From the Cliff Mass Weather Blog
I am getting tired of writing about the Seattle Times, but their miscommunication is simply getting worse, and I think you should know about it.
Take the front page of the online Seattle Times yesterday. There is a big picture showing a dry-looking scene in eastern Washington with a headline that eastern Washington will face another summer of sparse water supplies (see below).
The problem? Their headline is not true. The evidence is clear and definitive.
After a very wet, cool spring, the soil moisture is above normal for most of eastern Washington, including much of the dryland farming region, where wheat and barley are grown. Here is a picture taken in the Palouse last week by the very talented professional photographer Jack Graham. Look any different from the picture in the Seattle Times?
There is near normal soil moisture in the desert area from Yakima/Tri-Cities towards Moses Lake, where most farming uses irrigation.
Soil moisture with green being above normal
What about the water supplies for irrigation? The Yakima River reservoirs are way above normal in stored water and the Columbia River water forecasts are excellent (see below). Plenty of water for irrigation agriculture and even farmers with junior rights will be taken care of. Snowpack is well above normal. Rivers are above normal.
In short, the headline in the Seattle Times does not reflect reality and provides another example of the paper poorly informing its readership.But poor Seattle Times journalism doesn’t end with false water shortages in eastern Washington.
Also on the Seattle Times front page was a story that Colorado will lose half its snow by 2080 and look like Arizona. The research paper making these extreme claims has all kinds of technical problems, including the use of totally unrealistic assumptions for increases in greenhouse gases (RCP8.5). Furthermore, the models used do not have sufficient resolution to properly simulate the convective (thunderstorm) warm-season showers of the region, and how such showers will change under global warming.
The Seattle Times is always running “stories” about the importance of local journalism. I do believe that responsible, accurate local journalism is very important. How sad that Seattle Times hype, exaggeration, and advocacy, coupled with demonstrably wrong information, is making a statement against the value of local newspapers.
We noticed that the S Times, two days later, ran an article ‘explaining’ the atmospheric ‘river’ coming from the Pacific – without a word of credit to Cliff Mass.
ehhh…
Revisiting the 87-year Gleissberg solar cycle | Bread on the water
I told you!
Drought time coming up….
…just about right now….
The Seattle Times promotes the Huskey Football team as a top tier program too. They write to support their favorite narratives.
CHAZ, a shining community example for the rest of the city to aspire to. How gun free zones can really work. And so on and so forth.
Now, more than ever, this quote, usually attributed to Mark Twain, applies perfectly:
“If you don’t read the newspaper, you are uninformed; if you do read the newspaper, you are misinformed.”
Same can be said for much of the “news” as presented by the “media” in general, be it tv, internet, or radio.
+50
The MO comes from the Constitutional provision to flaunt it.
“All I know is what I read in the papers. And that’s an alibi for my ignorance.” -Will Rogers
Any story using RCP8.5 should have a āclimate pornā disclaimer attatched.
Why? Isn’t RCP8.5 the “business as usual” case?
You forgot the “/sarc” tag.
YVW
Are you the same MGC who used to post lies on Yahoo! before they terminated comments because too many people were challenging their false narratives? The same person who posted that global warming would cause fresh water to become a scarce resource followed almost immediately by a post that claimed global warming would cause us to be inundated with rain? That idiot?
No, MGC, RCP8.5 is a fabricated case that’s running about two times higher predicted CO2 concentration than actual business as usual.
Meab posts the same tired old, long-demonstrated-to-be-false yahoo comments narrative over and over and over again. I’m not a religious man, but his example brings Proverbs 26:11 to mind.
“RCP8.5 is a fabricated case etc. etc. etc. …”
Totally false, as usual.
Schwalm, Spencer, & Duffy
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
August 2020
“Not only are the emissions consistent with RCP8.5 in close agreement with historical total cumulative CO2 emissions (within 1%), but RCP8.5 is also the best match out to midcentury under current and stated policies with still highly plausible levels of CO2 emissions in 2100″
When one lie doesn’t work, drag out a couple more.
I’m willing to bet that you actually believe that the climate models have been accurate so far.
MGC, you’re very wrong. Watch this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6SOEs0LzZCg
It’s a history of RCP8.5 and why it’s not credible.
Watch the whole thing. If there are any big words that you don’t understand, look them up.
Now that you’ve been schooled on this, if you repeat your (false) post you’ll be lying and will confirm that you’re the same liar who used to post on Yahoo!
So meab, I looked at the prevailing CO2 trends myself. No listening to what anyone else says.
If I had to make a bet on where CO2 levels would be by mid-century, and I assumed that prevailing trends continue for the next three decades, I’d guess RCP 6 would be the closest, though RCP 8.5 would not be far off.
MGC, LIAR. Through 2060, RCP4.5 and RCP6.0 are almost exactly the same – both are 550 ppm CO2 equivalent in 2060. It’s only after 2060 that they diverge. You would have NO WAY to select between the two based on what you “guess” will happen by mid-century. NO WAY AT ALL.
Since CO2 is rising at a fairly linear 2.5 ppm per year, you would project roughly 515 ppm in the year 2060.
What you can conclude, without any doubt whatsoever, is RCP8.5 is totally out of the ballpark at 700 ppm.
You just now exposed yourself as a liar and in the process admitted that you lied about RCP8.5 being business as usual.
You’re not only a liar, but you’re also an idiot.
re: “CO2 is rising at a fairly linear 2.5 ppm per year”
Yet another false statement from MarkW.
The current 2.5 ppm per year is 60% higher than the rate was 30 years ago. Under the same acceleration conditions over the next 30 years, the rise rate could thus increase to perhaps 4 ppm per year by 2050.
LIAR.
Here’s the Mauna Loa data set with a linear fit to the last 30 years of data. That’s nearly linear.
I’ve got some advise for you, MGC. When you’ve dug a hole for yourself, you won’t be able to get out by standing on your own excrement.
meab, even a child could see that the data points are above the trendline at the beginning, below the trendline in the middle, and back above the trendline at the end.
That’s a classic textbook indication of a curved concave upward (accelerating) dataset. Elementary Statistics 101.
Also, the “fairly linear 2.5 ppm/yr” may not be applicable after mid century as the world population is expected to level off or at least ‘bend the curve’ – prosperity leads to less kids regardless of faith and medicine.
I have a feeling however, that the annual CO2 level increase may be more of an equilibrium level rather than a reaction to human emissions. The Keeling Curve doesn’t really respond to changes in human emissions, at least not quickly enough for me to accept the CO2 narrative.
In another case, the Earth is greening and the growing season expanding, as well as deserts shrinking, which should gradually increase the amount of CO2 sequestered every April to October.
So there is not much evidence to expect CO2 levels to drastically increase, nor even to continue with the 2.5 to 3 ppm typical increase.
For once we are in complete agreement !
“Nullius in verba” and all that …
Having “looked for myself” (see graph below), I’d actually agree that RCP 6 (the dashed yellow line) is indeed “the closest” one to “the prevailing (2000-2021, linear) trend” value in 2050 (around 480 ppm).
RCP 8.5 (the dashed red line), though … 540 ppm versus 480 ppm is 12.5% (a full one-eighth) higher, which ***I*** consider being fairly “far off” for a 30-year projection of this particular parameter …
An early version of “Poe’s Law” is attributed to Jerry Schwarz, who wrote the following way back in 1983 :
NB : I also have broken this particular “Law” many, many, times in the past, and will undoubtedly do so many times in the future.
Assuming that you were “being serious” (no smiley / winky in your OP …), note that Zeke Hausfather has written several articles, including (at least ?) one in Nature magazine, arguing that “RCP 8.5 = BaU” should be avoided by all serious commenters on “Climate Science”.
