The Times' McCain Scandal - Sex Or Ethics?

Times endorsed Republican front-runner John McCain now has to deal with innuendo from the Times - allegedly he got too cozy with an attractive young telecom lobbyist back in 1999 and may have done her political favors or, well, received romantic favors.

The WaPo has a me-too follow which focuses on the political favors.  Here is the understated version:

John Weaver, who served as McCain's closest confidant until leaving his current campaign last year, said he met with Vicki Iseman at the Center Cafe in Union Station and urged her to stay away from McCain. Association with a lobbyist would undermine his image as an opponent of special interests, aides had concluded.

Members of the senator's small circle of advisers also confronted McCain directly, according to sources, warning him that his continued relationship with a lobbyist who had business before the powerful Commerce Committee he chaired threatened to derail his presidential ambitions.

Let's get the steamier treatment from the Times:

A female lobbyist had been turning up with him at fund-raisers, visiting his offices and accompanying him on a client’s corporate jet. Convinced the relationship had become romantic, some of his top advisers intervened to protect the candidate from himself — instructing staff members to block the woman’s access, privately warning her away and repeatedly confronting him, several people involved in the campaign said on the condition of anonymity.

When news organizations reported that Mr. McCain had written letters to government regulators on behalf of the lobbyist’s client, the former campaign associates said, some aides feared for a time that attention would fall on her involvement.

Mr. McCain, 71, and the lobbyist, Vicki Iseman, 40, both say they never had a romantic relationship. But to his advisers, even the appearance of a close bond with a lobbyist whose clients often had business before the Senate committee Mr. McCain led threatened the story of redemption and rectitude that defined his political identity.

Jim Geraghty is not impressed by this attempt at journalism; apparently the Times has been waltzing around this story since at least December 2007.

Noam Scheiber of TNR writes that "The story reads to me like it had originally been much more ambitious, but had its guts ripped out somewhere along the way", and he should know - apparently TNR will have a piece online tomorrow covering the Times foot-dragging on this story; said article may have forced the Times hand.

Quel clown show.  We will know more when the TNR piece is out but one hypothesis is that an irate Timesman did not want his story spiked.  He leaked some of the Times in-house ruminations to  a friendly lib outlet, et voila!  Geez, isn't that what Matt Drudge is for?

OK, impact on McCain?  Well, it offsets the hit he took when the Times endorsed him.  OTOH, social conservatives who already didn't like him probably won't like this.  The timing is too late to derail his nomination and too early for the general election, which has worked well.

As to the question of inappropriate political favors, the Times ought to try and persuade us that McCain ended up doing favors for Ms. Iseman's clients that he might not otherwise have done or that were otherwise inconsistent with his political philosophy.  Otherwise, where are we - a lobbyist talked to a pro-business Republican who came out in favor of business.  Hold the front page.

These people at All The News That Advances Our Agenda really have no shame.  But you can't hold the front page for that, either.

Comments

[Topsecretk9]

I dunno, but maybe Rove's Mindrays were at work. It's always hilarious when a NYT's hit piece turns into a campaign positive.

Now I'm really, really, really curious about the GQ piece the Clinton's had deep sixed.

[clarice]

The public figure test is pretty elastic--maybe she's within it.

She like a number of lobbyists in town (saee Abramoff ) are really idiotic if, as the story reports, they publicly bragged of their connections with certain solons. Most top lobbyists would be far more discrete and say something more like "we've worked successfully with him before.."

[MikeS]

Would somebody ask the teacher how Obama is going to end partisanship and get conservatives and moderates to go along with his extreme far far left policy views?

Will it be Jedi mind tricks by Obami Wan?

[GMax]

OT

All 38 members of the Duke Lacrosse team sued the University and its President Richard Brodhead today.

File under Justice, About Time

[clarice]

I agree abd just blogged that. It may be the only way to get change on campuses--make em pay for this carp.

[MayBee]

Would somebody ask the teacher how Obama is going to end partisanship and get conservatives and moderates to go along with his extreme far far left policy views?

