The Issachar Report<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" />
1 Chronicles <?xml:namespace prefix = st1 ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:smarttags" />12:32
Dennis A. Wright, DMin
 
Famed Meteorologist Proclaims 'Global Warming Emergency'
 
"We are in a global warming emergency state and these storms are going to become more frequent, more intense," renowned meteorologist Barbra Steisand told Diane Sawyer of ABC News.  "There could be more droughts, dust bowls.  You know, it's amazing to hear these facts, I mean, the Andes have no ice caps on the mountains in winter.  The glaciers are melting.  I mean, for the United States not to be part of the Kyoto treaty is unforgivable," the liberal activist added.  Streisand is such a funny girl! 
 
Streisand's comments go against the belief of meteorology expert Max Mayfield, head of the National Hurricane Center in Miami.  "The 1940s through the 1960s experienced an above-average number of major hurricanes, while the 1970s into the mid-1990s averaged fewer hurricanes," Mayfield told the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee's Subcommittee on Disaster Prevention and Prediction.  "The current period of heightened activity could last another 10 to 20 years or more.  This increased activity is due to natural cycles of hurricane activity, driven by the Atlantic Ocean itself along with the atmosphere above it."  
 
Hurricane forecaster William Gray, a professor of atmospheric science at Colorado State University, also said the recent onslaught of storms "is very much natural," even though some have tried to make the connection between storm intensity and alleged climate change.  On August 30 Joe Kovacs wrote an interesting article for WorldNetDaily in which he documents the paranoia of the tree-huggers who are blaming President George W. Bush, as well as global warming, for Hurricane Katrina.  (This article can be found at: http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=46059 ).  
                                                                                               
So, did George do it all by himself?  A recent study released by the Congressional Black Caucus Foundation blames white people in general.  The CBCF study suggests rising temperatures will kill more black citizens than whites in the U.S., while claiming African-Americans are less responsible than others for causing so-called "global warming."  The research, conducted by the Oakland, Calif.-based group Redefining Progress, is being billed as the first-ever comprehensive examination of the health and economic impact of climate change on the black population.  (WorldNetDaily, July 22, 2004)
 
Dr Jurg Luterbacher and colleagues from the University of Bern discovered that European temperatures over the past few summers have been the highest for more than 500 years, that the summer of 2003 was by far the hottest of all, and that the 30-year averages of winter and annual mean temperatures between 1973 and 2002 were the highest over the same period (London Telegraph, March 5, 2004).  Bush and Company surely have been busy to accomplish this feat! 
 
BBC News reported on September 26 that Europe's Cryosat spacecraft is about to launch on a three-year mission to study the Earth's ice caps.  The satellite's main objective is to test and quantify the prediction that global warming is causing ice to thin at the poles.  Scientists hope the data will give a clearer picture of the impact of rising temperatures on ice and, ultimately, global sea levels.  Climate models suggest that as the Earth gets warmer, the planet's ice cover will shrink.  But while there are already some signs this is under way, scientists want conclusive evidence.
 
Just two days later BBC News reported that according to new data released by US scientists the area covered by sea ice in the Arctic has shrunk for a fourth consecutive year.  The Arctic climate varies naturally, but the researchers conclude that human-induced global warming is at least partially responsible.  They warn the shrinkage could lead to even faster melting in coming years.  "September 2005 will set a new record minimum in the amount of Arctic sea ice cover," said Mark Serreze, of the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC), Boulder, Colorado.
 
Maybe these fear-mongers have more to worry about than they realize.  Could it be that Bush and Company have been up to even more mischief?  For starters, Earth is not the only place getting warmer.  Space.com reported on September 20 that NASA's Mars Global Surveyor (MGS) spacecraft observed a gradual evaporation of carbon dioxide ice in one of Mars' polar caps, pointing to a slowly changing Mars climate.  "They way these polar pits are retreating is absolutely astounding," Jack Mustard, an associate professor of geological sciences at Brown University said.  Researchers were unable to account for the gradual climate change.  "Why is Mars warmer today that it was in the past, we really have no way of knowing why," Michael Malin, principal investigator for the Mars Orbiter Camera aboard MGS, said.
 
More astounding yet is the report on Space.Com three years ago (October 9, 2002) that, "astronomers today said Pluto is undergoing global warming in its thin atmosphere even as it moves farther from the Sun on its long, odd-shaped orbit."  Pluto's atmospheric pressure has tripled over the past 14 years, indicating a stark temperature rise, the researchers said.  They suspect the average surface temperature increased about 3.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
 
Could it be that we generate such a quantity of greenhouse gases that the excess floats off into outer space and has now polluted Mars and Pluto as well?   Hardly.
 
The real answer may have recently been discovered:  The Sun did it!   Global warming has finally been explained: the Earth is getting hotter because the Sun is burning more brightly than at any time during the past 1,000 years, according to new research.  A study by Swiss and German scientists suggests that increasing radiation from the sun is responsible for recent global climate changes.  Dr Sami Solanki, the director of the renowned Max Planck Institute for Solar System Research in Gottingen, Germany, who led the research, said: "The Sun has been at its strongest over the past 60 years and may now be affecting global temperatures.  The Sun is in a changed state.  It is brighter than it was a few hundred years ago and this brightening started relatively recently -- in the last 100 to 150 years.'  (London Telegraph, July 18, 2004) 
 
LiveScience.Com reported on September 30, 2005 that increased output from the Sun might be to blame for 10 to 30 percent of global warming that has been measured in the past 20 years, according to a new report.  Increased emissions of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases still play a role, the scientists say.  But climate models of global warming should be corrected to better account for changes in solar activity, according to Nicola Scafetta and Bruce West of Duke University.  The findings were published online this week by the journal Geophysical Research Letters, (Vol. 32, L18713).
 
Furthermore, some climate forecasts might be exaggerating estimations of global warming, according to a study funded by NASA and published in the March 15, 2004 issue of the American Meteorological Society's Journal of Climate.  NASA says the models possibly are overestimating the amount of water vapor entering the atmosphere as the Earth warms.  Study used satellite data from 6-9 miles above Earth.  Because water vapor is the most important heat-trapping gas in the atmosphere, the calculations consequently would overestimate future temperature increases.
 
Incidentally, Fred Singer has written an interesting article debunking the commonly held belief that mankind is totally responsible for global warming.  (See "Human Contribution to Climate Change Remains Questionable" at www.sepp.org/scirsrch/EOS1999.html.)
 
 
"The highest heavens belong to the LORD, but the earth he has given to man."
(Psalm 115:16)
 
 
Dennis A. Wright, DMin, is Founder and President of Understanding The Times Ministries.  An accomplished writer and educator, Wright has spoken in churches and conferences all over America on spiritual counterfeits and Christian Worldview topics.  He can be emailed at [email protected] and his new website can be found at www.UnderstandingTheTimes.org.