> Whatever you choose to call them, it is clear that there are a group of
> people who like to style themselves "skeptics" who reject the overwhelming
> consensus of climate scientists--a consensus that has been reviewed and
> endorsed by the National Academy of Sciences (along with nearly every elite
> professional scientific society in the world).

There is a veritable graveyard of discredited scientific theories (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superseded_scientific_theories). When has consensus ever been the genesis of truth? Danish professor Henrik Svenmark (http://www.space.dtu.dk/Medarbejdere.aspx?lg=showcommon&id=38287&type=publications&page=1) has a different theory for phenomenon of Global Warming; you can watch the 5 part video here: (http://gorebull.com/cloudmystery). How 'bout Richard Lindzen? Does not a PHd in Applied Mathematics count? (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Lindzen) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-sHg3ZztDAw)?

What about what Einstein who is reputed to have said, that just one fact was all that was needed to invalidate his theory of relativity?

> It is also clear that this "skeptic" point of view has been supported by
> an extremely well-funded public relations campaign backed by individuals
> and organizations who have a financial interest in sales of fossil fuels.

NB: the notion of *fossil* fuels is also under scrutiny.

Shellenberger and Nordhaus state in their article the long death of the environmental movement (http://thebreakthrough.org/blog/2011/02/the_long_death_of_environmenta.shtml):

In the wake of the crash [of the environmental movement], environmentalists pointed their finger at the usual bogeymen. They claimed that the problem has been that fossil fuel interests have massively outspent underdog environmental groups, funding skeptics to mislead the public and duping the media into giving too much credence to skeptical views about climate change.

In reality, the environmental lobby massively outspent its opponents. In just the last two years, by our rough estimate environmental organizations and philanthropies spent somewhere north of $1 billion dollars advocating for climate action. In contrast, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, Exxon-Mobil, the Koch Brothers, Big Coal, and the various other well publicized opponents of environmental action might have spent, when all was said and done, a small fraction of that.

== end quote ==

More quotes:

"If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State."
~ Joseph Goebbels

"We need to get some broad based support, to capture the public's imagination... So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements and make little mention of any doubts... Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest."
~ Prof. Stephen Schneider, Stanford Professor of Climatology, lead author of many IPCC reports

"No matter if the science of global warming is all phony... climate change provides the greatest opportunity to bring about justice and equality in the world."
~ Christine Stewart, former Canadian Minister of the Environment

“The data doesn't matter. We're not basing our recommendations on the data. We're basing them on the climate models.”
~ Prof. Chris Folland, Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research
“The models are convenient fictions that provide something very useful.” ~ Dr David Frame, climate modeler, Oxford University

"The only way to get our society to truly change is to frighten people with the possibility of a catastrophe."
~ emeritus professor Daniel Botkin

"The climate crisis is not a political issue, it is a moral and spiritual challenge to all of humanity. It is also our greatest opportunity to lift Global Consciousness to a higher level."
~ Al Gore, Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech (who got 'D's in Natural Sciences at Harvard) == end quotes ==

1) who donated to their campaign for office (not just trust and corporate names) but people
2) who voted/authored any given legislation

The issue which has swept down the centuries and which will have to be fought sooner or later is the people versus the banks.
~ Lord Acton (of absolute power corrupts absolutely fame)

Capital must protect itself in every way... Debts must be collected and loans and mortgages foreclosed as soon as possible. When through a process of law the common people have lost their homes, they will be more tractable and more easily governed by the strong arm of the law applied by the central power of leading financiers. People without homes will not quarrel with their leaders. This is well known among our principle men now engaged in forming an imperialism of capitalism to govern the world. By dividing the people we can get them to expend their energies in fighting over questions of no importance to us except as teachers of the common herd.
~ JP Morgan

There is no subtler, no surer means of overturning the existing basis of society than to debauch the currency. The process engages all the hidden forces of economic law on the side of destruction, and does it in a manner which not one man in a million is able to diagnose.
~ John Maynard Keynes, 1920

All the perplexities, confusion and distress in America arise, not from defects in their Constitution or Confederation, not from want of honor or virtue, so much as from the downright ignorance of the nature of coin, credit and circulation.
~ John Adams

Of all the contrivances for cheating the laboring classes of mankind, none has been more effectual than that which deludes them with paper money. This is the most effectual of inventions to fertilize the rich man's fields by the sweat of the poor man's brow. Ordinary tyranny, oppression, excessive taxation--these bear lightly on the happiness of the mass of the community compared with a fraudulent currency and the robberies committed by depreciated paper. Our own history has recorded for our instruction enough, and more than enough, of the demoralizing tendency, the injustice. and the intolerable oppression on the virtuous and well-disposed of a degraded paper currency authorized by law or in any way countenanced by government. It is one of the most successful devices, in times of peace or war, of expansions or revulsions, to accomplish the transfer of all the precious metals from the great mass of the people into the hands of the few, where they are hoarded in secret places or deposited under bolts and bars, while the people are left to endure all the inconvenience, sacrifice, and demoralization resulting from the use of depreciated and worthless paper.
~ Andrew Johnson - 1868 State of the union address (apparently he was quoting Daniel Webster) - also quoted by Nelson Aldrich, architect of the Federal Reserve system

100 Million Dollar Penny: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3dl1y-zBAFg

The first ever GAO (Government Accountability Office) audit of the Federal Reserve was carried out in the past few months due to the Ron Paul, Alan Grayson Amendment to the Dodd-Frank bill, which passed last year. Jim DeMint, a Republican Senator, and Bernie Sanders, an independent Senator, led the charge for a Federal Reserve audit in the Senate, but watered down the original language of the house bill (HR1207), so that a complete audit would not be carried out.

http://sanders.senate.gov/newsroom/news/?id=9e2a4ea8-6e73-4be2-a753-62060dcbb3c3

What was revealed in the audit was startling:

$16,000,000,000,000.00 had been secretly given out to US banks and corporations and foreign banks everywhere from France to Scotland. From the period between December 2007 and June 2010, the Federal Reserve had secretly bailed out many of the world's banks, corporations, and governments.

My situation: 59 yrs of age, started in electronics in 1979, migrated from hardware to software, no college degree (but some courses) I have found that working contract (temp) is a great way to open doors that might otherwise be closed. The company gets a good look at you, you get a good look at it. I've interviewed several times for a direct (captive) position at the place where I now work, and was shot down. This last go-round I hired into a temp position, (so the company has a low level of commitment) and I hit the street running. I *proved* I was up to the task even though I don't have the sheepskin (or much of the theory either - I just know how to make things work and get things done (using perl mostly :-)).

What keeps me from leaving Windows completely (outside of work) is that X-windows sucks, it just sucks. As long as I stay on the command line (zsh) I'm ok, it is just X-windows, X-windows sucks.

Don't know your locale, so this may be moot but Amazon is hiring, *big time* FBA (Fulfillment By Amazon) is growing 30% per year. It is an extremely energizing place to work.

> I haven't seen any information contrary to the hypothesis of AGW Well, here is an alternate theory http://gorebull.com/cloudmystery (I love the part (in the video) where he says he was surprised that no one wanted to publish his findings - a bit of an idealist, I shouldn't wonder)

> Well, evolution is just a theory, Though, I suppose, technically it is a hypothesis, I refer to it as the "conjecture of evolution".

So environmentalism is not a religion?: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=idYdVQ6nwfA Prof: Ian Plimer