From Tom Neslon who writes:
Barking madness in the New York Times: Global warming blamed for coldest winter in China in 30 years and many other extreme cold events; story illustrated with a photo of snow on the palm trees of Jerusalem
Extreme Weather Grows in Frequency and Intensity Around World – NYTimes.com
All this recent shift to pushing “extreme weather” in the clueless MSM made me wonder how the public is responding to it. Obviously, the use of the term has been dramatically on the rise, in fact it is a veritable hockey stick:
Source: Google ngram viewer (note: data only available to 2008)
But, I was really surprised at the public response. It seems that the public just might be smarter than the MSM and the AGW doomers think, or maybe they are just fed up with hype. Search trends on Google are flat:
Source: Google Trends
It seems that “extreme weather” is not catching on. I’m sure the doomers would say it is a “communications problem“. Compare “extreme weather” to the peak from Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth in 2007. All terms seem to be in an interest slump now.
Further, it seems to be mainly an English speaking aberration, the rest of the world apparently has even less interest.
Not to worry though, there’s still room on the leader-board for a new meme once the MSM and the doomers realize that “extreme weather” has fizzled out as a propaganda communications tool:
James Allison says:
January 12, 2013 at 12:31 pm
We have a new commenter “Climate Ace”. Full of comment but no substance and I expect no sense of the past. Well Mr Ace when I was in my late teens I worked as a stocky on out-back stations up near Cloncurry and have fought many pre-wet season grass and bush fires started by electrical storms mauraudering across the tinder dry black and red soil country. Some of these annual fires had + 200 mile plus fronts and in order to save our livestock and fences from burning we vainly fought them day after day. I was told at that time by locals that the fires had been an annual thing since ancient times and were good for grass regrowth and reduced the litter buildup under the gum trees. And that Mans recent attempts to tame the land to their will was causing the problems.
The locals also told me of dreadful earlier drought years where station owners slaughtered 100s thousands of their cattle rather than let them starve to death.
I am not sure what your point is. I lived in the Top End and am well aware of the Dry Season burns. I am well aware of the history of Australian droughts.
As for the impact of regular fires on soil nutrient status there is plenty of science to show that regular fires are damaging. This does not obviate the usefulness of fires generating a green pick in the following season. It does mean that annual fires are not sustainable over a long period of time in areas where the rate of soil formation is very slow – as it is in much of Australia’s north.
Some years later I lived in NSW (late 70s) and experienced the annual raging fires that tore through semi residential areas of native bush surrounding the cities and burnt down houses and claimed lives. I was told then that if people were silly enough to (be allowed to) live in houses built in fire prone bush and without sufficient firebreaks then they deserved to have their houses burnt down.
Since they sometimes burned to death along with their houses this does seem a bit harsh. If your general point is that the development of built infrastructure should follow some well-known common-sense rules in relation to bushfires, I could not agree more.
What we are hearing and reading now are emerging new age Eco Activitists telling us that somehow it’s all our fault that these bush fires are claiming lives and livestock. Whereas the reality is that its Man who is attempting to bend the will of nature to suit their economic and lifestyle purpose, meanwhile Mother Gaia simply carries on doing her own thing.
When I meet an ’emerging new age Eco Activist’, whatever that is, I’ll believe it.
mpainter says:
January 12, 2013 at 7:50 am
So Climate Ace, what does Jo Nova say about you?
I would not know and I would not care. Is she an expert on monetization?
Jimbo says:
January 12, 2013 at 7:06 am
It seems to me that what is happening is not more intense weather but more intense reporting. It is similar to the dead birds falling out of the sky in Sweden in 2011. Once the media picks up on something they all go out looking for the same thing, find it, and we get the impression that something odd is happening. In reality birds falling en-mass from the sky is not that unusual.
I am aware of reports from around the middle of the last century of thousands of Budgerigahs (Australia’s small desert parrot) falling dead from the sky. Even desert-adapted birds can succumb to prolonged drought and extreme heat. I have seen no good science on trends in birds falling out of the sky. If you aware of any, I would be pleased with a link.
Gerard says:
January 12, 2013 at 2:25 am
‘Climate Ace’ 5 million hectares of Victoria burned on Black Thursday 6th Feb 1851. The description does not sound much different to now the link at the bottom gives much useful information. Karoly is not just an extremist he is worse he is an opportunist!
THE WEATHER. ( from the Melbourne “Argus” Newspaper Feb. 8.1851 )
” Thursday was one of the most oppressive hot-days we have experienced for some years.
In the early morning the atmosphere was perfectly scorching, and at eleven o’clock the thermometer stood as high as 117 degrees ( 47.2 Celsius ) in the shade; at one o’clock it had fallen to 109 degrees and at four in the afternoon was up to 113 degrees.( 45 Celsius )
I wish people here would stop verballing me. I have never said that it wasn’t hot in Australia before. Stop pretending I have. I have never said that there were not big bushfires in Australia before today. Stop pretending I have. We have had some record heat recently. No amount of linking to ‘The Argus’, long since extinct itself, will ‘fix’ the problem you appear to have with record heat.
I am grateful that Karoly is willing to put up with the sort of casual personal viturpretation that BAU boosters think is normal and useful.
Are you Karoly?
Meant to say Climate Ace are you Karoly?
And that was in Oct. 2009, over four years ago.
