Does Sterling Burnett actually believe what he says about global warming?

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UPDATE: NASA has released itโ€™s 2008 temperature data finding that last year was the ninth warmest year sinceย 1880.

Sterling Burnett, a โ€œsenior fellowโ€ at the oil industry friendly National Center for Policy Analysis is claiming in a release today that global warming is a hoax because it is cold in Minnesota this winter.ย Really?

If only Burnett were right, we could move on and forget about this whole global warming thing. Unfortunately, Burnett is way off base which is no surprise considering this is the same Fox News pundit that compared Al Goreโ€™s Inconvenient Truth to Nazi war-time propaganda. It looks like Burnett has a penchant for making grandiose claims, most likely because they get him facetime on Foxย News.

Burnett and the NCPAโ€™s press release today declaring that โ€œglobal warming is likely not a result of man-made activitiesโ€ conveniently omits two key facts that seriously bring into question Burnettโ€™s understanding of theย basics:

1. Climate versus weather: the Nobel prize-winning climate scientist Dr. Andrew Weaver recently opined in a news article that, โ€œEvery time there is a freaking snowfall, it seems like everybody is going, โ€˜Whatโ€™s going on?โ€™ Itโ€™s frustrating as a climateย scientist.โ€โ€™

Itโ€™s frustrating for Weaver because people (i.e. Sterling Burnett) get climate and weather confused. In the article โ€œSnowstorms donโ€™t mean climate change threat has passedโ€ Weaver describes weather as โ€œwhat is here and now, like the sun shining or rain falling. Climate, on the other hand, is moreย long-term.โ€

Weaver explained climate change as a โ€œshift in the distribution of the likelihood of the occurrence of weather events towards the warmโ€. He continued, โ€œWhat that means is it doesnโ€™t mean that it will never be cold; it means that the likelihood of it being cold diminishes with time, and the likelihood of it being extremely warm increases withย time.โ€

You would think that someone like Sterling Burnett, who goes around touting himself as a โ€œleading authorityโ€ would understand something so fundamental as the difference between weather andย climate.

2. It is โ€œglobalโ€ warming, not โ€œUnited Statesโ€ warming: using a cold snap in Minnesota as an argument that the entire earth is not warming is just ridiculous. The bottom line is that when you look at the global trends, the average temperature of the planet continues to rise. Hereโ€™s a graph of the global temperatures over the last 126ย years:

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(click toย enlarge)

And hereโ€™s a great video made by the famous broadcaster and Naturalist Sir David Attenborough (of Planet Earth fame) explaining very clearly what is happening with the earthโ€™s globalย temperature:

Now Iโ€™m not a scientist and neither is Burnett, but all of this commonsense information about climate versus weather and global temperatures leads me to believe that *gasp* maybe Burnett is not the โ€œleading authorityโ€ he claims himself to be. Nothing new here, sorry everyone, but regardless of what Burnett wants us to think, global warming is happening, human activity is to blame and the best science is telling us that the consequences will beย dire.


This month weโ€™re giving away FREE copies Coming Clean: Breaking Americaโ€™s Addiction to Oil andย Coal.

Go here to find out more details about DeSmogBlogโ€™s monthly bookย give-away.

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Kevin is a contributor and strategic adviser to DeSmog. He runs the digital marketing agency Spake Media House. Named a โ€œGreen Heroโ€ by Rolling Stone Magazine and one of the โ€œTop 50 Tweetersโ€ on climate change and environment issues, Kevin has appeared in major news media outlets around the world for his work on digital campaigning. Kevin has been involved in the public policy arena in both the United States and Canada for more than a decade. For five years he was the managing editor of DeSmogBlog.com. In this role, Kevinโ€™s research into the โ€œclimate denial industryโ€ and the right-wing think tank networks was featured in news media articles around the world. He is most well known for his ground-breaking research into David and Charles Kochโ€™s massive financial investments in the Republican and tea partyย networks. Kevin is the first person to be designated a โ€œCertified Expertโ€ on theย political and community organizing platformย NationBuilder. Prior to DeSmog, Kevin worked in various political and government roles. He was Senior Advisor to the Minister of State for Multiculturalism and a Special Assistant to the Minister of State for Asia Pacific, Foreign Affairs for the Government of Canada. Kevin also worked in various roles in the British Columbia provincial government in the Office of the Premier and the Ministry of Health. In 2008 Kevin co-founded a groundbreaking new online election tool called Vote for Environment which was later nominated for a World Summit Award in recognition of the worldโ€™s best e-Content and innovative ICTย applications. Kevin moved to Washington, DC in 2010 where he worked for two years as the Director of Online Strategy for Greenpeace USA and has since returned to his hometown of Vancouver, Canada.

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