All I have for you is the facepalm/headshake. Obviously, none of us should be surprised, but I would like to be wrong even just every now and then about how completely screwed up/liberal/clueless/disconnected the Republican establishment is.

“The world is getting warmer”: Romney

Presidential hopeful Mitt Romney broke with Republican orthodoxy on Friday by saying he believes that humans are responsible, at least to some extent, for climate change.

“I believe the world is getting warmer, and I believe that humans have contributed to that,” he told a crowd of about 200 at a town hall meeting in Manchester, New Hampshire.

“It’s important for us to reduce our emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases that may be significant contributors.”

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  1. BostonBruin says:

    What makes matters worse is that he has flip-flopped on this issue not once but twice. This was posted last week in the context of Gov. Christie pulling NJ out of the regional cap-and-trade program:

    “As governor of Massachusetts, Romney actually hired the man who helped create the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative. But in late 2005, already eying a presidential run, Romney pulled out of the program. Romney was early to realize that being on board with even a modest plan to address climate change could become a liability.”

    Check out the blog post on this issue over at C4P for links to the flip-flop quotes (should be on the first page of comments).

  2. otlset says:

    Why would someone ever “believe” in global warming? Is it not based in science, which gets beyond belief to observable phenomena? And hasn’t the observable phenomena of the past three years shown the globe is actually cooling, and thus has very little relationship to atmospheric CO2 levels which still show modest increases?

    Which noted “authority” on global warming actually tried to “hide the decline” from us peons to maintain the fiction? (Mann) What about all the fuss over the now discredited “hockey stick” global temperature graph? The global socialists seeking in “global warming” a lynchpin excuse for global control (the beginnings of one-world government) will have to use something else. And we won’t allow Mitt to be one of them.

    Looks like Romney’s horse stumbled right out of the gate just like Gingrich’s did. Good. He’s just another pandering politician without any core principles.

    • makeshifty says:

      What I was more interested in (when I used to spend time studying this issue) is the period from the mid-1940s to 1980s, a 35-year period where the earth was cooling in the midst of a great deal of industrial growth. Another period of interest is during the Great Depression, when industrial activity should’ve decreased. By NASA’s own data, 1934 (I think it was) was THE warmest year on record. A 3-year period is statistically not that significant. Even in the big scheme of things, 35 years is not that significant, but when you’re talking about only 150 years or so, which is all the alarmists are talking about, I think 35 years is worth paying attention to. The only answer I hear from the alarmists when I bring up this period is, “What we’re talking about is a trend of more than 100 years.” Well, not really. Yes, CO2 measurements indicate that it’s been increasing coincident with the start of the Industrial Revolution, and has been going up ever since. That, they can attribute to a “100+ year trend,” but the temperature has not increased as consistently, and to my knowledge, they have yet to explain why. What got people so concerned about it in the first place is a warming trend that started in 1980, and continued by some estimates until the late 1990s. Since then it’s my understanding that the temperature has leveled off or cooled.

      You are right that science is based on observable phenomenon, not this statistical, computer modeling, or data correlation crap that “proves” humans are causing global warming. What has actually gotten very little attention is what the greenhouse effect is doing. It can be measured, but the accuracy is very iffy, so that muddies the waters. The best answer I was able to come up with, after looking at the science for myself is, “We don’t know.” Yes, I think there’s enough evidence to say that the Earth has warmed slightly over the last 30 years, but there’s no good data to show that humans are causing it, or even that CO2 is causing it.

      What Romney is going along with is group-think, or he’s just pandering. The elite have enforced an “Emperor’s New Clothes” dynamic, where the “scientists” are the fraudulent “tailors,” who have convinced them that humans are causing global warming, and anyone who doesn’t “see” it is too ignorant and unsophisticated to see it. The elite in many different institutions have come to believe in this dynamic, and so anyone who wants to be in their ranks has to swear that they “see” this, or else lose all respectability.

  3. JEN says:

    Huckibee beat him last go around and ask Romney where were you ? When our young men were being taken for Vietnam A Mitt?????

