holman jenkins
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</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">maine timeline:</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font face="Times New Roman" size="4">
</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>2018 (November) The Trump administration issues Volume II of the National Climate Assessment, dramatically challenging its own climate policies</b> </font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">The Global Change Research Act of 1990 mandates that U.S. federal agencies produce a report every four years assessing climate change science and impacts for the United States. Volume II of the Fourth National Climate Assessment [see Vol. I, 2017 (November] strongly affirms both the integrity of climate science and the seriousness of consequences of inaction. As characterized in The Washington Post, “<b>while it avoids policy recommendations, the report’s sense of urgency and alarm stands in stark contrast to the lack of any apparent plan from President Trump to tackle the problems, which, according to the government he runs, are increasingly dire</b>.” </font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Highlights from the Report’s Summary Findings: </b>“rising temperatures, sea level rise, and changes in extreme events are expected to increasingly disrupt and damage critical infrastructure and property, labor productivity, and the vitality of our communities;” “Changes in temperature and precipitation are increasing air quality and health risks from wildfire and ground-level ozone pollution. Rising air and water temperatures and more intense extreme events are expected to increase exposure to waterborne and foodborne diseases, affecting food and water safety. … Climate change is also projected to alter the geographic range and distribution of disease-carrying insects and pests, exposing more people to ticks that carry Lyme disease and mosquitoes that transmit viruses such as Zika, West Nile, and dengue…;” “continued warming that is projected to occur without substantial and sustained reductions in global greenhouse gas emissions is expected to cause substantial net damage to the U.S. economy throughout this century, especially in the absence of increased adaptation efforts. </font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">With continued growth in emissions at historic rates, annual losses in some economic sectors are projected to reach hundreds of billions of dollars by the end of the century—more than the current gross domestic product (GDP) of many U.S. states.”</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>
</b></font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><b style=""> Although the administration releases the report on “Black Friday,” one of the slowest news days of the year, a spokesperson for the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration confirms that “This report has not been altered or revised in any way because of political considerations.”</b> Holman Jenkins, writing in the Wall Street Journal, argues that the media has generally ignored the good news in the report: “The clear lesson of last week’s U.S. government report and every other official assessment is that climate change is not the end of the world. We can handle the cost and we can also handle the cost of avoiding a portion of climate change through sensible tax policy. (It should not be necessary at this point to rehearse the case for a<b style=""> carbon tax that is simultaneously pro-growth and anti-carbon.)</b>.</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">* Brady Dennis and Chris Moody, “Major Trump administration climate report says damage is ‘intensifying across the country’,” Washington Post, November 23, 2018, https://www.washingtonpost.com/energy-environment/2018/11/23/major-trump-administrationclimate-report-says-damages-are-intensifying-across-country/?utm_term=.dfccbeb327fe </font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">U.S. Global Change Research Program, Fourth National Climate Assessment, Volume II: Impacts, Risks, and Adaptation in the United States, Summary Findings, 2018; https://nca2018.globalchange.gov/ </font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"></span><b style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Holman Jenkins, </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">“Press is the Enemy of Climate,” Wall Street Journal, </span></b><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">December 4, 2018, https://www.wsj.com/articles/press-isthe-enemy-of-climate-1543966906 2018 (Novem</span></font></div><div id="siteSub" style="font-size: small; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="margin-top: 8px; margin-bottom: 8px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></p></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">=</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">http://mediamatters.org/research/2016/09/01/study-newspaper-opinion-pages-feature-science-denial-and-other-climate-change-misinformation/212700</font></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">
</font></div><div><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; -webkit-margin-before: 1em; -webkit-margin-after: 1em; line-height: 18.5714px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;"><u style="box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Misinforming Columnists At <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">WSJ </em>And <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Wash. Post</em></font></u></span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; -webkit-margin-before: 1em; -webkit-margin-after: 1em; line-height: 18.5714px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Holman Jenkins:</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> 32 Columns.