How climate science denier Senator Malcolm Roberts turned warmer into colder

Sometimes watching YouTube videos is a lot like eating your favourite flavour of chip, fudge or whatever else it is that you think is moreish.

You watch one video and then, on that panel on the right hand side, up pops a whole load of others that YouTube thinks you’ll like.

No doubt because of my years of writing about climate science denial, YouTube taunts me with all manner of climate science denialist crap – some quite sophisticated, some not. Continue reading “How climate science denier Senator Malcolm Roberts turned warmer into colder”

Hey Andrew Bolt. The guy in that picture isn’t who you say it is, and Richard Lindzen is totally not a world leading climate scientist

Every now and again I drop over to News Corp climate science denialist Andrew Bolt’s blog just to check that he’s still doing the stuff he’s always done, like misrepresenting climate science and giving his readers and followers bum information.

The answer is still yes, although Bolt’s post from a few days ago caught my eye for another reason.

The host of Sky’s Bolt Report pointed his readers to a lecture by Richard Lindzen.  Bolt has a picture. Here’s how it looked.

The first thing to say about this is the dude in the picture is not Richard Lindzen.

That’s actually Penn State climate professor and glaciologist Richard Alley delivering a lecture at MIT in November 2016.

You might think Bolt would have seen the mistake, given that he describes Lindzen as “one of the world’s most famous climate scientists.”

Yeh.  Nah.   Continue reading “Hey Andrew Bolt. The guy in that picture isn’t who you say it is, and Richard Lindzen is totally not a world leading climate scientist”

Why has Andrew Bolt suddenly fallen out of love with Antarctica?

Sea ice on Antarctic Sound off the tip of the Antarctic Peninsular

Andrew Bolt used to love writing about Antarctica [adopts sarcastic tone] bringing his laser-like scientific mind to the continent’s sea ice.

In December 2013, News Corp Australia’s climate science mangler-in-chief was delighting in the predicament of Professor Chris Turney, who had led an exhibition to Antarctica but whose ship had become stuck in sea ice.

Screaming of a “media cover-up” the Bolt was unhappy at the media coverage. Continue reading “Why has Andrew Bolt suddenly fallen out of love with Antarctica?”

Launching Positive Feedback – a podcast on climate science, denial and all that other stuff

positive feedbackI’ve launched a new podcast called Positive Feedback that will look at “climate science, denial, and all that stuff in between.”

Right now, it’s an entirely independent operation.

I’m drawing on the few radio skills I gained from a couple of years at BBC Radio more than a decade ago (mostly forgotten) to produce the whole thing myself. Should I feel like I need some help marketing it in the future, I know I can go to people like Lower Street to help me out with this but, for now, my focus is getting the first few episodes up and running, and get used to just talking.

I’m hoping to be able to cover both ends of climate change – from the hard science to the way I think it gets mangled and misrepresented in the minds of the public.

Podcasts are booming, but that’s not really why I’m doing it. Continue reading “Launching Positive Feedback – a podcast on climate science, denial and all that other stuff”

Here’s Donald Trump’s “100 day action plan” for energy and climate change. He wants to pull out of the UN Paris agreement.

trump-100-day-action-plan
Donald Trump’s “100 day action plan” for climate and energy

So Donald Trump won.

I’m not going to add right now to the mountain of hastily-written “think” pieces about what went wrong, who’s to blame and how roughly half of America’s voting public thought he was an OK option.

What’s important to remember, though, is that last bit. Roughly half of Americans who voted chose Donald Trump above Hillary Clinton.

But what’s also important, is how the issue of climate change was barely mentioned by either candidate.

In a few days, I’m heading to Morocco for the United Nations climate talks.

What will a Trump administration mean for climate change policy?

I wrote on The Guardian how the election would be a distraction for the first week of the talks, particularly if Trump was to win.  I think that was probably an understatement.

Why?

