Yet another good study of the lengths to which NOAA is going to manipulate the data to try to explain away the hiatus in warming over the last two decades. Here is a good summary:
"While satellite records have shown no global warming for at least 18 years, the land based data sets like the ones maintained by NOAA for the US Historical Climate Network (USHCN) continue to show a warming trend. One reason for this discrepancy, the study suggests, is that NOAA has been cherry-picking its raw data. That is, it has ignored the evidence from those weather stations showing little or no late Twentieth century warming and instead placed undue emphasis on the ones that do show warming. But the ones that do show warming also happen to be the least trustworthy. These are the ones, the study shows, which have been most corrupted by the Urban Heat Island effect — and other environmental factors."
This is yet another example of why our government cannot be trusted to be objective. Manipulating data, ignoring data and hiding data are all too common when it comes to this issue.