Steven Colbert reported Tuesday October 30, 2007 on the "Great Pacific Garbage Patch"
"It's heap of debris floating in the Pacific that's twice the size of Texas. To give you a sense of scale, Texas is a heap of debris one time the size of Texas."
Turns out the garbage is real and there is a nice Wikipedia entry on it, including links to both popular press articles as well as genuine science publications:
Walt Kelly, the creator of the comic Pogo, would have understood Global Climate Change well. His 1971 strip with "We have met the enemy and he is us" is as apt today as it was then, except today it is the whole earth we have screwed up.
Wikipedia's entry for this strip:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/We_have_met_the_enemy#.22We_have_met_the_enemy.....22
When NPR asked NASA Administrator Michael Griffin "Are you concerned about global warming", Griffin responded:
"I'm aware that global warming exists... Whether that is a long term concern or not, I can't say."
Griffin is of the opinion that a little global warming might be good for us and that, in any case, NASA is not authorized to take any action on climate change one way or another.
Time to dump Griffin. He's spouting the administration line. Lunacy. Shear lunacy.
Listen to the the entire interview:
Recommended Climate Change information resources which may be of help when responding skeptics:
Selected refereed literature on:
Science Newssn-solar-2007 has a nice introduction to the role solar power may play in fighting global climate change. Some telling statistics:
"If we are to have a 50 percent chance of meeting a 2 Celsius target we would have to cut global emissions by 80 percent by 2050," Nathan Rive of the Center for International Climate and Environmental Research in Oslo told Reuters.
We are already up 0.7 oC. The 2oC goal is somewhat arbitrary, but that level is expected to have serious consequences. In order to reach the world goal of 80% reduction, industrialized nations will have to cut CO2 by 95%, so says the report.