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U.S. Senate Hearing: Climate Scientist Says Warming of 'last 100 years is mostly natural’
U.S. Senate Environment & Public Works Committee ^ | July 22, 2008 | Dr. Roy Spencer

Posted on 07/22/2008 9:40:36 AM PDT by EPW Comm Team

U.S. Senate Hearing on Climate Science - Study Finds 'Mostly Natural' Warming

[Note: Below is testimony from today’s hearing “Full Committee hearing entitled, “An Update on the Science of Global Warming and its Implications.” Atmospheric Scientist Dr. Roy Spencer was one of the scientists testifying and deatlied new studies showing “mostly natural” climate influences. ]

Atmospheric Scientist Dr. Roy Spencer, formerly of NASA:

New Study Finds ‘warming we have experienced in the last 100 years is mostly natural’ (Spencer is currently Principal Research Scientist, Earth System Science Center University of Alabama in Huntsville

Spencer’s Testimony Excerpt: On the subject of the Administration’s involvement in policy-relevant scientific work performed by government employees in the EPA, NASA, and other agencies, I can provide some perspective based upon my previous experiences as a NASA employee. For example, during the Clinton-Gore Administration I was told what I could and could not say during congressional testimony. Since it was well known that I am skeptical of the view that mankind’s greenhouse gas emissions are mostly responsible for global warming, I assumed that this advice was to help protect Vice President Gore’s agenda on the subject. […]

Regarding the currently popular theory that mankind is responsible for global warming, I am very pleased to deliver good news from the front lines of climate change research. Our latest research results, which I am about to describe, could have an enormous impact on policy decisions regarding greenhouse gas emissions. Despite decades of persistent uncertainty over how sensitive the climate system is to increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels, we now have new satellite evidence which strongly suggests that the climate system is much less sensitive than is claimed by the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. […]

If true, an insensitive climate system would mean that we have little to worry about in the way of manmade global warming and associated climate change. And, as we will see, it would also mean that the warming we have experienced in the last 100 years is mostly natural. Of course, if climate change is mostly natural then it is largely out of our control, and is likely to end -- if it has not ended already, since satellite-measured global temperatures have not warmed for at least seven years now. […]

Based upon global oceanic climate variations measured by a variety of NASA and NOAA satellites during the period 2000 through 2005 we have found a signature of climate sensitivity so low that it would reduce future global warming projections to below 1 deg. C by the year 2100. […]

Obviously, what I am claiming today is of great importance to the global warming debate and related policy decisions, and it will surely be controversial. These results are not totally unprecedented, though, as other recently published research6 has also led to the conclusion that the real climate system does not exhibit net positive feedback. […]

I hope that the Committee realizes that, if true, these new results mean that humanity will be largely spared the negative consequences of human-induced climate change. This would be good news that should be celebrated -- not attacked and maligned. And given that virtually no research into possible natural explanations for global warming has been performed, it is time for scientific objectivity and integrity to be restored to the field of global warming research. This Committee could, at a minimum, make a statement that encourages that goal.

To see Dr. Spencer's full testimony see:

http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Files.View&FileStore_id=e12b56cb-4c7b-4c21-bd4a-7afbc4ee72f3


TOPICS: News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: climatechange; globalwarming
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1 posted on 07/22/2008 9:40:37 AM PDT by EPW Comm Team
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To: EPW Comm Team

Weather happens?


2 posted on 07/22/2008 9:41:51 AM PDT by ASA Vet
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To: ASA Vet

Algore wept.


3 posted on 07/22/2008 9:43:04 AM PDT by Eric in the Ozarks
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To: EPW Comm Team

The denier movement seems to be growing. It must be stopped at all costs!


4 posted on 07/22/2008 9:43:03 AM PDT by Always Right (Was it over when the Germans bombed Pearl Harbor?)
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To: EPW Comm Team

You know Spencer works for Rush don’t you.../sarc...


5 posted on 07/22/2008 9:45:07 AM PDT by Sybeck1 (I would rather be water-boarded than vote for John McCain......)
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To: EPW Comm Team; ASA Vet; Eric in the Ozarks

I’m surprised that his testimony wasn’t SHOUTED DOWN by all the Rat kool-aid drinkers.


