Why won’t Al Gore debate?

When Al Gore ran for U.S. senator from Tennessee he debated – repeatedly.

When he ran for president he once more debated frequently.

Why is it that as a recipient of the Nobel Prize for his theorizing about global warming Mr. Gore has refused repeated and prominently published challenges to debate this issue with scientists?

Is it possible Al thinks that the Nobel (also awarded to the late Yasser Arafat) makes him morally and scientifically impervious?

Or does he believe it would be unbearable for a Noble Prize winner to lose a debate on the issue for which he was awarded?

Among the more than 400 scientists from all over the world who have challenged our one-time vice president on this issue is Hendrik Tennekes, former research director at the Netherland Royal National Meteorological Institute:

“I find the doomsday picture Al Gore is painting – a six-meter sea level rise – 15 times the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change number – entirely without merit. I protest vigorously the idea that the climate reacts like a home heating system to the changed setting of the thermostat. Just turn the dial and the desired temperature will soon be reached.”

Then there is environmental scientist David Schnare, of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, who declared he is skeptical because “conclusions about the cause of the apparent warming stand on the shoulders of incredibly uncertain data.”

Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., the ranking Republican on the Environment and Public Works Committee, who compiled this report of more than 400 scientists, said: “This report debunks Mr. Gore’s claim that the debate is over. The endless claims of a ‘consensus’ about man-made global warming grow less and less credible every day.”

Dr. Nathan Paldor, professor of dynamical meteorology and physical oceanography at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem, noted: “Many of my colleagues with whom I spoke share these views and report on their inability to publish their skepticism in the scientific or public media.”

At that United Nations Conference in Bali, Indonesia, 100 scientists – 77 of them Ph.D.s – warned the U.N. that attempting to control the Earth’s climate is, in their words, “ultimately futile.”

In an open letter to U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, they questioned the scientific basis for climate fears and the U.N.’s so-called solutions.

“Attempts to prevent global climate change from occurring are ultimately futile and constitute a tragic misallocation of resources that would be better spent on humanity’s real and pressing problems,” the letter signed by the scientists read.

Signatories included: Dr. Anthony Zichichi, president of the World Federation of Scientists; Dr. Reid Bryson, dubbed the “father of meteorology”; MIT atmospheric scientist Dr. Richard Lindzen; U.N. scientist Dr. Vincent Gray of New Zealand; French climatologist Dr. Marcel Leroux of the University Jean Moulin; World authority on sea level Dr. Nils-Axel Morner of Stockholm University; and physicist Dr. Freeman Dyson of Princeton University.

In their letter, the scientists wrote:

“It is not possible to stop climate change, a natural phenomenon that has affected humanity through the ages. Geological, archaeological, oral and written histories all attest to the dramatic challenges posed to past societies from unanticipated changes in temperature, precipitation, winds and other climatic variables.”

“In stark contrast to the often repeated assertion that the science of climate change is ‘settled,’ significant new peer-reviewed research has cast even more doubt on the hypothesis of dangerous human-caused global warming,” the open letter added.

“Recent observations of phenomena such as glacial retreats, sea-level rise and the migration of temperature-sensitive species are not evidence for abnormal climate change, for none of these changes has been shown to lie outside the bounds of known natural variability.”

“The U.N. climate conference in Bali had been planned to take the world along a path of severe CO2 restrictions, ignoring the lessons apparent from the failure of the Kyoto Protocol, the chaotic nature of the European CO2 trading market, and the ineffectiveness of other costly initiatives to curb greenhouse gas emissions. Balanced cost/benefit analyses provide no support for the introduction of global measures to cap and reduce energy consumption for the purpose of restricting CO2 emissions. Furthermore, it is irrational to apply the ‘precautionary principle’ because many scientists recognize that both climate coolings and warmings are realistic possibilities over the medium-term future.”

This letter’s final paragraph noted the following:

“The current U.N. focus on ‘fighting climate change,’ as illustrated in the Nov. 27 U.N. Development Programme’s Human Development Report, is obstructing governments from adapting to the threat of inevitable natural climate changes, whatever forms they may take. National and international planning for such changes is needed, with a focus on helping our most vulnerable citizens adapt to conditions that lie ahead. Attempts to prevent global climate change from occurring are ultimately futile, and constitute a tragic misallocation of resources that would be better spent on humanity’s real and pressing problems.”

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