</span></span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> </span><em style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Wall Street Journal</em><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> editorial board member Holman Jenkins Jr. frequently writes columns dismissing science, attacking climate policies, and defending the fossil fuel industry. During the time period examined, Jenkins authored 18 </span><em style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Journal </em><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">columns that mentioned climate change -- 15 of which denied the consensus that human activities are driving climate change or otherwise misinformed on climate, such as questioning whether climate change is a “problem” or disputing the reliability of climate models to predict future warming. </span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; -webkit-margin-before: 1em; -webkit-margin-after: 1em; line-height: 18.5714px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><b>He also frequently attacked actions aimed at addressing climate change or holding the fossil fuel industry accountable, writing eight columns criticizing government investigations of Exxon, three criticizing the Paris climate agreement, and two criticizing the Environmental Protection Agency’s Clean Power Plan</b>. In one column responding to Climate Nexus’ study of climate denial on the </span><em style="box-sizing: border-box; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Journal</em><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">’s opinion pages, Jenkins declared, "No contributor has written more frequently on the subject of climate change on these pages,” and claimed that his views on the subject are “ploddingly conventional.” Yet he then proceeded to deny climate science by asserting that <b>“science has been unable to discern signal from noise in the hunt for man-made warming.”</b> As climate scientist Steve Sherwood pointed out to DeSmogBlog:</span></font></p><blockquote style="box-sizing: border-box; padding: 25px 30px 10px; margin: 20px 20px 25px; border: 1px solid rgb(170, 170, 170); box-shadow: rgb(204, 204, 204) 0px 6px 0px -4px; clear: both; line-height: 18.5714px; background: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-right: 0px; margin-bottom: 0px; margin-left: 0px; width: 543px; -webkit-margin-before: 1em; -webkit-margin-after: 1em; margin-top: 0px !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">“That’s just not true. There are dozens and dozens of studies that have done exactly this. There’s a whole field of climate science looking at detection and attribution. For example, you can see the human fingerprint of greenhouse gas warming in precipitation extremes, in the vertical pattern of change between the stratosphere and troposphere. And all these studies use observations and models. If you are dismissing models, then that means the person does not understand the scientific process.” [<em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Media Matters</em>, <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bRDqPd8Dt4Z64s13dcdyGbcfVHROb4KrAX50qlM_ttQ/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Frequent Misinformers Spreadsheet</a>, <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PnvucqIBBWlAOgAyBP_G7QLLdtqOIoj0nlW12adewVk/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Climate Denial/Misinformation Spreadsheet</a>; Climate Nexus analysis, accessed <a href="http://static1.squarespace.com/static/534ec657e4b03c887dde2641/t/575f6edd20c647ff95c170a0/1465872094069/FINAL_CN_WSJ_white_paper-0613.pdf" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">9/1/16</a>; Partnership for Responsible Growth, accessed <a href="http://www.partnershipforresponsiblegrowth.org/research-1/climatenexusdatabase" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">9/1/16</a>; DeSmogBlog,<a href="http://www.desmogblog.com/2016/07/01/wall-st-journal-shows-why-it-under-attack-climate-science-denial-publishing-another-dodgy-column" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">7/1/16</a>]</font></p></blockquote><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; -webkit-margin-before: 1em; -webkit-margin-after: 1em; line-height: 18.5714px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;">Kimberley Strassel: Six Columns.</span> <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Journal </em>editorial board member Kimberley Strassel is also a climate science denier, as <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Mother Jones</em> has documented, and her <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Journal </em>columns frequently include climate-related misinformation. Strassel defended Exxon in a June 16 column that peddled the baseless conspiracy theory that the real target of the attorneys general investigations is “a broad array of conservative activist groups that are highly effective at mobilizing the grass-roots and countering liberal talking points.” In it, she falsely claimed that the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC) has never “taken a position on climate,” when in fact ALEC has crafted model legislation that misrepresents science while attacking climate action. Strassel also claimed that the Koch brothers’ front group Americans for Prosperity (AFP) has “never taken a dime from Exxon,” but the group’s predecessor organization received hundreds of thousands from Exxon, and it remains an open question whether Exxon is continuing to funnel money to AFP via dark money groups DonorsTrust and the Donors Capital Fund. In an April 14 column, she claimed that Democratic attorneys general are “pursuing the bogus claim” that Exxon “suppressed climate science,” when in fact they are investigating whether Exxon violated the law by misleading investors about climate change in order to achieve financial gain, regardless of whether Exxon published climate research in journals. And in an April 21 column, she called climate change “the left’s new religion.” [<em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Media Matters</em>, <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bRDqPd8Dt4Z64s13dcdyGbcfVHROb4KrAX50qlM_ttQ/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Frequent Misinformers Spreadsheet</a>; <a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/06/17/wsjs-kimberley-strassel-pushes-illogical-conspiracy-theory-about-exxon-climate-investigations/211024" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">6/17/16</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/07/08/another-day-another-dodgy-defense-exxon-wall-street-journal/211451" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">7/8/16</a>; <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Mother Jones</em>,<a href="http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2016/02/climate-change-skeptic-kimberley-strassel" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">2/13/16</a>]</font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; margin-block: 1em; line-height: 18.5714px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;">George Will: Seven Columns.