Alex Jones Gets Weather Wacky Again, Says Biden Unleashed Kentucky Tornadoes

Totally not crazy Alex Jones thinks Joe Biden unleashed
can control weather and unleashed deadly tornadoes
on Kentucky earlier this month. 

Crazy conspiracy theorist Alex Jones would be both pathetic and hysterical if he didn't try so hard to hurt people with his wackadoodle musings. 

I dislike him intensely, as many people do, but his latest weather-related rant is sort of entertaining, in a skewed-brain sort of way. 

As Media Matters notes,  Jones informs us the government weather weapons were developed in the 1950s.  Biden is apparently using them in nasty ways, such as cutting the power to Texas during that horrible cold snap last February, and unleashing those tornadoes earlier this month down in Kentucky.

To be fair, he doesn't come right out and say Biden ordered the tornadoes, but Jones uses that go-to canard that "It is a legitimate question to ask."

 In that spirit, I'll ask a question of Jones: Are you freaking nuts?

I'll answer that! Yes.  

I'm not quite sure why Biden would order a tornado strike on Kentucky. And you'd think if Biden was powerful enough to create gigantic tornadoes, he would have cowed Joe Manchin into agreeing to the president's Build Back Better legislation. 

Somehow, though, I think Biden's too nice a guy to unleash tornadoes on innocent Kentuckians. Even if most of them didn't vote for Biden.  

What's next, Alex? What weather disaster are you going to blame on some vast, weird government conspiracy? I'm sure the Illuminati has got something up their sleeves, right?

 

Sigh. The Texas February Snow Wasn't Some Strange Plot By Bill Gates

If you put a lighter flame against a snow ball, soot will get
on the snowball. It doesn't mean it isn't snow. Jeez! 

As always, the conspiracy theorists are at it again.  A lot of people live in some strange alternate "reality" where everything is a physically impossible plot by villains to, to, I don't know. The purpose of these weird theories is never clear.  

I'm bringing this up because there's wackos out there who are sure the snow that fell in Texas last month wasn't really snow. It was supposedly something else, deposited for unclear reasons. 

This comes up every time it snows or ice storms hit places that usually escape such winter weather. 

And yes, I'm going to mercilessly mock the conspiracists. There's no getting through to them, ranters are going to rant. 

This time Reuters saw fit to run a fact check on this.  I don't know what good this will do - it won't convince the conspiracy wackos. But, it's fun to roll our eyes at these suckers that are truly born every minute. 

The favorite trick among the conspiracy minded is to hold a cigarette lighter's flame to a snowball to "prove" it's not really snow. This one has been around since at least 2014.

If you do the cigarette lighter trick with snow, it won't be immediately apparent it's melting, and the flame will leave a sooty smudge on the snow.  

So, for the record, according to Reuters:

"(Astronomer Phil) Plait explained that the snow does melt, but it doesn't appear to drip because the remaining snow, which is porous, absorbs the water."

Additionally, under a flame, snow can sublimate, which is a fancy word meaning it goes straight from ice to water vapor without melting into plain water first. 

And that soot on the snowball?  "Plait further explained the chemical process behind the dark mark: It's  not that snowball is scorching or burning, but it's soot adhering to the snowball."

Of course any dummy in Texas would have observed that once it warmed up, you could see the snow melt outdoors and the melt water running down countless storm drains in the Lone Star State. But that would make too much sense. 

By the way, Bill Gates always seems to be the bad guy in these scenarios.  And that just makes the silly more depressing.  If he's such a super-brained villain who wants to control us somehow, wouldn't he do it with something other than fake snow?

As Popular Mechanics tells us:

"Bill Gates is many things - billionaire, philanthropist, synthetic beef advocate - but conspiracy theorists think he and the Chinese government might both benefit from a world where people are blanketed by pretend snow. You'd just think if someone could seed clouds and control the weather, they'd use real snow instead of some kind of slush that has metal in it."

Of course, there are those that thought that Gates, or Joe Biden or somebody controlled the weather to make Texas and surrounding areas freeze.

