Why Fox may not where you should get news about the climate!

FoxNews, WattsUpWithThat push falsehood-filled Daily Mail article on global cooling that utterly misquotes, misrepresents work of Mojib Latif and NSIDC:
[Via Climate Progress]

30 Years of Global Cooling Are Coming, Leading Scientist Says

Latif … says we’re in for 30 years of cooler temperatures

Memo to media and anti-science disinformers (again): If your “global cooling” piece revolves around Dr. Latif, you probably have the entire story backwards. But, at least for the disinformers, that is the goal. And that goes double if the piece involves the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC).

In an interview back on October 1, Dr. Latif told me “we don’t trust our forecast beyond 2015″ and “it is just as likely you’ll see accelerated warming” after then. Indeed, in his published research, rapid warming is all-but-inevitable over the next two decades. He told me, “you can’t miss the long-term warming trend” in the temperature record, which is “driven by the evolution of greenhouse gases.” Finally, he pointed out “Our work does not allow one to make any inferences about global warming.”

In an interview today, he confirmed with me — as he will with anyone who talks to him — that he accepts the IPCC’s finding that most of the warming in the past century was very likely due to human causes — “definitely,” he said.

He remains puzzled and dismayed by articles like those in the Daily Mail, “Could we be in for 30 years of global COOLING?” that purport to be based on his work, that supposedly quote him directly, but in fact just make stuff up. Of course, the Daily Mail made up a lot stuff for this article, like this whopper about the NSIDC’s work:

Daily Mail

As NSIDC Director wrote me, This is completely false. NSIDC has never made such a statement and we were never contacted by anyone from the Daily Mail. We hope that this is simply a case of very lazy journalism and nothing more.”

[More]

The true sign of denialists – they lie. And FoxNews is part of this. apparently making up direct quotes and writing misleading words about what a researcher wrote:

And that leads to the FoxNews story quoted up top, “30 Years of Global Cooling Are Coming, Leading Scientist Says,” based solely on this game of telephone with Latif’s work. And of course The Swift Boat smearer and would-be Climate Killers excerpts this mangled and/or made up quote by the Daily Mail:

Shock Admission: UN IPCC’s Prof. Latif: ‘The warming we saw from 1980 to 2000 and at earlier periods in the 20th Century was due to these cycles (ocean) – perhaps as much as 50%”

Not. Call Dr. Latif up and ask him if accepts the IPCC’s finding that, as he put it, most of the warming in the past century was very likely due to human causes. He had me reread the quotes attributed to him a number of times, asking twice, “those are direct quotes?” After I did, he said to me: “I don’t know what to do. They just make these things up.” I suggested asking reporters to read quotes back to him.

This is why FoxNews is not a legitimate source of news on the climate. They are perfectly willing to spread unsubstantiated lies and misleading quotes of people that are shocked to find out that words they never spoke are being spread.

Because Latif has told everyone, in person and in his writing, that his ‘predicition’ can not be valid past 2015! So anyone who uses this data to discuss a decades-long cold spell is simply blowing smoke.

It is so easy to find the facts on the Web. Relying on Fox for facts instead of actually checking out the data seems like a sure way to get things wrong.

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