If Teacher Don is any indication, it will be by berating us.

[Rick Ballard]

"make em pay for this carp.

Gee, Clarice - don't be koi about it.

[GMax]

Looks like the threads of the Times little fantasy are quickly unraveling. The Captain has this:

John Weaver has issued a statement that exposes the New York Times story on John McCain as a hack job. Part of their supposed corroboration of the gossip about an allegedly budding romance between McCain and lobbyist Vicki Iseman was his alleged intervention to stop it. Weaver, who no longer works for the campaign, says he told the Times that his intervention had nothing to do with an affair:

"The New York Times asked for a formal interview and I said no and asked for written questions. The Times knew of my meeting with Ms. Iseman, from sources they didn't identify to me, and asked me about that meeting. I did not inform Senator McCain that I asked for a meeting with Ms. Iseman.

Her comments, which had gotten back to some of us, that she had strong ties to the Commerce Committee and his staff were wrong and harmful and I so informed her and asked her to stop with these comments and to not be involved in the campaign. Nothing more and nothing less.["]

Unnamed sources who are staffers under Weaver did an intervention with the candidate and Weaver, chief of staff did not know it? Bullshit.
The Times found this too good to check or knew better but could not resist smearing a Republican in a National election year.

[Other Tom]

Don is a bit too dumb to engage here...

That's magnificent news about the Duke guys. I wish they had named to 88 faculty members as well.

[MayBee]

"Huge Cache of Explosives Vanished From Site in Iraq/U.S. Admits the Loss of Material It Was Urged to Safeguard-Inquiry is Set."

Tops, I remember that. They actually reported it twice, IIRC.

[hit and run]

Don:
I come more like a substitute teacher trying to wrangle some order into a roomful of ignorant spoiled brats.

I'll buy that.

Explains the Peggy Hill vibe I was picking up on.

[Topsecretk9]

Gmax

I get the feeling that Iseman was prolly nothing more than flirty and flattering to McCain and the Times is appalled and their prudish ways are exposed when republican men are paid attention to.

[Topsecretk9]

Tops, I remember that. They actually reported it twice, IIRC.

Yeah Maybee, turned out Russians scuttled it out of the country before the war.

PLOP.

[Other Tom]

I think that at the very least, Vicki Iseman would be a "limited public figure," meaning that her conduct within an area of controversy--her lobbying--generated publicity about her. If that's correct, actual malice is required.

Also, I don't think the Times actually goes so far as to allege anything improper, either sexually or ethically. Am I wrong on that?

[clarice]

Rick, I'm koi because a reader saw a salty comment I posted last night and reprimanded me. I've decided to be more careful about mmmy language.

[GMax]

Peggy Hill?

Sounded more like Benny Hill from where I am sitting.

The lead in to his oddball British TV comedy always started off "Now for something completely different." Wacko was probably more descriptive.

[Bill in AZ]

clarice:

Forget the federal shield law--McCain Feingold gives apers like the NYT rare powers in the pre-election period. I think this time, he's got them flat footed, but think how much more power that ridiculous law gives the press.

Ann Coulter has an interesting take on this that came out this morning, that was written prior to NYT's McSplodeydope work accident.

I have wondered how the media was able to so skillfully manipulate us into this sorry state of affairs re: this election - and her article and your comment go a long way to explain it. McCain (and us) have, well, McCain, to thank for this state of affairs. We have a lot of work to do to counter this headwind.

[JM Hanes]

Don:

"This was a Republican hit job. Plain and simple."

LOL! Apparently, even Republicans know that if you're looking to place a hit piece on Republicans, you go to the New York Times. You may want to rethink today's lesson plan.

[Rick Ballard]

Clarice,

I see. Have you considered applying for press credentials for the Jefferson trial next week? I'd love to read about the prosecutions opening statement and I know I won't see anything but mendacious and meretricious gargle in the MSM.

