NC Media Watch

Global warming, bag money, and hybrid noise makers and now this

Russ Steele

Tax the rich and if they try to leave the state tax'em anyway. What businesses in their right mind would come to California. If this passed it will have a future date for implementation and the race of the rich to get the hell out of California will be on before this initiative kicks in. As the wealth leaves so do the income taxes, this initiative will only accelerate the loses.

Do not sign this initiative, I repeat do not sign, this initiative there will be enough imbeciles in San Francisco, Los Angles and San Diego who will sign.   

California Ballot Initiative to Impose 45% Income Tax, 55% Wealth Tax & 36%-54% Exit Tax
A California activist is trying to gather the 694,354 signatures needed to place a tax initiative on the ballot that would:
    •    Impose a new 35% income surtax (in addition to federal taxes and the existing 10.3% top state rate) -- 17.5% (on all of the taxpayer's income) when income exceeds $150,000 (single)/$250,000 (joint), and an additional 17.5% (again, on all of the taxpayer's income) when income exceeds $350,000 (single)/$500,000 (joint).
    •    Impose a one-time 55% wealth tax on assets exceeding $20 million held by a California resident or held in California by nonresident.
    •    Impose an exit tax of between 36.5% to 54.3% on both income and unrealized appreciation in asset values over $5 million when a resident dies or leaves California.

My source is the TaxProd Blog

In the suggestion box

Russ Steele

I read the Sac Bee Capitol Alert several times a day. To night there was this message for readers.

Thanks to all of you for reading. As always send us feedback on what you'd like covered, what you love, what you hate and what we're missing.

I sent the following:

Dear Editors,

You know if you were really sharp editors and reporters you would be looking into why the legislatures is continuing down the warming road, when it stopped warming ten years ago, and started cooling in 2003. The facts are clear. What a great expose it could be, our legislature using bad science to solve an imaginary problem and destroying our economy in the process. What a great moral issue to generate the readership you needed to save the paper from extinction.  Going against the warmers takes courage. Do you have it?

Russ Steele
530-273-XXXX

Sierra Summit: Highest temperatures in 400 years, and probably a 1,000 years.

Russ Steele

Well that is the claim in the latest post by Tom Knudson at Sierra Summit. True he is quoting an article by a "retired  U.S. Forest Service chief Dale Bosworth and three other researchers, including Connie Millar, a research paleoecologist with the Sierra Nevada Research Center of the U.S. Forest Service."

This raises the question where did they get this information:   

"Average temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere have reached their highest level in 400 years and probably in a 1,000 years," the authors point out, "and they continue to climb." But that is just the prelude.

And, why did Tom accept it withput question. The reference for the authors claim is the NATIONAL RESEARCH COUNCIL (NRC). 2006.Surface temperature reconstructions for the last 2,000 years. The National Academies Press, Washington, DC.

There is considerable evidence that the Medieval Warming Period (MWP) was as warm, or warmer, than we are today and there was little confidence in science reports of higher temperatures over the last 1000 years. Here is what the NRC report said about this uncertainty:

• It can be said with a high level of confidence that global mean surface temperaturewas higher during the last few decades of the 20th century than during any
comparable period during the preceding four centuries. This statement is justified by
the consistency of the evidence from a wide variety of geographically diverse proxies.

• Less confidence can be placed in large-scale surface temperature reconstructions
for the period from A.D. 900 to 1600. Presently available proxy evidence indicates that
temperatures at many, but not all, individual locations were higher during the past 25
years than during any period of comparable length since A.D. 900. The uncertainties
associated with reconstructing hemispheric mean or global mean temperatures from
these data increase substantially backward in time through this period and are not yet
fully quantified.

• Very little confidence can be assigned to statements concerning the hemispheric
mean or global mean surface temperature prior to about A.D. 900 because of sparse
data coverage and because the uncertainties associated with proxy data and the methods
used to analyze and combine them are larger than during more recent time periods.

Sunspots May Vanish by 2015

Russ Steele

There is more attention being focused on the sun's lack of sunspots as the current cycle approaches the edge of a historical norm, moving into territory unseen in this century.

I have posted two articles at Dalton Minimum Returns that suggest sun the sunspots will be declining, gone in 15 years. The last time this happened, the earth cooled and historical period known as the Little Ice Age spread famine and hard times across Europe.

After cold summer the folks in the UK are buying more warm cloths anticipating a really cold winter. From the Daily Telegraph:

Sales of winter clothes and thermal underwear are soaring as Britons suffer a dismal summer and prepare for a winter of high fuel bills, according to a leading retailer.
 
Department store Debenhams said shoppers were turning their back on summer sarongs, shorts and swimwear and opting for woollens instead.

Sales of thermal underwear at the store are up 54% on this time last year, winter coat sales are up 76% and warm knitwear is up by 53%.

Debenhams said the figures were similar to those traditionally seen during October.

Update #1:  The Daily Telegraph article came to me from Benny Peiser's e-mail alert and through a Google Alert.  Anna is right, I should have given Benny a hat tip. If you would like to subscribe to Benny's alerts send an e-mail to listserver@livjm.ac.uk ("subscribe cambridge-conference") in the subject line.

No budget, but some "paper or plastic" lunacy

Russ Steele

Just when you thought that requiring noise makes on hybrid and electric vehicles, our Legislature would get to work on the Budget. Buy, they persist:

Assemblyman Lloyd Levine's shopping bag tax. "AB 2769 would provide shoppers with a choice: Bring reusable bags or pay the true cost of a disposable bag.

