THE LATEST PANIC: GLOBAL WARMING AND WINE

Global warming may doom the Napa Valley, CBS News warned its July 12 "Evening News" audience. Yet correspondent John Blackstone excluded any scientists, including those who otherwise believe in man-made global warming, who warn that new computer models are conclusive or don't match up against recorded climate patterns. "New research says global warming threatens to make the Napa Valley too hot to make fine wine," Blackstone warned. A new study by Purdue University's Noah Diffenbaugh, Blackstone added, predicts that "across the country global warming could destroy more than 80 percent of the best vineyards."

But scientists who had a skeptical take on Diffenbaugh's conclusions were missing from Blackstone's report. In a July 11 article on Diffenbaugh's study, San Francisco Chronicle environment reporter Jane Kay cited University of Alabama's John Christy and the National Center for Atmospheric Research's (NCAR) Kenneth Trenberth as skeptics of Diffenbaugh's conclusions. Christy found "that using a model to reproduce past observations" was not "successful for the years 1910-2003" when calculating central California climate changes for a recent study published in the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Climate, Kay reported.

"I would not base economic decisions on the output of regional predictions from these models," Christy told the Chronicle. "As Alabama's state climatologist, I've watched agriculture closely during these past 20 years, and I've seen how farmers have applied clever adaptations to overcome many negative impacts on their produce, including those from climate variations."

"Models are not good enough for this purpose in my view," agreed NCAR climate analyst Kevin E. Trenberth, who is no global warming skeptic. Kay added that most of Trenberth's colleagues "don't yet accept predictions of future effects on crops," even though they believe in melting glaciers producing "rising sea levels."

Blackstone also left out a key fact reported by the CBS Web site: historically, climate change devastated grape growing well before the industrialization which many environmentalists blame for today's climate change. "A thousand years ago when Viking explorers arrived on the coasts of eastern Canada and New England, they named the region Vinland, a designation that has perplexed many historians since grapes are uncommon there now," CBS News and the Associated Press reported in a July 12 article available on CBSNews.com.

The CBS/AP article even cited Diffenbaugh noting that English vineyards - now resurging from warmer weather - got a chilly reception in "the Little Ice Age" that begin in the Middle Ages.

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The report might also have noted that modern grape varieties even grow in the tropics (e.g. in the Australian city of Townsville) and it will be a long time before the Napa valley is as hot as the topics. The tropical grapes in fact grow faster so are valued as providing fresh table grapes long before the harvest in cooler latitudes takes place






CALIFORNIA PESTICIDE BAN BACKFIRES

The most useful pesticides (pyrethroids) that are still permitted kill lots of things too -- what an amazing thing for a pesticide to do! Down with all pesticides! Welcome to all cockroaches, lice, ticks and grubs!

California next month will begin to regulate a broad class of pesticide that has become the dominant home and garden bug-killer. The state Department of Pesticide Regulation in August will notify manufacturers of pyrethroid insecticides that they must share data on their products or those products will be banned from sale in California. The data will drive a regulatory review that could result in use restrictions or a ban on specific products. In doing so, California steps out ahead of the federal government and other states in regulating pyrethroids, found to be deadly to aquatic life at very low concentrations.

Mary-Ann Warmerdam, director of the Department of Pesticide Regulation, said it will be the biggest pesticide regulation effort in state history, involving 600 consumer products sold in hardware stores, garden centers and pet stores. "We know we have enough caution flags, and that requires a regulatory effort," said Warmerdam. "I would rather see pyrethroids stay on the market, because of their positive attributes. But that only happens if we all work together."

Pyrethroid insecticides are those with active ingredients that end in "thrin" -- permethrin and cypermethrin mostly in household products, and the more potent bifenthrin and cyfluthrin used by pest-control professionals. At the retail level, the products are sold in sprays or in granules added to fertilizers spread on lawns. They are also used in some pet soaps and shampoos. Examples include Raid, Decathlon, Ambush, Easygone and Terro.

Consumers won't see any immediate changes. But within a few months, retail stores may begin to offer more educational materials to help consumers cut back on pesticide use. Manufacturers must respond within two months to the state's request for data; then they'll have a year to deliver that data. Those that don't respond or refuse to cooperate will have their products banned, said Warmerdam. The state will work with manufacturers to analyze the data and conduct additional studies and then decide what specific regulations will be most effective. That could happen by 2008. "Pyrethroids are a real problem in the urban setting, and their use is going up," said Pete Price, a lobbyist with the League of Conservation Voters. "I think it's in everyone's interest that we get more serious in the state about managing urban pesticide use."