PS: One of the comments there suggested that much of the liberal readership of those papers had moved to HuffPo.
Gerard
Meant to say Climate Ace are you Karoly?
What an odd question.
Climate Ace, David Karoly is well known for his aggressive response to criticism and his ego is big enough to see himself as an ace.
Climate Ace:
At January 12, 2013 at 5:51 pm you say to James Allison:
Allow me to help translate him for you.
[snip . . site rules . . mod] who has little knowledge and no understanding of what you blather about.
In addition, I add a comment of my own.
Your many very short and pointless posts to this and other threads suggest you are a paid troll obtaining remuneration based on the number of your posts.
Richard
richardscourtney says:
January 12, 2013 at 11:55 pm
Climate Ace:
At January 12, 2013 at 5:51 pm you say to James Allison:
I am not sure what your point is.
Allow me to help translate him for you.
[snip . . site rules . . mod] who has little knowledge and no understanding of what you blather about.
In addition, I add a comment of my own.
Your many very short and pointless posts to this and other threads suggest you are a paid troll obtaining remuneration based on the number of your posts.
Richard
This is a strange post. You have ignored the substance of every single post on the thread. Instead you come up with some (apparently) paranoid suspicions that I am being paid to do this. I can confirm that I am posting because I believe that AGW is the first order issue facing all governments and all peoples. I can also confirm that no-one is paying me to post. I can also confirm that the habit of some posters of making up stuff about me, IMHO, completely undercuts their credibility.
Mod:
Thankyou for your snip of my comment addressed to Climate Ace at January 12, 2013 at 11:55 pm. The deleted comment on Climate Ace was mild and the snip has created a blank which readers can fill with any strong comment they wish to attribute to the troll.
Richard
[you are welcome . . mod]
Climate Ace
It appears that Australia had its highest daily temp max average on record – 40.3C as opposed to 1972’s record of 40.2C. So extreme temps have risen 0.1C in 41 years. One would have expected more.
All individual records broken only go back to the 1950s and no individual state daily record was broken during this heatwave. The BOM only deal with temp records after 1910 so the heat waves of 1896, 1906 and 1908 are not taken into account. Eg Bourke had 22 days of over 40C in 1896, Melbourne had 5 days of over 40C in 1908.
Can anyone find any reference to the heatwave in Dec 1972 – or was it just a one- off event?
Climate Ace:
At January 13, 2013 at 1:05 am you claim
Perhaps you can “confirm” those things. If you can then please do. First you need to say who you are.
Your many content-free posts snowing several WUWT threads suggest you are a payed troll.
Richard
Reading further in that severe weather article quoted in the beginnning one may find: “In Siberia, thousands of people were left without heat when natural gas liquefied in its pipes…” Did it really get that cold? That would be pretty impressive…
Good grief Charlie Brown, NY has had snow, storms and flooding before now.
http://www.nydailynews.com/new-york/winter-new-york-city-gallery-1.1238424?pmSlide=0
Another content-free post. Yawn.
As you know, but pretend not to, climate scientists have been insisting for years that AGW would cause extreme weather events; the only thing you’re able to attack is the use of some words.
Of course, among your supine servile lackeys, this post is somehow a certain proof that there is no global warming.
It is the mainstream media (MSM) in general that have a warmist bias. Here in the Netherlands the NOS news, a Dutch government television news agency, has reported time after time about the wildfires in Australia and the drought in parts of Brazil. But they never mention the extreme cold in large parts of Asia, like it is not happening. Blizzards in North Dakota? Not an item in the Dutch television news. CNN is not much better. They reported about air pollution in Beijing, without even once mentioning the extreme cold temperatures in China. In some places it was minus 44 degrees Celsius, but they did not mention that. The showed a weather map of China with a large blue and purple coloured area marked: COLD. They did not give one clue about HOW cold it was. If you want honest information about all the record low temperatures that are broken time after time again, please visit http://iceagenow.info. Robert Felix gives us the honest news about the increasing cold in the world and the new record low temperatures that are established time after time. The MSN are trying to brainwash the public and they mention only the record high temperatures that occur once in a while. Many hundreds of people have died from the cold, but this fact is not mentioned in the MSM.
Rather misleading picture at the top of the article showing snow in Jerusalem. Snow in Jerusalem this time of year is rather common during winters and NOT extreme at all.
From wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jerusalem):
Climate
The city is characterized by a Mediterranean climate, with hot, dry summers, and mild, wet winters. Snow flurries usually occur once or twice a winter, although the city experiences heavy snowfall every three to four years, on average, with short-lived accumulation.
‘Nough said. NO snow would be the extreme… If they even can’t get the picture right how am I to believe the rest of the story??? The temperatures described for Russia are common too. Funny, that when the Earth finally starts to cool, many are still in denial and attribute it to climate change. (Since it’s not global warming anymore, ’cause the globe ain’t warming anymore for the past 16 years). Typical human psychology: first they’re is denial… etc.
I used to live in Jerusalem in the 70’s. We used to periodically have snow in the winter and great fun was had by all. I don’t ever recall a global warming/climate extreme meme happening then. It was normal. Driving in the stuff was fun too, because the city authorities were always caught by surprise and the snow plows never made it out in time.
Sounds like our climate warming friends are getting a tad desperate.
A ‘basic’ disconnect: COOLING climate causes extreme weather. WARMING climate causes placid weather.