bhoPresident Obama’s State of the Union address continued to blow smoke on the “greatest threat climate change” mantra essential to justify his war on coal (aka, “Clean Power Plan”).

He said: “Look, if anybody still wants to dispute the science around climate change, have at it. You’ll be pretty lonely, because you’ll be debating our military, most of America’s business leaders, the majority of the American people, almost the entire scientific community, and 200 nations around the world who agree it’s a problem and intend to solve it.”

In reality, no rational scientist, or any adult human for that matter, will argue that climate doesn’t change. Yet any notion that “almost the entire scientific community” agree that it’s a problem, even more, one of cataclysmic portent demanding $trillions to mitigate, has no basis in either fact or sanity.

First, let’s finally understand that the endlessly mainstream media repeated “science is settled consensus” argument is based upon a scientifically vacuous “study.”

aguPurporting to conclude that 97% of all scientists agree that humans are causing dangerous climate change, the overwhelming majority cited was based upon an underwhelming statistical sample of only 77 people. Those selected American Geophysical Union members were cherry-picked out of about 3,000 who responded to a very brief 2009 online survey submitted to the organization’s 10,257-member population.
The pseudo-poll consisted of two questions which virtually everyone I know would agree with. The first: “When compared with pre-1800s levels, do you think that mean global temperatures have generally risen, fallen, or remained relatively constant?”

Few would expected to dispute this, as the planet began thawing out of a three-centuries-long “little ice age” in the middle of the 19th century, predating the Industrial Revolution.

That was the coldest period since the last real ice age ended roughly 10,000-12,000 years redericago. The climate was at least as warm during the Medieval warm period 1,000 years ago when Eric the Red’s Vikings raised crops and livestock on the coast of Greenland, and also during the Roman Warm Period 1,000 years before that.

The second question asked: “Do you think human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean global temperatures?” So what constitutes “significant”? Does changing include both cooling and warming, and for both “better” and “worse”? And which contributions does this include land use changes, such as agriculture and deforestation? Does any of this suggest a crisis?

Somehow, however, all of this devolved into an alarmist meme which continues to remain publicly unchallenged by “experts” who are supposed to know a lot about proper quality standards for scientific research. Why don’t more of them expose exaggerated and irresponsible claims premised upon faulty theories and disproven climate models?

cgateAfter all, weren’t fossil-fueled atmospheric CO2 emissions predicted to drive global temperatures off a hockey stick-shaped chart by now? Instead, according to satellite records, other than the current El Niño, there has been no statistical global warming now for nearly two decades.

Responsible scientists have professional and ethical obligations to express uncertainties and doubts. The real climate change “deniers” are those who don’t exercise active skepticism…not those who do.

Looking back to the climategate scandals that alarmists wish us all to forget about, an email from one of the researchers to another said: “It is inconceivable that policymakers will be willing to make billion- and trillion-dollar decisions for adaptation to the projected regional climate change based upon models that do not even describe and simulate the processes that are the building blocks of [natural] climate variability.”

As another researcher observed: “…clearly, some tuning or very good luck [is] involved. I doubt the modeling world will be able to get away with this much longer.”

Researcher Peter Thorne prudently expressed caution, saying: “Observations do not show rising temperatures throughout the tropical troposphere unless you accept one single study and approach and discount a wealth of others. This is downright dangerous. We need to communicate the uncertainty and be honest.”

A few people will remember that U.S. temperatures were warmer back in the 1930s through mid-1940 when CO2 levels were lower. Concentrations were also lower for about three decades, a full climate cycle, following that period when North America underwent cooling. Some leading scientists and news publications proclaimed that the next true ice age had arrived.

Rather than worry about global warming, consider a greater and opposite problem which many scientists who are clearly missing in the “97% consensus” predict. Based upon solar conditions similar to those which occurred during the little ice age, Planet Earth may be in for a protracted cooling.

Let’s hope they are wrong. And while we’re at it, let’s also pray that the next person to present a State of the Union Address fully recognizes man-made threats that warrant real and urgent attention.

NOTE: A version of this article first appeared at: http://www.newsmax.com/LarryBell/climate-sotu-obama/2016/01/17/id/709821/