Given the fact that extremist climate-change-prognostication models have been wildly inaccurate, it would be wise to avoid basing any serious environmental policy on them. In fact, anyone interested in following the sound and time-tested scientific method would demand nothing less, and yet the Leftmedia is up in arms over President Donald Trump’s recent decision to do just that. The New York Times blows its climate alarmist’s dog whistle with the headline, “Trump Administration Hardens Its Attack on Climate Science.” Hardly.

The Times fallaciously asserts that “the attack on science is underway,” supposedly evidenced by Trump’s appointment of geologist and former astronaut James Reilly as the director of the United States Geological Survey. And how is Reilly “attacking science”? By insisting upon the practice of sound science. The Times huffs, “Reilly … has ordered that scientific assessments produced by that office use only computer-generated climate models that project impact of climate change through 2040, rather than through the end of the century, as had been done previously.”

In reality, Trump is pushing for the government to return to adhering to sound scientific practice for informing policy decisions, rather than agenda-driven hysterics. James Hewitt, a spokesman for the Environmental Protection Agency, explained, “The previous use of inaccurate modeling that focuses on worst-case emissions scenarios [and] that does not reflect real-world conditions needs to be thoroughly reexamined and tested if such information is going to serve as the scientific foundation of nationwide decision-making now and in the future.”

The Trump administration is also creating a new climate-review panel to be headed by respected Princeton University scientist William Happer. Long an outspoken critic of the alarmism surrounding rising CO₂ levels, Happer has argued, “The public in general doesn’t realize that from the point of view of geological history, we are in a CO₂ famine. … There is no problem from CO₂. The world has lots and lots of problems, but increasing CO₂ is not one of the problems. So [the Paris accord] dignifies it by getting all these yahoos who don’t know a damn thing about climate saying, ‘This is a problem, and we’re going to solve it.’ All this virtue signaling.”

No more Chicken Little climate alarmism dictating policy. It’s time to return to sound, verifiable scientific practices that don’t elevate worst-case predictions as a means of pushing for ever-more government regulation.