Physicians, Man Your Stethoscopes!

Editor’s Note:  Each issue, we’ll uncover climate change rumblings and rumors from 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. Like the National Weather Service, we’ll issue a WATCH for threatening actions and a WARNING for outright danger.

This issue, WATCH conditions prevail. As part of their pre-Kyoto full-court press, the White House has staged several photo ops. On Oct. 1, your local TV weatherperson(ality) was wined and dined at the Big House. On the menu? Global warming scare stories cooked up by a select group of taxpayer-financed government researchers. Most of these smiling, peppy weather folk can’t tell the difference between an adiabat and a fruit bat, so it’s doubtful they’ll question any of this White House pablum. Just for fun, if your hometown “forecaster” brings this up on the air, why not pick up the phone and ask why the satellite record shows no warming in the last 20 years? Federal climatologists’ recent explanations (see page 1) are harder to believe than the five-day forecast.

At press time, the White House was slated to mobilize local green organizations in dozens of cities across the United States to join in an Oct. 6 downlink to be televised in each community. Physicians for Social Responsibility—who apparently do not consider the truth to be a social responsibility (see WCR, 6/23/97)—are imploring their (very limited) membership to turn out for the meetings. Their p.r. included the following (emphasis theirs):   “PLEASE HELP US TO GET THE PUBLIC HEALTH MESSAGE OUT BY ATTENDING THESE EVENTS!  WEAR YOUR WHITE LAB COAT AND STETHOSCOPE IF POSSIBLE!!”