Is it hot here, or is it just global warming

By all accounts 2006 was a lot warmer in the continental United States. Global warming or just part of nature flexing her muscles?

Read this from The LA Times.

Exerpt:

On the fever chart of rising temperatures, 2006 was the warmest year on record for the 48 contiguous states, pairing a lethal summer heat wave with a winter so mild that in some places daffodils bloomed out of season and bears forgot to hibernate, government climate experts reported Tuesday.

Based on an analysis of readings from 1,200 weather stations around the country, the average annual temperature in the Lower 48 states last year was 2.2 degrees higher than the mean temperature for the 20th century and fractionally warmer than in 1998, which previously held the temperature record, the researchers reported.

Seven months last year were much warmer than average, concluded the scientists at the National Climatic Data Center in Asheville, N.C., a branch of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Indeed, January 2006 was the warmest on record in the U.S. and December was the fourth warmest since record-keeping began in 1895. In five states, December temperatures set record highs: Minnesota, New York, Connecticut, Vermont and New Hampshire.