text:
"Dennis, We've Been Crying Too Much": Dr. Hook and the Untold Story of the Best Rock Movie Ever Made—Part Two
I've chased down old Dr. Hook records here and there over the past five or six years, loving this live DVD the way I do and looking forward to hearing some of these great songs with some studio magic sprinkled over them, but what I've found has usually been a bit disappointing. I'm starting to conclude, sadly, that Dr. Hook were a band you had to see live to truly get it. This is more common than you'd think; every musician knows an amazing fellow band who never quite captured their brilliance on tape. Sometimes, even capturing the energy of a band on a concert recording can be tricky—I have to admit that I've fallen asleep while watching concert films by such all-time greats as Led Zeppelin and The Who. But that's another amazing thing about Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show: Live—somehow the intimacy of their black studio dream-space and the tight close-up of their cameras and the pressurelessness of their nonexistent audience helped perfectly express the energy of this particular band on this particular night, to the point where you feel like you're personally onstage in the midst of this crazy racing-around, this weird combination of hillbilly fervor and bar-band bravado and stoner idiocy and Marx Brothers archarchist chaos. No other concert film feels, to me, quite so intimate. I get a contact high just watching it.
In their lyrics as well as in their clothes and attitude, Dr. Hook could be said to embody the first wilt of the early-70s counterculture—that time when young people started crossing over into their 30s, when some hippies started going to seed, when the vibes were just starting to get weird, when the very earliest hints of malaise had started to creep in. This, at bottom, is Dr. Hook's milieu. By this point in the set they've already tackled drug dealers, VD-ridden free-love casualties, and dirtbag roadies, and now, on "Freakin' at the Freakers' Ball," it's time for the band to conjure up the seedy ambience of a key party. This also happens to be one of those moments where the band flickers from enervated and sloppy back to amazing again. After a mess of an intro, Locorriere snaps into a cute little country groove, the band locks in behind him, and Sawyer stops doing his strange and perverse dance routine and jumps on a nice harmony. They're playing and singing great, and even George, his animus temporarily set aside, takes a pleasant and tuneful little steel solo.
Coming two songs later, you could argue that "Freakin' at the Freakers' Ball" is the antithesis to—even the antidote for—"Penicillin Penny." Though robed in rude comedy, this is actually a sweet song whose underlying message is one of universal acceptance. "Well, there's gonna be a Freakers' Ball / tonight at the Freakers' Hall," Locorriere informs us, before issuing the promised singing invitation: "you know, you're invited / one and all." At the Freakers' Ball, we're told, everyone is not only welcome but they all get along; not only are "all the straights…swingin' with the funkies," but "the FBI is dancin' with the junkies." Penicillin Penny would not only be accepted and welcomed at the Freakers' Ball, she'd be viewed as positively boring, surrounded on all sides by "the fags and the dykes…boogieing together, the leather freaks…dressed in all kinds of leather," and, of course, "the greatest of the sadists and the masochists too / screamin,' 'Please hit me and I'll hit you!'" As the list goes on, it gets more and more outrageously all-encompassing. We get "brother-on-sister," "son-on-mother," and are told that "everybody is ballin' in batches / pyromaniacs striking matches." Finally, a hilarious topper arrives with the couplet "Black ones, white ones, yellow ones, red ones. / Necrophiliacs looking for dead ones." In almost every line there's a reference to people getting together, embracing, to a communion of sex or love; "everybody is kissing each other" as they ball in batches, we're promised that "I'll kiss yours if you kiss mine," and the overall image is of every single person in the Freakers' Hall, no matter how weird and twisted and bizarre, collapsing in a big loving puddle of humanity, their differences both completely immaterial and yet somehow defining and empowering. Though wrapped in the imagery of a dirty joke, this idea—that it's okay to be different, even different in a way that people might loathe or fear, and that no matter how different we are there is a way we can try to love each other—happens to be one of the most beautiful ideas in the world, an idea that embodies what was most exciting and most powerful about the energy of the 1960s, the energy that Dr. Hook crawled out of, rank with pot-smoke, eyes glassy with distant visions, bearded and patchy, "smear[ed] up with butter," arms akimbo in a drunken Jesus windmill on a stage where the audience has long since forsaken them.
Across the world in 1974, rock bands are starting to take synthesizer solos. They are starting to wear capes.
Even though they're hippies, maybe as hippie as hippie can get, you could say there's also something punk rock about Dr. Hook on this night—though not for long. Because by the time punk rock actually breaks, some three short years from now, Dr. Hook will have gotten their audience back and then some. They will be cranking out insipid soft-disco ballads like "When You're in Love with a Beautiful Woman" for ex-hippies who have become even older, even more lost, confused, directionless. Dr. Hook will no longer be "belly up," and they will no longer be bankrupt either. But they will have lost time and they will have lost bandmembers and they will have lost something else too. Tonight though, they possess it fully. It is only theirs. Across the world in 1974, rock bands are starting to take synthesizer solos. They are starting to wear capes. They are just plugging in their smoke machines. Prog-Rock, Jazz-Rock, Soft Rock, everything that the punks will try to tear down and unseat is, at this moment in time, just starting to become entrenched. This is the year the Captain marries Tenille. This is the year Lindsey Buckingam and Stevie Nicks join Fleetwood Mac. This is the year ABBA wins the Eurovision song contest with "Waterloo," their first international number-one single. This is the year Yes will sell out two nights at Madison Square Garden without placing a single ad. But there are no capes onstage tonight, no feathered hair, no 12-minute solos. There are just seven people who— to varying degrees—don't give a shit. Soon they will become smooth, professional, and monied. But tonight they don't give a shit, in the most beautiful and pure way possible.
They wrap up the song, and Locorriere decides to strum a dumb kind of suspended chord at the end. It really doesn't work, so he responds by strumming it again and again, like a bad joke whose punchline you repeat to be annoying. Sawyer giggles and admiringly says, "Man, that's…that's terrible!"
Then there is another iris fade and then we get the last song, where all of the threads of the set—musical, personal, thematic—converge and hit their crisis.
"We begged and we begged and we pleaded. Right? And we told em, 'Please. Please. We just, all we ever wanted to do was be on the cover. Of a magazine!' And we begged and we begged and they finally did it!" At this line Locorriere, who is pushed up into the mic, eyes heavy-lidded, gives a juvenile snicker, before leaning back to strum his guitar and discovering that, yet again, it isn't in tune. Sawyer, standing right next to him and waiting to start the song, is getting visibly impatient. He responds to Locorriere's umpteenth "That's terrible!" with, "They do get out of tune you know." Stalling for time, Locorriere continues:
"We wasn't on the cover of, ah, Newsweek, or National Geographic…"
"Time," Sawyer chimes in.
"Time. None of them."
"Or Life."
"Or Life, but…Penthouse? No! Hah-ha! But we did make one, and then they tried to kill us." Locorriere strums the out-of-tune guitar for punctuation.
"They might kill us again after you play this," says Sawyer, and then tries to block out his annoyance at all the befuddled guitar-tuning happening around him, closing his eyes in concentration and raising his hands up on either side of his face in a frozen jazz-hands pose, ready to rock. Wolters comes in with a four-on-the-floor kick intro, the band starts in, and it immediately becomes clear they're still horrendously out-of-tune.
At this, Sawyer storms off the stage. Locorriere comes running after him like a chastised little boy chasing after his disappointed dad. "I got it! I'm sorry! I got it!" Just as he's saying this, in what feels like a minor miracle, the band suddenly tightens up and sounds like a real band again, jumping into a country rock vamp with a tidy electric lick at the top. Sawyer wheels around and stares Locorriere right in the face darkly, angrily. He advances towards him as Locorriere starts retreating, scrambling backwards to his own mic, going, "I…Ahh…" Sawyer keeps stalking towards him, his face cold and angry, until, exactly on cue, he jumps into the first line of the song, turning away from Locorriere to face the cameras, waving a hand in the air, singing a line that, at this moment in time, they might have felt was mocking them:
Well, we're big rock singers!
We've got golden fingers
and we're loved everywhere we go.
This, of course, is Dr. Hook's blessing and their curse, their big hit and the song that got them banned from UK radio—"Cover of the Rolling Stone." At the words "everywhere we go," the melody line takes a joyous leap up a full octave. Sawyer, his voice cracking at the leap, chooses this moment to yank his shirt aside to expose his left nipple, poking it towards the cameras and tilting his head back flirtatiously. In so doing, he cracks himself up and his bad mood seems to evaporate instantaneously. With his one good eye, he shoots a quick, amused, forgiving glance in Locorriere's direction. He leans into Locorriere's mic for the next harmony, "We take all kinda pills that give us all kinda thrills…" and we see that Locorriere is also chucking a broad and relieved laugh. In fact, they're both laughing so much that they've having difficulty getting the lyrics out. At the next octave leap—the line "the thrill we've never known"—Sawyer shoots his hand in the air and then sweeps his arm out expansively, as if gesturing towards some broad, undiscovered vista. The camera cuts to a shimmying Billy Francis and then back to the team of Sawyer and Locorriere, singing about "the thrill that'll getcha when you get your picture / on the cover of the Rolling Stone." There follows a short call-and-response between Sawyer and the band about what he'll do when he gets his picture on the magazine's cover (stare at it, buy "five copies for my mother," etc…), during which Sawyer does one of his signature little struts around the stage, this time with his entire left shoulder and arm and most of his chest exposed because Locorriere has playfully pulled his shirt half off.
Crawling further under his pedal steel, George points a finger at Locorriere and says something off-mic that sounds like, "I'm coming after you."
This little litany finished, the band hit the last line of the chorus: "Gonna see my smiling face on the cover of the Rolling Stone," stringing out the last "Stoooooooooooooone" in a long protracted harmony that is wincingly out-of-tune. Things are getting bad again. Locorriere suddenly goes off on an ad-libbed spoken tangent, turning to the cameras and saying, "We figured if one of us had a lot of sex, that they would stick us on the cover of anything, man, anything, anything…" There is an awkward lull, as if the band doesn't quite know what to do here. Many of them just stop playing. The song has almost completely halted in its tracks by this point, aside from Billy Francis noodling aimlessly on his keyboard and Wolters tapping out a kind of dumb parody of a Jazz hi-hat pattern. The camera pulls back. Sawyer is dancing and strutting cluelessly, as if he's in his own world. His awkward tirade over, Locorriere is weaving back and forth. There is a stagnant feeling onstage. Finally, Sawyer snaps out of it. "No!" he shouts decisively. "That ain't gonna work." Beckoning to the pedal steel station on stage left, he calls out, "Come here, George. Come up here and do it."
High-stepping like a giant spider, George makes his way from behind his steels and walks to the front of the stage. Again, he pulls the great red handkerchief from his right-hand pocket. Locorriere has had it with the handkerchief, and he begs George not to use it. Glancing coolly at him, George responds simply, "Gotta have the handkerchief." He drapes it and then does his lean-in and stand-stock-still thing, singing the lines, "I got a freaky old lady / name of cocaine Katie / who em-broi-drers all my jeans. / I got my poor old grey-haired daddy / driving my limousine." As George is singing, Sawyer comes up behind him and lightly picks up strands of his long hair, fanning it out for a second in a moment reminiscent of a "rabbit ears" family photo. You see Locorriere glance at Sawyer and laugh.