Reading "the prosecution will show viedotapes and audiotapes of Congressman Jefferson (D) LA accepting cash in exchange for votes..." would be a pleasure.

[Don]

That's the beauty of the thing oh so slow one. They've got you suckers so trained you hear NYT and think devil. Who in his right mind thinks a Repub would blab to the NYT?

Exactly.

[Rick Ballard]

See - I can screew up spelling with the best of you. So theer.

[clarice]

Let's run a contest--we begin with all the last minute campaign "exposes" over the past couple of years and then we run a contest to see who comes up with this election's...

Add the Foley folderol--where an ambiguous email was conflated with more sexual IMs to grown ups to imply the House Reps were sheltering pedophiles on their side of the aisle.

[Pofarmer]

he isn’t making Kerry’s Swift Boat mistake

Well, that's probably because Kerry didn't have a leg to stand on, and he knew it. Still waiting for them papers to be released. Kerry's mistake was being Kerry.

We could use a few more CPAs in Congress ( and a hell of a lot less lawyers ).

Personally, I'd like to outlaw all lawyers from running for public office. Then again, I'd like to shutter all the law schools for 5 yrs, give or take.

[Other Tom]

Maybe it was a story that, say, Michael Isikoff had ready to go at Newsweek, and somebody at Newsweek leaked it to Drudge. Nah--nobody at Newsweek would ever leak to Drudge.

I just re-read the Times article, and indeed they never go further than to say that some staffers had "ecome convinced" that the relationship was romantic. I'm not certain that that rises to the level of defamation.

[Other Tom]

"become"

[Enlightened]

Don - please take your ball and go home now.

Ms. Obama appears to have full control of the naughty rightwingers, you're TA duties are no longer required.

Yessiree, I can almost feel the tingle down my spine, the tears will be falling like rain in anticpation of my apparently required Obama Reeducation summer camp.

[Topsecretk9]

I see. Have you considered applying for press credentials for the Jefferson trial next week?

Jefferson - the democrat superdelegate if you can believe it! - has filed last minute appeal. Trial delayed a few months now.

[clarice]

Rick, I think that trial is in Virginia and as far as I know only the DC court in Libby has permitted bloggers to attend and report.

[Topsecretk9]

I think my favorite NYT's story was the poor, abused by George Bush, Katrina victim. Big long human interest on the poor mother of 2 displaced by Katrina waiting so long for her 'aide" linked widely on the lefty lapblogs.

The day after it went to print the woman - who had a record of fraud - was charged with falsely claiming she was a Katrina victim and also claiming she had children she did not have.

[centralcal]

O/T: I read this morning that Tony Snow will be the substitute guest host on O'Reilly's radio show.

I sure wish they would bring him back on TV too!

[Enlightened]

MSM - What a laugh riot. McCain made his bed courting the likes of those asshats.

Clarice mentioned the Foley case, which was not disimilar to the Craig case. The MSM is going to try, try, try to vindicated Billy Jeff by exposing ever nuance of republican sex possible, and in so doing destroyed these 2 men.

And yet SFgate - the Bay Area's big time MSM mouthpiece says nary a word about Bernie Ward radio host - as leftwing as you could ever get, his vitriolic diatribes on Foley and Craig are truly classic in view of the fact he is an indicted child pornicator and sexual deviant. Ex priest, God talking leftard radio host - allegedly "researching" hypocrisy in the sex world - is a prolific, closeted bi-sexual deviant.

Oh yeah - the MSM matters. Not.

[Jane]

Jefferson - the democrat superdelegate if you can believe it! - has filed last minute appeal. Trial delayed a few months now.

What is he appealing?

[GMax]

More rain thundering down on the Times parade:

Jonathan Martin at Politico gets an on-the-record denial from former McCain press secretary Howard Opinsky, who describes how Jim Rutenberg was "fishing around" for dirt on Iseman, of whom Opinksy had never heard. Martin asked where the story may have originated, and Opinsky thinks it could have been from disgruntled lobbyists:

Opinksy also said that the Times use of the phrase "associates" to describe their McCain sources suggests that the leak may not have come from his campaign staffers at the time.

