I Agree With This Big Polluter Lobbyist About Republican Climate Science Denial

When it comes to the Republican Party and global warming, I agree with the assessment of Thomas Pyle, head of the American Energy Alliance, a polluter front group. Here's what Pyle told Bloomberg's Zachary Mider about Jay Faison, a Republican who's spending $175 million of his own money trying to change the GOP's mind on climate science and clean energy:

“You can’t get to where he wants to be, in his lifetime, without a massive dose of good old-fashioned government intervention,” Pyle said. 

Republicans don't deny climate science because they don't know the facts or don't trust its scientific rigor. They deny it because all available solutions to global warming contradict their free-market dogma that big business alone can solve all of our problems (with a few government subsidies along the way).

The free market hasn't, and can't, solve the climate crisis any more than it solved our smog or dirty water problems - we needed the Clean Air Act and Clean Water Act to do that. But instead of altering their ideology, American conservatives just pretend global warming doesn't exist.

After years of trying to pretend the right messaging will trick Republicans into supporting clean energy and climate science, Faison is still beating his head against the wall of denial. Inexplicably, Faison says he may vote for Gary Johnson, who doesn't think we should bother trying to stop global warming.

Faison would be better off taking Jon Stewart's advice: "Let's stop pretending that concessions to the right will, at any point, sate the beast."

And as the Center for American Progress reports, many of Faison's donations have gone to Republicans with mixed - or flat-out poor - records on climate change. Imagine how much good Faison's $175 million might've done if instead he'd spent that money trying to defeat climate science deniers?

GOP: I'm Not a Scientist, and I Don't Listen to Them Either

@Uptomyknees POPE: Global warming is real! conservatives: leave science to scientists! EVERY SCIENTIST: um? conservatives: fuck off nerds

— Todd Slade (@todd_slade) July 8, 2015

Conservatism Now Failing in Real Time on Climate Change in UK

With unprecedented climate change-fueled floods pummeling the United Kingdom, conservative Prime Minister David Cameron stood in front of the media Tuesday to insist that, despite appointing a climate science denying environment secretary to gut flood preparation and ignore climate threats, he is in fact aware that climate change is happening.

It's yet another reminder of how completely conservatism has failed humanity on global warming. Scientists have been warning of man-made climate change for more than a half century and of ongoing and potentially catastrophic climate change for more than a generation. Yet all these later, conservatives like Cameron remain paralyzed in the face of this ongoing disaster by their anti-tax zealotry. And compared to today's Congressional Republican leadership, Cameron is Al Gore.

Conservatism has no answer to climate change - that's why they demand to debate science, not solutions. The media may let them get away with it, but the atmosphere isn't so forgiving.

h/t Duncan Black

Alabama Republican Wants Big Government to Block New Wind Energy Business

Solar panels at NASA Marshall Space Flight Center
in Huntsville, Ala.

Hey look, another Republican who wants more big government regulation to protect polluting special interests! Kristi Swartz of E&E News reports this time it's an anti-wind state senator in Alabama:

Industry and federal government officials say advances in turbine technology could transform wind development in the Southeast, adding another renewable fuel option to an area once dominated by coal. But as outside developers are eyeing places to build taller towers and longer blades, emerging lawsuits and legislation could drive them away. [...]

"As a conservative Republican, I am typically for less regulation, but I also recognize that the absence of regulation can create anarchy," [State Sen. Phil] Williams [R-AL] said.

Just last month in Virginia, a Republican state senator's bill to put up new hurdles to wind energy in Virginia was narrowly defeated.

Again: Republicans aren't pro-business, or anti-government, anti-regulation, or anti-subsidies. Some have principles, sure. But many support what their big business patrons want them to support, and are willing to do whatever it takes to stop clean energy from infringing the slightest bit on their supporters' government-protected polluting monopoly.

A Bipartisan Win for Wind Energy in Virginia

Virginia's insane General Assembly schedule just produced an absurdly heart-warming outcome: Two smart Republicans blocked a bill that would've put up an unnecessary new hurdle for wind energy.

When it comes to clean wind power, Virginia remains a black hole. Republican State Sen. Tom Garrett thinks the problem is that it's not being regulated heavily enough:

A proposal by Sen. Tom Garrett, R-Louisa, to protect birds and bats from wind turbines passed a committee vote Thursday and was referred to the full Senate.

Garrett said some advocates for wind-generated electricity had criticized the bill.

“I want to make this abundantly clear — and I’ll speak really slowly — this bill is in no way, shape or form designed to be an anti-wind bill,” he said. “We will, I hope, generate a greater and greater percentage of our power in the coming years via renewable energy resources whether it be solar, etc. That doesn’t mean we should do so irresponsibly.”

