CNN.com Headline: 'Climate Change Makes Island Kids Bony, Stunted'

Photo of Terry Ann Rendon.
By Terry Ann Rendon (Bio | Archive)
July 7, 2008 - 17:27 ET

climatechange The picture alone of a weak little girl was enough to cause the heart of anyone who viewed the CNN.com home page earlier today to ache. What proof do they have that the drought in West Timor is due to climate change? Some unnamed aid officials:

Maria is fighting to live, wasting away in her remote village where aid officials say climate change has brought on a severe drought in recent years. It's nearly impossible for residents to live off the land like they have for generations.


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More proof

July 7, 2008 - 17:42 ET by jaywl

More proof of ClimateChange is in the Atlantic. A massive HURRICANE is taking aim at our coast. Never before has this been seen in such gargantuan size with extreme rotation of gigantic thunderstorms the scale of which has never before been witnessed by the human race, this year.

More, More Proof

July 7, 2008 - 17:51 ET by okiehawk44

Global Warming is certainly real. This morning on my commute to work I saw a dead armadillo in the road, and as we all know, this is such a rare occurrence that it has to be due to Climate Change. 

DAMN ALL YOU AGW DENIERS -

July 8, 2008 - 13:34 ET by TruthMonger

DAMN ALL YOU AGW DENIERS - LOOK WHAT YOU ARE DOING TO THIS CHILD

DAMN BUSH

DAMN ROVE

DAMN CHENEY, HALIBURTON, TORTURE, WAL-MART, NASCAR, EVANGELICALS  

IN SHORT, DAMN ALL REPUBLICANS

AND TALK RADIO, AND CLEAR CHANNEL, AND FOX - DAMN, DAMN, DAMN

this MAY be non-PC, but...

July 7, 2008 - 18:18 ET by SickofLibs

If only the late, great Sam Kinison had lived to jump into the global warming fray...

(on starvation in Ethiopia) "You want to help world hunger? Stop sending them food. Don't send them another bite, send them U-Hauls. Send them a guy that says, "You know, we've been coming here giving you food for about 35 years now and we were driving through the desert, and we realized there wouldn't BE world hunger if you people would live where the FOOD IS! YOU LIVE IN A DESERT!! UNDERSTAND THAT? YOU LIVE IN A F-ING DESERT!! NOTHING GROWS HERE! NOTHING'S GONNA GROW HERE! Come here, you see this? This is sand. You know what it's gonna be 100 years from now? IT'S GONNA BE SAND!! YOU LIVE IN A F-ING DESERT! We have deserts in America, we just don't live in them, a-holes!"

I Always Liked That Rant

July 7, 2008 - 19:56 ET by geoff.gale

That particular rant is so funny because of the kernel of truth at the heart of it.  The history of mankind is one of moving away from areas that don't have resources to areas that do have the resources to sustain life.  It was the raison d'etre of our original hunter-gatherer lifestyle.  Stay here until you've denuded this place, then move on.

Warmingists are really getting wearing.  I can't wait till the Next!Big!Thing! comes by and we'll all have a new set of clowns to entertain us.

"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

- Edmund Burke (1729 - 1797)

www.conservativeboot...

One of my favs. Saw him

July 8, 2008 - 01:24 ET by stratman

One of my favs.

Saw him in Cleveland and he did that bit.  Followed it with homosexual necrophilia.

We laughed till we cried.  When he died we cried till we laughed.

The man was funny.

RRAM Tough! 

Here, Here

July 8, 2008 - 01:41 ET by geoff.gale

He had a clarity of thought about the world that was astounding.  I'm raising a glass to him as I type this.  


"All that is necessary for the triumph of evil is that good men do nothing."

- Edmund Burke (1729 - 1797)

www.conservativeboot...

An enterprising journalist

July 7, 2008 - 18:20 ET by Roger the Shrubber

An enterprising journalist might have taken the effort to ponder the effect of 250,000 East Timor refugees that flooded into West Timor back in 1999. I am sure that had no bearing on today's crisis. I am also sure that an enterprising journalist would uncover that the UN took away all aid to those refugees after some UN aid workers were attacked by refugees. As of October 2006, there were still 80,000 East Timor refugees in West Timor. I wonder what impact that would have on the poor people of a country that has the population of under 2 million.

 

HEY

July 7, 2008 - 20:38 ET by jaywl

Roger, don't wake up the journalists. Shh.

el Shrubborino -- HOW DARE

July 8, 2008 - 05:28 ET by Jack Bauer

el Shrubborino -- HOW DARE you question global warming assertions.