Even if Gates or Biden could do that - which they can't - why didn't they keep the freeze going to really punish their so called enemies. A week after the cold wave the weather was warm and gorgeous. By the way, as I've explained before, the Arctic freeze was caused by the jet stream, and things up in the Arctic doing weird things. 

To the extent that humans caused it, the only way you could say that is the fact greenhouse gas-induced climate change might have had a role in the rough weather. The operative word here being "might"

It's unclear exactly what Gates or Biden or George Soros or whoever hoped to gain by dumping fake snow or bad weather on Texas, at least in the conspiracy minds.  It goes all over the place.  Biden was pissed that a few Texas were talking about seceding. 5G is always a big one.  The life saving Covid vaccines are really a plot by Gates to inject us with nanoparticles to control our minds, for what I have no idea. 

As if Bill Gates really cares what random Texan thinks. 

The massive power failures that cut electricity to more than 4 million Texans also seems to be fodder for conspiracy. Those power failures were largely caused by the agency that manages Texas electricity - ERCOT - did not plan for the effects of wintry weather on the state's grid. 

Alex Jones, always one to give us some weird fantasy, said Biden blocked the U.S. Department of Energy from increasing power during the storm.

Turns out the Energy Department did the exact opposite:  As the Independent reported. Acting U.S. Energy Secretary David Huizenga, quickly approve a request from ERCOT to temporarily exceed emissions limits to gain more capacity. 

The "fake" snow in Texas has long since melted, I guess proving it wasn't so fake after all. I do forecast, though, a 100% chance of more conspiracy theories from the gullible the next time the weather gets weird. Count on it. 

There really is a sucker born every minute. 

 

Inauguration Day Weather: Compared With History, Joe Biden Gets Lucky

Ronald Reagan's 1985 inauguration was forced indoors due
to record cold and bitter wind chills. 

As Joe Biden is inaugurated as the 46th president of the United States, gawd knows the biggest concern today is NOT the weather.  

With the threat of insurrectionists still simmering and the pandemic making public appearances in crowds risky, today's weather is not the thing that has people panicking. 

For the record, the weather forecast for today in Washington DC is pretty benign.  

There's a risk of an early snow shower there, but skies will clear as temperatures rise to the mid 40s -fairly close to normal. Wind gusts exceeding 30 mph from the northwest will make it feel colder.  

Biden still insists on having his inauguration outdoors, according to tradition. I'd rather have him wear a bulletproof vest than an overcoat, for safety's sake, but he probably should wear both. 

As is the case in most of the nation, the weather on Inauguration Day in Washington is not great. 

Franklin and Eleanor Roosevelt enduring soaking rains and
temperatures in the low to mid 30s during 
the 1937 inauguration ceremonies.

According to the National Weather Service office near Washington DC,  on average, the temperature at noon there, when the president is sworn into office, is around 37 degrees. The wind chill would be around 31 degrees. 

There's a one in six chance it would be raining at the time, and a one in 20 chance that snow would be coming down.  

For Donald Trump's 2017 inauguration, it rained a little, despite his protestation that it didn't (one of his first lies)! It was warmer than average though, with temperatures in the upper 40s. 

Needless to say, since it's midwinter, the weather is a real crapshoot on inauguration day in the Capitol.  They've had everything thrown at them.

In past inaugurations, Ronald Reagan holds the record for both warmest and coldest January 20 ceremonies. 

When Reagan was sworn in on January 20, 1981, it was a toasty 55 degrees. After Reagan's re-election, the January 20, 1985 inauguration noon weather was 7 degrees above zero with wind chills in the minus teens. The ceremony was forced indoors and the parade was canceled due to the bitter weather. 

Inaugurations until 1937 were held on March 4.  In that period, the warmest ceremony was for Andrew Jackson in 1829, when it was around 57 degrees.  The chilliest March inauguration was for Ulysses S. Grant in 1873 when it was 16 degrees.  

Jackie Kennedy emerges from a pre-inaugural
ball with JFK in tow during a snowy
inaugural week in 1961.

