by Shirley Gooding

Created on: October 10, 2009   Last Updated: October 11, 2009

There will have to be a lot more evidence in which global temperatures are warming more than a fraction of a degree over several decades to convince me that recent climate changes are due to global warming. In California we periodically have El Nino, a weather pattern that brings rain to our desert state. These events are caused by ocean currents that get warmer and affect the trade winds which will often bring us the Pineapple Express storms from Hawaii.When we are not in an El Nino year we are experiencing a drought, usually lasting 5-7 years. This has been going on since records have been kept, and there is nothing sinister about it. It is simply a naturally occurring event.

In the past few months there have been devastating earthquakes and tsunamis, most recently in American Samoa. These mega quakes, most have been recorded as a 7.8 to 7.9 on the Richter scale, have the ability to change landscapes, coastlines and land masses in general. They trigger volcanic activity which belch out more green-house gasses then all the methane producing cows on the planet with one blast. An earthquake occurring in the Yellowstone National Park caldera changed the timing of eruptions of the famous geyser known as Old Faithful back in the 1960s. Other geysers completely shut down while new ones emerged. The same could be said when earthquakes hit Rotorua, famous for it it's geysers on the South Island. In fact a recent quake this summer (2009) moved the entire South Island closer to Australia by one foot. Normally one would see movement 1 inch at a time or glacial speed. Another fact alarmists do not point out is that New Zealand glaciers have been on the move in recent years. Considering this island nation is close to the Arctic Circle that fact should be taken into consideration.

We have reached another end to hurricane season in the states and have not experienced one headline generating storm, despite what the doom-sayers would have you believe. There has been more evidence that the world is experiencing cooler than normal summers. A summer trip to our Midwest state of Iowa in July found former natives who had moved to California scrambling for warm coats and jackets to ward of the chill. There have also been fewer tornado's in the so-called tornado alley, which includes the American mid-west.

I hope this enlightens some people and calms others. The world will not end if we don't use the curly light bulbs, implement a cap and trade policy for carbon emissions or any of the other freedom encroaching rules officials are ready to implement in the name of climate change.

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