I wish USA Today would make up its mind. The title of the article attributes the increase in hurricane activity to "climate change." Then in the very first paragraph, it's due to "global warming." So, which is it?

I'm guessing the dissenting information was added late in the article due to the short attention spans that so many people seem to have these days. Many people probably won't trouble themselves to read the entire article, and still others will probably only scan the title itself.

"Because the ocean temperatures have not yet rebounded from
the significant drop in late spring, we have decided to reduce
our forecast numbers slightly," said Todd Crawford, a WSI
seasonal forecaster.

Hmm. According to Al Gore and his minions, who claim the planet is well on its way to becoming a burnin' ball of fire, to what do they attribute these cooler ocean temperatures?

Given that last year's hurricane season was pretty mild, and this year's seems headed the exact same way, I don't think these people have the foggiest notion what they are talking about.

Help Fred defeat everybody.

I predict the frequency of hurricanes will triple by 2018.

We only have 10 years to save the planet.  My dog and I have come to this consensus after negotiations with Michael Vick.

My local paper (The Frederick News Post, Frederick MD) this Sunday had at least three articles about Global Warming. I have noticed that now the news doesn't even pretend there is another side to the issue. AGW is now a given fact in their reportage. The constant reporting of the issue of AGW as a given fact with this "matter of factedness" built into each article seems to be a very effective strategy, IMO, because a contrary opinion is now considered a looney tunes opinion not worthy of any consideration or relevance or mention. Here are the articles: 

"Boxer sees global warming"  (had to use MSNBC cite/site- article was not on their internet site.) "Carbon footprint offsetting fails to toe the line on addressing global warming" editorial by staff writer of Frederick News Post."Global Warming forces Forest Service to reconsider strategy" (FNP-newswire from McClatchy Newspapers, had to Use McClatchy site/cite)

PS McClatchy Newspapers seem to be more left wing than the AP 

Ken. A layman can easily understand.. why there is little scientific record available to state such a thing. First, we can start with your opening observation: 'Weather satellites.."

Before the 1960's we did not have weather satellites, and even at that point in time, the coverage did not blanket the entire globe. And we got these great pictures - such as Betsy, which devastated New Orleans in 1965. Starting in the mid 1940's we started sending planes out into storms - but only those storms that we knew of, and were within reach - certainly not in all parts of the world. Who knows how many hurricanes formed out in the many oceans of the world, upon which no ship happened upon and managed to take the accurate barometer readings required to determine whether they were getting blown around in a tropical storm or a hurricane. If the ship had managed to get a reading (in the required center of the storm, and then sunk without getting the word back home...

Prior to this modern era, we probably would have never known how powerful Hurricane Wilma became in 2005. As Wilma approached the slot between Cuba and Cozumel, it quickly grew into the strongest, on record, in the Atlantic basin (breaking the record of Gilbert - of which I was in the middle of, in 1988). But Wilma was only such an intense storm for but a few hours - and only over while over open water. The details, more likely than not, would have never been known, before say 1960, or 1944.

Besides. We have other experts out there who understand these things:

GENEVA, 11 DECEMBER 2006 (WMO) – A consensus of 125 of the world’s leading tropical cyclone researchers and forecasters says that no firm link can yet be drawn between human-induced climate change and variations in the intensity and frequency of tropical cyclones. Source: World Meteorological Organization

And from our hurricane experts at Colorado State University - our leading forcasters. Philip Klotzbach and William Gray published this interesting bit in April of 2007:

Table 7: U.S. Landfalling tropical cyclones by intensity during two 50-year periods.

Years              Named      Hurricanes        Intense           Global Temp. Inc

                       Storms                            Hurricanes               degrees C        

                                                               Cat 3,4,5)

1900-1949        189             101                  39                   

(50 years)

1956-2005        165              83                  34                             +0.4

(50 years)

Really the average number of hurricanes double in the last 100 years
when NOAA admits that they had no means to properly detect and monitor
them pre-1944?

Tropical Cyclone Data Tape For the North Atlantic Basin, 1886-1983 (NOAA)

"...until organized reconnaissance began in 1944, the two major sources
of information on tropical cyclones were land stations and ships at
sea. Undoubtedly, during this early period some storms went undetected."

HAHA! This report is flawed by simple logic that they did not have the
means to detect every hurricane 100 years ago thus no comparison to present day can be
made! Satellite data only goes back to 1960.

Global Warming Increases Wind Shear, Reduces Hurricanes, Climate Model Shows

The Anti "Man-Made" Global Warming Resource