"There was only a handful of us [working on the campaign in 1999]," Opinksy said. "We never had a staff meeting to address any of this."

Asked who was behind the story, Opinksy said: "Lobbyists tell a lot of tall tales.

"What's behind this is money. There were a bunch of lobbyists in town who knew that if John McCain became president they were going to have a hard time."

Did the Times use gossip from Iseman's competitors to publish this smear?

[GMax]

The Press Secretary never heard of her.

NEVER HEARD of her.

Wrap your brain around that one. No staff meeting discussion of it.

The Times is making shit up.

[Topsecretk9]

Forgot - this was a bad week in '06

Hassan Fattah, New York Times' Abu Ghraib photos (2006) In March 2006, the New York Times ran a front-page interview by reporter Hassan M. Fattah with Ali Shalal Qaissi, who claimed he was the man hooded and hooked up to wires in the now infamous Abu Ghraib prison picture. The Internet magazine Salon quickly questioned the man's claim, as did the U.S. military, and the Times soon discovered that the man was not really the person in the picture. Furthermore, the Times had run the actual man's name in its own pages several years earlier. The Times admitted in the correction that it did not do enough to establish the man's identity.

Days later, the Times retracted the profile of a Hurricane Katrina refugee living in a Bronx hotel and criticizing the government's handling of the crisis because she, too, was a fraud. She was arrested on fraud charges for allegedly attempting to get federal relief.

[hit and run]

Set your watches...Dem debate tonight! Jane, Elliott...

[Rick Ballard]

Jane,

Here's a report on Jefferson's appeal. The gist of it seems to be that accepting bribes and selling votes are part of the legislative duties of Democrat Congressmen. He may be on solid ground there.

[Topsecretk9]

Jane

in a nutshell

The trial of a Louisiana congressman charged with bribery had been scheduled to start Monday. But it's being delayed so an appellate court can hear arguments on whether the defendant's status as a congressman protects him from prosecution.

Defense lawyers for Democrat William Jefferson filed their appeal Wednesday in U.S. District Court in Alexandria. Earlier this month, a judge rejected the argument that the 16-count indictment should be tossed out because it infringed on his privileges as a congressman.

Jefferson's attorneys argue that grand jury testimony given by his staffers violated the Constitution's speech or debate clause, which states that congressmen - quote - "shall not be questioned in any other Place" for speech or debate associated with their legislative work.

But the judge said the clause is " not a license to commit crime."

[Enlightened]

Well, the NYT was pretty accurate in condemning the Duke 3. Those devilish reporters of the NYT. I wish they weren't so - carptacular - in their fake but accurate, before the news cycle - news.

(Sorry to Clarice, I stole her salty language)

[Topsecretk9]

Also, the funny part is...Jefferson's attorneys perviously conversely argued the bribery charges should be thrown out because the bribery didn't effect any of his legislative duties - he just enriched himself and his family.

but now apparently "shall not be questioned in any other Place" for speech or debate associated with their legislative work."

it's legislative work. Whateve.

[GMax]

Where are those oh so enlightened progs to explain proper foreign policy to us? Clinton sent our troops into Kosovo for what purpose? And this is in support of what American interest?

And didn't we hear how despite the Iraqis celebrated the fall of Saddam's regime, it did not mean anything and our standing in the eyes of the world had dropped.

OK so when our Embassy is attacked, it means what then? Celebrations = not good, firebombs and looting = ? I am so confused by this higher order thinking.

[Jane]

Oh good, a six week Jefferson trial starting in September is just what the doctor ordered. I look forward to it. I suspect sentencing should happen around November 3rd.

Hit, I've got the debate penciled in, but I'm hoping Elliott will live blog so I can concentrate on snark.

[Enlightened]

Hmmm. Well Jefferson wasn't legislating by cigar in the hallway, so I guess that's a good thing in his favor.

