Scientists Converge on Las Vegas Climate Skeptics Conference
Article audio sponsored by The John Birch Society

LAS VEGAS — Some of the world’s leading authorities from the fields of climatology, paleoclimatology, astrophysics, astronomy, meteorology, geology, and other sciences have gathered in Las Vegas for a three-day symposium to challenge the extravagant and increasingly discredited claim that man-made anthropogenic global warming (AGW) is a threat to the planet and requires massive government intervention and unprecedented regimentation of all humankind.

On Monday evening, at the opening session of the Heartland Institute’s 9th International Climate Conference, the organization’s president, Joe Bast, pointed out that the 65 scheduled speakers come from 12 different countries, “thirteen, if you count the moon [Apollo 7 astronaut Walter Cunningham] and fourteen, if you count Washington, D.C. [Rep. Dana Rohrbacher], which many people consider a foreign country.”

Based on the media bias against past Heartland-sponsored climate conferences, Bast predicted that media outlets that didn’t completely ignore the confab probably would be running headlines such as: “Coal Companies Fund Denier Conference in Boiling Hot Las Vegas.”

His prediction was not far off. John L. Smith, a columnist for the Las Vegas Review-Journal, delivered a sarcastic salvo at the scientific meeting on Tuesday morning, claiming that it is a “climate change denial” event. Smith also played the thoroughly debunked “consensus” card, claiming “the vast majority of environmental scientists agree that climate change is serious and man-made.”

Heartland senior fellow for environment and energy policy James Taylor noted that the conferees are “not denying climate change; the climate is always changing.” And, he said, “We’re not attacking science; by subjecting [the AGW] computer models to real-world evidence, we are performing science.”

Then, of course, there was the expected charge that the Heartland conference is tainted due to corporate funding. The Review-Journal’s Smith alleged — without evidence:

As usual, the Heartland Institute’s political slip is showing. In recent years it has received large contributions from such environmentally sensitive folks as Exxon-Mobil, Big Tobacco, and large pharmaceutical corporations.

Joe Bastardi, meteorologist and co-chief forecaster at WeatherBELL Analytics, delivered a fast-paced and humorous survey of some of the most obvious frauds perpetrated in the name of AGW “science.” British journalist, humorist and author James Delingpole, also provided a lighter side to the drier, scientific presentations that would occupy much of the rest of the conference.

Delingpole, who writes for the Telegraph and Breitbart.com, has been an especially painful thorn in the side of the global warming establishment at the BBC, the Met Office, and the British government, repeatedly exposing the flaws and frauds in the AGW propaganda.

Delingpole introduced Austrian rap artist Kilez More, one of the more unusual (and unexpected) participants at the conference. More, whose rap music video on global warming went viral on the Internet a couple years ago, performed in sync with the video.

The 25-year-old More, who is passionate about political, economic and intellectual freedom, explained that he views his efforts using music to deliver a political message as an important outreach to his generation. His music causes young people to take the first steps toward challenging the AGW brainwashing that prevails in the schools and much of the popular culture.

Tuesday, the first full day of the conference, opened with a breakfast keynote address by Dr. Patrick Moore, a pioneer environmental activist and co-founder of Greenpeace. Dr. Moore, who led some of Greenpeace’s most famous direct action campaigns against whaling and seal hunts, is the author of Confessions of a Greenpeace Dropout: The Making of a Sensible Environmentalist. Moore told the conference he left Greenpeace when it “went anti-human.” Greenpeace, as well as much of the rest of the radical environmental establishment, he notes, regard humans not as part of the environment, but as enemies of the environment. Greenpeace claims to be for “renewables,” Moore pointed out, “but it is against the two best renewables: hydropower and trees.”

“We should be growing more trees and using more wood,” says Moore, but the global warming alarmists refer to the forests as “carbon stocks” that must not be used. The Greenpeace elites would deny billions of poor people access to energy, Moore notes, while at the same time living lavishly, by comparison. Greenpeace hypocritically boasts of the “super-efficient electric motors” on its new $22 million yacht, says More, but doesn’t mention that the boat is also powered by diesel engines that, of course, use the dreaded “fossil fuels” Greenpeace wants to deny to others.

As we reported previously, a full lineup of the extraordinary scientists and speakers at the 9th ICCC can be seen here, and live streaming video of the conference sessions can be viewed here.

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