By Peter Burrows 3/24/21 - elburropete@gmail.com
It's snowing here in Silver City, NM, which happens occasionally, but rarely in the last week of March. In the 16 years I've lived here, this is the coldest March I can recall. What's-her-name tells me my memory isn't what it used to be, so maybe I'm mistaken, but I don't think so.
At the Geezer Lunch Club meeting a couple weeks ago, the quips were on the order of, "Boy, we could sure use a little of that global warming about now," and, "Where's Al Gore when you need him?" Devastatingly witty stuff like that.
Typically, the media portrays an unusual weather event as due to Global Warming (always capitalize a religion) unless it doesn't fit the lib narrative, and then it becomes just "weather." I can hear you lemming-libs about now: "This snow storm is just weather! Just weather, you evil-dirty-bastard-racist climate-denier!!" (You forgot, "Islamophobic-maskless germ spreader.")
A more sophisticated argument is that global warming has affected the polar vortex, changing the jet stream which is pushing cold weather farther south. This would have more credibility had it been predicted, but, as far as I know, this is an ad hoc argument. Also, I would think that another effect of that would be drastically reduced artic ice, something that would surely have been heralded to the skies had it occurred.
I tried to look up the record for the March low temperature in New Mexico, but was unsuccessful. It must be out there somewhere, but I can't find it. I did find this about February, from the February 15, 2021, Albuquerque Journal: "Several places set record cold temperatures on Monday. Rio Rancho hit a low of 7 degrees, breaking the previous Feb. 15 record of 22 degrees set in 2010."
You will note the previous record low was in 2010. I couldn't find how New Mexico fared in the spring of 2015, when much of the rest of the nation recorded record lows: "Record-Breaking Cold: All-Time March Record Lows Set March 07, 2015 - All-time March record lows have been broken as one more shot of bitterly cold air plunged south in the wake of Winter Storm Thor. Some cities have seen their coldest temperatures in decades for so late in the season."
Thus, in the last 11 years, it appears there have been at least three very cold springs: 2010, 2015 and this year, 2021. This probably surprises you. It did me, but it reflects the fact that unusually cold weather doesn't make the news; only unusually warm weather does.
An exception would be this year's winter storm disaster in Texas, but if Texans would have kept all their coal-fired generators online instead of putting up thousands of wind turbines, there would have been no blackouts, no disaster and no news about unseasonably cold temperatures.
Climate alarmists and their political allies lament the public's lack of concern about "climate change." A Pew poll conducted last summer, found "climate change is second to last or tied for last in importance among the 12 policy issues the 9,114 voters surveyed were asked about."
One probable reason for that low ranking is uncooperative weather, such as we're having now. Another has got to be the long list of dire predictions by climate alarmists that just haven't come true. For example, back in 1988, a scientist from NASA, James Hansen, testified in front of a Congressional committee about the dangers of increasing carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. His performance earned him the title, "The Father of Global Warming." That was 33 years ago.
The very next year, 1989, he predicted that by 2019 rising sea levels caused by global warming would put the streets of Manhattan under water. He gave himself 31 years but still missed it. Father doesn't know best, it would seem. Hansen's fallibility has gone unnoticed by the MSM, but his reputation has not suffered an iota. (To his credit, Hansen has joined Michael Shellenberg's pro-nuclear movement.)
Hansen isn't alone. Many climate alarmists have made tons of predictions over the years, but nobody seems to notice that they never pan out. This hasn't dented the enthusiasm of Democrats for imposing all sorts of regulations to combat climate change, which is "the existential threat of our time," and "the number one threat facing humanity." (You have one guess as to who recently uttered those warnings. Hint: it wasn't Donald Trump.)
Such breathtaking stupidities fly in the face of numerous realities:
1. Even if CO2 is the threat the alarmists claim it is, it is very probable that humanity has time to work on the problem, perhaps a hundred years or so.
2. The economic progress being made by less developed nations, especially China and India, means that ANY CO2 reductions made by the U.S. are meaningless. For example, India has four times the population of the U.S. and emits only one-fourth the per capita CO2. To achieve our level of prosperity, India would multiply our CO2 emissions by 16. And, if you think somebody in India who's never had electricity is going to give a damn if Manhattan is under water, you must be a Democrat. Last I looked, India was opening 80 new coal mines. (China, by the way, emits twice the CO2 we do and has pledged to be carbon neutral by 2060. 2060? F you very much.)
3. Solar panels and wind turbines are both counter-productive and a waste of money, money that should have been used to subsidize and promote nuclear power, which is the only realistic way to reduce worldwide CO levels.
We can only hope that the adults start to take over the climate agenda, and there are a few adults in the Democrat Party. Here's one who would get my vote, an MIT physicist who worked in the Obama administration. PLEASE read:
https://issuesinsights.com/2021/03/24/the-climate-headline-the-legacy-media-wouldnt-dare-write/
Other URLs used:
https://www.abqjournal.com/2360028/more-snow-cold-for-new-mexico-ex-arctic-blast-causes-rolling-blackouts-in-se-area-of-state.html
https://weather.com/storms/winter/news/record-cold-early-march