Krugman posted on the possibly final version of FinReg. I think Krugman probably has as good of an outsider’s understanding of banking as anyone, so this along with reading the link that he references is probably a good assessment.
However, Ives Smith posted a little while ago that the devil is in the details and an objective insider is really needed when it comes to actual legislation and wording. She is sort of close to the industry, but referenced someone she thinks knows what he speaks of and whom said the Volker Rule (bans prop trading) has some unintended large loopholes. Then Volker himself recently talked about TBTF (something different than prop trading) and said the Dodd Bill could effectively do that.
Then some point out that banks should be baned from trading in things like stocks and commodities, but be allowed to trade in things obviously banking-like, such as interest rate futures and currency markets. Makes sense.
Then I still have doubts that making CDS trade on an exchange is really what is needed for that fine product. CDOs might work if we find just the right quant guy to write the standardized rules. But then again, why bother. The only purpose is obfiscation and we don’t need more of that.
Assuming we are ready to pass a bill (????), there is bound to be lots more dissection of the bill as we go along.
But Krugman does point out that there still are only regulator discretionary powers over the crucial issue of leverage, and that will go all to heck when President Palin takes office.
Following on the el Nino/La nina cycles, Bob Tisdale tracks the Surface Sea Temps, and has found that the SSTs effected first by the Nino/as have already gone negative. See his article here: NINO3.4 SST Anomalies Are Now Negative
He says: ” I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that global-average SSTs will plunge over the next couple of months. Based upon past experience, it will take a month or two for our (UAH) tropospheric temperatures to then follow suit.”
My point here is that the temps are cyclical and we are about to enter an ameliorating cooling period.
Overall the temps are going up, and they will continue to do so until we start the next ?little? Ice Age or next glaciation. Its just part of a series of interconnected cycles.
The first graph at this link, and most of the graphs on that page, show clear upward trends in the anomalies over the time scales covered, irrespective of smaller trend-degree variations.
Yes there are cycles – more than one, and at different degrees of trend. In fact, these things look disturbingly like Elliott waves. Going into a negative anomaly for NINO 3.4SST, in and of itself, doesn’t mean much.
A quick look at Spencer’s web site reveals that he is an AGW denialist, so he is predicting what is consistent with his belief system. No surprise there
JzB, why use this term? “A quick look at Spencer’s web site reveals that he is an AGW denialist,…” If you really read his site and writing you would know he is not a denialist.
Denialist (def.) One who excessively denies the truth.
If I were to judge between yours and his commentary I would judge you more a denialist than he. He, and his staff, calculate the monthly UAH satellite temps, and so have real world contact with the temp history for the past 30+ years. So he cannot be denying that there is warming. He has written re: the impacts of Green house gases, so he is not denying their impacts.
So, just what is he denying?
You on the other hand seem to imply that his views are not consistent with yours. Who’s in denial?
As to your comment re: Elliot Waves, why introduce something totally unrelated? Unless you are saying that human emotions/reactions cause climate change.
Anyway, few deny that there is Global Warming. Few deny that some is caused by man including a portion of that by burning carbon. What is questioned is the CAGW C=Catastrophic, predictions coming out of the “warmist” camp. Consistent with their belief. No surprise there, either.
If you care to discuss this, OK. I would be pleased to have a discussion, but drop the snarkiness.
The chart we probably want is this one — also from Spencer http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_Apr_10.gif It shows both the current and 1998 peaks. Both linked to El Nino apparently. Why should moving warm water around in the tropics warm or cool the planet? Beats me. As far as I can see no one knows.
Tangentially sunspot cycle 24 remains very weak. Today’s sunspot number is 15, but we’ve had 30 spotless days this year which should be well into the cycle by now. It looks like we may possibly be going to have a sunspot cycle similar to those experienced during the Maunder Minimum/Little Ice Age. Maybe we’ll find out if sunspots and global temperature are correlated. Or not as so many “scientists” seem more interested in advocacy than science and I suspect they are capable of burying any actual science in rhetoric. My impression is that Spencer is one of the good guys BTW. As are the folks that run the CO2 observatory in Hawaii.
BTW, sunspot number is an index, not a count. The number 15 is created by a single fairly active sunspot. I don’t recall ever seeing a sunspot number between 1 and 11 althouth I think numbers in that range are theoretically possible
Codger, speaking of the maunder and LIA, a speaker at this weeks Int. Conference Climate Change predicted we were entering the next LIA. His dates: 1014 for start, ~2045 for the solar minimum, and ~ 2060-65 for the temp minimum. He uses the solar equatorial size (reduction in it) as a measure. At least we won’t have to worry about it.
“The downside? He is stating flat out that we are headed for a Little Ice Age. The solar changes dictate cooling. The ocean mass delays it for about 40 years. And we’re headed for a lot of cold. There is a 200 year periodic decent of Total Solar Irradiance, that causes a Little Ice Age, and we’re due. The mechanism he asserts is a 250 km decrease in solar radius and that changes solar interior dynamics and processes. A plot of phase and amplitude for both sun spot number and solar radius showed a near perfect match, with the onset of the solar quieting in 1999. Not the type to be bashful about making clear predictions (no wussy “projections” for this man!) he stated flat out the “New Little Ice Age begins in 2014.” Though with various lags from things such as ocean heat content and climate cooling rates, the depth if the NLIA is not reached until 2042 +/- 11 years for the solar minimum and then 2065 +/- 11 years for the temperature minimum.”
AGW = Anthropogenic (i.e caused by man) Global Warming.
From Spencer’s site (emphasis added.)
“Global warming” refers to the global-average temperature increase that has been observed over the last one hundred years or more. But to many politicians and the public, the term carries the implication that mankind is responsible for that warming. This website describes evidence from my group’s government-funded research that suggests global warming is mostly natural, and that the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.”
Hence the term “denialist.”
I said these graphs look like Elliott waves, cuz – well – they look like Elliott waves; even to the extent of having lower degrees of trend superimposed on higher degrees of trend, and what looks like a 5 up three down pattern, if you squint a little. But, it’s simply an observation. I drew no conclusions. If that statement is irrelevant, feel free to ignore. Though, this is an open thread . . .
FYI, I can actually do snark pretty well, but generally choose not to here, out of respect for the proprietors. If you think there was snark in that commentt, I suggest you grow an epidermus.
JzB, please tell me you are not implying that you believe all warming is anthropogenic? From your quote of Spencer’s site: “…global warming is mostly natural…” Even he does not believe it is only anthro.
he is actually stating one of the important the underlying questions of Climate Change. How much is caused by what factor. There are very few peer reviewed papers, some, but not many, that claim perentages by factor for climate change/warming. Those that do can not be validated, so they are little better than scientific opinion.
You have yet to identify of what Spencer is in denial.
If you haven’t yet learned using “denialist” is akin to using the ‘N’ word or ‘B’ word. No good is imparted to the recipient and much is learned about the speaker.
JzB, please tell me you are not implying that you believe all warming is anthropogenic? From your quote of Spencer’s site: “…global warming is mostly natural…” Even he does not believe it is only anthro.
He is actually commenting on one of the important underlying questions of Climate Change. How much is caused by what factor. There are very few peer reviewed papers, some, but not many, that claim perentages by factor for climate change/warming. Those that do can not be validated, so they are little better than scientific opinion.
You have yet to identify of what Spencer is in denial.
If you haven’t yet learned using “denialist” is akin to using the ‘N’ word or ‘B’ word. No good is imparted to the recipient and much is learned about the speaker.
Even I’ve come across what Spencer is probably talking about and I’ve just been a casual observer of the debate. If I recall correctly (which I don’t guarantee) about 2/3 of the global warming effect is due to water vapor. The remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
So the “Anthropogenic” part is something significantly less than a third. And Spencer’s quote you highlighted above looks quite accurately stated in that context. And they say all we need to do is reduce man made CO2 emissions by 87% by 2050? I’d call anyone that says “no problem” to that a denialist.
Even I’ve come across what Spencer is probably talking about and I’ve just been a casual observer of the debate. If I recall correctly (which I don’t guarantee) about 2/3 of the global warming effect is due to water vapor. The remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
So the “Anthropogenic” part is something significantly less than a third. And Spencer’s quote you highlighted above looks quite accurately stated in that context. And they say all we need to do is reduce man made CO2 emissions by 87% by 2050? I’d call anyone that says “no problem” to that a denialist.
Even I’ve come across what Spencer is probably talking about and I’ve just been a casual observer of the debate. If I recall correctly (which I don’t guarantee) about 2/3 of the global warming effect is due to water vapor. The remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
So the “Anthropogenic” part is something significantly less than a third. And Spencer’s quote you highlighted above looks quite accurately stated in that context. And they say all we need to do is reduce man made CO2 emissions by 87% by 2050? I’d call anyone that says “no problem” to that a denialist.
***A quick look at Spencer’s web site reveals that he is an AGW denialist, so he is predicting what is consistent with his belief system. No surprise there ***
Is Spencer right? I don’t have the slightest idea. His science looks to be defensible and, unlike the IPCC, and the disaster is upon us crowd, he doesn’t seem to have an agenda, appears to handle his data in a professional manner, and doesn’t seem to think that everybody who disagrees with him is a fool or knave dedicated to bringing the human race to disaster. He could be wrong or right. So could James Hanson or the guy CoRev cites who predicts massive global cooling (based on real — if weak — evidence BTW) Anyway, I simply like Spencer’s attitude a hell of a lot better than I do that of the warming alarmists. Seems more … well .. scientific.
***What the GAO report could not foresee – because it had forgotten about its domestic accountability issues – was that the 2007 US sanctions against Iranian banks ironically ensured Iran’s immunity from the global financial crisis that was about to explode.
Iran was among the few major economies in the world not to be severely affected by the crisis.***
Does this imply that to straighten out the US economy, we do not need the Tea Party, Wall Street, Obama style “transparency” (which much resembles what we used to call “obsfucation”). No indeed, what we need is for the rest of the world to apply economic sanctions to the US for a few decades.
China is issuing more 50 year treasury bonds. The last batch six months ago went at 4.3% (for FIFTY years!!!!). The new ones are expected to go for even less.. As far as I can see, this indicates either that the efficient market is projecting deflation from now until the end of time. Or perhaps that some investors (Chinese Insurance Companies?) are just plain crazy. Or maybe they are buying CDS’s in New York to cover the risk that just maybe they might lose a bundle of yuan on these bonds if there are periods of inflation between now and 2060.
A summary: C&T an abject failure in the EU, Green jobs an abject failure in Spain. Carbon trading the newst investment scam throughout the EU, with Bulgaria just removed for cause from trading. Our own carbon trading market controlled by the key politicians/financiers/advisors supporting “O”. And finally, the C&T revenue was initially sold as a big, new revenue stream for funding health care, and the other liberal agenda items, helping pay for the big, new spending bills and not changing the deficit stream.
As confirmation, when the C&T bill got into hot water we then see the VAT trotted out.
What part of Tax and Spend, or Borrow and Spend do the voters NOT understand. Not much! They understand very, very well.
Before we get into the we NEED the FED Govt to spend to get us out of the recession argument, and therefore, need the added revenue streams. Yes! But the spending needs to be as immediate as possible to alleviate the pain being felt NOW, not two years in the future in an election year.