In addition, from the AR6 WG-III report, at the end of FAQ 3.3 (on page 3-118) :
According to the IPCC, “RCP 8.5 ā BaU” …
From the (updated / “Final”) version of the WG-I report (section 1.6.1.4, “The likelihood of reference scenarios, scenario uncertainty and storylines”, page 239 :
… for the IPCC “BaU” is for now (in 2022, and up to around 2070) more like RCP 4.5 / SSP2-4.5.
Excellent comment, Mark BLR š
One edit: this is a sideways smiley –> š
The WUWT “comments pre-processor” took my input string of
“:” & “-” & “)”
and unexpectedly converted it to š …
š¶
Bummer.
Here’s a tip: you can insert emojis by simultaneously pressing the Windows (“square” divided into 4 “squares”) key and the . (period or full stop) key.
And you can choose lots of different fun graphics…..
š š š š šāāļø š
Unlucky in your assumptions again !
When I press the Windows key on my computer the Linux Mint “Start Menu” pops up instead …
It’s business as usual for the climate catastrophists
Just because an activists labels something, does not make the label accurate.
The problems with 8.5 have been well documented for years.
Here we go again with the silly pretending that scientific professionals who have published the data that backs their research conclusions, in one of the most prestigious journals in the entire world to boot, are just “activists”.
Nice, except the actual, uncooked data does not support their lies.
BTW, declaring that only those who agree with me are “scientists”, is as old as the global warming scam.
Yet again you fail to give any references (or, even better, links) to anything that would support your BALD ASSERTIONS.
Allow me to show you how it’s done … [ rolls up sleeves, cracks fingers, re-starts typing … ]
– – – – –
In January 2020 Zeke Hausfather and Glen Peters (= “scientific professionals” …) got a “Comment” article published in Nature magazine (= “one of the most prestigious journals in the entire world” …).
The title of that piece (you ask with bated breath) ?
“Emissions ā the ābusiness as usualā story is misleading” (direct link).
From that article :
– – – – –
How about retrying your “RCP8.5 = BaU” BALD ASSERTION with some actual references (and/or links) and citations this time ?
They see eastern WA for images to fit biases and not visiting or investigating. It’s fly over prop country to them.
It is too bad that those that talk about climate, weather, and CO2 don’t take into consideration what has happened in the past. I live in Oregon, which shares a climate with Washington, pretty much. Here is an actual history of the region.
Columbia River Chronology
6 million-16 million B.P.: The greatest outpouring of lava in the history of North America, 90,000 cubic miles, oozes to the surface of the ancient Northwest in repeated flows, forming the Columbia Plateau of present-day central Washington and Oregon and, over time, redirecting the course of the ancient Columbia River.
5 million B.P.: Salmon known today are believed to have evolved in the Columbia River Basin at about this time. Salmonid fish generally are believed to have been present in the Columbia River Basin for about 50 million years.
15,000-12,800 B.P.: More than 40 tremendous floods of almost inconceivable force and dimension swept across large parts of the Columbia River drainage, beginning in present-day northwestern Montana and coursing to the sea, laying down the modern channel of the Columbia through Washington and the Cascade mountains to the ocean. These were the greatest scientifically documented floods known to have occurred in North America.
458: In this year, a Chinese monk named Hwui Shan, accompanied by four other monks, sailed north to Japan, then Kamchatka, then the Aleutians, then Alaska and then down the eastern Pacific coast, a region called Fu-Sang in Hwui Shanās narrative of the voyage. It is the first recorded voyage along the eastern Pacific, and thus the first to pass the mouth of the Columbia River.
900: Roughly the beginning of a period of warm and dry climate in the Northwest that persisted for 500 years. It was followed by a period of cooler and wetter weather that lasted about 400 years, into the early 1900s.
And they are wringing their hands, and worrying about CO2 and typical climate variations. Wait until the next 500 year drought and THEN let’s hear them wail.
Truth decay runs rampant amongst all denizens of the MLM (Mainly Lying Media). They no longer care, let alone know the difference.
Part of the systematizing of error.
Daily flossing between your ears using mental floss helps prevent truth decay.
The Seattle Times lead picture may be misleading (it’s dated 2021), but its headline and sub-heading are accurate.
They state “… the US drought monitor places most of Washington east of the Cascades in moderate to severe drought.”
For some reason Cliff Mass doesn’t consult (or reference, anyway) the paper’s clearly cited source – the US Drought Monitor. Their latest drought map for Washington was released on June 2nd and it does indeed indicate that most of Washington east of the Cascades is in moderate to severe drought.
Note, they state “The Drought Monitor focuses on broad-scale conditions. Local conditions [Palouse?] may vary.
Basalt terrain
087870ee4b88e35ddbc3118c0edf92a2.jpg (328Ć153) (pinimg.com)
8f941bb97b62e69f15da6b86133fa17d.jpg (600Ć315) (pinimg.com)
Not sure what the relevance of these pictures is to the point that the Seattle Times article is referring to the latest US Drought Monitor report?
It doesn’t take much to reach drought condition levels in thin or absent soils on a basalt plateau compared to other terrain. The terrain there is not equal.
From what I can see, the Drought Monitor is based on variation in normal rainfall conditions. That wouldn’t be affected by ground conditions. In any case, how would it make what the Seattle Times reported “miscommunication”?
ToeFungalNail, Eastern Washington is a semi-arid, near-desert. Always has been. It’s perpetually in drought or near-drought. It’s appropriate to compare soil moisture,
reservoir levels, and river flows to average conditions to determine whether there’s any unusual thing going on.
In the case of Eastern Washington, Spokane just had the coldest April on record, going back to the 1880s and one of the coldest Mays. That makes a slightly below average rainfall much less impactful.
You can’t be this stupid so why are you trying to mislead?
No, you’re not getting it. Are you so — as to not know a drought is based upon average precipitation for the area in question?
Reading comprehension problems, pee? Read my post again. This time read the whole post.
So? Does that mean it’s not a drought? No.
oh yes, blindy believe everything that the government says,without question.
I don’t buy half of what the govment says & the other half I take with a bushel basket of salt.I especially don’t believe anything they say about climate or the weather.
How can they be in “moderate to severe drought” with above average soil moisture and above average snowpack and runnoff?!!
It’s worth pausing here to really think about that. Cliff cites measurements of actual conditions. What possible metrics are being used to describe current conditions as a severe drought?
Calling a dog’s leg his tail, doesn’t make it so.
Glad you recognize they are clearly trying to deceive the readers with the picture that shows the opposite of current conditions.
You’d probably need to take that up with the National Drought Mitigation Center Drought Monitoring unit. I imagine they also use measurements of actual conditions.
I think the take-away here is that Prof. Mass’ post just highlights once again how msm outlets are always eager to run any story that promotes “bad” weather / climate conditions, but make no effort to check / reference any other info about the story they’ve just slavishly printed.
As even you must acknowledge TFN, just because a report is found on a website with “.gov” in its URL, that does not mean said report tells the full or correct story.
Seems to me that the person who has made no effort to check or reference the source here is Cliff Mass. The newspaper clearly stated its source and, as you can see from the links, its claim checks out. The source states exactly what the newspaper says it states. Cliff makes no mention of this in his article.
My point is – why wouldn’t the media outlet apply the sniff test to the source info before they went to print?
Just because you’re handed some info that is useful for your own designs & purposes, does that mean you rush ahead slavishly with publishing your story for broadcast consumption?
We know that scientific scrutiny has been failed by the deterioration of the peer review process, but journalistic scrutiny does not necessarily need to follow down the same path.
This ^
See Russia Colluuuusion story. Plant a story in some far away land and off the media goes. Then clowns like Simon and TheFinal go āsee itās reported.ā
Todayās media is lazy and angling for their next job in government
‘Todayās media is lazy and angling for their next job in government’
The last thing any totalitarian regime wants is a bunch of formerly useful idiots that could potentially betray the regime.
