The climate science community must have let out a collective groan after reading this opening line from Bill McKibben’s Daily Beast column:
Irene’s got a middle name, and it’s Global Warming.
If that sounds familiar, then you’ll remember this from Ross Gelbspan six years ago:
The hurricane that struck Louisiana and Mississippi on Monday was nicknamed Katrina by the National Weather Service. Its real name is global warming.
Boys, there is such a thing as rhetorical overkill. It has a way of undermining the legitimacy of your cause. Just saying…
UPDATE: Over at Scientific American, John Horgan has a nice piece that references this post and some of the exchanges in the thread.
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