On Monday, Feb. 1st, The Lima News published an editorial cartoon ridiculing the mainstream media for reporting on climate change. The first frame shows Chicken Little (the media) sounding the alarm about global warming. The second frame shows that same bird frozen to death in the snow. The caption reads, “The media marks the tenth anniversary of Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth.”
Here’s the irony: Both NASA and NOAA report that nine of the last 10 years have been the warmest since global temperatures started being kept (around a century ago). Last year, 2015, was the warmest yet, and 2016 is likely to be warmer still.
One of the most common and irritating denialist memes is that the existence of winter somehow disproves global warming. This would be like saying smoking a cigarette without keeling over is proof that cigarette smoking is harmless.
Speaking of smoking, the level of certainty among scientists that man-made global warming is real (and a real threat to life as we know it) is equivalent to the level of certainty among scientists that smoking cigarettes causes lung cancer.
Can we expect an editorial cartoon in The Lima News sneering at the media for communicating to the public the dangers of smoking?
Embarrassing.
— Kelly Anspaugh, Ada