From what I know about him, Cliff Mass qualifies as being a credible source, such as unbiased news media (that might qualify as an oxymoron) would seek out to add substance to an article written by a know-nothing wordsmith euphemistically called a journalist.
You’re saying the US Drought Monitor’s official May report is a less relable source than a Chris Mass blog post?
In a word – yes.
Dr. Mass provided his data. You on the other hand prefer the output of models to actual data. At least as long as the models support what you want to believe.
I’m not relying on anything other than the official US Drought Monitor report; neither is the Seattle Times. Cliff Mass says this is wrong: but he says it in a blog post. Who to believe?
Anything produced by a government must be correct.
Socialists are nothing if not predictable.
In other words, if the forecast doesn’t match the data, go with the forecast.
What forecast?
What Is Drought? Drought is a deficiency in precipitation over an extended period.
Source – https://www.weather.gov/safety/drought#:~:text=Drought%20is%20a%20deficiency%20in,duration%20of%20droughts%20varies%20widely.
“ I imagine they also use measurements of actual conditions.”
We can clearly see they do not!!!
(well, some of us can see that)
Some of us don’t want to see anything that contradicts the narrative.
Your arguments didn’t age very well…
https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2022/06/finally-us-drought-monitor-drops-severe.html
Now even the Draught Monitor Centre agrees with us about the facts on the ground and reversed itself.
The lesson here if you choses to learn one is that you shouldn’t blindly trust “experts” when your own lying eyes are telling you different!
Is there actually “above average soil moisture” in that area?
Cliff Mass mentions that green coloring in the soil moisture map represents above normal. But much of the area east of the cascades, perhaps even most, is colored white and some is yellow.
What do those colors represent?
Because droughts aren’t measured by soil conditions.
I agree. If they said, ” omg the Mojave Desert is in a severe drought” nobody would care, but people don’t know that Eastern Washington is practically a desert and drought conditions are the norm and the farmers there are used to it.
Anyways, compared to the rainfall in Spokane, everywhere else is a desert.
The drought monitor is very much wrong and exaggerates drought. Really strange that the journalists at the ST are so incurious they don’t seem to notice or care
What evidence can you provide that the drought monitor is “wrong” ?
“Because I say so” doesn’t count.
Try telling that to our resident alarmists
He gave the data. Though I’m not surprised that you refused to see it.
He gave no demonstrative data. He showed a single photograph and a soil moisture map, much of which is not colored green.
If you believe that, then maybe you should take your argument up with the drought monitor people, rather than the newspaper reporting their findings. I’m sure they’d be keen to have you point out where they are going wrong.
Again, Prof Mass didn’t cite the government drought monitor reference, the Seattle Times did.
Why didn’t the journalist pick up the phone to some farmers & residents in the subject areas and ask them what their lyin’ eyes were telling them when they looked out their windows?
(Disclosure – I started working life as a cadet reporter many many years ago. I still retain enough of my early training though to remember how the editor would kick arses if first-hand observations weren’t sought before proceeding to file copy. We were constantly reminded that we were reporters, not opinion writers.)
Journalism today has very little in common with journalism before cell phones. I’m certain if you asked a “reporter” with The Seattle Times if it had spoken with a farmer, it would have said “I checked Twitter thoroughly, used several different hash tags. There are no farmers in Washington.”
Why didn’t Chris Mass pick up the phone and ask the Drought Monitor people why they are publishing, in his view, “wrong” data, instead of critcising a newspaper report that accurately reflects their findings? He seems a little less ready to confront the official source. Wonder why?
Well, my old editor would have ordered me to track down this man or woman named CHRIS Mass and ask him / her why he / she didn’t do what you’ve suggested.
The editor would also have ordered me to –
The fact that you keep saying “Chris” Mass, shows us your reading comprehension scale.
You think Cliff Mass should check out the source of the information before writing his article. He checked out the actual data instead. I don’t see that as a problem. I do see a problem with the Seattle Times publishing incorrect incorrect information because they did not check their source. If you think Eastern Washington is “local” you’ve never driven across a large state.
The Seattle Times states its source clearly. Look at the caption of its picture in the article. It plainly states that its source is “the US Drought Monitor”. When yo go to that source you find that it says exactly what the Seattle Times says it does.
So the information it published is correct.
Not quite. The newspaper published what a government agency published. Your unstated assumption is that because it is a government agency, it has to be correct. The government employs people with biases and incompetencies. They need to be checked and validated. That is basically what Cliff Mass is providing. You accept it at face value probably because you don’t have the skill set to independently evaluate it, and you have shown a preference for running with the alarmist party line.
No. Cliff Mass is trying to say there isn’t a drought because of soil moisture and the availability of water for irrigation. That’s not what drought means.
If Cliff Mass is trying to say the projected effects of the drought are overstated because of soil moisture and water for irrigation, then he should say that.
A is not B.
We agree that the newspaper accurately reported the government agency’s findings and properly cited its source. So where is the “miscommunication”?
To be accurate, the headline should refer to the source of this story, since it’s a claim rather than a fact. And if the “reporter” is actually practicing journalism (yeah, like that’s going to happen in this day and age), it would go out and talk to the people who might be impacted.
So it’s not technically a piece of journalism. It’s just government propaganda, disseminated from friendly comrades in a hermetically sealed office downtown.
Given the water situation in most of the West (hence the low population density east of the Cascades), a real reporter might find out that farmers are rather used to this and plan accordingly. And in some cases (like Walla Walla with its famous onions), learn to thrive.
Why do I use the word “claim” and not “fact” regarding this alleged drought? Because the headline implies this is an unusual condition rather than the normal climate of Washington east of the People’s Republic of King County. Not that anyone working for The Seattle Times would know this without asking someone.
Cliff covered this in an early post at his blog.
Eastern WA had a cold and wet March/April period. Snowpack, reservoirs, and rain barrels are all full.
Where the authors of the “drought monitor’ live is a mystery — maybe Washington D.C.
I live in the area and will be happy to show you around our nice cool green area.
Grass is full of life, cacti are blooming, and the animals are healthy and sleek.
Well said John .
What annoyed Cliff Mass and quite rightly was the photo of the combine harvester from the last harvest or even earlier working harvesting the cereal crop in July or Augusts when conditions are usually dry.
Publishing a photo like this is very poor journalism but unfortunately this is happening all over the world .
At least they didn’t photoshop a couple penguins driving the combine.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/03/01/msn-augments-fake-news-with-photoshopped-penguin-photos/ š
‘The Seattle Times lead picture may be misleading (itās dated 2021)….’
So why use it? Either find a non-misleading picture on the net or send Jimmy Olsen, along with his Kodak, out to eastern WA to snap a new one.
See my comment below —
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/06/08/more-miscommunication-from-the-seattle-times/#comment-3530607
The photo makes their statements about “drought” highly misleading.
The photo creates the false impression that wheat (and other) farmers are going to face tougher than usual water conditions.
By omitting the fact that farmers in Eastern Washington irrigate, they mislead.
And I think they did it on purpose; thus, they are liars.
todays conditions. Check for yourself on windy.com.
And here is the current soil moisture anomaly for Wash and Oregon. All of Wash at or above normal and over 80% for Oregon. You can verify and windy (dot) com
That “clearly cited source — the US Drought Monitor” makes Cliff’s point — the Seattle Times reporters are biased, lazy, or incompetent. Just a few minutes research of the US Drought Monitor website clearly shows via it’s Comparison Slider that the entirely of eastern Washington was in extreme or exceptional drought at the start of this water year (early October). This past winter and spring precipitation significantly reduced the severity of ongoing drought to the point that 1/3 of the area is merely “abnormally dry” and and none is in extreme to exceptional drought. Would note that the data presented in the Seattle Times story was current as of May 31, and a few more minutes research online shows that Spokane got 0.83 inches of rain of it’s average 1.3 inch June rainfall in the first week of June. Then, again, dramatically lessened severity of drought is not news.
