October 2009 was the 3rd warmest October on record.
November 2009 was the warmest November on record.
December 2009 was the 4th warmest December on record.
January 2010 was the 3rd warmest January on record.
February 2010 was the 2nd warmest February on record.
March 2010 was the 2nd warmest March on record.
April 2010 was the warmest April on record.
Taken together, global temperature records for the months of December, January and February made the winter of 2009-2010 the 2nd warmest on record.
The Winter of 2009-2010 was one of the warmest we’ve seen on record. Each month of the winter was one of the warmest we’ve seen on record. Each of the months surrounding the winter has been one of the warmest we’ve seen on record. And this is not merely a case of a year of unusual weather. It’s right in line with an undeniable pattern that shows our coldest years on the planet are far, far behind us and our warmest years on the planet are all recent.
Despite this, our political cartoonists seemed to collectively conclude that because we had some snow during the winter, the notion of global warming must somehow be a fraud. On January 11 of this year, for example, political cartoonist Lisa Benson syndicated a cartoon in papers across the country featuring a woman burning Al Gore books in her fireplace to keep warm during this supposedly bitter winter. On January 8, to cite another more discursively violent example, a widely syndicated John Cole cartoon featured a hippie wearing a “Stop Global Warming” t-shirt being smacked in the head by a huge snowball labeled “Winter ’10.” There were many (here | here | here | here | here | here) examples.
Watching the global temperature records with one eye and these hyperbolically inaccurate political cartoons on the other hand, I wrote with incredulity this February asking myself how such a disconnect could happen:
Congratulations to these artists: they have discovered that winter is colder than summer. They seem to have forgotten all the cold and snows of winters past…. The cartoonists, published in my paper and syndicated around the world, confuse seasonal weather with global climate. If they are sincere in doing so, then surely come April we’ll see a comic with global warming deniers being beaten about the head by a large daisy. If I don’t see the daisy, I’ll suspect that their confusion is not so sincere.
No daisy smackdown from Lisa Benson. No daisy smackdown from John Cole. No editorial cartoons from the two that either apply their false “winter=no global warming” logic to conclude that “spring=global warming,” or acknowledge that global data show clear warming, even during the Winter of 2010. I have not been able to find a single political cartoon from any cartoonist during the Winter of 2010 noting how actually warm it was, noting that the larger climate trend of global warming continues.
While Newsbusters continues to assert the existence of a “Liberal Media” conspiracy, it’s increasingly difficult for me to chalk this pattern of editorial cartooning up to mere ignorance. You can’t ignore the pattern in the global temperature data if you take even the slightest peek at it. These political cartoonists appear to be drawing out of insincerity, and you’ll have to ask them why.
Keep pounding the drum, Jim, keep pounding the drum…yea, yea, facts and numbers don’t lie…but most people go with the thermometer out side their window to see that global warming isn’t what everyone says it is….and that’s all that matters….where I live we’ve had, in April, 5 nights near freezing, just like last year that actually killed the peach crop, and only 6 days of near 90 temps, far below the usual 10…so nope, don’t buy the stats….you sure they aren’t jacked figures from England….
What an interesting testament to your perspective on reality, Tomas.
Tomas, talk to the fruit production people. I have. Here’s what they’re telling me about the effect of the extraordinarily warm year we’ve been having: Fruit is 3 weeks ahead of schedule because of the warmth, which makes it more vulnerable when the weather returns, for a day or two, to seasonal normal. That frost that killed the peaches wouldn’t have killed the peaches if they weren’t abnormally advanced because of this year’s record-breaking general warmth.
Remember – you’re wasting your time trying to convert people who refuse to believe facts that there is any problem at all. If you took Tomas to the Gulf of Mexico and let him see the damage for himself, he’d probably think it was a hoax, or “only a local problem”, or a conspiracy.
The fact that 40% of our seafood comes from this region is definitely something to be “concerned” about.
By the way, Green Man, the same thing happened to the strawberry crop in Florida. They had a near freeze event, sprayed them to keep them from going bad, SUCCEEDED, and had so many strawberries as a result, that some farmers were tearing them up and tossing them out to keep the price from tanking.
Frankly, you’re right. I’m wasting my time trying to convert people like Tomas who refuse to believe facts. But I’m not trying to reach Tomas, Tom. Tomas shows in his comments here that he’s pretty much a lost cause. In the face of facts, he just shrugs and moves right along.
