On Tuesday's NBC Nightly News, anchor Brian Williams followed a story on the late October northeast snow storm by ominously proclaiming: "Everybody out east said the same thing about this freak snowstorm, 'This kind of thing didn't used to happen. This never happened before.' And while that is true, it may also be true that we'll all have to start getting used to this kind of thing over the long haul."
In the report that followed, correspondent Anne Thompson warned viewers: "Around the world it seems like the weather is going to extremes.....record breaking flooding in Thailand. 1,400 new highs hit in the U.S. just in the month of July. Moscow reaching 101 degrees in the summer of 2010. Heat and wildfires consuming southern Australia in 2009."
Thompson asserted that man-made climate change was now settled science: "Adding to all this, a new study that finds global warming is real. And that the science behind it is not impacted by bias, bad data, or cities that act as heat islands." The study's author, Richard Muller of the University of California-Berkeley, declared: "The existence of global warming, I think, is pretty much beyond dispute now. I think we have closed the last remaining questions on that."
Thompson concluded that the study must be objective, "because it was funded in part by a foundation backed by Charles and David Koch. They are oil billionaires and climate change deniers."
Turning to Williams, she announced: "Today no one can deny that extreme weather is here to stay." Williams observed: "All I know is, this didn't happen when we were kids."
Here is a full transcript of the November 1 report:
7:00PM ET TEASE:
BRIAN WILLIAMS: The long wait for millions of people still in the cold and the dark after that freak early snowstorm. And tonight a new report is warning we can expect more extreme weather ahead.
7:09PM ET SEGMENT:
WILLIAMS: Everybody out east said the same thing about this freak snowstorm, 'This kind of thing didn't used to happen. This never happened before.' And while that is true, it may also be true that we'll all have to start getting used to this kind of thing over the long haul. That story tonight from our chief environmental affairs correspondent Anne Thompson.
ANNE THOMPSON: Around the world it seems like the weather is going to extremes. Not just the Halloween snowstorm in the northeast, but record breaking flooding in Thailand. 1,400 new highs hit in the U.S. just in the month of July. Moscow reaching 101 degrees in the summer of 2010. Heat and wildfires consuming southern Australia in 2009.
JERRY NEIL: This is the future and we're already experiencing climate change.
THOMPSON: Dr. Gerry Meehl is the senior scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder. He says our warming planet makes extreme weather events more likely. As greenhouse gases created by burning fossil fuels, such as oil, gas and coal, alter the climate.
MEEHL: Just as steroids makes a baseball player stronger and increase his chances of hitting home runs, the greenhouse gases are the steroids of the climate system. They increase the chances of record breaking heat to occur, compared to record breaking cold.
THOMPSON: If the climate weren't changing, the ratio would be one record hot day to one record cold day. Meehl says we saw two record hot days for every record cold day in the last decade and this year we are on a three to one pace. Heat and little rainfall have parched Texas for the last year, making it, in the words of state climatologist John Nielsen-Gammon, "the worst one-year drought in Texas history."
JOHN NIELSEN-GAMMON: This is really the first time when climate change – the impact of climate change has manifested itself in a tangible way within the state of Texas.
THOMPSON: Adding to all this, a new study that finds global warming is real. And that the science behind it is not impacted by bias, bad data, or cities that act as heat islands.
RICHARD MULLER [UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA-BERKELEY]: The existence of global warming, I think, is pretty much beyond dispute now. I think we have closed the last remaining questions on that.
THOMPSON: Muller's study is getting a lot of attention because it was funded in part by a foundation backed by Charles and David Koch. They are oil billionaires and climate change deniers. Today no one can deny that extreme weather is here to stay. Brian.
WILLIAMS: All I know is, this didn't happen when we were kids. Anne Thompson on the change in our weather. Thanks.
- Kyle Drennen is a news analyst at the Media Research Center. Click here [1] to follow Kyle Drennen on Twitter.