Near downtown Los Angeles, on Wilshire Blvd. between Fairfax and La Brea, is a particularly important paleontological site.  The La Brea Tar Pits are an extraordinary window into the Pleistocene, the most recent ice age to envelop the Earth.  Back then, asphalt seeps turned into shallow ponds as rain water accumulated over the tar.  Wooley mammoths, saber-toothed tigers, giant sloths, and other beasts of the era walked into them in order to drink the water, not realizing that they would never be able to get out.

Being warm-blooded, mammals and birds had a significant advantage over reptiles in surviving an ice age.  Achieving fairly large size was also helpful in that their body mass increases at a much greater rate than their surface area does — so internal warmth is more effectively conserved.  This is important since, during the Pleistocene, 30% of the Earth’s surface was covered by ice.  The North Polar ice cap extended as far south as what are now Chicago and New York City.

But climate change is not always a global phenomenon.  Desertification of specific places happens when rain patterns change.  Wikipedia goes on and on about how unsustainable agricultural practices have caused desertification — but it does admit that there are also natural causes.  Desertification was caused long before humans ever existed.  Rising mountains can alter the course of storm tracks.  While on the voyage of the Beagle, Charles Darwin had an epiphany when, at a few thousand feet up in the Andes, he dug down and found sea shell fossils.  In 1872, an earthquake centered in California’s Owens Valley raised the east slope of the Sierras 15 to 20 feet in just a few seconds.

Between the Sierras and the Rockies is a vast semi-desert known as the Great Basin.  In a previous geologic epoch, it was under water — an inland sea.  Aquatic dinosaurs paddled around in its semi-tropical waters.  Some remnants remain, the Great Salt Lake being the largest and Mono Lake along the California-Nevada border being one of the most alkaline.  Death Valley used to be under water as well — known by geologists as Lake Manly.  A biological remnant of this period is the desert pupfish (Cyprinodon macularius), now found in isolated springs and waterholes scattered around the Great Basin.

Maybe it’s just me, but it seems that the media hysteria over climate change has recently been intensifying.  Perhaps they’re doubling down on deceit because the public is becoming ever more skeptical of their evocations to destroy our standard of living.  As winter approaches, the possibility of significantly great snowfall and near-record-low temperatures may further weaken the alleged legitimacy of the global warming hoax.

What is painfully obvious, but still bears repeating, is the dark political motive behind climate change.  Witness the spate of edicts being spewed forth by the “Climatistas”: an end to the use of fossil fuels.  Really?  How?  “Oh, we’ll figure that out.  If capitalism weren’t so evil, they would’ve done this long ago.”  Most of the “suggestions” being posed are just plain stupid.  Top of the list are the electric automobiles that are now clogging the dealerships’ storage yards.  Beyond the high cost in spite of taxpayer subsidies, the tendency to burst into flames, and limited travel between charges is the inescapable physical reality that they are a lot heavier than gas-powered vehicles.  Their tires cost more and wear out faster; they wear down road surfaces faster; and most importantly, they take a lot more energy to go from point A to point B regardless of the good intentions of the driver.  Ironically, some E.V.s display “Zero Emissions” below the name plate.  They may not be emitting carbon dioxide right then and there...but, miles away, a fossil fuel–burning power plant is working overtime to meet the increased demand on the electrical grid needed for E.V. recharging.

I could go on and on about them trying to make us eat bugs (for our own good) and propping up the Chinese communists by making us buy solar panels and battery storage, but that’s all too obvious by now.  What remains to be exposed for all to see is the authoritarian nature motivating the strenuous advocates of climate fraud.  If truth in labeling were applied to politics, the Democrats of today would have to be called the Totalitarians...sounds kind of like Libertarians, but means the exact opposite.  They have demonic brethren abroad.  Unfortunately, political office tends to attract wannabe dictators who think they possess superior understanding of what’s wrong with the world and how to fix it.  Or they just enjoy being at the top of the food chain and will do whatever it takes to get there...and stay there.

Imagine an apatosaur — a terrestrial and vegetarian reptile weighing as much as 14 tons.  Being cold-blooded, they needed fairly high ambient temperature in order to sustain their metabolism.  Today’s reptiles are mostly small lizards, some of the largest being crocodiles, which are semi-aquatic.  Though today’s lizards are descendants of the apatosaur, they cannot achieve such enormous dimensions in the less warm conditions of today’s climate.

Image: Marco Verch Professional Photographer and Speaker via Flickr, CC BY 2.0.