Junk in the Air and Junk on the Air

Readers of this blog busted David Kestenbaum (pictured above) for airing crap about climate change during his coverage of the UN Copenhagen Conference. As "doggydaddy" writes,

"This [link to the Tuesday morning story] may help explain my antipathy towards Kestenbaum this AM. Of all the stories one could file from Copenhagen, he gives credence to hack skeptic Lomborg who has been thoroughly discredited. [link to a point by point refutation of Lomborg's "science."] What a doofus and a tool is the Kestenbum."

Given that Bjorn Lomborg has been debunked, refuted and exposed as having only one goal - pushing for "the pressing need to do nothing about global warming" - one can only conclude that Kestenbaum shares this mission. This would explain his 2008 adoring [and shameless] piece on a teen global warming skeptic.

So how does a groovin', Yale-Harvard hipster like Kestenbaum top a scoop interview with Bjorn Lomborg? He does it by using his Thursday morning slot to sneer at and ridicule the attendees at the conference for contributing to carbon pollution by using air travel to get to the conference - how cutting edge! As "Woody" wrote in the comments,

"I nearly went inside the radio this AM, when I heard that lame-ass report on the "carbon footprint" required to host the Climate Summit, and the ever-so-condescending snarkiness of the lazy, smirking, sold-out creeps and asswipes reporting it.

Just once, I'd like to hear some proper context, like what is the size of the carbon footprint of just one day's operations by the USer military in Central Asia."

Ah yes, the footprint of the US military in Central Asia, that would be interesting. In fact would have been great fun to hear Bjorn Lomborg asked about the bloated US military spending that could be used for those humanitarian projects that he supposedly cares so much about.

News From the Cryosphere

(source of graphic)

You've probably heard the rather depressing poll numbers about US citizens and climate catastrophe awareness (NPR's AP website feed picked it up). Essentially folks in the US have grown even more ignorant about climate science over the past two years. Perhaps some of them have been listening a bit too much to NPR:

• (March 2007) - Richard Harris and Renee Montagne quibble with minor inaccuracies in Al Gore's generally cogent arguments.
• (Dec. 2007) - Harris and Siegel deride Gore for calling the Bushists obstructionists in climate talks.
• (April 2008) - David Kastenbaum lauds the work of 16 year old non-scientist who claims climate change is not caused by humans.
• (March 2009) - Montagne and Harris reassure listeners that the Antartic Ice won't be gone for at least 1,000 years.
• (April 2009) - NPR covered the little details of the Catlin expedition but (oops!) forgot to report the expeditions findings (the north pole ice is going bye-bye).

I was struck by the Democracy Now! report this morning on the 350.org world-wide protests - and by the non-coverage of the event on NPR. (Even US soldiers in Afghanistan got into the act!). Perhaps I'm jumping to judgment; maybe NPR is waiting until the actual day of the event (Saturday) to cover it - like they did for the Equality March - not! or like they did for the Tea-Party rally (where they only gave it a whole week of glowing lead-up coverage) before the big celebration.

[for information on the cryosphere - check out this resource]

No! Not the Bar-b-q!

Michele Norris couldn't even get through the intro to the article without diving into the industry talking points:

"A major shift in environmental policy today from the federal government. The EPA declared that greenhouse gases linked to climate change endanger public health and welfare. Scientists and environmentalists have been waiting years to hear that acknowledgment. And the declaration is a big first step toward regulating carbon dioxide. It's also a new restriction on almost every part of the economy."

Well, that seems a little alarmist, considering that it was actually not the point of the federal report released Friday, which didn't really mention regulations. However, it is certainly true that greenhouse gas pollution comes from sources throughout the economy, so let's see where NPR's going with this. The story is narrated by Jeff Brady who reports that:

"The EPA under the Bush administration had been reluctant to make that statement [that greenhouse gases are air pollution] for fear of the economic consequences of the agency regulating everything from new cars to power plants."

I'm pretty sure this is the absolute, most generous way you could ever possibly find to describe the Bush administration's refusal to admit to scientific realities or comply with environmental laws. Brady includes a quote from the environmental organizations who had to sue to force the government to release the suppressed federal report, but the story then quickly turns to the corporate talking points:

"Bill Kovacs with the U.S. Chamber of Commerce shares that concern. He worries the EPA could become a huge regulator involved in every part of American life. 'They would also be regulating office buildings, warehouses, churches...parts of the farm industry. Twenty-five cows produce enough methane to be a regulated entity.'"

No! Not 25 cows! In the interest of full disclosure, readers of this blog should know that I often work on regulations related to climate change. And I have never, ever, heard anybody in government, environmental organizations, or industry, ever suggest regulating churches! What does that even mean?

Of course, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is a lobbying and PR group for corporations, and these are obviously the talking points they decided might work best to scare Americans about today's report from the government. It is an obvious ploy, and lame. So does the article include a quote from scientist or the authors of the report in response to these scare tactics? Of course not. Instead, NPR uses the exact same talking points from an industry PR flack for the next day in their hourly "news" summary:

"This can clearly impact office buildings, hospitals, schools, your backyard bar-b-q, your weedwacker, everything that impacts our daily lives."

NO!!! First it was 25 cows and now the backyard bar-b-q! I'd better get out there and grill (beef) and weedwack before it's too late. Damn those government reports!