The surface of the planet has been warming up for centuries, since the Little Ice Age. For the vast majority of that time, it had nothing to do with CO2. One of the major criticism of climate alarmism is that natural variability is massively downplayed.

The models don't appear to be giving "reasonable projections" at the moment. Remember the hiatus, which has been acknowledged by the IPCC. Those "predictions" won't be worth much until the models better correspond to reality, and have been validated in some meaningful way. They are far from first principles models.

I don't have much of a quibble with that, except that what we should do should also be informed by desirable outcomes in general. For instance, LED light bulbs are clearly a win, as they save money while presenting no discernible downside except higher initial investment.

I'm glad to see you support nuclear power, keep it up!

The basic science is accepted by virtually everyone - CO2 is a weak greenhouse gas. The science that attempts to inform policy includes other controversial facets such as water vapor amplification. If the expected peak concentration of CO2 (550-600 PPM) will not cause problematic heating, there is no need for expensive, drastic action. Whether CO2 related warming will be problematic is still absolutely in dispute. Recent estimates for climate sensitivity to CO2 have been trending downwards.

What was Arrhenius' estimated value for transient climate sensitivity to CO2 again?

There are many informed skeptics who understand the science, but don't believe we have enough information yet for drastic measures.

What "coherent action on climate change" do you recommend, exactly? Not a single suggested mitigation will make a significant difference in the estimated (guesstimated) temperature by 2100. The one thing that would make a significant difference, if in fact there's a problem worth the effort, is a mass transition from coal to nuclear power worldwide (ESPECIALLY in China and India). However, apparently nuclear is anathema to the vast majority of climate alarmists and environmentalists, despite it being the safest power generation method in use by far.

I think the majority of scientists involved are honest, if not doing a great job with the science. You should read Judith Curry's site for some rational discussion of the issue from a highly qualified climate scientist. As far as the way the science is being used to advocate social change, remember that the most effective lies contain a grain of truth...

Actually, that's not obvious at all. It is clear that more research is needed before taking drastic measures that will harm the poor around the world more than any other group. In the meantime, we should embark on win/win efforts such as a mass conversion from coal to nuclear energy. Coal power is bad from many perspectives, such as killing tens of thousands of people every year, increasing ocean acidification, and providing a rich source of organic mercury. Solar and wind are fine as long as they're cost-effective, but they aren't a good fit for base load power.

The F-18 obviously did have a naval variant. We've had exactly one VTOL/STOL aircraft, the Harrier, so that's largely an unknown. Regardless, adding those capabilities to a basic airframe is far easier than designing and procuring an entirely different plane.

The F-22 would have been a great carrier plane, it would have provided both interceptor and strike roles nicely. Sadly, sanity has not prevailed.

All that said, the most basic definition of "multirole" is fighter versus bomber, and in that context what I said is entirely pertinent.

I see you've conveniently forgotten the F-16, which is the plane the F-35 is succeeding. The F-16 has been a resounding success. Whether that translates to the F-35 remains to be seen, but the precedent is there.

The F-15 and F-18 are also highly successful examples of multirole aircraft, FYI.

I do wish the F-22 production line hadn't been shutdown, it could have been a very successful export to Japan and Australia...plus the US could have bought a few hundred more.

I have no problem with the idea that bringing the "best and brightest" here to the US is good - meaning the top 10% (or even 5%) of talent. Those folks will innovate and start companies, boosting the overall economy and status of the USA globally. The problem with the current immigration push is it's bringing in millions of basically unskilled people, at great cost to the USA. That's essentially treasonous.

I also agree with you on the point of bringing in "regular" developers to drive the cost down. That's a bunch of crap, and has been for decades.

We need to kick out the current group of political clowns sending us down the drain, and get back to policies that actually help most people here in the USA.

* That just about no one had ever heard of...

1) There is already sales tax in most places, so very little would change for businesses.

2) It would completely eliminate scrutiny (and tax preparation!) for private citizens.

You need to read about the "prebate" aspect of the Fair Tax. It eliminates the regression that concerns you.

In fact, most of what you wrote is so far off base, you should just go read about the Fair Tax at the source, so you can discuss it intelligently.

The current tax code consists of 73,000 pages of regulations, requiring a giant, intrusive bureaucracy, an armada of tax preparers, and a fleet of tax lawyers. It is unfair, and it is broken. Just imagine if all that effort, and all those people were put to productive use instead of accounting.

That's very simply a bunch of crap.

With a consumption tax, it's up to you how much you are taxed. It rewards saving and investing much more than our current tax system. It would also get rid of the inequity between income tax and capital gains tax, which benefits the wealthy a great deal.

It would boost the economy immensely, and eliminate several forms of double taxation we "enjoy" now. It would also eliminate the IRS, and government snooping into every aspect of our economic life - that is a huge win as well. (Not to mention the billions saved on tax preparation and related activities...)

Sorry, but El Nino isn't cooperating.

Actually, given the likely solar activity we're going to see for the next twenty years, I fully expect a cooling trend of some type.

The right policy prescription is pretty simple - ton of research should go into cheap, clean energy sources like LFTR. Displacing coal power with clean energy is a win regardless of climate issues.

Actually I think you're more representative of someone who's making a lot of money working with an unpopular language.

C++ has fallen way down the charts, and I'd be willing to bet fewer than 10% of those writing software today are writing C++, especially using recent/advanced features. You're making good money because you're using one of the more difficult and painful languages out there. :-)

Sooner or later a superior language that fills the C++ niche will come along, then it will go to a truly legacy status...finally.

Right now Sony is eating Microsoft's lunch with PS4 actually.

I think SteamOS has a good chance of doing well, especially given how close Linux is to MacOS. Mac marketshare is picking up, so hitting both with (more or less) a single port is attractive. Various game engines are also making cross-platform a lot easier.

Windows has had its heyday, it's definitely on the decline going forward.

That is one hypothesis, and an unproven one.

No, almost all of it comes from freezing seawater.

Right, it never snows in Antarctica...the miles-thick sheets of ice appeared by magic. Got it.

That of course remains to be seen. Also be clear on sea ice versus landlocked ice. Some parts of the antarctic icecap are growing.

No, it's an objective look at polar sea ice based on the only directly measurable metric. Your interpretation of that is exactly that - one interpretation. Furthermore, you should reflect (oops, bad pun) on the fact that the additional antarctic sea ice increases albedo and thus has a net cooling effect - the same argument used to say that arctic sea ice loss is increasing arctic ocean heating.

No, the science is not clear. What is clear is the desperation of those shouting "the science is settled" while stubborn reality continues to contradict the beautiful theories and models. :-)

Nothing in particular. Here's the last 10 years (you know, the 10 years with the highest CO2 levels in history) of UAH data, showing a dead flat temperature trend. The point being, warming has definitely paused on around a decadal time scale. Will it last longer? That's a very interesting question. Solar activity, despite being near a maximum in the 11 year cycle, is low. The interesting thing is that the next cycle (forecast to begin roughly around 2020) is predicted to be extremely low - so low that a sunspot will be a rare event for 12-15 years (weak solar cycles are also longer). Such low cycles have historically been associated with quite significant temperature drops. So, we may in fact see flat or declining temperatures through 2035 or longer. That will be quite a shock for the alarmists if it works out that way. :-)

BTW, it may not be only lower solar irradiance that's responsible for lower temperatures, there may be other effects having to do with the solar wind and/or the solar magnetic field.

Citation? My understanding is that RSS and UAH are two independent analyses of the same data. The relevant Wikipedia article contains no mention of such a thing...

At any rate, this chart shows the close agreement between the two datasets.