Raymond Richman       -       Jesse Richman       -       Howard Richman

 Richmans' Trade and Taxes Blog

No Danger From Man-Made-Global Warming
Raymond Richman, 12/20/2018

President Macron’s imminent fall from power in France did not result from his proposed tax increase but because it was to be spent foolishly on addressing man-made-global-warming. Federal government, state government, and increased private expenditures wasted on man-made-global warming over the past two decades, nearly a trillion, yes a trillion dollars, on subsidies, tax credits, and private expenditures that accomplished nothing but made Gore and many others rich beyond belief. Most climate scientists believe that fossil fuels do bear responsibility for a small contribution to global warming. But the largest contributor is solar activity, which should not surprise anybody. And in less than a century, fossil fuels, a limited resource, will be displaced naturally by other energy sources.

In November, 2015, Craig Idso, Robert M. Carter, and S. Fred Singer – wrote Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming: Idso is a scientist who has published widely on carbon dioxide emissions, Carter was professor and head of the School of Earth Sciences at James Cook University in Australia from 1981 to 1998, and Singer, is professor emeritus of environmental science at the University of Virginia. Heartland Institute’s Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC) published Climate Change Reconsidered in 2009, an 880-page report on scientific research that contradicts the models of man-made-global- warming. As economists, we believe that the hundreds of billions of dollars spent world-wide to subsidize wind and solar power, the production and purchase of electric vehicles, and subsidizing solar panels and insulation of buildings, was entirely wasted.

The UN’s International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is using climate change as a political instrument to change the balance of political power around the world. Its support has little to do with the science of climate change and its causes. The UN agency’s leaders are aiming at the elimination of the USA as the leading industrial nation. Other UN agencies seemingly acting from the purist motives have been weakening American foreign policy. The Taliban in Afghanistan were eliminated easily because U.S. troops were welcomed by the population who reacted against the Taliban’s ban on the growing of opium. The Taliban was financed and resurrected as a fighting force when it reversed its anti-opium policy and we stupidly adopted an anti-opium policy at the UN’s suggestion and banned the growing of opium, even using American troops to destroy the crops in the fields. And for what? All of the Afghan opium is sold in Asia. As a result of our involvement in the anti-opium policy, it is we whom the Afghans now want out of their country amid growing support for the Taliban.

In 2012 the American Meteorological Society (AMS) surveyed its 7,000 members, receiving 1,862 responses. Of those, only 52% said they think global warming over the 20th century has happened and is mostly man-made (the IPCC position). The remaining 48% either think it happened but natural causes explain at least half of it, or it didn’t happen, or they don’t know. 

A mountain of evidence for this view is contained in “Inconvenient Facts: The science that Al Gore doesn’t want you to know.”  Written by Gregory Wrightstone of Pittsburgh, the book puts climate change into a geologic context of billions of years — a perspective derived from the author’s 35 years as a geologist. He states humans have thrived in previous periods significantly warmer than our modern age, most recently in the 13th century when Vikings farmed Greenland and citrus grew in England. Conversely, people have suffered during cold periods such as the Little Ice Age (1290-1850), which was marked by famine and disease.

Man has many tools to offset the undesirable effects of global warming which poses no danger to human existence and has benefits as well. What man needs to worry about is global cooling which could be catastrophic.  

Comment by JT, 1/2/2019:

Thanks for this great piece!  I hope I'm this sharp (or sharp at all) at 100. 

Comment by Bob Hanks, 3/12/2019:

Interesting that you used the American Meteorlogical Society to support your article.

As I hope you likely know the function of Meteorologists and Climatologists differ in one very important aspect. The former is short term forecasts, the latter long term (years and decades). Training is different, Climatologists must acquire a PHD, while Meteorologists are normally Bachelors Degree. A rough comparison is going to your Vet for personal treatment.

Also it is interesting to note the NASA page on Scientific Consensus (https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/) says the following:

"Multiple studies published in peer-reviewed scientific journals show that 97 percent or more of actively publishing climate scientists agree. Climate-warming trends over the past century are extremely likely due to human activities."

I find it more interesting that there are 18 Scientific Societies, including the American Meteorological Society (AMS) have all agreed to the following:

"Observations throughout the world make it clear that climate change is occurring, and rigorous scientific research demonstrates that the greenhouse gases emitted by human activities are the primary driver." (2009)

Further, most interesting of all,  the AMS has stated publicly;

"It is clear from extensive scientific evidence that the dominant cause of the rapid change in climate of the past half century is human-induced increases in the amount of atmospheric greenhouse gases, including carbon dioxide (CO2), chlorofluorocarbons, methane, and nitrous oxide." (2012)

Yet even still deniers exist. I wonder about the motives. My experience has taught me to follow the money. Regardless of want you want to believe, I must follow the science.