Help Me . . . I'm melting!

The USA Today newsrag ran another "politics passing as science" story yesterday. The headline read: This was the hottest summer since 1936, report says. The subhead claimed: Climate chief sees trend towards warmer weather. The intent of the story was to scare people into swallowing the "global warming" nonsense.

The refuge of all bad politicians, and the easily duped media in their pockets, is half truths and intimidation. The story went on to say: "The USA sweated this year through its hottest summer in 70 years, with temperatures not seen since the Dust Bowl of the 1930s, according to a government report."

"From June 1 to Aug. 31, as summer is defined by the National Climatic Data Center, the continental USA had an average temperature of 74.5 degrees, based on readings from hundreds of weather stations nationwide. It was the second hottest summer temperature the government has recorded since it started keeping track in 1895. The only one warmer - by about two-tenths of a degree - was 1936."

They included a graph showing the ten hottest summers since 1895 to further inflame us. I've reproduced it below:

• 1936............74.73
• 2006...........74.50
• 1934............74.27
• 2002...........73.89
• 1988...........73.86
• 1933............73.59
• 1931............73.50
• 2003...........73.45
• 1937............73.40
• 2001...........73.37

At this point we are supposed to conclude that we are spiraling towards heatwave oblivion because of "greenhouse gasses" and the evils of industrialization.

What I get from the graph is that only four of the years listed are in this decade (2004 and 2005 being notably absent). In fact, listing 2001, 2002, 2003 and 2006 seems to show a broken pattern, not one of escalation.

It also shows that 1931, 1933, 1934, 1936 and 1937 provided a hot decade 70 years ago. Using today's pseudo-science, temperatures should be averaging in the mid 90 degrees by now. But they aren't.

All any of this shows us is that weather occurs in patterns and cycles. Sometimes it is hot and sometimes it is cold. As to the "melting of the icecaps" hysteria, we are simply still at the trailing end of the last ice age and the last of the "extra ice" is still going away. The glaciers and ice caps have been shrinking for as long as man has recorded history. But suddenly Al Gore has noticed it -- so everybody panic!

Yes, we did have a hot summer. We may have more. The winter might be cold or it may be a wet one. It's just weather. So, get a grip.