Climate Media Watch

I’m not sure what’s going to be more fun over the next 10 days—watching John “Long Face” Kerry prattle on, or reading the predictable stories in the media about how the conference is “deadlocked,” “going into overtime,” and announcing, at the 11^th hour, a “breakthrough!” that will save the planet—at least until we can all meet again next year to repeat the farce.

But above all I think we’ll need to have extra Green Weenies on hand for media outlets that act as little more than cheerleaders and stenographers for the climate circus. Today’s New York Times western print edition has the headline “Pledges to Cut Emissions Lag as Climate Talks Get Under Way.” (The online headline appears completely different—“Paris Climate Talks Avoid Scientists’ Idea of ‘Carbon Budget’”— but this amounts to the same thing. I rather thought “pledges to cut emissions” was the whole point of the summit, which means a “carbon budget” is necessary. What are they going to talk about then?

But just take in reporter Justin Gillis’s lede to see what’s wrong with the world:

After two decades of talks that failed to slow the relentless pace of global warming, negotiators from almost 200 countries are widely expected to sign a deal in the next two weeks to take concrete steps to cut emissions.

First, “slow the relentless pace of global warming” over the last two decades? Um, “slowing the pace of global warming” has already happened; it’s called “the pause” throughout the scientific literature, and I’m pretty sure that “talking” had nothing to do with it, though we certainly suffer no shortage of hot air.

You can pretty much stop reading an article that begins with a lede like that. It’s not likely to get any better.