YES VIRGINIA, THERE REALLY IS A "HOCKEY STICK"

The wingnuts have been claiming for years that there is no "hockey stick" which indicates a recent and rapid increase in global temperature:



The AP reported on a recent Congressional hearing about global warming and followed up on this "controversy."

Obama science advisers grilled over hacked e-mails
Wednesday December 2, 2009
SETH BORENSTEIN AP Science Writer

Sensenbrenner attacked the work of Penn State's Mann, who is frequently brought up in the communications. Mann is the author of what is called the "hockey stick" theory, first described in the late 1990s. It suggested that the past 50 years had been the hottest in several centuries, if not 1,000 years, and that man-made global warming was to blame. That research was so controversial that the National Academy of Sciences studied the work in depth; it was used in former Vice President Al Gore's documentary on global warming.

Sensenbrenner said the 2006 National Academy study showed Mann's hockey stick was incorrect and that Mann's theory was discredited. But Holdren said the NAS study had quibbles with Mann's methods but agreed with his results.

The chairman of the Academy of Science panel, Texas A&M University atmospheric scientist Gerald North, confirmed in an interview Wednesday that Holdren was right, not Sensenbrenner.

"The conclusions that we came to were essentially the same as the hockey stick" theory that Mann proposed, North told The Associated Press. North said even if Jones, Mann and others had done no research at all, the world would still be warming and scientists would still be able to show it.