Pirate's Cove

Has anyone let the climate cultists know that there is no UN IPCC climate conference this year? They usually start with the super-scary stuff around this time of year as we head towards the normal early December big meeting. It was cancelled due to Bat Soup Virus, which might be a slightly bigger story

The climate crisis is the story of the century

The annual Western wildfire apocalypse rained ash from clouds of charcoal, lightning and white-hot heat waves set half the continent ablaze. Another late summer in the Gulf swirled with record torrential hurricanes — Laura recorded some of the highest winds on record and Sally took first place for being the slowest moving storm in recent history. A severe derecho sent pounding hail, spawned tornadoes and flattened the Midwest.

ZOMG, weather happened! There’s really no point in explaining to climate cultists that there is nothing unusual, and there have been plenty of hurricanes just as strong if not stronger when the CO2 levels were below the “safe” level of 350ppm.

Our world is growing hostile and uninhabitable and it’s only going to get worse. In the next 50 years, one in three people will live in cities and towns too hot for human life. The climate crisis is one of the most dramatic stories in our 200,000 year human history.

But, see, cable news has failed you

Fox, MSNBC and CNN do not give enough airtime to the crisis. Only 13 percent of their coverage connected the Western wildfires to climate change. A shameful fact, but unsurprising, when major news outlets allotted less than four hours of airtime to the climate crisis in the year 2019. This is largely because cable news is driven by clicks and ratings, not necessarily what the public needs to be informed about. As Chris Hayes put it in 2018, “it’s been a palpable ratings killer. So the incentives are not great.”

People watch what they care about

Cable news also does not give airtime to Biden’s climate plan. Americans are still waiting to hear about Trump’s plan. The mainstream media doesn’t need to just to ask the candidates about their plan, but make them answer with committed specifics. Climate is a top issue among Democratic voters, and it’s the issue that defines our lifetimes. The mainstream media has a duty in this moment to get to the bottom of their climate plans. The American people need to know.

If Democrats care about it so much, why do so few Dem run news outlets focus on it? Because few care in practice.

It’s why the right to a free press is enshrined in the Constitution. The job of that press is to carry out a vital service to our democracy: to hold the United States government accountable, expose corruption and report truth, and educate and inform the public about the most urgent issues of our time.

It sure sounds like the Cult of Climastrology wants to force the free press to cover their cult in a positive way, eh?

The crisis is not just a threat to future generations — it’s a threat to those alive and reading this now. I will be 73 in 2050. My brother will be 61. We have already lived through the hottest decade and record California wildfires. At our current rate, 2050 will not be a livable world.

Nikayla Jefferson is an organizer for Sunrise Movement San Diego and a Public Voices fellow of The OpEd Project and the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication. Follow her at @kayla_nikayla.

So, another parasite playing at being a cult leader.