On Sunday, Jan 28, the front-page story in my daily newspaper was “A chilling conclusion on global warming.” By Tuesday, the front page story was “Climate Study: Millions will go hungry and dry.” Soon more revelations about a United Nations report on climate change, due in April, will be in the news, but let me tell you its conclusion. We’re doomed.

Now, you might ask yourself, why should we have any confidence in a report from an international institution that perpetrated the “Oil-for-Food” scandal? Or that stacked its Human Rights Commission with representatives of the most repressive nations? Or that initiated a ban on DDT, thus leading to the needless deaths of millions from malaria? Or that is currently dawdling around while thousands continue to die in Darfur?

I mean, just how much credibility does the United Nations have these days? Or, for that matter, its International Panel on Climate Change that has issued various assessments of the climate since it was created in 1988 under the aegis of the U.N. Environmental Program?

Despite the Oscar statuette waiting for Al Gore’s dubious documentary, should we really take the word of Hollywood celebrities, politicians, and a U.N. panel that, according to the Sunday news story, involves a “group of 50 researchers, representing thousands more, (who) will then meet in secret to put the finishing touches on the report.”

“Meet in secret”? Excuse me, but isn’t real science about being able to actually prove one’s conclusions are accurate, as opposed to promoting a scarifying report that predicts that, by 2080, millions of people will go hungry and that there will be “critical water shortages in China and Australia, as well as parts of Europe and the United States?”

When he accepted the prestigious 2006 Craaford Prize, Wallace S. Broecker, a member of the National Academy of Sciences and universally deemed the world’s foremost climate interpreter, said, “My lifetime study of Earth’s climate system has humbled me. I’m convinced that we have greatly underestimated the complexity of this system. The importance of obscure phenomena, ranging from those that control the size of raindrops to those that control the amount of water pouring into the deep sea from the shelves of the Antarctic continent, makes reliable modeling very difficult, if not impossible.”

Despite the endless deluge of global warming claims there is also a mountain of climate data to dispute them. The primary reason for disputing the claims is that they are based on computer models. These are similar computer models meteorologists use to predict next week’s weather. How often are these predictions wrong? The answer is (a) daily, (b) weekly, (c) frequently or (d) all of the above.

Coming soon, there will be another huge media barrage about global warming. Let me put your mind at ease. It is common knowledge among meteorologists that the Earth has natural cycles of warming and cooling. Has the Earth been warming? Yes, since the end of the last Ice Age according to most experts. Is it rapidly warming now? No – at least not outside the range of natural variability.

If you want to believe a bunch of guys meeting in secret to write horrible scenarios of stuff that is not going to happen, be my guest.

What really scares me, however, is proposed federal legislation based on the latest U.N. report. The damage it will do to our thriving economy is incalculable.

Caruba, an adjunct CFACT policy analyst, writes a weekly column, “Warning Signs,” posted on the website of The National Anxiety Center at www.anxietycenter.com.