Will You Believe Lies or theTruth

Alarmist global warming claims melt under scientific scrutiny :: CHICAGO SUN-TIMES :: Other Views The Chicago Sun-Times (definitely NOT a member of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy!) has an issue with Gore. An issue about telling lies.

Gore has a new book urging everyone to "accept science." A good idea. He should follow his own advice.

If Gore really means what he writes, he has an opportunity to make a difference by leading by example on the issue of global warming.
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Many of the assertions Gore makes in his movie, ''An Inconvenient Truth,'' have been refuted by science, both before and after he made them. Gore can show sincerity in his plea for scientific honesty by publicly acknowledging where science has rebutted his claims.

There are many examples of where science and Gore disagree. Here are 3 of my favorites.

Gore claims global warming is causing an expansion of African deserts. However, the Sept. 16, 2002, issue of New Scientist reports, "Africa's deserts are in 'spectacular' retreat . . . making farming viable again in what were some of the most arid parts of Africa."

Gore argues Greenland is in rapid meltdown, and that this threatens to raise sea levels by 20 feet. But according to a 2005 study in the Journal of Glaciology, "the Greenland ice sheet is thinning at the margins and growing inland, with a small overall mass gain." In late 2006, researchers at the Danish Meteorological Institute reported that the past two decades were the coldest for Greenland since the 1910s.

But my favorite bit of science - since it impacts me.

Gore claims global warming is causing more frequent and severe hurricanes. However, hurricane expert Chris Landsea published a study on May 1 documenting that hurricane activity is no higher now than in decades past. Hurricane expert William Gray reported just a few days earlier, on April 27, that the number of major hurricanes making landfall on the U.S. Atlantic coast has declined in the past 40 years.

Thanks to the hysteria of the Weather Channel, we now hear about more of them, and thanks to the insanity of building more and more in hurricane impact zones, the cost of each one is going up. (That and the fact that today people feel bound to have the government take care of them, instead of standing on their own two feet, the way Galveston, Texas did in 1900.)

Accepting science and its observations are important. Denying simple facts that don't agree with the conclusions you want to make is dishonest and stupid. (How did the Catholic church look in all those centuries after they denied that the earth revolved around the sun?) As long as Al Gore states things that are not true - easy things like the average temperature in Greenland over the last 40 years - he will be branded by anyone without dogmatic blinkers on as being a liar.

Of course, he is right about some things. All together too many people - on both the left and the right - refuse to accept science when it challenges their beliefs. That is exactly what the Catholic church did with Galileo 500 some odd years ago. [Hat tip Les Jones]