George Will Believes The Hottest Decade In History Shows An ‘Absence Of Significant Warming’
George Will Believes The Hottest Decade In History Shows An ‘Absence Of Significant Warming’
In the Washington Post’s game of global warming coverage, George Will gets seven strikes and he’s still not out. Will has penned yet another column questioning climate science, the seventh this year. Will’s thesis is that there has been no global warming since 1998, based on his misinterpretation of a poorly written article about temperature trends by New York Times climate reporter Andy Revkin:
By asserting that the absence of significant warming since 1998 is a mere “plateau,” not warming’s apogee, the Times assures readers who are alarmed about climate change that the paper knows the future and that warming will continue: Do not despair, bad news will resume.
By this logic, we’d have to conclude that the Toronto Blue Jays just clinched the A.L. East division title — after all, they’ve won six games in a row and are 9-1 in their last ten games, while the New York Yankees lost their last game and are only 7-3. (In reality, the Yankees have clinched the division title.) However, when ThinkProgress contacted Will to confirm this theory, he responded:
You don’t seem to understand baseball. The Blue Jays are not even in contention.
Will’s persistent assertion that global warming has stopped during the hottest decade in recorded history is just as nonsensical as the idea that a team that is nine games below .500 is beating one that is 45 games above .500. Unfortunately, Will hung up before we could ask who he believed was the hottest team in baseball.
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It’s a conspiracy, I tell ya! Will wants us to all believe the Earth is actually cooling, so we can keep drilling for oil in the Gulf of Mexico so the Chinese won’t be able to drill near Cuba and…
I don’t know. Turn the country Communist?
I can understand not being as alarmist as the governor of Tokyo (who believes Tokyo should get the 2016 games because they’ll be the last due to global warming), but Will is pure flat-earth.
Global warming is a slow process, to be sure…but it’s those few fractions of a degree that add up over time. All it takes is enough of a shift in global temperatures, though not necessarily perceptable to us, to cause catastrophic damage to an ecosystem.
And, George, we all live in some ecosystem.
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:48 amMethinks someone’s been at the meth again. This summer was unbelievable, I damn near melted
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:48 amI find it incredible that these idiots think everything else contributes to Climate Change EXCEPT humans. I heard it was cow flatulence, dinosaur flatulence. The fact is, we pollute the air with toxins. And yet, these people think we are blameless! WTF?
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:49 amWhich University did George Will recieve his doctorate in Climatology?
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:49 amWill has penned yet another column questioning climate science, the seventh this year.
– - Will: “I’m not a climatologist or scientist of any kind but I play one in the media!”
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:52 amUSNclerk says:
This summer was unbelievable, I damn near melted
– - Depends where you live. Here in Los Angeles our summer was noticeably cooler (ok, less hot) than the last two summers. We need to look at the totality of weather across the globe over a lengthy period of time.
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:54 amThis comment has been voted down. Click to read.
George Will is acting just as Bush, the neocons and the evangelicals have acted for the past 8-10 years; they believe in their beliefs but they don’t believe in evidence/proof.
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:58 amGeorge Will likes George Will.
George Will likes baseball. See George sit.
George Will never played baseball. See George write.
George Will, last of the newsprint dinosaurs.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:00 amHey, if you take the teams first 35 games of the season and their last 15, then yes, the Blue Jays are the best team in the AL East! Hot start, hot finish, middle… not so much. Being Canadian, I’m a Blue Jay fan. It’s too bad we are in the same division as the Yankees and the Red Sox. That’s just the way it is. It’s called… let me think… oh right… A FACT! See George, sometimes you have to accept the facts and try adjust accordingly.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:02 amTo be honest, I think we are pretty much doomed. The Climate Change denyers have been in power far to long. We should have been conserving for decades. Between Global Warming AND pollution, we are, in fact, killing ourselves. We pollute the water, overfish our waters, and have a dangerous indifference to the balance of nature. SOON, we will run out of clean water and destroy our own planet. Depressing, eh?
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:05 amShorter George Will: It’s not true!! I said it’s NOT true!!
**blubbering and stamping his feet**
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:05 amGeorge will be an idiot about science stuff. He should stay with the stuff he knows, which would be…uh,…..er…..well, Hmmmm… I dunno?
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:06 amthe bow tie says it all.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:14 amWills, Kristol, Krauthammer all intellectuals who exist in Manhattan or D.C. bubbles and have no real life experience actually doing anything, besides blathering to create content for the corporate propaganda machine.
War mongers who never served, a climate commentator who has no scientific background.
They should stick to their area of expertise.
If I want advice on midtown Manhattan restaurants, hotels or publishers they’re the go-to guys.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:16 amGo Blue Jays!
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:23 amI quit watching ‘This Week’ with George Suff’Nonsense, but have you noticed how George Will always gets first chance to talk at the round table?
I suppose it’s out of some kind of respect, but I lost all respect for that show & it’s host during the election last year.
George Will always looks constipated, but to him, everyone else IS a pain in the ass.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:24 amI wonder how long Fred can hold that idiot troll on the ThinkFast? :-D
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:33 amcarbon dioxide is well known to be a greenhouse gas, which traps heat in the atmosphere. It’s not the most plentiful of such gases in our atmosphere, but it is one of which humans have measurably increased its concentration over the course of the industrial revolution.
