Thirty years ago, on this day, June 26th, 1988,
The Inside Sunday edition of the CBS Evening News for June 26, 1988 featured a very unusual eight-minute environmental story that led with the greenhouse effect, linking it to the high temperatures of the 1980s. The Goddard Institute’s David Rind and climatologist Thomas Karl warned of future warming and discussed the need to decrease the production of carbon dioxide.
(Sachsman, 2000: 5)
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was 351ppm. As of 2026, when this post was published, it is 432ppm. This matters because the more carbon dioxide in the air, the more heat gets trapped. The more heat, the more extreme weather events. You can make it more complicated than that if you want, but really, it’s not. Fwiw, I have a tattoo of the Keeling Curve on my left forearm.
The broader context for this was that various news networks, especially CBS, had been broadcasting clips on the greenhouse effect repeatedly. There was one in 1980 and then in response to various congressional hearings, especially in 1982-1983. This was nothing particularly new, except in the length of it (8 minutes is a long time in TV-land).
The specific context was that three days earlier, in the midst of a heat wave and a drought, James Hansen had said to journalists after a meeting, after giving evidence to the Senate inquiry, that “it was time to stop waffling and say that the greenhouse effect was here.” This had been broadcast around the world.
What I think we can learn is this: the media has. Indeed tried to alert us. It’s the rain falling on hard surfaces and just running away.
What happened next: The media continued to cover the story with more or less accuracy and ethics over the coming years. An important one to remember is the September l88 incident where Stephen Schneider is not invited on because they want someone who’s going to make even more “alarmist.” And you’ve also got Australian science journalist Robyn Williams talking about how they’ll have to be the backlash stories. But that’s science is not a matter of opinion like this, you fucking muppets. And then, crucially, the denialists learn to exploit journalistic norms for their own purposes – “Balance as Bias”, as Boykoff and Boykoff put it.
You can see the chronological list of All Our Yesterdays “on this day” posts here.
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
If you want to get involved, let me know.
If you want to invite me on your podcast, that would boost my ego and probably improve the currently pitiful hit-rate on this site (the two are not-unrelated).
Also on this day:
June 26, 1975 – Denialist Richard Scorer being stupid
June 26, 1986 – Australian Environment Council schooled on climate
June 26, 1986 – “our children will grow old in a world that fragmenting and disintegrating.”
June 26, 1988 – it’s SHOWTIME for climate…
June 26, 1991 “environment is not flavor of the month any more”
June 26, 1992 – BCA versus reality (BCA wins in the short-term) –