monitoring Trump and relevant contemporary events

U.S. President Donald Trump "believes the climate is changing," U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley said on Saturday.

"President Trump believes the climate is changing and he believes pollutants are part of the equation," Haley said during an excerpt of a CNN interview released on Saturday. The interview will be broadcast on CNN's "State of the Union" on Sunday.

So...not quite the science denier after all.

So, the arctic ice caps aren't shrinking?

NASA Study: Mass Gains of Antarctic Ice Sheet

A new NASA study says that an increase in Antarctic snow accumulation that began 10,000 years ago is currently adding enough ice to the continent to outweigh the increased losses from its thinning glaciers.

The research challenges the conclusions of other studies, including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s (IPCC) 2013 report, which says that Antarctica is overall losing land ice.

“We’re essentially in agreement with other studies that show an increase in ice discharge in the Antarctic Peninsula and the Thwaites and Pine Island region of West Antarctica,” said Jay Zwally, a glaciologist with NASA Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, and lead author of the study, which was published on Oct. 30 in the Journal of Glaciology.

Zwally’s team calculated that the mass gain from the thickening of East Antarctica remained steady from 1992 to 2008 at 200 billion tons per year, while the ice losses from the coastal regions of West Antarctica and the Antarctic Peninsula increased by 65 billion tons per year.

“The good news is that Antarctica is not currently contributing to sea level rise, but is taking 0.23 millimeters per year away,” Zwally said.

Updated NASA Data: Global Warming Not Causing Any Polar Ice Retreat

Updated data from NASA satellite instruments reveal the Earth’s polar ice caps have not receded at all since the satellite instruments began measuring the ice caps in 1979. Since the end of 2012, moreover, total polar ice extent has largely remained above the post-1979 average. The updated data contradict one of the most frequently asserted global warming claims – that global warming is causing the polar ice caps to recede.

“The good news is that Antarctica is not currently contributing to sea level rise, but is taking 0.23 millimeters per year away,” Zwally said.

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So...not quite the science denier after all.

First thing, it's Ambassador Haley who's saying this, not Mr. Trump. Second, it doesn't really represent an affirmation of climate science; he could just be going along with the emerging consensus without taking the trouble to understand the research. Third, even if he's changed his opinion on the matter, it's not as if he's using the bully pulpit to bring all the conservative science deniers along with him or accepting the USA's responsibility to work with the rest of the world on this problem. Let's wait and see.

Manchester bomber Abedi met ISIS fighters in Libya

Manchester suicide bomber Salman Abedi went to Libya before the attack and met with Islamic State extremists linked to the 2015 Paris terrorist attack, The New York Times reported Saturday.

The report, citing current and retired intelligence officials, said Abedi met the ISIS operatives on visits to Tripoli and another town.

The paper reported that those operatives were from Katibat al-Battar al-Libi, a core ISIS unit that attracted a number of French and Belgian foreign fighters and carried out terror attacks in Europe when it moved to Libya from Syria.

Alumni of the group were involved in the Paris attacks, including mastermind Abdelhamid Abaaoud, the paper reported.

No, I can't see mass transit working very well in the USA. That's why fuel efficiency and non-polluting automobiles are important goals to pursue.

Very few people seem to have known who she was and nobody saw the video/pic/whatever. Everyone around me was asking what it was and if anyone had seen it. The answer was consistently - no idea and no. Gotta wonder who found it to show it to Mr. Trump's son.

Part fight club, part Western-pride fraternity, the Alt-Knights and similar groups recruit battalions of mainly young white men for one-off confrontations with their ideological enemies — the black-clad left-wing militants who disrupted President Trump’s inauguration and have protested against the appearances of conservative speakers on college campuses.

Along with like-minded groups like the Proud Boys, a clan of young conservative nationalists, and the Oath Keepers, an organization of current and former law-enforcement officers and military veterans, they mobilized on social media to fight in New Orleans over the removal of Confederate monuments; on the streets of Berkeley, Calif., where clashes between the left and right have increasingly become a threat for law enforcement; and at a raucous May Day rally in Los Angeles.

The left is having a completely unnecessary hissy fit over this. At most, Trump will be in office for 8 years. In 8 years the Democrats will again try to forward some shitty candidate to be the next President. When Trump is gone, the next President can change EPA laws and such.

Well, we'll see because what we are told must be done to avert calamity is not going to be done.

Nice. About time someone stepped up to protect us from these violent thugs. My thanks goes out to these heroes.