The average global temperature for December was just posted yesterday.
That gives us the average global temperature for 2008. It was .325
degrees centigrade above the year 1940 (the zero point for the 20th century). This temperature is lower than
nearly every year since 1997. The temperature of the earth has
been level or declining for more than a decade. If you want to get hysterical about this data...go ahead.
(I can't help mentioning the absurd fact that the Clinton/Gore years were an average of .2 degrees centigrade above 1940 and the Bush/Cheney years were only .3 degrees above. A rather small change, one tenth of a degree, over a 16 year period.)
Anyone who looks at this data and believes we are in a long term
warming period due to human CO2 emissions has to be suffering an
ideological malady. Source.