Donald Trump may be getting all the press, but Ted Cruz and others are hot on his heels bringing on the crazy and the science denial. This week, Cruz held a mock Senate hearing stacked with climate change skeptics. Not to be outdone, Lamar Smith, the House version of Ted Cruz and possibly an even nastier if lesser known piece of work, penned a pitiful op-ed to the San Antonio Express. Here’s just one example of the known, false info he vomited up in that screed:
NOAA’s report ignored temperatures collected by satellites. This data, considered by many to be the most objective, has clearly showed no warming for the past two decades. NOAA and this administration simply chose to ignore the satellite data so they could get the results they wanted. Almost every other study has found no increase in global temperature in recent years.
When I see stuff that wholly dishonest, that cynical, that sweeping and shameless in grandeur, there’s a little piece of me that says this clown is simply beyond all hope. The best thing that could possibly happen for mankind would be for him and others like him to quietly return to ashes from whence he came. This kind of clown could literally end up causing more death and misery than your above-average serial killer.
- This is from a few weeks ago, but as far as I know, 2015 is still barreling along to meet or beat all other years in the GISTEMP global temperature record going back to 1880 for the hottest year measured:
This year’s average temperature through October is running 1.55 degrees (0.86 Celsius) above the 20th century average, 0.22 degrees above 2014, the previous warmest year. NOAA points out 2015’s lead over 2014 is “larger than the uncertainty associated with the dataset” leaving no question 2015 is in unprecedented territory in the current era.
Another possibility (which seems more likely to the object’s discoverers) is that it is about 300 AU away and about 1.5 times the size of Earth, making it the first “super-Earth” found in our solar system. ... There’s reason to be cautious of this idea, however, because of its location.