Pyrethroids are manufactured versions of pyrethrins, natural insecticides produced by certain species of chrysanthemum. These stronger synthetic derivatives began to dominate the retail market in 2000. That coincided with the phasing out of pesticides more dangerous to humans and water quality, mainly the organophosphates diazinon and chlorpyrifos. Pyrethoids are considered safer, partly because they don't easily dissolve in water. But researchers found instead that pyrethroids attach easily to soil particles, hitching a ride when overwatering washes topsoil into storm drains. They are also more harmful to fish and other aquatic creatures than the products they replaced.

Tracking the problem is difficult, because consumer pesticide use is not regulated. But a study completed in June for the San Francisco Estuary Project suggested that residential application of pesticides far exceeds commercial and farm use. Donald Weston, a UC Berkeley environmental toxicologist, made headlines last year with a research paper that found pyrethroids from urban runoff in the sediment of several Roseville creeks. The chemicals, found at low concentrations of five parts per billion, killed virtually all the tiny shrimp-like crustaceans that lived in the sediment. Subsequent testing of 18 other creeks in Northern California yielded similar results. "We found pyrethroids in about 85 percent of the places we looked," Weston said. "It doesn't take many homeowners misusing -- or even using -- these products to contaminate a substantial stretch of stream." Weston briefed a number of state water quality officials Thursday during a visit to Pleasant Grove Creek in Roseville. Joining the tour were representatives of industry and environmental groups.

Laurie Nelson, a legislative advocate for the Consumer Specialty Products Association, said her group supports the state's approach to pyrethroids. "The water agencies are finding out that it (pyrethroids) seems to be a problem in some areas, and we're willing to step up and address it," said Nelson, whose group represents pesticide manufacturers. "If we're part of the problem, we're willing to be part of the solution, too."

During the regulatory review, Warmerdam said her agency expects manufacturers and retailers to get serious about consumer education to prevent misuse of pyrethroids. Likewise, the state hopes homeowners will exercise more care. Warmerdam said this can start first by minimizing pyrethroid use and then by carefully following product label instructions. "There's an obligation on the part of all of us to ensure what we do doesn't have broader implications for the environment," she said.

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BLOOMBERG NEWS ON THE BROKAW SPECIAL:

Tom Brokaw's special on global warming claims to have ``no agenda,'' though some viewers will quickly suspect he's out to make us sweat. If mankind doesn't change its polluting ways, New Yorkers will soon be snorkeling to work. That's the basic message of ``Global Warming: What You Need to Know,'' which airs on July 16 at 9 p.m. New York time on the Discovery Channel. Brokaw, like former Vice President Al Gore and many prominent scientists, is convinced that carbon-dioxide emissions are the main cause of global warming and that without serious change we should expect gondoliers in San Francisco. The former NBC anchorman delivers the bad news in his trademark solemn monotone and travels widely to marshal his argument.

In the ice fields of Patagonia, glacier expert Stephan Harrison explains that ice is melting at an incredible rate. In Montana, the 66-year-old Brokaw says Glacier National Park may be glacier-free ``in my lifetime.'' Geologist Mark Serreze takes us into the National Snow and Ice Data Center in Boulder, Colorado, where core ice samples reaching back 600,000 years provide a startling fact: heat- trapping carbon-dioxide levels have reached an all-time high, which bodes ill for the planet's health. In the Amazon rain forest, tree harvesting, farming and drought are reducing the ability of the ``Earth's lung'' to cleanse the air of CO2. In China, growing energy demands are being met by large-scale production of CO2-belching, coal-fired power plants.

No Dissent: Then there's the U.S., world leader in C02 emissions thanks to our love of the internal-combustion engine, large appliances and jet travel. Brokaw relies largely on a handful of experts in the two- hour show, particularly NASA's James Hansen and Princeton professor Michael Oppenheimer. Both support Brokaw's view of global warming and consider the scientific debate closed. Brokaw scoffs at the notion that there are ``any remaining doubts humans are behind temperature rises,'' while Hansen says ``99.5 percent of scientists say we know what's going on.''

