By Emma Dumain
Two major hurricanes hitting the same region of the country just weeks apart are not moving the needle for most congressional Republicans when it comes to endorsing tougher action against climate change.
After Hurricanes Helene and Milton devastated huge swaths of the Southwest and continue to stress the limits of federal disaster relief coffers, Republicans are by and large still not ready to change the way they react and respond to natural disasters, which studies show to be growing in both intensity and frequency as global warming persists.
Their reasons range broadly from questioning the science to offering solutions different to what advocates and other experts say is needed. Most Republicans don’t see climate change as a crisis and the storms aren’t changing that.
c
Webster was one of 42 GOP members of the House and Senate contacted by POLITICO’s E&E News this week, asking if they believed the severity of the storms were exacerbated by global warming and if those storms would motivate lawmakers to endorse reducing greenhouse gas emissions — many of them from burning fossil fuels — that scientists call the major cause of climate change.
…
In the end, only three House Republicans and one Republican senator — Marco Rubio of Florida — responded to the requests. None of them attributed the strength of the storms to climate change.
“Congresswoman Mace is a strong advocate for bipartisan action on extreme weather and clean energy, but she’s also clear-eyed about Biden-Harris and the Left’s reckless climate spending,” said Gabrielle Lipsky, a spokesperson for Rep. Nancy Mace (R-S.C.), who represents coastal Charleston and is a member of the Conservative Climate Caucus.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
“asking if they believed the severity of the storms were exacerbated by global warming”
Answer should be a flat out.. NO !! (as per the IPCC)
DeSantis gave a pretty good response to this type a question a few topics back.
Warming should, theoretically, reduce the temperature differential, hence reducing severity of hurricanes etc.
This theory is backed by actual data which shows global ACE trending downwards since the 1990s
Leftist wackos believe CO2 controls hurricanes and climate.
Conspiracy wackos believe secret government weather controls steer hurricanes to where they need them to wreak havoc.
And rightist wackos think the lefties control the hurricanes… Just ask MTG.
“Yes they can control the weather. It’s ridiculous for anyone to lie and say it can’t be done,”
https://www.axios.com/2024/10/10/mtg-hurricane-milton-helene-house-republicans
So we can agree they’re both wrong.
karlomonte just said that. Meanwhile leftist wackos believe that Jews control the weather.
https://forward.com/fast-forward/396810/watch-dc-councilman-says-rothschild-family-controls-the-weather/
I think we can agree that the guy quoted in that story is as crazy as MTG.
“Righties” (correcties) don’t think Lefties can control hurricanes, Lefties themselves think they can control hurricanes by simply dialing down the magic CO2 knob.
Yeah but not a quick fix sadly.
Why is it sad? Boo hoo, I want my mommy never worked anyway.
Sorry, how old are you?
DeSantis also said that there was a stronger hurricane in 1935. That’s counter to the current global warming nonsense.
It is hard to know what the actual data is. Here is how the MSM hyped Milton.
Spencer stating:
Hurricane Milton wind speeds at landfall: Another case of exaggerated estimates? I went through all the highest sustained wind speeds the Hurricane Center listed for several hours around landfall time: The average observed by stations was 67 mph, and the average of the NHC [National Hurricane Center] official value was 114 mph. That’s a 47-mph difference. The best positioned station was just offshore of Venice Beach, which measured 78 mph at landfall, which was 42 mph lower than the NHC estimate (120 mph). The same thing happened with Helene: our UAH storm intercept team measured only 60 mph at landfall, whereas the NHC value was 140 mph.
There is good reason for the National Hurricane Center to be cautious when a hurricane is approaching landfall, but to exaggerate the wind speed at landfall by 50% is inappropriate.
“Most Republicans don’t see climate change as a crisis and the storms aren’t changing that. Well, duh! They’re intelligent, thinking, folks.
People should not be surprised about hurricanes during hurricane season in hurricane alley. The alarmists seem to be alarmed, and disappointed, that other people are not so alarmed by such normal, though quite variable, occurrences. They really want you to be cowering in fear and begging the government to come and save you, so much so that they will actively prevent anyone else from coming to help people affected. In the end, it’s not really about the weather at all, it’s about control.
“People should not be surprised about hurricanes during hurricane season in hurricane alley.”
And during La Niña, no less. La Niña is well known to reduce Atlantic basin wind shear and enhances the Atlantic hurricane season. Case in point, the second half of 2005.
H.L. Mencken said, “The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed — and hence clamorous to be led to safety — by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary.”
As I’ve said before, probably the best summation of the “climate Boogeyman” ever penned.
“None of them attributed the strength of the storms to climate change.”
Good for them! Because no such causation is in evidence. Simple as that.
Politico has another name, Bullshitico.
and globally…
Obviously increasing the amount of man-made CO2 in the atmosphere causes hurricanes to avoid landfall. Why are Democrats not howling for massive increase in atmospheric CO2 after the two disastrous hurricanes last week? Have they no compassion?!
/sarc off/
Their howling is increasing local CO2 which is causing hurricanes to divert and not make landfall.
We should thank them!
(Humor… a difficult concept)
The never ending warmist/alarmist bogus arguments continues while a caveman can look up Atlantic Hurricanes to see there is nothing unusual going on.