Once this bill passed if you want a bag (paper or plastic) to carry your purchases it will cost you 25 cents. All additional bags will cost you 50 cents each. The goal is to force shoppers to bring their own canvas bag when shopping. Forgetting the bag is going to cost you.      

Nanny government wants more enviornmental noise

Russ Steele

Remember those days  long ago when you wanted your peddle bike to sound like a motorcycle going down the street. And you raided  your mom's clothes line, and then and took the joker from you dad's playing cards and crafting a flapper that smacked the spokes as your bike wheel turned. The card and the clothes pin made motor sounds as you went down the street. They had not yet invented the duct tape shown in the picture.

Now the California Legislature wants manufactures of hybrid and electric vehicles  to add virtual clothes pins and cards to their vehicles so they make motor sounds going down the street.  California maybe the first State to require hybrid and electric cars to have a minimum sound level. The California Senate has just approved a bill  to be signed by the Governator, who has not taken a stance on this politically-charged issue. But,  given his choice of powerful and noisy vehicles, he may be in tune with the request.  I wonder if this new noise device will have a volume control, quiet for the neighborhood and full volume for the open road.

Our Legislature cannot pass a budget but they can mess with this nanny crap!

It's the Sun, Not your SUV

Russ Steele

John Zyrkowski's book It's the Sun, Not your SUV: CO2 Won't Destroy the Earth came in the mail last week, and I am almost finished with the first reading. It will require multiple readings, as the book is not that well written. The author assumes the readers understands regression analysis and speeds through some complex issues. According to the jacket, the book is targeted to the amateur scientist with an interest in climate change and who are willing to take the time to develop their own conclusions.

The book is filled with charts and graphs, along with links to the data sources used in the graphical plots. It is going to take some time to grasp all the information packed into this short 140 page book. There are 35 pages of references for the ten chapters and seven Excel models that readers can down load to validate Zyrkowski's findings. Charts and graphs can be manipulated, as we have seen in the IPCC 2001 Report, having access to the models will help clear up some of these issues interested readers.

While there is a wealth of information to understand, the summary is quite clear. Zyrkowski lists four findings from his analysis of the global warming theory as presented in the IPCC 2001 Report. I wish it could have been the latest IPCC report, but modeling, analysis and writing takes time.

The first finding ... "the sensitivity rate used to derive temperature changes is above scientifically plausible levels by a factor of 2 to 3."

The second finding ... "the Global Warming Theory does not recognize any change in the earth's reflectivity."

Bee's light climate science article is light on facts - the Sierra not warming

Russ Steele

Tom Knudson, has written another tear jerker front page climate change article for the Sunday Bee. We are driving the little furry creatures in the Sierra to extinction with our SUV's spewing CO2. The article has some great pictures, and interesting narrative, but it is a little light on the science. I have asked Tom to clarify some of his sources, but while we wait I thought maybe we could explore one of the questionable assertions in his story, starting with  one:

"Historic records for Yosemite indicate there's been about a five degree Fahrenheit (increase) in the maximum summer temperature, for any given elevation," Chow said.

According to a study published in the Journal of Climate by John Christy and William Norris, Methodology  and Results of Calculating Central California Surface Temperatures Trends: Evidence of Human-Induced Climate Change, the official temperature records in Yosemite are:

Yosemite Valley HQ National Park - 1905

South Entrance of Yosemite National Park - 1941

Grant Grove Yosemite National Park - 1940

Christy use the hand written records which he validated and digitized to looked at broad swath of the Sierra as shown on this graphic.

In the graphic below you can see that T max warming in the Sierra from 1905 to 2005 was flat. No warming.

Who is Curtis Walker?

Russ Steele

Curtis Walker will be blogging from the Democratic Convention on the Union Web Page. But, who is Curtis Walker? According to the Union: "This person has not created their profile yet."  They suggest that we leave Curtis Walker a message "to find out more or Add Curtis Walker as a friend and you can check back later." Would you make an anonymous name your friend? He has not even posted his picture.

If you read Light on Nevada County, Rebane's Ruminations and this blog NC Media Watch you know that Jeff Pelline, The Union's Editor is always demanding that we disclose our politics, our political donations, and our association affiliations. I wonder if he will do the same for Curtis Walker? 

More proof the Sun controls our weather

Russ Steele

 

New climate record shows century-long droughts in eastern North America according to an article in the Ohio University Research News. Weak sun created cool oceans, lowered rainfall seven times in 7,000 years reports scientist. We have about 500 years to prepare for the next super drought.

A stalagmite in a West Virginia cave has yielded the most detailed geological record to date on climate cycles in eastern North America over the past 7,000 years. The new study confirms that during periods when Earth received less solar radiation, the Atlantic Ocean cooled, icebergs increased and precipitation fell, creating a series of century-long droughts.

A research team led by Ohio University geologist Gregory Springer examined the trace metal strontium and carbon and oxygen isotopes in the stalagmite, which preserved climate conditions averaged over periods as brief as a few years. The scientists found evidence of at least seven major drought periods during the Holocene era, according to an article published online in the journal Geophysical Research Letters.

“This really nails down the idea of solar influence on continental drought,” said Springer, an assistant professor of geological sciences.

More on the study here.  I find it interesting that this study confirms the 1,500 year cycles reported on in Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years by Dennis T. Avery and S. Fred Singer. To order your copy, click on the book thumbnail in the left hand column. 

The other thought that come to me is that super droughts come during periods of cooling, not global warming.  In the early 1800s, during the Dalton Minimum, when average temperatures were down about 4 degrees C, California experienced a 13 year drought. Not from global warming, but cooling. As our sun remains quiet, we might want to be preparing for global cooling rather than global warming.   Just a thought!