Yes, the voters understand well that the compassionate party, is not compassionate, just all politics all the time.
apologies if i missed your point, but water vapor is very much a “greenhouse gas.” it is what keeps the daytime temperature within a hundred degrees of the nighttime temperature. but it has nothing to do with “global warming” for a variety of reasons having to do with the physics of water.
global warming is the slow, gradual increase in global average temperature that has been measured, correlates well with the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere, that is itself accounted for by man burning fossil fuels, and which is well understood to increase global temperature by the absorption of radiation (heat)… delaying its passage back out into space. there really isn’t much mystery here.
there was some mystery about whether CO2 sinks would turn up that limited the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere. so far none have.. or at least none that stop the increase.
i am not a physicist, much less a climate scientist, but i did make an effort to read the arguments of both sides. the people saying we have a problem read to my eye like honest scientists… i do have some background in honest science. the people saying there is no problem read to my eye like dishonest people relying on the ignorance of their audience to mislead them.
CoRev by now may actually know more about the details of the argument than I do, but he has repeatedly demonstrated that he knows nothing at all about basic science and is easily fooled by preposterous claims. I like CoRev and if he would concentrate on the ways that politicians and other power seekers are using global warming to advance a power-agenda of their own, i’d be glad to listen to him. But when he talks “science” he is in way over his head.
but again, forget about water vapor. they aren’t making any more of it. [oh, to be sure, as the planet warms up, more water vapor will be taken up into the atmosphere increasing the warming … but that is an effect, not a cause.]
more details on the evils of cap and trade would be welcome. i don’t care much for the idea myself. looks like another way to make money for wall street. but i do like the idea of a straight carbon tax. i’d agree with you about the compassionate party, but you need to recognize that the tough-guy party is at least as dishonest, and just as all politics all the time.
and i would definitely agree with you that federal revenue could be better spent. sure as hell don’t see the point of giving it to people in the form of tax breaks.
I suspect they have discovered how to prosper while losing money. That may seem like an oxymoron to you, but I understand that it is the way Finance is played by the folks who know what they are doing.
My statement was based on what I percieved to be a conclusion driving the analysis, rather than the data driving a conclusion. Perhaps I was unfair to Spencer.
But this:
“the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.”
For the most part (there are exceptions), those “unfair trade practices” exist only in the delusions of the mindless. Our problem is simple. We are a high cost producer of most things. We’ve talked, cajoled, threatened most of the worlld into free trade — only to find that they can produce stuff and deliver it to Wilmington, CA cheaper than we can make it here. … And that no one wants to buy our stuff because it costs too much
We aren’t being cheated. We’re being stupid. The two have different cures. Blaming others for self-inflicted problems isn’t likely to fix them.
Well, the sunspots most likely will come back some day, no? On the other hand it’d be a hell of a break with tradition if we didn’t leave a few intractable problems for our descendents. After all, they need a few problems. Solving problems builds character.
I haven’t read Spencer. better things to do, and if there are new developments in climate science i am sure i will hear about them. but your experience is different from mine. i can’t imagine an honest scientist being a denialist at this point, but it is always possible. what is more possible is that the devil learns to talk like an honest scientist.
if you have been reading the hysterical left you will have a poor view of the “global warming is real and it is dangerous” argument. There are lots of real scientists who are not hysterical, and even some books for the general reader that strike my eye as “reasonable.”
Like I said, I haven’t been following the debate closely. But the argument I was referring to is if you think of the atmosphere as a blanket that keeps us warm, the components are something like about 2/3 water vapor, and the remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
I don’t remember the percentage split between CO2 from man vs natural sources, but lets pick 20%.
So the man made percentage of the blanket is 20%. So some argue that this is a small percent that man has contributed.
Now you can say, everything else held constant, adding this 20% was what made global warming occur, and was a big enough difference.
The naysayers are saying that “everything else held constant” hasn’t really been proven.
This of course is why I haven’t paid that much attention to the arguments. It sounds too much like religon.
Like I said, I haven’t been following the debate closely. But the argument I was referring to is if you think of the atmosphere as a blanket that keeps us warm, the components are something like about 2/3 water vapor, and the remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
I don’t remember the percentage split between CO2 from man vs natural sources, but lets pick 20%.
So the man made percentage of the blanket is 20%. So some argue that this is a small percent that man has contributed.
Now you can say, everything else held constant, adding this 20% was what made global warming occur, and was a big enough difference.
The naysayers are saying that “everything else held constant” hasn’t really been proven.
This of course is why I haven’t paid that much attention to the arguments. It sounds too much like religon.
Like I said, I haven’t been following the debate closely. But the argument I was referring to is if you think of the atmosphere as a blanket that keeps us warm, the components are something like about 2/3 water vapor, and the remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
I don’t remember the percentage split between CO2 from man vs natural sources, but lets pick 20%.
So the man made percentage of the blanket is 20%. So some argue that this is a small percent that man has contributed.
Now you can say, everything else held constant, adding this 20% was what made global warming occur, and was a big enough difference.
The naysayers are saying that “everything else held constant” hasn’t really been proven.
This of course is why I haven’t paid that much attention to the arguments. It sounds too much like religon.
Dale, not to correct your science background, but the physics of H2O in the atmosphere is one of the key arguments in today’s CC discussions. One side thinks it is a positive feedback, and the other, led by Spencer, thinks it is a negative feedback. This issue is compounded by the many, many papers and articles that claim that the impacts of CO2 are logarithmic and adding more to the atmosphere has a much diminished impact. Some, but not as much as estimated by many of the models.
If some of the core tenets of the physics of AGW theory are still under discusssion, can we trust the claims of catastrophic out comes? (And that’s a whole other ongoing discussion.)
As to your science background in CC, you have admitted in the past to not reviewing new literature, and this is just silly in a science as dynamic as this.
Dale, we have discussed here for several years now, and I have this observation of a pattern you have.
You often come across s being reasonable while adding personal attack zingers. Eventually your commentary becomes overloaded with the zingers to the point reader push back against them becomes common place. At which point you seem to disappear for some time and the cycle regenerates. You appear to be approaching the point where we, the readers, comment back in kind.
It’s sad really, since on SS you are valued source, but for much of the other subject matter you add little and come across as just a nasty old fart. (Some would use the same description for myself.) So, please add technical points without the personal body shots. You’ll be more effective.
CR, the comment was to Codger’s and my age. One issue often brought up by 2slugs, as not having the same meaning for our (at least my) concern over CC’s impact on his more extended future. Just a silly backroom, insider joke!
Codger, I tend to agree with this: “We aren’t being cheated. We’re being stupid. ” Most other countries use a VAT tax, and they are using that tax to offset import prices and lowering the prices on their exports.
The first graph at this link, and most of the graphs on that page, show clear upward trends in the anomalies over the time scales covered, irrespective of smaller trend-degree variations.
If you’d pay attention to the main point of what I said, instead of trying to play “Gotcha” with the minutia, you might be less inclined to make wild accusations about what I believe. I have not stated anything about what I believe on this topic.
And, really, I think for you to ignore me is really the best route to take.
The atmosphere is largely nitrogen and oxygen. Water vapor, per this wiki entry, varies between about 1% and 4% at the surface, and is about 0.4% over the entire atmosphere. Everyting else is a minor quantity.
We are talking about large outcomes from relativley large changes in constituents present at small levels.
I’ll guess that water vapor concentrations are beyond human control, since the oceans are pretty big. CO2 emissions are at least partially within human control.
sorry for the body shots. i have apparently a gift for offending people, but i assure you i have a kind heart.
as i said, you may know more about the state of the argument by now than i do. i have other things to do. but i also said… because it is true, and even you need to know it, that you have presented “scientific” claims here that just do not demonstrate an understanding of high school science. i am sorry if that is “nasty.” it is offered in good faith.
let me try to assure you, i think i know SS. i do not claim to know much of anything else. even global warming could turn out to surprise me. i don’t think so. but then it wouldn’t be a surprise.
The heat retention components of the atmosphere are 70% water vapor/ 20% manmade CO2-other/ 10% natural CO2.
We have control over the 20%.
They say adding the 20% is what caused global warming.
If we are absolutely sure correlation implies causation, then we can stabilize temperature by reducing CO2 emissions to zero immediately. Or maybe that just stabilizes the rate of increase. Not sure on that point. Lots and lots trees will make it cooler again.
All set to start?
Also, there is the positive vs. negative feedback issue with water vapor. If warming makes it more humid, temps rise further. However, cloud cover reflects sunlight(heat) back out. I’ve heard cloud cover is not in the climate models, but I don’t know if that’s true or not.
The heat retention components of the atmosphere are 70% water vapor/ 20% manmade CO2-other/ 10% natural CO2.
We have control over the 20%.
They say adding the 20% is what caused global warming.
If we are absolutely sure correlation implies causation, then we can stabilize temperature by reducing CO2 emissions to zero immediately. Or maybe that just stabilizes the rate of increase. Not sure on that point. Lots and lots trees will make it cooler again.
All set to start?
Also, there is the positive vs. negative feedback issue with water vapor. If warming makes it more humid, temps rise further. However, cloud cover reflects sunlight(heat) back out. I’ve heard cloud cover is not in the climate models, but I don’t know if that’s true or not.
The heat retention components of the atmosphere are 70% water vapor/ 20% manmade CO2-other/ 10% natural CO2.
We have control over the 20%.
They say adding the 20% is what caused global warming.
If we are absolutely sure correlation implies causation, then we can stabilize temperature by reducing CO2 emissions to zero immediately. Or maybe that just stabilizes the rate of increase. Not sure on that point. Lots and lots trees will make it cooler again.
All set to start?
Also, there is the positive vs. negative feedback issue with water vapor. If warming makes it more humid, temps rise further. However, cloud cover reflects sunlight(heat) back out. I’ve heard cloud cover is not in the climate models, but I don’t know if that’s true or not.
***”the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.”
Makes me think that perhaps I wasn’t. ***
If you read further, You’ll find that Spencer thinks about 25% of observed warming is from human generated CO2 and 75% from natural phenomena — mostly variations in cloud cover due to natural variations in North Pacific circulation patterns. He may or may not be correct, but his simple models and satellite data track to 20th century observed Sea Surface Temperatures fairly well. The IPCC models do not as far as I can tell.
I’d also point out that he uses satellite data where possible, and that’s probably a good thing. Satellites have problems — especially correlating data from previous and later satellites and instrumentation. But overall, satellites have much more uniform coverage, and collect all their data worldwide with the same sensor — eliminating any problems with data collection site specific biases.
Cedric the water vapor is, so far, self regulating. stuff called rain. i suppose warming could produce clouds that would reflect sunlight, then all we’d have to worry about is the acidification of the oceans. and the continued hot house effect from all that co2 and new, added, h2o. this is only hand waving on my part, but it seems to me that the “studies” that co-rev cites are a more sophisticated version of “fool the rubes” than what i was reading a few years ago.
it turns out… or did turn out… that the natural sinks take care of about half the CO2 man adds to the atmosphere. so we could cut our CO2 emissions in half, and just take the warming already built into the system… it won’t be good. or we could cut our CO2 emissions even more and gradually get back to “normal.” but it won’t be quick, and it won’t be without the further warming already baked into the cake.
and all of this so teenagers can drag the strip on saturday night?
JzB, you do realize that this was the end of my comment to which you responded. “Overall the temps are going up, and they will continue to do so until we start the next ?little? Ice Age or next glaciation. Its just part of a series of interconnected cycles.“
So if your main point was its getting warmer, well Duh!!!!
