We did it America: 2011 is already tied for the 10th warmest year on Earth since record-keeping began in 1850, according to the United Nations' World Meteorological Organization. Yesterday was also the warmest day ever in NYC, with the mercury hitting 70 degrees in Central Park, breaking the previous high of 69 degrees, which happened in 1990. (Before that, the high of 69, dude, had only been reached in 1896.) The 13 hottest years in modern civilization's history have all have occurred in the last 15 years, or at least that's what secular "scientists" would have you believe, with their precious "facts."

In NYC, there has not yet been a frost so far this month, and yesterday's record heat is just the latest freaky weather development in a year which saw the snowiest January ever, the rainiest August, and a record-setting high heat of 104 degrees in Central Park in July. Around the NYC area, humans celebrated the unseasonable mildness like blissful frogs in a slowly warming pot of water. @LongIslandProbs proudly tweeted, "It's the end of November and it's still warm enough to walk around with an iced coffee. Thank you Mother Nature!"

The U.N., which is holding the annual fruitless multinational climate conference circle jerk in South Africa, also reports that the Arctic sea ice has shrunk to record-low volumes this year. On September 9th, the ice shrunk to 4.33 million square kilometres, which was 35% below the 1979-2000 average and only slightly more than the record low set in 2007. "Unlike the 2007 season, both the Northwest and Northeast Passages were ice-free for periods during the 2011 summer," the UN reports. The preliminary report also notes these "highlights":

  • Severe drought, then flood, in east Africa
  • Major floods in south-east Asia, Pakistan, Central and South America
  • Deadliest flash flood with landslide in Brazil
  • A year of extremes in the United States
  • A dry start to the year in Europe and eastern China
  • Another year of below-average tropical cyclone activity

Representatives of 192 countries are meeting this week to try to come to some agreement on future action to curb climate change. Inhabitants of small islands are particularly alarmed, because rising sea levels threaten to erase them from the map. Climate negotiators have set a goal of keeping temperatures from rising more than 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit above preindustrial levels, but the islands want that target reset at 2.3 Fahrenheit. "Forget about it. It's too late," Michel Jarraud, IMO's secretary-general, told the AP yesterday. Oh well, islands are boring anyway. Is it our fault if they're not too big to fail?

And then there's the climate change feedback loop to worry about. The AP reports that the largest departure from the norm occurred in northern Russia, where temperatures rose an average 7.2 degrees Fahrenheit above average in some places. This is troubling because the Russian Arctic and most of Siberia "hold massive amounts of methane locked into the permafrost, carbon-rich soil that never thaws. Warmer summer temperatures mean a deeper thaw of permafrost and greater release of methane, a gas with a global warming potential 23 times more powerful than carbon dioxide."

But hey, fuggedaboutit! As Dave Heimann of Staten Island tells the Daily News, "It’s great not having to wear a coat — it puts you in a better mood." And on Twitter, New Yorker Tara Lawall speaks for all Americans when she opines, "If this is what global warming feels like, fire up those Hummers."