Chapter 1 of Taken By Storm – Dr. Christopher Essex & Dr. Ross McKitrick, (2002), Key Porter Books Ltd., Toronto, Ontario, Canada, opens with a description of a thunderstorm and the inability of science to understand the forces involved in that storm.
Science has published a study based on satellite estimates of global rainfall. Then calculating the frictional drag on the raindrops.
From Nature:

All the same, the total global total rate of energy dissipation from precipitation is around 10^15 watts, about 100 times the rate at which humans consume energy worldwide.

Science is getting closer to understanding that thunderstorm.

I don’t know if anyone has been following the Peter Gleick controversy or not, but it’s hilarious.
Powerline does an excellent deconstruction of the memo at the heart of the controversy and as always, you can keep up-to-date with Anthony.

h/t Matt from Mississauga

In the old days, you know, when the words “right” & “wrong” actually meant something, there was an important part of Canada’s Criminal Code known as Section 46 that carried some weight with the citizenry. It describes “High treason” and “Treason”.
If foreign terrorists from another large oil producing nation were to destroy the oil production facilities in Northern Alberta, it would be reasonable to conclude that they would be criminally charged. If some Canadians conspired with them, one can only speculate if Section 46 would be used to charge them.
One is left to wonder if Canadians accepting vast sums of money from foreign sources to shut down Canada’s oil production via non-violent means is unethical and possibly unlawful?
h/t SDA commenter ‘G’
Related Update: In this video Ezra Levant describes the paralyzed hearings in Northern B.C. – h/t Sammy

At WUWT – The behind-the-scenes bumbling of the “hockey stick”.

January 12, 2012:

January 16, 2012:

Oh wait . . .

Details . . . and a cool time-lapse video!

Mike Hulme – senior researcher in the Climatic Research Unit, founder of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research in 2001.

“to reduce emissions requires more evidence than that humans are altering climate.”

Good thing that never got out.

James Delingpole;

As you’ll know by now, I’m not usually Mister Optimist. So what the hell am I doing crowing about victory in the climate wars when clearly there remains so much work to be done? We-e-ll….

Greenbot’s, are you sitting down?
Okay, here’s the bombshell. The volcanic eruption in Iceland, since its first spewing of volcanic ash has, in just FOUR DAYS, NEGATED EVERY SINGLE EFFORT you have made in the past five years to control CO2 emissions on our planet, all of you.
Of course you know about this evil carbon dioxide that we are trying to suppress it’s that vital chemical compound that every plant requires to live and grow, and to synthesize into oxygen for us humans, and all animal life.
I know, it’s very disheartening to realize that all of the carbon emission savings you have accomplished while suffering the inconvenience and expense of: driving Prius hybrids, buying fabric grocery bags, sitting up till midnight to finish your kid’s “The Green Revolution” science project, throwing out all of your non-green cleaning supplies, using only two squares of toilet paper, putting a brick in your toilet tank reservoir, selling your SUV and speedboat, vacationing at home instead of abroad, nearly getting hit every day on your bicycle, replacing all of your 50 cents light bulbs with $10.00 light bulbs…well, all of those things you have done have all gone down the tubes in just four days.
The volcanic ash emitted into the Earth’s atmosphere in just four days – yes – FOUR DAYS ONLY by that volcano in Iceland, has totally erased every single effort you have made to reduce the evil beast, carbon. And there are around 200 active volcanoes on the planet spewing out this crud any one time – EVERY DAY.

“No journalism here, only obedience…”

Roger Harrabin and Joe Smith write to UEA warmist Mike Hulme, ask: “What should the BBC be doing this time in terms of news, current affairs, drama, documentaries, game shows, music etc?”