As to your absurd idea of acting like an "investigative" journalist, and talking about things that happened in 1998 as if they have any relevance today... phoey my man.

History began on Sept. 11, 2001, when George Bush blew up the World Trade Center and started global warming. Nothing that happened before that date is worth noting. Grow up.

AND PLEASE IGNORE THESE "FACTS"

Climatic conditions:
Tropical monsoonal climate, regulated by the ESE monsoon from May to October, and the WNW monsoon from November to April. Cyclones are rare, but there are periods of very heavy rainfall and prolonged droughts, particularly in the west.
Indonesia has a history of recurrent natural disasters.

Man made disasters ncluding have resulted in internally displaced persons (1.3m IDPs in the country in November 2001).

The Timorese are well developed due to historical and repeated stresses to food security including both complex and environmental disasters. events such as droughts have motivated the population to diversify agricultural production and, even in urban areas, to maintain family gardens. These traditions have been aimed at minimizing risks, of food shortages, rather than in optimizing productivity and aggregate production.


The El Niño-related drought seriously affected food production in 1998

Vote 4 change. Vote 4 anything. See Jack & Mr Shy's first campaign ad for the ONLY viable 3rd party candidate.

I hate it when Brits are

July 8, 2008 - 07:12 ET by Roger the Shrubber

I hate it when Brits are smarter than me.... :P

Don't worry shrubbo

July 8, 2008 - 08:18 ET by Jack Bauer

Don't worry shrubbo .. we've got more than our fair share of dummies. At least 30 million.

Vote 4 change. Vote 4 anything. See Jack & Mr Shy's first campaign ad for the ONLY viable 3rd party candidate.

I find it interesting that

July 8, 2008 - 08:28 ET by Killgrave

I find it interesting that you two switch fictional characters across the pond... :)

And I just ordered "Life of Brian" in blu-ray. I love that movie.

Talking about across the

July 8, 2008 - 09:04 ET by Jack Bauer

Talking about across the pond, I had a letter on O'Reilly last night from my real ego. 1 in 5 ain't bad!

However I wrote it tongue in cheek, and his staff rewrote it serious so Bill could make a point!

Vote 4 change. Vote 4 anything. See Jack & Mr Shy's first campaign ad for the ONLY viable 3rd party candidate.

Show us please. Nuke em

July 8, 2008 - 11:43 ET by Dan The Man 2

Show us please.

Nuke em til they glow then shoot em in the dark.

dan -- this was the letter

July 8, 2008 - 14:15 ET by Jack Bauer

dan -- this was the letter I sent...

Bill

When are you going to tackle Big Hollywood?

In the past six years Will Smith has earned around an "obscene" $200 million.

Surely that qualifies for a Windbag Tax?

I need to check the Tivo for the one they read out... but the jist was that I was complaining about Smith, and Bill replied that he wan't damaging the country -- like the oil companies

Vote 4 change. Vote 4 anything. See Jack & Mr Shy's first campaign ad for the ONLY viable 3rd party candidate.

Good for you, Jackson!

July 8, 2008 - 14:49 ET by Roger the Shrubber

Did BoR send you a No Spin Zone soapdish? Weedwhacker? tackle box?

According to the CIA

July 7, 2008 - 18:56 ET by jdhawk

According to the CIA Factbook, East Timor is a basket case in the best of times.  It has about million people with an average per capita income of $2500 per year - nearly the lowest on the planet.  42% of the population live below the poverty line.  There is only about 1,000 square kilometers that is arable.  That amounts to only 8.5% of the total land area. Of that, only 4.5% is under permanant cultivation. 

Meanwhile, the same weather system, known as El Nino, that has caused far less hurricanes in the south of our country and attendant reduced rainfall, is causing somewhat the same conditions in East Timor in terms of rainfall.  It really has nothing to do with "Global Warming."

Once again, our drive by "journalists" are assigning all manner of things to "Global Warming."  It is not only silly, but continues to erode people's confidence in these yo-yos.  No wonder these networks continue to lose viewership.  They have no one to blame, but themselves when their numbers continue to be culled.   

Climate Change

July 7, 2008 - 19:02 ET by Barrack

Now the contention by U.N. Secretary General Hanky Ban Ki Moon last year that genocide in the Sudan is caused by drought leading to cranky militants doesn't look so bad...

www.benbarrack.com

Just wondering

July 7, 2008 - 20:21 ET by MOONSTRUCK

For the life of me I cannot remember what they called these Humongous swings in temperature years ago.......hmmmmm........oh yeah, summer, fall, winter and spring.