  4. lord-ruler says:

    To be fair Palin said the same thing when she was running with John McCain. Not sticking up for Romney but this is an issue that is unprovable either for or against. I personally do not believe in anthropogenic global warming but that does not mean that a person who believes in it is a heretic. The thing I do not like about global warming is the leftists who tout it to tear down energy companies or use it for redistribution of wealth schemes. Even if global warming does exist I subscribe to Matt Ridleys view in his book “the rational optimist” *future author for Tamcast?* where he basically says we have no need to fear because technology will outpace and solve the problems of the future.

    • Tammy says:

      lord-ruler, I don’t mind you advocating for whatever candidate or position, I just hope your actual position isn’t that of anti-Palin troll. So, “to be fair,” how about the truth? Palin did not say the same thing during the campaign (and after). In fact she said quite the opposite:

      August 2008: Palin: Global Warming Not Man-Made

      In an interview for the September issue of the conservative magazine Newsmax, Gov. Sarah Palin, R-Alaska, said she does not believe climate change is caused by human behavior. “A changing environment will affect Alaska more than any other state, because of our location. I’m not one though who would attribute it to being man-made,” Palin said in the interview, which was posted online Friday…Palin’s quote about global warming not being manmade is also at odds with the freshly approved GOP platform for 2008.

      And:

      Feb 2010: Palin: Global Warming Just “Snake Oil”

      Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin called studies supporting global climate change a “bunch of snake oil science” Monday during a rare appearance in California, a state that has been at the forefront of environmental regulations…Palin told the audience that filled the 2,000-seat Redding Convention Center that she disagreed with the science the government used to support the listing.

      “We knew the bottom line … was ultimately to shut down a lot of our development,” she said during her 40-minute speech, which was followed by a 20-minute question-and-answer session. “And it didn’t make any sense because it was based on these global warming studies that now we’re seeing (is) a bunch of snake oil science.” […] Palin also weighed in on the Obama administration’s efforts to secure a climate change treaty during the international conference held recently in Copenhagen. “Yeah, I don’t think much of it,” Palin said.

      • JEN says:

        Its Ludicris Based on false reports Its a darn Lie…

      • lord-ruler says:

        I was not trying to be a troll. I am not anti Palin. I just remembered it that way. I guess I was wrong.

      • makeshifty says:

        I followed the McCain/Palin campaign pretty closely, and I can’t remember her once saying that she thought global warming was caused by humans. What I do recall is that as governor, possibly during the campaign (though I’m fuzzy on that detail), she had empaneled a group that was studying the issue, and that for a time she refused to answer either way, just saying that the issue was being looked at. Tammy has a quote from earlier than this where she’s saying that she doesn’t attribute GW to human activity. What I remember is that she started saying that in 2009. It seems she returned to that position, by which I don’t mean to imply that she flip-flopped, just that she returned to a more definitive stand on the issue.

  5. Ginger says:

    Good grief, I’ve had it with these wimpy candidates. We’re waiting, Sarah.

  6. dennisl59 says:

    Open All Channels and Hailing Frequencies:

    The United Federation of Planets and Starfleet Command will bet, straight up, a googolplex of Donuts(mixed variety), and enough Red Bull to wash them down, there will be a Press Release from the Romney campaign within 24 standard Earth Hours ‘clarifying’ his remarks. The Ferengi are excluded from this wager for obvious reasons.

    Make it so!

    Ciao’

    posted 6/3 @ 700pm central

  7. Maynard says:

    For what it’s worth, I think it’s reasonable to be concerned about the rise in atmospheric carbon dioxide, which has moved in lockstep with the industrial revolution and the burning of fossil fuels. Any systems engineer understands that altering the fundamental parameters of a complex system may permute or even eliminate that system’s stable state. But obviously there are countless factors in play here, and the Earth has gone through warming and cooling cycles without our help. It’s obvious that the Left doesn’t care about “green”, but it sees an opportunity and excuse to control industries and individuals to a degree that civil libertarians would otherwise object to. So the Left desperately needs man-caused global warming to be true and major, even as its “solutions” do nothing to reduce carbon dioxide. We shut down our own industries and they end up in China and India, and the CO2 keeps rising but now we’re going broke also. Meanwhile, the government-mandated “green” programs, such as starch ethanol, are boondoggles and payoffs, wasting more money and resources. Yes, we’d be better off proclaiming that there’s no threat from rising CO2. Maybe CO2 will kill us in a century, but our fiscal policies will kill us in a couple of years; that should guide the priorities of a sane government. But, even as I reject the fascistic idiocy of the “green” governments, I’m not going to say I’m comfortable watching the CO2 level tick up. Somewhere behind the politics and the agendas there’s a reasonable question.

