On Feb 12, 8:46*am, Joseph Gwinn wrote:
The academic world was stunned by Climategate. *This is another piece of
the fallout.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB1000...05930310700065
6.html?KEYWORDS=climate+study+gets+review

The Wall Street Journal, 12 February 2010, page A15.

Joe Gwinn

LOL...another piece of evidence that global warming is doing a number
on the climate.

Snow in all 50 states? New storm could make that true.
By Patrik Jonsson Patrik Jonsson
2 hrs 15 mins ago

Atlanta – Three hundred plow trucks are lined up to combat an
afternoon rush-hour snowstorm in Georgia, including traffic-congested
Atlanta. In Mobile, Ala., kids are poised for a rare snowball fight.
And fat flakes are already falling in Blountstown, Fla.

This has been one of the most bizarre winters of the new century, with
storm after storm slamming the East Coast in particular. And now, a
storm that dropped a foot of snow Thursday on Dallas – Dallas! – could
help bring about the presence of snow in all 50 states.

That’s if the storm delivers a few inches, as expected, in parts of
north Florida. If that indeed happens, meteorologists at AccuWeather
and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) say
they expect some coverage in all 50 states.

(In case you’re wondering, some of the tallest peaks in Hawaii have
snow sprinkled on them.)

“By the time the storm ends, we may be looking at a truly historic
snow cover map to open up the weekend,” AccuWeather.com’s Joe Lundberg
writes.

This winter’s white legacy has inspired at least one meteorological
project.

"On Friday afternoon, I'm going to begin asking for photos of the
snow," Patrick Marsh, a student employee at NOAA’s National Severe
Storm Laboratory in Norman, Okla., told Oklahoma’s News 9 channel.
"Hopefully I'll get photos from all 50 states, and if I do, I'll put
them into a Google Earth map and make a snow snapshot of America."

(Wanna help Mr. Marsh? Send pics to .)

So what’s going on?

Climate-change debate has been hot and heavy as official Washington
shut down for four straight days. The wintry blasts, Time magazine
explained, could actually be part of a global-warming trend. (We’ll
let them explain that here.)

Less controversial were the communal dig-outs taking place across
Washington. Shovelers dubbed the comity “snowcialism.”

More seriously, the storms are likely to nip American taxpayers as
city and states burn through their snow-clearing budgets.

“[S]end dough for snow,” Sen. Barbara Mikulski (D) of Maryland wrote
in a plea to Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.

The culprit, it appears, is a strong Pacific El Niño pattern that has
stirred up a boatload of moisture rolling across Mexico, into the
Gulf, and up through the South. All that is now colliding on a regular
basis with unusually deep dips of Arctic air.

At the same time, much of the Midwest is experiencing a comparatively
mild snow season – even as Vancouver, British Columbia, is having to
truck in snow for some of its Olympic events.

Other notable events in this topsy-turvy season: The South saw one of
the first big storms, frozen iguanas fell out of trees in Florida, and
snowfall records were broken in a dozen cities including Baltimore,
Philadelphia, and Washington.

And winter is barely halfway over. (Punxsutawney Phil, after all, said
we have at least six more weeks of winter to go.)

“The snow blitz ... is truly a rare event that has no parallel in the
historic record,” wrote Weather Underground’s Jeff Masters Friday
morning.