Cliff Mass:
“The problem? Their headline is not true. The evidence is clear and definitive.”
Its not true because the headline forecasts drought based on a snapshot from Drought Monitor.
Hey fella I live right there in Eastern Washington, April was the 10th wettest month on record out of 148 years data, May was also well above average, and the mountains water equivalent is very well above average.
There is excellent irrigation news this year as there will be abundant water available from many rivers.
The Drought map used to have a lot of RED in it know that is all gone which you didn’t account for.
The equivalent of “drill baby drill” is “print baby print with bias and agenda.” It’s volume that matters in agenda reporting and agenda science.
Even if I were a ardent radical environmentalist vegan leftist, I would hate being lied to even if the lies supported my movement. Truth and integrity matter universally, or maybe not. In our age it seems there are no universals. Nothing signifies anything universal. In the mind of the radical the gestalt of the images and headlines is equivalent to the photograph with the green grass. Neither green or beige signify anything universal. If I want the scientific truth to be that Eastern Washington is in the grips of a drought caused by climate change…then so be it. All truth is contingent truth .All truth is subjective and conditioned by one’s personal existential concerns. It’s not even that the lie is justified, It is as if every thing is true if I want it to be true and false if I want it to be false. Biology signifies nothing universal unless I want it to. When the human conscience is not informed by universals, it become seared and ceases to perceive reality as it is. This sort of approach to reality turns people into pliable pawns.
.
“Even if I were a ardent radical environmentalist vegan leftist, I would hate being lied to even if the lies supported my movement. ”
Well then you would obviously be in the minority then. The truth is abhorrent if it does not further the cause. The correct propaganda is worth more than 1000 truths.
I think the issue about truth in American is far more endemic than the correct propaganda. I think there has been a intellectual shift to an extreme nominalism for many kids who went to college in the past 20 years. For them any appeal to a universal is an appeal to power. Symbols, words, pictures signify no universal truth… even a graph on a page. So personal convictions and subjective experience becomes the rule either left or right. The massive shift from classical conservatism to anarchistic Libertarianism and Marxism either classical or anarchistic is rooted in nominalism, especially Marx’s earlier writings.
So weather there is actually a drought in Eastern Washington becomes a battle of opinions, images, competing graphs and quibbling over definitions. It all become pointless because the people who care have their conviction and the people who don’t care are not even in the discussion.
“Even if I were a ardent radical environmentalist vegan leftist, I would hate being lied to even if the lies supported my movement”
But that’s why you are NOT.
Tony G. You are definitely correct. From 1974-1990 I dabbled with leftist radical environmentalist animal rights activism and veganism. Yet I hated the lies and the personality cults, urban legend and mythology in that community. I hated their extreme nominalist appeal to the subjective and suspension of the ethical in service of their movement. I awoke and fled those people and resumed eating as much meat as I desired without my conscience being bound to self righteous people of rather poor character.
Give those article writers a break. (Canāt really call them journalists) They only get paid 50 cents a word and have to come up with something salacious and entertaining every few days or their career is over because their click-count isnāt high enough. Itās just a characteristic of the system that what they write is quick, dirty, and unresearched. Best that everyone just knows thatā¦..
Thanks for bringing us the facts which are frequently hidden from view by mainstream media outlets who appear determined to perpetuate climate emergencies at every opportunity.
Any rational person can see for themselves the abundance of water resources this year in Washington. What the Times is counting on is the lack of information coming from the āotherā Washington. Having lived and worked in Eastern Washington, the climate there is always dry during Summer months hence the need for the massive irrigation district. It would be mostly desert and sage brush otherwise.
Well, its the Seattle Times. That should clue anyone in as to its content and the veracity thereof.
And…from what I have seen, the P-I (Post-Intelligencer) is little better.
Seattle fish wrapper makes stuff up to push AGW narrative? I’m shocked, SHOCKED, they’d do such a thing. /snark
Well there you have it. Global Warmongering makes it wetter. Griff warned you!
I didn’t read the Seattle Times article, but I will go out on a limb and say no mention at all was made of China being by far the largest emitter of those dreaded greenhouse gases over which they currently wet their panties.
If I’m wrong, let me know.
David ignores the fact that while China is currently the largest emitter, the U.S. has put more total greenhouse gases in the air than any other nation.
“If Iām wrong, let me know”
Interesting fact, but not important unless you provide objective, verified data as to how long any greenhouse gas remains in the atmosphere, be it natural or anthropogenic. I’ve seen statements of 10 years to as much as 1,000 years for CO2, with no reference to any measurements.
The open air atomic tests back in the 50’s injected a unique isotope of carbon into the atmosphere. By measuring the rate at which this isotope was cleared from the atmosphere after the open air tests were stopped showed that the residence time for a molecule of CO2 was a bit over 10 years.
MarkW sadly parrots this tired old misrepresentation.
This information totally misrepresents the actual residence time of bulk CO2.
Many of those “unique isotope” CO2 molecules leave the atmosphere via exchange with other non-unique isotope CO2 molecules. Thus an amount of CO2 injected into the air actually remains there for much, much longer than just 10 years.
But folks like MarkW always leave that part out.
MCG ignores the fact that as the USA has reduced emissions significantly during the past decades, China’s emissions are skyrocketing. In fact, China is building coal-fired power plants as if popping them out of a Pez dispenser while the world is supposedly in the midst of a climate crisis from which there is no return unless emissions are reduced significantly.
“If I’m wrong, let me know.”
US per capita emissions are still over twice that of China’s. Cumulatively, ~6 times higher. And residence time is a FOS parameter w.r.t. this discussion.
https://www.worldometers.info/co2-emissions/co2-emissions-by-country/
Well done USA, that extra atmospheric CO2 is much needed by the planet.
So as long as China’s per capita emissions are lower than that of other countries, the Chinese can keep popping out those coal-fired power plants. Way to go, Bob. I’m sure the Chinese will be pleased at your rationalizations.
Furthermore, Bob. What a great way to tell all of us here and everywhere that you really don’t give a rat’s ass about the so-called climate crisis or carbon emissions.
So what? I thought the total amount of CO2 being put into the atmosphere was what mattered?
At least it should be if your goal was to stop the mythical global warming.
“I thought the total amount of CO2 being put into the atmosphere was what mattered?“
History doesn’t matter? That channels those who in 1865 who said “You’re free. See ya soon.”.
Most of the present problem is from past rich nation emissions.
Define the “present problem.” Please use data and precise and accurate technical terms.
Null hypothesis stands: there is no human CO2-caused “problem.”
bob,
see Janice above.
Please define not just ‘present problem’; please define what you mean by “most of the present problem”.
Given this definition we will be able to figure out what is left over … “remainder of the present problem”. Is the remainder 48%? Who/what is responsible for the 48%? Is it the poor nations past emissions? Are there ‘median’ nations (not rich/not poor) that are responsible for anything … which nations are those?
Did you see biden on tv last night? He seemed to think his biggest problem was the framing of the messaging … and the lack of understanding of the masses. Help me understand.
Blob, you failed to address this question from Janice.
Define the āpresent problem.ā
What the hell does per capita emissions have to do with anything?
Why that metric?
Why not land area?
Why not names that start with ‘Z’?
Why not emissions/intellectual theft?
Why not CO2 benefits/CO2 harms?
Why keep making a fool of yourself?
“What the hell does per capita emissions have to do with anything? Why that metric?”
It’s the single best metric of how much carbon we use, compared to to other lands. Hint: Less is better
“Why not land area?”
Why? We are discussing people. This is the same kind of thinking leads one of our political parties to think that states with more acres/person deserve electoral weighting.