Related – I’ll let others psychoanalyze the bizarre opposition to such news, and I’ll let the scientists explain the science and the actual number of people on each side of the issue. What I am able to do is show what the mainstream media buries, namely all the red flags surrounding accusations against skeptic scientists.
h/t Russell

Mann hockey stick co-author Bradley:

…the biggest “miss” was an apparently very warm year in the late 19th century that we did not get right at all. This makes criticisms of the “antis” difficult to respond to (they have not yet risen to this level of sophistication, but they are “on the scent”). Furthermore, it may be that Mann et al simply don’t have the long-term trend right, due to underestimation of low frequency info. in the (very few) proxies that we used. We tried to demonstrate that this was not a problem of the tree ring data we used by re-running the reconstruction with & without tree rings, and indeed the two efforts were very similar — but we could only do this back to about 1700. Whether we have the 1000 year trend right is far less certain (& one reason why I hedge my bets on whether there were any periods in Medieval times that might have been “warm”, to the irritation of my co-authors!).”

Chris Horner reviews:

The UK police and the US DOJ, Criminal Division, are pursuing a leaker of public records subject to one or more FOIA, records that were unlawfully withheld under those laws, which leaks indicate apparent civil violations (tortious interference by seeking dismissal of certain “skeptics”), and raising reasonable questions of fraud against taxpayers.
And they are pursuing the leaker.

Anthony Watts has plenty of updates.

At the Air Vent;

Tallbloke a fellow recipient blog of the climategate emails, and linked on the right, was raided today in what seems to be a coordinated effort by Metropolitan Police, the Norfolk Constabulary and the Computer Crime division and the U.S. Department of Justice Criminal Division. His home was raided and computers were taken for ‘examination’.
[…]
UPDATE: Tallbloke and I both received the following notification from the U.S. Department of Justice Criminal Division and forwarded by Ryan at WordPress. ClimateAudit is also mentioned yet I’m not certain that Steve Received notice. It seems that the larger paid blogs may not have received any notice.

U.S. Department of Justice
Criminal Division
1301 New York Avenue, NW, 6th floor
Washington, DC 20005
PHONE: 202-353-2854
FAX: 202-514-6113
December 9, 2011
VIA ELECTRONIC MAIL
Automattic Inc.
60 29th Street #343
San Francisco, CA 94110
Attn: law-enforcement@wordpress.com
Re: Request for Preservation of Records
Dear Automattic Inc.:
Pursuant to Title 18, United States Code, Section 2703(f), this letter is a formal request for the preservation of all stored communications, records, and other evidence in your possession
regarding the following domain name(s) pending further legal process: http://tallbloke.wordpress.com, http://noconsensus.wordpress.com, and http://climateaudit.org (“the Accounts”) from 00:01 GMT Monday 21 November 2011 to 23:59 GMT Wednesday 23 November 2011.
I request that you not disclose the existence of this request to the subscriber or any other person, other than as necessary to comply with this request. If compliance with this request might result in a permanent or temporary termination of service to the Accounts, or otherwise alert any user of the Accounts as to your actions to preserve the information described below, please contact me as soon as possible and before taking action.

Related: In an unrelated story, according to Richard Tol, IPCC has told its WG2 scientists that they are above the law on freedom of information.
More at WUWT.
For old times sake….

An interesting new article coming out of the failed Greenfest in Durban opens up an entirely new set of questions for Canada’s American MP, Elizabeth May.
Leon Louw, Executive Director of South Africa’s Free Market Institute, has some most interesting things to say about the goals of May and her comrades at the UN:

The money goes to government and governments spend it on of course on themselves, meaning various government projects, creating bigger departments — bigger bureaucracies, it’s called big bureaucratic capture. They build empires, they build conference centers, and they buy political support. They go and distribute the money to communities where they want support and votes.
What the UN is saying is: ‘We want you to indulge our opinion of climate change and if you do so it’s going to cause a great deal of poverty and unemployment in poor counties.’ You cannot, as a poor country, subscribe to the Kyoto Protocol and grow. The two are mutually exclusive.

