Earth on Fire

"The scientific debate is closing [against us] but not yet closed. There is still a window of opportunity to challenge the science."

-- Email to Republican press secretaries from Bush political advisor Frank Lunz, 2002

"Voters believe there is no consensus about global warming within the scientific community. Should the public come to believe that the scientific issues are settled, their views about global warming will change accordingly. Therefore, you need to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debate... ."

-- Memo to Republican candidates from Bush political advisor Frank Luntz, 2002

This afternoon the National Academy of Sciences' Board of Atmospheric Sciences and Climate released a pre-publication copy of its special report titled Surface Temperature Reconstructions for the Last 2,000 Years. You can download a pdf copy of the entire 157-page draft report for free by going here and clicking on "Free PDFs" to register.

The bottom line:

"[R]ecent warmth [in the surface temperature of the Earth] is unprecedented for at least the last 400 years and potentially the last several millennia."

Over at the American Geophysical Union, a panel of 20 experts convened in January has just issued an equally important report, Hurricanes and the U.S. Gulf Coast: Science and Sustainable Rebuilding. The bottom line from the geophysists divides into two:

The U.S. Gulf Coast from south Texas to the panhandle of Florida is slowly being drowned at varying rates by waters of the Gulf of Mexico.

And --

There is a strong basis in both theory and observation for projecting continued longer and more severe hurricane seasons for the foreseeable future. The hurricane climatology of the past decade, with increasing numbers of more intense hurricanes, should be considered the new normal.

Indeed, USA Today is reporting an interview with two climate experts who say the research shows "global warming produced about half of the extra hurricane-fueled warmth in the North Atlantic in 2005, and natural cycles were a minor factor."

These two new reports should have Americans gathering at the gates of Congress and the White House demanding, What are you going to do about this?

Alas, that isn't going to happen, is it? Too many of us would rather be fooled by lies than face reality.