What They Say about the Weather, and What They Don’t Say

In Yosemite, temperatures in the 80’s and rain on the snowpack threatens flooding.

In Colorado, similarly, temperatures fifteen and twenty degrees above normal are melting the snowpack: water levels haven’t been this high in twenty years, according to one kayaker.

And on the East Coast, it’s been a gloomy spring. The third coldest ever, according to a National Weather Service meteorologist.

The connection? All these facts can be seen as examples of a climatological trend predicted years ago by climatologists. For example, James Hansen, perhaps the best known climatologist in the country, has in more than one study argued that in a global warming scenario, the East Coast will actually get colder. Not enormously colder — about two degrees on the average — but measurably and noticeably.

Question: Why is this prediction never mentioned in newspaper stories about unusual weather? Wouldn’t it be worth at least a question to a climatologist once in a while? Then maybe we could have "a conversation" about the issue, as they say in newsrooms.

Just a thought.