Bob Mount: Carbon dioxide emissions now out of control
Columnist
Published: September 15, 2009
“After running a fever for a while and noticing abnormal aches and pains, you see a specialist. The doctor examines you, runs tests, and says you have a serious disease.
Without immediate treatment, it will worsen over time, and be hard, if not impossible, to cure.
“Since the treatment is unpleasant and will be costly, you decide to get a second opinion. Same warning, same prescription.
“You ask for the third, fourth, and fifth opinion. Same answer.
“After visiting (these specialists), you visit (one) who tells you what you want to hear—that all the other specialists are wrong, your health is fine and you can forget the whole thing.”
The above was excerpted and slightly modified from opening paragraphs of a commentary on the subject of global warming and climate change. The writer follows by quoting a joint statement released in June by the National Academies of the United States and 12 other large nations. “Climate change is happening even faster than previously estimated; global (carbon dioxide) emissions since 2000 have been higher than even the highest predictions, Arctic Sea ice has been melting at rates much faster than predicted, and the rise in the sea level has become more rapid… The need for action to address climate change is now indisputable.”
The writer also states that carbon dioxide emissions are causing the world’s oceans to become more acidic, “which could lead to irreversible damage to fisheries that supply protein-rich food to millions of people.” This is a warning of the science academies of the U.S. and more than five-dozen other countries. As a reference, he cites http://dels.net.edu/climate-change/.
I suspect that Rush Limbaugh ditto-heads and other so-called “conservatives” assume the above commentary was written by Al Gore or some other liberal Democrat. The author was a Republican, Jim DiPeso, Vice President for Policy and Communications, Republicans for Environmental Protection, an organization whose members I consider to be conservatives.
DiPeso quotes Doug Holtz-Eakin, domestic adviser to McCain last year, who wrote on newmajority.com, “…conservatives favor freedom of opportunity for the generations to follow. It would not be conservative to play fast and loose with the environmental inheritance today and leave it for future generations to pick up the pieces.”
* * *
Birders of the country, unite! We’re being outmaneuvered by the cat lovers. Read the article, “Incite,” by Ted Williams in the September-October issue of Audubon to find out how badly our birds need assistance.
An estimated 500 million birds are killed by cats each year in the U.S. Are measures being taken to reduce this level of depredation? Apparently not. Are cat owners required to adhere to rules and regulations similar to those applicable to dog owners? I am aware of only one municipality in Alabama, Montevallo, which has an ordinance requiring owners of cats to keep them on their premises.
Bob Mount is emeritus professor of zoology and entomology at Auburn University and writes a weekly column for the Opelika-Auburn News.
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Reader Reactions
Think about lowering carbon emissions for a moment. Do you know the biggest carbon emission? CO2!!!! Uh-Oh. Could it be part of population control plans? What does CO2 do? Well, it is real simple for anyone who ever paid attention in elementary school. CO2 is Carbon Dioxide. Oh my, Carbon Dioxide is what we humans exhale and plants inhale. The plants need it to make their food and grow, then plants exhale oxygen.
It is a well known FACT: that even those in the Whitehouse say global warming is not a major issue and does not exist. Scientists from all over the world dispute info given by liberals because they have an agenda to complete. Get the FACTS and stick to them. Have you noticed how cool it was during Obama’s big push for Cap & Trade and his push for his Green Jobs Czar, Van Jones? Record lows were recorded for the time of year. This was all back in June and July. Chicago was one city that reported record lows. I think, if we would listen, God is trying to give us some very obvious hints. Are you listening? Obviously most of America is.
CAP & TAX, just another way for the dem’s to rape the pockets of American Citizens. No I am no expert on the climate other than to say is has not been as hot this summer as has been in past years and winters tend to be milder that say 20 years ago.
But I do know our government needs toget tax revenue to attempt to cover Obama’s & the Dem’s unchecked spending programs…ie Obama-Care.
Why should we penalize ourselves when China and the rest of the industrialized world polutes with no real authority to answer too.
A greater problem is the rate of population growth in the world. In 20 years how will the world be fed if and when the population doubles and triples? Oh, I forgot, social engineering could solve that problem!
Mr. Mount-
Actually the need for action to address climate change is disputable.
Frankly, I support cap-and-trade or any CO2 regulation until we in America have our own ‘climate truth commission.‘ The USA now largely out-sources our climate science to the United Nations, a political organization, dedicated to advancing their “consensus” view that CO2 drives global warming. The problem is, their view is neither a consensus and can’t possibly be 100% correct because they don’t factor-in clouds and solar activity:
You don’t have to be a climate scientist to understand why the U.S. should not follow the UN’s lead:
1) The 600 climate scientists who worked on the UN’s Climate Change 2007 report never voted on the ‘drives’ issue. That conclusion was reached by only about 50 scientists plus UN bureaucrats.
2) The UN has a huge conflict of interest. The ‘Kyoto Protocol’ is their’s and they have a vested interest in demonizing CO2.
3) Thousands of knowledgeable people and climate scientists worldwide tell us the UN is wrong.
4) Past climate changes—100s of them—were driven by Mother Nature, not mankind. Yet, the UN took Mother Nature off the table when they limited their evaluation to ‘climate change caused by human activity’.
5) There is no ‘smoking gun.‘ The proof that CO2 drives global warming is circumstantial.
6) The UN treats unproven climate projections as ‘fact’, yet UN forecasts for the last 10 years do not fit what actually happened.
7) The UN used faulty data to bolster unwarranted findings in the past.
The United States needs our own objective, transparent climate commission to think-through global warming. We need the advice of a bi-partisan ‘Climate Truth Commission’ before we burden our economy with expensive energy. Both sides of the man-made global warming issue should welcome such an approach. ...each is so sure of themselves.
—Robert Moen, www.energyplanUSA.com
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