Don't you worry about that ...

Here is what John Howard's Finance Minister (repeat, Finance Minister), Nick Minchin, had to say on the subject. This is on the front page of The Age. Lib scorns mass 'panic' on climate.

It should not be seen as a sin to be cautious about the science of global warming, a senior Federal Government minister has warned.

Finance Minister Nick Minchin says "there remains an ongoing debate about the extent of climate change" and the extent of human activity's role in global warming.

He warned the Coalition not to get spooked by the intensifying political pressure on the issue, saying it must not let political pressure drive decisions on environmental policy when the stakes for the Australian economy were very high.

"There is never a finality to almost anything in the scientific world," he said. "Even the most hardened advocates of (global warming) accept that the world's climate is the most complex system imaginable. I doubt you could ever say the matter will be settled."

His comments come two weeks after the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change found "unequivocal" evidence that the world was getting hotter.

Nick, we know you've got our best interests at heart -- or is that the best interests of the government's coal industry cronies. Never mind, who could possibly question the credibility of the John Howard Party on any subject?

Meanwhile, back at Reality Headquarters ...

Then there is this little story on page 12 of The Australian: Glacier could be gone in five years.

The principal glacier of the world's biggest tropical ice cap could disappear within five years as a result of global warming, one of the world's leading glaciologists predicted yesterday.

The imminent demise of the Qori Kalis glacier, the main component of the Quelccaya ice cap in the Peruvian Andes, offered the starkest evidence yet of the effects of climate change, according to Lonnie Thompson, of Ohio State University.

Although scientists had known for decades that Qori Kalis and the other Quelccaya glaciers were melting, new observations indicated that the rate of retreat was increasing, Professor Thompson said.

When he visits this summer, he expects to find that the glacier has halved in size since last year, and he believes Qori Kalis will be gone within five years.

"This widespread retreat of mountain glaciers may be our clearest evidence of global warming as they integrate many climate variables," he told the American Association for the Advancement of Science conference in San Francisco.

"Most importantly, they have no political agenda."

Imagine a world without political agenda! Hah! It would have to have been "created" by a "god" with a few more neurons than the bearded blimp religionists have lamely conceived. About the only way I can think of to achieve such a world here and now is to simply hoist a backpack and start walking solo in the mountains. No political agenda among the lilies of the field. Of course some four-legged indigene might decide to terminate my capacity to conceptualise with a swift chomp to the brain stem, but I wonder if taking that chance wouldn't be preferable to the absurdly cancerous climate wherein we have to listen to and be governed by men and women who should have had their brain stems severed at birth.

Professor Thompson concludes:

The fate of tropical glaciers globally will have an impact on water supplies relied on by more than four billion people.

"Millions of people are going to have to adapt to these changes, many of which will occur in some of the poorest regions of the globe," Professor Thompson said.

So … who would you believe? Or … given the inability of the human race to look after its own well being, is it too late to matter?

-- Olney Garkle