There's a fascinating article here...

Was Margaret Thatcher the first climate sceptic? - Telegraph

claiming Margaret Thatcher created the mechanism necessary to get the global warming alarm ringing. They claim she later became one of the first skeptics of the alarm she sparked.

They neglect however to mention the claim made by other sources that she came up with the idea of creating a global warming scare to combat the gathering strength of coal unions. The idea was the UK could go nuclear.

A political flip flopper. and not the first or last

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Here's another one. Her science adviser was Christopher Monckton. Monckton as you may know is one of the big names in the Skeptic world. He's the guy who used to chase Al Gore around trying to get him to debate.

OK, so put it all together. It's alleged Thatcher put the global warming scare together as leverage against the coal mining unions. She created, or helped create much of the early scientific, and political mechanism necessary to create the global warming alarm - the IPCC, and Hadley center which links up to form HadCru (home of Climategate, and the infamous missing climate data).

Her science adviser, Christopher Monckton has never to my knowledge supported global warming, and is today one of the big names among skeptics. In 2003 she writes a book where she's saying stuff I've heard Monckton say on the bad science in global warming.

So here's the question. Is it a flip flop if she knew it was a scam all along?

Would politicians work a scam like that? Well at about the same time in 1988 the American politician Tim Wirth was working a scam over in Washington with Scientist/Activist James Hansen. This is not an allegation. This is fact. Wirth admits it.

I think flip flopping could be called a scam if you wanted to put it that way.
She was a shrewd operator , a clear leader. She had to have some skills at dodging the truth from time to time. And yes I'm being polite here. Politicians lie all the time IMO. The only great leader I can think of who tried to project honesty (and that may have been one helluva campaign ploy) was Abe Lincoln.
Does this mean there is no such thing as global warming? No. Just means Maggie may have used it at least twice to her advantage.
Do I think global warming has grounds as a serious theory?
I will say what I did several times before.
There's not enough long term data.
I am not concerned about it as much at this time as I am pollution of the air, water, and land which I think at this point is indisputable.
I also believe over population has a lot to do with most of it, but we don't seem to be making any inroads there presently.

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Christopher Monckton explains the Thatcher thing.

According to him the story about the scare being created to get the coal miners under control is false.

He says it wasn't a flip flop. It was more a case of them noticing the factual, minor effect of CO2 on warming, but not knowing how bad it could get. She wanted to know. Thus the Hadley center, and the IPCC. When evidence showed the effect was not that bad she lost interest in political remedies.

Margaret Thatcher: the world?s first climate realist | Watts Up With That?

I thought the data thus far supported GW but that it isn't long term enough to know if it is mini-cyclical or what.

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There's data showing greenhouse gases maintain some warning, and carbon dioxide is a minor greenhouse gas. There's enough data on the temperature record to support the idea there was a small global rise in temperature over the 20th century of possibly about .7 of a degree globally. There's data showing CO2 generally rose over that period. When you try to connect these pieces to show one on one correlation you run into problems.

When you make a giant leap in logic from a minor effect to a prophecy of catastrophic temperature rises the existing data does not support it. The accuracy, and manipulation of the raw data is called into question.

I think the debate is only a smoke screen to stave off any real debate on pollution.

2centavos (which ain't worth a hill of pinto beans)

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