On Saturday morning, CBS and NBC both ran predictable reports arguing that human activity is causing global warming, which is causing hurricanes like Florence to be worse, while those who are skeptical are derided as "climate change deniers."
By contrast, global warming skeptic Joe Bastardi appeared on both Friday's Fox News at Night and Thursday's Hannity show on FNC. He argued that, while it is true that climate has always undergone change, past hurricane seasons have actually been worse than those in recent decades, as he doubted that humans are making a significant impact on the climate.
CBS This Morning Saturday spent more than seven and half minutes on the subject as correspondent John Blackstone ran a full report on the Global Climate Summit, which was then followed up by having meteorologist Jeff Berardelli appear as a guest in studio to make predictions about how he believes hurricane seasons will get worse in the future.
As the segment came to a close, co-anchor Michelle Miller posed: "Can anyone deny climate change any longer?"
Berardelli responded:
I don't think it's possible to do it. There are some people that will do it -- there are about eight percent of the population that you'll never convert. But the truth is, it's here, it's now, it's serious, and we have to take action if we want to save our future.
Over on Saturday's Today, NBC correspondent Harry Smith filed a full report about the dire predictions for hurricanes in the future. No one thought it was odd to predict harsher hurricanes in the future when Florence made landfall as a Category One storm, which wasn't great evidence of the doomsayer scenario.
Near the end of the report, as he spoke with environmental planner Rob Freudenberg, the NBC reporter posed: "So what would you say about all this to climate change deniers?"
Freudenberg responded:
There are people who don't believe that climate change is happening or that humans aren't the cause of climate change, but the fact is, changes are happening, and everybody recognizes that. And we're going to have to deal with more flooding and bigger storms regardless of whether you believe in climate change or not.