You just hurt some caveman’s feelings.
Cavemanist!
A partial list of what Democrats want to blame Republicans for includes slavery, the civil war, the KKK, Jim Crow laws, Vietnam and hurricanes.
1964
Cleo formed third week of August and struck Miami at the end of August as a Cat 2 storm
Dora formed 5 days after Cleo, struck between Daytona Beach and St Augustine as Cat 3 on Sep.10
Category ratings based on Ground Level Airspeed measurements not at 6,500 – 8,000′
So Florida has been hit by multiple storms in a matter of days way back 60 years ago
In fact from 1950 to 1964 (1974?) Florida has been hit by 85 Tropical Storms or Hurricanes.
_tracks.jpg)
Here are their tracks
Politico? They are a joke Leftist rag. You can tell by this story alone. There is too much data that refutes their political bias regarding Global Warming. Just ask Richard Feynman. Such bigoted stories are the norm in “Drive-by Media” these days.
One could claim that climate change makes water wetter, and they would believe it.
“
climate change(global warming) makes water wetter”TRUE …
In the Little Ice Age a lot of water was dry & solid, then as we warmed it melted & got wetter !!
As hurricane intensities and numbers are declining in the real world, as opposed models, continuing what we are currently doing is reasonable.
More hysterical histrionics from the BoM in Australia..
BoM weather warning: ‘Now is the time’: Cyclone warning in Bureau of Meteorology advice for Australians ahead of ‘severe weather season’ | 7NEWS
Note the graphic below is direct from the BoM web site, (by someone who doesn’t know enough to change the series headings).. D’oh !!
The caption below the graph on their web site may give us a hint what the red and yellow represent?
ps, an interesting link of TC tracks for Northern Australia region
Southern Hemisphere Tropical Cyclone Data Portal (bom.gov.au)
Uh, okay, I’m not moving to Phoenix either.
To be fair, it was the southwest part of the southeast.
/S
Politico’s E&E News this Week needs to explain exactly what mechanism would enable CO2 to make storms more severe and frequent.
Bob, you are the smartest commenter on this site!
No explanation required, you just gotta believe.
Life and the comforts of living well and safely is dependent on the human resources available to achieve that comfort and safety.
If we continue to squander our human capital and hard won resources on imaginary impossible to alter issues such as climate change then we must not be surprised when society collapses and reverts to savage survival level.
That sadly is what awaits western society if we continue to spend $billions and ultimately $trillions on false fears, ramped into frenzied demand for changes by the media peddling stories of chaos that are simply untrue.
The truth is, life and climate conditions as currently experienced have never been more benign or more enjoyable. Unfortunately that fundamental position is being denied by the authorities. They are using the media power of communication to suggest things are getting worse. The fact all study shows climate is not deteriorating into some kind of hell on Earth, does not stop the control freaks from saying it is.
We may need to change the old adage, the first casualty of war is truth. Now we can see the first casualty of totalitarianism is truth.
“never been more benign…”
IDK. 1,000 years ago Greenland was warm enough to farm and grapes grew in Newfoundland. Seems like there’s still room for improvement.
Yes, and *improvement* comes from a *WARMER climate,* not a colder climate.
They didn’t call the warmest period during the current epoch, the Holocene, the “Holocene Climate OPTIMUM” because it was so awful.
Florida was hit by four major hurricanes during the 2004 season, then two more very damaging hurricanes in 2005 … and then no more major hurricanes hit the state until 2017, prompting a lot of questions as to why such variances in hurricane activity.
We still don’t know the answer to that, beyond “it’s the weather – it changes”.
Perhaps we’ll eventually figure out the hurricane cycles, which may be affected by factors such as ENSO cycles, solar irradiation, other astrophysical effects (cosmic rays), other ocean current cycles, whatever. What we most definitely DO know is that it’s not due to CO2 and global warming which have remained steady throughout years with lots of Atlantic cyclone activity and years with very little Atlantic cyclone activity.
For example, based upon the tea leaves and animal entrails the hurricane forecasters use, they predicted an extremely active Atlantic hurricane season, with nearly double the number of cyclones, hurricanes, and major hurricanes of an average season … and through most of last month we experienced almost none … and even adding in the late September and early October storms of Helene and Milton, we now are at an average frequency.
Weather changes. Global warming due to rising CO2 is steady, and does not vary wildly year to year and even month to month as does Atlantic cyclone activity. And none of that should have anything to do with politics, but here come the Dems as always trying to make everything political.
it’s not due to CO2 and global warming which have remained steady throughout years with lots of Atlantic cyclone activity and years with very little Atlantic cyclone activity.
Atmospheric CO2 has steadily increased during the period that hurricane activity decreased (2005–20017). It should be obvious that if there’s a connection between CO2 and hurricanes, it’s the opposite of what climastrologists predict.
Why should I change my mind about an invalid connection between CO2 and climate change?
…endorsing tougher action against climate change…
The usual nonsense – as if there was anything that the US can do about climate change! When you are doing only 5 billion tons out of 38 billion, nothing you do will make any material difference, even assuming emissions have the effect the activists claim.
And no-one is looking to the US or UK either for an example of what to do. More staring with amazement at their folly.
Of course there is no such involvement. The Climate Change movement is a nonsense.