By: David Freddoso
Online Opinion Editor
12/21/09 1:51 PM EST
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| Mary Mitchell cross country skis in a deserted downtown in front of the U.S. Capitol December 19, 2009 in Washington, DC. (Photo by Win McNamee/Getty Images) |
Robert F. Kennedy Jr., who flies around on private planes so as to tell larger numbers of people how they must live their lives in order to save the planet, wrote a column last year on the lack of winter weather in Washington, D.C.
In Virginia, the weather also has
changed dramatically. Recently arrived residents in the northern
suburbs, accustomed to today's anemic winters, might find it
astonishing to learn that there were once ski runs on Ballantrae Hill
in McLean, with a rope tow and local ski club. Snow is so scarce today
that most Virginia children probably don't own a sled. But neighbors
came to our home at Hickory Hill nearly every winter weekend to ride
saucers and Flexible Flyers.
In those days, I recall my uncle,
President Kennedy, standing erect as he rode a toboggan in his top
coat, never faltering until he slid into the boxwood at the bottom of
the hill. Once, my father, Atty. Gen. Robert Kennedy, brought a
delegation of visiting Eskimos home from the Justice Department for
lunch at our house. They spent the afternoon building a great igloo in
the deep snow in our backyard. My brothers and sisters played in the
structure for several weeks before it began to melt. On weekend
afternoons, we commonly joined hundreds of Georgetown residents for ice
skating on Washington's C&O Canal, which these days rarely freezes
enough to safely skate.
Meanwhile, Exxon Mobil and its carbon
cronies continue to pour money into think tanks whose purpose is to
deceive the American public into believing that global warming is a
fantasy.
Having shoveled my walk five times in the midst of this past
weekend's extreme cold and blizzard, I think perhaps RFK, Jr. should
leave weather analysis to the meteorologists instead of trying to
attribute every global phenomenon to anthropogenic climate change.