When will CBC/CTV/Global be asking Ms. May why she continues to support the oppression of poor people?
Related: James Delingpole debates Michael Jacobs, former climate adviser to Gordon Brown.   And John Ibbitson is ashamed … on behalf of you; Charles Adler has a somewhat different view.

Via New Nostradamus;

The IPCC’s Fourth Assessment claimed that “there is strong evidence” of sea level rising over the last few decades. It goes as far as to claim: “Satellite observations available since the early 1990s provide more accurate sea level data… This decade-long satellite altimetry data set shows that since 1993, sea level has been rising at a rate of around 3mm yr–1, significantly higher than the average during the previous half century.”
Almost every word of this is untrue. Satellite altimetry is a wonderful and vital new technique that offers the reconstruction of sea level changes all over the ocean surface. But it has been hijacked and distorted by the IPCC for political ends.
In 2003 the satellite altimetry record was mysteriously tilted upwards to imply a sudden sea level rise rate of 2.3mm per year. When I criticised this dishonest adjustment at a global warming conference in Moscow, a British member of the IPCC delegation admitted in public the reason for this new calibration: “We had to do so, otherwise there would be no trend.”

(Emphasis mine.)

While reading various articles about the champagne & caviar E-Lovefest going on in Durban, I came across a number of entries from a particular Toronto resident. His latest is a letter to the Toronto Red Star. Here it is in full:

Re: Tories ready to abandon Kyoto deal, Nov. 29
I was at Copenhagen and I resent Environment Minister Peter Kent putting such misleading “spins” on critical matters. Elizabeth May counters with the truth:
1) Kyoto does include 191 countries. Only the U.S. is outside.
2) Most of the industrialized countries have met or exceeded their Kyoto targets. Canada is the only country to have repudiated its legally binding obligations.
3) The Copenhagen Accord, which Kent touts, is merely political “spin.” The non-binding pledges will lead to far more than 2 degrees C global warming with disastrous consequences for our grandchildren.
4) Canada is the first country to refuse to enter negotiations for a second Kyoto commitment, and the only country to ignore its legally binding Kyoto targets.
Most Canadians want our country to remain in Kyoto yet our government/oil corporations apparently plan to withdraw. Unless he changes very quickly, Stephen Harper’s climate legacy will be a wasted world for future generations.
Anthony Ketchum, Toronto

I know I’m just an ignorant Western hick but the hairs on the back of my red neck were tweaked while reading through Tony 4 “truths”. Would any SDA fact checkers care to shed some light on his statements?
Incidentally, Mr. Ketchum’s blog can be found here and more from him can be read/seen here and here. The latter link, a video, shows what an absolutely angry, totalitarian Leftist thug he truly is. To realize that this elderly man has gained little to no wisdom in his lifetime but instead based his entire worldview on a pack of lies is beyond sad.

h/t Matt from Mississauga

There’s a poll at CBC News that needs your help. Please vote now!
h/t DanBC

David Rose and Melanie Phillips carefully detail the rampant corruption at the BBC as exposed by the latest Climategate e-mails.

‘The emails – part of a trove of more than 5,200 messages that appear to have been stolen from computers at the University of East Anglia – shed light for the first time on an incestuous web of interlocking relationships between BBC journalists and the university’s scientists, which goes back more than a decade.
‘They show that University staff vetted BBC scripts, used their contacts at the Corporation to stop sceptics being interviewed and were consulted about how the broadcaster should alter its programme output.
‘… BBC insiders say the close links between the Corporation and the UEA’s two climate science departments, the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) and the Tyndall Centre for Climate Research, have had a significant impact on its coverage.
‘Following their lead has meant the whole thrust and tone of BBC reporting has been that the science is settled, and that there is no need for debate,’ one journalist said. ‘If you disagree, you’re branded a loony.’

Open Questions: Here in Canada, are the members of our mainstream media, particularly throughout the CBC and CKNW’s Bill Good, any less corrupt? Will any of these so-called “professional” journalists ever resign over their complete breach of ethics?