The begining of the end for climate skeptics!
Fox News the famously Neo-Con news channel has always had problems with global warming, in large part due to the political persuasion of thos most strongly pushing for action on this issue. In a futher sign of washingtons increasing isolation on this issue, Fox News is set to broadcast a docummentary based on facts and not oil funded spin! An interesting quote:
Fox News Channel reporter Rick Folbaum, in a statement on the news organization's website, explained that "after months of research and interviews with many experts, I've learned this simple fact: The earth is heating up. And it's happening much faster than ever before. No one can argue with this."
Halleluja! I believe this is representative of the realisation amongst the rulling class arounf the world of the reality of the situation, and by rulling class i obviously include most of the big buisness leaders in the USA.
"(CNSNews.com) - A Fox News Channel documentary on "global warming," set to air Sunday night, provides only the liberal take on the controversial issue and was approved after environmentalist Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. reportedly "dragged" Fox News Chairman Roger Ailes to a lecture by former Vice President Al Gore, "kicking and screaming."
Clay Rawson, the Fox News Channel producer of the hour-long special titled "The Heat Is On: The Case of Global Warming," told Cybercast News Service Wednesday that the project "was a little bit different for us.
"Often on Fox News Channel, we present both sides, according to our 'fair and balanced' motto, but this is the global warming story," Rawson said. "We do make it clear that this is one side of the issue through inclusion of a disclaimer," he added. The documentary is said to ignore scientific skeptics who believe that human activity is not responsible for catastrophic climate change.
The Bangor Daily News (Maine) on Sept. 23 reported Kennedy's comments about having "dragged" Ailes to the Gore lecture. The November edition of Outside magazine also features a column by Amanda Griscom Little, in which she asserts that Laurie David, the wife of comic Larry David, managed to persuade Ailes about the need to air the special.
According to Griscom Little's column, Ailes telephoned Laurie David to discuss the "one-hour global-warming report that his network will air this fall, thanks in large part to Laurie's badgering."
Griscom Little also wrote that "Ailes was charmed by what he calls Laurie's 'impressive passion and dedication'" and that Ailes "considers her one of the country's 'leading authorities' on global warming." Laurie David is a trustee of the Natural Resources Defense Council. Ailes was unavailable for further comment Wednesday night.
Fox News Channel reporter Rick Folbaum, in a statement on the news organization's website, explained that "after months of research and interviews with many experts, I've learned this simple fact: The earth is heating up. And it's happening much faster than ever before. No one can argue with this."
But Chris Horner, senior fellow with the free market environmental group, Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), is among those arguing about the theory of "global warming." He is also criticizing Fox News Channel, not only for its decision to air the documentary, but for featuring "Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., a prominent agenda-driven environmentalist and registered lobbyist for green causes ... as a 'special correspondent' for the show."
Despite the disclaimer at the beginning of the program, Horner told Cybercast News Service that "many and possibly most viewers would not even see this disclaimer ...
"While it is unfathomable that a reputable news network would air so blatantly a one-sided program regardless of any disclaimer, that the 'fair and balanced' network would put itself in the position of suspending its motto is stupefying," Horner said. CEI plans to deliver a letter to Ailes on Thursday morning, complaining about the documentary.
"I hate to draw attention to a Sunday night 'filler' program, but it is important to expose this disgraceful excuse for journalism, particularly by the so-called 'fair and balanced' crowd," Horner said. "Maybe a special on the 10,000 dead in New Orleans could follow."
Folbaum asserted in his Fox News website statement that "the vast majority of the scientific community says we're witnessing a unique and troubling kind of climate change, one where changes that used to occur over centuries are now taking place during the course of a single lifetime."
The reporter concluded by pleading for website visitors to tune in to Fox News Sunday, Nov. 13 at 8 p.m. "Learn the facts about global warming and decide for your self what needs to be done about these new realities," Folbaum stated.
Fox News Channel coordinated the special with the Alaska based Weston Productions, which has previously worked with Greenpeace and National Geographic."
posted by Calvin Jones @ 3:44 AM
1 comments
1 Comments:
I watched the show on Fox News about global warming tonight, and i just had a couple observations:
I realize the point they were trying to make, but standing near the terminus of a glacier during the summer, pointing to the streams of meltwater as an example of how badly the glaciers are melting is a little bit disingenuous. In the summer time, temperate glaciers will ALWAYS have some impressive streams, creeks and rivers flowing from them. They're glaciers. It's what they do.
Glaciers, especially valley glaciers, have two primary zones: The accumulation zone, where snowfall exceeds snowmelt and the glacier is actually built. Lower downhill is the melt- or ablation zone, where the ice melts. Without a melt zone, the glacier would only build, and build, and build--eventually the glacier would cover the entire Earth. Thank goodness glaciers melt, eh?
A glacier may advance or it may retreat. It may even be static, but unless something is really going wrong, they always melt at the bottom, even during an ice-age. Actually, the only difference during an ice-age is that it doesn't melt as fast as it builds, BUT IT STILL MELTS.
At one point during the show, they were standing on the Mendenhall Glacier, only about a mile from the very bottom, pointing to surface melt (a mill creek) as an example of how the glacier was melting and retreating. I know that spot well, because i spent most of last May within a quarter of a mile of that spot, on the other side of the ice. Let me tell you, if there isn't a serious amount of melting and water flow on that spot during the summer, you better not plan on moving to Juneau, 'cause it won't be there long!
Yes, yes, most of the glaciers in Alaska and around the world areretreating. Yes, the average surface temps on the planet have been increasing over the last couple hundred years. But another example they gave is equally silly:
They had some great shots of the Hubbard Glacier, used to illustrate the type of flooding that often occurs with glaciers. They sometimes damn up creeks, rivers and other waterways, often their very own meltwater. Since ice floats on water, eventually all the lakes created will get deep enough to float their ice-dams and break free. This happens on the Hubbard and is causing much controversy up there as people debate whether or not we should do something about it.
But here's the one key piece of information they left out of their report: The Hubbard Glacier has created its dam because it's ADVANCING. Again, filling and draining lakes is what glaciers do! If they advance or retreat, they will always dam waterways, then release them. Actually, without that very type of action (on a much grander--nay, biblical scale) we wouldn't have had the Missoula Floods, which formed the Willamette Valley and one of the richest farming areas on the West Coast.
But that type of accurate information would have probably distracted from the sensational point they were trying to make.
Post a Comment
<< Home