“Why not names that start with āZā?”
I hope even you know why not.
“Why not emissions/intellectual theft?”
Are they “stealing” emissions? And intellectual theft has nada to do with this.
Why not CO2 benefits/CO2 harms?
I’m all for that. You really aren’t.
“Why keep making a fool of yourself?”
You need to work on your self awareness.
The US has also reduced its emissions more than any other nation. You should give credit where it is due.
And it’s not just China.
India Reopens 100 Coal Mines ā Watts Up With That?
It really is amazing how many hoops the trolls will jump through in order to excuse the behavior of their pay masters. If it what’s being emitted now doesn’t matter, then let’s bring back coal plants. At least they created reliable energy that people could afford.
The issue, of course, is that you guys use “bu bu bu bu what about China” as an excuse for us not to do anything.
Because other people are drilling holes in the lifeboat is not a reason for us to continue drilling our own holes.
1) If China’s increase is many times bigger than our decrease, then our decreases are meaningless.
2) There is not and never has been any need to do anything.
3) The fact that you defend China’s increases is proof that this was never about climate.
What a moronic analogy.
How is feeding the planet’s plant life got anything to do with drilling holes in a boat.
Be very glad that current CO2 levels are not down around 200ppm, there would be a lot less food to feed the world’s population.
Somehow, we need to push it up past 600ppm. !
CO2 at 600 ppm would just about guarantee the eventual flooding of millions upon millions of people’s homes along the world’s coastlines.
You really have drunk the kool-aide, haven’t you.
Going from 280 to 420 ppm has had no impact on the world’s temperatures. Why should we believe that going from 420 to 600 is going to be so devastating?
re: “Going from 280 to 420 ppm has had no impact on the worldās temperatures.”
Simply because the great and powerful MarkW has declared it to be so.
Meanwhile, every major scientific organization on the entire planet says otherwise. And they have over a century’s worth of well verified evidence to back what they say.
Sorry, MarkW, but I’ll accept what major scientific organization on the entire planet says over what you say any day of the week and twice on Sundays.
MGC and BugOilBoob are just demonstrating that stopping the mythical climate change was never their primary goal.
Here’s my reason for doing nothing- the high non-correlation between T & C! š®
Ah, this laughable old cartoon again, that so many skeptics want to pretend actually “means” something.
Of course there have been other factors also influencing the climate throughout geological history. Like the fact that the sun’s heat output was much less hundreds of millions of years ago , so it would not be really really warm way back then, even with lots of CO2 in the air. But folks who rely on this cartoon as their “evidence” always somehow conveniently forget things like that.
Sorry, but the existence of other factors does not provide “evidence” that CO2 does “not” influence the climate.
And meanwhile, there’s over a century’s worth of overwhelming evidence, from many lines of inquiry, that CO2 has significant climatic influence. Maybe try learning about some of that evidence for a change.
Please tell me, MGC. How is the climate currently changing that has you so alarmed?
Maybe someone should publish it.
And once again, MGC demonstrates that not only does he not know any science, he’s proud of his ignorance.
The sun was not much less, it was only about 10% less and has been increasing steadily, it did not go up and down by huge amounts, the way it would have have to done if it was responsible for the warmings and coolings seen in the chart.
If CO2 was actually the all powerful gas that you so desperately want to paint it as, then CO2 levels over 5000ppm should surely be able to compensate for a sun that was 10% less luminous.
re: “it was only about 10% less”
10% less solar irradiance is a decrease of around 23 W/m2 at the earth’s surface. 5000 ppm CO2 represents a 13.5 W/m2 increase in radiative forcing over today’s values.
Who here exactly is “ignorant and proud of it”?
And me we continue to add GHGs to the air!!! The difference between the West & the
ChiComms is they’re not stupid enough yet to destroy the reliables & rely on the ruinables!
me = may
Back on your meds dude.
It’s pretty ironic to see an article here about “miscommunication”. Willis E. has admitted directly that WUWT itself publishes obviously false content.
Willis E:
“People say ‘But WUWT publishes some things that are obviously false’ … ”
“Thatās true.”
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2020/12/30/a-new-years-look-at-wuwt/
Kinda left out this part:
“The more that incorrect ideas get exposed to critical review, the sooner they will be shown to be incorrect.”
What, MGC cherry-picked the quote?
It’s not like he’s actually trying to argue honestly.
re: āThe more that incorrect ideas get exposed to critical review, the sooner they will be shown to be incorrect.ā
This is, of course, an utterly ridiculous rationalization for publishing known-to-be-false content. Ideas that are already known to be “obviously false” do not need to be “shown to be incorrect”.
Moreover, it is very apparent from article comments that lots of WUWT readers actually believe these incorrect and obviously false ideas.
Publishing false content is a clear disservice to the public.
Fascinating how reality is obviously incorrect and false.
BTW, I notice that you define “correct” as anything published that you agree with.
Fascinating how MarkW apparently doesn’t even want to believe Willis E., who has directly stated that yes, WUWT does publish “obviously false” content.
You really refuse to understand what other people have written.
Willis’s point, which you work so hard to avoid is that anyplace where lots of things are published, there will be from time to time things published that are wrong.
When that happens it is rapidly pointed out and corrected. Unlike your favorite sites, where when errors are pointed out, those who are so uncouth as to point out the errors are quickly banned.
re: “there will be from time to time things published that are wrong.When that happens it is rapidly pointed out and corrected.”
Again, this “rapidly pointed out and corrected” claim is made all the time, but it is simply not so. There are many instances of false content not only being published, but being repeated again later. Not in any way “corrected”. And lots of readers actually believe this false content.
Fake misinformation from MGC, yet again
Not a drop of honesty.
Of course you have to show the fake data if you want to show it is fake.
Again, your own Willis E has directly admitted that WUWT publishes “obviously false” content. I’m merely reporting facts that you want to try to pretend away.
Once again, we see that MGC isn’t smart enough to let go of a lie when he’s called on it.
It’s so sad to see folks like MarkW continue to hide from reality.
How many times must it be pointed out that even Willis E has directly admitted that WUWT publishes āobviously falseā content.
ššš
You edited WE’s comment so that it is presented out of context, and what’s more, you either didn’t understand the point he was making, or chose to distort it, which is basically lying. Why would you write something that makes you look like an unethical advocate of alarmism? Did you think that nobody would take the time to review your link? Or are you desperate to make any converts, even of lazy people?
Why do you purposely kick the chair out from under yourself? There are plenty of ‘friends’ here who will gladly do it for you.
I understood exactly the point that was trying to be made, Clyde. It was a ridiculous rationalization for pretending that publishing obviously false content was “OK”. There is no need whatever to expose already-known-to-be-false content to critical review.
Moreover, a quick look at the comments to articles containing obviously false content demonstrates that lots of WUWT readers actually believe these incorrect ideas.
I did not quote the entirety of the statement because the rest of it is simply wrong.
You’re sounding like Justin Trousseau alleging that people who disagree with his politics have –
“unacceptable views”
(He probably wanted to say “deplorables”, but then he remembered how THAT turned out . . . )
Again, it’s already been admitted by WUWT writers like Willis E. that “obviously false” content is actually published here.
And there’s a big difference between scientific facts that are based upon reliable, well verified evidence and mere “views”.
Quit lying and use the whole quote. Repeating the same lie over and over again only works in your own mind. We aren’t fooled.š
I didn’t use the whole quote, Matthew, because the rest of it is so terribly wrong. There is no need to publish what are already known as obviously false ideas so that “the sooner they will be shown to be incorrect.ā They are already known to be incorrect.
The quote is nothing but a ridiculous rationalization for publishing known false content.
The truth doesn’t get MGC where he wants to go.
Obviously false content is published in Nature and Science, like just about anything by Mann or Jones et al
Another tired old parroting of the “Mann was wrong” fairy tale talking points.
