Rush Limbaugh says "almost no temperature records were broken" during the recent heat wave, and Newsbusters writer Noel Sheppard says there were "only 34 new all-time daily temperature records set." Only 34? Why, that's barely a record-breaking heat wave at all! Except for the fact that a) 34 records is nothing to sneeze at and b) by "34," Sheppard means "somewhere between 70 and 7,612."

"All-time daily record" is not a thing, but there are daily records and all-time records. Daily records compare the max and min temperatures that day to the same date in previous years. All-time records compare the max and min temperatures that day to every day in every year ever. And July set 70 all-time maximum and 175 all-time minimum records (which are maybe more important). That's leaving out the daily and monthly records completely; when you add those in, it's over 7,000. Sheppard's number isn't even in the ballpark.

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Here's the data (from NOAA) on the number of U.S. records broken or tied in the month of July so far:

  • All-Time Highest Maximum Temperature: 70
  • All-Time Highest Minimum Temperature: 175
  • Monthly Highest Maximum Temperature: 125
  • Monthly Highest Minimum Temperature: 330
  • Daily Highest Maximum Temperature: 2,125
  • Daily Highest Minimum Temperature: 4,787

Limbaugh also claimed that "it does this every year," which … if the heat is really setting records every year, wouldn't that perhaps be indicative of some kind of trend towards warming? Some kind of warming trend?

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As always, weather isn't climate, and showing a connection between record heat waves and climate change takes more work than just saying "it's motherfucking hot." But showing that climate change doesn't exist takes a HELL of a lot more than just covering your eyes, turning on the A/C, and going "la la la what heat wave?"