If it’s all a "liberal" conspiracy, what are they trying to gain?

All people already in government would gain increased governmental control over the citizenry's lives — the vast majority of them believe, they "know better" than their subjects — bless our little hearts — how to live. Which is why you haven't yet seen a "green" measure proposed, that reduced that control, have you?

In addition, the "green" measures cause the Capitalism to slow down — a cause dear to the Illiberals and the foreign handlers of some of them. Seriously, scratch a "green" activist, and you'll find a Che Guevara T-shirt underneath...

I can see what you get to gain by denying the problem exists

Could you be more specific? What do I get to gain? Do you suppose, I — or the KKKoch brothers — have a wonderful new planet for ourselves (or our children) to emigrate to, when Earth becomes too polluted? Some kind of Elysium being built for the 1%?

It makes no difference to the topic of dire predictions not materializing... Because it means, that other predictions made by the same people using the same methods aren't likely to materialize either — and thus any public policies based on such predictions should be scrapped.

Wrong side of the planet.

Distinction without difference. Both ice caps were supposed to melt — dangerously increasing water-levels planetwide.

Temperature is up a little

Citation needed.

but the freezing point is up much higher, so the sea ice is forming more easily.

This would explain, why the water levels have not risen. And it would illustrate, how the "conservatively formulated claims" of the scientists become shrill calls for immediate action ("We must do something!"), when the politicians get to them — and dangerously wasteful such actions can be...

Somehow a quite conservatively formulated claim (subjunctive mode, "some models, 75% chance, 5-7 years, during some month of the summer") magically morphed into the strong claim "Al Gore said in 5 years time the Arctic will be completely ice free".

The actual scientists may be formulating their claims conservatively indeed. And the morphing does occur.

But it is not the critics, but rather the politicians and journalists — peddling the global warming panic — who are doing the morphing. "The North Polar ice cap is falling off a cliff," — are the actual words of Al Gore from 2007 — "It could be completely gone in summer in as little as seven years. Seven years from now."

Yeah, he said "could be" — about as evasive as Geico's "could save you 15% or more"... But it increased — a lot — instead of shrinking so he was not even in ball-park. And thus, any scientific models used by to make that dire prediction are invalid and any policies based on those models ought to be abolished at once — regardless of how many solyndras have been financed already following those policies.

slashdot today!? ... difference between North and South

There is a distinction between the two, of course, but it is without difference to the topic of this thread. Both ice-caps were supposed to shrink (with dire consequences for the rest of the world, of course).

One expedition set out to measure the loss of the ice, found itself stuck in it — not that it changed the leading professor's opinion about the global warming...

altitude > 100km.