<div dir="ltr"><div>Ask a scientist?  Really?  But don't some scientists promote "agenda driven propaganda?"  The Union of Concerned Scientists article mentioned in subject heading is lower down.  But first this astonishing unbelievable but true story that involves the "agenda-driven propaganda" from some of a scientific mind-set.</div><div>-------------------------------------------------------</div><div><span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:"Nunito Sans","Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",sans-serif;font-size:19.5px;font-weight:700;letter-spacing:-1px">***** Original material contained herein is Copyright 2000 through life plus 70 years, Ted Moffett.  Do not copy, forward, excerpt, or reproduce outside the </span><a href="http://vision2020.moscow.com/" target="_blank" style="font-family:"Nunito Sans","Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",sans-serif;font-size:19.5px;font-weight:700;letter-spacing:-1px">Vision2020.Moscow.com</a><span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:"Nunito Sans","Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",sans-serif;font-size:19.5px;font-weight:700;letter-spacing:-1px"> </span><span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:"Nunito Sans","Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",sans-serif;font-size:19.5px;font-weight:700;letter-spacing:-1px">forum without the express written permission of the author.*****</span><br></div><div><span style="color:rgb(51,51,51);font-family:"Nunito Sans","Open Sans","Helvetica Neue",sans-serif;font-size:19.5px;font-weight:700;letter-spacing:-1px">-----------------------------</span></div><div><h1 style="font-variant-numeric:normal;font-variant-east-asian:normal;font-variant-alternates:normal;margin:10px 0px 0px;color:rgb(48,48,48);font-kerning:auto;font-feature-settings:normal;font-stretch:normal;font-size:36px;line-height:38px;font-family:"Unify Sans","Helvetica Neue","Arial Nova",Helvetica,Arial,sans-serif">Opinion: Ham fleeced a town that gave him his Ark Encounter</h1></div><div><a href="https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/2020/02/24/opinion-ham-fleeced-town-gave-him-his-ark-encounter/4831987002/" target="_blank">https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/2020/02/24/opinion-ham-fleeced-town-gave-him-his-ark-encounter/4831987002/</a><br></div><div><br></div><div>2-24-2020</div><div><br></div><div>Excerpt from article above:</div><div><div><p style="margin:14px 0px;color:rgb(48,48,48);font-family:"Georgia Pro",Georgia,"Droid Serif",serif;font-size:18px">In a <a href="https://www.cincinnati.com/story/opinion/2020/02/19/opinion-ark-documentary-another-hatchet-job/4793491002/" rel="noopener" target="_blank" style="color:rgb(48,48,48);text-decoration-color:rgb(0,152,254)">Feb. 19 opinion in <em>The Enquirer</em></a>, Ham reacted harshly to the PBS premiere, calling it "an agenda-driven propaganda piece" and claiming the directors had misrepresented their intentions.</p></div><div><span style="color:rgb(48,48,48);font-family:"Georgia Pro",Georgia,"Droid Serif",serif;font-size:18px">Among other storylines, the film follows the relationship between the Ark Encounter and the city of Williamstown in Northern Kentucky, where the Ark is located. Buoyed by promises from Ham and others that the "biblical theme park" would bring a flood of tourism and prosperity, the city voted to sell the Ark 100 acres of land for $1, while also giving them hundreds of thousands in cash. The city also issued Ham’s company $62 million in unsecured bonds and arranged for them to be repaid via diversion of tax revenue. The film shows that the promised prosperity never materialized, with Williamstown businesses shuttering.</span><div class="gmail-yj6qo"></div><div class="gmail-adL">----------------------------------------------------</div></div></div><div><br></div><a href="https://blog.ucsusa.org/elliott-negin/calling-out-the-companies-responsible-for-western-wildfires/">https://blog.ucsusa.org/elliott-negin/calling-out-the-companies-responsible-for-western-wildfires/</a><div><br></div><div>Excerpt from article above: </div><div><br></div><div><p style="border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-variant-alternates:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:20px;line-height:inherit;font-family:UCSMercury,"mercury ssm a","mercury ssm b",Georgia,serif;font-kerning:inherit;font-feature-settings:inherit;margin:0px auto 1.6rem;padding:0px 1rem;box-sizing:inherit;letter-spacing:-0.001em;max-width:32rem;color:rgb(0,0,0)">The US wildfire season used to last about four months, beginning in late summer or early autumn. These days, it <a href="https://www.usda.gov/media/blog/2019/06/27/wildfires-all-seasons" style="border-width:0px 0px 2px;border-top-style:initial;border-right-style:initial;border-bottom-style:solid;border-left-style:initial;border-top-color:initial;border-right-color:initial;border-bottom-color:rgb(0,174,235);border-left-color:initial;font:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit;color:currentcolor;text-decoration-line:none">stretches</a> six to eight months, according to the US Forest Service, and in some places it’s now a year-round affair.