When George's verse is finished, he pulls the handkerchief back off the mic and returns to his corner. Calmly, he straps on a giant hollowbody electric guitar, and then plugs it in. In the foreground, Locorriere and Sawyer are smiling and giggling as usual, singing "Gonna see my smiling face / on the cover of the Rolling Stone." As they sing the long drawn-out "Stoooooone" this time, George strikes a dissonant guitar chord and then turns to his guitar amp and rolls the volume knob all the way up. His amp immediately squeals into a high, painful feedback note. It's the loudest thing onstage, but Locorriere and Sawyer haven't really noticed yet. Behind them, John Wolters is cooking away on the drums, bobbing his head happily. Then he realizes something's wrong. He turns towards the direction of the screaming feedback, but he can't see past George's giant guitar amp. Elswit has noticed now too. He's staring at George dubiously. As the feedback grows louder and louder, George rears back. At this moment, Locorriere notices what's happening. Again he steps away from George's corner of the stage, as if afraid of him. He grabs Sawyer by the shoulder, precisely at the moment that George strikes a giant, nasty distorted guitar chord and then throws his arm up in the air, jumping backwards angrily. Sawyer spins around. Everyone is looking at George now, and the cameraman realizes what's happening and zooms in on him too, just in time to see George hunker down behind his pedal steel station, lurking there like some Grimm-Brothers troll beneath a bridge.
The music stops completely, and for a long suspended lull there is nothing happening onstage; the only sound we hear is George's torn, jagged feedback squall hanging unpleasantly in the air. Uncharacteristically, Locorriere tries to take control of the situation. He walks towards George and sternly says, "No! Not on television!" Helplessly, he turns to Sawyer, who has now come over to George's side of the stage as well. "Not on television," he mouths a second time. Wolters has abandoned his drum kit and is standing up, discussing the situation with Jance Garfat. George keeps the feedback ringing, jabbing the head of his guitar at Locorriere like a spear. At this point, Sawyer seems to give up. He grabs Locorriere hard by his arm and yanks him across the stage, leaving George at his station, where he punches the strings of his electric guitar with a clenched fist, making a loud whanging noise like someone smashing two steel poles together. "Take if OFF!" screams Locorriere, off-mic. The band stands around, wondering what to do. His distortion note having transformed into a low humming howl, George suspends himself on one leg before ducking back down and hiding below his steel, bent over like a troll again, his spine poking through his tight white wife-beater. He lifts his right hand and waves it dismissively at the two singers before clenching in into a fist and shaking it at them. Crawling further under his pedal steel, he points a finger at Locorriere and says something off-mic that sounds like, "I'm coming after you." The only sound onstage is George's guitar and it's as if the only people onstage are George and Locorriere, locked together in mutual antagonism. George seems so absorbed in the confrontation that he barely even notices when Sawyer impishly leaps off the stage, crossing the blackness of the studio floor to briefly sneak up behind him and play with his hair again before running away. His loud low hum hanging in the air, the rebelling guitarist pulls his flask from his back pocket and takes a quick pull off it. Then, with the flask in his right hand, he starts using it as a slide, scraping it across the guitar strings to unleash an angry spasm of noise. He crawls out from the far side of the pedal steel and, still hunched over at the knees, advances towards Locorriere and Sawyer. Concerned, the latter grabs his mic and backs away wildly.
His chaotic noise solo hitting a climax, George suddenly leaps into the air, throwing his hands up high above his head. All sound stops. The editors of Musikladen cut away from the wide shot of George suspended in the air and cut back in on a confusing blur; him rising, him falling.
Negativity and chaos and atonality and despair have already lost this round; brotherhood and love have won.
In utter silence, George thunks back onto the stage and for a second he wobbles around, disoriented. The effect, instead of being menacing, is surprisingly goofy. The entire band bursts into uproarious, howling laughter. George has lost. In a self-deprecating attempt to acknowledge this loss, he holds himself erect, puts one hand behind back, and bends into a low, theatrical, utterly dorky bow. It's the kind of thing you might picture a suburban dungeonmaster doing after a particularly epic D&D session. Sawyer is laughing so hard that he's holding his hands against the side of his head and the mic in his right hand is feeding back loudly. Vanquished, George turns his back and skulks into his corner.
It is at this moment that the rest of Dr. Hook saves the day, for Wolters has made the decision to sit back down at his drums, Rik Elswit sees him and plucks the root note of the song, and Locorriere, taking his bandmates' cue, starts strumming his acoustic. Elswit plays his nifty little country hook and then, in one of my favorite moments in the history of musicianship, the whole band quickly falls in line and the song starts right up again, almost as if nothing had happened. Still shaking with laughter, Sawyer and Locorriere jump back in on their next vocal line, and their eyes briefly meet with a can you believe that happened look. Sawyer leaps up the octave to his high note: "We got all the friends money can buy / so we never have to be alone." He leans in to Locorriere and lays a hand on the right side of his face, stroking his hair as they put their two heads together, Locorriere cracking up as he sings the line, "and we keep getting richer / but we can't get our picture / on the cover of the Rolling Stone." At this, George throws in a barb from the back of the stage: "That's 'cause you can't boogie!" Locorriere glances back angrily at him, but Sawyer is unreachable now. He laughs it off. The band builds up in energy. Locorriere screams and shouts. Sawyer struts. The whole band (but George), beaming, bellows, "Rolling Stone! Rolling Stone! On the cover of the Rolling Stone!" The camera pulls back into a triumphant wide shot. We leave them like that, as the fuzzy black iris closes up and seals them there, in 1974. In the background, you can tell that George has tried his noise bit again. He's rearing back. The guitar is squalling. Sawyer and Locorriere walk toward him. You hear some kind of studio banter, something that sounds like it could be "What the fuck was that?" But negativity and chaos and atonality and despair have already lost this round and brotherhood and love—briefly—have won.
The thing about Dr. Hook at the Medicine Show: Live—its banter, its chaos, its buffoonery—is that it may be all fake. One thing I didn't mention earlier about tracking down those Dr. Hook studio recordings is that they're actually full of banter like this. The studio version of "Cover of the Rolling Stone," in fact, starts with the following bit of chatter:
LOCORRIERE: Dahahaha-oh…I don't believe it.
SAWYER: Shuh…Dagh! Agh! Oh!
LOCORRIERE: Don't touch me. Hey Ray…Tell them who we are!"
Later in the same song, there is a deliberately awful guitar solo (presumably tongue-in-cheek and played by George) and then Sawyer sarcastically says, "Oh, that's beautiful," in much the same way that Sawyer and Locorriere repeatedly say "That's terrible!" in Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show: Live. When I first discovered this, I got depressed. I felt like it had all been an act, and that all the emotions that I'd felt—repeatedly—watching Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show: Live had all been coerced, manipulated out of me. Watching the DVD for what must have been the 20th time, I searched for signs of choreography. I noticed some slightly suspicious stuff. For example, in many of the occasions in which Sawyer jumps right on top of his next vocal line after a moment of complete chaos, I noticed that, during the chaos, he'd carefully grabbed his mic while no one was paying attention. When Locorriere launches into his awkward song-stopping monologue "We figured if one of us had a lot of sex" in "Cover of the Rolling Stone," I similarly noticed Sawyer leaning over and muttering something to him immediately before. A bit of lip-reading and rewinding revealed to me that he's saying "Tell them about the sex." But these moments were few and far between and even the "Tell them about the sex" moment is open to interpretation. Was the original plan for Locorriere to start rambling about sex and for the band to then awkwardly stop playing and Sawyer to finally say, "No, that ain't gonna work?" The opposite seems more likely, that the "Tell them about the sex" moment was intended to be something great—some long spoken ad-lib that Locorriere ended up miffing, or some ragtime piano solo that a drugged-out Billy Francis couldn't hack—and that the chaos we perceive at that moment, a chaos that certainly feels real, was real. These "real or not real" moments, once you start looking for them, end up adding an extra layer of intrigue to Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show: Live. For example, during Locorriere's memorable "some of us are puking" moment, it doesn't really seem like he's puking, per se. There's none of the protracted, difficult-to-watch full-body heaving we all know accompanies actual vomiting. On the other hand, there very definitely is a giant glob of something quite disgusting-looking in his beard.
I had a similar moment with my favorite live album of all time, Sam Cooke's Live at the Harlem Square Club, a sublime 1963 recording that for some is the holy grail of all live albums. Live at the Harlem Square Club is one of those works of art that you almost feel like you could use as proof of the existence of God. In it, Cooke weaves nearly all of his hit singles into a tight, driving set where long stretches of musical banter are almost indistinguishable from the songs and the audience starts to feel indistinguishable from the band. He calls on the audience to picture him standing at a lonely train station with a suitcase in his hand. He instructs them on how to moan along to "Chain Gang" and gives them a long, tender lecture about what to say to each other during a lovers' quarrel. He commands them to take their handkerchiefs out and all wave them, handkerchiefs, white flags in the sweaty air of a 1963 Florida night. But the highlight of the entire set is the last song, "Having a Party," which seems, in the Live at the Harlem Square Club recording, almost like an essay on what live music is supposed to mean. "We're having a party / dancing to the music" goes the chorus, again and again to this beautiful band, swinging along, and at the end of the song—after a long call-and-response with the audience—Cooke tells them that "I hate to quit" and then explains to them what the night has been about, this wonderful ball that they've all been having, and what they should do next:
Don't fight it. You keep on having a party. I gotta go. But when you go home, keep on having that party. No matter where you're at, remember I told you to keep on having that party. If you're with your loved one somewhere, keep on having that party, understand? If you feel good all alone riding to the radio sometime, riding in a car and the radio's on, keep on having that party.
This song is so moving to me I just about weep every time I hear it, and at the same time it's a song that will always cheer me up when nothing else can. It's a song that encapsulates everything I think pop music and performance should be. And it's scripted. According to Peter Guralnick's excellent Cooke biography Dream Boogie, on this particular tour the usually more sedate Cooke was furiously trying to compete with Little Richard's dynamic set on the same bill, and to that end he kept refining the exact same songs in the exact same order, with programmed banter that only changed slightly each night. When you hear Live at the Harlem Square Club, you're hearing a band performing off of a script. At the same time, everybody who's heard it knows that when you listen to Live at the Harlem Square Club that's not what you're hearing at all. You're hearing something that's both faker and truer than real life, you're hearing genuine, surging emotion, organized and ordered for maximum impact on both the audience and the people playing it. On the page, a script is dead. Live, it changes every night, depending on what the audience is like, depending on what happened to the band the day before, if they had a good meal or if they had no sleep, if they fought or if they laughed or if they maybe took too many drugs one afternoon in Hamburg and then remembered they had to play a TV show that night in Bremen.
I don't know how much of Dr. Hook and the Medicine Show: Live reflects a scripted, programmed set and how much is unprogrammed madness and chaos. My hunch is that programming and scripting was minimal at best, but ultimately it doesn't really matter. This is who these guys really and truly and deeply were. We know it and feel it intuitively. These are the guys who founding member George Cummings will soon have "personal and musical differences" with and leave, these are the guys who will almost quit music and declare bankruptcy, who will have a minor comeback with, of all things, the Sam Cooke song "Only Sixteen," and who will then go on to soft-rock success and ignominy. You probably hadn't heard about them before this article, or had vaguely heard about them but didn't care, and if you're still with me by this point I just want to say thank you and to tell you that I feel very silly writing twenty pages about them and you're probably very very sick of them by now and I'm sorry. They weren't really that important. They weren't really unsung heroes. They weren't the Van Goghs of mid-70s rock. They weren't the greatest rock and roll band in the world, except for one night when they were.
Will Sheff is the songwriter and lead singer for Okkervil River. This essay was condensed from an original version published on his web site, willsheff.com.


