I don't think anyone is arguing the fact that the climate is changing. It always has and it always will. The thing being argued about is how much of an impact humans are actually having on it? Are we causing 10% of the change, 90%? We really don't know.
in the 70's there was a scare of a mini-ice age. This was well past when the industrial revolution happened and global warming should have started. I have seen too many graphs with an agenda that use a specific date range to try and further their cause. If you look at longer date ranges you can see fluctuations are normal. Look at this graphic for example:
It was cooler early on and warmer recently, but we are talking about a 1*F change from 1860 to today! I hardly think that is enough of a change to announce the sky is falling. That could simply be a high point in the cycle and we could head lower again in the future. We have already seen that temps have stabilized over the last few years.
There are lots of factors that go in to global temperatures and most of them are much more significant than the factors we are playing in it. That isn't to say we aren't having some impact, but I think it is being overstated by some and it is simply too early to really be able to tell.
Now that doesn't mean I am against doing obvious changes to better the climate, smog and other things are obviously bad. If you look at CO2 emissions in the US you will see that cars are not actually that significant of an impact any more. It is still a pretty big chunk, but it does not seem out of line.
Now when you look at what is going on in the rest of the world compared to the US, that is where I get concerned. We need to get some of the developing countries on track.
