I don’t watch the Olympics that much (except for wrestling, which I think should be moved to a winter sport since it would give it more visibility), but I used to love watching figure skating. However, the SNL skit with Chris Farley ruined it for me.

Every time someone gets out there, all I can see is this.

But even the Olympics is now being turned into a propaganda message, as we are hearing about how warm it is. Um, hello? Sochi’s normal high is 52 degrees Fahrenheit in winter.

Here is what Wikipedia has to say about Sochi:

> According to the 2010 Census, the city had a permanent population of 343,334, up from 328,809 recorded in the 2002 Census, making it Russia’s largest resort city. It is one of the very few places in Russia with a subtropical climate, with warm to hot summers and mild winters.

You are holding the Olympics in a subtropical climate and you are complaining about it being warm?

Or how about the reason it’s so cold in the U.S.? I think Arctic ice melt was one of the reasons. The winters of the 1970s were comparably cold. The winter of ‘76-'77 was one of the warmest on record in Alaska and much of the Arctic, with near record high Arctic sea ice. So why is it at that time, at the height of the ice age scare, it wasn’t the same thing as being pushed now? Because there is no difference – it’s natural and cyclical, and since we came out before the fact with a cold and stormy winter, modeling it after 1917-1918 and 1993-1994, obviously it’s something that has happened before.

By the way, the fact is, during this current cold period here, the earth has been averaging below normal temperatures as the herky-jerky downturn continues. The globe has been averaging between .2 and .3 degrees Celsius below normal while this is going on.

Now we are hearing about “hidden heat” deep in the oceans and changes in global wind patterns. It’s flabbergasting watching all this. First of all, Dr. Bill Gray has pioneered the cycles of the ocean known as the meridional circulation for over three decades. I have linked to his paper several times. But when the tropical Pacific changes from warmer to cooler, it has a huge effect on the global wind, increasing the easterlies (trades). How this is somehow being offered as an excuse is beyond me. You “discover” something that has been known for years, and then you tell me it’s because of global warming?

Here is an inconvenient fact: When water sinks (downwells), it warms. That so-called warming is a sign of a large-scale oceanic circulation, which has been occurring since way before man was here and will continue way after.

You know, all this would be funny (actually it is) if we already weren’t seeing the effects of an energy policy based on non-facts. I wanted to get another tank of propane here, which normally cost $250. They wanted $700. When I balked, I found out that the propane shortage has reached the eastern U.S. I just had my highest electric bill ever, and that was from December. Lord knows what it’s going to be in January. The economic toll this winter is taking, plus the lack of understanding how cold it can get, has left our nation in a very bad position. (Remember five years ago when we were told, “Children are not going to know what snow is”?) Just what do you think will happen next year when coal plants go offline? We will be left out in the cold – literally.

But one has to keep their sense of humor about all this. I am trying to be a happy warrior rather than a ranting worrier, but it’s a battle. It’s tough to smile when you realize that what people are pushing has nothing to do with the reality of cold, hard facts.

Joe Bastardi is chief forecaster at WeatherBELL Analytics, a meteorological consulting firm.