</p><p style="border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-variant-alternates:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:20px;line-height:inherit;font-family:UCSMercury,"mercury ssm a","mercury ssm b",Georgia,serif;font-kerning:inherit;font-feature-settings:inherit;margin:0px auto 1.6rem;padding:0px 1rem;box-sizing:inherit;letter-spacing:-0.001em;max-width:32rem;color:rgb(0,0,0)">In just five years, from 2018 through 2022, wildfires scorched <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10244/66" style="border-width:0px 0px 2px;border-top-style:initial;border-right-style:initial;border-bottom-style:solid;border-left-style:initial;border-top-color:initial;border-right-color:initial;border-bottom-color:rgb(0,174,235);border-left-color:initial;font:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit;color:currentcolor;text-decoration-line:none">38.3 million acres</a> across the country. That’s nearly 60,000 square miles, slightly bigger than the state of Georgia. Last year alone, nearly <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10244/66" style="border-width:0px 0px 2px;border-top-style:initial;border-right-style:initial;border-bottom-style:solid;border-left-style:initial;border-top-color:initial;border-right-color:initial;border-bottom-color:rgb(0,174,235);border-left-color:initial;font:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit;color:currentcolor;text-decoration-line:none">69,000</a> wildfires burned <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10244/66" style="border-width:0px 0px 2px;border-top-style:initial;border-right-style:initial;border-bottom-style:solid;border-left-style:initial;border-top-color:initial;border-right-color:initial;border-bottom-color:rgb(0,174,235);border-left-color:initial;font:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit;color:currentcolor;text-decoration-line:none">7.6 million</a> acres, more than 40 percent of which were in Alaska.</p><p style="border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-variant-alternates:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:20px;line-height:inherit;font-family:UCSMercury,"mercury ssm a","mercury ssm b",Georgia,serif;font-kerning:inherit;font-feature-settings:inherit;margin:0px auto 1.6rem;padding:0px 1rem;box-sizing:inherit;letter-spacing:-0.001em;max-width:32rem;color:rgb(0,0,0)">Not only is the fire season longer, wildfires are burning larger areas more severely and at higher elevations. The average acreage that has burned every year since 2000—<a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10244/66" style="border-width:0px 0px 2px;border-top-style:initial;border-right-style:initial;border-bottom-style:solid;border-left-style:initial;border-top-color:initial;border-right-color:initial;border-bottom-color:rgb(0,174,235);border-left-color:initial;font:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit;color:currentcolor;text-decoration-line:none">7 million</a>—is more than double the annual average of <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10244/66" style="border-width:0px 0px 2px;border-top-style:initial;border-right-style:initial;border-bottom-style:solid;border-left-style:initial;border-top-color:initial;border-right-color:initial;border-bottom-color:rgb(0,174,235);border-left-color:initial;font:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit;color:currentcolor;text-decoration-line:none">3.3 million</a> acres in the 1990s, even though the annual average of <a href="https://crsreports.congress.gov/product/pdf/IF/IF10244/66" style="border-width:0px 0px 2px;border-top-style:initial;border-right-style:initial;border-bottom-style:solid;border-left-style:initial;border-top-color:initial;border-right-color:initial;border-bottom-color:rgb(0,174,235);border-left-color:initial;font:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit;color:currentcolor;text-decoration-line:none">70,025</a> wildfires a year since 2000 is 12 percent less than in the 1990s.</p><p style="border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-variant-alternates:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:20px;line-height:inherit;font-family:UCSMercury,"mercury ssm a","mercury ssm b",Georgia,serif;font-kerning:inherit;font-feature-settings:inherit;margin:0px auto 1.6rem;padding:0px 1rem;box-sizing:inherit;letter-spacing:-0.001em;max-width:32rem;color:rgb(0,0,0)">There are a number of reasons why there has been so much more wildfire destruction this century, particularly in the western United States and Canadian southwest. Encroaching development in fire-prone areas and widespread fire suppression are among them. But another major culprit is climate change, which has intensified the heat and drought that have always been factors in western North America.</p><p style="border:0px;font-variant-numeric:inherit;font-variant-east-asian:inherit;font-variant-alternates:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:20px;line-height:inherit;font-family:UCSMercury,"mercury ssm a","mercury ssm b",Georgia,serif;font-kerning:inherit;font-feature-settings:inherit;margin:0px auto 1.6rem;padding:0px 1rem;box-sizing:inherit;letter-spacing:-0.001em;max-width:32rem;color:rgb(0,0,0)">That climate change obviously didn’t just happen on its own. It mainly comes from burning fossil fuels, and a new Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS) peer-reviewed <a href="https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/acbce8" style="border-width:0px 0px 2px;border-top-style:initial;border-right-style:initial;border-bottom-style:solid;border-left-style:initial;border-top-color:initial;border-right-color:initial;border-bottom-color:rgb(0,174,235);border-left-color:initial;font:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit;color:currentcolor;text-decoration-line:none">study</a>—published on May 16 by <em style="border:0px;font-variant:inherit;font-weight:inherit;font-stretch:inherit;font-size:inherit;line-height:inherit;font-family:inherit;font-kerning:inherit;font-feature-settings:inherit;margin:0px;padding:0px;box-sizing:inherit">Environmental Research Letters</em>—calculates just how much of the acreage burned in forest fires in the western United States and southwestern Canada can be attributed to the carbon emissions from the world’s largest fossil fuel companies and cement manufacturers and their products.</p></div></div>