CROWD PROTESTS GLOBAL WARMING IN ALEXANDRIA, VIRGINIA

I know, I know--cold weather does not negate the possibility of climate change. But I also recall how the Global Warming Activists jumped at the opportunity to blame Hurricane Katrina on global warming. In fact, some--such as MNBC's Ed Schultz on The Ed Show--have even attributed this winter's storms to global warming, on the theory that climate change means more weather volatility. It's a wonderful position, because whatever the weather data, it can be offered as substantiation of global warming.

Still, all-in-all, it has been a bad month for global warming activists. First, the key claim in an influential report on climate change by the United Nations IPCC (co-winner with Al Gore of the Nobel Peace Prize)--that the Himalayan glaciers could vanish by 2035--was exposed to have been based purely on speculation and not supported by any scientific research data. Here is the news story from the UK's TimesOnline.

Then, on February 13, the BBC published an "e-mail interview" with Phil Jones, director of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia (UEA), which has been at the center of the "Climategate" row over hacked e-mails. In the course of the interview, Mr. Jones conceded that the Northern Hemisphere may well have been warmer during the Medieval Warm Period of 1000 years ago, without a trace of industrially generated carbon dioxide. Moreover, he admits that there has been no statistically significant global warming since 1995.

Why is the British press so much more aggressive than American mainstream media in questioning the climate change orthodoxy? Is it that they are less invested in the story? Or is it perhaps because of the welcome prospect of vineyards returning to England, as in medieval times?

(Hat tips to Al Levine for the photo and also Don Surber at the Daily Mail.)