Greta Thunberg and Andrew Bolt: two sides of the same coin

Andrew is slightly more careful about his lies than Greta, but he is still an expert at deceiving his listeners. He loves to imply that drought has absolutely nothing to do with climate change, but of course anyone with a lawn knows that it is harder to recover from drought when the weather is hot than when it is cool. The IPCC says that "Over the period 1961-2013, the annual area of drylands in drought has increased, on average by slightly more than 1% per year, with large inter-annual variability." Andrew's get out of jail free card is that Australia is not one of the regions most likely to be impacted in the future.

Andrew's second lie is that climate change must be nonsense because crop yields have been increasing. In 2016 he wrote: "Global warming is giving us booming crops and cheap food." The reason that crop yields have increased though is not the climate; it is genetically improved seeds, more fertiliser and more irrigation. The IPCC has indicated that food security will be severely impacted primarily in poor dryland countries. Food prices have gone up 80% in the last 20 years.Of course, there is no reason for Andrew to mention any of that, since that doesn't help him sell his business-as-usual world view.

These lies make the disgust that Greta and Andrew show to opposing views, disintegrate to showmanship. In that respect, I have slightly more respect for Andrew who has always come across as an entertainer, as much as a commentator.

I can't criticise either one for being a showman. That is how you get on TV and politicians care more about who the public is watching on TV, than any truth embedded in dozens of 500 page reports written by scientists.