Extinguishing the Climate Change Fires

By Victor Morawski


On June 14th U.S. Forest Service Chief Thomas Tidwell testified before the Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, an entirely legitimate, routine appearance where the Forest Service discusses its fire fighting mission and its future budgetary needs for accomplishing it.

What struck me as illegitimate, however, was the attempt by Committee Chairman Bingaman to spout the party line in his opening remarks and try to tie in the occurrence of wildfires with climate change and global warming.

There he made specific reference to a recently published document by the National Academy of Sciences entitled, “America’s Climate Choices” as evidence that global warming is affecting wildfire frequency and severity.

As it was specifically mentioned in the hearing, the report is worth taking a look at because it is a blueprint for Big Government intervention to head off the supposed dire consequences of Global Warming: “The significant risks that climate change poses to human society and the environment provide a strong motivation to move ahead with substantial response efforts. Current efforts of local, state, and private sector actors are important, but not likely to yield progress comparable to what could be achieved with the addition of strong federal policies…”

And yes, the report does have some things to say about forest fires. As an impact of global climate change it claims that, “The frequency of large wildfires and the length of the fire season have increased substantially in both the western United States and Alaska.”
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