6 posted on 07/22/2008 9:46:58 AM PDT by BOBTHENAILER (One by one, in small groups or in whole armies, we don't care how we do it, but we're gonna getcha)
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To: EPW Comm Team

True, Spencer doesn’t the same credentials as the music and sociology professors the UN included as “climate experts” in their panel findings but his opinion will just have to do I guess.


7 posted on 07/22/2008 9:47:02 AM PDT by Slapshot68
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To: EPW Comm Team
What is the Tennessee equivalent to Arkancide?
8 posted on 07/22/2008 9:49:31 AM PDT by Forrestfire (("To educate a man in mind and not in morals is to educate a menace to society." Theodore Roosevelt))
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To: EPW Comm Team

well duh! but do you really think that is going to stop all the greenies?


9 posted on 07/22/2008 9:51:34 AM PDT by tatsinfla
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To: EPW Comm Team
At least respected scientists are coming to the plate. Gore keeps declaring the world is flat and his theory might work if it was so. But it is not flat. It is in constant change.

Humanity is so minute within the scope of the Universe.

And if they're so worried about "Our Lives" and if life is so precious, how can people like Gore and Obama...say..."Kill The Children"....It's a good thing??

THE AUDACITY OF IT ALL!!

10 posted on 07/22/2008 9:54:02 AM PDT by Sacajaweau (I'm planting corn...Have to feed my car...)
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To: EPW Comm Team

Rush just played an audio clip of one of the vapid air-heads at the hearing attempting to denigrate Spencer’s testimony on the premise that he couldn’t be credible because Rush called him “the official meterologist of the EIB network”.

Does anyone think she’d say that James Hansen’s testimony couldn’t be credible because he gives campaign contributions to DemocRATS, uses stagecraft to mislead people in his congressional testimony, and was in cohoots with Enron, et.al., to hype the anthropogenic GW hoax?

Riiiight.

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/news/2048577/posts?page=13#13


11 posted on 07/22/2008 10:08:02 AM PDT by Matchett-PI (Driving a Phase-2 Operation Chaos Hybrid that burns both gas AND rubber!)
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To: Matchett-PI

The vapid airhead in question was Barbara Boxer.


12 posted on 07/22/2008 10:09:41 AM PDT by popdonnelly (Boycott Washington D.C. until they allow gun ownership)
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To: popdonnelly

Thanks for the name. There are so many of them in Congress, they’re impossible to keep track of.


13 posted on 07/22/2008 10:16:13 AM PDT by Matchett-PI (Driving a Phase-2 Operation Chaos Hybrid that burns both gas AND rubber!)
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To: EPW Comm Team
At which point they were slapped with a contempt of Congress by the Democrats in charge and hauled off to an unknown destination for reeducation.
14 posted on 07/22/2008 10:17:48 AM PDT by SF Republican
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To: Sybeck1

No no no no....Spencer works for Big Oil....so does Rush....so do I.


15 posted on 07/22/2008 10:28:28 AM PDT by ElectricStrawberry (27th Infantry Regiment...cut in half during the Clinton years.)
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To: BOBTHENAILER

No one expects the Environmental Inquisition!


16 posted on 07/22/2008 10:37:02 AM PDT by BenLurkin
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To: EPW Comm Team
I hope that the Committee realizes that, if true, these new results mean that humanity will be largely spared the negative consequences of human-induced climate change. This would be good news that should be celebrated -- not attacked and maligned. And given that virtually no research into possible natural explanations for global warming has been performed, it is time for scientific objectivity and integrity to be restored to the field of global warming research.

This scientist is suggesting that common sense rule the day. Unfortunately, he's speaking to a Senate committee chaired by Democrats who wouldn't know common sense if it walked up and slapped them in the face.

17 posted on 07/22/2008 11:26:12 AM PDT by SuziQ
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To: EPW Comm Team

Climate hearing ping


18 posted on 07/22/2008 11:28:29 AM PDT by gleeaikin
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To: EPW Comm Team

bttt


19 posted on 07/22/2008 11:40:57 AM PDT by Eagles6 ( Typical White Guy: Christian, Constitutionalist, Heterosexual, Redneck)
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To: EPW Comm Team
Who cares about CO2? It's good for plants. Make more CO2.