Continue reading “Here’s Donald Trump’s “100 day action plan” for energy and climate change. He wants to pull out of the UN Paris agreement.”

Great Barrier Beer – when three planets align

James Grugeon and me, with a Great Barrier Beer. You should have one.
James Grugeon and me, with a Great Barrier Beer. You should have one.

Sometimes you feel like all your planets have suddenly aligned — like the cogs of chaos have finally locked themselves into place to give you a bit of purchase on life’s unsealed road.

This seems like an overly loquacious and ornate start to this post, but screw it. I’m having an attack of enthusiasm.

Anyway, a few weeks back I was invited to a Mexican place called Zambreros for a mini-launch of a beverage called Great Barrier Beer.

This is where the aligning of the planets took place. And when I say planets, I actually mean three planets, one of which is beer.

To understand my enthusiasm here, I should explain a few things. Continue reading “Great Barrier Beer – when three planets align”

Introducing Alex Jones, the rage machine who thinks Hillary Clinton “Smells of Sulphur” and global warming is a total hoax

alex-jonesIn case you didn’t know, there are people on Hillary Clinton’s security detail who think that she’s a “demon possessed” because she “smells like sulphur”.

President Obama smells like sulphur too and, apparently, the internet is awash with photographs and images of the president in crowded rooms where he is the only person to have flies land on him.

“We are dealing with demons here.”

Welcome, ladies and gentleman of the internet, to the scratch n’ sniff world according to Alex Jones, the walking and almost always yelling one-stop shop for all your New World Order global government conspiracy needs.

Jones runs a US media site called infowars.com and is commonly referred to as a “conspiracy theorist”, because he is one. Rolling Stone magazine has described him as “the most paranoid man in America”. Continue reading “Introducing Alex Jones, the rage machine who thinks Hillary Clinton “Smells of Sulphur” and global warming is a total hoax”

When Senator Malcolm Roberts thanked 9/11 truthers and New World Order conspiracists for their science guidance

 

Unless you’ve either been living under a massive rock or in Mars-like isolation, you would have struggled to miss the recent exploits of Malcolm Roberts.

But if you have, here’s a very brief summary.

Roberts is a climate science denialist from Queensland who has been elected to the Australian Senate to represent the far-right One Nation party, led by Pauline Hanson.

He thinks climate science is a fraud being pushed by the United Nations, which wants to instill a world government.

His odd views have been irresistible to media outlets around the world and back home in Australia.

He had an argument with British Professor Brian Cox on Q&A that made international headlines.

He seems to be enjoying all the attention.

But back when Roberts was regarded by some as little more than a serial pest — haranguing politicians, journalists, scientists and government agencies for their endorsement of “climate fraud” — Roberts made a list.

The list, from February 2013, was an appendix to one of his many reports that “proved” human-caused climate change was a scam.  Continue reading “When Senator Malcolm Roberts thanked 9/11 truthers and New World Order conspiracists for their science guidance”

Column in The Australian calls climate denialist Malcolm Roberts a “complete nutter”. A glitch in the matrix?

I’ve written plenty of stories over the years having a go at the way Rupert Murdoch’s loss-making newspaper The Australian covers climate science.

So it would be a bit churlish if I didn’t point out when its coverage is, shall we say, a little more mainstream.

But first, some context. Continue reading “Column in The Australian calls climate denialist Malcolm Roberts a “complete nutter”. A glitch in the matrix?”

Media Watch challenges The Australian’s misreporting on coral science

mediawatch grab lloydThe ABC’s Media Watch program ran a segment earlier this week lambasting The Australian’s environment editor Graham Lloyd for recent stories on coral science.

Much of the segment covered the same ground, and raised the same questions, as I had done here a few weeks ago.

For newcomers, a very quick catch-up.  Lloyd has a history of what I consider poor reporting on climate change science where his pieces are “balanced” by the views of non-experts. Continue reading “Media Watch challenges The Australian’s misreporting on coral science”