Your Opinion: Science supports warming

Dear Editor:

Both Joe Bachant and Robert Haslag address the issue of the overwhelming scientific evidence to support the fact of global warming in their letters of Jan. 9, corroborated further by a news article in your paper on Jan. 10. In contrast, Steve Sampson's letter of Jan. 9 purports to debunk that evidence with quotations, implying that they come from the respected British Antarctic Survey (BAS), when in fact they are taken verbatim from The Register, a UK online propaganda organ for climate change deniers.

The writer Sampson actually quotes is Lewis Page, a former British military engineer, not a scientist, who has a track record of distorting reports on scientific studies to support his own opinions and suppressing the opinions of those with whom he disagrees. If Sampson wishes to cite the BAS he should read their news articles, which consistently offer real scientific evidence of global warming not Page's distortions.

Sampson, who so readily throws out insults about celebrities with whom he disagrees being dropouts might want to reveal his own scientific credentials for lecturing the rest of us on climate change.

Fifty years ago the Surgeon General issued his report linking smoking and lung cancer. The scientific evidence at the time was overwhelmingly in support of this report, just as the evidence today is overwhelming on the subject of global warming. The lies told then by the tobacco companies to protect their profits at the expense of the health of millions of Americans are similar to the lies told today by Exxon Mobil and other oil companies and their right wing supporters such as the Koch brothers, and for the same reason.

There is real science, which relies on observable, testable evidence, and there are lies. While I understand your newspaper's reluctance to censor letters to the editor, you do a disservice to the public by publishing cartoons promoting those lies. Editorial cartoonists can only lie to us if their employers permit it.

We must conclude that you, like Sampson, do not understand the science. You owe your readers an explanation.