Ah, Brad, Desi & the Green News Report. Know you three needed some R & R, but it's so good to have ya'll back!

Thanks, Ernesto! And I'll assume those kind words are not just because you got a shout out in today's episode!

I'm about as concerned over the Northwest passage opening up as I am about the South Pole of Mars that has been melting for the past 3 years in a row. That is for those of you who believe JPL is a reliable source of information. Oh, and they've also confirmed a .5 degree C increase in Mars temperature the past 30 years. I haven't a clue why this is happening, but I'm sure some of the scientific geniuses out here on the Green Blog will fill me in.

The California Jobs Initiative (CJI) is an oil corporation farce and fraud. There is no connection, whatsoever, between greenhouse gas emission reduction and the loss of jobs. This notion is an insult to the intelligence of the people of California. In fact, there is growth in the clean renewable energy industry. The only jobs created by the oil industry are clean-up jobs after oil spills and deep water, blow-outs and pump-handler jobs. CJI will make fantastic profits for the oil industry, increase air pollution, especially in communities around their refineries, and there will not be lower gas prices. Koch Industries, Valero and Tesoro are super Enrons. Since when did the oil companies start to show any concern for the unemployed and their families?

Brook parroted yet another Fossil Fuel Industry/GOP/sucker talking point with:

the South Pole of Mars that has been melting for the past 3 years in a row.

Really? Where'd ya get that info from? Fox "News"? Rush Limbaugh? Marc Morano? Fred Thompson?

Seriously, Brook, are you just willing to retype anything they tell you, without bothering to check it out in the least?! Are you that daft? Or just don't mind if your comments have any relationship with truth?

Now we never claimed to be "scientific geniuses" here "at the Green Blog", but when we have questions of science, we do tend to rely on actual scientists for the answers to them. You may wish to try it.

You can start here, in regard to your Mars talking point:
http://www.skepticalscie...obal-warming-on-mars.htm

Do be sure to read both the Basic and Intermediate responses to your and Mr. Thompson's "science", since I'm certain you're genius enough to comprehend both.

And please consider this your second warning about violation of our rule against posting "knowing disinformation" here. If you keep it up, you'll not be commenting here much longer. So thanks for minding those rules, Brook.

Maybe you missed the part where i cited my source: the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. And your source was skepticalscience.com. This pretty much says it all, folks.

So, again we ask the question --- why is Mars warming up. Anyone want to take a stab at that one? Anyone?

Maybe you missed the part, "Brook", where you didn't actually cite anything. You just claimed that JPL says so.

Links, please, so people can read specifically what you're claiming JPL said, and the context --- say, specifically the part where the folks at JPL say the data on Mars (which has no oceans, a very thin atmosphere, where the instrument record extends back less than a decade because no humans have ever set foot on it) has any relevance to disproving the evidence of climate change on Earth.

(For those like "Brook" who haven't yet bothered to check into it, SkepticalScience.com is a compendium of the ACTUAL scientific studies dealing directly with these subjects, LINKED for further study. That "Brook" didn't bother pretty much says it all.)

Happy to oblige, but disappointed it is necessary...

http://mepag.jpl.nasa.go...limate_change/index.html

http://www.heartland.org...A_Scientists_Report.html

http://www.canada.com/na...e-47ba-913f-7359a5c7f723

Brook,

The Heartland Institute and Canada.com are not reliable sources. They are funded by API, Koch and the like. However, your link to NASA clearly explains the causes of the observations on Mars. Large variations in Mars' planetary motions are causing the climate change.

These sources simply reported the NASA findings --- not their own. However, I'm glad we are getting somewhere here, as John admits global warming IS happening on Mars. Hey, we are making progress. It's not a tea-bagger fantasy --- it's actual real gol dang science.

Now, let's examine what the article really says, and that is they have a WORKING THEORY of why Mars is warming. Now, these people are real scientists willing to admit they don't have all the answers, but have a good theory as to what might be happening on Mars.

Is there a correlation at all between Martian GW and GW here at the same point in time? A real objective scientist would be asking those questions, but we don't have objective climate scientists. We have evanglicals with Phds.

For a moment, let's go back to your initial post:

I'm about as concerned over the Northwest passage opening up as I am about the South Pole of Mars that has been melting for the past 3 years in a row.

So you're more concerned about what's happening on the planet you don't live on, vs. the one you do?

Um, no one is 'admit'ting that Mars is warming --- the request was that you show specifically where JPL indicates Mars data is relevant to disproving whether Earth's atmosphere is warming from human activities.