The primary evidence that CO2 and the greenhouse effect have anything to do with raising global temperature is missing entirely. It isn't there.

No Smoking Hot Spot (The Australian)

This is a short and easily understandable article showing the plain truth. The hinge pin that links global temperature to the greenhouse effect is missing. It is easily measurable and hundreds of probes have done so.

20 posted on 07/22/2008 11:49:51 AM PDT by TigersEye (Drill or get off the Hill. ... call Nancy Pelosi @ 202 - 225 - 0100)
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To: EPW Comm Team; 11B40; A Balrog of Morgoth; A message; ACelt; Aeronaut; AFPhys; AlexW; ...
DOOMAGE!

Global Warming PING!

You have been pinged because of your interest in environmentalism, alarmist wackos, mainstream media doomsday hype, and other issues pertaining to global warming.

Freep-mail me to get on or off: Add me / Remove me

Please ping me to all note-worthy threads on global warming.

The Sky Is Falling On Gore Again

No Smoking Hot Spot (Scientist recants on global warming)

Global Warming on Google

Global Warming on Free Republic

Latest from Global Warming News Site

Latest from Greenie Watch

Latest from Junk Science

Latest from Terra Daily

21 posted on 07/22/2008 11:52:26 AM PDT by Tolerance Sucks Rocks (Drill Here! Drill Now! Pay Less! Sign the petition at http://www.americansolutions.com/)
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To: EPW Comm Team

The Gorwellian Concensus continues to crumble, as it should.


22 posted on 07/22/2008 1:19:02 PM PDT by PeaceBeWithYou (De Oppresso Liber! (50 million and counting in Afganistan and Iraq))
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To: EPW Comm Team

I thought it was COMMON knowledge not to listen to anything the UN say?


23 posted on 07/22/2008 1:24:18 PM PDT by wolfcreek (I see miles and miles of Texas....let's keep it that way.)
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To: EPW Comm Team; According2RecentPollsAirIsGood; TenthAmendmentChampion; Horusra; CygnusXI; ...
 




Beam me to Planet Gore !

24 posted on 07/22/2008 1:30:43 PM PDT by steelyourfaith
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To: popdonnelly

your comment is redundant.


25 posted on 07/22/2008 1:32:49 PM PDT by purpleraine
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To: Forrestfire

Tennecide or Tennicide I think.


26 posted on 07/22/2008 1:46:46 PM PDT by rdl6989 ( I'm a carbon based human being, a Carbonated-American)
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To: SF Republican
At which point they were slapped with a contempt of Congress by the Democrats in charge and hauled off to an unknown destination for reeducation.

Shudder! Shudder!

To Gulag XVII?

27 posted on 07/22/2008 2:22:02 PM PDT by Ole Okie (Who are you going to believe anyway, Gore or your lyin' eyes?)
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To: aflaak

ping


28 posted on 07/22/2008 3:23:12 PM PDT by r-q-tek86 (If you're not taking flak, you're not over the target.)
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To: xcamel

ping


29 posted on 07/22/2008 3:27:14 PM PDT by r-q-tek86 (If you're not taking flak, you're not over the target.)
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To: EPW Comm Team; OKSooner; honolulugal; Killing Time; Beowulf; Mr. Peabody; RW_Whacko; gruffwolf; ...

FReepmail me to get on or off


Click on POGW graphic for full GW rundown

New!!: Dr. John Ray's
GREENIE WATCH

The Great Global Warming Swindle Video - back on the net!! (click here)

Ping me if you find one I've missed.


From the EIB crack climate team...
30 posted on 07/22/2008 3:33:18 PM PDT by xcamel (Being on the wrong track means the unintended consequences express train doesnt kill you going by)
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To: xcamel; EPW Comm Team; OKSooner; honolulugal; Killing Time; Beowulf; Mr. Peabody; RW_Whacko; ...
Next thing you know, someone will tell all the kids there ain't no Santa Claus. OK, this guy has a few facts under control. BFD. Soon that Senate chamber will be under water.

Personally, I am sticking very close to Al Gore. When the ice caps melt, he should float pretty good.

