Musings

Today’s post is a quick take on several subjects that have been bouncing around in my brain like the ping pong balls in a lottery machine. The first is geopolitical, and the second climatological. Bear with me here; I’m not an expert on either subject, but I have obtained several insights that I thought I should share.

On Iran

I think the Jihadist movement is sputtering out globally. While hate mongers on either side of the issue demonize one another, little attention is being given to the vast majority of true believers, be they Islamic, Hindu, Buddhist, or Christian, that simply want to live their lives peacefully, and regard religion as a private matter. Most folks in these ranks are caring and kind to one another, their neighbors, and non-believers in their midst.

While many in the USA and Europe see a war with Iran as the next big crisis looming on the horizon, I have concluded that if outsiders are patient, the Iranian people will deal with the nutcases that now rule their country. The worst thing we can do is to start another war or allow the Israelis to attack them. Such action would strengthen the rogue religious dictatorship, and force the citizens to ‘rally around the flag’.

It is far better to continue to tighten sanctions, especially refined petroleum product imports, and weaken the leadership through other peaceful means. Internal dissent will grow accordingly, and at some point the Iranian Revolution (Rev. A) will take place and a true democracy will emerge. I suspect that in time, the same sort of revamp will happen in Pakistan and perhaps, Afghanistan.

Our best possible military strategy is to provide security for the citizenry in these countries while they work out forms of government that will be embraced by all. We can best influence the course of history for them by offering a helping hand such as building schools, hospitals, and infrastructure. We must set an example by showing the benefits of democracy and freedom of choice.

On Climate Change

The bullshit is flowing deep and thick. In the interest of providing a balanced view, the following are a few fun facts to consider:

It is an unarguable fact that the portion of the Earth's greenhouse gas envelope contributed by man is barely one tenth of one per cent of the total. Do the numbers yourself: CO2 is no more than 4% of the total (with water vapor being over 90% followed by methane, sulphur, and nitrous oxides). Of that 4% man contributes only a little over 3%. Elementary school arithmetic says that 3% of 4% is .12% and for that we are sentencing civilization to a wealth of damaging economic impacts if we implement draconian CO2 restrictions.

The effect of additional CO2 in the atmosphere is limited because it only absorbs certain wave lengths of radiant energy. As the radiation in the particular wave length band is used up, the amount left for absorption by more of the gas is reduced.

If greenhouse gases were responsible for increases in global temperature of recent decades then atmospheric physics shows that higher levels of our atmosphere would show greater warming than lower levels. This was not found to be true during the 1978 to 1998 period of .3 degrees centigrade warming.

900,000 years of ice core temperature records and carbon dioxide content records show that CO2 increases follow rather than lead increases in Earth’s temperature which is logical because the oceans are the primary source of CO2 and they hold more CO2 when cool than when warm, so warming causes the oceans to release more CO2. In addition, while temperatures have fluctuated over the past 5000 years, today's Earth temperature is below average for the past 5000 years.

Al Gore and his minions have consistently discounted the reality of solar output, orbital mechanics, or interstellar radiation and gaseous clouds as being part of the equation. The National Aeronautic and Space Agency (NASA) has determined that during the time the Earth has been warming so has Mars, Pluto, Jupiter and the largest moon of Neptune. All four major global temperature tracking outlets (Hadley UK, NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, University of Alabama Huntsville, and Remote Sensing Systems Santa Rosa) have released updated information showing that in 2007, global cooling ranged from 0.65C to .75C, a value large enough to erase nearly all the global warming recorded over the past 100 years; all in one years time. History suggests that we are due to enter another Ice Age in the not too distant future.

While the alarmists are holding sway in the court of public opinion, I hope we rethink the measures we are taking at the moment. I view it as a good thing to do whatever we can to limit the impact of civilization on the ‘natural world’. I’m tired of living in the growing cesspool of human refuse and pollution, but let’s take realistic steps toward remediation. After all, our future is at stake.

I’ll close this post with a terrific idea my older and wiser cousin offered to eliminate the high cost of a monitored burglar alarm system for your home. Just replace the Brinks or other alarm company sign in your lawn with this one: