Media Matters - Kevin Kalhoefer
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| Sarah Wasko / Media Matters |
1. Breitbart’s James Delingpole claimed 400 new scientific papers show global warming is a myth.
Numerous studies have found near-unanimous scientific agreement on human-caused climate change, with perhaps the most well-known
study
on the matter finding that 97 percent of scientific papers taking a
position on the cause of global warming agree that humans are behind it.
And this year, a review of the 3 percent of papers that deny climate
change found that they were
all flawed. Nonetheless, Breitbart writer Delingpole
claimed that 400 scientific papers published this year demonstrated that climate change is a “myth,” basing his article on a
post on the denialist blog No Tricks Zone.The fact-checking website Snopes
roundly debunked
Delingpole’s article, giving it a “False” verdict after speaking with
authors of some of the cited papers who said their work was grossly
misinterpreted or misrepresented.
2. The Daily Mail claimed government researchers “duped” world leaders with "manipulated global warming data."
Daily Mail reporter David Rose
alleged
that climate scientists "rushed" to publish an "exaggerated" paper in
an attempt to convince leaders to support the Paris agreement and spend
billions to fight climate change. Rose, who has written his
fair share of
climate misinformation for the
Mail,
based his story on an “exclusive interview” with and a blog post by
retired U.S. government scientist John Bates. The error-ridden article
quickly made its way around right-wing media in outlets such as
The Daily Caller,
National Review, and
Breitbart, and was even
promoted by GOP members of the House science committee, including its chairman
Rep. Lamar Smith
(R-TX). The story’s claims also received “at least 752,300 shares,
likes, comments, or other interactions on social media,” according to a
Buzzfeed analysis. But the claims in the article were
widely discredited by climate scientists, including Bates’ former colleagues and even
Bates himself. The errors in the
Mail’s
article were so significant that the Independent Press Standards
Organization (IPSO), an independent media regulator in the U.K.,
issued a ruling
that "the newspaper had failed to take care over the accuracy of the
article ... and had then failed to correct ... significantly misleading
statements." The
Daily Mail was required to
publish IPSO's reprimand.
3. Radio host Rush Limbaugh said he was "leery" of hurricane forecasts because they advance a "climate change agenda."
As Hurricane Irma barrelled toward Florida, Limbaugh
spun conspiracy theories
and told his listeners that hurricane warnings are part of a scheme to
benefit retailers, the media, and people like Al Gore who want to
"advance this climate change agenda." Notably, Limbaugh didn’t have any
skepticism about the danger Irma posed when it came to his own
well-being, as he
fled
from his Florida home to Los Angeles before Irma made landfall. It's
not the first time Limbaugh has spouted irresponsible conspiracy
theories about hurricane forecasts. He was
criticized last year for doing the same thing during Hurricane Matthew, earning himself a spot on the
2016 edition of this list.
4. New York Times columnist Bret
Stephens argued that because political operatives were wrong in
predicting Hillary Clinton would win the election, people should be
skeptical of climate science.
After Trump’s election,
The New York Times launched an ad campaign billing itself as the antidote to Trumpian “alternative facts.” Shortly after that campaign, though, the
Times hired Stephens as a columnist -- a
serial misinformer who had called climate change a “sick-souled religion” during his time at
The Wall Street Journal. In his
inaugural column for the
Times,
Stephens encouraged skepticism of climate scientists and compared those
who advocate climate action to Cold War-era authoritarians. Stephens’
column was short on actual facts and science; the one time he cited a
scientific report, he
got it wrong. The
Times added a correction to the column, but numerous scientists pointed out that the correction
wasn’t sufficient, and a number of scientists
canceled their subscriptions over Stephens’ hiring, his problematic column, and the
Times public editor’s
dismissive defense of Stephens’ column. EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt later
cited Stephens' column to
defend the Trump administration's decision to pull out of the Paris agreement.
5. Conservative media commentator Stephen Moore claimed that
Trump created tens of thousands of coal jobs in the first few months of
his presidency.
Experts and journalists have repeatedly noted that President Donald Trump's
campaign promise
to bring back coal jobs is an empty one, since the decades-long decline
in coal mining jobs has been driven much more by economic forces, such
as
increased automation and
competition from natural gas and renewables,
than by government regulations. But that didn’t stop Moore, a frequent
Fox and CNN commentator and former Trump economic advisor, from
proclaiming in op-eds in
The Washington Times
and Breitbart that Trump had already made good on his promise after
just a few months in office. Moore cited jobs reports from March and
April to claim that Trump had added tens of thousands of mining jobs,
thereby restoring the coal industry. But Moore grossly misrepresented
the data he cited, which actually included jobs in a number of
sectors
like oil and gas. Had Moore bothered to look at the actual coal mining
jobs category, he would have seen that it had only grown by
approximately 200 jobs through April,
barely moving since Election Day.