Mann’s research results have been corroborated and verified over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over again, by multiple research teams from all over the world, using all kinds of different techniques.
It’s time to accept reality, pal.
I did not quote the entirety of MGC’s statement because the rest of it is simply wrong.
so your a liar ?
Everybody makes mistakes from time to time. If you publish lots of stuff, some of it is going to be wrong. It’s inevitable.
The question then becomes what do you do about it.
Here at WUWT, errors get pointed out and corrected.
At any alarmist rag, dissent is not permitted and is actively suppressed.
The equivalent of an MGC at the Seattle Times site will quickly be banned.
re: “Everybody makes mistakes from time to time.”
Sorry, but publishing material that is already known to be false, and moreover, publishing said material repeatedly, is not merely a “mistake”.
“Here at WUWT, errors get pointed out and corrected.”
People make this claim all the time, yet there are many, many examples that demonstrate WUWT reality is often exactly the opposite. Article comments routinely show lots of readers actually believing obviously false published content.
I love the way you just declare that you and only you are the repository of what is true and what is false. Not only that, but in your “mind”, everybody agrees with you, they just won’t admit it.
None of the things you have pointed out are false, at best they are things about which there are disagreements. On the other hand, just about everything you have posted is wrong, and has been demonstrated to be wrong over and over again.
Sorry, MarkW, but it is not “just me”. As already stated multiple times now, even WUWT writer Willis E directly admits that WUWT publishes obviously false content.
Not to mention that pretty much the entire professional scientific world also agrees.
re: “None of the things you have pointed out are false”
Oh please. All kinds of false claims have been posted throughout your commentary to this article. Just a few examples:
“The claims that there are droughts in the southwest are equally unfounded”
“All real world experiments with CO2 show that it only stays around in the atmosphere for a few decades at most”
“Here at WUWT, errors get pointed out and corrected”
“Going from 280 to 420 ppm has had no impact on the worldās temperatures”
“There is not and never has been any need to do anything”
“the global warming ‘scam’ “
“CO2 is rising at a fairly linear 2.5 ppm per year”
All easily demonstrated as obviously false.
A few questions for the author of this piece:
1- despite some water availability improvements that were mentioned in your article, much of the area east of the cascades is still listed as being in “severe drought” conditions:
https://www.drought.gov/states/washington
Why has that data been ignored in your criticism of the Seattle Times piece? It seems to me that they are simply reporting that data. If you disagree with that data, then provide sufficient evidence to support such a position. A single picture is not sufficient evidence.
2- what is the source of the “soil moisture” map included in your article? You mention that in the map, green is “normal” soil moisture. But much of the area east of the cascades is white, and some part is yellow. What do those colors indicate?
3- Why do you claim that RCP8.5 represents “totally unrealistic assumptions for increases in greenhouse gases” ? RCP8.5 is just the “business as usual” case. Please explain why “business as usual” is supposedly “unrealistic”.
4- What actual evidence is available to demonstrate that the Colorado 2080 projections are on track to be “wrong”? Sorry, but “because I say so” doesn’t count.
Isn’t that basically what you are depending on to refute Cliff Mass?
Oh please, Clyde. Of course, no. The article is relying on U.S. Drought Monitor data.
And as every good warmunist knows, if it’s produced by government, it must be true.
Same tired old zero evidence conspiracy theory excuses.
So, why do you keep doing it?
re: “So, why do you keep doing it?”
I don’t. Why do you write false statements like that?
Self awareness is one of the first thing a troll loses.
I’m guessing that MGC hopes that if he keeps making the same point, over and over again, eventually people will get tired of pointing out his mistakes.
Dr. Mays provides actual data. MGC declares that the models disagree with the data, therefor the data must be wrong.
PS: Just because a couple of liars declare that 8.5 is “business as usual” doesn’t make it so, no matter how much you wish it to be true. 8.5 assumes growth rates in CO2 emissions that are many times greater than has ever been seen in history.
Dr Mays does not provide any data about a drought in Eastern WA. He talks about soil moisture and water for irrigation. While those will reduce the effects of the drought for the current season, he does not show there isn’t a drought.
Do you see the difference? Drought is based upon a deficit from the average precipitation over time. Droughts are not based on soil moisture.
Droughts may not be defined by soil moisture, however soil moisture is an indicator of drought. If there is above average moisture in the ground, then you aren’t having a drought. Regardless of what the models say.
But is there actually “above average moisture in the ground” ?
The author mentioned that in the map presented in this article, “green represents above average”. But most of the area east of the cascades is not green and is not “above average”.
Yet another MarkW falsehood.
Schwalm, Spencer, & Duffy
Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences
August 2020
āNot only are the emissions consistent with RCP8.5 in close agreement with historical total cumulative CO2 emissions (within 1%), but RCP8.5 is also the best match out to midcentury under current and stated policies with still highly plausible levels of CO2 emissions in 2100ā³
When you look at idiotic “predictions” using 8.5, you can see just how moroncally bad climate models really are.
And of course , totally devoid of any sort of reality.
Let’s push that aCO2 up to 600ppm, and get the world’s plant life really really happy.
I won’t have any affect whatsoever on the climate.
Yet another typical “Nuh Uh because I say so” type of response, devoid of any evidence or rational justification
1,2- Do intense research on the accuracy of those maps over 10 yrs taking numerous datapoints
& report back to us then to see what you discovered.
3- https://judithcurry.com/2021/05/19/projecting-manmade-climate-change-scenarios-to-2050/
3,4- The graph below shows “wot done them in” as far as worst case/too hot scenarios. Just
because GHGs would drive Ts higher, doesn’t mean they will. Climate’s interdependent & non-linear.
If their current climate models were tuned to have no heating in the tropopause, maybe there output
would be much more accurate, too!
I don’t see anything on the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI) for Washington state that suggests that there is man made climate catastrophe happening.
A closer look…
Copied from my comment “above”, itself copied from the AR6 WG-III report (FAQ 3.3, on page 3-118) :
The IPCC now, in AR6, explicitly states that “RCP8.5 ā BaU”.
– – – – –
IPCC AR6, WG-I report, section 1.6.1.4, “The likelihood of reference scenarios, scenario uncertainty and storylines”, page 239 :
You can argue semantics about how “unrealistic” and “counterfactual” are not synonyms until you’re blue in the face.
The IPCC says that RCP8.5 in in the “counterfactual” range of CO2 emissions scenarios (see graph below).
– – – – –
The RCP (CMIP5, for AR5, 2013) “pathways” used a common set of “Historical Data” up to (December) 2005, and only split into separate sets of “projections” from (January) 2006 onwards.
It is hardly surprising that the “cumulative” emissions from 1750 to 2005 (255 years …) for all of the RCP pathways (not just RCP8.5 …) are “accurate”, and have only deviated by (less than) 1% in the 16.5 years since then.
Claiming the cumulative (since 1750) CO2 emissions numbers are “within 1%” of actual emissions is irrelevant.
NB : The SSP (CMIP6, for AR6, 2021/2) pathways updated their “Historical Data” numbers to (December) 2014. The deviation of the “cumulative” numbers over the last 7.5 years will be even less significant.
See the graph below of annual (FF&I) CO2 emissions (since 2000 / this century) for just how deceptive trying to “move the goalposts” to cumulative emissions (since 1750) really is.
See the graph below for concrete empirical evidence of how the “RCP8.5 is within 1% of actual emissions” claim can reasonably be asserted to have been “thoroughly debunked” for (at least) the post-2014 period.
That’s a great image by Jack Graham. In the southeast part — called “The Palouse” — settlers used horses, mules, and windmills to survive. It was/is called dry-land farming for a reason.