Wind energy is already heavily regulated by a range of officials and agencies charged with making sure its siting is as friendly to communities and wildlife as possible. Is it more likely Sen. Garrett was standing up for wildlife, or using anti-wind talking points pushed by polluter front groups to try to kill wind before it even gets off the ground?

Also, I have three reallys:

• Really, Virginia is now solely concerned with how energy impacts wildlife? Virginia has already lost 156,000 acres on 67 mountains to mountaintop removal coal mining, but now that people want to build wind turbines to compete with coal energy, suddenly protecting birds and bats is the top priority? Really?
• Really, Sen. Garrett's commitment to advancing our energy future? Really? The same Sen. Garrett who last year sponsored a bill to put onerous new regulations on energy-saving smart meters? Really?
• Really, Sen. Garrett is completely dedicated to the health & well being of Virginia's wildlife? Really? His only other wildlife-related bill is to allow the hunting of coyotes on Sunday.

And last year the General Assembly passed and Gov. Bob McDonnell (R-Federal Court) signed a bill that Sen. Garrett introduced to spend taxpayer dollars promoting nuclear power. Remember this when Republicans try to tell you they're pro-business or anti-regulation. In reality, they're pro-their preferred industries.

The bill actually passed out of committee with the support of some of the most progressive Democrats in the Virginia Senate. I'm hoping they didn't fully understand it - that they just saw a bill that claimed to be good for wildlife and voted yes. Virginia's horribly dysfunctional General Assembly session is just 6 weeks long, requiring legislators to file, consider and vote on bills in less than a month. Again: Insane.

But fortunately it was saved on the Senate floor by two Republicans who know wind power means jobs in their district:

Sens. Frank Wagner and Tom Cosgrove, both Republicans from Virginia Beach, opposed the bill on the Senate floor.

Wagner said a wind-turbine park off the Virginia coast is awaiting a decision by federal agencies, bird-flight patterns already were considered, and adding new regulations would harm the project.

Here's hoping yesterday's vote is one of many that bring together clean energy jobs-loving Republicans with climate change-fighting Democrats.

October's Lesson for Climate Activists: Skate to Where the Puck is Going

Here's what we've learned about Congressional Republicans in October:

• Republicans are so paranoid, they think even mundane legislative procedure is "a political trap."
• Republicans shut down the government and almost crashed the economy, admitted they had no idea why, and ended up with nothing to show for it but historically dismal poll numbers. 
• Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) now opposes his own immigration bill.

It's not just that today's Republican Party rejects all available solutions to all available problems because they don't want President Obama to get any credit for solving any problems. They're willing to create entirely new crises solely in hopes of making President Obama look bad.

Congressional Republicans won't support any legislation that gives President Obama any credit for solving the climate crisis. In fact, if the climate crisis did not exist, the House GOP would be gleefully passing bills trying to create one.

The only hope is that either Democrats can re-take the House or that Congressional Republicans get more interested in problem-solving - as Wayne Gretzky once said, skate to where the puck is going to be, not where it has been. Climate activists should be planning and power building now for that moment when it comes, hopefully in 2014 or 2016.

Yet I keep hearing arguments like this:

Carbon taxes will also encourage more private investment in renewables because investors are hesitant to invest while congressional action is uncertain. This should appeal to conservatives who dislike government investing in high-tech ventures that might fail. Private investors invest more successfully.

Also, conservatives hate EPA regulations that are expensive to implement and inefficiently only target one industry at a time. Carbon taxes fairly affect the whole economy's emissions simultaneously.

Conservatives also object to reducing U.S. emissions without international emissions reductions. Carbon taxes with border adjustments will impel nations exporting products to the U.S. to pay US carbon taxes or enact their own, thus impacting foreign emissions.

This is skating to where the puck was in 1992. As David Roberts detailed at Grist, since then sane Republicans have been driven from the party. There is no policy nuance that will satiate people willing to blow up DC to end the reign of the Socialist/Fascist Dictator/Weak-Kneed Muslim/Religion-Hating Obama.

Advocate for the policy we need and hope Congress catches up - skate to where the puck is going.

The 3 Things Missing from the Republican Case for Climate Action

Two articles make the Republican case for Congressional action on climate change today, one in the New York Times by former Environmental Protection Agency administrators under GOP presidents William D. Ruckelshaus, Lee M. Thomas, William K. Reilly, and Christine Todd Whitman, and one in the New Jersey Star-Ledger by former Rep. Bob Inglis (R-SC).