6. Radio host Hugh Hewitt recommended appointing Rush Limbaugh to a national commission to study climate change.
In an op-ed for
The Washington Post, Hewitt
proposed
creating a “national commission led by men and women of impeccable
credentials” to determine whether and how the U.S. should address
climate change, arguing that the country needs a group of “[d]iverse,
smart non-scientists who are going to listen to the scientists -- all of
them -- and report back on what ought to be done.” But Hewitt’s
proposal instantly lost all credibility when he suggested including Rush
Limbaugh as one of the commission members. Limbaugh has repeatedly
called climate change
a hoax, promoted dangerous climate-related
conspiracy theories,
misrepresented research in an attempt to dispute that global warming is happening, and even
criticized a TV show for portraying climate change as a reality.
7. Fox hosts attacked a journalist and called him "stupid"
for asking a Trump official about the links between hurricanes and
climate change.
2017 was a
record year for hurricanes, as Harvey, Irma, and Maria wreaked havoc along their respective paths. A number of
climate scientists have explained how climate change
exacerbates
some of the worst impacts of hurricanes. While CNN and MSNBC frequently
aired segments discussing the link between climate change and
hurricanes like
Harvey and
Irma, Fox News hosts almost exclusively covered the climate change-hurricane link by criticizing others who raised the issue. The
September 11 episode of Fox's
The Five,
for example, featured a lengthy discussion in which hosts criticized
CNN's Jim Acosta for asking Homeland Security Advisor Tom Bossert
whether there's a link between climate change and powerful hurricanes.
The hosts said that Acosta was “anti-science” and looked “stupid” and
“dumb,” and they called his question was "politically opportunistic."
Fox's Jesse Watters said concern about climate change stems from liberal
“guilt” and a desire to control people’s lives. Likewise, on the radio
show
Breitbart News Daily, host Alex Marlow
pushed
EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt to deny the link between climate change
and hurricanes, which Pruitt did, stating, “For opportunistic media to
use events like this to, without basis or support, just to simply engage
in a cause-and-effect type of discussion, and not focus upon the needs
of people, I think is misplaced."
8. Rush Limbaugh argued that the historic BP oil spill caused no environmental damage.
Limbaugh cited an
article in the right-wing Daily Caller headlined “Bacteria Are Eating Most Of The 2010 BP Oil Spill” and
concluded, “The BP spill didn’t do any environmental [damage].” The Deepwater Horizon spill, which leaked oil for
87 days, was the
largest accidental spill of oil into marine waters in world history. Researchers have documented a wide array of negative
environmental impacts from the disaster. For example, a 2016 study found that the BP spill may have caused
irreversible damage to one of the Gulf shore’s most important ecosystems. The spill is believed to have killed
tens of thousands animals in 2010, and for years afterward,
dolphins and other animals in the area continued to die at higher-than-normal rates.
9. Fox News’ Jesse Watters claimed, “No one is dying from climate change.”
During a discussion about Al Gore’s warnings on climate change, Watters, a co-host of Fox News’
The Five,
declared, “People are dying from terrorism. No one is dying from climate change.” Rush Limbaugh also
made the same assertion this year. But an independent report commissioned by 20 governments in 2012 concluded that climate change
already kills more people than terrorism, with an estimated 400,000 deaths linked to climate change each year.
10. Radio host Alex Jones
said it was "suspicious" that Hurricane Irma came along shortly before
the release of a climate disaster movie.
Jones briefly speculated about the possibility that Hurricane Irma was “geoengineered” or created by humans before
stating, “Meanwhile, though, right on time with these superstorms, we have the new film
Geoengineering (sic)
2017, coming soon on October 20. Oh, just a little bit more than a
month or so after Irma is set to hit. Isn’t that just perfect timing?
Like all these race war films they’ve been putting out. This is starting
to get suspicious. Here it is,
Geostorm.” The action movie
Geostorm featured satellites that controlled the global climate. Jones' speculation about the film is just one of the
countless conspiracy theories he has promoted over the years.
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