What I objected to was your name calling and your overall arrogant and mostly ignorant tone. From that, i didn’t need you to admit what your CC beliefs were. They were evident, that’s why I asked if you actually believed it was only caused by A.
Which leads me to clrify the discussion of GHG and atmospheric make up. 99% of the atmosphere is made up of Nitrogen (78%) and Oxygen (21%). ~70% of the remaining 1% is made up of several inert gases. That leaves the remaining ~.3% as GHGs. Of that .3% ~60-70% is made up of H2O (.21% overall.) Therefore the remaining .09% is made up of the other GHGs, and of that .99% is made up of CO2 (.0891%.) Finally, of the .0891% only .112% is manmade (.0099792.) The US contributes ~40-50% of that (.0049896).
If you believe that ACO2 is the cause of all the globe’s warming .00299376C is the responsibility of the US in the past century. If, like Spencer, you beleive it is ~25% of the warming then we get into even more zeroes after the decimal. (Y’all can do the math.)
So if you are a Dem or believer of the AGW theory, and think that C&T is going to be impactful, then y’all need to work much harder to prove it to the reality-based populace. C&T causes economic constraints maybe even termoil for a gain so small that it can not be measured.
If my math is wrong, how wrong can it be? One less zero after the decimal?
Dale, why do you persist in the personal attacks. Claiming I don’t know high school science and then making this claim “it turns out… or did turn out… that the natural sinks take care of about half the CO2 man adds to the atmosphere.” BTW, ~82% of the CO2 increase is natural. Yup, those ole sinks can tell the difference in the makeup of a CO2 molecule and selects for the manmade. And I’m the one who doesn’t know HS science.
Dale, your comments are becoming an embarrassment.
I heard the teens around here switched to skateboards when gas hit $3. But I don’t think it has really sunk in what actually doing something substantial about CO2 emisions really means. Then the government will tax us for it for the next 40 years, and we can check then and see if it went down somehow.
We certainly aren’t going to come up with a sophisticated climate model here. I’ll tweek the one I started a bit. From the co2 data posted above, it actually looks like the man made percentage is more like 10%.
So my heat capacity components are 70% water vapor, 20% natural CO2, 10% man-made gases.
You can have increased average values for humidity even tho it does rain now and then. Compare FL to AZ. This means a lot more heat can be stored in water vapor.
But like I say, I really do have no idea who’s right about it.
I heard the teens around here switched to skateboards when gas hit $3. But I don’t think it has really sunk in what actually doing something substantial about CO2 emisions really means. Then the government will tax us for it for the next 40 years, and we can check then and see if it went down somehow.
We certainly aren’t going to come up with a sophisticated climate model here. I’ll tweek the one I started a bit. From the co2 data posted above, it actually looks like the man made percentage is more like 10%.
So my heat capacity components are 70% water vapor, 20% natural CO2, 10% man-made gases.
You can have increased average values for humidity even tho it does rain now and then. Compare FL to AZ. This means a lot more heat can be stored in water vapor.
But like I say, I really do have no idea who’s right about it.
I heard the teens around here switched to skateboards when gas hit $3. But I don’t think it has really sunk in what actually doing something substantial about CO2 emisions really means. Then the government will tax us for it for the next 40 years, and we can check then and see if it went down somehow.
We certainly aren’t going to come up with a sophisticated climate model here. I’ll tweek the one I started a bit. From the co2 data posted above, it actually looks like the man made percentage is more like 10%.
So my heat capacity components are 70% water vapor, 20% natural CO2, 10% man-made gases.
You can have increased average values for humidity even tho it does rain now and then. Compare FL to AZ. This means a lot more heat can be stored in water vapor.
But like I say, I really do have no idea who’s right about it.
no. i think it is yours. i was trying to be kind. i’m sorry but you do not know high school science. this is not a personal attack. just the only way i can think of to reply to some of the things you say.
the sinks don’t have to tell the manmade from the natural. there is a certain amout of natural CO2 added to the atmosphere each year. and a certain amount of manmade CO2 added to the atmosphere each year. of the total amount added, an amount is subtracted. the remainder is equal to half the amount of manmade added.
maybe what you aren’t getting here is that if there was no manmade CO2 added, the amount subtracted would be ALL of the natural amount added. but no, i wasn’t saying the sinks select for manmade, or natural, CO2. i was talking about the quantities.
you really do have no idea. and that is not a personal attack. i like to think that if you read what i wrote you might see where you are going wrong. but long, bitter experience has taught me the foolishness of that thought.
Unless you are putting us on, this is an example of what I am trying to save you from. Math is not like a grocery store. You can’t just run madly through the aisles throwing whatever strikes your fancy into the cart and then adding it all up at the check out counter.
You seem to have convinced yourself that you, unlike the sinks, can identify the “manmade CO2” molecules in the atmosphere and since they are a vanishingly small percent of all the molecules in the atmosphere, manmade CO2 accounts for only that vanishingly small percent of global warming.
It doesn’t work that way. In the first place most of the gas in the atmosphere has no signiificant effect on warming at all, and the heat trapping gasses that are not man made are responsible for the relative warmth of the earth AT baseline. What humans have been used to since we were small furriy little animals who remote descendents would become apes. The only “greenhouse” gas that contributes to the INCREASE in warming is manmade greenhouse gas. And that is mostly Carbon Dioxide from burning fossil fuels. Moreover it is only that part of the CO2 from fossil fuels that exceeds the amount the natural sinks were removing from the atmosphere every year.
So if half of all manmade CO2 is removed from the atmosphere every year, and America contributes 25% of all manmade greenhouse gasses, one could argue that America contributes half of all global warming. Of course this is bad math too. The real answer is that America accounts for 25% of warming, just as it contributes 25% of manmade CO2.
The reason I point this out and that other thing that upset you, is that life is precious and short. We both have better things to do with what is left of our lives than arguing about global warming.
“The only “greenhouse” gas that contributes to the INCREASE in warming is manmade greenhouse gas. And that is mostly Carbon Dioxide from burning fossil fuels. Moreover it is only that part of the CO2 from fossil fuels that exceeds the amount the natural sinks were removing from the atmosphere every year. “[my emphasis]
But, going back to the fundamentals of your satement, your advanced (over HS) physics education makes you believe that CO2 is the only GHG culprit in the heating? [Since the CO2 theory is being proven less than robust, the catastrophists have shifted to increasing methane as the next big scare. So, Dale, what happened to that GHG?] That the difference (increase) in CO2 is all manmade? That’s so wrong it’s not even worth responding. Hint: just look at some of the long (1+M year) range graphs of heating and CO2, or even compare the graphed results for the last 10-20 years. Or better still explain the glacial periods with your understanding.
“So if half of all manmade CO2 is removed from the atmosphere every year, and America contributes 25% of all manmade greenhouse gasses, one could argue that America contributes half of all global warming. Of course this is bad math too. The real answer is that America accounts for 25% of warming, just as it contributes 25% of manmade CO2. ” Yup, ALL the heating has to be from ACO2. Please find a reputable peer-reviewed paper that says that.
Without doing the math, you are confirming this statement of mine: “If you believe that ACO2 is the cause of all the globe’s warming .00299376C is the responsibility of the US in the past century. If, like Spencer, you believe it is ~25% of the warming then we get into even more zeroes after the decimal. (Y’all can do the math.)”
I’ll do the math for you. You are now saying that we need to be concerned for this level of warming: .00074844C from my calculation. Or from your belief, in the past century the average global temp has gone up ~.6C. So in your simplified advanced college physics training the US is responsible for as much as .15C (your 25%) and since the goal is only an 80% reduction .12C of that increase.
Are those the numbers of which you are really frightened or you’re trying to frighten the kiddies?
I see, like others here, you have gone well into “blind belief” land.
i find it interesting that you take my “mostly” to mean “only” and then castigate me for ignoring the other GHG. I will try to repeat that my point was about what is contributing to warming above the base-line.. the temperature regime we as a species evolved with. To account for “more” warming, you have to look at what is “new.” I did not enter into all the complications of climate science because I don’t know much about them, and this is a blog not a library of learned journals. I’ll leave the details, or any startling new discoveries, to the scientists (for now. i am not one to just stand by and admire “the experts” when my skepticism has been aroused.).
Don’t know if peer reviewed papers bother with the blame game. I would offer, though, that if the US contributes 25% of the CO2–which i take your word for– it is a reasonable conclusion that the US contributes 25% of the warming… though it is kind of a meaningless statistic… the problem being global and all.
I am afraid I did not confirm that statement of yours. I was trying as gently as I could to show why it was nonsense.
As for frightening the kiddies, it is one of my kiddies who has a PhD in a closely related subject, who has been frightening me. Small changes in global average temperature result in large changes to ecosystems. We will find ourselves inhabiting a world we won’t like. Try imagining Portland turning into Phoenix. [and try to understand this is a rhetorical point. my kiddie assures me the global warming models suggest portland is more likely to get colder and wetter. will play hell with my apple crop.]
Dale, your writing and thinking are getting less and less logical. you said: “The only “greenhouse” gas [that is singular not plural] that contributes to the INCREASE in warming is manmade greenhouse gas. And that is mostly Carbon Dioxide [again you used a singular form of the verb] from burning fossil fuels….” so from that we are supposed to rea dyour mind and infer that you are not saying CO2 is the “only” GHG causing global warming?
Then later on in this comment you say this: “…that if the US contributes 25% of the CO2–which i take your word for– it is a reasonable conclusion that the US contributes 25% of the warming…” doing the advanced college level calculus I conclude you are saying 100% of the warming is from CO2. That is regardless of some more wishful illogic regarding a baseline.
Dale in very simple terms we have gone through at least one glaciation in that time frame you define as the baseline. How does that CO2 affect that level of ?warming? again?
BTW, I did not say that US contributed 25% of the CO2. I said: “ …CO2 (.0891%.) Finally, of the .0891% only .112% is manmade (.0099792.) The US contributes ~40-50% of that (.0049896). ” The 25% was related to Spencer’s estimate of man versus natural warming.
Saying this confirms my description of your writing and logic and more importatnly your “blind belief”: “I did not enter into all the complications of climate science because I don’t know much about them, and this is a blog not a library of learned journals. I’ll leave the details, or any startling new discoveries, to the scientists (for now. i am not one to just stand by and admire “the experts” when my skepticism has been aroused.). ” Your commentary shows no skepticism, just “blind belief.”
Dale, your writing and thinking are getting less and less logical. you said: “The only “greenhouse” gas [that is singular not plural] that contributes to the INCREASE in warming is manmade greenhouse gas. And that is mostly Carbon Dioxide [again you used a singular form of the verb] from burning fossil fuels….” so from that we are supposed to read your mind and infer that you are not saying CO2 is the “only” GHG causing global warming?
Then later on in this comment you say this: “…that if the US contributes 25% of the CO2–which i take your word for– it is a reasonable conclusion that the US contributes 25% of the warming…” doing the advanced college level calculus I conclude you are saying 100% of the warming is from CO2. That is regardless of some more wishful illogic regarding a baseline. So from this advanced math and the muddled thinking and writing, I conclude that you are saying CO2 is the “only” GHG causing global warming? Dale in very simple terms we have gone through at least one glaciation in that time frame you define as the baseline. How does that CO2 affect that level of ?warming? again?
