Posted on 08/07/2007 2:57:11 AM PDT by Sub-Driver
Ex-Clinton Official Ties Minneapolis Bridge Collapse To Global Warming By Noel Sheppard | August 7, 2007 - 00:12 ET
A former member of the Clinton administration, and current Senior Fellow at the virtual Clinton think tank the Center for American Progress, claimed Monday that global warming might have played a factor in the collapse of the I35 bridge in Minneapolis last week.
I kid you not.
Writing at Climate Progress, the global warming blog of CAP, Joseph Romm - who served as Acting Assistant Secretary of the U.S. Department of Energy in 1997 and as Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary from 1995 though 1998 - stated in a piece amazingly entitled "Did Climate Change Contribute To The Minneapolis Bridge Collapse?" (emphasis added throughout):
I was skeptical at first, but after doing a Google search - and after NBC reported Sunday that National Transportation Safety Board investigators are "looking at everything" including "the weather" - I think it is a legitimate question to ask.
Keep your seatbelts fastened, for it got better:
Melissa Hortman of the Minnesota House of Representatives "speculated that 90-plus-degree heat Wednesday and the above-normal temperatures of the past two summers may have been a contributing factor," and said "You wonder if this bridge was built to withstand the massive heat we have had this summer." Or even if it was built to withstand heat, whether its structural deficiencies undermined the design integrity to a point where heat contributed to the collapse.
[...]
Some may object to even asking the question, "Did climate change contribute to the Minneapolis bridge collapse?" My guess is those are the same people who deny that global warming is caused by humans or that it is a serious problem - the same people who inevitably say "we can adapt to whatever climate change there is."
But, in my experience, those "adapters" are actually not interested in finding out what the impacts of global warming are. The Bush administration has blocked research into the impact of climate change on this country and muzzled climate scientists from discussing key climate impact issues, such as the connection between global warming and the recent increase in intense Atlantic hurricanes - which is obviously a central adaptation issue.
By the way, for those that have forgotten, CAP is the group headed by former Clinton Chief of Staff John Podesta which in June outlined a Democrat assault on conservative talk radio. But I digress:
Those who argue against strong action today to reduce greenhouse gas emissions - the adapters who are essentially saying to climate change, "Bring it on!" - cannot criticize those who then ask the obvious adaptation question - how will climate change impact this country and its infrastructure?
Certainly climate change will have the biggest infrastructure impact on our coastal cities, water and sewage systems, levees, and electric grid. But given that a remarkable 70,000 other bridges in the country are also structurally deficient, we should seek to learn whether such troubled bridges can take the ever-growing stresses generated by global warming. We need to be as prepared as possible for a changed climate - as the Center for American Progress has previously argued. Indeed, if the adapters have their way in blocking serious efforts aimed at prevention, we'll need to be prepared for the very worst.
Absolutely unbelievable.
They forgot to mention 12 years of Reagan-Bush neglect, 1980-1992.
They call’em “moonbats” for a reason.
guess the tons of repairing material had nothing to do with it.
http://seattlepi.nwsource.com/national/326473_bridge06.html
It’s hard to figure which think tank causes more embarassment for the US, Carter’s or Clinton’s.
This example deserves wide recognition.
You gotta give the loonies credit : they do stay on the message.
Exactly. They’re moonbats.
This Clinton Administration jerk is a total fool.
Nah...it's not the heat, it's the humidity. Heavy air broke the bridge.
Damn, to think that no one ever explained how bridges stay up in 100-130 degree heat in more southerly climes.... Are there any bridges still standing in Arizona, Texas, etc.?????
Those 90 degree days in Minn. must be doing in all the bridges there.
Maybe eviiillll Republicans have a secret plan to make bridges collapse only in Demagogue-leaning states like Minn.
LLS
The noted metallurgist, Rosie O’Donnell, says steel doesn’t melt. So the collapse must have been due to the overpopulation of pigeons and their tons of corrosive excrement. Global Warming® has led to an extended breeding period, and so many of these undocumented anchor pigeons are homeless, so they have to live under bridges.
No matter, it is still Bush’s fault.
So Romm has DIRECT responsibility for preventing America
attaining alternative energy sources, which could have avoided
the human contribution (to whatever degree that is) to
Global Warming (to whatever extent it exists).
Was Romm also responsible for giving US technology to China
for a few payoffs to the DNC?
Snort. I should have known.
Then all the Mississippi River bridges in Louisiana should have collapsed long ago--they have both the heat AND the humidity to contend with.
Funny how the old Highway 190 Mississippi River bridge at Baton Rouge (built in the 1940's, I think) is still up and going "strong".
has her highness hillary come out on global warming yet?
