If to have a thread with this title, may as well add some posts about George "Warmer" Bush, the world’s leading Anti-Scientist (leading as in his powerful position, has downplayed science, notably re global warming). Now this buffoon is presiding over major cut in satellite monitoring that’s important for knowing what’s happening with global warming. (Any skeptics wander by: important, too, for showing whether and to what extent global warming really is an issue.) From AP report, here in the Guardian:
Quote:
The Bush administration is drastically scaling back efforts to measure global warming from space, just as the president tries to convince the world the U.S. is ready to take the lead in reducing greenhouse gases. A confidential report to the White House, obtained by The Associated Press, warns that U.S. scientists will soon lose much of their ability to monitor warming from space … the Pentagon and two partners – the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA – will rely on European satellites for most of the climate data. “Unfortunately, the recent loss of climate sensors … places the overall climate program in serious jeopardy,” NOAA and NASA scientists told the White House in the Dec. 11 report obtained by the AP. They said they will face major gaps in data that can be collected only from satellites about ice caps and sheets, surface levels of seas and lakes, sizes of glaciers, surface radiation, water vapor, snow cover and atmospheric carbon dioxide. Rick Piltz, director of Climate Science Watch, a watchdog program of the Washington-based Government Accountability Project, called the situation a crisis. “We’re going to start being blinded in our ability to observe the planet,” said Piltz, whose group provided the AP with the previously undisclosed report. “It’s criminal negligence, and the leaders in the climate science community are ringing the alarm bells on this crisis.” … Jerry Mahlman, a former scientist at NOAA who is now at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, said he and other colleagues warned of problems as far back as 1995. He compared the preparations for the satellites to a “planned train wreck.”
U.S. Cuts Back Climate Checks From Space