    • JEN says:

      When they had nothing no platform for their agenda they knew that first thing was to grab on one so they hijack any thats easily available and start their infernal persecution. Tree-huggers,Earth First Bas**rds,sierra club Ect… Or They will grab on to the polar bear or a little lizard down in west texas.They are what is Knawing away and trying to destroy this country But Now we have our first Heroine Yep just like in the novels cause I never seen a real live one until now there is HOPE…

    • lord-ruler says:

      that is what I was trying to say but with less eloquence and more skeptically than you.

    • Tammy says:

      Well said my dear 🙂

  8. mrcannon says:

    This GOP campaign is becoming more funny than the average David Zucker movie. However, I am not laughing. The only emissions that need to be regulated come from the stupidity that spreads throughout DC like a disease. Still, we will surely hear from Mitt tomorrow–by which time the new media has torn him apart–when he issues an entertaining “clarification” that puts us back in our place.

  9. JEN says:

    Yea hed be good turning flapjacks…

  10. ancientwrrior says:

    Romney is just another nut-bar in a package full of sissy candy a***s. Nothing new here.

  11. FrankRemley says:

    Willard is nothing more than the GOP version of John Kerry. He’s lazy, stupid, and myopic–but he has great hair.

  12. dwbinder says:

    Shut the front door are you trying to warm up the whole outside?
    MY Mother

  13. blogchick says:

    wow, that sure didn’t take long…these RINOs all seem to have a loaded gun directly trained on both feet and can’t WAIT to pull the trigger.

  14. strider says:

    Romney sticks his toes in the stupidity tar pit.

  15. otlset says:

    Because the earth is actually not in a warming phase now (forcing the media narrative to change the terminology to “climate change” instead), it appears to me there are greater factors at work in affecting the earth’s weather patterns (the totality of which over time with respect to seasonal and geographic variations which make up what we call “climate(s)” — distributed over the planet in climate zones) than merely the observance of small rises in atmospheric CO2 over the past century and a half.

    Yet ‘pop-culture scientists’ refuse to abandon their own hubris (or is it just scientific myopia?) to appreciate that their view of CO2 as the primary culprit (or indeed many other views of scientific certainty held today) may be short-sighted, and overturned by new paradigms of understanding in the future. Science marches on, they say.

    Yes the earth’s geography and climate systems are extremely complex, and most importantly dynamic and in a continual flux as the myriad interactions play out. So far the marvelous thing for me is the awareness that the earth is always balancing all these dynamic interactions that make up “climate”, and as the CO2 increases over time, contrary to what the warming alarmists predict (based merely on CO2 stats), the earth is somehow compensating and cooling itself off instead. Divine.

  16. radargeek says:

    This is what happens when you have no ground to stand on but only jello. Mittens has no integrity and has allied with liberals. He is a lib and cannot help but show it. He thinks his pretty-boy smile is all he’ll need, but guess what mittens, the stakes are too high to allow another pretty-boy to walk into the white house and destroy this country with liberal policies. The amazing thing to see are these RINOs who think the people are still stupid and are not able to see them for who they are: libs with R’s. It is nice to see them fall within a few days of announcing their POTUS. Gingrich, Trump, and now Mittens. Hucleberry- forget it, don’t waste yours and our time! There is only one true conservative that knows the issues and she can take her time because WE THE PEOPLE have her back!

  17. Tinker says:

    I didn’t facepalm but I did laugh out loud and say “He’s done!” Yes I mean kaput, finished, over and out, sayonara, yes sir step over there in line behind the Blingrich’s.

    I’m not worried about CO2 or anything else. I believe in personal and corporate responsibility and I think it’s sad there even has to be laws about not dumping poison into the environment. But that little hole in the ozone that everyone used to be so scared about is God’s stovepipe. Ultimately, to put it simply “He’s got the whole world, in His hands.” People talk about the delicate balance of nature..who do they think keeps it in balance? us?

