Two years in a row of snow appearing in places that see snow once a decade.

The problem with sunspots is that the new “active” cycle start is overdue by a year or two now.

In the past, there has been a strong correlation between “no sunspots” and “sharp cooling.”

Green on the outside, Red on the inside.

At the macro-level, my advice would be to go study the points in more details before spouting – since you can find more on these topics with a little searching on the interweb tubes.

But if you insist:

o I didn’t number these, but note that 2 and 3 have no absolute dependence on ice core data.

We know from many, many sources that the large glacial coverage period (the last “ice age) ended c. 13,000 years ago, and we’ve entered an interglacial that has been very stable. There is much more about this than just ice cores.

The discovery of polar bear remains more than 100,000 years old indicates that the supposedly-fragile ursus maritimus is a very robust species that has survived many ice ages and interglacials – including the Roman warming and Medieval Warm Period – for which historical records strongly indicate a warmer overall climate than today.

o The role (or lack thereof) of the sun in climate was a topic of great debate at the meeting – and is a topic of great debate in general. Lindzen’s thought on the subject is that the natural variability of the system is so large that we have to assume that’s enough and not look for an external forcing function to “replace” CO2. I tend to agree with his take on this because I have a lot of experience with statistics and the statistical behavior of real world systems (and ones where misunderstandings of such can lead to multi-hundred-million-dollar mistakes). In contrast, Soon argues persuasively that the sun-temperature correlations exist, and to a degree that seems to be more than incidental. I don’t rule that out, but since science is an ongoing process (not the committee selection of talking points) I have to remain open to persuasion if the statistical argument proves insufficient and the solar argument gains more strength. For the solar stuff there is a parsing of the issue with regard to the longer time scales, but that’s another matter.

Lindzen did NOT address sunspots in particular, just solar influx. As per the above, it remains very interesting to note that a lack of solar activity (as symptomed by a paucity of sunspots) *does* seem to show a historical correlation with multi-century-long periods of cooling. This is an empirical observation, but it’s a very interesting one. We don’t need to understand the physics to note a correlation that has predictive power. If (as per the above) the present dearth of sunspots *does* correlate (predictively) with a noticeable cooling period, then the notion of sun-temperature links is strengthened and needs further detailed study to identify causal mechanisms.

o The Des Moines and state high temperature records are relevant if you’ve been paying attention to the AGW alarmists and their attempt to try to tell us that all the “heat” has been in very recent years; this contention crumbles when the realities are analyzed. If such things cluster in the 1930s, we haven’t suddenly entered a period of new super-heating.

My final suggestion is that you learn the difference between “agitating” and just being an immature show-off.