You can't because JPL says no such thing. Heartland and Canada.com are not scientific organizations and their conclusions should not be confused/conflated with those of the scientists at JPL. [on edit, the scientists quoted at those links are not from JPL, and seriously hedge their conclusions on the relevance to Earth's climate.]

JPL says the limited Mars data set can inform Earth climate studies, but nowhere do they claim it has direct relevance in predicting the sensitivity of the Earth's very different atmosphere to the massive inputs of greenhouse gas emissions from human activities. No cars on Mars, you know! Or coal-fired power plants, or water vapor, or oceans --- just as Earth doesn't have the Mars dust that is believed to be the primary driver of Mars' climate (Szwast 2006). But luckily "real objective scientists" are asking those questions, as JPL demonstrates. Please don't misstate their conclusions.

Lastly, just to clarify your comment at #10, are you saying that only scientists who study Mars are doing "real gol dang science", and the scientists who study Earth's systems are not?

'Cause it sure reads like you respect the "real scientists willing to admit they don't have all the answers, but have a good theory" only if it relates to Mars, yet actively denigrate the data of scientists who study Earth systems who ALSO admit they don't have all the answers and have ALSO presented their "WORKING THEORY" --- just because you just don't like their conclusions. What's your process for evaluating data?

Again, the data from Mars is limited. The volume of data collected on Earth's systems is literally orders of magnitude greater, and it all points in the same direction. Yet one is from "real scientists", the other from "evangelicals with Phds"?

You might enjoy this: an actual climate scientist in a debate with 52 skeptics that aired on Australian TV.

WATCH: Can one climate change scientist change the minds of a roomful of climate change sceptics?

Transcript is here, if you don't want to watch.

Brook said:

Happy to oblige, but disappointed it is necessary...

Yes, I'm sorry that simply trusting in the uncited claims of anonymous commenters falls below our standards of "evidence" here. I know it's difficult moving from Fox "News" to some place like The BRAD BLOG where actual source information is required.

And speaking of actual "source information", did you even bother to read the links you posted here, Brook?

Did you realize, as John J noted for you, that two of the "sources" you cited were from fossil fuel funded ECONOMIC sites (versus scientific sites)? That one of those two pages you cited relies on a scientist who says we will have an ice age on earth in the next 50 years? That the other notes that, at best, only 10 to 30 percent of GW on Earth (as correlated with Mars in best case scenario) could be attributed to increased solar output? (That, even as the other page charges we're about to have an ice age?!)

As to the actual source document, the one from NASA, did you bother to read IT at least? If so, you'll surely have seen that they make no such claims as you're implying, that their research goes back just a few years, that they attribute any *possible* warming on Mars --- as based on the tiny body of data they have, versus the mountains of data from dozens of earth sciences back here on planet Earth --- to fluctuations in orbit and/or other potential and unverified theories?

It's amusing that the one Russian scientist who claims we'll very soon have an ice age and the other scientist who poses extremely vague and un-peer reviewed theories at the NASA site are "real scientists" versus the thousands of scientists across the globe who all agree on decades of peer-reviewed consensus findings, across dozens of disciplines which all confirm the same final working hypothesis. Those thousands of folks, of course, are "evanglicals with Phds" who are not "objective" (even as you show no evidence in the slightest for their lack of objectivity).

You're either a joke, Brook, or a paid fossil fuel industry stooge. Take your pick. Either way, as you continue to post disinformation here, prepare to see your freedom to do so on my blog come to an end shortly, unless you wise up and post actual cites to support your outrageous and tedious disinformation (eg. the lack of objectivity of climate scientists, the "evanglicals with Phds." as you allege).

The time it takes to respond to your easily discredited bullshit is VERY quickly becoming not worth the effort. Once again, you've been repeatedly and politely warned.

http://science.nasa.gov/...sa/2003/07aug_southpole/

More Mars warming evidence. I've got as many of these links as you guys care to look at. Now, this one is from nasa.gov, so i am assuming we're cool here.

I think this debate has been very helpful for Mr. Friedman. In 24 hrs. he's gone from claiming mars warming theory is a Fred Thompson special to actually having a scientific answer when someone asks him why Mars is warming. Glad to be of service.

Now, these theories of Mars and Earth warming are all very interesting to those who have that kind of interest. The problem with the Earth CO2 hypothesis is these scientists are claiming they can reduce the Earth's temperature by 2 degrees --- if we, the American taxpayers just fork over $ 850 billion. You would normally laugh such an absurd claim off --- except we actually have politicians (who can't balance a budget to save their lives) that are telling us it's the only way to save the planet. "Just give us more money!"

