In her very good recent piece about global warming on this blog, Ruth Lea wrote that
I believe that man-made global warming is a huge con, propelled by clever propagandists who don the green cloak of environmentalism to wreck freedoms and control people’s lives.
You should Read the Whole Thing, but that's a proposition I broadly agree with. The next question that one might ask is, "if that's so, why are they successful?"
One answer to that question - and I acknowledge that this is probably a deeply unoriginal thought, and also quite a simplistic one - is that there is a ratchet effect in media coverage on the issue. When evidence conforms with that outlook, it's adopted. When it doesn't, it's discarded. So the global warming ratchet tightens every time.
To put it more plainly:
- When it's unseasonably or surprisingly hot: it's global warming.
- When it's unseasonably or surprisingly cold: well what do you expect, it's England in February.