The record for the hottest inauguration came shortly after Richard Nixon resigned from the presidency in 1974.  Gerald Ford was sworn in as president on August 9, 1974 when the temperature stood at 89 degrees. 

Inaugurations have had some nasty weather, and might have been the cause of death for one president.  As the National Weather Service office near Washington DC tells us from 1841:

"William Henry Harrison was worn into office on a cloudy, cold and blustery day. His speech lasted one hour and 40 minutes and he rode a horse to and from the Capitol without a hat or overcoat. Pneumonia developed from a lingering cold he caught on that day and he died just one month later."

Other presidents who faced awful weather on Inauguration Day include Franklin Pierce in 1853, who delivered his inaugural address in a snowstorm. 

In 1909, Inauguration Day for William H. Taft featured heavy snow and strong winds that toppled trees and telegraph poles.  In 1937, for Franklin D. Roosevelt's inauguration, it poured all day with temperatures barely above freezing. Some sleet mixed in. 

In 1961, eight inches of snow hit Washington DC on the evening before the inaugural, causing massive traffic jams and forcing John F Kennedy to miss some pre-inaugural celebrations. 

Whatever happens with the weather or anything else today, we wish our new president godspeed and the best of luck with the huge challenges the nation is facing. 

 

Global Hot November And A Cool Political Change

Climate change continues apace, as new November data
shows. But at least Joe Biden is poised to put us
on the correct team to battle it. 

I was a bit distracted by last week's epic snowstorm in southern Vermont and elsewhere, so I never did get into the monthly check on global temperatures, which came out last week. 

The global analysis was for November, and unfortunately, did not contain any surprises.  Unfortunately, because the heat stayed on. 

Out of past 141 Novembers in the global database, this year's was the second hottest on record on a global basis. Only November, 2015 was marginally warmer. 

The data was compiled by NOAA's National Centers for Environmental Information.

The world's ten warmest Novembers have happened since 2004 and the top five have occurred since 2013, so we are having hot times due to climate change.  

Relative to normal, the warmest places on Earth during November, 2020 were northern Russia, Australia, a good chunk of South America, the eastern two thirds of the United States, the North Pacific Ocean and the Bering Sea. 

Even with a warm globe, there's inevitably cool spots. Those were in northwestern Asia, a spot in the North Atlantic and especially the equatorial eastern Pacific Ocean off of South America.

That last spot is especially worth noting. That cool eastern Pacific air and water is a sign that the La Nina weather pattern is in full swing.  La Nina overall tends to suppress global temperatures a bit, so it is alarming we managed to have the second warmest November with a La Nina. 

The opposite, a warming in the Pacific call El Nino, tends to warm the world a bit overall. 

Overall, it looks like 2020 will be the second hottest year on record, after 2016, which I believe had an El Nino.  There's even a chance this year could be THE hottest, depending upon how December goes.

CLIMATE CHANGE TEAM COMING TO WHITE HOUSE

President-Elect Joe Biden certainly has a different approach to climate change than outgoing President Trump. 

Trump has famously called climate change a hoax and pulled the United States out of the Paris Climate Accord. 

Getting back into the Paris agreement will apparently be rather easy.  Biden has pledged to get back into it his first day on the job, January 21.

Biden is also assembling a climate focused team. As NPR reports:

"Biden announced his intention to nominate Rep. Deb Haaland, D-NM to serve as secretary of the interior; former Michigan Gov. Jennifer Granholm to head the Department of Energy; Michael Regan as EPA administrator; Brenda Mallory as chair of the Council on Environmental Quality: Gina McCarthy as national climate advisor and Ali Zaidi as deputy national climate advisory."

Additionally, we know that Biden as nominated Pete Buttigieg a transportation secretary, and it appears he will be active in promoting green technology in our transportation infrastructure. 

While Biden can reverse a number of Trump's anti-climate policies through executive orders, his administration will have a tough time fighting Republican efforts to thwart these policies. That's especially true in the likely event that the January Georgia Senate runoff seats one or two Republicans rather that Democrats. 

The Biden administration also will be unable to stop climate change, or even mitigate it to any huge degree.  But at least with the new administration, the United States will at least be on the right team.