C'mon, folks, it's time to get real. Do you believe Barbara Boxer can control the temperature on this planet --- yes or no! That's what this comes down to. Think about it.

mean to add this one...

http://www.newscientist....ajor-global-warming.html

Northwest Passage Navigable in 1937

http://uk.answers.yahoo....id=20100426015605AAxIH4N

What created the warming of the 30's that led to that substantial melt? Looking for an answer, please.

Brook claimed:

Looking for an answer, please.

Guess you're not "looking" very hard. You may want to check the very same link you posted under "Best Answer - Chosen by Voters".

When you get around to coming up with some crazy explanation for ocean acidification, let us know about that too. Though be sure to read your own link, whatever it will be, before posting it here, just to save us all some time. K?

Now back to your fossil fuel funded Church of Denial.

Brook disinformed:

The problem with the Earth CO2 hypothesis is these scientists are claiming they can reduce the Earth's temperature by 2 degrees --- if we, the American taxpayers just fork over $ 850 billion. You would normally laugh such an absurd claim off --- except we actually have politicians (who can't balance a budget to save their lives) that are telling us it's the only way to save the planet. "Just give us more money!"

C'mon, folks, it's time to get real. Do you believe Barbara Boxer can control the temperature on this planet --- yes or no! That's what this comes down to. Think about it.

Congrats! After lord knows how many warnings for ya, you've just landed yourself on the moderate bin. You've been warned of our very few rules for commenting for a long time. I'm sorry you've chosen to disobey them. Your posts will not be allowed to be published if they continue to break the rules. If we get tired of moderating you, you and your posts will be banned all together.

And no, scientists are not "claiming they can reduce the Earth's temperature by 2 degrees ... if we, the American taxpayers just fork over $ 850 billion." Neither is Barbara Boxer. Neither is anybody for that matter.

Some, including Boxer, have been supportive of a Cap and Trade plan to use market structures to control the ever-increasing release of dangerous carbon, akin to Cap and Trade plans signed into law by previous Presidents which successfully controlled the elimination or reduction of different greenhouse gasses, without "taxing" anybody for it in the bargain.

See ya.

Brook, thank you for finally admitting your real problem with climate change data: you attack the scientific evidence because of what you perceive to be the potential policy responses, and you're afraid of what it means to you economically.

That's understandable --- it's an unknown that has been attacked, fear-mongered and demigogued with virulent intensity by the oil industry, who are understandably afraid of losing even a tiny portion of their substantial profits. The oil industry is the most profitable business in the history of humanity, after all, and it's free for them pollute, let the taxpayer pay for cleanup and substantial health impacts. Big Oil can raise prices at will and pocket the profits... along with the billions they receive annually in taxpayer-funded permanent subsidies and tax breaks (which dwarf clean energy support, btw, by 4 to 1). It's a sweet deal.

Have you considered whether your lifestyle of cheap, subsidized dirty energy might be done cleaner, greener, cheaper and more efficiently through good ol' American ingenuity with American-made energy? Are you aware of the mountains of evidence that show investing in clean energy, energy efficiency and sustainable practices will save literally billions of dollars over the dirty energy economy we have now?

But what are you talking about here?:

The problem with the Earth CO2 hypothesis is these scientists are claiming they can reduce the Earth's temperature by 2 degrees --- if we, the American taxpayers just fork over $ 850 billion.

Assuming you're not making up BS about geo-engineering --- No one is claiming they can "reduce the Earth's temperature".

It's too late for that.

A certain amount of warming is already baked in to our future, but we have the capacity to mitigate the amount of additional inputs by moving away from burning dirty fuels, using technology we possess today.

Sorry to be the one to break this to ya, but the interaction of CO2 with solar radiation is basic, established physics. No amount of data on Mars warming can change that --- or on ocean acidification, as Brad mentioned.

At least you reveal why you discount the overwhelming scientific consensus --- money.

Oh, and to this Brook nonsense/waste of all of our time:

http://science.nasa.gov/...sa/2003/07aug_southpole/

More Mars warming evidence. I've got as many of these links as you guys care to look at. Now, this one is from nasa.gov, so i am assuming we're cool here.

