Climate Denial is Killing Us. - Bumper Sticker

As Houston begins its long recovery from Hurricane Harvey, epic wildfires burn throughout the western U.S., and Irma charges toward Florida after devastating several Caribbean islands, while two other storms build strength in the Atlantic basin, conservative radio host Rush Limbaugh is among those helping to expose the deadly consequences of climate change denialism by claiming threats posed by such global warming-related events are being exaggerated. "One thing that the science is very clear on is that the strongest storms will get stronger because of global warming, because the oceans are warmer." —Michael Mann, climate scientist And so while climate activist Bill McKibben on Thursday morning warned that "we've never had anything quite like" the current fires and storms now being experienced, it was The Nation's Mark Hertsgaard who argues, in a piece titled "Climate Denialism Is Literally Killing Us," that those who have made it public policy to downplay the threat of man-made climate change should be held to account for the deaths that such denialism is now causing. During his show on Tuesday, Limbaugh told his listeners: "There is a desire to advance this climate change agenda, and hurricanes are one of the fastest and best ways to do it.... All you need is to create the fear and panic accompanied by talk that climate change is causing hurricanes to become more frequent and bigger and dangerous, and it's mission accomplished, agenda advanced."