BTW, I did not say that US contributed 25% of the CO2. I said: “ …CO2 (.0891%.) Finally, of the .0891% only .112% is manmade (.0099792.) The US contributes ~40-50% of that (.0049896). ” The 25% was related to Spencer’s estimate of man versus natural warming.
Saying this confirms my description of your writing and logic and more importatnly your “blind belief”: “I did not enter into all the complications of climate science because I don’t know much about them, and this is a blog not a library of learned journals. I’ll leave the details, or any startling new discoveries, to the scientists (for now. i am not one to just stand by and admire “the experts” when my skepticism has been aroused.). ” Your commentary shows no skepticism, just “blind belief.”
thanks. i don’t know what caused the ice ages. but since one of the possible consequences of global warming that has been discussed is glaciation of europe by stopping the gulf stream heat conveyor, i have to imagine there are causes not dreampt of in my philosophy. meanwhile i think the science that relates teh current warming to the increase in carbon dioxide from man burning fossil fuels is pretty solid. and your arguments do not tend to increase my skepticism about it.
i am going to disappear for awhile. i forgot what motive you ascribed to me for that. but it’s mostly because i don’t want to argue with you. i end up hurting your feelings, and i can’t see where that does either of us, or the rest of the world, any good.
Gross Federal Debt as of March 10, 2011 was $14.16 trillion, of which $9.55 trillion is Debt Held by the Public and $4.61 trillion in Intragovernmental Holdings.
Social Security OASDI trust funds assets – the special interest Treasuries and earned interest – are reflected in the Gross Federal Debt as part of the Intragovernmental Holdings identified above. When any of the debt is transferred to the General Fund, it is then recorded as a liability or outlay of Treasury’s General Fund. If such require any public financing with new marketable Treasuries, then that portion of the debt transfer becomes new Debt Held by the Public. Otherwise, the Treasury’s General Fund absorbs the transfer liability cost as an outlay in the General Fund accounting. If new publicly held debt is required for redemption or reimbursement, that new debt is recorded and carried in the General Fund. The interest costs of the new debt are recorded in the General Fund budget as Interest payments and is simply added to the existing level of other Interest payments that are outlays of the General Fund.
Special issue Treasuries or the earned interest on such which are redeemed by the Treasury are recorded as liabilities in the Treasury’s General Fund for the fiscal year in which they are transferred from the SSA to the Treasury for redemption. If there is insufficient general revenue in the General Fund, a debt obligation is incurred to provide redemption or reimbursement payment to the SSA. Additional deficit spending occurs in the General Fund if that situation exists. So, yes, redemption or reimbursement payments to the SSA for the combined OASDI trust funds can most assuredly result in an increase in the General Fund fiscal year deficit. No question.
The U.S. Treasury explains in the 2010 Financial Report of the United States Government:
“When the trust funds get the receipts that they loan to the General Fund, these receipts provide additional authority to spend on benefits and other program expenses. The General Fund, in turn, has taken on the obligation of paying interest on these loans every year and repaying the principal when trust fund income from other sources falls below expenditures — the loans will be called in and the General Fund will have to finance the benefits paid by the trust fund through general revenues or borrowing, just as for any Governmental program.”
U.S. Treasury adds this in the same section of the report:
“From the Governmentwide perspective, only revenues received from the public (and States in the case of Medicare, Part D) and expenditures made to the public are important for the final balance. …For OASDI, the difference between total expenditures made to the public ($706.2 billion) and revenues from the public ($669.4 billion) was ($36.8) billion in 2010, indicating that OASDI had a negative effect on the overall budget outcome in that year.”
“The trust fund perspective is captured in the bottom section of each of the three trust fund columns. …For OASDI, total revenues of $787.9 billion ($669.4 + $118.5), including interest and a small amount of other Government transfers, exceeded total expenditures of $706.2 billion by $81.7 billion.”
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
Gross Federal Debt as of March 10, 2011 was $14.16 trillion, of which $9.55 trillion is Debt Held by the Public and $4.61 trillion in Intragovernmental Holdings.
Social Security OASDI trust funds assets – the special interest Treasuries and earned interest – are reflected in the Gross Federal Debt as part of the Intragovernmental Holdings identified above. When any of the debt is transferred to the General Fund, it is then recorded as a liability or outlay of Treasury’s General Fund. If such require any public financing with new marketable Treasuries, then that portion of the debt transfer becomes new Debt Held by the Public. Otherwise, the Treasury’s General Fund absorbs the transfer liability cost as an outlay in the General Fund accounting. If new publicly held debt is required for redemption or reimbursement, that new debt is recorded and carried in the General Fund. The interest costs of the new debt are recorded in the General Fund budget as Interest payments and is simply added to the existing level of other Interest payments that are outlays of the General Fund.
Special issue Treasuries or the earned interest on such which are redeemed by the Treasury are recorded as liabilities in the Treasury’s General Fund for the fiscal year in which they are transferred from the SSA to the Treasury for redemption. If there is insufficient general revenue in the General Fund, a debt obligation is incurred to provide redemption or reimbursement payment to the SSA. Additional deficit spending occurs in the General Fund if that situation exists. So, yes, redemption or reimbursement payments to the SSA for the combined OASDI trust funds can most assuredly result in an increase in the General Fund fiscal year deficit. No question.
The U.S. Treasury explains in the 2010 Financial Report of the United States Government:
“When the trust funds get the receipts that they loan to the General Fund, these receipts provide additional authority to spend on benefits and other program expenses. The General Fund, in turn, has taken on the obligation of paying interest on these loans every year and repaying the principal when trust fund income from other sources falls below expenditures — the loans will be called in and the General Fund will have to finance the benefits paid by the trust fund through general revenues or borrowing, just as for any Governmental program.”
U.S. Treasury adds this in the same section of the report:
“From the Governmentwide perspective, only revenues received from the public (and States in the case of Medicare, Part D) and expenditures made to the public are important for the final balance. …For OASDI, the difference between total expenditures made to the public ($706.2 billion) and revenues from the public ($669.4 billion) was ($36.8) billion in 2010, indicating that OASDI had a negative effect on the overall budget outcome in that year.”
“The trust fund perspective is captured in the bottom section of each of the three trust fund columns. …For OASDI, total revenues of $787.9 billion ($669.4 + $118.5), including interest and a small amount of other Government transfers, exceeded total expenditures of $706.2 billion by $81.7 billion.”
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
I have extracted key line entries from the table: Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010 (In billions of dollars)
HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
I have extracted key line entries from the table: Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010 (In billions of dollars)
HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Gross Federal Debt as of March 10, 2011 was $14.16 trillion, of which $9.55 trillion is Debt Held by the Public and $4.61 trillion in Intragovernmental Holdings.
Social Security OASDI trust funds assets – the special interest Treasuries and earned interest – are reflected in the Gross Federal Debt as part of the Intragovernmental Holdings identified above. When any of the debt is transferred to the General Fund, it is then recorded as a liability or outlay of Treasury’s General Fund. If such require any public financing with new marketable Treasuries, then that portion of the debt transfer becomes new Debt Held by the Public. Otherwise, the Treasury’s General Fund absorbs the transfer liability cost as an outlay in the General Fund accounting. If new publicly held debt is required for redemption or reimbursement, that new debt is recorded and carried in the General Fund. The interest costs of the new debt are recorded in the General Fund budget as Interest payments and is simply added to the existing level of other Interest payments that are outlays of the General Fund.
Special issue Treasuries or the earned interest on such which are redeemed by the Treasury are recorded as liabilities in the Treasury’s General Fund for the fiscal year in which they are transferred from the SSA to the Treasury for redemption. If there is insufficient general revenue in the General Fund, a debt obligation is incurred to provide redemption or reimbursement payment to the SSA. Additional deficit spending occurs in the General Fund if that situation exists. So, yes, redemption or reimbursement payments to the SSA for the combined OASDI trust funds can most assuredly result in an increase in the General Fund fiscal year deficit. No question.
The U.S. Treasury explains in the 2010 Financial Report of the United States Government:
“When the trust funds get the receipts that they loan to the General Fund, these receipts provide additional authority to spend on benefits and other program expenses. The General Fund, in turn, has taken on the obligation of paying interest on these loans every year and repaying the principal when trust fund income from other sources falls below expenditures — the loans will be called in and the General Fund will have to finance the benefits paid by the trust fund through general revenues or borrowing, just as for any Governmental program.”
U.S. Treasury adds this information in the same section of the report:
“From the Governmentwide perspective, only revenues received from the public (and States in the case of Medicare, Part D) and expenditures made to the public are important for the final balance. …For OASDI, the difference between total expenditures made to the public ($706.2 billion) and revenues from the public ($669.4 billion) was ($36.8) billion in 2010, indicating that OASDI had a negative effect on the overall budget outcome in that year.”
“The trust fund perspective is captured in the bottom section of each of the three trust fund columns. …For OASDI, total revenues of $787.9 billion ($669.4 + $118.5), including interest and a small amount of other Government transfers, exceeded total expenditures of $706.2 billion by $81.7 billion.”
U.S. Treasury also provides a table of revenues and expenditures from which a few key line entries have been extracted:
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010 (In billions of dollars)
HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1 Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010 (In billions of dollars)
HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1 Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7 Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8 Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Hottest April on record. 2nd hottest January-March on record-behind 1998.
Look at the graph. Will we have a new warmest year ever?
Krugman posted on the possibly final version of FinReg. I think Krugman probably has as good of an outsider’s understanding of banking as anyone, so this along with reading the link that he references is probably a good assessment.
However, Ives Smith posted a little while ago that the devil is in the details and an objective insider is really needed when it comes to actual legislation and wording. She is sort of close to the industry, but referenced someone she thinks knows what he speaks of and whom said the Volker Rule (bans prop trading) has some unintended large loopholes. Then Volker himself recently talked about TBTF (something different than prop trading) and said the Dodd Bill could effectively do that.
Then some point out that banks should be baned from trading in things like stocks and commodities, but be allowed to trade in things obviously banking-like, such as interest rate futures and currency markets. Makes sense.
Then I still have doubts that making CDS trade on an exchange is really what is needed for that fine product. CDOs might work if we find just the right quant guy to write the standardized rules. But then again, why bother. The only purpose is obfiscation and we don’t need more of that.
Assuming we are ready to pass a bill (????), there is bound to be lots more dissection of the bill as we go along.
But Krugman does point out that there still are only regulator discretionary powers over the crucial issue of leverage, and that will go all to heck when President Palin takes office.
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/05/21/thank-you-lloyd-blankfein/
We might. The el Nino is just finished. We’ll see how fast and strong the La Nina is.
UPDATED to correct typos and add a comment.
Following on the el Nino/La nina cycles, Bob Tisdale tracks the Surface Sea Temps, and has found that the SSTs effected first by the Nino/as have already gone negative. See his article here:
NINO3.4 SST Anomalies Are Now Negative
Furthermore, Dr. Roy Spencer who is a principal manager of the UAH satellite temps, makes this prediction.
Global Average Sea Surface Temperatures Poised for a Plunge
He says: ” I’m going to go out on a limb and predict that global-average SSTs will plunge over the next couple of months. Based upon past experience, it will take a month or two for our (UAH) tropospheric temperatures to then follow suit.”
My point here is that the temps are cyclical and we are about to enter an ameliorating cooling period.