    • makeshifty says:

      A few years ago I was in a climate discussion and I heard people say stuff like, “We are the owners of this earth, and we had better start acting like it.” Really? Just how much did the people who were swept away by the Indonesian tsunami, or were killed in the recent quake in Japan feel like “owners” of this earth? We are but guests here.

  18. ShArKy666 says:

    um…have people forgotten about basic science 101? there’s only 2 parts per MILLION of CO2 in the atmoshpere, so any increase is comletely harmless…
    actually plants LOVE CO2 since they need it to live and then in turn emit OXYGEN for us to breath…it’s impossible to WARM the earth with CO2..what warms the earth is water vaopr which has nothing to do with CO2….if people really wanna understand what this whole scam of manmade global warming us, go to YOUTUBE, and do a search for the glenn beck show where his investigation team did a whole series of shows about the CCX (chicago climate exchange) in chicago…it’s a trillions of dollars scam that was meant to redistribute wealth from the developed countries into the third world areas which CAP & TAX was a huge part of..

    • makeshifty says:

      To be accurate, CO2 is a gas that re-radiates heat when exposed to energy of certain wavelengths, so like water vapor, it is a greenhouse gas. Its effect is logarithmic, though, so each addition has less of an effect than what was there before. Some have pointed to Venus as an example of what CO2 can do. Indeed, one of the reasons Venus is so inhospitable is because its atmosphere is 98% CO2. The atmospheric pressure is crushing, because CO2 is a dense gas. The planet’s surface is also extremely hot, not only because it’s closer to the Sun, but because CO2 traps the heat the planet receives, and there’s so much of it that it traps quite a bit. The problem with getting all worried for us because of this is that the Earth is the polar opposite of Venus. Our CO2 level is a few hundredths of a percent, after 150 years of industrialization. The best estimates we have are that the Earth’s surface temperature warms 0.1 degrees Celsius with each doubling of CO2. After listening to a discussion on all the different effects of CO2, it seemed like we’d be more likely to suffocate from a concentration of about 3-5% (about a hundred times higher than where it is now) before we’d cook from it!

      I’ve heard alarmists claim there’s a level where CO2 is poisonous to plants. They must not have bothered to look at the geological data, which shows that plants came into existence when CO2 concentration was a lot higher. Lest we forget, the Earth’s atmosphere was mostly CO2 for billions of years, from the time it formed. It was only with the advent of photosynthetic bacteria (to the best of our current knowledge) that over about a billion years it transformed the atmosphere to have more oxygen in it.

      You are right, though, that water vapor is THE major greenhouse gas here. It makes up about 5% of our atmosphere, and whatever effect CO2 has now is background noise in comparison.

      • otlset says:

        Good information, thanks.

        I would also like to add some statistics for perspective on atmospheric CO2.

        It has been estimated that since the beginning of the industrial revolution atmospheric CO2 concentrations have risen from about 280 parts per million to 390ppm today.

        Typical outdoor concentrations at ground level are about 300ppm to 400ppm, or .03% to .04%.

        Indoor concentrations are normally around 600ppm to 800ppm, or .06% to .08%.

        Indoor unvented rooms can reach 1000ppm or .1% concentration.

        Plant scientists know that raising the concentration of greenhouse CO2 to around 550ppm, or .055% increases plant growth significantly (Which leads me to believe any increase in overall CO2 levels in our atmosphere actually stimulate MORE plant growth, which then absorb the CO2 as nutrient removing it from the air. Ah, the balance of Nature!).

        Levels of atmospheric CO2 which are hazardous (toxic) to health are around 50,000ppm, or 5% concentration.

  19. Hrankta says:

    Here is the SCIENCE of the relationship between CO2 and global climate change from an actual scientist! I have built predictive models for everyone from AOL to NASA. This IS my sandbox, and as an expert in Neural Net predictive models, CO2 Climate models MAKE MY EYES BLEED!!!