You'll find more dissent at a North Korean political rally than in this program, which would have benefited from contrarian views, perhaps from MIT's Richard S. Lindzen or William Gray, the world's foremost expert on hurricanes and a critic of global- warming orthodoxy. Both are serious scientists, yet neither appears to be in Brokaw's Rolodex.

Kyoto Protocol: Brokaw does ask Oppenheimer why critics ``refuse to believe it's a fact.'' Oppenheimer says some may find the issue too ``frightening,'' while others have a ``financial interest'' in the status quo. In other words, critics are stooges for industry. Does that mean Brokaw is a stooge for environmentalists?

While the show claims some of the damage is ``irreversible,'' Brokaw holds out hope that personal and political action can bring about significant change. Americans can greatly reduce their CO2 output by driving smaller cars, taking the bus, using fluorescent light bulbs and exercising a bit more thermostat discipline. Brokaw praises the Kyoto Protocol, which sets goals for reducing greenhouse-gas emissions in industrialized countries. The Bush administration opposes the agreement, saying it would hurt the U.S. economy and not have much impact in heavily polluting countries like China.

The program offers a host of possible solutions, including wind farms, solar energy, increased use of ethanol and buildings that utilize recycled material and energy saving-technology. If we don't act soon, Brokaw says, we may reach a ``tipping point'' of no return: New York and other coastal cities will be submerged, while Bangladesh will vanish beneath the waves. We're also told there could be mass extinction of wildlife, a plague of disease-bearing insect swarms, extreme weather and famine causing mass starvation. A powerful presentation, to be sure, though certainly one with an agenda.

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MEDIA HYPE FOR A HOAX

The slanted coverage of the debate over global warming is on display almost every day. But a good recent example was the June 23 USA Today story headlined, "Global warming stoked '05 hurricanes, study says." That headline ran across the entire top of page 4 of USA Today. A picture with the story showed emergency workers battling Hurricane Katrina. You have to read to the 7th paragraph to find out that an expert named William Gray of Colorado State University believes "more intense hurricanes" are due entirely to natural changes. It turns out that Gray has been described as "the world's most famous hurricane expert" and that he has been studying hurricanes for 50 years.

The story, however, highlighted a new report finding that "Global warming helped fuel 2005's destructive hurricane season…" Gray, in the 7th paragraph of the story, called that "ridiculous." Gray, former director of the National Hurricane Center, has told the Washington Post that global warming is "one of the greatest hoaxes ever perpetrated on the American people." That is also the claim made by Senator James Inhofe, chairman of the Senate Environment Committee. Gray placed that quote on the cover of one of his scientific papers analyzing global warming and hurricanes.

In testimony before the Inhofe committee, he said that he has been dismayed over "the bogus science and media-hype" associated with the man-made global warming theory. "As a boy, growing up here in Washington, D.C.," he said, "I remember the many articles on the large global warming that had occurred between 1900 and 1940. No one understood or knew if this warming would continue. Then the warming abated, and a weak global cooling trend set in from the mid-1940s to the early 1970s. The global warming talk ceased and speculation about a coming ice age came into vogue. I anticipate that the trend of the last few decades of global warming will come to an end, and in a few years we will start to see a weak cooling trend similar to that which occurred from the mid-1940s to the early 1970s."

In a sense, getting Gray's views on page-seven of a story is a step forward. Like gay rights, the idea of questioning a human role in global warming is being thrown aside by many in the media as not even worthy of attention. What we are seeing is opinion journalism, in which journalists sharing Al Gore's opinion about global warming are manipulating the coverage. In a famous Los Angeles Times op-ed, Victor Navasky of The Nation magazine said that the problem with modern journalism was not that there was too much opinion, but too little. He means liberal opinion. It is noteworthy that Navasky, a professor of journalism at Columbia, is chairman of the Columbia Journalism Review.

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Many people would like to be kind to others so Leftists exploit that with their nonsense about equality. Most people want a clean, green environment so Greenies exploit that by inventing all sorts of far-fetched threats to the environment. But for both, the real motive is to promote themselves as wiser and better than everyone else, truth regardless.

Global warming has taken the place of Communism as an absurdity that "liberals" will defend to the death regardless of the evidence showing its folly. Evidence never has mattered to real Leftists

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