"Gavin Schmidt, the climate modeler at NASA and Columbia University who has long endured the slings and arrows that come with blogging on climate, has now gained a laurel for his efforts — the inaugural $25,000 Climate Communications Prize of the American Geophysical Union. [The geophysical union release is now posted.]"

"The Earth's natural resources like food, water and forests are being depleted at an alarming speed, causing hunger, conflict, social unrest and species extinction, experts at a climate and health conference in London warned Monday."

"Far from being 'alarmist,' predictions from climate scientists in many cases are proving to be more conservative than observed climate-induced impacts."

Douglas Fischer reports for The Daily Climatge October 18, 2011. [13]

"Officials in Rick Perry's home state of Texas have set off a scientists' revolt after purging mentions of climate change and sea-level rise from what was supposed to be a landmark environmental report. The scientists said they were disowning the report on the state of Galveston Bay because of political interference and censorship from Perry appointees at the state's environmental agency."

"A federal judge has thrown out a key section of an Interior Department rule that declared global warming is threatening the survival of the polar bear."

"Climate change's laundry list of impacts — melting glaciers and rising sea levels, shifts in timing for bird migration and flower budding, a poleward shift of species — just got a new addition: shrinking species."

"

"In 2008, both the Democratic and Republican candidates for president, Barack Obama and John McCain, warned about man-made global warming and supported legislation to curb emissions. After he was elected, President Obama promised 'a new chapter in America's leadership on climate change,' and arrived cavalry-like at the 2009 United Nations Climate Conference in Copenhagen to broker a global pact.

But two years later, now that nearly every other nation accepts climate change as a pressing problem, America has turned agnostic on the issue."

"The conservative nonprofit Americans for Prosperity unleashed a volley of ads aimed at Democrats in last year's midterm elections, but it recently reported to the IRS that it was not active in political campaign activities."

"

"Australia's carbon tax is set to become law after the lower house of Parliament passed the government's historic but controversial set of bills to establish the world's most broadly based carbon pricing scheme."

Forests moderate global warming by pulling carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere. But scientists can't predict whether warming will cause major forests to die back, causing a vicious cycle that will make global warming worse.