Mitt Romney's long hot summer
News blogs, sports blogs, entertainment blogs, and more from Philly.com, The Philadelphia Inquirer and the Philadelphia Daily News.
Mitt Romney's long hot summer
Things aren't really breaking Mitt Romney's way, are they? For one thing, his entire campaign is largely predicated on the economy being terrible. And let's be honest -- it's not great, especially for millions of long-term unemployed (who Republicans are trying to woo by cutting their benefits, but we digress...). But while we'll know better tomorrow, it does appear that moderate job growth is resuming and that Europe hasn't tanked the U.S. economy, at least not yet. And Romney's manic gyrations on health care suggest that this one time Rick Santorum may have been (gulp) right, that his "Romneycare" made him politically the worst candidate to challenge "Obamacare."
And now there's something else.
It's hot. You probably already knew that. It gets hot in the summer sometimes -- the hottest day in Philadelphia history happened way back in 1918 (the same year as a deadly influenza outbreak centered here and also World War I...a.k.a. "the good ol' days," but yet again I digress). That said, the seemingly unrelenting wave of record-high temperatures across the United States this year has to give one pause. When the 5-day forecast for St. Louis looks like what the weather is supposed to be in Las Vegas, it's understandable to think that something is up.
Scientists say that your suspicions are correct:
So far this year, more than 2.1 million acres (850,000 hectares) have burned in wildfires, more than 113 million people in the US were in areas under extreme heat advisories last Friday, two-thirds of the country is experiencing drought, and earlier in June, deluges flooded Minnesota and Florida.
"This is what global warming looks like at the regional or personal level," said Jonathan Overpeck, professor of geosciences and atmospheric sciences at the University of Arizona. "The extra heat increases the odds of worse heat waves, droughts, storms and wildfire. This is certainly what I and many other climate scientists have been warning about."
Kevin Trenberth, head of climate analysis at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in fire-charred Colorado, said these are the very record-breaking conditions he has said would happen, but many people wouldn't listen. So it's I told-you-so time, he said.
Of course, there are still going to be your hardcore climate change deniers out there, but I think recent events like the Colorado wildfires are causing a lot of the undecided folks to believe in man-made global warming. And that -- like just about everything else that's happened lately -- is not very good news for Mitt Romney. Not good news at all.
You see, Romney used to believe in human-induced climate change. And, like a lot of GOP governors in the Northeast, he supported sensible policies to do something about it. Then came the Tea Party revolution, and Romney's stop-at-nothing long march toward the Republican nomination. Suddenly, Romney believed that any human link to global warming was a lot of hot air. Except now that he's got the nomination, it appears that climate change is real, my friend.
And so Romney's political game of Twister (right foot, red!) has tied him in such a knot that there's no way to move without falling on his rear end. Sound familiar? It's Romneycare/Obamacare all over again. The former Massachusetts governor would have been so, so much better off if he had just stayed where he was, circa 2005 -- except for the problem that he never would have won the nomination in the radicalized GOP of the '10s (why don't we call it that, anyway?...another digression).
Meanwhile, here in Philly we're looking at 101 degrees in the shade. Mitt Romney better hope that this heat wave breaks...real, real soon. Or this long hot summer might burn down his White House dreams before the fall campaign even starts.
Will forgot to mention that over 800 new daily LOW record temps were set in June:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/extremes/records/
But, don't let the facts get in the way of a good rant, Mr. Bunch.
Job numbers come out tomorrow. I'm thinking that Obama and his surrogates in the press will be throwing everything else at the wall to get people to look at anything but this President's woeful economic record.— Nicher- Bunch...even you are not left wing looney (dumb) enough to actually believe in man made climate change.
Easter Bunny, Santa Claus, Man Made Climate Change, Tooth Fairy.
— kelprod2 - "It's the economy, stupid." ~ James Carville— theodotius
- It's going to be so sweet the first Tues. nite in November....Our president and the economy are stuck.— bannedrepublican
- If reporters would report against Bush's record the same way as Obama's, then focus on the deficit, the war, the drones killing innocent people in record numbers would turn the heat up where it belongs. However blind faith keeps thinking Obama is special.— Fisher
- ===}}} Will forgot to mention that over 800 new daily LOW record temps were set in June: {{{===
Dude, that comment is a joke, right?