Yeah. We're cool. Or would have been if you had an ounce of integrity. Again, did you bother to read your own link, which notes, among other similar points:

Like Earth, Mars has seasons that cause its polar caps to wax and wane. "It's late spring at the south pole of Mars," says planetary scientist Dave Smith of the Goddard Space Flight Center. "The polar cap is receding because the springtime sun is shining on it."

Yes, the sun does tend warm things.

If you find any scientific material proving global warming doesn't exist because the globe seems to get cooler at night when the sun goes down, let us know.

I think this debate has been very helpful for Mr. Friedman. In 24 hrs. he's gone from claiming mars warming theory is a Fred Thompson special to actually having a scientific answer when someone asks him why Mars is warming. Glad to be of service.

Thanks. Was unclear on that whole day/night, winter/summer thing. Appreciate your clearing it up for all of us.

Now, um, don't let the door hit ya.

Brook, on the very big assumption that you are simply misinformed or under-informed, as opposed to an oil industry plant, here's an excellent starting point for you.

See, Dr. James Hansen, Storms of My Grandchildren: The Truth About the Coming Climate Catastrophe and Our Last Chance to Save Humanity.

I would respectfully suggest that you pay especially close attention to the work by Hansen and other scientists in the field of paleoclimate studies conducted here on Earth, which establishes why the corporate-funded pseudo-science offered up by the likes of Heartland Institute and Canada.com (Hansen refers to it as "greenwash" but I prefer "hogwash") and your inapposite reference to a JPL study on Mars are of no value whatsoever.

Come back after you've read and digested Hansen. Then, perhaps we can have a meaningful conversation.

The UMass Amherst report naming Koch as one of the country’s top polluters also listed Ford Motor, General Motors, GE, Pfizer, Eastman Kodak, Sony, Honeywell, Berkshire Hathaway, Kimberly Clark, Anheuser Busch and Goodyear. In other words, almost anybody who makes anything in America generates permitted emissions and can be called a top “polluter.”

More information on Koch Industries can be found at www.kochfacts.com.

Thanks for your comment, "Koch Facts". Do you agree that pollution is an issue of concern?

Re: your statement.... "In other words, almost anybody who makes anything in America generates permitted emissions and can be called a top “polluter.”" Actually, no, that's a false statement. There are many, many more companies who "make things" in the USA who are not on the list of Top Polluters.

What steps are the employees and directors at Koch Industries taking to reduce their "permitted emissions" and get off that list of Top Polluters?

The other companies you mention are working with environmental groups to reduce the impact of their operations. Kimberly Clark, for example, signed a deal with Greenpeace to implement sustainability strategies last year, for example.

To borrow a phrase from another hot topic in the news, just because you CAN pollute doesn't mean you SHOULD. So what concrete steps are being taken by Koch Industries to reduce its emissions and its pollution?

Also, how does Koch Industries justify making this statement (from your website): "We've strived to encourage an intellectually honest debate on the scientific basis for claims of harm from greenhouse gases", when your owners have spent millions undermining the factual scientific consensus that exists among the vast majority of Earth systems scientists?

How does giving millions to promote Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt over the scientific consensus among EVERY reputable scientific organization in the world encourage "an intellectually honest debate?"

What is Koch Industries' response to the assertions from economists, and entrepreneurs and tech companies in Silicon Valley that the Koch-funded CA Proposition 23 would be the real job killer, rather than AB 32?

Lastly, when will Koch Industries begin to use its considerable profits to move to clean energy and sustainable practices for its many polluting manufacturing operations --- rather than waste time and millions fighting like mad to remain mired in dirty 19th century technologies?

Hey, Brook! Funny how right after you made that BS assertion about Mars, and then didn't even bother to read the actual scientific evidence, the folks at SkepticalScience.com answered your BS assertion, in response to a flurry of questions about it (actual scientific data at the link):

Mars: the notion that Mars is warming came from an unfortunate conflation of weather and climate. Based on two pictures taken 22 years apart, assumptions were made that have not proved to be reliable. There is currently no evidence to support claims that Mars is warming at all.

Hope you'll bother to pre-bunk yourself before posting to ensure you actually understand your own argument and the evidence (or lack thereof) behind it.

While we await a response to Des' poignant questions @23 posed to "Koch Industries" (aka dirty energy is good for you, inc) perhaps Koch would like to explain to us why it has secretly funded the "Tea Party" movement.

While you're at it, perhaps you would like to post a response to the claim made by Bill Koch back in 2000 when he appeared on 60 minutes, that Charles Koch and Koch Industries "made millions by stealing oil from the government."

kochfacts.com? Now there's an oxymoron.