Overall the temps are going up, and they will continue to do so until we start the next ?little? Ice Age or next glaciation. Its just part of a series of interconnected cycles.
The first graph at this link, and most of the graphs on that page, show clear upward trends in the anomalies over the time scales covered, irrespective of smaller trend-degree variations.
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2010/05/april-2010-sst-anomaly-update.html
Yes there are cycles – more than one, and at different degrees of trend. In fact, these things look disturbingly like Elliott waves. Going into a negative anomaly for NINO 3.4SST, in and of itself, doesn’t mean much.
A quick look at Spencer’s web site reveals that he is an AGW denialist, so he is predicting what is consistent with his belief system. No surprise there
Cheers!
JzB
JzB, why use this term? “A quick look at Spencer’s web site reveals that he is an AGW denialist,…” If you really read his site and writing you would know he is not a denialist.
Denialist (def.) One who excessively denies the truth.
If I were to judge between yours and his commentary I would judge you more a denialist than he. He, and his staff, calculate the monthly UAH satellite temps, and so have real world contact with the temp history for the past 30+ years. So he cannot be denying that there is warming. He has written re: the impacts of Green house gases, so he is not denying their impacts.
So, just what is he denying?
You on the other hand seem to imply that his views are not consistent with yours. Who’s in denial?
As to your comment re: Elliot Waves, why introduce something totally unrelated? Unless you are saying that human emotions/reactions cause climate change.
Anyway, few deny that there is Global Warming. Few deny that some is caused by man including a portion of that by burning carbon. What is questioned is the CAGW C=Catastrophic, predictions coming out of the “warmist” camp. Consistent with their belief. No surprise there, either.
If you care to discuss this, OK. I would be pleased to have a discussion, but drop the snarkiness.
The chart we probably want is this one — also from Spencer http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_Apr_10.gif It shows both the current and 1998 peaks. Both linked to El Nino apparently. Why should moving warm water around in the tropics warm or cool the planet? Beats me. As far as I can see no one knows.
Tangentially sunspot cycle 24 remains very weak. Today’s sunspot number is 15, but we’ve had 30 spotless days this year which should be well into the cycle by now. It looks like we may possibly be going to have a sunspot cycle similar to those experienced during the Maunder Minimum/Little Ice Age. Maybe we’ll find out if sunspots and global temperature are correlated. Or not as so many “scientists” seem more interested in advocacy than science and I suspect they are capable of burying any actual science in rhetoric. My impression is that Spencer is one of the good guys BTW. As are the folks that run the CO2 observatory in Hawaii.
BTW, sunspot number is an index, not a count. The number 15 is created by a single fairly active sunspot. I don’t recall ever seeing a sunspot number between 1 and 11 althouth I think numbers in that range are theoretically possible
A couple of links:
http://spaceweather.com/glossary/sunspotnumber.html
http://solarscience.msfc.nasa.gov/SunspotCycle.shtml
Codger, speaking of the maunder and LIA, a speaker at this weeks Int. Conference Climate Change predicted we were entering the next LIA. His dates: 1014 for start, ~2045 for the solar minimum, and ~ 2060-65 for the temp minimum. He uses the solar equatorial size (reduction in it) as a measure. At least we won’t have to worry about it.
Codger, speaking of the maunder and LIA, a speaker at this weeks Int. Conference Climate Change had this to say, as parphrased by EM Smith (ChiefIO): http://chiefio.wordpress.com/2010/05/17/iccc-day-two/
“The downside? He is stating flat out that we are headed for a Little Ice Age. The solar changes dictate cooling. The ocean mass delays it for about 40 years. And we’re headed for a lot of cold. There is a 200 year periodic decent of Total Solar Irradiance, that causes a Little Ice Age, and we’re due. The mechanism he asserts is a 250 km decrease in solar radius and that changes solar interior dynamics and processes. A plot of phase and amplitude for both sun spot number and solar radius showed a near perfect match, with the onset of the solar quieting in 1999.
Not the type to be bashful about making clear predictions (no wussy “projections” for this man!) he stated flat out the “New Little Ice Age begins in 2014.” Though with various lags from things such as ocean heat content and climate cooling rates, the depth if the NLIA is not reached until 2042 +/- 11 years for the solar minimum and then 2065 +/- 11 years for the temperature minimum.”
At least we won’t have to worry about it.
AGW = Anthropogenic (i.e caused by man) Global Warming.
From Spencer’s site (emphasis added.)
“Global warming” refers to the global-average temperature increase that has been observed over the last one hundred years or more. But to many politicians and the public, the term carries the implication that mankind is responsible for that warming. This website describes evidence from my group’s government-funded research that suggests global warming is mostly natural, and that the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.”
Hence the term “denialist.”
I said these graphs look like Elliott waves, cuz – well – they look like Elliott waves; even to the extent of having lower degrees of trend superimposed on higher degrees of trend, and what looks like a 5 up three down pattern, if you squint a little. But, it’s simply an observation. I drew no conclusions. If that statement is irrelevant, feel free to ignore. Though, this is an open thread . . .
FYI, I can actually do snark pretty well, but generally choose not to here, out of respect for the proprietors. If you think there was snark in that commentt, I suggest you grow an epidermus.
Or you may wish to simply ignore anything I post.
Cheers!
JzB
JzB, please tell me you are not implying that you believe all warming is anthropogenic? From your quote of Spencer’s site: “…global warming is mostly natural…” Even he does not believe it is only anthro.
he is actually stating one of the important the underlying questions of Climate Change. How much is caused by what factor. There are very few peer reviewed papers, some, but not many, that claim perentages by factor for climate change/warming. Those that do can not be validated, so they are little better than scientific opinion.
You have yet to identify of what Spencer is in denial.
If you haven’t yet learned using “denialist” is akin to using the ‘N’ word or ‘B’ word. No good is imparted to the recipient and much is learned about the speaker.
JzB, please tell me you are not implying that you believe all warming is anthropogenic? From your quote of Spencer’s site: “…global warming is mostly natural…” Even he does not believe it is only anthro.
He is actually commenting on one of the important underlying questions of Climate Change. How much is caused by what factor. There are very few peer reviewed papers, some, but not many, that claim perentages by factor for climate change/warming. Those that do can not be validated, so they are little better than scientific opinion.
You have yet to identify of what Spencer is in denial.
If you haven’t yet learned using “denialist” is akin to using the ‘N’ word or ‘B’ word. No good is imparted to the recipient and much is learned about the speaker.
Even I’ve come across what Spencer is probably talking about and I’ve just been a casual observer of the debate. If I recall correctly (which I don’t guarantee) about 2/3 of the global warming effect is due to water vapor. The remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
So the “Anthropogenic” part is something significantly less than a third. And Spencer’s quote you highlighted above looks quite accurately stated in that context.
And they say all we need to do is reduce man made CO2 emissions by 87% by 2050?
I’d call anyone that says “no problem” to that a denialist.
Even I’ve come across what Spencer is probably talking about and I’ve just been a casual observer of the debate. If I recall correctly (which I don’t guarantee) about 2/3 of the global warming effect is due to water vapor. The remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
So the “Anthropogenic” part is something significantly less than a third. And Spencer’s quote you highlighted above looks quite accurately stated in that context.
And they say all we need to do is reduce man made CO2 emissions by 87% by 2050?
I’d call anyone that says “no problem” to that a denialist.
Even I’ve come across what Spencer is probably talking about and I’ve just been a casual observer of the debate. If I recall correctly (which I don’t guarantee) about 2/3 of the global warming effect is due to water vapor. The remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
So the “Anthropogenic” part is something significantly less than a third. And Spencer’s quote you highlighted above looks quite accurately stated in that context.
And they say all we need to do is reduce man made CO2 emissions by 87% by 2050?
I’d call anyone that says “no problem” to that a denialist.
***A quick look at Spencer’s web site reveals that he is an AGW denialist, so he is predicting what is consistent with his belief system. No surprise there ***
Take a longer look. As I recall, Spencer does think that the correlation between greenhouse gas concentration and global warming is weaker than is generally thought and has solid reasons for thinking that. Check, yep, see http://www.drroyspencer.com/global-warming-101/ then progress to http://www.drroyspencer.com/research-articles/satellite-and-climate-model-evidence/
Is Spencer right? I don’t have the slightest idea. His science looks to be defensible and, unlike the IPCC, and the disaster is upon us crowd, he doesn’t seem to have an agenda, appears to handle his data in a professional manner, and doesn’t seem to think that everybody who disagrees with him is a fool or knave dedicated to bringing the human race to disaster. He could be wrong or right. So could James Hanson or the guy CoRev cites who predicts massive global cooling (based on real — if weak — evidence BTW) Anyway, I simply like Spencer’s attitude a hell of a lot better than I do that of the warming alarmists. Seems more … well .. scientific.
From Al Jazeera — http://english.aljazeera.net/focus/2010/05/201052271814825709.html
***What the GAO report could not foresee – because it had forgotten about its domestic accountability issues – was that the 2007 US sanctions against Iranian banks ironically ensured Iran’s immunity from the global financial crisis that was about to explode.
Iran was among the few major economies in the world not to be severely affected by the crisis.***
Does this imply that to straighten out the US economy, we do not need the Tea Party, Wall Street, Obama style “transparency” (which much resembles what we used to call “obsfucation”). No indeed, what we need is for the rest of the world to apply economic sanctions to the US for a few decades.
CoRev,
“At least we won’t have to worry about it.“
Very funny. Here’s what to worry about. Cap and Trade will end the world as we know it.
http://www.nakedcapitalism.com/2010/05/guest-post-cap-and-trade-is-a-gigantic-scam.html?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+NakedCapitalism+%28naked+capitalism%29
Or how about this from China Daily: http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/bizchina/2010-05/21/content_9879430.htm
China is issuing more 50 year treasury bonds. The last batch six months ago went at 4.3% (for FIFTY years!!!!). The new ones are expected to go for even less.. As far as I can see, this indicates either that the efficient market is projecting deflation from now until the end of time. Or perhaps that some investors (Chinese Insurance Companies?) are just plain crazy. Or maybe they are buying CDS’s in New York to cover the risk that just maybe they might lose a bundle of yuan on these bonds if there are periods of inflation between now and 2060.
A summary: C&T an abject failure in the EU, Green jobs an abject failure in Spain. Carbon trading the newst investment scam throughout the EU, with Bulgaria just removed for cause from trading. Our own carbon trading market controlled by the key politicians/financiers/advisors supporting “O”. And finally, the C&T revenue was initially sold as a big, new revenue stream for funding health care, and the other liberal agenda items, helping pay for the big, new spending bills and not changing the deficit stream.
As confirmation, when the C&T bill got into hot water we then see the VAT trotted out.
What part of Tax and Spend, or Borrow and Spend do the voters NOT understand. Not much! They understand very, very well.
Before we get into the we NEED the FED Govt to spend to get us out of the recession argument, and therefore, need the added revenue streams. Yes! But the spending needs to be as immediate as possible to alleviate the pain being felt NOW, not two years in the future in an election year.
Yes, the voters understand well that the compassionate party, is not compassionate, just all politics all the time.
