From time to time we complain that the media treat hot weather events as proof of climate change while cold events are just weather. But recently The Weather Network managed to report that a “50˚C heat dome shatters records across Australia” without once mentioning climate change. Meanwhile here in frozen North America the endless snow and cold, we are now told, is (ta-dum) proof of climate change. Inside Climate News hollers “A Winter Storm Fueled by Global Warming Tests U.S. Disaster Response” and if you’re wondering how, well, “Climate change is making disasters more intense and unpredictable.” Right. Whereas they were definitely mild and predictable in the past. Everyone says so. Or at least everyone they know assumes so. Cue the arm-waving by the scientists who say.

To wit:

“In fact, scientists say, global warming has reshaped the atmospheric engine in ways that can make winter storms and extreme cold outbreaks more disruptive than ever. Rapid Arctic warming and melting, stronger and more intense ocean heat waves, increased atmospheric moisture and more frequent disruptions of the stratospheric polar vortex are all factors ‘contributing to the extreme winter weather unfolding across the U.S. this week,’ Jennifer Francis, an atmospheric scientist and senior scientist at the Woodwell Climate Research Center in Falmouth, Massachusetts, said via email.”

As they knew she would, since that Center says of itself:

“Woodwell Climate Research Center conducts science for solutions at the nexus of climate, people, and nature. We partner with leaders and communities for just, meaningful impact to address the climate crisis.”

And Francis says of herself:

“My research has sparked scientific debate and drawn broad public attention.”

Precisely what we want here.

Heatmap meanwhile blames you while excusing themselves for this harsh winter storm amid global heating:

“The relationship between fossil fuels and severe weather is often presented as a cause-and-effect: Burning coal, oil, and gas for heat and energy forces carbon molecules into a reaction with oxygen in the air to form carbon dioxide, which in turn traps heat in the atmosphere and gradually warms our planet. That imbalance, in many cases, makes the weather more extreme. But this relationship also goes the other way: We use fossil fuels to make ourselves more comfortable – and in some cases, keep us alive – during extreme weather events. Our dependence on oil and gas creates a grim ouroboros: As those events get more extreme, we need more fuel. This weekend, some 200 million Americans will be cranking up the thermostats in their natural-gas-heated homes, firing up their propane generators, or hitting icy roads in their combustion-engine cars as a major winter storm brings record-low temperatures to 35 states, knocks out power, and grinds air travel to a halt.”

The alternative being, um, uh… But they’re not letting you off the hook so easily for daring keep the furnace going:

“Climate change deniers love to use major winter storms as ‘proof’ that global warming isn’t real. But in the case of this weekend’s polar vortex, there is evidence that Arctic warming is responsible for the record cold temperature projections across the United States.”

Scientific American also gets  in on the game, saying “Weekend winter storm that battered eastern U.S. was supercharged by climate change” to which that email teaser linked starts out:

“If you live in the eastern U.S., you are likely among the millions dealing with the aftereffects of the heavy snow, sleet and freezing rain that buried the region over the weekend. And while it may be extremely cold, new research reveals that last weekend’s weather was in fact supercharged by global warming.”

Supercharged. A nice scary word. And what is this “new research” that “reveals” rather than “suggests” or “argues” or “kluges together”? Why, that “it dumped more frozen precipitation than it would have if the storm had occurred decades earlier” because:

“It may seem paradoxical that a warming climate could mean heavier snowfalls, but hotter, albeit still below freezing, temperatures are nonetheless a recipe for more snow.”

Or less snow, or different snowfall patterns, or whatever just happened. Which “new research” has been blasting out for decades as alarmist predictions fall like snow on Toronto in January 2026.

Alas, the story is not “science” just because it says it is on the package. It goes on immediately to explain that:

“That’s because for every one degree Celsius (1.8 degrees Fahrenheit) of warming, the atmosphere can hold about 7 percent more moisture. And this storm happened in an atmosphere that has become up to five degrees C (nine degrees F) warmer than it was in past decades, according to the research organization ClimaMeter, which produced the new analysis. That means that this storm had up to 20 percent more precipitation than it would have if there was no human-caused warming.”

Now hold on, you may cry. Five degrees Celsius? Isn’t that the loony prediction of RCP8.5 not what anyone claims already happened? But before we get to that one, or the issue of multiplying seven times five and getting twenty which is more Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy than Scientists’ Guide to the Weather, let’s dispose of the premise. Which is based on the “Clausius-Clapeyron” principle that for every degree warmer the air gets its potential humidity rises by 7%. Potential, you understand. And as we observed in July of 2024, climate models assume without checking that its “specific humidity”, how much water it actually absorbs, rises in lockstep with its potential humidity. But as we also observed, actual new research revealed that outside the computers and the alarmist screeds, it doesn’t.

