According to Tom Fletcher BC is not burning

FLETCHER: No, B.C. is not burning

read the title of Tom Fletcher's opinion piece, which ran in many of Black Press's local newspapers including the Townsman, this week.

http://www.kamloopsthisweek.com/fletcher-no-b-c-is-not-burning/

Well, if it is not burning somewhere close to where you live, it likely is or has been smoking. The reason why someone would write this, what could be interpreted as a deliberately provocative and offensive column is a mystery, unless it is an attempt to minimize the real issue of climate change, which looms large on many minds and is a serious election topic of great concern for many voters.

"Snowpacks for southern B.C. were indeed the lowest on record this past winter, but that record only goes back 31 years. When were high snowfall records last broken?” “That would be 2011.",  wrote Fletcher as if to dismiss the considerable body of long term statistics, which point to much more serious evidence for climate change than fluctuating precipitation alone, in just this part of BC.   It is a lot more complex than that and one only has to go to a source such as NASA to find the global trends, which affect us all. http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/Features/ArcticIce/

We have been advised by many scientists, as the result of much research and proof, to prepare for extremes of everything, floods, drought, wind and temperatures. It was only last week that we read, “The Earth experienced its hottest June and the hottest first half of the year since records began, according to scientists.” http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jul/21/climate-scientists-say-2015-on-track-to-be-warmest-year-on-record

Climate change is not an hypothesis any more.

Fletcher also questions the predictions of ‘periods of drought being the new normal’ with the question:

“Is drought also the “new normal”? “The B.C. government’s own climate-change forecast is for increasing overall precipitation, albeit with more rain and less snow”, he wrote.

Either Fletcher has a real lack of understanding of what climate changes really are, in this article or there is a motive to soothe our souls into thinking we need not do anything about the changes.   

Fletcher refers to the upcoming Climate Summit as, “the latest global climate doom festival in Paris this fall”, a patronizing and dismissive characterization of what, for many, is of major importance for every economy and survival of much of life as we know it.