Codger, what part of the unfair trade practices used against us not support that already? 🙂
Cedric
apologies if i missed your point, but water vapor is very much a “greenhouse gas.” it is what keeps the daytime temperature within a hundred degrees of the nighttime temperature. but it has nothing to do with “global warming” for a variety of reasons having to do with the physics of water.
global warming is the slow, gradual increase in global average temperature that has been measured, correlates well with the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere, that is itself accounted for by man burning fossil fuels, and which is well understood to increase global temperature by the absorption of radiation (heat)… delaying its passage back out into space. there really isn’t much mystery here.
there was some mystery about whether CO2 sinks would turn up that limited the increase in CO2 in the atmosphere. so far none have.. or at least none that stop the increase.
i am not a physicist, much less a climate scientist, but i did make an effort to read the arguments of both sides. the people saying we have a problem read to my eye like honest scientists… i do have some background in honest science. the people saying there is no problem read to my eye like dishonest people relying on the ignorance of their audience to mislead them.
CoRev by now may actually know more about the details of the argument than I do, but he has repeatedly demonstrated that he knows nothing at all about basic science and is easily fooled by preposterous claims. I like CoRev and if he would concentrate on the ways that politicians and other power seekers are using global warming to advance a power-agenda of their own, i’d be glad to listen to him. But when he talks “science” he is in way over his head.
but again, forget about water vapor. they aren’t making any more of it. [oh, to be sure, as the planet warms up, more water vapor will be taken up into the atmosphere increasing the warming … but that is an effect, not a cause.]
CoRev
more details on the evils of cap and trade would be welcome. i don’t care much for the idea myself. looks like another way to make money for wall street. but i do like the idea of a straight carbon tax.
i’d agree with you about the compassionate party, but you need to recognize that the tough-guy party is at least as dishonest, and just as all politics all the time.
and i would definitely agree with you that federal revenue could be better spent. sure as hell don’t see the point of giving it to people in the form of tax breaks.
Codger
I suspect they have discovered how to prosper while losing money. That may seem like an oxymoron to you, but I understand that it is the way Finance is played by the folks who know what they are doing.
“the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.”
Nuff said?
It’s typical that what I say to you has to be repeated.
And gosh, thanks for the lesson in blogging propriety.
Cheers!
JzB
My statement was based on what I percieved to be a conclusion driving the analysis, rather than the data driving a conclusion. Perhaps I was unfair to Spencer.
But this:
“the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.”
Makes me think that perhaps I wasn’t.
Cheers!
JzB
OK, you’ve confirmed yourself to be a “blind believer” in the “A” portion of the formula. Nuff said there!
I started a rebutal, then decided it was useless. With “blind belief” there is no ground to have a discussion. So, G’day to you on this subject.
For the most part (there are exceptions), those “unfair trade practices” exist only in the delusions of the mindless. Our problem is simple. We are a high cost producer of most things. We’ve talked, cajoled, threatened most of the worlld into free trade — only to find that they can produce stuff and deliver it to Wilmington, CA cheaper than we can make it here. … And that no one wants to buy our stuff because it costs too much
We aren’t being cheated. We’re being stupid. The two have different cures. Blaming others for self-inflicted problems isn’t likely to fix them.
***At least we won’t have to worry about it.***
Well, the sunspots most likely will come back some day, no? On the other hand it’d be a hell of a break with tradition if we didn’t leave a few intractable problems for our descendents. After all, they need a few problems. Solving problems builds character.
Codger
I haven’t read Spencer. better things to do, and if there are new developments in climate science i am sure i will hear about them. but your experience is different from mine. i can’t imagine an honest scientist being a denialist at this point, but it is always possible. what is more possible is that the devil learns to talk like an honest scientist.
if you have been reading the hysterical left you will have a poor view of the “global warming is real and it is dangerous” argument. There are lots of real scientists who are not hysterical, and even some books for the general reader that strike my eye as “reasonable.”
Like I said, I haven’t been following the debate closely. But the argument I was referring to is if you think of the atmosphere as a blanket that keeps us warm, the components are something like about 2/3 water vapor, and the remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
I don’t remember the percentage split between CO2 from man vs natural sources, but lets pick 20%.
So the man made percentage of the blanket is 20%. So some argue that this is a small percent that man has contributed.
Now you can say, everything else held constant, adding this 20% was what made global warming occur, and was a big enough difference.
The naysayers are saying that “everything else held constant” hasn’t really been proven.
This of course is why I haven’t paid that much attention to the arguments. It sounds too much like religon.
Like I said, I haven’t been following the debate closely. But the argument I was referring to is if you think of the atmosphere as a blanket that keeps us warm, the components are something like about 2/3 water vapor, and the remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
I don’t remember the percentage split between CO2 from man vs natural sources, but lets pick 20%.
So the man made percentage of the blanket is 20%. So some argue that this is a small percent that man has contributed.
Now you can say, everything else held constant, adding this 20% was what made global warming occur, and was a big enough difference.
The naysayers are saying that “everything else held constant” hasn’t really been proven.
This of course is why I haven’t paid that much attention to the arguments. It sounds too much like religon.
Like I said, I haven’t been following the debate closely. But the argument I was referring to is if you think of the atmosphere as a blanket that keeps us warm, the components are something like about 2/3 water vapor, and the remaining 1/3 is natural CO2, man-made CO2 and other trace quantities of gases.
I don’t remember the percentage split between CO2 from man vs natural sources, but lets pick 20%.
So the man made percentage of the blanket is 20%. So some argue that this is a small percent that man has contributed.
Now you can say, everything else held constant, adding this 20% was what made global warming occur, and was a big enough difference.
The naysayers are saying that “everything else held constant” hasn’t really been proven.
This of course is why I haven’t paid that much attention to the arguments. It sounds too much like religon.
Dale, not to correct your science background, but the physics of H2O in the atmosphere is one of the key arguments in today’s CC discussions. One side thinks it is a positive feedback, and the other, led by Spencer, thinks it is a negative feedback. This issue is compounded by the many, many papers and articles that claim that the impacts of CO2 are logarithmic and adding more to the atmosphere has a much diminished impact. Some, but not as much as estimated by many of the models.
If some of the core tenets of the physics of AGW theory are still under discusssion, can we trust the claims of catastrophic out comes? (And that’s a whole other ongoing discussion.)
As to your science background in CC, you have admitted in the past to not reviewing new literature, and this is just silly in a science as dynamic as this.
Dale, we have discussed here for several years now, and I have this observation of a pattern you have.
You often come across s being reasonable while adding personal attack zingers. Eventually your commentary becomes overloaded with the zingers to the point reader push back against them becomes common place. At which point you seem to disappear for some time and the cycle regenerates. You appear to be approaching the point where we, the readers, comment back in kind.
It’s sad really, since on SS you are valued source, but for much of the other subject matter you add little and come across as just a nasty old fart. (Some would use the same description for myself.) So, please add technical points without the personal body shots. You’ll be more effective.
CR, the comment was to Codger’s and my age. One issue often brought up by 2slugs, as not having the same meaning for our (at least my) concern over CC’s impact on his more extended future. Just a silly backroom, insider joke!
Codger, I tend to agree with this: “We aren’t being cheated. We’re being stupid. ” Most other countries use a VAT tax, and they are using that tax to offset import prices and lowering the prices on their exports.
Let’s try this again.
The first graph at this link, and most of the graphs on that page, show clear upward trends in the anomalies over the time scales covered, irrespective of smaller trend-degree variations.
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2010/05/april-2010-sst-anomaly-update.html
If you’d pay attention to the main point of what I said, instead of trying to play “Gotcha” with the minutia, you might be less inclined to make wild accusations about what I believe. I have not stated anything about what I believe on this topic.
And, really, I think for you to ignore me is really the best route to take.
Cheers!
JzB
The atmosphere is largely nitrogen and oxygen. Water vapor, per this wiki entry, varies between about 1% and 4% at the surface, and is about 0.4% over the entire atmosphere. Everyting else is a minor quantity.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atmosphere_of_Earth
CO2 has increased from about 320 ppm to 398 ppm since the late 50’s, a relative increase of about 24%.
http://co2now.org/
The geological record shows a strong correlation between CO2 level and temperature, at CO2 levels of 200 to 280 ppm, far below what we now have.
http://maps.grida.no/go/graphic/historical-trends-in-carbon-dioxide-concentrations-and-temperature-on-a-geological-and-recent-time-scale
We are talking about large outcomes from relativley large changes in constituents present at small levels.
I’ll guess that water vapor concentrations are beyond human control, since the oceans are pretty big. CO2 emissions are at least partially within human control.
At the very least, we need more trees.
Cheers!
JzB
CoRev
sorry for the body shots. i have apparently a gift for offending people, but i assure you i have a kind heart.
as i said, you may know more about the state of the argument by now than i do. i have other things to do. but i also said… because it is true, and even you need to know it, that you have presented “scientific” claims here that just do not demonstrate an understanding of high school science. i am sorry if that is “nasty.” it is offered in good faith.
let me try to assure you, i think i know SS. i do not claim to know much of anything else. even global warming could turn out to surprise me. i don’t think so. but then it wouldn’t be a surprise.
be of good cheer.
I guess I still need to clarify.
The heat retention components of the atmosphere are 70% water vapor/ 20% manmade CO2-other/ 10% natural CO2.
We have control over the 20%.
They say adding the 20% is what caused global warming.
If we are absolutely sure correlation implies causation, then we can stabilize temperature by reducing CO2 emissions to zero immediately. Or maybe that just stabilizes the rate of increase. Not sure on that point. Lots and lots trees will make it cooler again.
All set to start?
Also, there is the positive vs. negative feedback issue with water vapor. If warming makes it more humid, temps rise further. However, cloud cover reflects sunlight(heat) back out. I’ve heard cloud cover is not in the climate models, but I don’t know if that’s true or not.
I guess I still need to clarify.
The heat retention components of the atmosphere are 70% water vapor/ 20% manmade CO2-other/ 10% natural CO2.
We have control over the 20%.
They say adding the 20% is what caused global warming.
If we are absolutely sure correlation implies causation, then we can stabilize temperature by reducing CO2 emissions to zero immediately. Or maybe that just stabilizes the rate of increase. Not sure on that point. Lots and lots trees will make it cooler again.
All set to start?
Also, there is the positive vs. negative feedback issue with water vapor. If warming makes it more humid, temps rise further. However, cloud cover reflects sunlight(heat) back out. I’ve heard cloud cover is not in the climate models, but I don’t know if that’s true or not.
I guess I still need to clarify.
The heat retention components of the atmosphere are 70% water vapor/ 20% manmade CO2-other/ 10% natural CO2.
We have control over the 20%.
They say adding the 20% is what caused global warming.
If we are absolutely sure correlation implies causation, then we can stabilize temperature by reducing CO2 emissions to zero immediately. Or maybe that just stabilizes the rate of increase. Not sure on that point. Lots and lots trees will make it cooler again.
All set to start?
Also, there is the positive vs. negative feedback issue with water vapor. If warming makes it more humid, temps rise further. However, cloud cover reflects sunlight(heat) back out. I’ve heard cloud cover is not in the climate models, but I don’t know if that’s true or not.
***”the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.”
Makes me think that perhaps I wasn’t. ***
If you read further, You’ll find that Spencer thinks about 25% of observed warming is from human generated CO2 and 75% from natural phenomena — mostly variations in cloud cover due to natural variations in North Pacific circulation patterns. He may or may not be correct, but his simple models and satellite data track to 20th century observed Sea Surface Temperatures fairly well. The IPCC models do not as far as I can tell.