[Enlightened]

Ok, strike that - I'm getting my Jeffersons mixed up.

[Enlightened]

Wait.wait - Jefferson's trial is delayed until the election? Or thereabouts?

Sigh.

[JM Hanes]

Don:

"Who in his right mind thinks a Repub would blab to the NYT?"

So it would be a New York Times hit job then.

[anduril]

Part of the Clinton legacy? Serbs Attack American Embassy.

Bill in AZ, thanks for the link to Coulter's brilliant article. Here's the ending:

What a bizarre coincidence that a few years after the most draconian campaign-finance laws were imposed via McCain-Feingold, our two front-runners happen to be the media's picks! It's uncanny -- almost as if by design! (Can I stop now, or do you people get sarcasm?)

By prohibiting speech by anyone else, the campaign-finance laws have vastly magnified the power of the media -- which, by the way, are wholly exempt from speech restrictions under campaign-finance laws. The New York Times doesn't have to buy ad time to promote a politician; it just has to call McCain a "maverick" 1 billion times a year.

It is because of campaign-finance laws like McCain-Feingold that big men don't run for office anymore. Little men do. And John McCain is the head homunculus.

You want Reagan back? Restore the right to free speech, and you will have created the conditions that allowed Reagan to run.

What a brilliant idea: reward McCain for his campaign to make America safe for rich incumbents by making him president.

[anduril]

L'Ann also wrote:

Pro-lifers like to ask, "How many Einsteins have we lost to abortion?" I ask: How many Reagans have we lost to campaign-finance reform?

The campaign-finance laws basically restrict choice political jobs, like senator and governor -- and thus president -- to:

(1) Men who were fatties in high school and consequently are willing to submit to the hell of running for office to compensate for their unhappy adolescences -- like Bill Clinton, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee and Newt Gingrich. (Somewhere in this great land of ours, even as we speak, the next Bill Clinton is waddling back to the cafeteria service line asking for seconds.)

(2) Billionaires and near-billionaires -- like Jon Corzine, Steve Forbes, Michael Bloomberg and Mitt Romney -- who can fund their own campaigns (these aren't necessarily sociopaths, but it certainly limits the pool of candidates).

(3) Celebrities and name-brand candidates -- like Arnold Schwarzenegger, George Bush, Giuliani and Hillary Clinton (which explains the nation's apparent adoration for Bushes and Clintons -- they've got name recognition, a valuable commodity amidst totalitarian restrictions on free speech).

(4) Mainstream media-anointed candidates, like John McCain and B. Hussein Obama.

[JM Hanes]

anduril:

I thought the McCain implosion you promised me was supposed to come before he wrapped up the nomination!

[JM Hanes]

"Pro-lifers like to ask, 'How many Einsteins have we lost to abortion?'"

I thought they preferred to point out that liberals were aborting themselves into demographic extinction.

[anduril]

Hey, gimme just a bit of a break--based on past performance I thought I was justified in my ironclad assurances!

Here's Kaus on our conservative paladin:

"McCain seems to believe his wartime heroism entitles him to an unlimited moral bank account that he can withdraw from whenever it's in his self-interest to do something dishonest."

Kausfiles on "A desperate guy with a lot of self-righteousness"

[anduril]

Actually, the way I've always heard it they say 'How many Einsteins have we lost to abortion?' cuz Beethoven's mom fit the profile for someone libs think they're helping. Anyway, I didn't write the column, just endorsed it. The analogy still works for me.

[anduril]

Correction:

Actually, the way I've always heard it they say 'How many Einsteins Beethovens have we lost to abortion?' cuz Beethoven's mom fit the profile for someone libs think they're helping. Anyway, I didn't write the column, just endorsed it. The analogy still works for me.

[GMax]

OT

BTW I missed it in the first read of the news account, but the lacrosse players all sued the City of Durham too.

File under Justice, more

[Jane]

So Kerry, Biden and Hagel had an emergency helicopter landing in Afghanistan today.

