Pielke's Weekly Memo #15

A mysterious disappearing article at the NYT, THB updates, an absolutely amazing graph & recommended readings and podcasts

Greetings from cloudy and cold Oslo! Yesterday I made my way to the CC Vest Arena in the west of Oslo for a second division soccer match between Ullern and Moss. It was great fun, with a spirited crowd and a physical, entertaining match. Moss won and secured promotion to the second tier OBOS-ligaen. Lower tier football is a joy to watch. Highly recommended where ever you are in the world!

Travelling Moss supporters getting ready to storm the field after securing promotion. Photo: Photo: Fredrik Sarberg

Lots going on this week. So let’s get to it.

The curious case of the disappearing NYT article

I had a very odd interaction with The New York Times this week that remains mysterious. On Wednesday morning I received an email from a NYT fact-checker with an urgent request to respond to some fact-checking questions that same day before going to press with the article for this weekend. The request was a surprise, as I had not been in touch with any NYT journalist related to the seven questions that were put to be by the fact checker.

The first three questions seemed to be something of a warm-up, as they are all public record — Was my name spelled correctly? (Yes), Have I co-authored publications with Justin Ritchie? (Yes) and, Did I read his 2017 paper in Energy Economics? (Yes)

Based on these questions I assumed that the NYT article had something to do with our various peer-reviewed work on plausible scenarios over the past few years. Readers here will be very familiar with that work and its significance. This post is the most-read ever at The Honest Broker.

The next four questions from the NYT were odd to say the least as they were not about our data, research methods or how I might view the significance of our work. They were all leading questions about how the NYT should characterize me personally — seemingly as a contrarian political scientist friendly with Republicans, a veritable word salad of delegitimization. This is not my first rodeo, I’ve seen this playbook many times by the media, so I was immediately suspicious about what was up.

Below are the questions from the NYT and my responses. You can judge for yourself.

Out of the blue fact-checking questions from The New York Times and my replies.

It is 2022, and having been down this road before, I did what one should do in such circumstances — I went public. I shared what was going on via Twitter and in response (on Twitter and also in private) I received many responses of support. I especially was heartened by a number of journalists who were willing to comment on how unusual and inappropriate it would be for the first contact between me and a newspaper writing about me to be a fact-check.

It is mid-day Sunday as I write this and the NYT has gone to press for the weekend, and no article has appeared. So who knows what happened.

In any case, for any journalist who wants to explore my funding, my politics, my interests in lower-division soccer — whatever — just be in touch, I am easy to find, happy to chat and I am an open book. But as interesting as I may be, the research I am doing with colleagues and the research of others that I write about here is far more interesting. I would much prefer to chat about the research and why it matters.

Updated U.S. hurricane landfall graphs

By request, I have updated the time series of U.S. landfalling hurricanes (and corrected an error spotted by an eagled-eyed reader, thanks!). Here are all landfalling U.S. continental hurricanes 1900 through today. Of course, 2022 hurricane season is not over and the 2022 numbers could still change.

U.S. continental hurricane landfalls updated from Klotzbach et al. 2018 via NOAA.

Here is a similar time series 1900 through today for major U.S. continental major (Category 3+) hurricane landfalls.

U.S. continental hurricane landfalls updated from Klotzbach et al. 2018 via NOAA.

After the jump: An amazing graph & recommended readings and podcasts

There is an incredible amount of things going on these days where science meets politics. Coming days and weeks here at The Honest Broker will be fun and provocative.

I am fortunate to have so much interesting and important things to write about. I appreciate the growing numbers of subscribers and also, for many of you, participating here at The Honest Broker. Please do like and share, and consider commenting as well.

Now the jump . . .