I’d also point out that he uses satellite data where possible, and that’s probably a good thing. Satellites have problems — especially correlating data from previous and later satellites and instrumentation. But overall, satellites have much more uniform coverage, and collect all their data worldwide with the same sensor — eliminating any problems with data collection site specific biases.
Cedric
the water vapor is, so far, self regulating. stuff called rain. i suppose warming could produce clouds that would reflect sunlight, then all we’d have to worry about is the acidification of the oceans. and the continued hot house effect from all that co2 and new, added, h2o. this is only hand waving on my part, but it seems to me that the “studies” that co-rev cites are a more sophisticated version of “fool the rubes” than what i was reading a few years ago.
it turns out… or did turn out… that the natural sinks take care of about half the CO2 man adds to the atmosphere. so we could cut our CO2 emissions in half, and just take the warming already built into the system… it won’t be good. or we could cut our CO2 emissions even more and gradually get back to “normal.” but it won’t be quick, and it won’t be without the further warming already baked into the cake.
and all of this so teenagers can drag the strip on saturday night?
JzB, you do realize that this was the end of my comment to which you responded. “Overall the temps are going up, and they will continue to do so until we start the next ?little? Ice Age or next glaciation. Its just part of a series of interconnected cycles.“
So if your main point was its getting warmer, well Duh!!!!
What I objected to was your name calling and your overall arrogant and mostly ignorant tone. From that, i didn’t need you to admit what your CC beliefs were. They were evident, that’s why I asked if you actually believed it was only caused by A.
Which leads me to clrify the discussion of GHG and atmospheric make up. 99% of the atmosphere is made up of Nitrogen (78%) and Oxygen (21%). ~70% of the remaining 1% is made up of several inert gases. That leaves the remaining ~.3% as GHGs. Of that .3% ~60-70% is made up of H2O (.21% overall.) Therefore the remaining .09% is made up of the other GHGs, and of that .99% is made up of CO2 (.0891%.) Finally, of the .0891% only .112% is manmade (.0099792.) The US contributes ~40-50% of that (.0049896).
If you believe that ACO2 is the cause of all the globe’s warming .00299376C is the responsibility of the US in the past century. If, like Spencer, you beleive it is ~25% of the warming then we get into even more zeroes after the decimal. (Y’all can do the math.)
So if you are a Dem or believer of the AGW theory, and think that C&T is going to be impactful, then y’all need to work much harder to prove it to the reality-based populace. C&T causes economic constraints maybe even termoil for a gain so small that it can not be measured.
If my math is wrong, how wrong can it be? One less zero after the decimal?
That’s definitely worth a SHEESH!!!!!!!!
Dale, why do you persist in the personal attacks. Claiming I don’t know high school science and then making this claim “it turns out… or did turn out… that the natural sinks take care of about half the CO2 man adds to the atmosphere.” BTW, ~82% of the CO2 increase is natural. Yup, those ole sinks can tell the difference in the makeup of a CO2 molecule and selects for the manmade. And I’m the one who doesn’t know HS science.
Dale, your comments are becoming an embarrassment.
I heard the teens around here switched to skateboards when gas hit $3. But I don’t think it has really sunk in what actually doing something substantial about CO2 emisions really means. Then the government will tax us for it for the next 40 years, and we can check then and see if it went down somehow.
We certainly aren’t going to come up with a sophisticated climate model here. I’ll tweek the one I started a bit. From the co2 data posted above, it actually looks like the man made percentage is more like 10%.
So my heat capacity components are 70% water vapor, 20% natural CO2, 10% man-made gases.
You can have increased average values for humidity even tho it does rain now and then. Compare FL to AZ. This means a lot more heat can be stored in water vapor.
But like I say, I really do have no idea who’s right about it.
I heard the teens around here switched to skateboards when gas hit $3. But I don’t think it has really sunk in what actually doing something substantial about CO2 emisions really means. Then the government will tax us for it for the next 40 years, and we can check then and see if it went down somehow.
We certainly aren’t going to come up with a sophisticated climate model here. I’ll tweek the one I started a bit. From the co2 data posted above, it actually looks like the man made percentage is more like 10%.
So my heat capacity components are 70% water vapor, 20% natural CO2, 10% man-made gases.
You can have increased average values for humidity even tho it does rain now and then. Compare FL to AZ. This means a lot more heat can be stored in water vapor.
But like I say, I really do have no idea who’s right about it.
I heard the teens around here switched to skateboards when gas hit $3. But I don’t think it has really sunk in what actually doing something substantial about CO2 emisions really means. Then the government will tax us for it for the next 40 years, and we can check then and see if it went down somehow.
We certainly aren’t going to come up with a sophisticated climate model here. I’ll tweek the one I started a bit. From the co2 data posted above, it actually looks like the man made percentage is more like 10%.
So my heat capacity components are 70% water vapor, 20% natural CO2, 10% man-made gases.
You can have increased average values for humidity even tho it does rain now and then. Compare FL to AZ. This means a lot more heat can be stored in water vapor.
But like I say, I really do have no idea who’s right about it.
CR, see my earlier, 6:4X comment. It provides the actual percentages for atmospheric makeup.
CoRev
no. i think it is yours. i was trying to be kind. i’m sorry but you do not know high school science. this is not a personal attack. just the only way i can think of to reply to some of the things you say.
the sinks don’t have to tell the manmade from the natural. there is a certain amout of natural CO2 added to the atmosphere each year. and a certain amount of manmade CO2 added to the atmosphere each year. of the total amount added, an amount is subtracted. the remainder is equal to half the amount of manmade added.
maybe what you aren’t getting here is that if there was no manmade CO2 added, the amount subtracted would be ALL of the natural amount added. but no, i wasn’t saying the sinks select for manmade, or natural, CO2. i was talking about the quantities.
Cedric
you really do have no idea. and that is not a personal attack. i like to think that if you read what i wrote you might see where you are going wrong. but long, bitter experience has taught me the foolishness of that thought.
CoRev
Unless you are putting us on, this is an example of what I am trying to save you from. Math is not like a grocery store. You can’t just run madly through the aisles throwing whatever strikes your fancy into the cart and then adding it all up at the check out counter.
You seem to have convinced yourself that you, unlike the sinks, can identify the “manmade CO2” molecules in the atmosphere and since they are a vanishingly small percent of all the molecules in the atmosphere, manmade CO2 accounts for only that vanishingly small percent of global warming.
It doesn’t work that way. In the first place most of the gas in the atmosphere has no signiificant effect on warming at all, and the heat trapping gasses that are not man made are responsible for the relative warmth of the earth AT baseline. What humans have been used to since we were small furriy little animals who remote descendents would become apes. The only “greenhouse” gas that contributes to the INCREASE in warming is manmade greenhouse gas. And that is mostly Carbon Dioxide from burning fossil fuels. Moreover it is only that part of the CO2 from fossil fuels that exceeds the amount the natural sinks were removing from the atmosphere every year.
So if half of all manmade CO2 is removed from the atmosphere every year, and America contributes 25% of all manmade greenhouse gasses, one could argue that America contributes half of all global warming. Of course this is bad math too. The real answer is that America accounts for 25% of warming, just as it contributes 25% of manmade CO2.
The reason I point this out and that other thing that upset you, is that life is precious and short. We both have better things to do with what is left of our lives than arguing about global warming.
Dale, made this statement:
“The only “greenhouse” gas that contributes to the INCREASE in warming is manmade greenhouse gas. And that is mostly Carbon Dioxide from burning fossil fuels. Moreover it is only that part of the CO2 from fossil fuels that exceeds the amount the natural sinks were removing from the atmosphere every year. “[my emphasis]
But, going back to the fundamentals of your satement, your advanced (over HS) physics education makes you believe that CO2 is the only GHG culprit in the heating? [Since the CO2 theory is being proven less than robust, the catastrophists have shifted to increasing methane as the next big scare. So, Dale, what happened to that GHG?] That the difference (increase) in CO2 is all manmade? That’s so wrong it’s not even worth responding. Hint: just look at some of the long (1+M year) range graphs of heating and CO2, or even compare the graphed results for the last 10-20 years. Or better still explain the glacial periods with your understanding.
“So if half of all manmade CO2 is removed from the atmosphere every year, and America contributes 25% of all manmade greenhouse gasses, one could argue that America contributes half of all global warming. Of course this is bad math too. The real answer is that America accounts for 25% of warming, just as it contributes 25% of manmade CO2. ” Yup, ALL the heating has to be from ACO2. Please find a reputable peer-reviewed paper that says that.
Without doing the math, you are confirming this statement of mine: “If you believe that ACO2 is the cause of all the globe’s warming .00299376C is the responsibility of the US in the past century. If, like Spencer, you believe it is ~25% of the warming then we get into even more zeroes after the decimal. (Y’all can do the math.)”
I’ll do the math for you. You are now saying that we need to be concerned for this level of warming: .00074844C from my calculation. Or from your belief, in the past century the average global temp has gone up ~.6C. So in your simplified advanced college physics training the US is responsible for as much as .15C (your 25%) and since the goal is only an 80% reduction .12C of that increase.
Are those the numbers of which you are really frightened or you’re trying to frighten the kiddies?
I see, like others here, you have gone well into “blind belief” land.
CoRev
i find it interesting that you take my “mostly” to mean “only” and then castigate me for ignoring the other GHG. I will try to repeat that my point was about what is contributing to warming above the base-line.. the temperature regime we as a species evolved with. To account for “more” warming, you have to look at what is “new.” I did not enter into all the complications of climate science because I don’t know much about them, and this is a blog not a library of learned journals. I’ll leave the details, or any startling new discoveries, to the scientists (for now. i am not one to just stand by and admire “the experts” when my skepticism has been aroused.).
Don’t know if peer reviewed papers bother with the blame game. I would offer, though, that if the US contributes 25% of the CO2–which i take your word for– it is a reasonable conclusion that the US contributes 25% of the warming… though it is kind of a meaningless statistic… the problem being global and all.
I am afraid I did not confirm that statement of yours. I was trying as gently as I could to show why it was nonsense.
As for frightening the kiddies, it is one of my kiddies who has a PhD in a closely related subject, who has been frightening me. Small changes in global average temperature result in large changes to ecosystems. We will find ourselves inhabiting a world we won’t like. Try imagining Portland turning into Phoenix. [and try to understand this is a rhetorical point. my kiddie assures me the global warming models suggest portland is more likely to get colder and wetter. will play hell with my apple crop.]
Dale, your writing and thinking are getting less and less logical. you said: “The only “greenhouse” gas [that is singular not plural] that contributes to the INCREASE in warming is manmade greenhouse gas. And that is mostly Carbon Dioxide [again you used a singular form of the verb] from burning fossil fuels….” so from that we are supposed to rea dyour mind and infer that you are not saying CO2 is the “only” GHG causing global warming?
Then later on in this comment you say this: “…that if the US contributes 25% of the CO2–which i take your word for– it is a reasonable conclusion that the US contributes 25% of the warming…” doing the advanced college level calculus I conclude you are saying 100% of the warming is from CO2. That is regardless of some more wishful illogic regarding a baseline.
Dale in very simple terms we have gone through at least one glaciation in that time frame you define as the baseline. How does that CO2 affect that level of ?warming? again?