I heard from the NTSB that it was the cold winters and salt on the bridges that caused most of the damages
Not to mention all the corrosive effects from the nearbly petrochem plants.
any mention of the asymmetric loading at the time
of the accident?
Well, ya’ can’t say I didn’t warn ya. ;)
“I heard from the NTSB that it was the cold winters and salt on the bridges that caused most of the damages”
You have to realize that cold weather in Minnesota is Bush`s fault, also.
evil leftists!
LLS
Of course, it’s the white male hemogony/monopoly/power structure that’s responsible for the bridge collapse. If we had affirmative action involved in the hiring of bridge workers and inspectors, this would have never happened /sarc.
I saw a clip (very soon after) on YouTube with an engineer theorizing just that. He was working under the assumption that there was no traffic on the closed down lanes.
Now we know that there was a whole bunch of dead weight on half the bridge. So I'm wondering about the dynamics of dead load vs live load...half the bridge w/ a big dead load w/ the other half live loaded...
She may have been thinking of buckling. Whatever. A truss is designed to resist buckling. I’ll wait to hear from bridge engineers.
Well, I suspect that the bauxite coating from Kaiser neutralized the sulfuric acid from Stauffer. Acid-base chemistry, y'know.
"Romm is an author, lecturer, and scientist, who has concentrated on problems related to global warming, energy efficiency, green energy technologies and green transportation technologies. "
When the only tool you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail. When you've wasted your career on global warming, everything looks like a Republican conspiracy.
Despite his academic credentials he is no bridge engineer.
No. All the spans in the south dropped last week due to a combination of the the heat and humidity, except for one. That one was dropped due to huge balls of ice falling from the sky. But the Bush administration, led by their evil mastermind Karl Rove, is keeping this under wraps by only permitting coverage from Fox News. And Fox News is obeying its master Rupert Murdoch, a puppet of Dick Cheney, and not mentioning these numerous disasters. As for the remanider of the press, they are being kept in the dark about this and being pacified with special mind control rays being emmitted from a secret hilltop hideaway in Maryland. Those Republican b*****ds!
Wow, it gets in the 90’s in Minnesota in the summer?
Who would have guessed.
Wait till she finds out about the massive amounts of corrosive de-icers that are applied to roads in the upper Midwest. In the winter of course.
And to think, people like this were (and are) running our government and helping to determine how we all live.
Too many scientists are unable to see past next year's grant applications and therefore don't realize that they have staked their reputations on global warming. It's fine with me if they become a laughing stock at some future date, but I am afraid that with the aid of a credulous and biased media, they have staked the reputation of the entire scientific community on it.
I am now waiting for Rosie O’Donnell to insinuate that the bridge collapse was “an inside job” and that bridge supports were deliberately cut and explosive charges planted by sinister forces in the Bush administration. Sadly the MSM would even give this BS total credibility.
Yes, of course. It should also be pointed out that the extra cold weather is also caused by global warming. I read that somewhere. It must be true.
Not sure how 'strong' it is in actuality. According to the link below, that bridge is deficient.
There is a bridge in Monroe that I cross regularly that has a rating of 4.7 out of 100. Well, it is a bridge that I used to cross regularly.
He had a ton of idiots didn't he? Halfbright, Reno, Jocelyn Elders. The list goes on and on.
And this guys engineering degree is from where? LOL.
Rosie says heat does not melt steel. So, they really need to get on the same page here. Also, COLD effects steel much more than heat expansion. I really wonder why what some of these yazoos say even gets PRINTED...but then i remember...it fits the agenda of the MSM.
This guy has a Phd from MIT? He might want to get his money back.
Don’t forget poor dead Ron Brown - Secy of Commerce and Bagman for the Chinese.
Let me get this straight. Fire can’t melt steel (according to Rosie), but a few warm days can weaken a bridge to the point of collapse? My how metallurgy has changed since I studied it!
The scary part is that most were selected by Hillary.
.
I don’t know what I said that resulted in your response.
On Fox & Friends the other morning, the blonde woman (Gretchen?) said she had just gotten back from Minneapolis and noted how hot it was - maybe that had something to do with the bridge collapsing, she pondered. I couldn’t believe my ears. A whole new brand of stupid is taking over the Air Waves.
I don’t know how to post pix-but I gotta say....
Not THIS S%#$ again?
That's OK since global warming climate change (gotta keep the story going) causes cold winters too.
Also, doesn't everybody realize that sodium reacts violently with water and chlorine is a poisonous gas? It's insane to put such a deadly combination as sodium chloride on the roads. :=)
I meant not this global warming stuff again.
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