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Opinion: Watch Out!

Opinion: Watch Out!
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By Chris Skates
Apr. 17, 2015 | PADUCAH, KY
By Chris Skates Apr. 17, 2015 | 05:40 PM | PADUCAH, KY
When the Left Chummies Up to Religion—Watch Out!

Recently U.S. Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Gina McCarthy met with officials in the Vatican. That day McCarthy said, "I think the pope knows his own beliefs. I want him to know that the president is aligned with him on these issues and that we are taking action in the United States."

So, according to McCarthy, President Barack Obama and Pope Francis are sympatico on climate change. In this world of unreality, allow me to inject some reality.

The theory of anthropogenic global warming can be summarized thusly: Fossil fuels give off carbon dioxide when burned. 
As the world’s population increases so does the burning of fossil fuels and thus the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.

Increased CO2 in the atmosphere creates a “greenhouse affect” (slowing the escape of heat from the surface of the earth to outer space).
Therefore as population and CO2 continue to increase, there will be a corresponding increase in the global average temperature (GAT) of the earth.

However the scientific method dictates that one can disprove a theory by finding even a single observation that disagrees with its predictions. We who are skeptical of the assertion that man-made emissions of greenhouse gases are having any significant impact on global temperatures base our skepticism on the following:

According to the most accurate data currently available (satellite temperature data), there has been no statistically significant warming in the last 18 years, despite an accelerating increase in CO2 in the atmosphere.

Contrary to the breathless reports of the media, 2014 was most emphatically NOT the warmest year on record. The data set used to draw this conclusion were cherry picked from thermometer data the accuracy of which is notoriously affected by urban heat, and the difference between 2014 and the next several “hottest” years was far less than the margin of error.

Other warming alarmist boogey men like ocean acidification, sea level rise, and increased intensity and frequency of storms are demonstrably NOT occurring. What’s more the 97% scientific consensus is not a consensus—the 97% wasn’t really 97% and none of the actual scientific data cited to support the theory actually does.

Despite all of this, after her meetings at the Vatican, McCarthy commented, "One of the challenges that I think we face in the U.S. is that climate change is very often viewed as a political issue. And environmental issues are not political …"
 
The EPA’s own mission statement promises to base policies on the best scientific evidence. Which makes McCarthy’s statement breathtaking in its hutzpah. 

It is the Obama Administration and its alarmist allies, not “climate skeptics,” who are relying on politics to drive the discussion on warming and climate change. The White House’s sending an unelected department head to the Vatican is a case in point. Christians should not expect the EPA Director to stop there. McCarthy has made no secret that she intends to hold similar meetings with a broad spectrum of religious leaders.  

One cannot help but notice the liberal hypocrisy. Are we to understand that the separation of church and state mantra so sacred to the Left can be ignored if the church happens to agree with said state? 

All Christians share a God-given compassion for the poor. That is why the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation seeks to protect the world’s poor from inflated energy costs driven by misguided energy policy. Those policies continue to have a much more immediate and grave impact on the poor than hypothetical harm from an unsupported theory.

Chris Skates employs decades of environmental and power plant experience in his writing. His enviro-thriller Going Green has won him multiple accolades, speaking engagements, and even lunch with White House cabinet members. Skates, a Contributing Writer for the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation, is also the author of multiple magazine articles and technical papers, and writes a regular column for his local paper.
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