Guest essay by Larry Hamlin

The L A Times published yet another climate alarmist Ca. wildfire story quoting Gov. Brown claim that the states recent wildfires are driven by man made “greenhouse gases”.

The Gov. offered the following assessment:

“The more serious predictions of warming and fires to occur later in the century, 2040 or 2050, they’re now occurring in real time,” Brown said at a news conference at the state’s emergency operations center outside Sacramento.”

“Brown, who met with top fire and emergency response officials, said the state would spend whatever is needed to combat the blazes. But he said the current conditions are part of a long cycle that began with the rapid rise in greenhouse gases caused by human activity.”

The Gov. has made these flawed claims before as noted below even though the states forest management policy leadership had clearly identified the failure of a century long practice of unnatural wildfire suppression policies that has allowed the built up huge amounts of wildfire fuel materials that were greatly increasing the risks for more dangerous and damaging wildfires.

In October 18, 2015 L. A. Times article wildfire experts unsupportive of Brown’s position noted that:

“Today’s forest fires are indeed larger than those of the past, said National Park Service climate change scientist Patrick Gonzalez.

At a symposium sponsored by Brown’s administration, Gonzalez presented research attributing that trend to policies of fighting the fires, which create thick underlayers of growth, rather than allowing them to burn.

“We are living right now with a legacy of unnatural fire suppression of approximately a century,” Gonzalez told attendees.”

This century long policy of fire suppression and its impact of Ca. wildfires is further reflected in a 2015 University of California Berkeley study which noted:

“National parks and other protected areas clearly provide an important function in removing carbon from the atmosphere and storing it,” said Battles. “But we also know from previous research that a century of fire suppression has contributed to a potentially unsustainable buildup of vegetation. This buildup provides abundant fuel for fires that contribute to carbon emissions.”

This most recent L A Times article fails to address these flawed forest management policies largely championed by environmentalists as being responsible for the present wildfire challenges being experienced in the state and instead tries to falsely speculate that man made greenhouse gases are the culprit.

The Times continues to promote its climate alarmism propaganda campaign by hiding the forest management fire suppression policy failures of the state as well ignoring the role played by Gov. Brown and the legislature in these failures.

The L A Times seems incapable of addressing real world issues regarding the states climate and energy policy.