The Devastating Ash-Cloud-To-End-All-Ash-Clouds That Wasn't

Hmmm...

From the Daily Mail:

Britain's airspace was closed under false pretences, with satellite images revealing there was no doomsday volcanic ash cloud over the entire country.

Skies fell quiet for six days, leaving as many as 500,000 Britons stranded overseas and costing airlines hundreds of millions of pounds.

Estimates put the number of Britons still stuck abroad at 35,000.

However, new evidence shows there was no all-encompassing cloud and, where dust was present, it was often so thin that it posed no risk.

The satellite images demonstrate that the skies were largely clear, which will not surprise the millions who enjoyed the fine, hot weather during the flight ban.

Jim McKenna, the Civil Aviation Authority's head of airworthiness, strategy and policy, admitted: 'It's obvious that at the start of this crisis there was a lack of definitive data.

Okay, two things come immediately to mind.  First, they made this far-reaching decision that affected tens of thousands of travelers all over the world based on a 'lack of definitive data'?!  What is wrong with these people?  Have they no common sense, and can they not see the economic, logistical, and sheer-hassle ramifications of doing this kind of thing on a whim?  Apparently not.  Are they so eager to validate their environmental sensitivities that they are willing to leap like this before they even know if they're leaping off a curb or a cliff?  Apparently so.

Second, aren't these the same sort of tests administered by the same sort of people that environmentalists are using to predict all manner of planetary catastrophes if humans don't spend enormous sums of money on their pet cause?  Why yes, yes they are, in fact, the same!  So...let's stop and think for a moment.  Work with me here - I know this is a real tough stretch, but someone's got to do it.  If these people and these tests so grossly mis-read a current phenomenon that was happening right before our eyes and which we could readily test at every moment of every day, how much credibility do they have when talking about projections of something so vastly complex as the entire planetary climate decades or centuries into an unknown future?

The answer: ABSOLUTELY NONE.

I'm officially at the point where anyone pushing anything 'green' or 'environmentally friendly' or anything of the sort is, in my opinion, automatically discredited as either a certifiable idiot or a mind-numbed political hack until they prove they have a quarter of a functional brain.  If something happens to be environmentally friendly and it saves me money, cool.  If a 'green' widget actually works better than a standard widget, I'll take one.  If I'm supposed to do anything, read anything, listen to anything, think anything, believe anything, buy anything, not buy anything, pay more taxes for anything, or be inconvenienced in any way, shape, or form simply because it's 'green' or 'environmentally friendly', you can just go take your environmentally friendly green-ness and shove it down the nearest garbage disposal, thank you very much.

I'm done.

There's my two cents.