OK, revealed is too strong a word. It’s not how science works. What actually happened is that the new research suggested that it doesn’t seem to, an invitation for people to investigate further. But alarmist research tied to headlines is a dogmatic business. And ambulance-chasing “attribution science” not the normal kind. As the outfit that cranked out this hype, ClimaMeter, says of itself:

“ClimaMeter is a rapid framework for understanding extreme weather events in a changing climate based on looking at similar past weather situations. ClimaMeter is hosted by the Institut Pierre Simon Laplace.”

Rapid. Not reliable. Not for them the tedious business of careful time-consuming checking. Their algorithms blame anything you want on man-made climate change with sufficient rapidity to nab headlines which is, after all, what they’re paid for.

Another gaping hole in this ClimaMeter drive-by smearing is:

“We mostly ascribe the increase of precipitation in the January 2026 North American winter storm to human-driven climate change, and natural climate variability likely played a minor role.”

As we have said before and will say again until it stops happening, “climate change” is not a causal agent it is a description of different weather patterns. So it might be an apt description of this increase of precipitation (or it might not) but the latter cannot be ascribed to the former any more than a teenage growth spurt can be ascribed to the person getting taller.

Yet it keeps being so ascribed. For instance David Gelles in The New York Times “Climate Forward” does the usual verbal dance, starting with:

“On a typical winter day, the Arctic air that has gripped much of the United States this week should be a few thousand miles to the north, sitting atop the North Pole. But as man-made climate change continues to disrupt global weather patterns, that mass of cold air, known as the polar vortex, is straying beyond its usual confines.”

No. If he were right about other aspects of the matter, these allegedly disrupted patterns would constitute man-made climate change. They wouldn’t be the result of it. But of course he’s not right. Under the heading “Hotter hots and colder colds” the piece basically says anything and everything is evidence of the theory except he has no evidence:

“The escaped polar vortex is just one instance of extreme weather playing out right now around the world. With so much cold air much farther south than usual, typically frigid regions have become relatively balmy…. Elsewhere, extreme heat is raging. Australia is reeling from a record heat wave that has pushed temperatures past 120 degrees Fahrenheit, or about 49 Celsius, in some areas, leading to fires and power outages. In central Africa, brutal heat has shattered records in recent days, with countries north of the Equator hitting temperatures above 101 degrees Fahrenheit. Colder colds. Hotter hots. These are the intense bouts of unusual weather that scientists for decades warned would become more common with global warming.”

And at least there he blames warming not change for change. But as Chris Martz pointed out with justified irritation:

“First, scientists NEVER predicted both more extreme heat and cold decades ago. Only more frequent and intense heatwaves were predicted.”

Moreover, he says, in the U.S. which was the focus of the article:

“Both extreme heat and cold have decreased since the early 20ᵗʰ century. The extreme heat during the 1930s and 1950s mask any recent increase, while the number of cold waves fell off a cliff after December 1989.”

For our part we point out irritably that the weather is not getting more unusual and people who make a big hoohah about being the rational evidence-based ones shouldn’t be so cavalier about evidence.

We have good records of many phenomena from Martz’s U.S. temperatures to North Atlantic hurricanes and beyond, and no trend is discernible. And we do not have good records of central African temperature even half a century ago (and arguably not very good today) so there’s nothing to compare it to. However as with “attribution science” if the premise is that all bad weather is man-made, the conclusion will be that any particular piece of bad weather is man-made. But it’s not science and it’s not logic.

Now in fact the heat in Australia is bad. So bad it’s “something not seen since the 1930s in New South Wales.” Not that the 1930s were hot, you understand. And yes, some areas have set all-time thermometer records though we again caution that (a) measurements in the past were not always rigorous (b) authorities have been known to adjust past temperatures downward and (c) areas setting records are more urbanized now than 90 years ago.

Still, the impact of such heat is minimal compared to the impact of the concurrent cold. You don’t see headlines like the Boston Herald’s “Officials urge residents to stay inside, off roads as major winter storm approaches” when it’s hot out. And so we’re actually encouraged that the Weather Network reported on Jan. 24:

“Ontario is the midst of its coldest temperatures this winter, and for some, their chilliest in years. Kirkland Lake, Ont., bottomed out at an extremely cold, -43.7 C low early Saturday morning. It occurred as much of the province endured through a lobe of the polar vortex that has weakened, and has been displaced from its position in the Far North. The bone-chilling, overnight value recorded in Kirkland Lake was its coldest since Jan. 21, 1984 (-44.0 C).”

They didn’t soft-pedal it, combining “bone-chilling” with a subsequent “Wickedly cold values on Saturday morning” from 11 places. Almost as if they were starting to notice something important.