What does George Will, or any climate denier, think will happen when we increase the concentration of a gas that traps heat (and it’s not the only one that has increased)?
And why is it that virtually every time someone comes down forcefully on the side of climate change denial, they always turn out to be politically conservative? It’s like evolution. Among the vast majority of the population, it’s an incredibly uncontroversial, well-accepted scientific principle. And whenever someone rejects it, they always turn out to be right-wingers.
Weird.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:34 amUpdate- “Matt Yglesias looks at the Washington Post’s continuing contempt for its readers,…”
Along with the Washington Post’s new embracement of all things Reich/neocon, I’ve noticed that the NY Daily News is also riding this rollercoaster downhill into the toilet. I’ve gotten tired of writing to their editorial page asking why they are so compelled to offer daily half page editorial rants to the likes of Krauthammer, Michael Rubin and any failed neocon s(umbag they can get their hands on. If I want to read that crap I’d buy the NY Post. The “librul” media sure loves them some pseudo-intellectual neocons don’t they? I guess that’s ther way of being “fair and balanced” although to be truly fair they would need to balance these clowns out with some true Progressive-minded people. Somehow the MSM expects us to believe that these so-far-to-the-Right-as-to-be-not-even-on-the-map idiots are simply run of the mill conservatives. Liberal media my @ss!
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:35 amGeorge just can’t seem to get all his stuff into one sock. He bases much of his opinion on faulty information. He wrote a previous Washington Post column which doubted the effects of global warming, stating: “According to the University of Illinois’ Arctic Climate Research Center, global sea ice levels now equal those of 1979.” In responding, the website of Arctic Climate Research at the University of Illinois stated: “We do not know where George Will is getting his information, but our data shows that on February 15, 1979, global sea ice area was 16.79 million sq. km and on February 15, 2009, global sea ice area was 15.45 million sq. km. Therefore, global sea ice levels are 1.34 million sq. km less in February 2009 than in February 1979.”
But, hey…if you are a journalist, you have to stand by your story, facts be damned. Right, George?
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:42 amtherightscoop says:
Hey guys, in case you missed it, the hockey stick is broken.
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:55 am
Nice try, but wrong. The hockey stick is only broken if you cherrypick one set of trees in Siberia that don’t match the mountains of data from ice cores and other sources that DO confirm the hockey stick.
Come on, let’s see what else you got.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2009/09/hey-ya-mal/
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:44 amGeorge doesn’t care if he’s right or not about Global Warming, he’s an old man, and will be dead and buried before we all start paying the price for our foolishness.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:46 amP.D. says:
I find it incredible that these idiots think everything else contributes to Climate Change EXCEPT humans. I heard it was cow flatulence, dinosaur flatulence.
October 2nd, 2009 at 9:49 am
_____________
The most ironical part of that argument is that cow flatulence (eructation, to be accurate) IS a human cause of climate change. The cows that we know today have been selectively bred over thousands of years to be living fermentation vats, raised in massive industrial farms solely to produce milk, shit, and more cows. In their natural habitat, with a natural diet and natural predators to keep their population in check, they’d never be a contributor to greenhouse gases.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:51 amAnybody that intellectually dishonest doesn’t get to call themselves an intellectual.
.
therightscoop says:
Hey guys, in case you missed it, the hockey stick is broken.
… in Yamal Peninsula, Russia only. Congratulations, you found the one place in the world that isn’t graphing sharply upwards. You are aware that local deviations from the mean are not the men?
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:56 amIs Will checking the thermometer that is up his a$$? Certainly he has passed enough flatulence for any one being.
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:57 amPeople need to use their brains with this subject:
http://americaspeaksink.com/2008/12/global-warming-and-the-jonestown-koolaide/
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:59 amGeorge Will refuting thousands of reputable SCIENTISTS the world over…yeah, right.
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:04 amI believe the continual disregard of facts informing Will’s statements is evidence of a significant lack of intelligence.
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:05 amjoedee1969 says:
People need to use their brains with this subject:
October 2nd, 2009 at 10:59 am
___________
We do. That’s why we’ve read about the actual facts of climate change, rather than read some moron blogger’s unfounded accusations.
Climate change is real. It is happening, and we are the primary cause. This is a fact. To deny fact only shows your ignorance.
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:06 amRich H says:
I believe the continual disregard of facts informing Will’s statements is evidence of a significant lack of intelligence.
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:05 am
____________
Continual disregard of facts is the conservative mantra.
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:08 amYeah, well, George will exhibits a decided absence of significant reasoning ability. Does anybody listen to his corrupt blather anymore?
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:29 amWill’s intellectual body odor was exposed 25 years ago when he appeared on ABC praising Reagan’s debate performance without disclosing that he assisting in Ronnie’s debate preparation. The fact that the Post still allows this pedantic whore to pollute its pages with columns that are discredited as soon as they appear demonstrates yet again why the death of newspapers is not an entirely bad thing.