What did they blame the suffering on 10, 15 and 20 years ago??

 For what it's worth, 58 glorious degrees in Northern MN.  ;o)

I think I will take my explorer for a drive and warm this town up!!

Moonstruck... I will just

July 7, 2008 - 20:27 ET by bigtimer

Moonstruck...

I will just shut up about having to have a fire going in the morning here in Mt. for the last couple of days as a Global Warming heat wave is about to pounce upon us here in the next few days..we have got around eighty here somewhat in the last few days...

Guess you better keep that engine runnin' til our weather moves east to you...

LOL...

 

"America isn't the problem...America is the solution." ~ Rush Limbaugh

Will do

July 7, 2008 - 20:31 ET by MOONSTRUCK

BT

Love it!!!

P.S.  94 here yesterday. 

Sun so hot I froze to death, Al Bore don't you cry.

Well, we cooled

July 7, 2008 - 21:22 ET by DEVILDOCMOM

to 96 degrees here in Tucson today. We have been pretty hot the last few weeks. Oh well, it is summer in the desert.

BTW, many, many years ago my husband and I were in what was then Ft. Lamy in Chad. He was working as a bush pilot for an evil, evil, oil company (LOL), this was the hottest place I have ever been, bar none. There was a severe drought there...not much has changed, I see.

I'm convinced now Journalists are just dumb

July 7, 2008 - 20:43 ET by desertdweller

I used to think they had an agenda in this "man-made climate change" business.

But now I am convinced they are just dumb and don't know how to sell their articles to editors unless they play that way. 

Lush green landscape vs prolonged drought??

July 7, 2008 - 20:43 ET by Gary Hall

Someone help me out here...(my bold):

Aid groups also warn that the situation is likely to worsen because of rising global food prices.

Here, far-flung villages lie nestled in deceptively lush green landscape, with no real roads, no electricity and no running water. Barely clothed children play in the dirt.

According to the survey, more than 90 percent of households don't have enough food.

Families try to farm the land, but the prolonged drought has destroyed their crops, cutting off their main food supply.

prolonged drought - destroyed their crops - in the middle of a lush green landscape.

yeah. It's because the government dictates what the people do.

July 8, 2008 - 11:36 ET by c5then

They gather them all up and make them live in villages and plant non-native crops that don't do well in the area. Then they blame the whether conditions when things don't work out.

Rain forrests are the worst soils for growing crops because they rely on the rotting folliage from above to supply most of the nutrients. Once the forrest is cleared and the first season of crops have used up all the nutrients, the soil is unfit for growing most vegitation.

The day that "politician" became a career choice is the day we started losing the Republic. Let's get it back! Alan Keyes '08.

Don't forget to thank

July 8, 2008 - 12:05 ET by danbo

Don't forget to thank Rachael Carson for the high malaria rate. That also helps the kids.

Thank all the environmentalist who saved us from DDT related cancer and birds from the supposed thinning of egg shells. At the cost  of over 97 million lives world wide. And over 14 billion cases of needless malaria.

It took WHO how many years to lower the ban on DDT? And I don't think they ever admitted they goofed or had bad science.

"There is a clear attempt to establish truth not by scientific methods but by perpetual repetition."
- Richard S. Lindzen, Ph.D. Professor of Meteorology, MIT

Got yer Timor updates here

July 7, 2008 - 21:02 ET by metrox

real news site:

 

http://wwww.reliefweb.int/rw/srch.nsf/doc304SearchResults?OpenForm&query=%22west+timor%22&cc=tls&view=rwrwb&offset=0&hits=25&sortby=rwpubdate-rwpubdatedisplay&sortdirection=descending&mode=simpleall

plenty of flooding last year...oh well, another man made myth

let me get this straight....

July 8, 2008 - 11:27 ET by c5then

All the other droughts were 'natural' but this one is caused by the eeeevil humans?

The day that "politician" became a career choice is the day we started losing the Republic. Let's get it back! Alan Keyes '08.

MAN MADE CLIMATE CHANGE IS A FAIRY TALE

July 8, 2008 - 18:18 ET by deerjerkydave

Where I live it was cool weather last week.  This week it is hot.  OH NO, THE CLIMATE CHANGED!  MY FREEDOM TO OWN AND DRIVE A CAR MUST BE TO BLAME.  RUN FOR YOUR LIVES!  ONLY BARACK H. OBAMA CAN SAVE US!

As for this CNN story, notice that the United States is to blame for this little girl's lack of food because we drive SUVs.  Do they bother to blame the government under which they live?  Nope.