2007 Year in Review: The Ridiculous

Wednesday, January 2, 2008 2:39 am Daniel J. Summers

Continuing the tradition started last year, I'm writing a three-part series “2007 Year in Review: The Good, the Bad, and the Ridiculous.” And, as I did last year, I'll post them in reverse order so they're in the right order when they're done. Without further ado…

Global Glow-Bull Warming

During 2007, the global warming movement was exposed for the political, not scientific, issue that it is. As with any movement which sees its power diminished, its adherents ramped up their rhetoric; and, in many ways, the movement has become a parody of itself. In April, Sheryl Crow suggested limiting how much toilet paper we use at each sitting, and suggested we wear “dining sleeves” - devices on which we can wipe our mouths, then remove them and replace them with a clean one. (I'm not sure if the extra water for that laundry offsets the lack of a paper napkin - and wouldn't cloth napkins do the same thing?)

Carbon offsets were also shown to be next to useless. Carbon offsets, for the uninitiated, are fees one pays to a company which claims to do something “environmentally friendly” to offset one's carbon emissions. (If that sounds familiar, it should - I believe this technique was pioneered by the Roman Catholic church under the name “indulgences.” Can't stop sinning? Just get forgiveness beforehand!) A group of three environmentally-conscious people (not right-wing fanatics) created a site called CheatNeutral. It aspires to create a network of fidelity to offset those who cheat on their significant others. It illustrates the point beautifully - ten faithful people mean nothing if you're the one being cheated on.

In October, Al Gore won the Nobel Peace Prize for his work on global warming, including his film An Inconvenient Truth. Inconveniently, though, many of the claims made in his film have been debunked. Also, a site called Surface Stations shows some of these temperature monitoring stations - these are the stations whose readings have been used to claim that temperatures are increasing. However, many stations are by air conditioning exhausts and other heat-producing structures. Finally, in December, at a UN conference in Bali on global warming, the man leading the negotiations broke down and cried. It must be rough to see all that power slipping away.

Never-Ending Political Cycle

I won't talk much about this, because I'm pretty much tired of it just when it becomes time for it to actually happen. Do we really need a 2-year period of time to pick our next President?

Celebrity Culture

This could probably be a ridiculous item every year, but this year seemed especially ridiculous. Earlier in the year, after Anna Nicole Smith passed away, a circus erupted over the paternity of her young daughter. I don't even know where to start - if every one who claimed that they were the father had a relationship with her that would result in a child in the timeframe where it would be believable… Sheesh.

Train wrecks all over - Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan, Britney Spears… Even Britney's sister got into the fray. The biggest problem I have with all this is the amount of press they get, distracting people from other important issues. But, I don't know whether to be more exasperated with the media for putting out the information, or the people who give it such good ratings that they keep pumping it out.

That's enough ridiculousness for one year - up next, the bad…

Glow-Bull Warming Comic

Friday, December 21, 2007 4:59 pm Daniel J. Summers

There has been a ton of news and evidence about glow-bull warming that has come out in the last few weeks. But, alas, other pulls on my time are keeping me from chronicling them here. I did want to share this comic, though, that I found today in an e-mail.

The artist is Lisa Benson, whose work can be found on TownHall.com.

Sin Independence Day

Friday, May 11, 2007 12:06 pm Daniel J. Summers

This past Wednesday, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) declared that this July 4^th will be known as “Energy Independence Day” and focus on global warming issues. This is absolutely ludicrous - can they not let us celebrate the founding of our nation without trying to make us feel guilty over our success? I guess not - they feel that the mandate from their November win entitles them to force their earth-centric religion on us.

I wonder what would happen if a Republican politician stood up on the House floor and declared that July 4^th will be known as “Sin Independence Day” to remind us to fear a holy God. How long would it be until every leftist organization in the nation called for his removal? The issue is the same. In fact, I think it takes more faith to believe in global warming than it does to be a Christian.

Global warming is based on flimsy science, a short-sighted view of natural weather cycles, outright fraud, and an arrogance that we, as man, can control the weather. If we're so powerful, why can't we make it rain when areas go through droughts? Why can't we keep hurricanes from going whatever way they want? Why can't we drop the humidity in the Southern states? The global warming crowd has no answers for this. Even if we unplugged everything and lived in tents for the next year, it would have no effect on the weather.

The outright fraud is perhaps the most disturbing of the global warming crowd's claims. For example, I'm sure you have seen the picture of two polar bears floating on a piece of glacier. This picture supposedly shows that these poor bears are floating and are going to drown because of the glacier melting. In fact, this picture was taken of young polar bears playing on the piece of ice. A picture of something beautiful in nature is presented as a problem.

And this claim by the Democrats to want energy independence is pretty rich. Which party has been opposed to drilling in the area of the Alaska National Wildlife Reserve (ANWR) that was set aside for that purpose many years ago? Which party vilifies the energy companies for making profits? Without profits to invest in research of alternative sources and uses, how much progress do they expect to be made?

Don't fall for this. July 4^th is Independence Day - our nation's birthday, the day we declared independence from Britain, and the day we formally began the most successful experiment in representative republicanism to date.