Search images with this string; “harvesting wheat with mules and horses”
Domestic and stock water was pumped; use this string: “original farm windmill”
My dad in worked in The Palouse in 1936 harvesting wheat. I just found a video of it from 1938.
They had a 5-man crew- driver, header-puncher, brake/engine man, & two sackers. My dad had to
keep the header low enough to cut the wheat but out of the dirt as the coulees & hills made that
quite a chore!
https://www.pinterest.com/pin/368802656967156115/
That is a great video.
In the early 1950s a friend and I rode the wagon behind the (powered) harvester of his uncle. We tied the bags of grain and piled them behind us on the wagon.
In the video a similar sequence is seen about 35 to 45 seconds. I was too small to lift the sacks, so I would drag mine out of the way and an older person would lift it into place.
In the video the bags get dropped on the ground, to be picked up later. Ouch! It hurts just thinking about that.
You were never too small to contribute what you could!
The terrain’s quite rugged. Combines are kept leveled so all the grain & straw doesn’t
shift to the downhill side.
Cow and sheep farts to be taxed by New Zealand in world firstNew Zealand, home to 5 million people, has about 10 million cattle and 26 million sheep.
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/world-news/2022/06/08/cow-sheep-burps-taxed-new-zealand-world-first/
Average New Zealander (vegetarians and many of the NZ politicians even more so) probably fart as mach as one sheep.
From your link:
āThere is no question that we need to cut the amount of methane we are putting into the atmosphere, and an effective emissions pricing system for agriculture will play a key part in how we achieve that,ā said James Shaw, climate change minister.
____________________________________________________________
Really there’s no question about regulating methane because of “Climate Change”? It would be nice if someone would come up with prediction of how much methane is on course to run up global temperature by 2100. So far that estimate is glaringly missing from what we are being told by main stream media and climate science.
There are estimates available. The bottom line is that with methane emissions being about 3-orders of magnitude smaller than CO2, and most of it natural, the pledges to reduce anthro’ methane are just virtue signaling.
Industrial agriculture is vital to us. But it is not a “natural” source.
Yes, wiki. If you have a substantive rebut to their data, provide better. After all, it’s your claim.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Methane_emissions
Methane has a relatively short life of 12 years compared to the hundreds or even thousands of years that CO2 hangs around.
If a herd of cattle emits the same amount of methane over 12 years, they are contributing to warming for (only) those 12 years.
https://clear.ucdavis.edu/explainers/why-methane-cattle-warms-climate-differently-co2-fossil-fuels#:~:text=Methane%20stays%20in%20our%20atmosphere,that%20CO2%20hangs%20around.
All real world experiments with CO2 show that it only stays around in the atmosphere for a few decades at most.
So they’re going to tax their prime exports before it leaves the country
Clever
Cliff – Back in 2018, the South Sound newspaper The News Tribune printed an alarming article, apparently drawn from one of the national news services, regarding ‘dwindling snowpack in the western United States’. At the time, the snowpack in Washington State was near or above normal – the ‘journalists’ as well as the editors just let the partial truth be published, without vetting the data concerning the locale where they purvey the paper. Lazy journalism, or purposeful omission to perpetuate a narrative?
Back then, my Letter To The Editor was in fact published in the TNT, to their credit they did offer a humble apology. Here is the letter that I submitted to them:
“Editors – Posted 11 March 2018 edition is an article titled ‘Study Shows Western Snowpack Dwindling’. This is a very misleading study, when juxtaposed against actual snowpack data for specifically the Pacific Northwest drainage basins, as detailed in this link: https://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/snow/snow_map.html. Also, for 2018 the snowpack data show that out of 11 snowshed areas, 9 are well above normal, with two areas near normal (see: https://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/ftpref/data/water/wcs/gis/maps/wa_swepctnormal_update.pdf). These actual measurements belie the referenced research article, at least for the PNW snow/watersheds. Very misleading article that does not include all available research or measurements that would allow readers to accurately interpret what is happening in our state, as compared to other areas of the Western US. Strongly urge you all to provide these information sources to your readers as well as the alarming article referenced above. Don’t want readers to go away with only half of the actual information, would we? Respectfully submitted, MCR”
I tend to think that, for the journalists of today it is a combination of lazy journalism, combined with a lifetime of indoctrination in the belief that nothing positive can occur with weather, due to the perceived deleterious effects to ‘climate’ from Carbon Dioxide released into the atmosphere via burning of petroleum or methane. For the PNW, ample water/snowpack (the two are inseparable for this region) is considered a positive circumstance!
Keep up the Good Fight,
Regards,
MCR
Add to lazy, indoctrinated journalists, the reduction of reporter staffing, requiring reporters to turn out more copy per hour. There is not time to check a story, nor the resources to do so.
There is an old saying: “If something is worth doing, it is worth doing well.” Perhaps the ‘news’ media should focus on quality rather than quantity.
That all depends on what you are trying to do.
If their goal is to produce brainless propaganda, then they are doing their job very well.
In the movie ‘His Girl Friday‘, Cary Grant and the other news reporters epitomize reporters doing their jobs well.
That is, reporting anything as exciting news tidbits, not facts, keeps the bosses thinking the reporter is working; not drinking and playing poker.
Anything was fair game to be written into lurid news articles comprising sparse levels of accuracy.
The exciting news tidbits tend to be a very long way away from factual. What facts actually get included tend to be salacious or gory.
Rosalind Russell depicted a true journalist who capably wove critical facts/details into well written informative news.
Al Capp and Walt Kelley both mocked the nation’s news services.
The Photograph only carries the date of the article. The image is intended to send the explicit message about the current status of the drought in eastern Washington. Yet the current status of the drought in Eastern Washington is green not beige. Furthermore, ripe grain is always beige when it is harvested regardless of the amount of moisture in the soil. And threshing and winnow grain always produces a big discharge of dust. Finally, this is the silliest aspect of the article; a field of ripe grain is not a sign signifying drought but the exact opposite. LOL
I know porn when I see it. I know BS when I see it.
From my home in Central Oregon, I jealously watched the southern edge of a continuous string of storms pass by all winter. I watched TV news reports of floods and record rainfall from BC to Mt. Hood, all just out of reach. Then April-May storms sagged south and saved the season for us locally but not our neighbors to the south and east. People that believe that Times article either just arrived earlier this week or were in hibernation the last 8 months. It was a wet winter and spring in eastern Washington. The forecast is for more rain this week.
Ps. I spent Memorial Day weekend in the Cascades. We put an awning over the fire pit and anchored it down so it wouldn’t blow away. It rained hard but then turned to snow. We gave up and went home on Sunday.
I found an article here that uses the same picture — I didn’t see a link to the article in question. I found it here — https://www.seattletimes.com/seattle-news/environment/whats-in-store-for-eastern-wa-as-water-becomes-more-scarce-throughout-the-west/.
I can only assume this is the article in question. Here’s the full paragraph you quoted from:
“Eastern Washington isnāt facing the same extreme water shortages wreaking havoc in the desert southwest, but dry years have become a near constant. Even now, after a cool, wet spring, the U.S. Drought Monitor places most of Washington east of the Cascades in moderate to severe drought.”
I see no reason to believe that’s not an accurate assessment of what the U.S. Drought Monitor says.
Cliff Mass does a poor job of refuting the article. Water of irrigation and high soil-moisture doesn’t mean there is not a drought. That’s not how droughts are defined. In the article I found, no specific climate studies are referenced, except a mention of unnamed climate projections.
I’m among the many WUWT readers who can show those projections aren’t worth the paper napkin they’re written on but that doesn’t mean Cliff Mass’ criticism are correct.
Is there an unpost? This is a reply to TheFinalNail.
The claims that there are droughts in the southwest are equally unfounded.
The ST picture looks like a wheat field being harvested. Here is Kansas, wheat fields always look like “amber waves of grain” during harvest and there’s always wheat dust flying around the combine. A month or two before harvest they are bright green.
