited and subsequently removed from the proceedings of the U.N.'s International Panel on Climate Change" (IPCC). Noted Scientists such as Dr. Edward Wegman, former chairman of the Committee on Applied and Theoretical Statistics of the National Academy of Science, have proven that the "hockey stick graph" is the result of incorrect statistical analysis.
A British Court has ruled that if Al Gore's book, "An Inconvenient Truth", is used in public schools then they must be informed of "11 troubling inaccuracies.";
According to Dr. William Happer's U.S. Senate testimony on February 25, 2009, there has been no increase in global temperatures during the last 10 years and the global warming cycle started in 1800, long before any appreciable carbon increases in the atmosphere due to human activity. There are many more incidents by credible sources of serious disagreement with IPCC conclusions that are used to justify enormous public outlays of the people's money to attempt to influence the world's "carbon footprint"
What troubles me most with this issue is the almost total willingness of communities and their elected officials to accept the need to reduce our carbon output regardless of the cost and the cadre of scientists who disagree with the "supporting" science. The "green movement" transcends the need for truth. Indeed, it is a religious crusade that invades our lives with proselytization in lieu of settled science.
-- Charles J. Hayes
Takoma Park, Md.
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