The people I’m trying to reach are the same people that the oil companies and other corporate-sponsored global warming deniers are trying to reach: those people who can be persuaded but aren’t going to go about digging up the truth on their own. For reasons of time or diligence or whatever else, they need to be shown what the facts are. If you or I or somebody doesn’t provide that information, the oil companies and the corporate-sponsored deniers and the Lisa Bensons and the John Coles of the world are going to have the stage to themselves and their factually unsupported bullcrap will probably be accepted by a lot of people because if you don’t pay attention it sounds plausible. You or I or somebody else is going to need to take pains to dig up the truth and present it in its actual, undeniable form in order to make a difference.
Right…then they will nod and say, “Yeap JIM, what an outstanding point you have…” pat you on the back, and then go home. To HGTV footage of Gore’s new Malibu home, and they will glance around and see all the modern convienances they have to give up and say…”Naw, it’s bullshit…” and they will go on with their lives. As many others are coming to see…hence the decline of the Green Movenment….the reality is…man can’t change the scale of a thing as global warming because it’s a natrual event….it’s not solely man made….
All the hand wringing you do is for nothing. Why? Because you can’t change anything on a gobal scale when your leaders don’t lead by example. IE Gore and his new Malibu mansion….forget it…scream all you want, more and more people are walking away from the preaching and the Green Blitz that was in effect for so long. It no longer means anything. Yea, yea…oil in the gulf….it’s not refined crdue, it’s not gasoline, it’s raw crude, a natrual element from the earth….in time, the earth will take care of it….the next time an undersea quake cracks the earth open and spews raw crude out then, who will you blame? Who will clean it up? It’s a mute point. NO BODY CARES but a handful of folk, and those directly affected….THAT is reality.
Tomas, there never was any “Green Blitz” in effect. Almost a generation after the Kyoto Protocol was organized, the USA still has not passed any significant legislation to deal with climate change, and now, the Kerry-Lieberman bill actually promotes expanding offshore drilling and the burning of coal, which will make climate change worse, not better.
The fact is that there are plenty of people who care about the environment, and do what they can to reduce their impact. Unfortunately, there are many more people like yourself, who believe that their own needs matter more than anything else.
And how about those many hungry people living on the shores of Lake Tanganyika – you know, the ones in the article I wrote that you conveniently ignored? You think they don’t care that their fish harvest is diminishing due to warming lake waters? Is that all somehow explained away by Al Gore’s house or an email from the University of East Anglia?
Global warming is a natural occuring event..those people will need to do what their ancestors did to survive…MOVE ELSEWHERE….
Uh, Tomas, if it’s GLOBAL, how can we move elsewhere? Going to Mars? Moon colonies?
Also, you’re not addressing the Lake Tanganyika research, which found that rising temperatures were unprecendented over the previous 1,500 years.
The Chicken Little mentality you have makes talking to you mute…whatever….hide under your bed, if you want, but leave my life style alone….
Tomas, can you show me any single record cold month in the last generation? No.
Can I show you any single record warm month in the last generation? Yes. Plenty.
I can also show you manipulated tainted data to move the agenda along….
Tomas, these data are not derived from computer simulations. They aren’t projections. They come from thousands upon thousands of actual observations of points around the globe. You can cry “tainted” but if you want to be taken seriously prove it.
Example: John takes his readings from a roof top in the middle of downtown Big City….Harry take his from the middle of an open field in the middle of Anywhere county 10 miles away, the results are far different, but John’s results are used to show the needed data while Harry’s is disregarded. That’s the push of the Green Machine….money…just ask Gore. That’s if you can get passsed the guards at the front gates….heh, you know how Malibu is….or maybe you don’t….
“it’s raw crude, a natrual element from the earth….in time, the earth will take care of it”
From deep within the earth, not naturally floating around in the sea. Also, can’t say as I’ve heard of massive leaks of crude from earthquakes. All of which ignores all the other effects of continuing to depend on this stuff on the environment as a whole. (refining process, combustion, production of plastic, non biodegradibility of plastic in landfills)
And the word you want is moot, not mute.
Ass.
Arsenic is a raw, crude, natural element from the Earth. When mountaintop removal coal mining puts it in people’s drinking water, in time, the Earth will take care of it.
And what will happen in the meantime?
Are you going to go have an arsenic milkshake, because it’s a raw, crude, natural element from the Earth?
Hey, New Yorker…he who lives in glass houses….you can’t be “Green” and live in the land of the Steel Canyon…Dick…..
Tomas – you’re one seriously fucked up dude.
So says the ass-wipe….