An idea would be for little newspapers to be created that correct the stories of the big newspapers in a city. It could be an electronic one offered to subscribers to the big paper. A nice green grasses picture like that in this article and a short audio interview with a local farmer. Maybe called Seattle Tymes Redux.
The Seattle Times is a Blethen paper, like many of my local Maine papers. Founded by Alden Blethen of Maine in 1896, I think. This is not the worst that rag is capable of, they were instrumental in sending me to prison on bogus charges some years back. I believe the Seattle based “journalists” do the actual writing and the Maine hacks do the cutting and pasting while smoking a fatty or two. I can say that with some authority because I have been to a Kennebec journal Christmas party and “That Smell” permeated the entire area around the hotel. To be fair, the local sportswriters are excellent. They have to write their own material and actually get out of the office. They are pretty formidable drinkers, though.
Looks like we have a lot of readers that need to review the definition of the word drought.
From weather.gov — “What Is Drought? Drought is a deficiency in precipitation over an extended period. It is a part of normal climate variability in many climate zones. The duration of droughts varies widely. Drought can develop quickly and last only for a matter of weeks, exacerbated by extreme heat and/or wind, but more commonly drought can persist for months or years. <more…> https://www.weather.gov/safety/drought#:~:text=Drought%20is%20a%20deficiency%20in,duration%20of%20droughts%20varies%20widely.
Sure looks to me like Eastern WA is in a drought. Droughts aren’t measured by soil moisture. Having lots of water for irrigation does not mean there is no drought.
The headline for the article online is Whatās in store for Eastern WA as water becomes more scarce throughout the West?
Cliff Mass’ blog post says the headline isn’t true. The article is based upon current conditions and climate projections and nowhere in his post does Cliff May show there is not a drought currently in Eastern WA.
He go on to say there isn’t a water shortage in Eastern WA. This is a straw man argument.
Cliff Mass didn’t show the climate projections to be false. The online article gives no source for the projections used for the article. While most of us are familiar with the low quality of climate models and the useless nature of their projections, this also is not addressed in the blog post in question.
“Eastern WA faces another summer of scarce water supplies.”
The Seattle Times.
He go[es] on to say there isnāt a water shortage in Eastern WA. This is a straw man argument.
jeffery p
Water supply is the issue.
“Cliff Mass didnāt show the climate projections to be false”
They are a fantasy, built on unvalidated computer games.
Nobody has to prove anything
Has anyone proved that the tooth fairy doesn’t exist.
Every time I’ve cited peer reviewed science in support of a comment the Times has removed it. They allow violations of terms of use for the people name calling me a denier and worse but empirical evidence that destroys the narrative is forbidden.
ABC news closed their comment section several weeks ago. So they no longer have to contend with contrary voices such as ours.
The Hill closed theirs a while back because the false narratives were being destroyed in the comment sections.
Almost all of the “news” outlets have removed them, even local stations and newspapers.
Having lived and gone to university in the Palouse region of eastern Washington/north Idaho, it’s important that springs be cool and wet to promote growth of their main crops – winter wheat, and dried peas and lentils, but that the summer when the harvest takes place to be warm and dry. The worst thing that can happen to a ripening grain crop is excessive rain which can literally rot the crop on the stem, and also makes it difficult to harvest the crops The picture showing all the green above taken last week is perfect … and now over the next month it needs to dry out to keep production up.
Liars can spin things to make them sound exactly the opposite of the truth … and did so here.
So far this spring there has been a never ending stream of storm clouds generating in the Western Pacific which then move over the western US. It rained here in NorCal last weekend, and rain is also forecast for this upcoming weekend. The weather forecast for Thursday, the 9th, was for 89F last week. Now that forecast is at 85F as overhead clouds continue to cool the region.
Not sure when the picture was taken but it seems to be showing a wheat field with a combine during harvest. That would show golden grain and straw and not drought. The other picture seems to show current conditions, wet and green – pre-harvest. Have family all thru the high desert of eastern WA and OR. Nothing new here either way!!
Miscommunication? No, it’s called lies. At best, disinformation.
When the facts do not support you, very few will notice if you fall back on lies.
Nice word, that – “miscommunication.” Really, what is now called “disinformation” – but what old-timers like me call “bald faced lying.”
The default response to the offense of disinformation propaganda is always a self-righteous appeal to “what about this…and this and this and this and this and this”.
.
This is the reason why posts like this one (Seattle Post Article on Eastern Washington Drought) are so important in WUWT. Expose propaganda for what it isā¦. a manipulative derangement of facts. The default response to the offense of disinformation propaganda is always a self-righteous appeal to “what about this…and this and this and this and this and this”. And the issue of a particular offense to truth, (a disinformation article) gets lost in the sauce of existential commitments within a myriad of supposedly higher more relevant truths. This seems to happen no matter how offensive the disinformation is to the truth. Now if the grid of truth consensus is rooted in a grid of disinformation propaganda, then the higher truths will be a matter of subjective conviction with facts strewn about. In our effort to stand for the truth, we must stand on particular facts and the particulars of real evidence even when no one else is playing by the logic of cause and effect or the ethics of truth. Where our evidence lacks the rigors of science, we must be humble. We must avoid being like the very thing we oppose. If a hypothesis is a hypothesis call it hypothesis…a theory…a theory. Increasingly people are abandoning the logic of cause and effect and the ethics of truth in public discourse. The use of propaganda disinformation must be opposed whether they are for us or against us.
Just for fun,
I have watched a bunch of old 007 movies lately…. lots of shorelines, beaches
etc….they look the same 50-60 years later. Yet I cannot conclude that sea
levels have not risen based on my observation. My observation is only the
beginning of the scientific endeavor. Most people like myself, (gardener,
theologian, social worker) have no knowledge or interest in all the variables
of sea level (submarine volcanism, water temp, gravitation variance, Wind and
ocean currents, trash dumping, cliffs falling, bird poop, space junk, huge
cavasses opening under water, ice melting, tidal forces) but I was trained in
the complexities of the logic of cause and effect and the ethics of truth. It
seems that the logic of cause and effect has been lost on our youth and
something else has taken over.
August 16,2008, the August skies in PA appeared as if the month of August had rapidly
fled into late Sept. My potatoes crop failed to have a third set with healthy
plants. My working hypothesis at the time was that there is something about the
sun that I had no knowledge of: variability in irradiance. So, I sought an
answer on the internet and found WUWT. I discovered that the sun was in the
deep slumber of the minimum of SC 23 and had a very large corona mass ejection
significantly reducing irradiance even to the naked eye. 2010, the sun picked
up and I had a bumper crop of giant potatoes and tomatoes. And again, the
minimum of SC 24, resulted in several dim and wet summers 2018,2019 and 2020.
Then I learned that cosmic radiation increased cloud cover and rain. Those wet
dim years made gardening much harder. I assumed that increased cosmic radiation
due to the solar minimum was the reason gardening was so hard those year. Yet my assumption was based on a hypothesis not fact. Increased cosmic radiation is a fact of the solar cycle and its impact on the atmosphere with increased cloud cover is a fact but the relationship between those two facts and my gardening experience are nothing more than a hypothesis that needs further investigation…that I will never do. This is the logic that
has been lost.
I mean Seattle Times … not Post but they are hardly different.
I wouldn’t put it past the psychopaths running WA state to sell the water to another state or another country and just concoct a false narrative that there are drought condition in order to explain away the shortfall. Hell, these democrats are so insane over their climate cult agenda that they’d dump the water in to the ocean to force a drought to “prove” their climate cult voodoo predictions are correct. That’s how crazy people running things are now.
https://www.wcc.nrcs.usda.gov/ftpref/data/water/wcs/gis/maps/wa_swepctnormal_update.pdf