On Politics, War by Other Means — 07

Let’s dissect a disinformation campaign.

The Fossil Fuel Elites are “grooming” Trumpublican America that the impending “Climate Catastrophe” is “natural”.

This figure shows the annual values of the U.S. Heat Wave Index from 1895 to 2020. These data cover the contiguous 48 states. An index value of 0.2 (for example) could mean that 20 percent of the country experienced one heat wave, 10 percent of the country experienced two heat waves, or some other combination of frequency and area resulted in this value.

This graph is interesting for a lot of different reasons. Let’s break it apart and look at what it tells us.

Firstly, where does this graph come from?

Who’s dataset is this graph “gestalting” into a single image?

That would be the Environmental Protection Agency and the graph comes from here:

Climate Change Indicators: Heat Waves — This indicator describes trends in multi-day extreme heat events across the United States.

Secondly, who inserted the text and what does it mean?

That is a very interesting story. It starts here, “What the EPA Doesn’t Want You to Know” by this guy “David Siegel”.

Mr. Siegel writes a lot of Climate Change articles here on Medium. Here’s a sample of his work.

How the Sun Affects Earth’s Climate, Part I: Milankovich Cycles

How the Sun Affects Earth’s Climate, Part II: Solar Flux and Cosmic Rays

Carbon Dioxide Has Reached a Point of Diminishing Returns: The Greenhouse Effect Explained