text:
The same durable sun-blocking fabric used in the shade sails we sell is now available in pre-fabricated curtain panels or in bulk rolls. This fabric not only blocks 90% of the sun's rays, but also serves as an easy, effective way to screen off areas for privacy. For years of service indoors or out, the fabric is made of a rugged 300g/m2 knitted polyethylene with UV, mold and mildew inhibitors and strong edge stitching. The permeable material allows breeze to pass through, minimizing strain on the fabric and any mounting fixtures.
The 50" wide and 96" long curtain panels have large exterior-grade grommets made of stainless steel with a black nickel finish. They can be hung from a cable or curtain rod up to 1-1/2" in diameter and have a weighted bottom hem to help the panel hang straight. Each curtain comes with a matching loop-and-toggle tie-back.
The fabric is also available in 6' wide by 15' rolls to suit a wide range of projects, from dog runs and play areas to garden screening. It is sturdy enough to be attached to a structure with staples, cable ties, wire or cord. To create a sliding panel, fabric clips or grommets can be used.
These products have sold out for the season.

subset: commoncrawl


text:
KEXP Reviews
|Browse by one of the following:
- (Capitol)
While this New York duo has a pretty campy reputation due to their flashy, over-the-top live shows, they've also shown themselves to be savvy record makers, and they continue to get better at it. Their second album finds them using more analog instrumentation for a warmer sound, while also showcasing some serious, well-crafted electro-pop tunes. 3/2/2005 - Don Yates
Other Fischerspooner album reviews:
#1 - 2/15/2003


text:
A Hymn and its History is a ministry that depends solely upon the Lord for his guidance, it is
distributed free as a ministry of HymnalAccompanist.com. Please help us to continue to
touch lives and bring blessings to many others 24 hours a day all over the world.
If you have been blessed by this Ministry please give a donation as the Lord
lays it upon your heart, and share in the Blessings. By investing in the
lives of others you will reap benefits that will last for all eternity.


text:
Microsoft today
confirmed what has been rumored
on the Internet for a few weeks with regards to its Xbox 360 console. The
Redmond giant will include Forza Motorsport 2 and Marvel Ultimate Alliance with
its Xbox 360 Premium and Xbox 360 Elite consoles.
News of the two bundled games first leaked to the web via
Best Buy's online website -- the store later took the product pages down
(likely after being contacted by Microsoft).
Bundled games are nothing new and retailers often bundle
free games with new consoles during special promotions. When the Xbox 360 price cuts
went into effect over the summer, Circuit
City offered Rockstar Table Tennis
for free with the Xbox 360 Premium.
This move, however, marks the first time that Microsoft
itself has officially included two high profile games with its console.
The holiday season should prove to be quite fulfilling for
potential Xbox 360 customers. Microsoft has already rolled out HDMI ports
on the current crop of Xbox 360 Premium, Xbox 360 Elite and Xbox
360 Halo 3 Special Edition consoles.
In addition, cooler-running 65 nanometer Falcon CPUs
are starting to
show up in Halo 3 Special Edition consoles and will likely rollover to the
rest of the Xbox 360 range shortly.


text:
Supreme Court Summaries
Opinions filed May 24, 2012
People ex rel. Glasgow v. Kinney, 2012 IL 113197
Original action for mandamus.
CHIEF JUSTICE KILBRIDE delivered the judgment of the court, with opinion.
Justices Freeman, Thomas, Garman, Karmeier, Burke, and Theis concurred in the judgment and opinion.
This original action in the Illinois Supreme Court for mandamus comes from Will County, where Michael W. Drew pled guilty to DUI in 2009. Although the Illinois Vehicle Code and the Unified Code of Corrections provide that a fourth DUI conviction is a nonprobational Class 2 felony, Drew, who had three prior DUIs, was sentenced to only probation, in the amount of 48 months. The State's Attorney objected and sought mandamus for sentencing in accordance with these codes.
This driver had argued that as to one of his earlier offenses, in Bureau County in 2000, he had pled guilty without legal counsel and, therefore, this prior conviction should not be considered for sentence-enhancement purposes. Relying on earlier decisional authority from the appellate court (which was currently questioned but had never been expressly overruled), the circuit court agreed with this, rejecting the arguments to the contrary raised by the state's attorney.
In the opinion filed today, the Illinois Supreme Court overruled People v. Finley, 209 Ill. App. 3d 968 (1991), upon which the circuit court had relied in making a disposition of probation as it did. This result is based on the more recent decision of the United States Supreme Court in Nichols v. United States, 511 U.S. 738 (1994), which compels the conclusion that a valid uncounseled misdemeanor conviction is also valid when used to enhance punishment as to a subsequent conviction.
A judgment of mandamus was entered by the Supreme Court directing the trial judge to sentence defendant in accordance with statute.


text:
81 members109 Comments 14 Likes
143 members66 Comments 0 Likes
496 members139 Comments 36 Likes
91 members97 Comments 4 Likes
536 members270 Comments 6 Likes
Timothy Allman has not received any gifts yet
Posted on July 26, 2012 at 8:13am 0 Comments 0 Likes
Private unaccredited religious education is really messed up. Two of the main reasons for sending ones children to such a school are 1. to isolate and indoctrinate, 2. to reform children who have been kicked out of public school. These go together well. When teaching their children how evil the outside world is they only have to point to the very troubled second group and say, "See them? That is how the world without God will make you". That is just from my experience and I do not have any…Continue
thanks, timothy.
Welcome, Timothy! Glad you could join us. :D
Please consider joining a group to meet people and talk about anything that's on your mind, Hang With Friends.
© 2018 Atheist Nexus. All rights reserved. Admin: Richard Haynes. Powered by


text:
BAYAMON, Puerto Rico --Fresh off his MLS debut, Christian Wilhelmsson may make his debut in the CONCACAF Champions League on Wednesday against the Puerto Rico Islanders.
Tuesday could be Wilhelmsson's first taste of continental competition in North America after appearing in continental competitions in Europe and Asia. Because he made the trip to Puerto Rico, one would expect Wilhelmsson to play some role in Tuesday's match, but even if he does not, the Swede obtained a valuable experience as he looks to integrate into American soccer.
Below are Wilhelmsson's thoughts from Tuesday's training session...
WILHELMSSON: "It's like any other trip that I've been to. When you're playing a game away, it's a little bit further, but it went smooth. It's like any away game."
On the distance of travel…
WILHELMSSON: "When you play with the national team or the Champion's league then you get these types of trips. You stay in a hotel the day before and it's the same kind of style. It's not a big difference."
(On the conditions at training…)
WILHELMSSON: "There was humidity in the air; the field was spongy with high grass. It's going to be quite heavy to play the game and the ball will go a little bit slower than normal so we have to be prepared."
(On participating…)
WILHELMSSON: "I don't know how we will play or who the team is at the moment. I'm just preparing for playing and I'm trying to get myself ready."
(On his training…)
WILHELMSSON: "I'm playing a little bit right and a little bit left. I'm just trying to get my legs going and my conditioning and it's working out well."
(On his conditioning…)
WILHELMSSON: "Physically, I feel better and better. I feel quite good. It's just the game rhythm that has to grow. Those small things like timing still need to get in rhythm."