    Global Warming models are built on correlation. For any model to be validated, you have to have a control set. We don’t have a second earth to test, so anyone who says the issue of global warming is settled is either a liar or an ignorant useful idiot.

    CO2 is a water solluable gas who’se solubility varies based on the temperature of the water. Want to do a little experiment? Open a warm Pepsi, then open a cold Pepsi. Which one fizzes more (gives off more CO2)? The WARM ONE!!! The colder the water, the more CO2 it will hold. What covers 2/3 of the earth’s surface? WATER!!! The warmer the water is, the more CO2 it will hold. So naturally, the source of the historical data, the Vostok Ice Core samples, sho a correlation between CO2 and average global temperature! I’ve seen the data myself. The dirty little secret from “An Inconveinient Truth” is that they cut off the data when man shows up. The CO2 levels SKYROCKET, but temperature doesn’t.

    [Sorry, due to blog security rules, link redacted]

    Do you know what else correlates with global climate data? Total Solar Irradience (TSI). If the Earth is getting hotter, it is because the sun is getting hotter. And we have entered a Maunder Minimum, so the globe is going to start cooling soon.

    Right now, we are at about 369 parts per million of CO2. If we could get it up to 650, crop yields would increase 20-40%.

    So, to sum up: What is responsible for global climate change is that giant unstable nuclear fusion reactor at the center of our solar system, that is constantly hurling heat and energy at our world, and NOT 0.04% of our atmosphere.

    • Hrankta says:

      Sorry, one correction: The COLDER water is, the more CO2 it will hold.

    • makeshifty says:

      It’s interesting you mention this idea of a “control.” I got into a debate with a climate modeler at NCAR a couple years ago who was swearing up and down that *he knew* that humans were causing global warming, and that his models show it. I confronted him on the information I had seen, and one of the arguments he threw back at me was basically that we should use climate models *as the control,* “because we do not have a second Earth.” I was baffled at this. I didn’t even know where to begin with that, it was SO outlandish! It seemed as though he was arguing against the idea of science itself, because I think he said at one point, “We have to get beyond science,” and models like his were the way to do it. It was frigging bizarre. I started to feel like I was talking to someone who needed to be in an asylum. He wasn’t some newbie to this either. He said he had been working at this stuff for about 24 years. Whatever.

      Re. the ice core data, what I’ve heard from scientists who have looked at historical ice core data is that you have to look at it in fine detail to see what’s really there, because if you don’t, it will look like there’s a nice matchup between CO2 and temperature, and it’ll give you the impression that CO2 is causing the temperature to rise and fall. Looking at it in finer detail they’ve said that CO2 follows temperature. The lag time is on the order of hundreds of years. First temperature rises, and then CO2 starts to rise. The temperature falls, the CO2 curve continues upwards for a while, and then starts to fall, following the temperature trend. What’s clear, and scientists know this from observing what the oceans have done (warm water emits CO2, cold water absorbs it), is that at least the naturally emitted CO2 is at the affect of the temperature, not the other way around!

      It’s too bad that this information can’t get a wider exposition. Every single year 60 Minutes runs a segment on “the Earth is getting warmer,” and they interview these “concerned scientists” who are working at the North Pole and such, and say that humans are causing the warming, and how distressing it is. I get so disgusted with that I turn it off, and I sit and wonder how we can lie to ourselves on such a wide scale and it seems nobody who knows better can get people to understand that it’s a lie. It’s damn scary to me sometimes. It’s like living in George Orwell’s “1984.”

      I got my undergrad degree in computer science in the early 90s. In one of my classes our CS professor was talking to us about different kinds of models, and which have more accurate computability. Chaotic, non-linear system models were addressed, and the information that was relayed to us about the research that had been done on them was that it was extremely difficult to get a model of this type that had an accuracy that was any good. The climate is a coupled, chaotic, non-linear system, and it’s mystified me how climate modelers have been able to get away for decades now telling government, the public, etc. that the models show humans are causing global warming, and they can predict the future of our climate. I’ve been saying for years that’s hogwash, because our current computer models (I speak of the actual computing architecture, not the climate models) are just not good at modeling these types of systems (this goes for economies as well, which are also chaotic and non-linear). You would think somebody in authority would’ve consulted with computer scientists years ago to evaluate whether this method of modeling the climate even works, so that this charade could’ve been ended, and we wouldn’t be hearing this crap now.

