In the aftermath of the Los Angeles fires and North Carolina floods, the phrase “extreme weather” has been brandished widely by the Left and their allies in mainstream media as an explanation for the severity of these catastrophes. It has gained prominence as an umbrella term for unusual and severe weather phenomena, such as heatwaves, floods, droughts, and storms that are supposedly a result of anthropogenic global warming.

However, the term “extreme weather” did not even enter the popular lexicon until right after Hurricane Katrina devastated New Orleans in 2005. It was then that mainstream media shifted public attention to the term as part of a broader effort to raise fear about climate change due to anthropogenic global warming. It is important to remember that over a decade had elapsed since the UN Rio summit in 1992, in which world leaders first gathered to address concerns over climate change. Within that period, not a word was written in the media attributing the severity of weather events to anthropogenic global warming. Why was that? For one thing, the empirical record for extreme weather events does not show any increase in severity and frequency. So, what changed after Hurricane Katrina?

From a metrological perspective, Hurricane Katrina, was only a Category 3 hurricane upon landfall in Louisiana. Compared to Hurricane Camille that struck the Gulf Coast in 1969 as a Category 5, Katrina was relatively mild. However, Katrina’s storm surge hit an unprepared New Orleans. Having not experienced a direct hit in decades, the US Army Corps of Engineers, which was responsible for maintaining the levee system around New Orleans, became lax in their preparation for such an event. The levee system that held back the waters of Lake Pontchartrain and Lake Borgne was completely overwhelmed by rain and Katrina’s storm surge and flooded a large part of the city.

From a political perspective, things were different with Hurricane Katrina. The environment was politically charged. Although the chaos that engulfed New Orleans in the aftermath of Katrina was in large part due to the magnitude of the flooding, responsibility for restoring order fell on the mayor and he came up short. However, the mainstream media made it out to be the fault of President Bush. It was in this politically charged environment that mainstream media reporters first tested out the idea that Katrina’s ferocity was due to climate change and that we could expect more of it in the future. It turned out to be a major propaganda coup for climate change advocates, their message being amplified with every storm, flood, and drought that followed. Climate change advocates resorted to promoting extreme weather narrative because it was more visceral, immediate, and fearful to their targeted audience. The supposed long-term effects of anthropogenic global warming such as sea level were more distant, incremental, and less fearful.

Beside the fact that the empirical data does not support the extreme weather narrative, we all sense that the devastation from a storm or fire is not due solely to its severity. As was the case with Hurricane Katrina and the recent Los Angeles fires, unpreparedness on the part of state and local authorities played a big role. In the pre-Katrina period, the media might attribute devastation to the fitful ways of nature or human incompetence but in the post-Katrina era all blame is due to climate change and human culpability is only measured in terms of tailpipe emissions.

Another way to look at the whole climate change/extreme weather scare is to analogize it to a situation where you visit your physician. After your physical, your physician tells you that you may have a fatal disease. He’s not sure, but he proposes a treatment that will be expensive and painful while offering no prospect of preventing the disease. When you ask why you would ever agree to such a thing, he says he just feels obligated to “do something.” Does it make any sense to blindly follow the prescription of our climate doctors? I will leave that to be answered by the reader.

Image: Free image, Pixabay license.