Where's the data when you really want it?

As did a large number of people, I read the news item from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Association (NOAA) about the average temperature of the continental United States in the first half of this year being the warmest on record.  Whew, that is an ugly sentence, but what can you do with such raw material?  I assume there were a "large number" of people because I assume that it was a front page item on most newspapers the day it came out, as it was on my local  rag.

The only problem with the story is that it didn't give us all the facts, and the facts it did give seemed meant to mislead us.  To take the last point first, the way it was worded could very easily cause someone to think that this half year was actually three degrees hotter than any other half year, a fact which would be very alarming, indeed.  But alas for the global warming advocates, it just is not so.  The three degrees was against the mean of the whole 20th century.  Individual years may vary widely from the mean, but unless you can show an upward trend in the data, all you have done is prove what everyone knows - that weather is unpredictable.

Which brings us to the lack of facts.

What the news story reported was that the average temperature for the first six months of 2006 was the highest on record - that is, since 1895.  And it said that that average was something like 3 degrees above the average for last century.  What it didn't tell us were two very important facts.  One - how much hotter was the monthly average for this period than the next hottest half year?  And two - when was that second hottest half year?

Now, if it were reported that this year was a degree hotter than the second hottest such period, and that the second hottest was in 2004, with 2003 being the third hottest and 2005 being the fourth, then even I might begin to see a trend.  But if the next hottest half year were actually in 1930 and the third hottest was in 1899 and the actual difference between 2006 and 1930 were a hundreth of a degree - well, let's say I wouldn't quit my job to join the "Al Gore for President" campaign.

Somehow, though, I have the feeling that if reality were somewhere close to the first scenario, we would have heard all about it.