In August, The Hill, a climate-change-embracing publication, published an article by Glenn C. Altschuler, insisting that “Climate Deniers Are Entitled To Their Own Opinions But Not Their Own Facts.” When it comes to facts, though, who is really advancing his own facts about what’s going on with the Earth’s climate?

The article promises a brief summary of facts about climate change and its effect on the lives and livelihoods of all Americans.” Below, I’ve taken each of Altschuler’s “facts” and exposed them to actual facts.

CLAIM:

2023 is likely to be the hottest year on record, and possibly the hottest in 100,000 years.

To legitimatize this claim, the author states:

This summer, the temperature in Phoenix topped 110 degrees for 31 consecutive days, and failed to drop below 90 degrees for 16 consecutive days.

FACT:

Temperatures are not climate. The 1930s—long before global warming was dreamed up—registered some of the hottest temperatures on record. This headline is from 1934:

AMERICAN DROUGHT – DESTRUCTION OF CATTLE – HEAVY HUMAN DEATH TOLL

Texas cowboys are reportedly shooting 1,000 head of cattle daily to prevent sufferings from thirst.

And this describes events in Nebraska in 1934:

The early thirties were not good times for most Nebraskans. Aftershocks from the stock market crash had spread across the country, and the nation was in the grip of the Great Depression. However, in Adams County, it isn’t the economic depression that stands out in the memories of those who lived through 1934, but the drought, dust storms and heat.

The drought began in 1933 with Nebraska’s driest year in 57 years … For 18 consecutive days from July 8 through July 25, temperatures over 100 degrees were recorded. (Emphasis added.)

Meanwhile, in the lead-up to this past July, NOAA predicted that, in large swaths of the U.S., below-normal temperatures would overshadow the areas of above-normal temperatures.

CLAIM:

“Rising temperatures, early snowpack melt and a longer dry season result in more frequent, severe and longer droughts.”

FACT:

“Early snowpack melt”? Really? That was one of the doomsday predictions from 2001: “Snows of Kilimanjaro to vanish by 2020. Instead,

What has been described as a “cold dagger” struck into the heart of Europe in late July 2023. Also during late July 2023 there was a report of unusual snowfall in the Alps.

Cold Dagger plunges into the heart of summer in the heart of Europe should be headline making, but not a peep. Summer snow coming for the Alps pic.twitter.com/B2m2WJRLgO

— The American Storm (@BigJoeBastardi) July 28, 2023

(The prominent blue area on the left map depicts cool temperatures, the purple arc on the map to the right depicts snowfall in the Alps.)

In late May, a German publication had this to say: “For Scandinavia, the Alps and the Pyrenees, snow is predicted into June – amazing!” Powder, a ski magazine, also reported on a summer blizzard in the Alps.

The U.S. also had summer snow. A posting from Snowboarder says:

Labor Day weekend [2023] brought an unexpected delight to ski enthusiasts, as several ski resorts reported a dusting of snow on their slopes. Solitude, Snowbird, Mount Hood Meadows, and Brighton all shared the exciting news, igniting a sense of anticipation among winter sports aficionados.

The winter of 2022-2023 was also bitterly cold in Mongolia.

And, of course, California had one of its regularly occurring incredibly snowy winters, an El Nino phenomenon that always follows on the heels of Califorina’s equally regularly occurring droughts.

CLAIM:

This year’s excessive heat has already resulted in 235,000 emergency room visits and more than 56,000 hospitalizations in the U.S., at a cost of more than $1 billion.

FACT:

Excessive cold is infinitely more lethal than excessive heat.

CLAIM:

As sea levels rise, coastal flooding will increase significantly, perhaps by one foot by 2050, adding to the 4.3 million homes in Florida, California, South Carolina and Texas currently deemed at risk of being swept away.

FACT:

This sounds dangerously close to what was predicted in 1988 when environmental officials warned that, by 2018, the Maldives could be completely covered by water due to global warming-induced sea level rise. Oddly, that never happened. “The Indian Ocean did not swallow the Maldives island chain as predicted.”

In fact, a 2019 global analysis published in late 2020 found that 89% of 709 island coasts have been either stable or growing in size in recent decades.

A 2016 article in the BBC reported, “Scientists have used satellite images to study how the water on the Earth’s surface has changed over 30 years.” What they discovered jolts the synapses:

“We expected that the coast would start to retreat due to sea level rise, but the most surprising thing is that the coasts are growing all over the world.

“We were able to create more land than sea level rise was taking.”

Meanwhile, a September 1986 article from the Miami Herald predicted that Florida’s shores of Florida would be inundated with a possible two feet rise in sea levels by 2020. Still waiting.

Likewise, we’re still waiting for the fruition of the 1989 prediction that “New York City’s West Side Highway will be underwater by 2019.”

In reality, the average rate of sea level rise, according to the world’s best long-term-trend tide gauges amounts to about 3½ centimeters per century. As always, of course, if you live in low-lying coastal areas, flooding is an ongoing threat. ‘Twas ever thus.

CLAIM:

Although wildfires occur naturally, heat waves and droughts increase their frequency, length and severity. 

FACT:

For more than two decades, satellites have recorded fires across the planet’s surface. The collected data are clear: Since the early 2000s, when 3% of the world’s land caught fire, the area burned annually has steadily decreased”

In 2022, the last year for which there are complete data, the world hit a record low of 2.2% burned area.

[snip]

In the case of American fires, most of the problem is bad land management.

A century of fire suppression has left more fuel for stronger fires.

Even so, last year, US fires burned less than one-fifth of the average burn in the 1930s and likely only one-tenth of what caught fire in the early 20th century.

The media, though, have been hysterical, just as they were when Australia had a bad fire season in 2019 and 2020. The media’s hysterical reaction to the Canadian and Maui wildfires is reminiscent of Australia’s cyclically occurring fires in 2019-2020:

Despite the regularity of drought and fire in Australia, the headlines showed rising hysteria (“Apocalypse Now” and “Australia Burns!”). However, satellite data revealed that the fires seared roughly 4% of Australian land-- half of what was burned away in the early 2000s, when 8% of Australia went up in flames. As in the U.S., the area of land burned annually keeps decreasing.

Interestingly, after the “Apocalypse,” Australia may even be cooling down. An article in a German publication claims, “Australia is cooling down, and the proof of this lies in measurements: over the past six years, it has been colder than average in Down Under…

And what about the horrendous Maui wildfires that Hawaiian Governor Josh Green blamed on climate change? Green neglected to mention the huge swaths of flammable savanna that still threaten Hawaii. Thus, “Over 25% of the State contains non-native, fire-prone grasses and shrubs which fuels the fires that occur in the State.”

The final paragraph Altschuler’s allegedly blockbuster article, one that instead offers condescending arrogance, weaponized misinformation, and abject lies is a stunning example of what can only be described as sclerotic hubris:

Some climate deniers, it seems clear, are willfully or invincibly ignorant. These people must not be allowed to prevent the rest of us from addressing a clear, present, extraordinarily well-documented and existential threat to the United States — and to planet Earth.

When you consider that every existential threat leftists have touted has proven untrue, isn’t it reasonable to believe that July 2023, rather than be verified as the hottest year on record, will eventually be revealed as just another scam?

Image: Earth on fire (edited)  by rawpixel.