No comment.

[Jane]

Apparently they are all fine and off to Turkey to meddle in things.

[Ann]

"No comment"

Well, I have to say I had visuals of Kerry crying and wetting his pants.

Or, maybe the military looking the other way.

:) Go ahead THWACK, it was worth it. See ya tonight.

[Jane]

Now the senators can't agree what happened. Kerry says it was mechanical failure, Biden said it was a snow storm.

They really should get their stories straight.

[Enlightened]

"So Kerry, Biden and Hagel had an emergency helicopter landing in Afghanistan today."

The Scarecrow, Tin Man and Cowardly Lion - they do know they're not in Kansas anymore?

[Topsecretk9]

Jane

Would we have know the 3 musketeers were there had they not made an emergency landing?

[hit and run]

Ann:

Well, I have to say I had visuals of Kerry crying and wetting his pants.

On the flight home he is writing his own nomination for a Congressional Medal of Honor.

[Appalled Moderate]

I just came fdown here to let you guys know there was another thread, and I see this chit chat about John Kerry. What's he got to do with anything?

[cathyf]

When news organizations reported that Mr. McCain had written letters to government regulators on behalf of the lobbyist’s client,

Isn't this what Harry Reid did for Abramoff's money?

So, what are you insinuating, TSK9? That Abramoff was snogging Reid? ;-)

eeeewwwwwwwwww...

[Enlightened]

"Congressional Medal of Honor."

So Forrest Gumpish..At the very least Lurch could have jumped out of the helicopter, and thrown himself on the poppy-field ground for some self-inflicted scratch of some sort.

[Sue]

The Scarecrow, Tin Man and Cowardly Lion - they do know they're not in Kansas anymore?

That is so bad. And I laughed so hard my sides hurt. ::grin::

[Topsecretk9]

Speak o' the devil

But in 2008, it might be harder for the Democratic presidential nominee to make the same case that his or her Congressional counterparts successfully built in 2006. Facing off against likely Republican nominee John McCain, who as a senator led early investigations into Abramoff's corrupt lobbying, either Hillary Clinton or Barack Obama could find themselves linked to Abramoff and his former law firm, the Miami-based giant Greenberg Traurig.

A RAW STORY review of Federal Election Commission records shows that Clinton and Obama both received hundreds of thousands of dollars of donations from Greenberg Traurig staff. Moreover, each candidate has particularly benefited from the largesse of the firm's top management and its registered lobbyists.

The Clinton and Obama campaigns were both contacted on Monday and Wednesday for comment regarding donations to their candidates from Abramoff-linked donors. Neither responded to RAW STORY's queries.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Carbon encumbering will kill people by the hundreds of millions, if the sun is cooling for half a century.

Oh, Kim, don't go overboard the other direction. Get long ice skates, buy up Aspen time-shares in May and September, but remember, even if we are heading for another Little Ice Age, it'll take 300-400 years to get to the bottom --- which was a whole 4 degrees cooler than the 90's peak.

[Charlie (Colorado)]

Gee, Clarice - don't be koi about it.

Ain't it the trout.

[PeterUK]

"John Kerry. What's he got to do with anything?"

The eternal conundrum,if there were two you could use them for bookends. One just about keeps the outhouse door closed in a gale.

[clarice]

Fate- Kerry,Biden and Hagel's helicopter goes down in Afghanistan. I take it they've been rescued already, but it would be fun to see what happened if they weren't.
Just saying (*bad,bad*)

[PeterUK]

""So Kerry, Biden and Hagel had an emergency helicopter landing in Afghanistan today."

They were surrounded by Taleban,John Kerry said "Iv'e captured these two Amerikans for you"

[clarice]

HEH,PUK.

[Jim Miller]

Even when Clarice says she's wrong, she's often right. Example: "apers like the NYT". That's great on two levels; she says they are copying others, aping them, and she implies that they have the intelligence of apes. Excellent.