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:39 amGeorge will is more educated than everyone here including me. Try actually reading what he has to say, you might learn something.
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:54 amPolitically Inferior, you are not well educated enough to judge your own level of education.
October 2nd, 2009 at 12:36 pmPolitically Superior says:
George will is more educated than everyone here including me. Try actually reading what he has to say, you might learn something.
No he isn’t! Except maybe you – but who isn’t! LOL! ;)
October 2nd, 2009 at 12:52 pmPolitically Superior says:
Yes George Will maybe more educated than us, but how exactly does having a PhD. in politics make you an expert on the planet’s climate?
October 2nd, 2009 at 1:05 pm.
George Will = D E N I E R
.
October 2nd, 2009 at 1:34 pmGeorge Will= Prissy little overprivileged bubbleboy who gets paid by his corporate masters to lie to the American people.
A baseball fanatic who’s never actually played baseball
October 2nd, 2009 at 2:15 pmA climate change denier who has no scientific training
A paid liar
George will is more educated than everyone here including me. Try actually reading what he has to say, you might learn something.
–
October 2nd, 2009 at 4:41 pmDude you are a 22 year old poser claiming superiority. Every f uckin body is more educated than you….
Hey, it’s cool (heh heh snark), George has pretty good airconditioning. Probably lives a few meters above high tide too.
Next time you call him, ask him what the thermography trend is for his location.
October 2nd, 2009 at 5:14 pmHere’s some classic George Will. Do yourself a favor and watch it all the way to the end.
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Politically Superior says:
George will is more educated than everyone here including me.
No, the rest of us actually managed to pass the sixth grade.
.
Politically Superior says:
Try actually reading what he has to say, you might learn something.
I have. I didn’t.
Let’s just say that sometimes, certain people know how to use a lot of obscure classical references and large and/or out-of-use words, without actually knowing what the hell they’re talking about. You know, the types who pad word counts on their college papers and manage to say nothing. Will is one of those types.
October 2nd, 2009 at 11:53 pmEducation does not equal intelligence.
I have met a considerable number of individuals who, while educated, remain quite incapable of critical thinking skills. While in possession of an erudite set of facts they’ve learned through simple rote memorization, they nonetheless cannot work their way through a problem via an understanding of the fundamental underlying concepts of said problem.
All too often, their conclusions line up not with a reasoned and thoughtful line of inquiry, but rather conform with their preconceived notions. Thus, these individuals become quite flummoxed when presented with a problem that falls outside of their narrow views of the world.
These folks are quite often narcissistic, believing they know more than those who do, in fact, understand the fundamental underlying principles of a given subject. They believe, for example, that they know more than tens of thousands of highly trained scientists, who have spent millions of man-hours, been subjected to countless review by their peers to assure the upholding of the scientific method, have proposed, tested and presented hundreds of thousands of hypotheses, and who, as a group, have reached a general consensus with regards to what most likely explains the data available.
George Will? He’s not one of those people. Not even close. He’s a bloviating demagogue, spewing nonsense in an echo chamber, attempting to downplay legitimate fears, while lifting up fallacious fears, for the purpose of both personal gain, and an overall gain in power for those he sees as “his team”. Regardless of the consequences, in either the long or the short term, for anyone who is “other”, for his nation, or for the world.
October 3rd, 2009 at 2:43 pmBy “those people” in the last paragraph above, I, of course, refer to the tens of thousands of highly-trained scientists.
He is indeed one of the former type: an individual who believes he is vastly more knowledgeable and superior to pretty much everyone else. Utterly full of himself.
October 3rd, 2009 at 2:46 pmOh. My. God.
I was looking up George Will’s history due to this discussion, and came across something I had no idea about:
Let me get this straight: Will coached Reagan. Will had read Carter’s briefing book beforehand. Oh. My. God.
As anybody of a certain age knows, going into the 1980 debates, Reagan had little chance to beat Carter. He was viewed as an old actor with little actual grasp of national or world events. And he rocked it. That debate delivered him a landslide. Reagan was on point, delivering folksy responses that made conservative approaches seem like common sense, timed perfectly in response to everything Carter tried to bring up. His famous zinger, “there you go again” was delivered with famously perfect timing, almost as if he was reading off of Carter’s script.
He was.
Will had given him access to Carter’s script, his debate notes. Will’s defense? Merely that he barely looked at it, and even if he did read it thouroughly, Carter’s debate notes were “next to useless” anyway. That’s hardly a defense when it comes to prepping an old actor about what his cues were. Even if Will believed Carter’s notes were “next to useless” to Carter, they’d hardly be useless to somebody who didn’t know politics but who did know what lines to say in response to explicit cues.
I can’t even begin to describe how underhanded this is. This kind of crap makes Nixon look like a choirboy – at least his burglary attempt failed.
OK, I used to think Will was a sycophant who tries to sound smarter than he is. Now I know he’s the fcuking DEVIL.
October 3rd, 2009 at 11:17 pmThank you for your sharing.!
October 7th, 2009 at 5:02 pmGeorge Will’s latest column questioning the science of global warming burun estetigi
October 9th, 2009 at 9:03 am