Sadly, Your Personal Observations Alone Are Irrelevant to Global Warming

I make it a general rule to avoid the Drudge Report, but today he is leading with the big, bad headline: Cold, Cold, Colder. It is cold right now, no question, but clearly the idea Drudge is shoveling is that global warming cannot possibly exist when it is so cold outside! He also links to the following stories:

Temps Plunge to Record as Cold Snap Freezes North, East States...
CHILL MAP...
Vermont sets 'all-time record for one snowstorm'...
Iowa temps 'a solid 30 degrees below normal'...
Power outage halts flights at Washington Reagan National Airport...
Seoul buried in heaviest snowfall in 70 years...
Peru's mountain people 'face extinction because of cold conditions'...
Beijing -- coldest in 40 years...
World copes with Arctic weather...

It's almost like we are trying, at times, to show how little we understand about logic and reasoning and critical thinking. Let me start here: the terms "global warming" and "global climate change" have something in common, can you spot it? Yes, it is the word global. As in, the entire globe throughout the entire year. So a few news stories from a smattering of places that happen to be cold are not persuasive, at all, to refute global warming.

Here are some items that Drudge and others have conveniently omitted from their crack efforts to debunk global warming:

In 2007, the 11 hottest years occurred in the previous 13 years.
2009 was the fifth hottest year on record.
The Aught's was the hottest decade on record.
The polar ice caps are melting faster than expected.
Polar ice is at record lows.
New sea routes are opening because of melting polar ice.

Here we have stories in which scientists that are remembering to take into account the global part of "global warming" find compelling evidence that global warming is occurring, and that man-made actions are a major factor. It is no longer sufficient to walk outside your house to see if it's a cold winter to have an opinion on the global climate. We're a little more sophisticated now.

And I am by no means an alarmist. I tend to think we still have time to take a measured approach to this problem as long as we start now. I think the legislation that is making its way through Congress now, which reduces emissions of greenhouse gases by around 17% by 2020, is a nice sensible step. I think the modest agreement Pres. Obama arranged in the Copenhagen climate change summit can do some real good. By taking moderate steps now we can avoid having to make drastic, economy-altering changes in the future.

In a perfect world we would all voluntarily cut our personal emissions drastically for the good of Earth and ourselves. We would demand more fuel-efficient cars, drive less, use less electricity, buy locally-produced food, recycle everything possible, and demand real investment in alternative and renewable energy sources. We would have a cleaner planet and lead healthier and happier lives.

But in the real world, on a global economic scale, we unfortunately have to take more moderate steps. What doesn't help, though, is people drawing conclusions about global issues based on infinitesimally small data points, like how cold it got last night in their back yard.