The Global Warming Boys’ Club

This fish is a boy. Can't you tell?

I’ll start with the quote from This chicken-little story:

“We found that in fish that do have temperature-dependent sex determination [TSD], a rise in water temperature of just 1.5 degrees Celsius can change the male-to-female ratio from 1:1 to 3:1,” says Piferrer, the study’s co-author. In especially sensitive fish, a greater increase can throw the balance even more out of whack. Ospina-Alvarez and Piferrer have found that in the South American pejerrey, for example, an increase of 4 degrees Celsius can result in a population that is 98% male.

What makes these findings especially troubling, of course, is that the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicts that ocean-water temperatures are likely to rise by 1.5 degrees over the course of this century — and they may even go up a few degrees more. “If climate change really does result in a rise of 4 degrees, which is the maximum the IPCC predicts, and if species can’t adapt in time or migrate, then in the most sensitive cases of TSD, we’re looking at extinction,” says Piferrer.

Let’s pay attention, here. This is news. Why? because they have found a dramatic rise in the ratio of male to female fish populations, right? Well, not really. There is a reference to a study that alludes to a rise in one specific population of fish in one specific area of the globe. Of course, we would never jump to conclusions based on anecdotal regional evidence and extrapolate it to global trends, would we? Of course not. More importantly, and you can almost sense the anguish in which they need to toss other potential factors into the equation, there are other potential explanations for the ratio shift. We don’t want to talk about those, though, because it detracts from the horrific nature of global warming.

The paragraphs I quoted are nearly 100% conjecture. It’s all an “if” based on IPCC models that are already failures.

Something stinks here, and it isn’t the fish.

News: 01-30-2008 – Edwards NO kingmaker, Vermont traitors, and Middle East and Chinese snow

Well, so much for the brokered convention idea…

So two days after the whole idea that Edwards is eyeing a brokered convention in order to become Kingmaker and wield some power, the anticipation balloon has popped. I must admit to being a bit disappointed. You see, a month ago this was shaping up to be a dandy and potentially historical year. There seemed to be a real possibility of at least one, if not two, brokered conventions.

Imagine the excitement surrounding a convention where the delegates are voting, without knowing in advance who the nominee is! On the Republican side, we had Huckabee winning Iowa, McCain winning New Hampshire, and Romney taking care of business in Michigan, Wyoming, and Nevada. There was the prospect of a Giuliani win in Florida, and possibly even a Thompson win in South Carolina. But now McCain has won two states in a row, leading to a Super Tuesday that appears to have two viable candidates: McCain and Romney. The only possibility of a brokered convention is if Huckabee captures a few states next Tuesday. There are a couple states where this seems to be a distinct possibility, but even that may not be enough to cause the turmoil that was eagerly anticipated.