In the wake of President Obama’s emphatic call for action on climate change in his State of the Union Address, and clear polling numbers showing new public concerns about climate – GOP presidential hopefuls are taking steps to obfuscate their anti-science records.
Mitt Romney told reporters that after believing the scientists in 2010, then mocking the scientists in 2012, he now is back to believing the scientists.
In an interview with WBUR Boston, he elaborated.
“I’m one of those Republicans who thinks we are getting warmer and that we contribute to that,” he said of climate change, charging that federal leaders have failed to enact global agreements needed to tackle the problem.
His evolving platform comes as he works to reshape his image after consecutive presidential defeats. Romney spent little time talking about poverty, the middle class or climate change in a 2012 campaign in which opponents cast him as an out-of-touch millionaire. But in public and private conversations in recent weeks he has focused on poverty, perhaps above all, a dramatic shift for the former private-equity executive.
UPDATE: Not all Republicans are buying it. Conservative Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin tweeted thusly:
Now, one of Romney’s potential opponents, Marco Rubio, has morphed his widely ridiculed “I’m not a scientist” message to, “We can’t ignore the scientists but..”, in an interview with Katie Couric of Yahoo News, above.
One key problem these folks are going to have is their Crazy Uncle in the Basement, Senator Strom..I mean James Inhofe, the 80 year old incoming chairman of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, who hopes to use his new seat as a platform to spew climate denial nonsense on the Senate floor. Science literate voters should make sure that every member of the Republican party be held responsible for the disinformation campaign mounted by one of their most senior colleagues.
Typical republicans; most don’t believe in scientists but most believe Jesus was white and spoke English.
Quote: “we know that climate regulation will kill certain jobs”. Couldn’t the same be said about the emerging oil industry (circa 1860) which was about to put almost all whalers out of work? (or at least put and end to artificial lighting from whale oil). And yet, no one today is calling for the total extinction of the oil industry. Large vehicles (planes, trains, boats, trucks, and tanks) will most likely be powered by fossil fuels for the next few hundred years.
While I agree with your main point, I have to take issue with your assertion that: “Large vehicles (planes, trains, boats, trucks, and tanks) will most likely be powered by fossil fuels for the next few hundred years.”
‘… few hundred years’? Really? Peak oil must be a, err, ‘hoax’, then, despite the International Energy Authority (IEA) admitting that global crude oil production peaked in 2006.
May I suggest you watch the seminal lecture ‘Arithmetic, Population and Energy’ by Professor Albert A Bartlett.
Got to admire the incredible research Inhofe has put into this, showing old Time magazine covers, which seems to be a favourite of climate deniers to modify as well:
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2013/06/04/the-1970s-ice-age-myth-and-time-magazine-covers-by-david-kirtley/
Soon I guess we will see pictures of his backyard with up to several snowmen disproving manmade global warming.
I was genuinely shocked that he used H.H. Lamb’s Central England Temperature Record schematic from 1982.
As I’m sure almost everyone here will know – Lamb is plotting 50-year averages and the final data point is 1950 (BP).
Even disregarding for the moment that it is based on the CET and was never intended as a proxy for global temperature – Central England temperatures have risen 1C since Lamb’s last measurement in any case.
It really is a stunningly amateurish attempt to deceive considering the venue and the massive resources available to the Denial Industry.
I thought they might at least have come up with some new rubbish.
Just shows how desperate they are that the best they can produce is a laughable universaly debunked 30 year old myth.
In case there are any lurkers who are not familar with this wearisome peice of nonsense some details and links are here.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/print.php?r=338
Reblogged this on Joe's Notepad.
So uncertainty implies ‘do nothing’ is the best policy? I guess the senator from FL has never bought insurance. (Why would he, when it has a clearly known upfront cost and no well-defined, certain payoff?)
Listening to Rubio on climate sensitivity I immediately thought this ones been influenced by Dick Lindzen and then what do we have at the beginning of that Inhofe clip but: “Controlling carbon is a bureaucrat’s dream. If you control carbon, you control life”, which of course is a quote from Lindzen, one echoed by such as IceAgeNow and American Thinker.
Inhofe continues with a plethora of lies or at best wishful thinking about the scientific consensus which is not based upon the same premises as an opinion poll, and other many times debunked, so familiar, arguments.
The energy waste providing this man with a platform from which to air such shameful propaganda should not be allowed to continue. Maybe somebody could take him up on his offer to debate, with caveats so that he cannot hijack the proceedings with a Gish Gallop. Would need firm control such as seen in the debate between Plimer and Monbiot on ABC Australia a few years back.
Until sanity is restored in US politics then the extreme, fossil fuel endowed, elements will continue to pollute the thoughts of many in the US and abroad.
“…Maybe somebody could take him up on his offer to debate”
No. Deniers want ‘the debate’ to continue. It’s a distraction.
Sorry my net con’ keeps hanging up (and supposed to have been upgraded recently it is now worse than before getting the flashy new combined modem-router) but I hadn’t got to the part where Inhofe goes on about archaeological investigations providing evidence for climate change of the past. Well I guess that is partly true as William Ruddiman’s work is informed by such but I think this senator does not know the difference between archaeology and palaeoclimatology of which latter I doubt he has heard and would have difficulty in pronouncing.
If in any debate, Inhofe demonstrates a clear lack of knowledge or understanding of the fundamentals then he should follow a course of remedial education and be tested to demonstrate that he has learned. If he fails then he should be urged to find another job.
Isn’t 3 feet sea level rise the low estimate? They want to ignore even the low estimates?
And in this video Rubio accepts that human activities have played a role in climate change, and yet he voted in the Senate that human activities don’t contribute to climate change.
http://www.wired.com/2015/01/senators-dont-believe-human-caused-climate-change/
How I pity the poor aid having to sit there and put up jokes as charts without laughing or crying.
aide