1998 is NOT the warmest year on record

NASA has rather quietly fixed the numbers behind a "ground-breaking" discovery: a chart that showed that 1998 was the warmest year in American history. Get that? Warmest. year. ever.

But now, we're finding out that those numbers were wrong, something GISS head and enviromoonbat extraordinaire James Hansen, who created the graphs along with NASA’s Reto Ruedy, had no official announcement or comment to make on.

It wasn't until Steve McKintyre, who operates the blog Climate Audit asked to see the algorythms Hansen used to generate the data, which was refused to him. So McKyntire reverse-engineered the numbers and found a Y2K bug. He notified Hansen and Ruedy of the problem, who said they would fix it.

NASA released the corrected figures, and boy, are they sure different:

NASA has now silently released corrected figures, and the changes are truly astounding. The warmest year on record is now 1934. 1998 (long trumpeted by the media as record-breaking) moves to second place. 1921 takes third. In fact, 5 of the 10 warmest years on record now all occur before World War II. Anthony Watts has put the new data in chart form, along with a more detailed summary of the events.

The really fun part is that NASA and GISS didn't report this.

You would think that they would, considering the current global warming "debate". But because according to the Goracle, Hansen, and other enviromoonbats like them there is a "consensus", there's no need to. Throw any scientific data at them you'd like to, and it won't matter, because according to these guys, the debate is over anyways.

Agree with the Goracle and you'll get more money.

Another interesting thought -- how accurate could temperature data be in the 19th century? The 18th? The 17th? I mean, we can't go back in time and test data from 1781 or something using the superior technology we have today to find out what temperatures were like then. So when it comes down to it, how do we really, truly know what the warmest years are? I'm no science whiz, so if there is some way to accurately find out temperatures from like, 1824 then by all means, let me know. I just find it hard to believe that, even with the corrected data, we can be certain that these years are the warmest years ever in American history.

Oh well.

Somehow, I don't see this going onto the cover of Newsweek.

Others commenting:
Moonbattery
Iowa Voice
Newsbusters
Blue Crab Boulevard
Tigerhawk
Wake Up America
Hot Air
American Thinker
Q & O
Macsmind
Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler
IMAO
And of course,
Climate Audit

NASA's Griffin caves under political pressure

Typical:

The head of NASA told scientists and engineers that he regrets airing his personal views about global warming during a recent radio interview, according to a video of the meeting obtained by The Associated Press.

NASA administrator Michael Griffin said in the closed-door meeting Monday at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena that “unfortunately, this is an issue which has become far more political than technical, and it would have been well for me to have stayed out of it.”

“All I can really do is apologize to all you guys.... I feel badly that I caused this amount of controversy over something like this,” he said.

I was really disappointed to see this. It's interesting how, whenever a scientist or climatologist or politician or college professor or whatever, speaks out against the global warming hysteria their career is threatened. I don't know what happened with Griffin, but reading between the lines leads me to believe that he probably was "gently" asked to make some sort of statement. He hit the nail on the head: the problem is more political than technical.

For Al Gore and the global warming fanatics, it's a dead lock. There is NO argument to be had. Al Gore invented the internet, so we must believe everything he says about global warming. He said so, and a bunch of celebretards believe it too, and therefore it is 100% accurate that humans invented global warming, and the planet is going to die, and the only way to prevent it is to cause massive destruction to the economy in the United States.

Unfortunately for the Goracle, Leo, Laurie David, Pioneer Pelosi, and the rest of the hysterics, the argument is far from over. There is even a petition, The Global Warming Petition Project (which over 17,000 scientists have signed) stating that global warming is not a problem and might actually be environmentally helpful:

Below is an eight page review of information on the subject of "global warming," and a petition in the form of a reply card. Please consider these materials carefully.

The United States is very close to adopting an international agreement that would ration the use of energy and of technologies that depend upon coal, oil, and natural gas and some other organic compounds.

This treaty is, in our opinion, based upon flawed ideas. Research data on climate change do not show that human use of hydrocarbons is harmful. To the contrary, there is good evidence that increased atmospheric carbon dioxide is environmentally helpful.

The proposed agreement would have very negative effects upon the technology of nations throughout the world, especially those that are currently attempting to lift from poverty and provide opportunities to the over 4 billion people in technologically underdeveloped countries.

It is especially important for America to hear from its citizens who have the training necessary to evaluate the relevant data and offer sound advice.

We urge you to sign and return the petition card. If you would like more cards for use by your colleagues, these will be sent.

Frederick Seitz
Past President, National Academy of Sciences, U.S.A.
President Emeritus, Rockefeller University

Unfortunately, most of the fanatics aren't interested in actually stopping global warming. As Griffin discovered, the argument is for political gain. Just thirty years ago, they were saying we'd be in a massive ice age right now. Shoot, my weatherman can't even predict whether it will rain in a few days, and we're supposed to believe Al Gore -- who isn't a scientist or a climatologist -- is who we should believe can predict what the weather will be like ten or twenty years from now?

Unfortunately, the political crowd will excommunicate you if you question their gospel. Too bad Griffin couldn't stick to his guns.

Previous: NASA scientist "unsure" of validity of global warming

NASA scientist "unsure" of validity of global warming

From ABC News:

NASA administrator Michael Griffin is drawing the ire of his agency's preeminent climate scientists after apparently downplaying the need to combat global warming.

"I have no doubt that a trend of global warming exists," Griffin told Inskeep. "I am not sure that it is fair to say that it is a problem we must wrestle with."

"To assume that it is a problem is to assume that the state of Earth's climate today is the optimal climate, the best climate that we could have or ever have had and that we need to take steps to make sure that it doesn't change," Griffin said. "I guess I would ask which human beings — where and when — are to be accorded the privilege of deciding that this particular climate that we have right here today, right now is the best climate for all other human beings. I think that's a rather arrogant position for people to take."

Griffin's comments — released in transcript form by NPR — immediately drew stunned reaction from James Hansen, NASA's top climate scientist at the Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York.

"It's an incredibly arrogant and ignorant statement," Hansen told ABC News. "It indicates a complete ignorance of understanding the implications of climate change."

Interestingly enough, James Hansen was featured heavily in Al Gore's mockumentary, An Inconvenient Lie, I mean, An Inconvenient Truth. Mixed interests, much?

This is exactly the way enviro-moonbattery always seems to work. Global warming should just be accepted as an absolute truth, and any climatologist or scientist who dares dispute or question that truth is out of their mind.

Funny thing is, Griffin wasn't even really disputing that there is some global warming going on -- he just wasn't buying into the apocalyptic hype that Al Gore, Laurie David, Sheryl Crow, and the rest of the moonbats are spewing. Temperatures rising one degree will cause the world to end! Start building dome cities on the moon! We must abort Earth now! ABORT, ABORT, ABORT!!

He said it perfectly: which human beings are allowed to say what is causing global warming, and what makes them more authorized to do so? And how is it that Al Gore is the most knowledgeable person on the planet when it comes to global warming? He usurped that position at the forefront of "the fight against global warming!", just like Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton appointed themselves leaders of the civil rights movement.

And funny, again, how questioning the validity of global warming "draws the ire" of climatologists at NASA. Aren't scientists supposed to be continually questioning and testing their theories? I didn't realize that science was so easy to predict, especially climatology.

If that's the case, then why can't the local meteorologist even predict whether or not it's going to rain this afternoon?? Maybe he needs to drink some of Al Gore's Kool-Aid.