Look - it is a mistake to attribute any particular weather pattern to climate change, but in fact a long-term disparity between cold and hot records is indicative, as theoretically if there weren't climate change then the # of hot and cold records would be more or less equal.
--snip--
First Half 2012 Heat Records Outpace Cold By Over 11 to 1;
June Ends With 29th Consecutive Warm Week
[...]
Although it began on a relatively mild note, June 2012 ended with a rush of high temperature records, including many monthly records and even some all-time records. The nearly 2300 new daily heat records were about 50% more numerous than in May, although the ratio to cold records declined to 4.6 to 1.
--snip--
http://2.bp.blogspot.com/-sGgOuuR2u0Q/T_NZleIDbeI/AAAAAAAADJw/3unRv7s4VAs/s1600/temp.us.weekly.history.063012.jpg— Talking point sleuth - Solyndra, Ener1, Beacon Power, Solar Trust, and Nevada Geothermal. All green energy corporation that the Obama admin backed and have collapsed.
— RG - Careful mentioning Nevada Geothermal. I questioned Joe Distefano about it yesterday and my comment was deleted. I'm still waiting for an article about it somewhere on Philly.com. — jfar86
- Note the unbiased analysis here. RG has analyzed the entire portfolio in-depth, but just wanted to casually remind everyone here that some of the companies didn't make it. Very unbiased. — Murrayman
- I am heading for British Columbia where the sensible people have instituted a carbon tax. People see their personal taxes reduced by the same amount that corporations are taxe on the amount of carbon raises. Since you pay more gor gasoline (because of the tax), you use less gas, but you still benefit financially from the returns. It is a painless way to promote sensible reduction of the carbon that is the basis of global warming.— Archimedes
- Later.
Don't let the door smack you on the rump. and be sure to turn off the lights on your way out. - "Solyndra, Ener1, Beacon Power, Solar Trust, and Nevada Geothermal. All green energy corporation that the Obama admin backed and have collapsed."
How about the lives and trillions of dollars lost in EyeRack? Do they count for anything in Wingnut World?— Bruce in NM - Grill, baby, grill!— montani semper liberi
- I like mandates. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1dSy9G_4_Uk— montani semper liberi
- If this keeps up, we'll see Congressional hearings demanding Obama come clean on how he's heating up the atmosphere to incite global warming hysteria. Is he secretly letting coal fall in the hands of rogue Mexican power plants?— montani semper liberi
- Andrew Sullivan
- Blinq
- Blogorrhea
- Blonde Sagacity
- Free Republic
- Instapundit
- James Taranto
- ScrappleFace
- The Corner
- Buzzmachine
- Eat the Press
- Editor and Publisher
- Media (Huffington Post)
- Media Bloodhound
- Mickey Kaus
- Pressthink
- Romenesko
- The Inksniffer
- A List of Things Thrown Five Minutes Ago
- Above Average Jane
- BlankBaby
- Citizen Mom
- Keystone Blog
- Metroblogging Philadelphia
- Phawker
- Philadelphia - America's Hometown
- Philadelphia Will Do
- Philebrity
- Philly Future
- Phillyblog
- Phillyist
- The Clog
- The Next Mayor
- Welcome to Phillyville
- Young Philly Politics
- Afro-Netizen
- All-Spin Zone
- Atrios
- Bad Attitudes
- Billmon
- Booman Tribune
- CorrenteWire
- Fables of the Reconstruction
- iFlipFlop
- Kiko's House
- MyDD
- Philly (Dragonballyee)
- Rowhouse Logic
- Slacktivist
- Suburban Guerilla
- Tattered Coat
- upyernoz
- AmericaBlog
- Andy Borowitz
- BuzzFlash
- Crooks and Liars
- Cursor
- Daily Kos
- David Sirota
- Drudge Report
- Echidne of the Snakes
- Fire Dog Lake
- Glenn Greenwald
- Hullabaloo
- Jesus' General
- Jon Swift
- Josh Marshall
- Juan Cole
- Kevin Drum
- Mad Kane
- Majikthise
- Matthew Yglesias
- Oliver Willis
- Raw Story
- Swing State Project
- Talk Left
- Taylor Marsh
- TBogg
- The Carpetbagger Report
- Think Progress
- War and Piece
- Wonkette
- A Citizen's Blog
- Balls, Sticks and Stuff
- Beer Leaguer
- Dick Polman
- Phillies Nation
- Philling Station
- Shallow Center
- The 700 Level
- The Good Phight
