Over this past summer, NewsBusters frequently pointed out to its readers that parts of the southern hemisphere were experiencing their coldest winters in more than a century.
Of course, a global warming obsessed media chose not to share such inconvenient truths with their patrons.
Now that summer has turned to winter in our hemisphere, will press outlets be able to be so selective in what weather information they share?
Take for example the following Reuters piece featured at Yahoo concerning China's harsh winter (emphasis added, h/t NBer MikeB):
Millions remained stranded in China on Monday ahead of the biggest holiday of the year as parts of the country suffered their coldest winter in a century.
Freezing weather has killed scores of people and left travelers stranded before the Lunar New Year, or Spring Festival -- the only opportunity many people have for a holiday all year.
[...]
The China Meteorological Administration said the weather was the coldest in 100 years in central Hubei and Hunan provinces, going by the total number of consecutive days of average temperature less than 1 degree Celsius (33.8 degrees Fahrenheit).
Think Katie, Charlie, and Brian will be doing a feature on this Big Chinese Chill this week?
Think they'd be all over this story if it was the middle of the summer, and China was being hit by warmer temperatures than its seen in a century?
Yeah, those are rhetorical questions.
*****Update: NBC's "Nightly News" did a feature on China's cold weather Monday evening:
BRIAN WILLIAMS, anchor:
We're covering a big story overseas tonight. It is being called China's Hurricane Katrina. Today the nation's forecasting office there admitted the country was not prepared for the month of blizzards that have brought it to a virtual standstill. Millions have been stranded. Hundreds of thousands of people are homeless. Food, vital shipments of fuel have been cut. Our own Mark Mullen found out just how challenging life has become as he traveled to an area that has taken the brunt of these storms.
MARK MULLEN reporting:
The journey to reach Chenzhou, the city hardest hit by China's worst winter storms in a century, is long, slow and revealing. For hundreds of miles, power lines everywhere downed by ice, buildings collapsed by snow and frozen crops, which have caused produce prices nationwide to double. Eight hours into what should be a three-hour trip, we reached Chenzhou, the city of four million virtually cut off from the rest of China. For 10 days, there has been no power, no running water, no heat. Coping has become a lesson in ingenuity. For water, people are using community wells. For electricity, merchants who can afford them buy generators. And with limited cell phone service, word of mouth is usually the way to find out if an ATM is working, though cash, just like diesel fuel, is running out.
A city the size of Chenzhou not having electricity for more than a week is causing some concern over how well-equipped China may be to handle a national emergency, just six months before the Summer Olympics.
But the biggest concern for the Cheng family, keeping warm. They've spent their entire savings on coal.
Unidentified Woman: (Through translator) We can't afford to buy more coal if it snows again.
MULLEN: But there was some good news today. A break in the weather gave some of China's one million deployed troops a chance to clear the country's crucial north/south freeway and gives millions of motorists a chance to head home and finally celebrate China's new year holiday. Mark Mullen, NBC News, Chenzhou, China.
Though it's nice to see this being covered, it would also be refreshing to have Williams or Mullen refer to how this impacts the global warming debate.
After all, if the report was on China experiencing its warmest temperatures in 100 years, global warming certainly would have been blamed. With the advent of solar cycle 24, and the likelihood that the globe will be experiencing cooler temperatures for years to come, it only seems fair that media observances of such should call into question the global warming myth.
Or is that asking too much?