31 posted on 07/22/2008 4:02:56 PM PDT by Kenny Bunk (GOP Plank: Pump MORE US Crude--2Xrefining capacity -- Coal /METHANOL fuel-- Build Nukes)
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To: EPW Comm Team

Excellent report - spread the news - Globaloney is..,.,.well...,Globaloney!

We need a ticker tape parade!!!!


32 posted on 07/22/2008 4:53:48 PM PDT by Freedom'sWorthIt (Tony Snow founnd out - to live is Christ, to die is gain....Thanks be to God for Tony's life!)
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To: popdonnelly
The vapid airhead in question was Barbara Boxer.

When you describe Babs as a "vapid airhead," you assign her more "gravitas" than she merits. In college, I used to date vapid airheads. They've got much more on the ball than Babs.

33 posted on 07/22/2008 9:41:34 PM PDT by Entrepreneur (The environmental movement is filled with watermelons - green on the outside, red on the inside)
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To: EPW Comm Team
During the Clinton-Gore Administration I was told what I could and could not say during congressional testimony. Since it was well known that I am skeptical of the view that mankind’s greenhouse gas emissions are mostly responsible for global warming, I assumed that this advice was to help protect Vice President Gore’s agenda on the subject.

But, but, but...

I thought that only St James Hansen was censored when he was only quoted 14,000 times about being censored.

34 posted on 07/22/2008 9:45:21 PM PDT by Entrepreneur (The environmental movement is filled with watermelons - green on the outside, red on the inside)
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To: popdonnelly
The vapid airhead in question was Barbara Boxer.

Ann Coulter said she is now the most stupid Senator since Lincoln Chaffe retired. LOL!
35 posted on 07/22/2008 10:00:45 PM PDT by wjcsux (Islam: The religion of choice for those who are too stupid for Scientology)
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To: TigersEye
Evans denigrates the standard practice of science quite readily, focusing on the result he likes and belittling without discussion the hard work of scientists trying to get accurate results.

Tropical tropospheric trends again

36 posted on 07/28/2008 8:49:19 AM PDT by cogitator
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To: EPW Comm Team

but, but, the un says p-ss on the facts, so line up to get pissed on


37 posted on 07/28/2008 8:52:47 AM PDT by Waco
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To: EPW Comm Team

Did they break him on the rack, dismember his body and send the parts to various offices as a sign of what happens to heretics of the religion of global warming?


38 posted on 07/28/2008 8:58:32 AM PDT by Pistolshot (We need a powerful remedy for NO B.O.)
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To: EPW Comm Team

The warming might be due to spurious readings from light pollution. It is so light around population centers that the residents rarely achieve dark adaptation at night during their entire lives, cannot see any but the brightest stellar objects, and do not know where to look for the moon.


39 posted on 07/28/2008 9:01:45 AM PDT by RightWhale (I will veto each and every beer)
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To: cogitator

IOWs he takes greenhouse theory at face value and finding no objective evidence of greenhouse warming based on the foundation of the theory itself he comes to a logical conclusion. How he belittles the work of scientists by noting that they use state of the art instruments and have deployed them profusely searching everywhere they can to verify their data only you would know. lol


40 posted on 07/28/2008 9:16:37 AM PDT by TigersEye (Drill or get off the Hill. ... call Nancy Pelosi @ 202 - 225 - 0100)
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To: TigersEye
based on the foundation of the theory itself he comes to a logical conclusion.

Logical but incorrect, because he is not considering the reasons that bias corrections are necessary. The scientists actually working with the data do understand this.

"He concludes: "The new analysis adds to the growing body of evidence suggesting that these discrepancies are most likely the result of inaccuracies in the observed temperature record rather than fundamental model errors."

"these discrepancies" is the supposed lack of a global warming signal in the tropics.

Evans is using a rather standard argumentative device, which is to state that the unadjusted data indicates a certain conclusion, without pursuing why adjustments are necessary.