text:
This is the diver's watch that uses patented illumination technology 10X brighter than watches using tritium tubes alone. Highly visible in darkened underwater conditions, the watch's three hands and hour markers provide intense, initial brightness using a strontium aluminate coating that spans the time of most recreational dives, recharging to its original intensity when exposed to light. As the intensity fades over several hours, tritium gas-filled tubes built into the hour/minute hands and the 12-, 3-, 6-, and 9 o'clock positions provide reliable illumination for up to 25 years, the only technology to combine both illumination techniques. Completely resistant to salt water and weighing 40% lighter than stainless steel, the solid-forged titanium case, screw-down crown, and caseback provide a rigid, watertight seal that ensures water resistance to 990'. A window clearly displays the day of the week while its unidirectional rotating bezel measures elapsed time underwater. A 3.5mm scratch-resistant K1 crystal protects the face. The watch's precise Miyota quartz movement and 10-year lithium battery ensures reliable timekeeping. The adjustable band fits wrists 5"-8 1/2" and attaches to the case with solid, threaded screw bars, eschewing the unreliable spring bars common to lesser timepieces. Case 1.79" Diam. x .54" thick. (4 1/2 oz.)
Lifetime Guarantee
The Most Visible Diver's Watch comes with The Hammacher Schlemmer Lifetime Guarantee. If this product ever disappoints you, for any reason, you may return your Hammacher Schlemmer purchase for exchange, credit, or refund.
Should you have any questions, we are available seven days a week (8:00 am – midnight EST). Please call 1-800-321-1484 to speak with a specialist or email us at firstname.lastname@example.com to receive a response within three business hours or less.
Shipping charges noted in parentheses apply in addition to our standard shipping & service.
We're sorry, but gift wrap is not available. Please call 1-800-395-7006 for Premium or Express delivery rates.
Oversized items scheduled for expedited delivery (Premium or Express) may incur additional shipping and services charges because of their unusual size. Please call 1-800-321-1484 for an estimate of S&S charges. International callers, please call 1-513-860-3397.
We're sorry, but gift wrap is not available for oversized items.
Shipped via truck and may require customer assistance upon delivery. You will be contacted to make an appointment for delivery.
We're sorry, but gift wrap and gift cards are not available.
GST still applies and will be charged upon processing. For complete shipping & service charges please call Customer Service at
May we recommend:
COPYRIGHT © 2018 HAMMACHER SCHLEMMER & COMPANY, INC. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. W109147 E. 57th ST • NEW YORK, NY • 10022 • 1-800-_321-1484


text:
Monkey business for dolphins
THE internationally famous Monkey Mia dolphins in Western Australia, which swim right up to beachgoers in shallow waters, have added two new calves to their pod.
The state Environment Minister, Bill Marmion, announced the births on Wednesday, saying the calves would be closely monitored by Department of Environment and Conservation staff over the next six weeks to ensure their protection when close to shore.
The dolphins pay daily visits to the World Heritage-listed Shark Bay, attracting more than 80,000 tourists a year as well as science researchers.
''The Monkey Mia dolphins are of worldwide significance and it is extremely important that great care is taken to ensure the newborns are given the greatest chance of survival, as unfortunately there is a high mortality rate for calves in the wild,'' Mr Marmion said.
''It will be some time before the calves become accustomed to visitors … but there are protocols in place to protect them, and the interaction sessions will continue to allow visitors to feed the other beach dolphins.''
Get the Morning Edition
Sign up for our daily wrap of the news you need to start your day.


text:
nss-pam-ldapd is a Name Service Switch module and Pluggable Authentication Module using an LDAP server. It allows your LDAP server to provide user account, group, host name, alias, netgroup, and almost any other information that you would normally get from /etc flat files or NIS, and allows you to do authentication to an LDAP server.
GoAccess is a real-time Web log analyzer and interactive viewer for almost every Web server. It runs in a terminal and provides fast and valuable HTTP statistics for system administrators that require log monitoring and visual reports on the fly. GoAccess can monitor unique visitors, browsers, spiders, OS, hosts and IP geolocation, keyphrases, referring sites, status codes, etc. It has support for IPv6 and it parses nearly any Web log format.
white_dune is a graphical VRML97/X3DV editor, simple NURBS/Superformula 3D modeller, animation tool, and VRML97/X3DV commandline compiler in development. VRML97 (Virtual Reality Modeling Language) is the ISO standard for displaying 3D data over the Web via browser plugins ("HTML for realtime 3D"). X3DV is the direct successor of VRML97. VRML97 and X3DV have support for animation, real-time interaction, and multimedia (images, movies, and sounds). white_dune can read, create, and display VRML97/X3DV files and let the user change the scenegraph/fields. It also has support for stereoscopic view via "quadbuffer"-capable stereo visuals, and support for 3D input devices like a joystick, spaceball, or magnetic tracker.
Aspose.Cells is a Java component for spreadsheet reporting without using Microsoft Excel. Other features include creating spreadsheets, opening encrypted Excel files, macros, VBA, Unicode, formula settings, pivot tables, and importing data from JDBC ResultSet. CSV, SpreadsheetML, PDF, ODS, and all file formats from Excel 97 to Excel 2007 are supported. It supports all advanced features of data management, formatting, worksheet, charting, and graphics.
The STUBS Toolchain and Utility Build Suite is a set of scripts which, together with a set of pre-written configuration files, builds one or more software packages in sequence. STUBS is designed to work in very minimal environments, including those without "make", and URLs are included so source and patches can be downloaded as necessary. Configuration files and scripts are provided which create boot media for Franki/Earlgrey Linux (one of several example busybox- and uClibc-based Linux environments) and the intention is that STUBS should be able to rebuild such an environment from within itself.
TYPO3 CMS is a Web Content Management System which features automatic creation of navigational menus, headlines, and other dynamic graphical elements, automatic conversion and scaling of images, the ability to present different templates based on variables such as client browser or country code, support for multiple templates on a site, and a built-in password-protection option. Pages can be timed to be shown on a certain date, be hidden on a certain date or just temporarily hidden. TYPO3 supports search in SQL-databases and redesigning of a website at once is just a matter of creating a single new template.
Diskless Remote Boot in Linux (DRBL) provides a diskless or systemless environment for client machines. It works on Debian, Mandriva, Red Hat, Fedora, and SuSE. Unlike LTSP, it uses distributed hardware resources and makes it possible for clients to fully access local hardware. It also includes Clonezilla, a partitioning and disk cloning utility similar to Symantec Ghost.
A Web resource optimizer for Java.
A Wordpress plugin that lets users draw using basic options.


text:
About 375 Palo Alto residents — including more than 100 children in local public schools — face relocation with the planned closure of the Buena Vista Mobile Home Park on El Camino Real in Barron Park, the Board of Education was told Tuesday.
Buena Vista residents and their supporters packed the school board chamber to plead for help in their quest to stay put — or at least to keep their kids in Palo Alto schools.
Their plea came a day before the city released a report from the landowner stating Buena Vista residents would receive a minimum of $31,000 — $11,000 as "relocation assistance" and $20,000 or more per home based on assessed fair-market value. Those able to move their homes would receive the $11,000 only.
The developer, Prometheus, plans to replace the 108 mobile homes with 180 apartments.
All five school board members indicated they would back a "statement of support" for Buena Vista students and their families to "partner" with them, the community and the City of Palo Alto "as we seek favorable educational outcomes for the children."
Buena Vista children make up 12 percent of the enrollment at Barron Park Elementary School.
"This is a major potential dislocation with impacts not only on students leaving but on students staying," board member Melissa Baten Caswell said.
School board member Camille Townsend, a lawyer, said she so far has come up short in a search for legal ways to keep children in the district who do not live within its borders.
"Obviously we have the Tinsley program (admitting some children from the Ravenswood City School District), but that was a court-ordered agreement of desegregation many years ago," Townsend said.
"The current policy is that children can stay until the end of the semester after their parents leave, but that doesn't solve it either," Townsend said.
"There's no neat category into which this unique and difficult situation falls — no easy solution yet, but that doesn't mean we're not going to work on this, and it's going to take some time."
Terman Middle School seventh-grader Alvaro Hernandez told the board he would be sad to leave.
"My family and I moved here from East Palo Alto a couple of years ago because Palo Alto is safer. When we lived in East Palo Alto some robbers came into our house with guns, and it was very scary, and that's why I don't want to move to another city."
Alvaro said he dreams of studying hard at Gunn High School and attending Stanford University.
"It will be very sad for me and my sisters to lose our homes, schools and friends," he said.
Supporters of the Buena Vista residents Tuesday included Stanford University Professor Amado Padilla, who served on the Palo Alto school board from 1993 to 1997.
"Many of the Buena Vista adults work in Palo Alto or in immediately surrounding communities, where they are employed in the service industry, in construction, and as nannies or health care workers.
"Thus, the adults living in Buena Vista are important for the contributions they make to ensure that Palo Alto is the great place that we all love," Padilla said.
Buena Vista began as a tourist camp in 1926 and became a trailer park in the early 1950s. It has 104 spaces, but only 98 are currently occupied. The property was purchased by Toufic Jisser in 1986 and is the only mobile-home park in Palo Alto.
The appraiser hired by the Jisser family estimated that most of the mobile homes are so deteriorated that they cannot be moved. Nearly 60 percent of the residences are worth less than $20,000, the report stated.
Palo Alto enacted a 2001 Mobile Home Conversion Ordinance that allows the landowners to close the park, but it outlines procedures for providing relocation assistance and compensating mobile-home owners.
This story contains 633 words.
Stories older than 90 days are available only to subscribing members. Please help sustain quality local journalism by becoming a subscribing member today.
If you are already a subscriber, please log in so you can continue to enjoy unlimited access to stories and archives. Subscriptions start at $5 per month and may be cancelled at any time.


