We watched closely and were pretty sure we saw EPA Administrator Lisa “Action” Jackson in this.  Too bad we all can’t own Audis:

• About time … A prominent scientist has joined sceptics in calling for the UN authority on climate change to be reformed, as yet more flaws are exposed in the International Panel on Climate Change’s reports.
• IPCC Gate Du Jour: Aussie Droughtgate
• Ugg, here comes Earl Blumenauer (see more about him here): Transit bills fight climate change
• Frum Forum: Is Climate Change Legislation Dead?
• … LA Times: basically, yes, dead as is
• Climate Skeptic: The Madness of Prince Charles
• But we aren’t supposed to eat cows, right? Protein might help fight global warming
• Wyoming Politician: Follow global warming money

In journalism school in the early 2000’s, there was pervasive hand-wringing over whether the industry having crossed the line from skeptical to cynical on the ways it looked at and portrayed American life.

And then there’s the issue of global warming, which required something of a fifth estate to get journalists to even mention skepticism of the most far-fetched claims.

Mark Steyn writes that “‘climate change’ is not only a scientific scandal but also a massive journalistic failure.” The entire post is worth reading, but Steyn looks at one case in particular:

Like all the poodles of the environmental beat, Margot O’Neill repeats those magic words “peer review” every couple of paragraphs like a talisman to ward off evil deniers. But, in the course of invoking the phrase “peer review”, she never bothers to look at whether the IPCC actually does it. By contrast, without benefit of the resources of a national TV news operation plus salary and benefits, lone blogger Donna Laframboise did a couple of text searches on the IPCC report and discovered multiple predictions of doom – on Himalayan glacier melt and much else – resting not on peer-reviewed science but merely on activist groups such as the World Wildlife Fund and Greenpeace.

H/t: Instapundit

Wow: “even leading scientists and environmental groups admit the IPCC is facing a crisis of credibility that makes the Climategate affair look like small change.”

Today, the mayor of Washington, D.C. declared a state of emergency (though, of course, D.C. is not a state) due to an expected mini-blizzard. That usually coincides with some big push for carbon dioxide regulation or legislation and/or a visit from global-warming zealot Al Gore. So who invited him, and where is he hiding?

This is just getting ridiculous.

“The latest setback for global warm-mongers is a probe conducted by the British Guardian newspaper, which discovered a prominent climate scientist ’sought to hide problems in key temperature data on which some of his work was based.’”

To quote Charlie Brown, Good grief!

Shopfloor.org:

A bipartisan trio of House members on Tuesday introduced a bill to prevent the Environmental Protection Agency from regulating greenhouse gas emissions.

Reps. Ike Skelton (D-MO), Collin C. Peterson (D-MN), and Jo Anne Emerson (R-MO) introduced H.R. 4572, which would also amend the 2007 Energy Bill to stop EPA from calculating land use changes in foreign countries in determining American renewable fuels policy, and would broaden the definition of renewable biomass.

“Simply put, we cannot tolerate turning over the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions to unelected bureaucrats at EPA,” Skelton said. “America’s energy and environmental policies should be set by Congress.”

As we’ve been issuing virtual screams, it looks like cap and trade is in mortally wounded shape. So the vigilance of the economically minded and global warming skeptics needs to focus on regulatory efforts through the Environmental Protection Agency.

As Mark Tapscott of the indispensable Washington Examiner writes:

As Energy and Environment Climatewire’s Jessica Leber reports today, the Obama administration has proposed a modest cut of $300 million from EPA’s overall $10 billion budget for 2011, the amounts allocated for global warming related regulatory and other activities is up, to $1.1 billion, or about 12 percent of the agency’s expenditures.

A total of $56 million will go to global warming regulations, while another $169 million of the $1.1 billion total will be spent on efforts directly aimed at reducing the greenhouse gases global warming advocates like former Vice President Al Gore claim are responsible for causing dangerous temperature increases in the Earth’s atmosphere.

Ugg. To the rare few Americans who maintain a balanced view of politics, it has to be clear by now that the forces of global warming alarmism are in this for a quasi-religious cause and the possibility to control billions or trillions of money — and probably both.

Glenn Reynolds is linking to what amounts to a post mortem of the campaign for global warming. The short story: “The movement died from two causes: bad science and bad politics.”

We think it’s too early to pop the champagne corks, but it’s certainly looking good. Who knows, maybe we can put this blog on the shelf to collect dust.

Here’s a reminder of our hope/prediction from a few months ago.

• Heh: So much wasted green for climate-change talks
• … meanwhile … Obama on defensive, US climate Bill in retreat
• Acorss the pond: Brown Says UN Climate Negotiations Were ‘Flawed,’ Need Reform
• While the UN fails: “My Eighth Grade Son Did Better Science”
• Why we can’t see the forest for the trees: U.N.’s Global Warming Report Under Fresh Attack for Rainforest Claims
• Disgusting: ‘Pachauri didn’t correct glaciers’ report despite being informed’
• It keeps going and going and going … Climategate scandal continues to unfold