As we watch the climate alarmist retreat turn into a rout, we are reminded of Rudi Dornbusch’s line about economics, that first things happen more slowly than you thought possible and then they happen faster than you thought possible. Thus Roger Pielke Jr. just quoted Axios from January 13, that “The climate agenda’s fall from grace over the past year has been stunning – in speed, scale and scope” and adds “The recent change in the climate conversation has been stunning… Catastrophism is out, pragmatism is in.” Well, we shall see about the pragmatism, as the kinds of people running about yelling that the sky is falling, or burning up, or full of radiation, or whatever the scare du jour are not noted for the practicality of their remedies even if you accept the premise of their alarm. But when RPJ also reflects on a friendly profile of himself in the Swedish magazine Kvartal, “My how the world has changed.” You ain’t foolin’.

For instance Bloomberg Green faces the grim reality even in the land of the Swedish doom goblin:

“Six years ago, the cobbled square outside Sweden’s parliament buzzed with energy as Greta Thunberg and her ‘Fridays for Future’ demonstrators urged passing lawmakers to act on climate change through loudhailers and whistles. On a recent Friday, it was far different. Two protesters, a small cardboard sign and a quiet vigil. The energy that’s drained out of the campaign mirrors a broader deflation of green ambitions in Sweden and across the continent. Populist groups are pushing back against environmental initiatives, spurred on in part by Donald Trump’s anti-green agenda, and there’s been a weakening of near-term emission-reduction measures, especially where climate and cost-of-living policies have clashed.”

They may not like it. But they’re realistic enough to note serious difficulties. Including that the green energy transition empirically raised costs rather than lowering them, far enough to create a climate policy crisis in many places.

Heatmap also notes the vibe without liking it, emailing on Jan. 14:

“Every year, Heatmap asks dozens of climate insiders – reformers, academics, business leaders, and more – some of the most pressing questions in the field. Our goal is to take the field’s temperature after a bruising year.”

Even more remarkably, The Atlantic “Weekly Planet” runs a balanced guest essay deploring the “remarkably broken” climate debate in the United States where:

“Leaders of one political party frame climate change as an existential emergency that threatens human life and prosperity. Leaders of the other dismiss it as a distraction from economic growth and energy security.”

Which is already a surprisingly balanced portrayal, and which then continues:

“Economists like me, trained to think about trade-offs, are uneasy with both camps. But, in practice, we have helped fuel the extremes of this dysfunctional debate. High-profile economic studies claim to quantify the global damages that will be caused by climate change centuries into the future and have produced estimates that range from modest to catastrophic. They have lent a veneer of scientific authority to arguments for both complacency and alarm, even though these studies are far too limited to support either position.”

The author then notes the work of Nobel laureate William Nordhaus on carbon pricing and says:

“the central message of Nordhaus’s work is the importance of balancing the benefits and costs of climate action, rather than identifying any particular pathway forward. Despite this, the most visible use of climate-economics analysis today is to advance extreme arguments that most economists do not agree with. How did that happen? One important reason is that policy makers want these damage estimates. Elected officials want to show that the benefits of their preferred climate policies exceed the costs.”

Again, the point is worth noting on its own merits, and doubly so for appearing in a publication not conspicuous in days of yore for conceding that there might be a massive state-funded bias toward alarmist pseudo-science.