text:
Steepfall Burrow
Steepfall Burrow is a cave located in North Western Skyrim. You can find it by traveling over the mountains West of Solitude.
If you enter the cave, be prepared to battle some Frost Trolls. There is some truly great loot and weapons to be had here, so if you're not afraid of a few trolls, definitely head in.
Just past the entrance you will cross a narrow bridge. Below you is Lower Steepfall Burrow, which can be accessed through a separate cave entrance. If you fall, you will be able to swim out of there.
The Mystery of Princess Talara Part III, a destruction skill book, can be found up past the second Frost Troll.
Top Wiki Contributors
Need assistance with editing this wiki? Check out these resources:
What Links Here
Skill Books | Map Locations | Locations | Caves & Mines | Map Locations - Alphabetical | Caves and Mines


text:
This versatile cart can accommodate a variety of surgical supplies ranging from large instrument trays to IV catheters and other OR supplies simply by combining standard wire shelves with deep bin shelves. Adding shelf dividers, shelf inlays, shelf liners and shelf dividers expands the use of this cart to include IV bags and solutions. The deep bin shelves keep items secure and easily accessible and the open-wire construction promotes air circulation, reducing dust and contaminates. This chrome-finish cart has a load capacity of 1000 pounds, is available in four sizes and features four heavy-duty, non-marring swivel casters. Shelves are easily adjustable in one-inch increments.
Related Reads


text:
KONG Company Teddy Bear has the quality and the ease of which the sqeaker can be replaced and/or removed. As a bonus, all of these dog toys come with a FREE replaceable squeaker.
Very Important: No dog toy is indestructible. Supervise your dog's use of KONGS until you are confident they can be used safely without supervision.


text: I really like the string but sometime I feel like it's too soft on my microgel prestige MP strung at 47lbs. I tried tour bite and it's too stiff due to the string pattern 18/20...strung at 47 too. II was thinking about babolat pro hurricane but I don't know where to place it as far as stiffness. Open to suggestions.... Thanks


text:
Investors cheer Incitec's results
Shares in fertiliser and explosives maker Incitec Pivot have gained more than 5 per cent after it lifted its annual profit by 10 per cent and increased dividends.
However, the share price rise only just managed to offset the previous day's sharp fall caused by the shutdown of an ammonium plant.
Incitec Pivot's net profit in the 12 months to September 30 of $510.7 million was up from $463.2 million in the previous year. The profit growth was primarily due to one-off items, which delivered a $106 million benefit in fiscal 2012, and a $67 million cost in fiscal 2011.
Incitec Pivot also declared a 75 per cent franked final dividend of 9.1 cents per share, up from 8.2 cents at the same time last year.
Its shares were up 15.5 cents, or 5.3 per cent, $3.065 in late morning trade. Incitec Pivot shares lost 5.2 per cent in value on Monday after the company said a temporary shutdown of a plant in Mt Isa, Queensland could cost up to $25 million.
The company' underlying performance was hampered by a drop in earnings from its fertilisers business. Net profit excluding one-off items in the year to September of $404.7 million was down 24 per cent from the previous year's $530.1 million.
Earnings in fertilisers fell by 40 per cent from the previous corresponding period, due to a fall in commodity prices and the strong Australian dollar, Incitec Pivot said.
It expects distribution margins in the fertilisers business to recover to average levels in the year ahead, but the plant closure in Queensland will lower ammonium production. Earnings from explosives were up eight per cent from the previous year.
Chief executive James Fazzino said 60 per cent of the company's earnings came from its explosives business, reflecting a strategic emphasis on that sector.
Mr Fazzino said the Dyno Nobel explosives business, which grew 8 per cent in the year, accounted for 60 per cent of total earnings, while the fertiliser business, where earnings dropped 40 per cent, accounted for the balance.
He said the strong dollar had reduced earnings in its fertiliser business by $40 million in fiscal year to September.
He declined to comment on a newspaper report that Incitec was a potential bidder for the $400 million ammonia company Yara Pilbara, which is being sold by Apache.
Incitec, whose earnings in previous years have been split 50-50 between fertiliser and explosives, had expanded in explosives to tap into Australia's mining boom, but fresh plans have stalled as mining demand subsides.
In September, the company postponed until at least 2015 a decision on whether to expand its ammonium nitrate capacity in Australia, which would have supplied explosives to coal producers in the Hunter Valley.
Incitec said a feasibility study into building an ammonia plant at a brownfield site in Louisiana in the United States was ongoing, and it expected to reach a decision by end-June 2013.
The company also said its sulphuric acid plant at Mt Isa in Queensland will be shut for up to one month for repairs, which would have a financial impact in the current year of $25 million before tax.
Incitec Pivot did not give any further outlook for the current fiscal year.
Shares in Incitec Pivot have fallen 6.4 per cent this year, underperforming a decline of 1.0 per cent for main competitor Orica and a gain of 9.7 per cent for the broader market.
AAP, Reuters
Get the Morning Edition
Sign up for our daily wrap of the news you need to start your day.


text:
Summer Transportation Institute (STI) for High School Students
July 7, 2011
Cheyney University will host a Summer Transportation Institute (STI) for high school students in support of the Federal Highway Administration's vision to develop a diverse, well-qualified workforce for the transportation industry in the 21st century.
The STI program at CU will introduce students to the vast career opportunities in the field of transportation. The program will be an intense 4-week, non-residential program. The students will identify transportation challenges within their neighborhoods and work on developing solutions. Student will be exposed through lectures and visits to organizations and individuals that will provide resource information for this project. The students, under the guidance of full journeymen, will work in teams on the construction of a bridge. Students will build a model bridge by the end of the 4-week program.
Students will attend classes in advanced Math, English and Computer Technology. There will be weekly field trips to reinforce seminars in law, meteorology, green communities, logistics and global influences. SKYPE will be utilized to give students the opportunity to connect with transportation experts in other countries. Field trips will include visits the Goddard Space Center, a Meteorology project at a local college, The Chester County and Philadelphia airports, The Helicopter Museum, The Port Authority, The Market St. Septa/Amtrak station.
Program participants must be high school students with a minimum 2.5 GPA. Lunch and transportation to and from Cheyney University will be provided. The STI program will run Monday thru Friday from 9am-4:00pm from July 25th thru August 19th. Students should apply immediately as space is limited!
Applications will be accepted thru July 18th and will be available at the Charles A. Melton Center, Sankofa Charter School, West Chester Area School District Office and Cheyney University Economic and Workforce Development Center. Students who complete the 4-week program will receive a $500.00 stipend.
Orientation for program participants will be held at the Charles A. Melton Community Center on Monday July 18, 2011 at 6:00pm sharp! A parent or guardian must accompany students to orientation.
Interested parties should contact Ms. Cassandra Jones, Program Director at 610-399-2312 or email at firstname.lastname@example.com or Ms. Sharon Cannon, Executive Director at 610-399-2057 or firstname.lastname@example.com.


text:
By Naomi Dillon
Four years ago, Barack Obama delivered a stunning victory at the presidential polls, in no small part because of his campaign's ability to harness the power of social media to build grass roots support. And so it was for Steve Knagg, who threw his hat into the school board race earlier this year after a short-lived retirement and longtime career with the Garland Unified School District in suburban Dallas.
A seasoned communications professional, Knagg had been instrumental to the district's unblemished record of successful bond referendums. But he soon discovered the world had dramatically changed in the five years since he retired.
"It seems to me, the way people want to get their information these days is on a little screen in their hand," Knagg notes.
Mobile technology and social media have arguably been the 21st century's most disruptive innovations. According to the Pew Internet & American Life Project, two-thirds of Americans who go online do so to visit social networking sites. And many of them do so from smart phones, which about half of all Americans own.
Such ubiquity has changed the way people interact, connect, and exchange information. It's even altered the political process. Indeed, another Pew survey found more than one-quarter of respondents citing social networking sites as an important source for political news, debate, and rallying.
Please click here to continue reading.
Login or Subscribe
Connect with us:
Copyright © 2018, National School Boards Association. American School Board Journal is an editorially independent publication of the National School Boards Association. Opinions expressed by this magazine or any of its authors do not necessarily reflect positions of the National School Boards Association. Within the parameters of fair use, this article may be printed out and photocopied for individual use, provided this copyright notice appears on each copy. This article may not be otherwise, linked, transmitted, or reproduced in print or electronic form without the consent of the Publisher. For more information, call (703) 838-6739.
American School Board Journal. The Source for School Leaders.1680 Duke Street, Alexandria, Virginia 22314, USA (703) 838-6722
© National School Boards Association


text:
Please keep in mind that we do enforce the rules about posting in the correct forums. If it is not directly related to Giants football, do not post it in TAGF. We have provided plenty of areas to discuss almost any type of sports related topics. If it is completely off topic, do notpost it at all
Repeat offenders will be suspended


text:
Sony confirms intention to sell its VAIO brand to JIP
Sony has just delivered the news release confirming that they are going to transfer their VAIO brand PC business to the Tokyo-based investment fund, Japan Industrial Partners, Inc (JIP).
No details were released regarding the monetary value of the deal. There was also no mention of any joint venture or dual ownership of a holding company with JIP for the VAIO PC business.


