Ireland is green, but her people are not

Posted on Tuesday, October 12, 2010 at 11:08 AM

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Ireland's winters and summers will get warmer thanks to climate change, according to a report published last week by a team of experts. The prospect of milder winters and summers is hardly the stuff of climatic nightmares. An Irish summer generally means temperatures in the 60s and winter, although not icy cold, is typically damp and raw, with temperatures around 40^oF.

For the most part the issue of global warming, climate change (what have you) worries Europeans far more than Americans. At least that's my impression. However, the average Irish man or woman is hardly quaking in their boots and reports like last week's are unlikely to scare anyone into changing their ways.

"You have the Green Party in government," you might say. That's true. The Green Party has two seats at the ministerial table. Those ministers and others in the party make a lot of noise, but the party makes up less than 4% of the Irish parliament. And, even that share of the vote can be attributed in large part due the Greens' image as innocently incorruptible rather than as a sign of any great support for the party's views on saving the planet or whatever.

All the other parties utter appropriately green statements on occasion, but it's always obvious that the environment doesn't excite them. EU environmental regulations are strict and, well, membership has a price.

All of which explains how the same people who voted for a government that banned the sale of incandescent light-bulbs also took to SUV's during the boom years like ducks to water. It's a case of appeasing the EU on the one hand and letting the market decide on the other.

I expect this situation to continue well into the future. I mean, after all, why would the people of Ireland want to prevent their climate going from north Atlantic to Mediterranean? All we have to do is carry on as we have been and wait for 2080 to bring the good weather.

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PhilipOHayda | Oct 17, 2010, 05:47 AM EDT

I hate the Green Party, They don't do anything for the working man, they just chill with the hippies. find me sumone in the Green Party that doesit and also Ireland is very good at taking care of mother earth.

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Monsoonman | Oct 13, 2010, 08:55 PM EDT

Enjoy the "warm" summers back in the mother country Yank, just know it is a natural occurring phenomena, not man caused. It is a repeating cycle that has visited our homeland before. Just look at the medieval warm period between 1100 AD–1300 AD. The mini ice age followed and plunged us into a famine which caused us to farm crops which grew below the surface, ie: spuds, as it was too cold for above ground crops to survive...You should do a piece on it. I think the Persol sunglass company got its start during the mwp.

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TheYank | Oct 13, 2010, 01:25 AM EDT

Monsoonman,

What are you saying, that we're not going to get our warmer winters and summers? Is that what you're saying? Well, keep that to yourself. Things are gloomy enough around here without you doomsayers denying that Ireland is about to become a virtual paradise.

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Monsoonman | Oct 12, 2010, 07:48 PM EDT

US physics professor: 'Global warming is the greatest and most successful pseudoscientific fraud I have seen in my long life' ...Professor Harold Lewis is Emeritus Professor of Physics at the University of California. This is an important moment in science history. I would describe it as a letter on the scale of Martin Luther, nailing his 95 theses to the Wittenburg church door. It is worthy of repeating this letter in entirety on every blog that discusses science. Read it in the Telegraph.co.uk

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