      Thanks for sharing your expertise, BTW. I appreciate seeing people who’ve worked in the trenches, have seen this folly up close, and are willing to talk about it. I’ve only been able to look at this from a distance, and apply reason to the arguments.

      • Hrankta says:

        Climate models are built using either linear regression or logistic regression models. They are dependent on a correlation to work. Neural Nets are the best way of predicting non-linear systems. We used to use them to predict human behavior, and they were by far the most accurate.

        Here’s another tidbit for you. Ever heard of Peirs Corbyn? He is a predictive modeler out of the UK who uses astrophysical data ONLY in his neural net models and bets on weather and climate. Its how he makes his living. His models have out performed ALL of the “climate scientists” regression models.

        I read a story earlier today where activists are calling for forcibly tattooing “Climate Denier” on the foreheads of those who understand the actual science behind climate change and CO2.

        • makeshifty says:

          I’ve heard some about how LTCM failed, and if I remember correctly, they were using neural net models to make their financial predictions. They were sure they had eliminated all risk. Everything was going fine with it until Russia decided to default on its debt, which apparently their model didn’t predict, and then their financial hedging scheme fell to pieces. Thus my point about economic models.

          I have gotten some basic concepts about how neural nets work, but maybe I’m reading too much into this. The following is my conception of how they work, and what I see as the pitfalls of this approach. I haven’t built them or worked with them, though I have seen demonstrations, and I believe I have seen them fail (as I cited above).

          The thing that makes me uneasy about the idea of neural net models for prediction is the research method that uses them counts too much on machine learning. In effect the neural net develops its own theory about the data it’s receiving, but a researcher has no idea what that theory is, unless they investigate the net, and even then that might be real difficult. Unless that’s done, there’s no way to tell if the model just appears to be right, because the assumptions it has made from past data happen to work. The researcher can set up some basic rules for how the net is to be built, but after that the net builds itself, based on the input stream, and even then that’s only based on past experience. I would assume it lacks the ability to generalize and extrapolate into other models that could help illuminate and broaden the theory it has. I think what I’m saying is I doubt that these nets have the ability to be introspective, to be “skeptical” of their own model, and try to find evidence that its own model is wrong, as a scientist who’s building their own mental model would. So in short, they work, until they don’t, in terms of accurate prediction, in my view.

          Is there any sense when building these models what their predictive range is? Do researchers try to see situations where they might miss? That’s an important aspect of model building, understanding their limitations.

          I believe I have heard of Peirs Corbyn. He seems to have a very good track record of being right, though I attribute this more to his own theory and what he pays attention to (as you were saying, astrophysical data). When I used to follow the issue more, I thought that he was getting a little full of himself. My memory is that one time he said he was ready to predict that a particular town would get snow or rain on a particularly day, even taking it down to the hour, of when the weather he predicted would begin, based on the data he had from months earlier. I didn’t hear the outcome of that, but I thought that would just make him vulnerable to his critics if it didn’t happen just as he said. I got a sense that he could predict a season with his technique, but day-to-day weather? That seemed like a stretch, but if he could do that for years on end, that would be very impressive.

          Re. the activists

          Well I’m sure they didn’t say that “those who understand the actual science” should have their heads tattooed (they think the scientists who say what they say, “understand the actual science”), but I know what you mean. This is the ultimate insult to science: People who are not acting as scientists, who are in fact acting more like the superstitious leaders of the community who burned “witches” at the stake for “cooking the weather” during the Little Ice Age, claiming “science” as their mantle (in the old days they claimed themselves as the authority on the word of God). It’s disgusting. To me it signals a dangerous trend, if it’s allowed to grow, of a new dark age. The very idea of trying to silence those who differ in the scientific community is antithetical to science, though it’s not unusual. It’s happened before in science, unfortunately. There seems to be something in human nature that drives this urge to suppress views that don’t agree with our own, because they are too threatening to status and power.

  20. walk2thebeach says:

    I agree totally… Lefties can always be sniffed out when they say “the argument is settled” , that is because they can not think for themselves…

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