text:
Kevin Grandia | February 26, 2008
By Kevin Grandia • Tuesday, February 26, 2008 - 08:34
So far we've completed briefing notes on 32 of the presenters at the upcoming climate skeptics conference being organized by the Heartland Institute.
Here's the list:
Nothing new there
Pretty much the same old crowd, eh? Is there any chance of finding out who has registered to attend the "conference"?
Fern Mackenzie
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
There is nothing wrong with
There is nothing wrong with these scientists. The notion that their opinions are dictated by big oil is terribly passe. Has it occurred to you that even if you get some funding from industry sources that you can still carry out honest research or that your opinion is not necessarily tainted by association?
But I do believe that many scientists are indeed somewhat biased in the way they collect their data or interpret their observations.
Fortunately we have the internet to gather information on any conceivable subject. We can search for opinions that are counter to the mainstream views or whether these dissenting views are given any voice in the media.
This is especially true in relation to climate change, where the mainstream alarmist view (climate change is man-made and bad) has been challenged by a minority view alleging that it is mainly natural and of no great concern. Since the general public (i.e the average desmogblogger) does not have the expertise to judge the scientific arguments on their merits, it remains a contentious subject.
To overcome this shortcoming, I suggest you do the following statistical test on the internet. It is an effective way to help the layperson to decide whether the media and the science of climate change are giving us a fair representation of the alleged dangers.
Take 50 things that we humans like, such as: butterflies, koala bears, polar bears, penguins, squirrels, wine, frogs, skiing, peace, health, cave paintings, archaeological sites etc. and then 50 things we don't like, such as: cockroaches, sharks, feral cats, cane toads, jelly fish, droughts, hurricanes, snow storms, floods, malaria, crime, allergy etc. Then Google each of them with the term "global warming" or "climate change" and see what happens.
Invariably one will notice the following. Anything we like is going to suffer and anything we don't like is going to thrive. You will never find butterflies and colorful tropical fishes thriving and cockroaches and rats suffering.
Since the forces of nature are insensitive to the preferences of humans there should be a balanced outcome of thriving or declining likes and dislikes. Since this is not the case, the statistic significance of this exercise allows us to draw the conclusion that the sciences dealing with climate change are genarally alarmist and subject to severe bias. One doesn't have to be a scientist to be able to make that claim, even a desmogblogger can!
Cutting-edge denialist "science" and "logic" strikes again!
Chris Schoneveld scripsit,
"I suggest you do the following statistical test on the internet. Take 50 things that we humans like"
Now _that's_ cutting-edge denialist "science" at work! We can know about the actual state of the climate, not by actually studying temperature records, but by using Google to what people think! And this totally "scientific" method is based on Chris Schoneveld's totally subjective impression of what humans "like" and "don't like"! (For example, I'm not sure humans _like_ polar bears – they're endangered, but you sure don't want to get really up close to one.) And whether such and such a thing is going to "thrive", is of course according to the same kind of 100% scientific interpretation of some Google search results! It's absolutely science-tific!
_I'll_ tell you what a layperson (me) already knows about global warming. First, global warming doesn't exist… and it's mainly caused by the sun… and it's also mainly caused by methane… and it's mainly China and India's fault. And – of course – it's the terrorists'! Climate models can easily be rigged to fit any data, but Hansen et al.'s models can't fit the data at all! It's a miracle! Global warming came to an end in 1998… and it came to an end again in 2008… and it never existed anyway! And so on.
- - -
By the way, um, _Dr._ Chris Schoneveld, I decided to use Google for something else. I couldn't find any mention of any published scientific papers written by you, try as I might… and I find this strange. Perhaps you can give me a citation or two of some of your peer-reviewed research work? It sure will help clear up a lot of things.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
I am sorry I can't follow
I am sorry I can't follow your incoherent ramblings. Your insinuations about my academic credentials are also rather peculiar, to put it mildly. But to satisfy your curiosity as to who is behind these heretic posts on desmogblog try Google for:
"Schoneveld" and "porphyroblasts" .
I wonder whether you will be gracious enough to offer me an apology.
Schoneveld is grasping at shadows
Chris Schoneveld:
"I wonder whether you will be gracious enough to offer me an apology."
I thought a bit about this, and I say: no, no apology. Especially since I was just asking, not accusing. And especially since you have time and time again outright accused the climatology community of bias, with nothing concrete to show for it.
(And no, your proposed `survey' is a shoddy `method' which is totally subjective and proves nothing.)
"Has it occurred to you that even if you get some funding from industry sources that you can still carry out honest research or that your opinion is not necessarily tainted by association?"
So where's this "honest research"? You repeatedly suggest that there's "honest research" on climate change out there by "skeptics". You claim that this "honest research" exists; so show it.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Stephen Berg replied on Permalink
What do porphyroblasts have
What do porphyroblasts have to do with climatology?
So what research have these
So what research have these scientists done in the past five years that has been published in peer reviewed journals?
Ian Forrester replied on Permalink
You call yourself a scientist?
Good grief, Inhofe really had to scrape the bottom of the
barrel to put you on his infamous list of "eminent" (or was that imminent) scientists.
I think you will find that the "average desmogblogger" has far more knowledge about climate science than you have. Your post is a disservice to DeSmogBlog since it lowers the scientific credibility substantially. Your post is more in keeping with the junk science posted on climateaudit. I suggest that you keep your junk science to blogs that support that sort of rubbish and not lower the standards of DeSmogBlog
Ian Forrester
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Kevin, you forgot to
Kevin, you forgot to mention: Robert C. Balling Jr., Ph.D.
He will speak on Monday 3 March, title of his talk: The Increase in Global Temperature: What It Does and Does Not Tell Us
His Bio:
Professor in the climatology program in the School of Geographical Sciences at Arizona State University.
Prior to accepting a position in Arizona, he was a faculty
member in the climatology program at the University of Nebraska. Over the past 20 years, Balling has been involved in a variety of interrelated climatological issues. He has published more than 125 articles in the professional
scientific literature, received more than $3,000,000 in research grants, presented lectures throughout the United States and in more than a dozen foreign countries, and appeared in a number of scientific documentaries
and news features. He has served as a climate consultant to the United Nations Environment Program, the World Climate Program, the World Meteorological Organization, the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization, and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Balling has written three books on climate change: The Heated Debate: Greenhouse Predictions Versus Climate Reality, Interactions
of Desertification and Climate, and The Satanic Gases: Clearing the Air about Global Warming.
From Sourcewatch: "Balling
From Sourcewatch:
"Balling has acknowledged that he had received $408,000 in research funding from the fossil fuel industry over the last decade (of which his University takes 50% for overhead). Contributors include ExxonMobil, the British Coal Corporation, Cyprus Minerals and OPEC."
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Kevin, you also overlooked:
Kevin, you also overlooked: David H. Douglass, Ph.D.
He speaks on Monday 3 March at 08.45
David H. Douglass is professor of physics in experimental condensed
matter physics at the University of Rochester, whose faculty he joined in 1968. He was a recipient of the Alfred P. Sloan Award (junior) for four years, the Alfred P. Sloan Award (senior), and the University of Rochester's Bridging Fellowship to the Eastman School of Music. He is a fellow of the American Physical Society. His work has involved experiments in the areas of liquid helium and superconductivity (both low temperature and high temperature). He also has made significant contributions in the field of gravitational wave detectors. He has also worked on chaos and frequency drifts of spectral lines of extended sources. His interests for the past several years are on climate change, in particular with the fundamental science issues underlying "global warming."
In a recent paper(*), Douglass et al. take the output of models, treat them as if they're raw observations, and then make the assumption that the models are "independent" (Section 2.3).
lolwut? Observations can be independent, but talking about independent models is clearly bunk.
So much for "sound science" and "honest research".
- - -
(*) D. H. Douglass, J. R. Christy, B. D. Pearson, and S. F. Singer. 2007. A comparison of tropical temperature trends with model predictions. International Journal of Climatology.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Kevin, another one: Stanley
Kevin, another one: Stanley B. Goldenberg
Stanley B. Goldenberg is a meteorologist with the Hurricane Research Division/AOML/NOAA located in Miami, Florida. His hurricane-related research has included developing and implementing significant improvements to one of the earlier numerical hurricane-track prediction models used by the National Hurricane Center. More recently, he has examined the various climatic factors that influence the variability of hurricane activity in the Atlantic from intra-seasonal to multi-decadal time scales. In particular, he has done extensive research into the physical mechanisms responsible for the connection between El Niño and Atlantic hurricane activity. Goldenberg has participated in numerous research flights into nearly 20 hurricanes aboard NOAA's P-3 aircraft and on many of the NOAA G-IV jet's flights. His interest and experience in hurricane disaster preparedness was greatly increased when his home was destroyed as his family experienced the full force of Hurricane Andrew (1992). His family's Andrew experience has been featured in TV specials done by National Geographic, PBS, and the Discovery Channel. He has authored several scientific papers and has been a regular speaker at numerous
hurricane preparedness, insurance and scientific conferences.
http://tinyurl.com/2n7vpf -=-
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Kevin, one more skeptic:
Kevin, one more skeptic: Fred Goldberg
Fred Goldberg is associate professor at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm and an authority on polar history and exploration. He has been an invited lecturer at more than a dozen universities around the world and has participated in numerous conferences worldwide with papers about thermal cutting, mechanized welding, laser processing, and seam tracking systems. He has published in more than 12 languages on those topics as well as on polar history and exploration. In 1966, he participated in the Stockholm University Svalbard Expedition with Prof. Valter Schytt and Prof. Gunnar Hoppe. In 2004 he formed an informal international network to study and distribute information
