Well, I'm more that just a AGW skeptic. I believe it to be the single greatest falsehood ever perpetrated on mankind.
Recall the term. "Big Lie"? It refers to a lie so "colossal" that no one would believe that someone "could have the impudence to distort the truth so infamously". Who coined the term? Adolf Hitler in "Mein Kampf", in 1925.
I'll repeat that the AGW mafia may have done irreparable damage to the conservation movement. Those who do not believe in AGW often lump ecology minded people into the same group with the AGW advocates. This undermines to goal of protecting and preserving the various endangered eco-systems and many species of wildlife world wide. It may be guilt by association, but many in the "green" movement have embraced AGW purely on faith. A very bad way of looking at questionable science.
Clearly, the damage man has done to his local environment and to the wildlife population is staggering. While I do not believe that man is responsible for warming, I am appalled at what he has done to his planet.
Consider these numbers, relating to America alone. They are staggering in scope.
It is estimated that the population of Grizzly Bears in what are now the northwestern states was no less than 100,000 in the year 1500.
Frederic Wagner estimates that at the time Columbus arrived in the New World, there were between 5 and 10 million Buffalo in what would become the United States. Add to that 10 to 15 million Pronghorn, 2 million Big Horn Sheep, 5 million Mule Deer and 2 million Elk.
Predictions of Buffalo herd growth leads to current estimates that between 22 and 30 million Buffalo roamed the American plains as of 1800. By that time, the number of wild horses (originally released by or escaping from the Spanish) had grown to somewhere between 1 and 2 million. It was these horses that fostered the development of the plains Indian horse-centered cultures. In 1882, hunters in Montana shot more than 100,000 Bison. The next year, they shot only 6. Effectively exterminating the species in that territory.
It is generally believed that 24,000 Wolves were killed in the first 10 years of the 20th century in Wyoming, Idaho and Montana. Today, there exists a tiny population of 1,500 Wolves, almost all of which resulted from their being reintroduced in 1996 as part of the Endangered Species Act.
Just stop and dwell on this massive destruction of wildlife for a minute. Then think about the fact that this slaughter continues in many parts of the world today.
Man may not be turning up the planet's thermostat, but he certainly has the ability to turn his planet into a barren cesspool. So, while we can point to AGW and argue that it's all lies and damned lies, never forget that we still have the power to destroy our environment and much of what lives on the earth, both on land and in the seas.
You can still be a fervent ecologist and a disbeliever in AGW.
My regards,
Widewing