Some points about his article:

"Yet hundreds of radiosondes have given the same answer, so statistically it is not possible that they missed the hot spot." (does not discuss the paucity of radiosonde measurement stations in the tropics compared to mid-latitudes)

"Recently the alarmists have suggested we ignore the radiosonde thermometers, but instead take the radiosonde wind measurements, apply a theory about wind shear, and run the results through their computers to estimate the temperatures. They then say that the results show that we cannot rule out the presence of a hot spot. If you believe that you'd believe anything." (Actual process: "Sherwood et al (pdf) take a different, iterative, approach that involves using the wind shear measurements (taken at the same time as the temperatures) as a consistency check. These measurements can be linked (via the thermal wind equation to temperature gradients) but are not subject to the same problems in instrumentation. They specifically avoid using the satellite data in the process, so that this can serve as a check on the final product."

That's what scientists do. They come up with ways to check to see if observational data is accurate. They don't assume it's accurate (a very bad, fundamental mistake). If observations don't agree with theory, then either theory is wrong or the the data is wrong. Amazingly enough, scientists actually check both, repeatedly, to keep refining their understanding. And this is the process that Evans belittles.

41 posted on 07/28/2008 10:44:27 AM PDT by cogitator
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To: cogitator
"He concludes: "The new analysis adds to the growing body of evidence suggesting that these discrepancies are most likely the result of inaccuracies in the observed temperature record rather than fundamental model errors."

That statement doesn't appear anywhere in the article. Try again, Algore.

42 posted on 07/28/2008 11:06:30 AM PDT by TigersEye (Drill or get off the Hill. ... call Nancy Pelosi @ 202 - 225 - 0100)
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To: TigersEye

It’s in the linked article in my first reply.


43 posted on 07/28/2008 12:04:49 PM PDT by cogitator
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To: cogitator

Then it’s not relevant to the article I linked is it?


44 posted on 07/28/2008 12:05:59 PM PDT by TigersEye (Drill or get off the Hill. ... call Nancy Pelosi @ 202 - 225 - 0100)
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To: cogitator

Looks like they adjusted the data to fit the model; the uncertainty allows the speculation.


45 posted on 07/28/2008 12:47:04 PM PDT by Old Professer (The critic writes with rapier pen, dips it twice, and writes again.)
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To: cogitator

To say that the sonde box is being heated by the sun and influencing the thermometers is misleading as the boxes have always been made with as high an albedo as possible to guard against this very sort of thing; to use wind as a correlation to the levels where changes should occur is further to accept the raw data that fits and throw out the data that doesn’t.

Admittedly there are not enough sounding stations but currently the trend is to reduce observation points on a huge scale with no plans to increase them in the tropics or elsewhere to my knowledge.

Monkeying with the data only makes monkeys of the turkeys doing so.


46 posted on 07/28/2008 12:54:22 PM PDT by Old Professer (The critic writes with rapier pen, dips it twice, and writes again.)
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To: EPW Comm Team
U.S. Senate Hearing: Climate Scientist Says Warming of
'last 100 years is mostly natural’


In times of revolutionary deceit, telling the truth is a
revolutionary act.

(my imperfect paraphrase of something George Orwell said)
47 posted on 07/28/2008 12:56:40 PM PDT by VOA
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To: EPW Comm Team
U.S. Senate Hearing: Climate Scientist Says Warming of
'last 100 years is mostly natural’


In times of revolutionary deceit, telling the truth is a
revolutionary act.

(my imperfect paraphrase of something George Orwell said)
48 posted on 07/28/2008 12:56:40 PM PDT by VOA
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To: TigersEye

This issue has been seething below the surface for a while now, the business of how much adjusting and homogenization is prudent or at what point we enter the realm of the made-up.

It would be better to throw out the radiosonde data and go with the satellite data if we are going to concentrate on the 1979-present era than to keep massaging the air soundings until they are so far apart from any observed data as to be starkly separate.

cogitator means well, he’s just a scaredy-cat. :>)


49 posted on 07/28/2008 1:01:46 PM PDT by Old Professer (The critic writes with rapier pen, dips it twice, and writes again.)
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To: EPW Comm Team
This guy is the Official Climatologist of the EIB Network. He can't be trusted.

</sarcasm>

50 posted on 07/28/2008 1:04:50 PM PDT by Fundamentally Fair (If given a choice between a POW and a POS, I'll take the POW.)
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