</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> </span><em style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box;">Washington Post</em><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> columnist George Will, who is also a contributor for Fox News, wrote seven columns about climate change or energy in the time period examined, three of which denied climate science. In two of these columns, Will pointed to natural shifts in the climate hundreds of years ago to cast doubt on the scientific consensus that human activities are driving the climate change that is occurring now. In the other, he dismissively referred to “the supposed warming that supposedly caused Hurricane Katrina.”</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 153, 0);"> Will, who was <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">Media Matters' </em>"Misinformer of the Year" in 2014, </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">has a long track record of pushing climate change misinformation, which led a coalition of advocates to create a 2014 petition -- ultimately signed by 110,000 people -- demanding that the </span><em style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box;">Post</em><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> stop publishing editorial content by Will and others who deny climate science. That same year, Will was also criticized by the Society of Professional Journalists’ then-ethics chair Kevin Smith for not disclosing his involvement in donor summits organized by the oil billionaire Koch brothers while writing columns promoting Koch-backed candidates. [</span><em style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); box-sizing: border-box;">Media Matters</em><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">, </span><a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bRDqPd8Dt4Z64s13dcdyGbcfVHROb4KrAX50qlM_ttQ/edit#gid=0" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);">Frequent Misinformers Spreadsheet</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">, </span><a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PnvucqIBBWlAOgAyBP_G7QLLdtqOIoj0nlW12adewVk/edit#gid=0" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);">Climate Denial/Misinformation Spreadsheet</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">, </span><a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/05/22/neil-degrasse-tyson-debunks-an-anti-science-fox/199435" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);">5/22/14</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">, </span><a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2015/01/09/george-will-misreads-history-to-deny-climate-ch/202079" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);">1/9/15</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">, </span><a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/12/22/misinformer-of-the-year-george-will/201946" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);">12/22/14</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">,</span><a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2014/09/09/60-minutes-gingrich-conflicts-helped-spark-majo/200696" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);">9/9/14</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">; Forecast the Facts, </span><a href="http://web.archive.org/web/20150313214853/http:/forecastthefacts.org/press/releases/2014/2/20/110k-call-washington-post-end-climate-change-denia/" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);">2/20/14</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">; FoxNews.com, accessed </span><a href="http://www.foxnews.com/person/w/george-will.html" style="background-color: transparent; box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204);">9/1/16</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">]</span></font></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; -webkit-margin-before: 1em; -webkit-margin-after: 1em; line-height: 18.5714px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;"><u style="box-sizing: border-box;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">Science-Denying Lawmakers</font></u></span></p><p style="box-sizing: border-box; margin: 0px 0px 10px; -webkit-margin-before: 1em; -webkit-margin-after: 1em; line-height: 18.5714px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><span style="box-sizing: border-box; font-weight: 700;">Antiscience Members Of Congress: Five Op-Eds. </span><em style="box-sizing: border-box;">USA Today</em>, <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">The Wall Street Journal</em>, and <em style="box-sizing: border-box;">The Washington Post</em> all gave space to members of Congress who denied climate science or peddled other misinformation around climate change:</font></p><ul style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-top: 0px; margin-bottom: 10px; line-height: 18.5714px;"><li style="box-sizing: border-box; margin-bottom: 5px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style=""><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"><em style="box-sizing: border-box;">The Wall Street Journal</em> published an April 23, 2015, op-ed by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), who cited “the lack of global warming over the past 15 years”</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> to baselessly dismiss concerns about future climate change.</span></font></li></ul></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman">==</font></div></div>