TD Securities expects a cold winter

"MDA EarthSat, a prominent weather forecaster concentrated on the energy industry, is forecasting that the 2008-09 winter will be the coldest in 5 years with average temperatures coming in 1.5 percent colder than last year and 0.3 percent warmer than the 30-year normal from 1971-2000. The prediction is based upon a weak La Niña that should be forming over the Tropical Pacific Ocean which has historically caused cooler winters across North America. "

I agree with this for the following reasons:

First Point: The JPL Laboratory reporst that 2008 has marked a shift in the Pacific Decadal Oscillation to a negative phase..resulting in a stronger than usual La Nina. http://www.jpl.nasa.gov/news/news.cfm?release=2008-066

Key Graf from the article: "The image also shows that this La Niña is occurring within the context of a larger climate event, the early stages of a cool phase of the basin-wide Pacific Decadal Oscillation. The Pacific Decadal Oscillation is a long-term fluctuation of the Pacific Ocean that waxes and wanes between cool and warm phases approximately every five to 20 years. In the cool phase, higher than normal sea-surface heights caused by warm water form a horseshoe pattern that connects the north, west and southern Pacific, with cool water in the middle. During most of the 1980s and 1990s, the Pacific was locked in the oscillation's warm phase, during which these warm and cool regions are reversed. For an explanation of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and its present state, see: http://jisao.washington.edu/pdo/ and http://www.esr.org/pdo_index.html"

Second Point: Although the current sunspot cycle (Cycle 24) was expected to start in early 2008, the level of solar activity thus far has been minimal. http://www.dailytech.com/article.aspx?newsid=12823 "The sun has reached a milestone not seen for nearly 100 years: an entire month has passed without a single visible sunspot being noted. " As sunspot activity is correlated with solar output (See "Maunder Minimum" in Wiki), fewer sunspots would suggest a colder winter.

Just what the doctor ordered...and just in time. I hope that a series of colder winters will convince people that "Global Warming" is just another hoax, designed to convince the people to give more control over the economy to governments.