More evidence for the argument made here a few days ago -- and I am sorry that I can't recall who made it. JOM attracts smart commenters, and, for some reason, especially smart women commenters. Including Clarice. And many others.

My thanks to all of you.

[GMax]

http://www.wgal.com/download/2008/0220/15357472.pdf>Franklin Marshall College Poll

I just noted while the sample size is quite large, it is a registered voter poll. That means no attempt to qualify as a likely voter. Those types of polls tend to favor Democrats.

I know its early. My point is with all the hysteria over Obama in the media, it does not seem to be playing out in the opinion polls does it?

[clarice]

Thank you, Jim--But I really am a carppy typist.

[hit and run]

Jim:
More evidence for the argument made here a few days ago -- and I am sorry that I can't recall who made it. JOM attracts smart commenters, and, for some reason, especially smart women commenters.

In the end, it's all about the sex.

Or is it gender? I never get that distinction right.

[kim]

Charlie, if we cool it will most likely only be for half a century. And why do you think a 5% die-off of the human race is unlikely? I'm counting freezing, starving, and intercurrent disease. Probably war, too. There are a lot of people living on the margin, right now.
==============================

[kim]

A lot will die even if we don't encumber carbon. Worse if we do. I could be wrong. I certainly hope so.
=================================

[Charlie (Colorado)]

And why do you think a 5% die-off of the human race is unlikely?

Because we didn't have a 5 percent die off the last time this happened?

[kim]

Heh, I'm pretty sure you can't prove that.
=========================

[kim]

An easy, perhaps too easy, illustration of my point is to consider carbon encumbrance as an artificial 'peak oil'. Then see what the peak oil people predict. Sorry to make you look at that swamp.
================================

[PeterUK]

Last time we didn't have half witted politicians like the IPCC and the EU trying to introduce carbon emissions.We just burned something to keep warm.

[PeterUK]

reductions.

[kim]

Whaddya mean burning these black rocks will change the weather? What druid told you that?

Coal from seams hitting the Eastern shore of England was used to make salt to preserve the herring harvested in huge amounts ages ago.

By the way, Charlie, I have no intention of arguing with you. Past human die-offs, and the causes thereof are controversial and the data is not in existence to settle the question. I do know that anticipation and preparation for the human tragedies involved in cooling will do a lot more to ameliorate the disaster than pooh-poohing the possibility.

There is no question we are cooling. See Reallyrealclimate.blogspot.com for some revelatory graphs.

The real question is for how long we are cooling. The sun, presently, is unusually, not quite extraordinarily, quiescent.

There is now an ice bridge from Iceland to Greenland. When was the last time that happened?
================================

[kim]

Pete, if you haven't already read Jonathan Swift's Tour of England, I highly recommend it.
==========================

[Pofarmer]

Last time we didn't have half witted politicians like the IPCC and the EU trying to introduce carbon emissions.We just burned something to keep warm.

LOL

That's funny right there.

[kim]

There is a nice big fat La Nina storm about to hit California. We are cooling, folks.

New acronym for you. OLR for outgoing longwave radiation. It is probably connected with clouds, and ozone and ultraviolet, and it has jumped dramatically, lately.

The sun is very sultry and we must avoid its ultry-violet rays.

H/t N. Coward and Plum.
============

[kim]

Maybe arguing would be better.
===================

[kim]

Show me.
=====

[kim]

The Afghan shepherd sleeps,
To keep him warm, his sheeps.
Talya Gamba
Hell, yeah, Mama.
He hobbles forth, and leaps.
==================

[kim]

There will be an excellent skeptics' conference in New York City March 2-4.
==============

[kim]

Hey, Charlie, there is an interesting article by Gill et al showing that the collapse of the Mayan Civilization, millions of Mayans, occurred during a 200 year drought, connected to insolation.
==============================

[battery]

If it's not too late, can I vote for "SnottyGate" ? I like the aliteration...

[sophy]

We all love game, if you want to play it, please cheap hellgate gold and join us.