Warming issue finally 'resolved'
7/7/2006There are ominous signs that the Earth's weather patterns have begun to change dramatically with serious implications predicted for nearly every nation on Earth.
The evidence supporting these predictions has begun to accumulate so massively that meteorologists are hard-pressed to keep up. Just last April, in the most devastating outbreak of tornadoes, 148 twisters killed more than 300 people in the U.S.
To scientists, these incidents represent the advance signs of fundamental changes in the world's weather. Meteorologists are almost unanimous that the trend will continue for at least 25 years. A recent report by the National Academy of Sciences warns that a major climatic change would force economic and social adjustments on a worldwide scale.
Does all of that sound like what you're hearing in 2006 regarding global warming? Guess again. Those numbers and forecasts appeared in Newsweek in 1975 and referred to the global cooling mania taking place then among many climatologists. The National Academy, which warned about the severe ramifications of global cooling, is the same group whom The Blade praised in a recent editorial as getting it right about global warming.
What the global warming crowd won't mention is that 6,000 years ago global temperatures were about 2 degrees Fahrenheit warmer than in the late 1990s, nor that from 1000 to 1300 A.D., farmers raised grapes in England 300 miles north of present limits and, in what are now icebound parts of Greenland, Norse settlers grazed sheep and dairy cattle.
Obviously, these places were warmer then than now. Also, Al Gore will not tell you that Tennessee has cooled over half a degree since he was born. Records show that his state's warmest 30-year period since 1895 was from 1925 to 1954, according to the National Climatic Data Center.
I'm sure relieved that global warming is a settled matter.
Paul L. Arndt
Chatham Valley Drive
Al-Qaeda accomplished far more on 9/11 than it ever hoped to. Oh, they had George Bush's number. They knew he was an arrogant, self-righteous person and that he would react with uncontrolled anger and strike out at Muslim nations.
But what they did not know was that the Congress of the United States was similar, and many Americans were similar, and that Mr. Bush would get the backing he needed to do what he has done.
And what has he done? He attacked one of the most defenseless nations on the face of the earth, Afghanistan, blowing out its infrastructure and causing the deaths of tens of thousands of innocent people. Has anyone seen Five In the Afternoon?
And then he would violate the Constitution and international law and attack Iraq, a country which had not attacked the United States.
So if Mr. Bush wants to take credit for the fact that there have been no more major attacks on the U.S.A. since 9/11, well, all I can say is that he is being ignorant, ironic, and stupid, and hopes that somehow history will justify what can never be justified.
Impeachment has been a joke here at home and abroad because of what it was used for in the Clinton years. We would best use it for what it is supposed to be used for and impeach this President, if for nothing else for the sake of history being kinder to us when the text is printed.
God have mercy on the United States of America.
There are so many genuinely good people here, and even some good politicians, and we can do something to prove it. We can impeach George Bush and Dick Cheney.
Donald A. Keller
Foxbourne Road
We have sacrificed at least two longtime and well respected Toledo police officers, Jack Smith, our now former chief of police and Sgt. Richard Murphy. I, for one, had great hopes when Chief Smith was appointed in January. Now I feel that we have taken a step backwards in fighting crime.
Again we are told that our mayor, Carleton Finkbeiner, has acted in a way that I feel is very unbecoming to a man in such a public position.
Many times, citizens and taxpayers have heard that our mayor has treated another person with disrespect. Mr. Finkbeiner again has stated that the other person in the confrontation is stretching the truth or just plain lying. How can it be that Mr. Finkbeiner is never the person who is wrong?
How many embarrassing situations must this city and its citizens face before someone finally faces the truth and sees that the king is not wearing any clothes?
How many of our finest and best will leave and we are left to face the problems of this city on our own?
Patricia Poitinger
Mulberry Street
Today's obsession with politicians having to be religiously inclined as proof of their qualification for election is sad.
There can be no stronger religious faith than that of a priest and yet being affiliated with the church does not stop scores of them from abusing children.
It did not stop Jesse Jackson from committing adultery, nor does it stop Jerry Falwell and Pat Robertson from being intolerant.
A mass killer of women was deacon of his church for many years and a religious zealot kidnapped, raped, and kept as his wife a teen-aged girl.
And it does not prevent our President from causing the deaths of thousands of Americans and Iraqis.
Give me honesty, virtue, true compassion, concern, and smarts over religion any time.
Adele Federman
Mockingbird Lane
In his June 24 Saturday Essay, Bowling Green Prof. Marc Simon misrepresented the Academic Bill of Rights and understated the problems it was designed to correct.
Mr. Simon points out that academic freedom places limits on professors' speech in the classroom, forbidding them from "spout[ing] off on religion or politics when it has no relation to the subject" they are teaching.
Yet he fails to mention that this key principle of students' academic freedom is almost entirely absent from student handbooks at universities across the nation. When it is cited at all, it is only in faculty handbooks, which students have no cause to consult.
Mr. Simon seriously misrepresents the Academic Bill of Rights when he claims that David Horowitz "has suggested that all theories should be provided equal time in the classroom." Mr. Horowitz has never made such a suggestion.
His Academic Bill of Rights states that "exposing students to the spectrum of significant scholarly viewpoints on the subjects examined in their courses is a major responsibility of faculty" (emphasis added). It says nothing about providing equal time for any views, or teaching theories regardless of academic merit.
Similarly, there is nothing in the Academic Bill of Rights (or in the state resolutions inspired by it) that threatens "government oversight" of curricula, as Mr. Simon claims. These resolutions are merely designed to ensure that existing academic freedom guidelines are enforced and that students are aware of their rights.
If Mr. Simon truly believes his own statements about academic freedom, he should enthusiastically support the Academic Bill of Rights.
In any case, he should not misrepresent it as he did in his essay.
Sara Dogan
National Campus Director
Students for Academic Freedom
Ballwin, Mo.
The terminology used in connection with the Coingate scandal must amaze anyone with even a modicum of common sense and intelligence.
Those individuals who took money from Tom Noe should not be labeled as "conduits." On the contrary, they should have been branded as "co-conspirators," prosecuted as felons, and put in jail if convicted. Maybe then the political bamboozling would stop and genuine campaign finance reform could begin.
Mel Pommeranz
Francis Avenue