December 1, 2009 | Comments
Every year, as part of their science classes, my kids are taught the Scientific Method – the basic tenets by which scientific theories are tested to confirm that yes, they are indeed correct, or no, go back to the drawing board and start over.
I guess my kids are lucky still to be learning this, as it seems the Scientific Method has been replaced by a new technique that is much quicker and easier: the Consensus Method.
First, get some willing scientists together, particularly those affiliated with a university — oh, say, Britain’s University of East Anglia, for example. Now, get these scientists to agree to a consensus that fits your agenda (use threats, bribes…whatever it takes). Next, recruit some high-profile political types — a Nobel Peace Prize/Oscar winner, the leader of the free world, the United Nations, socialist-minded legislators – and some Fortune 500s (General Electric perhaps?), the mainstream media, and the nation’s school systems. Using pictures of cuddly polar bears, convince these entities to behave as though your theory is a given, that the science is “settled,” dispose of any pesky evidence that may prove otherwise, and there you have it. Your scientific theory is proven, a done deal, case closed. No Scientific Method necessary. No science at all, actually. Easy.
Of course this is exactly how the whole idea of manmade global warming, a.k.a. climate change, became accepted and “settled science” – touted by such highly trained scientific minds as Bill Clinton, Al Gore, various supermodels, the President of the United States, your kid’s English teacher, and most of Hollywood’s TV and movie stars.
But these folks were faced with a problem a couple of weeks ago when emails were leaked from the University of East Anglia, one of the world’s leading institutions in the proliferation of the global-warming agenda, essentially proving what we heretical non-believers knew all along: There is no evidence that we humans are heating up our planet, and evidence defying the global-warming theory is being destroyed, ignored and disregarded, like the Scientific Method itself.
Unwilling to abandon their efforts to promote global warming, however — and the power grab that comes with it — those who have made it their mission to further the concept, many of them making hefty profits by selling carbon offsets, squiggly light bulbs and tiny, tin-can automobiles, refuse to give up the ghost. The media, GE, various Congresspeople and the White House continue to preach to us huddled masses the accepted science that record cold, record heat, hurricanes, arson-sparked brushfires, tornadoes, earthquakes, record snowfall, record rainfall, ice storms, tsunamis, droughts and floods – all are caused by manmade global warming. The message is embodied in artsy, self-congratulatory commercials, sponsored in part by Coca-Cola and Siemens, celebrating the upcoming Climate Change Conference not in Copenhagen, but “Hopenhagen.”
Despite the mounting evidence, and despite the stupid Hopenhagen ads, I don’t see much shame evident in the global-warming crowd. Nor is there any sign of them changing their travel plans when a week from now they make the pilgrimage in their fleets of private jets and limousines to Copenhagen. The President of the United States among them, there they will gush on about the climactic dangers our world is facing and the income that needs to be redistributed to fix it, glad-handing each other over feasts of Kobe beef and caviar for their mutual heroism in saving the world.
I can’t help but wonder, though, will anyone dare mention during these sumptuous feasts the East Anglia emails? Will there be a moment of conscience among at least a few of the attendees as they ponder their own involvement in what many are calling the greatest scientific hoax in history? Will any dare whisper the word “Climategate?” It doesn’t matter. The secret is out, and all the self-congratulation and avoidance in the world can’t erase that.
So a week from now as the Copenhagen attendees stand before us, their peers, and their teleprompters in their black-tie finery, spouting the now-even-emptier rhetoric of climate change, they will look more and more foolish with every uttered phrase. And I think they know it. We’ll see it in their eyes. We may see fear in those eyes, too, as they start worrying about investigations and mobs with torches at the castle gates.
Indeed outside those gates, we angry mobs are demanding, “Let the investigations begin!” Let’s start with the guys in the tuxes – the ones with the look of worry in their eyes. Time to find out what they knew and when they knew it – and how much money they’ve raked in because of it. Follow the money, and you will find the truth – and the Scientific Method — waiting to be set free. That will be a show worth watching. I can’t wait.
Betsy Siino | Comments
Sage Parental Advice from the Obamas for the New Year
January 1, 2011 | Comments (1)First, as part of Michelle Obama’s ongoing war against obesity (read that phrase any way you wish), the First Lady lauded the “Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act” that will regulate what children eat in federally funded meal programs. The cynical among us see this as only the first shot fired in Obama’s ongoing attempt to mandate what children eat in their own homes and restaurants, as well, evident from the FLOTUS’ illuminating comment at her husband’s signing of this act that “we can’t just leave it up to the parents.”
Obama continued, stating that “childhood obesity isn’t just a public health threat, it’s not just an economic threat, it’s a national security threat, as well” (oh, if only she, her husband and their rabidly devoted minions would describe extreme fundamental jihadists with those same words). But fear not, America. Though Mrs. Obama has targeted many of America’s best-loved foods for abolition in her war against this alleged national-security threat, let us take solace from the fact that she does from time to time grant us permission to partake of those forbidden, national-security-threatening foods. Indeed just this past November, she granted us permission to eat pumpkin pie at Thanksgiving.
Not to be outshone by his wife, Barack Obama offered his own words of wisdom several days later, when he took time from his busy schedule as leader of the free world and commander-in-chief of the American armed forces to promote some children’s book, that, like several other books we might name, lists “Barack Obama” as the author. The leader of the free world’s topic on this day as he spoke to a group of Virginia schoolkids: poop scooping.
“….a lot of times, I walk Bo at night, and that’s fun,” a folksy Obama told the kids in reference to the dog he named after himself. “Sometimes I run around with Bo, although I have to — sometimes I have to scoop up his poop, because I don’t want to just leave it in the lawn.”
Obama continued, “So if you guys have a dog, you got to walk your dog, too, and clean up after him a little bit,” not only speaking down to the kids, but doing so with improper grammar, using an example that showed them what it means to be perfectly unpresidential. (It’s a safe bet he, shall we say, fudged the truth, as well, since we know there is no way he has ever scooped poop at the White House or anywhere else). No word on whether Obama needed a teleprompter for this event, or if Bill Clinton was waiting in the wings to push him off the stage to offer the kids sage poop-scooping advice of his own.