When Dallas Freezes Over

Friday brought a sunny seventy-degree day to Dallas. But by Saturday night we had sleet. And on Sunday morning my husband woke me with, “We have an inch of snow outside.”

“What? No way!” I exclaimed. I had greeted the forecast with total skepticism, and as it turned out, we ended up with more snow than the weatherman even predicted. Indeed, we’ve had record snow in Texas this winter, er, spring.

And it’s not just us, right? In January our extended family in Washington, D.C., sat snowbound in two feet of snow. Somebody in their part of the world even built a six-foot-tall igloo on Capitol Hill with a sign atop it that said, “Al Gore’s New Home.” Ni-i-ice.

As expected, several people talking about the Texas weather in the past 24 hours have taunted with, “Ha! It looks more like global cooling than global warming.” They claim the white stuff disproves the theory about the earth heating up.

Now, I don’t side with one group or the other in the global warming debate. My personal theory about global warming is that millions of women started having hot flashes when they all went off their meds after researchers found an estrogen-cancer link.

Still, something bugs me about the “snow disproves global warming” remark. Most climate scientists think crazy-making cold fronts like Dallas has had of late are actually consistent with a heating planet. These experts have warned from the beginning that we should expect many such intense weather events.

Now, they may be wrong. But the recent snows do not necessarily discredit the theory. And people who truly think the big snow storms do so demonstrate they haven’t read much on both sides of the issue.

That said, I am not of the Henny Penny school—that is, I do not think the sky is falling. But I do think the earth will someday be consumed in fervent heat. Is it such a stretch, then, to think human factors might play into that scenario? Aren’t some people powerful enough and nuts enough to torch the planet? I find it interesting that those who believe in “total depravity” are often the least likely to believe humans have seriously damaged the earth. And they may be right. But some are so anti-Gore, I suspect they wouldn't believe in global climate change even if hell froze over.