about climate change and global warming. In 2006 he was appointed Secretary General for an International Climate Seminar at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm. He has been a frequent lecturer on climate change at civic organizations, on television programs, and to such wide-ranging groups as the Travellers Club, the Swedish Parliament, California Institute of Technology, Linköpings University, University of Copenhagen, Liberalni Institute, University of Leiden, the 9th International Conference on Arctic Mining (Norway), the 260 Club (Tucson, Arizona), and Alandia People's Education Center.
"The July issue of the journal Polar Biology reported four dead polar bears floating in the open waters of the Beaufort Sea in 2004 and attributed the deaths to drowning. But, not everyone is convinced by the data coming in.
"`I'm going to write a letter to the World Wildlife Fund to ask who did an autopsy that found polar bears drowned,' said Fred Goldberg, an authority on polar history and exploration at the Royal Institute of Technology in Stockholm, Sweden.
"Aerial surveys of the area between 1987 and 2003 found no evidence of polar bears drowning. Goldberg also stated that since the bears were protected from hunting in 1973, "there have never been so many polar bears."
Therefore all the climatologists were wrong and global warming is a myth. Um… yeah.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Obviously those bears all
Obviously those bears all committed suicide. Like the Woody Allen joke about the man who committed suicide by shooting himself from a passing car.
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Kevin, Please update your
Kevin, Please update your list: David Henderson
David Henderson was formerly (1984-92) head of the Economics and Statistics Department of the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) in Paris. Before that, he had worked as an academic economist at Oxford and University College London; as an economic adviser in Her Majesty's Treasury and as chief economist in the UK Ministry of Aviation; with the World Bank, where he was at one point director of the Economics Department; and as a consultant in Greece, Malaysia, and for the World Bank. In 1985 he gave the BBC Reith Lectures, which were published in book form under the title Innocence and Design: The Influence of Economic Ideas on Policy (Blackwell,1986). Since leaving the OECD Henderson has been an independent author and consultant and has acted as visiting fellow or professor at the OECD Development Centre (Paris), the Centre for European Policy Studies (Brussels), Monash University (Melbourne), the Fondation Nationale des Sciences Politiques (Paris), the University of Melbourne, the Royal Institute of International Affairs (London), the New Zealand Business Roundtable, the Melbourne Business School, and the Institute of Economic Affairs (London). He is currently a visiting professor at the Westminster Business School, London, and also at the London School of Economics. He is an honorary fellow of Lincoln College, Oxford and in 1992 was made Commander
of the Order of St Michael and St George.
E&E, the Journal where the Bogus is Strong
Castle and Henderson's "IPCC SRES Revisited" critique was published in Energy and Environment. Enough said.
Why couldn't they get published even in a proper economics journal? I guess Henderson's economic theory isn't as sound as it seems to be after all! (At least when it comes to AGW matters.)
Of course, not content with being debunked, Castle and friends decided to trot out the same "PPP vs. MER" talking points in the latest issue of…
…drum rolls please…
…Energy and Environment.
$ound $cience sure rocks!
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Kevin, and what about: Yuri
Kevin, and what about: Yuri A. Izrael
Yuri A. Izrael is a vice-chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), and the "most influential scientific advisor" for Vladimir Putin, the president of Russia, according to CNN. He is a former chairman of the Committee for Hydrometeorology.
He also served as director of the Institute of Global Climate and Ecology, which is apart of the Russian Academy of Sciences. He was a former first vice-president of the World Meteorological Organization and helped develop World Weather Watch. In 1992, Izrael won the UNEP Sasakawa Environment Prize for, among other accomplishments, contributing to the "success of Working Group II" of the IPCC.
From Wikipedia:"Izrael was
From Wikipedia:
"Izrael was chairman of the State Committee on Hydrometeorology (Goskomgidromet) at the time of the Chernobyl nuclear accident. Following the accident he was widely criticized for slow and inaccurate monitoring. He was also criticized for allowing air pollution throughout the USSR to reach unprecedented levels."
Maybe that's why he's now a "former" chairman.
Rock on, $ound $cience!
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Um, Dr. Schoneveld, you can engage in as much name-dropping as you like, but all that still fails to answer the question… what precisely are the peer-reviewed research papers they have written which dispute the AGW theory in an intellectual honest way?
You claimed there's "honest research" out there disputing AGW. If so, then show us the research papers. Tell us exactly what's right about these particular research papers.
Cutting-and-pasting a lot of bios doesn't do it.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Ok Frank, I was waiting for
Ok Frank, I was waiting for you, because I was otherwise going to continue my cut and paste exercise until infinity, just to show you that Kevin only put those scientists (the names he dropped)on his list of which he could dig up some alleged dubious connection with a right wing think tank or big oil. He conveniently left out those scientists who are apparently "unblemished". There are dozens more I could mention but I think the readers must have got the message by now. You didn't seem to get the intention of my cutting and pasting.
And could you please tell me the research papers that have given the unequivocal proof that AGW is responsible for the climate variations that we have experienced since humans have used fossil fuels? In previous blogs I have quoted a number of papers that give good evidence that climate change can have many causes among which CO2 may well be a minor contributor.
Please before you continue disqualifying me because of my supposed lack of climate research credentials, could you give me an indication what your background is that makes you so qualified to attack anyone who is an AGW skeptic?
Then quote them again
"In previous blogs I have quoted a number of papers that give good evidence that climate change can have many causes among which CO2 may well be a minor contributor."
Then quote them again. Surely your cut-and-paste skills allow you to do that.
Or do you cut-and-paste only when the content doesn't actually prove anything?
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Frank, you first identify
Frank, you first identify yourself and tell us what your scientific background is that makes you the (self-righteous) authority on this blog.
You repeatedly claimed that
You repeatedly claimed that "honest research" disputing AGW exists.
The onus is on you to prove your claim.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Kevin, please add also: J.
Kevin, please add also: J. O'Brien, Ph.D.
James J. O'Brien is Robert O. Lawton Distinguished Professor
and professor emeritus of meteorology and oceanography
at The Florida State University and retired director of its Center for Ocean-Atmospheric Prediction Studies. He has been a physical scientist in oceanography and meteorology for 40 years, modeling time-dependent ocean motions, understanding of El Niño, and applying El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) forecasts to the United States. O'Brien is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, American Geophysical Union (AGU), American Meteorological Society (AMS), Royal Meteorological Society, and Oceanographical Society of Japan. He has received numerous awards for his work, including in 2006 a medal from the Florida Academy of Sciences and the UDA Prize from the Japan Oceanographic Society. O'Brien was appointed State of Florida Climatologist in 1999 and served on the Florida Commission on Hurricane Loss Projection Methodology from 1999 to 2005. He has served on scores of committees with the AGU, AMS, Goddard Space Flight Center, National Academy of Sciences, National Aeronautics and Space Administration, National Climatic Data Center, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, and Scientific Committee on Oceanic Research and has published hundreds of articles in peer-reviewed journals.
Stop spamming.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Oh, and...
O'Brien is a member of Tech Central Station, the George C. Marshall Institute, and the Fraser Institute. Need I say more?
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
To repeat my questions
To repeat my questions:
Um, Dr. Schoneveld, you can engage in as much name-dropping as you like, but all that still fails to answer the question… what precisely are the peer-reviewed research papers they have written which dispute the AGW theory in an intellectual honest way?
You claimed there's "honest research" out there disputing AGW. If so, then show us the research papers. Tell us exactly what's right about these particular research papers.
Cutting-and-pasting a lot of bios doesn't do it.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Frank, you must have missed
Frank, you must have missed my response earlier on. Yours sincerely.
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Dear F.Bi, Here are just 3
Dear F.Bi,
Here are just 3 papers (cut and past of course). After you have read them (look for them on the internet) and reviewed them, I will give you another 3 etc etc.
I am sure your comments won't be of "peer-review" quality because you have not identified yourself as a qualified academic in all your post thus far.
Tornetrask tree-ring width and density AD 500–2004: a test of climatic sensitivity and a new 1500-year reconstruction of north Fennoscandian summers
By: Hakan Grudd, Department of Physical Geography and Quaternary Geology,
Stockholm University, Sweden
The late-twentieth century is not exceptionally warm in the new Tornetra¨sk record: On decadal-to-century timescales, periods around AD 750, 1000, 1400, and 1750 were all equally warm, or warmer. The warmest summers in this new reconstruction occur in a 200-year period centred on AD 1000. A ''Medieval Warm Period'' is supported by other
paleoclimate evidence from northern Fennoscandia, although the new tree-ring evidence from Tornetra¨sk suggests that this period was much warmer than previously recognised.
Published In: GEOPHYSICAL RERSEARCH LETTERS
Surface warming by the solar cycle as revealed by the composite mean difference projection
By: Charles D. Camp and Ka Kit Tung
published 18 July 2007. One of their conclusions:
At the global scales, an objectively determined spatial filter can be constructed using the composite difference between the solar-max years and the solar-min years.
This filter effectively removes the shorter interannual variations, such as from ENSO. We obtained a globally averaged warming of almost 0.2 K during solar max as compared to solar min, somewhat larger than previously reported.
A comparison of tropical temperature trends with model
David H. Douglass et al.
The last 25 years constitute a period of more complete
and accurate observations and more realistic modelling
efforts. Yet the models are seen to disagree with the
observations. We suggest, therefore, that projections of
future climate based on these models be viewed with
much caution.
Alex J replied on Permalink
So how many of those papers
So how many of those papers actually constitute a serious challenge to the case for anomalous global change (vs. regionally-concentrated and non-synchronous events like during the MWP), and of those how many survived peer review? There seem to be plenty of papers on the persistent forcing effect of CO2, as well studies of natural influences, but wouldn't most serious researchers say there's no such thing as "unequivocal proof" in science? Only strong theory subject to further refinement and testing?