BTW, I did not say that US contributed 25% of the CO2. I said: “ …CO2 (.0891%.) Finally, of the .0891% only .112% is manmade (.0099792.) The US contributes ~40-50% of that (.0049896). ” The 25% was related to Spencer’s estimate of man versus natural warming.
Saying this confirms my description of your writing and logic and more importatnly your “blind belief”: “I did not enter into all the complications of climate science because I don’t know much about them, and this is a blog not a library of learned journals. I’ll leave the details, or any startling new discoveries, to the scientists (for now. i am not one to just stand by and admire “the experts” when my skepticism has been aroused.). ” Your commentary shows no skepticism, just “blind belief.”
Dale, your writing and thinking are getting less and less logical. you said: “The only “greenhouse” gas [that is singular not plural] that contributes to the INCREASE in warming is manmade greenhouse gas. And that is mostly Carbon Dioxide [again you used a singular form of the verb] from burning fossil fuels….” so from that we are supposed to read your mind and infer that you are not saying CO2 is the “only” GHG causing global warming?
Then later on in this comment you say this: “…that if the US contributes 25% of the CO2–which i take your word for– it is a reasonable conclusion that the US contributes 25% of the warming…” doing the advanced college level calculus I conclude you are saying 100% of the warming is from CO2. That is regardless of some more wishful illogic regarding a baseline. So from this advanced math and the muddled thinking and writing, I conclude that you are saying CO2 is the “only” GHG causing global warming?
Dale in very simple terms we have gone through at least one glaciation in that time frame you define as the baseline. How does that CO2 affect that level of ?warming? again?
BTW, I did not say that US contributed 25% of the CO2. I said: “ …CO2 (.0891%.) Finally, of the .0891% only .112% is manmade (.0099792.) The US contributes ~40-50% of that (.0049896). ” The 25% was related to Spencer’s estimate of man versus natural warming.
Saying this confirms my description of your writing and logic and more importatnly your “blind belief”: “I did not enter into all the complications of climate science because I don’t know much about them, and this is a blog not a library of learned journals. I’ll leave the details, or any startling new discoveries, to the scientists (for now. i am not one to just stand by and admire “the experts” when my skepticism has been aroused.). ” Your commentary shows no skepticism, just “blind belief.”
CoRev
thanks. i don’t know what caused the ice ages. but since one of the possible consequences of global warming that has been discussed is glaciation of europe by stopping the gulf stream heat conveyor, i have to imagine there are causes not dreampt of in my philosophy. meanwhile i think the science that relates teh current warming to the increase in carbon dioxide from man burning fossil fuels is pretty solid. and your arguments do not tend to increase my skepticism about it.
btw
i am going to disappear for awhile. i forgot what motive you ascribed to me for that. but it’s mostly because i don’t want to argue with you. i end up hurting your feelings, and i can’t see where that does either of us, or the rest of the world, any good.
My position statement:
Gross Federal Debt as of March 10, 2011 was $14.16 trillion, of which $9.55 trillion is Debt Held by the Public and $4.61 trillion in Intragovernmental Holdings.
Social Security OASDI trust funds assets – the special interest Treasuries and earned interest – are reflected in the Gross Federal Debt as part of the Intragovernmental Holdings identified above. When any of the debt is transferred to the General Fund, it is then recorded as a liability or outlay of Treasury’s General Fund. If such require any public financing with new marketable Treasuries, then that portion of the debt transfer becomes new Debt Held by the Public. Otherwise, the Treasury’s General Fund absorbs the transfer liability cost as an outlay in the General Fund accounting. If new publicly held debt is required for redemption or reimbursement, that new debt is recorded and carried in the General Fund. The interest costs of the new debt are recorded in the General Fund budget as Interest payments and is simply added to the existing level of other Interest payments that are outlays of the General Fund.
Special issue Treasuries or the earned interest on such which are redeemed by the Treasury are recorded as liabilities in the Treasury’s General Fund for the fiscal year in which they are transferred from the SSA to the Treasury for redemption. If there is insufficient general revenue in the General Fund, a debt obligation is incurred to provide redemption or reimbursement payment to the SSA. Additional deficit spending occurs in the General Fund if that situation exists. So, yes, redemption or reimbursement payments to the SSA for the combined OASDI trust funds can most assuredly result in an increase in the General Fund fiscal year deficit. No question.
The U.S. Treasury explains in the 2010 Financial Report of the United States Government:
“When the trust funds get the receipts that they loan to the General Fund, these receipts provide additional authority to spend on benefits and other program expenses. The General Fund, in turn, has taken on the obligation of paying interest on these loans every year and repaying the principal when trust fund income from other sources falls below expenditures — the loans will be called in and the General Fund will have to finance the benefits paid by the trust fund through general revenues or borrowing, just as for any Governmental program.”
U.S. Treasury adds this in the same section of the report:
“From the Governmentwide perspective, only revenues received from the public (and States in the case of Medicare, Part D) and expenditures made to the public are important for the final balance. …For OASDI, the difference between total expenditures made to the public ($706.2 billion) and revenues from the public ($669.4 billion) was ($36.8) billion in 2010, indicating that OASDI had a negative effect on the overall budget outcome in that year.”
“The trust fund perspective is captured in the bottom section of each of the three trust fund columns. …For OASDI, total revenues of $787.9 billion ($669.4 + $118.5), including interest and a small amount of other Government transfers, exceeded total expenditures of $706.2 billion by $81.7 billion.”
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of […]
My position statement:
Gross Federal Debt as of March 10, 2011 was $14.16 trillion, of which $9.55 trillion is Debt Held by the Public and $4.61 trillion in Intragovernmental Holdings.
Social Security OASDI trust funds assets – the special interest Treasuries and earned interest – are reflected in the Gross Federal Debt as part of the Intragovernmental Holdings identified above. When any of the debt is transferred to the General Fund, it is then recorded as a liability or outlay of Treasury’s General Fund. If such require any public financing with new marketable Treasuries, then that portion of the debt transfer becomes new Debt Held by the Public. Otherwise, the Treasury’s General Fund absorbs the transfer liability cost as an outlay in the General Fund accounting. If new publicly held debt is required for redemption or reimbursement, that new debt is recorded and carried in the General Fund. The interest costs of the new debt are recorded in the General Fund budget as Interest payments and is simply added to the existing level of other Interest payments that are outlays of the General Fund.
Special issue Treasuries or the earned interest on such which are redeemed by the Treasury are recorded as liabilities in the Treasury’s General Fund for the fiscal year in which they are transferred from the SSA to the Treasury for redemption. If there is insufficient general revenue in the General Fund, a debt obligation is incurred to provide redemption or reimbursement payment to the SSA. Additional deficit spending occurs in the General Fund if that situation exists. So, yes, redemption or reimbursement payments to the SSA for the combined OASDI trust funds can most assuredly result in an increase in the General Fund fiscal year deficit. No question.
The U.S. Treasury explains in the 2010 Financial Report of the United States Government:
“When the trust funds get the receipts that they loan to the General Fund, these receipts provide additional authority to spend on benefits and other program expenses. The General Fund, in turn, has taken on the obligation of paying interest on these loans every year and repaying the principal when trust fund income from other sources falls below expenditures — the loans will be called in and the General Fund will have to finance the benefits paid by the trust fund through general revenues or borrowing, just as for any Governmental program.”
U.S. Treasury adds this in the same section of the report:
“From the Governmentwide perspective, only revenues received from the public (and States in the case of Medicare, Part D) and expenditures made to the public are important for the final balance. …For OASDI, the difference between total expenditures made to the public ($706.2 billion) and revenues from the public ($669.4 billion) was ($36.8) billion in 2010, indicating that OASDI had a negative effect on the overall budget outcome in that year.”
“The trust fund perspective is captured in the bottom section of each of the three trust fund columns. …For OASDI, total revenues of $787.9 billion ($669.4 + $118.5), including interest and a small amount of other Government transfers, exceeded total expenditures of $706.2 billion by $81.7 billion.”
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In […]
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended 1September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States: 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 2 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective 3 (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
(In billions of dollars) HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds
and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010
(In billions of dollars)
HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
I have extracted key line entries from the table:
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds
and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010
(In billions of dollars)
HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
My statement:
Gross Federal Debt as of March 10, 2011 was $14.16 trillion, of which $9.55 trillion is Debt Held by the Public and $4.61 trillion in Intragovernmental Holdings.
Social Security OASDI trust funds assets – the special interest Treasuries and earned interest – are reflected in the Gross Federal Debt as part of the Intragovernmental Holdings identified above. When any of the debt is transferred to the General Fund, it is then recorded as a liability or outlay of Treasury’s General Fund. If such require any public financing with new marketable Treasuries, then that portion of the debt transfer becomes new Debt Held by the Public. Otherwise, the Treasury’s General Fund absorbs the transfer liability cost as an outlay in the General Fund accounting. If new publicly held debt is required for redemption or reimbursement, that new debt is recorded and carried in the General Fund. The interest costs of the new debt are recorded in the General Fund budget as Interest payments and is simply added to the existing level of other Interest payments that are outlays of the General Fund.
Special issue Treasuries or the earned interest on such which are redeemed by the Treasury are recorded as liabilities in the Treasury’s General Fund for the fiscal year in which they are transferred from the SSA to the Treasury for redemption. If there is insufficient general revenue in the General Fund, a debt obligation is incurred to provide redemption or reimbursement payment to the SSA. Additional deficit spending occurs in the General Fund if that situation exists. So, yes, redemption or reimbursement payments to the SSA for the combined OASDI trust funds can most assuredly result in an increase in the General Fund fiscal year deficit. No question.
The U.S. Treasury explains in the 2010 Financial Report of the United States Government:
“When the trust funds get the receipts that they loan to the General Fund, these receipts provide additional authority to spend on benefits and other program expenses. The General Fund, in turn, has taken on the obligation of paying interest on these loans every year and repaying the principal when trust fund income from other sources falls below expenditures — the loans will be called in and the General Fund will have to finance the benefits paid by the trust fund through general revenues or borrowing, just as for any Governmental program.”
U.S. Treasury adds this information in the same section of the report:
“From the Governmentwide perspective, only revenues received from the public (and States in the case of Medicare, Part D) and expenditures made to the public are important for the final balance. …For OASDI, the difference between total expenditures made to the public ($706.2 billion) and revenues from the public ($669.4 billion) was ($36.8) billion in 2010, indicating that OASDI had a negative effect on the overall budget outcome in that year.”
“The trust fund perspective is captured in the bottom section of each of the three trust fund columns. …For OASDI, total revenues of $787.9 billion ($669.4 + $118.5), including interest and a small amount of other Government transfers, exceeded total expenditures of $706.2 billion by $81.7 billion.”
U.S. Treasury also provides a table of revenues and expenditures from which a few key line entries have been extracted:
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for […]
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds
and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010
(In billions of dollars)
HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)
Table 1
Revenues and Expenditures for Medicare and Social Security Trust Funds
and the Total Federal Budget for the Fiscal Year ended September 30, 2010
(In billions of dollars)
HI SMI OASDI Total All Other Total 1
Revenues from the public/States 203.4 61.8 669.4 934.6 1,227.1 2,161.7
Total expenditures to the public 249.0 268.0 706.2 1,223.2 2,232.6 3,455.8
Net results—budget perspective (45.6) (206.2) (36.8) (288.6) (1,005.5) (1,294.1)