A firefighter joins the crowing:

Consider the devastation in Victoria. Research by the CSIRO, Climate Institute and the Bushfire Council found that a “low global warming scenario” will see catastrophic fire events happen in parts of regional Victoria every five to seven years by 2020, and every three to four years by 2050, with up to 50 per cent more extreme danger fire days. However, under a “high global warming scenario”, catastrophic events are predicted to occur every year in Mildura, and firefighters have been warned to expect up to a 230 per cent increase in extreme danger fire days in Bendigo. And in Canberra, the site of devastating fires in 2003, we are being asked to prepare for a massive increase of up to 221 per cent in extreme fire days by 2050, with catastrophic events predicted as often as every eight years.

So now even the firefighters are pleased about the bushfires. Because that is what you mean by crowing, isn’t it Bolt? We’re pleased that people have died, right? We’re using the dead to push our socialist agenda?

Just keep digging that hole.

Andrew Bolt sez:

Sky News runs yet another apocalyptic story on global warming, this time threatening the Sami of Lappland. No figures are offered, just a couple of anecdotes, and this evidence of a warming world:

There’s a lot more snow these days.

We’re also told the ice is now too thick for reindeer, but also too thin for snow mobiles.

We really need to collate this kind of reporting in some document for future generations. They will not believe how comprehensively the media lost its reason, and the media sure won’t be in the mood to remind them.

Science, research and evidence say:

The seasonal pattern of snow cover shows that there’s been no noticeable decline during fall and winter, so we shouldn’t be the least bit surprised by the large snowfall over the U.S. this past week. We can also plainly see that snow cover exhibits extremely large fluctuations, so again last week’s snowfall is no surprise whatever, and no harbinger of any reversal of global warming. But the rapid decline of springtime snow cover over the last four decades, and the even more rapid decline of summer snow cover, show the mark of global warming unambiguously. And despite what some like to shout, the statistically strong trends are what’s important, not the statistically normal noise.

It truly is a case of populist anecdotal evidence versus science. I’ll let you make up your own mind, dear reader.

Update: Beware – “Global cooling” alarmism is now taking hold:

Global warming,what global warming,we could get snow on the Gold Coast next winter.

Anyone?

I can’t see how the government’s budget decision to slash CSIRO funding by $63 million can be anything but:

a) Bad policy and bad for Australia;
b) A slap in the face for science in Australia; and
c) An admission that the Labor policy to “revitalise” the CSIRO was non-core.

It is widely held that Australia is suffering a science and technology “brain drain” due to pitiful funding of research in this country, yet the Rudd government talks endlessly about things like strengthening industry, protecting agriculture from the effects of drought, and battling climate change through smarter energy generation. Unless we want to import the knowledge and technology required to meet these sort of challenges we must ensure that the CSIRO is generously resourced. And while corporate dollars should make up a portion of total funding the bulk of the money must inevitably come from the taxpayer purse unless government introduces serious incentives for corporations to invest serious money (while ensuring that commercial interests do not impact on the integrity of the research, of course.)

The CSIRO receives total funding of far less than a billion clams per year — pocket change for the kind of work they do — and the Rudd Labor government just tightened the belt even more despite promises to do otherwise. Very disappointing, Kevin.