Let's see
Grudd's paper is about Fennoscandia.
I already talked about Douglass et al.'s bogus paper above.
That leaves Camp and Tung, which I understand is perfectly good work but doesn't even dispute the AGW theory: http://tinyurl.com/35nl9a
- - -
So, Schoneveld is still maintaining an impressive track record of being Completely Wrong. Hey, maybe someone should write an epic novel with Dr. Schoneveld as the Brave Hero of the Wrong. It'll be a hoot!
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
And Michael Mann's shocking
And Michael Mann's shocking paper was about bristle cone pines of America South west. Not very global, huh?
Explain me in your own words why Douglass paper is bogus, yet it is a peer reviewed paper. Weren't you asking for peer reviewed papers? So are you now saying that peer review is not necessarily a guarantee for quality?
Shorter Schoneveld: Peer-review infallible except when it isn't
"And Michael Mann's shocking paper was about bristle cone pines of America South west. Not very global, huh?"
Nobody except denialists has claimed they're global.
"So are you now saying that peer review is not necessarily a guarantee for quality?"
Yeah, that's what I think. It's you who are treating "peer-review" as infallible except when it comes to the mainstream climatologists' work.
Your "scientific" standards are pretty high, eh, aren't they?
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
Are you serious? The IPCC
Are you serious? The IPCC used his hockey stick to show that GLOBAL warming was unprecedented in human history.
"The IPCC used his hockey stick to show that GLOBAL warming was unprecedented in human history."
…as one piece of evidence among others. Again and again you denialists like to talk as if the IPCC's and Al Gore's entire thesis is totally, absolutely based on nothing but Mann et al.'s work. Again, that is not true.
Now, if you'd like to tell us why Douglass et al. are somehow justified in talking about "independent models", you're welcome.
If your only excuse for defending Douglass et al.'s paper is "it's peer-reviewed! It's peer-reviewed!", then you're obviously an idiot.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Oops. I actually managed to whittle down Dr. Schoneveld's list of SEVEN (7) "skeptic" scientists who are "unblemished", "honest", and "peer-reviewed"… to ZERO (0).
Clearly an impressive feat on Schoneveld's part – an unblemished track record of perfect wrongage.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Nice work, Frank Bi.
Nice work, Frank Bi.
Chris Schoneveld replied on Permalink
You are demanding,
You are demanding, demanding, demanding, (like a self proclaimed inquisitor) but fail time and time again to give your own academic credentials (I doubt you have any). You also failed to offer me any scientific "peer reviewed" (the magic word on eco-blogs for those who have no clue about the many other ways that research is being disseminated in academic circles) papers that convincingly show that global warming of the last 30 years is in any way different from the natural global temperature fluctuations before that.
Wow, here is one other "PEER REVIEWED" paper. If you are qualified to criticize the paper please go ahead, but don't start quoting sources like Realclimate to hide behind your own ignorance.
The second paper (A working paper, not peer reviewed in the strictest sense) can be considered as a partial rebuttal of the Nobel committee's justification to give the IPCC and Al Gore the Nobel Peace Prize.
I herewith throw the towel in the ring because I doubt I will receive any reasonable response. Being retired allowed me the luxury to waste my time with you. I must confess I deliberately continued the "debate" to see how doctrinaire, pedantic, but above all, incoherent and "ad hoministic"(my neologism) eco-bloggers can be.
Unresolved issues with the assessment of multidecadal global land surface temperature trends
Roger A. Pielke Sr., et al.
Published 29 December 2007.
A major conclusion is that, as a climate metric to diagnose climate system heat changes (i.e., ''global warming''), the surface temperature trend, especially if it includes
the trend in nighttime temperature, is not the most suitable climate metric. As reported by Pielke [2003], the assessment of climate heat system changes should be performed using
the more robust metric of ocean heat content changes rather than surface temperature trends. If temperature trends are to be retained in order to estimate large-scale
climate system heat changes (including a global average), the maximum temperature is a more appropriate metric than using the mean daily average temperature. This paper
presents reasons why the surface temperature is inadequate to determine changes in the heat content of the Earth's climate system.
Richard S.J. Tol and Sebastian Wagnere
a Economic and Social Research Institute, Dublin, Ireland
b Institute for Environmental Studies, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
c Department of Spatial Economics, Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
d Department of Engineering and Public Policy, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh,
e Institute for Coastal Research, GKSS Research Centre, Geesthacht, Germany
January 15, 2008
Working Paper FNU-154
We investigate the relationship between a thousand-year history of violent conflict in Europe and various reconstructions of temperature and precipitation. We find that conflict was more intense during colder periods. This relationship is weakening over time, and is not robust to the details of the climate reconstruction or to the sample period.
We thus confirm Zhang et al. (2006, Climatic Change, 76, 459-477) that, at least in temperate climates, global warming would, if anything, lead to reduced violent conflict.
Shorter Schoneveld: I'm wrong, but I'm still right!
Pielke Sr.'s proposed metric doesn't seem to be changing any conclusions. Whether you use surface temperatures or ocean heat content, there's still a warming trend. So what was your point again? (http://tinyurl.com/rdelo)
As for your bringing up of the second paper: yeah, global warming doesn't exist, and global warming is good? A genius argument!
- - -
"You are demanding, demanding, demanding, (like a self proclaimed inquisitor)"
Ah, the spectre of Galileo! Works every time.
"I must confess I deliberately continued the `debate' to see how doctrinaire, pedantic, but above all, incoherent and `ad hoministic'(my neologism) eco-bloggers can be."
Oh really. If I say I'm wrong, then you're right. If I don't say I'm wrong, then it's my fault for being a "doctrinaire", "pedantic", et cetera et cetera etcetera "eco-blogger". Great double-edged logic.
Thing is, you don't actually have any "smoking gun" argument to dispute the AGW theory – if you actually had one, you'd have simply presented it long ago. That's why you have to engage in "argumentum verbosum" (http://tinyurl.com/2j84br), and what your so-called "arguments" lack in quality, you simply make up for with quantity.
Well, it was nice watching your antics… and debunking a few more denialist arguments while at it. Good day.
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
Ian Forrester replied on Permalink
Schoneveld does have a fictional character
Frank, no need to write another fictional epic for Schonevelde. He is showing everyone that he is the "Black Knight" of the Denier band of pseudo-scientists.
He is doing us all a favour by putting all the denier rubbish in one easy to find file. No need to Google them all separately. If he continues we will have all the junk science in one easy to find place.
Ian Forrester
" ...at least in temperate
" …at least in temperate climates, global warming would, if anything, lead to reduced violent conflict."
I've just heard Brian Fagan on CBC radio's Quirks and Quarks talking about how during Europe's Medieval Warm Period, years of warmer weather allowed people to expand farming, then colder weather caused crop failures and mass starvation. The point being that people adapted to certain conditions, and could not adapt when the conditions changed.
He believes the main problem with global warming will be lack of water. Global warming leads to longlasting droughts; and I would expect much more global conflict over water even though the temperature is warmer. I'll bet that Tol and Wagnere are being too simplistic.
Edited to add link about Fagan's book: http://www.brianfagan.com/reviews.html
Strong link in distant past, weak link now
VJ, it seems your surmise was right. Here's Tol and Wagner's working paper: http://tinyurl.com/2l5zxp … I wonder why they cut off the running correlation graph (Figure 4) at 1850?
Oh wait, global warming doesn't exist, so whether AGW's good or not is all moot anyway. :B
Frank Bi, http://globaldumbing.tk
William Briggs replied on Permalink
I was a speaker at the Heartland Conference
I notice that I was left me off the list of people who spoke at the Heartland Climate Conference.
I have been actively engaged in statistical climatology and meteorology for a long time. For example, I am a member of the American Meteorological Society's Probability and Statistics Committee, am an Associate Editor of Monthly Weather Review, and, e.g., have a paper about to come out in J. Climate showing tropical storms and hurricanes have not increased. I have a version of that paper at the Heartland Conference.
I have never gotten any money, not even salary, for any of the work I have ever done in meteorology and climatology (since my graduate student tuition at Cornell). I have never received anything from any tobacco or oil or energy company. I did not get the honorarium from Heartland to speak at their conference.
My summary of the conference and of state of knowledge is this: too many people are too confident about too many things. I have a longer summary at my web site, which is http://wmbriggs.com
All the best,
William Briggs
Darren Rickard replied on Permalink
Global Warming
I understand world renown "greeny" Botanist and Scientist David Bellamy was there. There were also a couple of Kiwi climate change deniers. This is a brilliant forum as it fights against the myth of GW and its clear political overtones.
Darren Rickard replied on Permalink
Retraction of above
It seems I shot my mouth off without delving further into this website.
The premise of this site is intellectually retarded and it seems clear that the supporters of it need some sort of prescription drug to restore their sanity.
Clearly we can rely on your
Clearly we can rely on your well researched and carefully thought out opinions… Not.
GW is washed up
Frank, you've got a good line in sharp tactics but your GW theory has run out of steam - been real cold this winter hasn't it? In fact the IPCC never made anything stick, from the Mann 'Hockey Stick' Study onward the IPCC swallowed any case it could find to make itself more important and just pigged-out on flawed computer models and selective sceince in desperation to please its political manipulators. I notice how you concentrate on the anti-GW evidence but don't come out with any of your own? Have you any study that isn't based on a stupid model? Much of the IPCC's own observational science has being challanged, from it's inaccurate tempreture readings to its claims about polar ice caps melting. Currently neither is happening, in fact quite the reverse. Secondly much of the scare stories about extreme weather have again been found completely false. Global warming leads to greater plant growth (as do higher CO2 levels) greater bio-diversity and greater species (not threats to food chains and extinction). Nearly every claim about the threats are overstated and/or completly inaccurate. Why don't you find another topic, something that has a little merit, like The Earth is 'Possibly Flat' Society! Even the IPCC's Vice President had now admitted Govts have been too hasty jumping on the GW bandwagon and there are many other possibilities to GW than CO2. This GW theory has lost its hot air. IPCC RIP.