‘Houston, we have a dumbass problem’

Watts Up With That:

I’m truly sorry about the title, but nothing else really describes the ridiculousness of the pronouncement by the White House aide John Podesta over these two satellite images in a maddeningly idiotic story from the Washington Post.
 

In a Feb. 24 Oval Office meeting, two of President Obama’s top climate advisers presented these sharply-contrasting images of California’s snowpack on Jan. 13, 2013 (left) and a year later (right), as a way to underscore how global warming is changing conditions on the ground in the United States.

The satellite images viewed by President Obama before a meeting with eight Western governors were stark, showing how snowpack in California’s mountains had shrunk by 86 percent in a single year. 

“It was a ‘Houston, we have a problem’ moment,” recalled White House counselor John D. Podesta, one of two aides who briefed the president that February day. Obama mentioned the images several times as he warned the governors that political leaders had no choice but to cope with global warming’s impact.

After years of putting other policy priorities first — and dismaying many liberal allies in the process — Obama is now getting into the weeds on climate change and considers it one of the key components of his legacy, according to aides and advisers.

Story here: http://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/for-president-obama-a-renewed-focus-on-climate/2014/05/04/6b81412c-d144-11e3-9e25-188ebe1fa93b_story.html

Gasp! 86% change in a single year. More proof positive that ‘global warming’ is accelerating. /sarc

So tell me, oh geniuses, what will you show the President after the looming El Niño kicks in later this year, and California has a wetter than normal year during the winter of 2014/15 and the snow pack goes up to something like 146% of normal? What then? Blame that on global warming and call it another “Houston we have a problem” moment when we getflooding in California like in 1997/1998 after that big EL Niño changed the weather pattern in a single year to drench the state?

The lack of snowpack in 2014 is all about ENSO and resulting jet stream patterns, something well known for years.

Pattern shifts related to ENSO make California winters highly variable. For example, compare the snowpack change from 1880 to 1881 in the graph below from the Sierra Snow Lab and note some of the other low years highlighted in yellow.

Read more