1. Republican leaders aren't representing Republican voters on climate action. Poll after poll shows anywhere from 30% to 50% of Republican voters say climate change is happening and we should do something about it, but only a handful of Congressional Republicans advocate climate action. Why aren't Congressional Republicans representing their own voters on climate change? These articles ignore the disparity altogether.
2. No one likes a carbon tax better than carbon limits. Both articles argue that a revenue-neutral carbon tax is superior to Environmental Protection Agency limits on carbon pollution, citing conservative economists who say that's the most virtuous way to go. The problem is that among non-economists, Americans across party lines agree taxes are bad and Environmental Protection Agency regulations are good. Even if it was popular, as Grist's David Roberts has detailed, a carbon tax is trickier than you think.
3. Why is inaction untenable? Neither article lays out the scientific urgency of addressing climate change - for example, the number of American communities that inaction will literally put underwater. Neither article lays out the political urgency - for example, that young voters think Republican climate denial is ignorant, out-of-touch and crazy. Both articles focus on economic solutions, which again, is compelling to economists but won't win you many arguments at a neighborhood picnic. A much stronger case was made by a young conservative Congressional staffer ... who wrote under a pen name for fear of losing his job for speaking the truth about the scientific & political urgency of climate action.

Much like with immigration reform, Congressional Republicans have painted themselves into a political corner: They're screwed in the short-term because they've opposed sensible solutions for so long, they'll get none of the political credit for their passage. But that would leave them screwed in the long-term as the ignoramus party. Wouldn't you rather take the short-term hit and move on to topics that you can win on?

I'd rather these articles have dealt with that reality, rather than blaming "gridlock" and pushing plans no one likes. Where does that get us?

Republican Science Denial Hits New Low

U.S. Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia is a molecular biology denier.

When Climate Polls Collide with Political Conventional Wisdom

A new Gallup poll shows worry about global warming and acceptance of the climate science consensus is up sharply in the last two years. The spike isn't being fueled by Democrats - it's being fueled in large part Republicans.

But the political conventional wisdom in Washington presents a very real obstacle to this reality breaking through. The same pundits who bemoan partisan polarization in one breath perpetuate it the next - all Democrats hate coal, and all Republicans hate clean air! The nuance of rank-and-file Republicans disagreeing with Republican party leadership stands little chance of breaking through these stereotypes.

Let's dig into the poll numbers. You could make the case that Republicans are just cooling off from the heated fight over clean energy & climate legislation that had party leaders, polluters, and conservative media telling them that they had to oppose climate action to support the team.

But we're just coming off an election year in which Republican candidates went after climate science and clean energy with renewed fury, yet rank-and-file Republican acceptance of the climate science consensus went up anyway. What's really going on here?

Another poll, this one from the Yale Forum on Climate Communication, fills in some of those gaps. It finds rank-and-file Republicans frustrated with their party leadership on climate change & clean energy:

• A majority of respondents (52%) believe climate change is happening, while 26 percent believe it is not, and 22 percent say they “don’t know.”
• By a margin of 2 to 1, respondents say America should take action to reduce our fossil fuel use.
• Only one third of respondents agree with the Republican Party’s position on climate change, while about half agree with the party’s position on how to meet America’s energy needs.
• A large majority of respondents say their elected representatives are unresponsive to their views about climate change.

There are organizations like ConserAmerica and former GOP Rep. Bob Inglis' Energy and Enterprise Initiative trying to break through. But when the Koch brothers and other billionaire polluters are funding such massive operations to keep GOP leadership polluter-aligned, what chance do true conservative reformers have of breaking through?

Why Do Only Progressives, and Not Polluters, Need to be Diverse?

Darryl Fears has a good piece in today's Washington Post taking a closer look at diversity in the environmental movement - or lack of it. Tough but fair. I work for an environmental organization and I agree green groups don't do nearly enough.

But what about polluters and their allies - how are they doing on diversity?

• Exxon Mobil board of directors: 12 members, 2 women, 0 Hispanics, 2 African Americans
• Arch Coal board of directors: 11 members, 1 woman, 0 Hispanics, 0 African Americans
• Heritage Foundation board of trustees: 27 members, 8 women, 0 Hispanics, 1 African American
• Congressional Republican leadership (House & Senate): 10 members, 1 woman, 0 Hispanics, 0 African Americans

What about workers in polluting industries? It's just as bad:

• Oil & gas extraction: 23% women, 9% Hispanic, 4% African American
• Coal mining: 6% women, 3% Hispanic, 1% African American

No one writes articles about polluting industries being almost entirely white men because it's taken for granted that polluting industries are all run by rich old white guys. Even when they repeatedly get caught using stock photos to try to not look to the public like such rich old white guys - and Republicans, coal, and chemical polluters all have - it isn't covered in the mainstream media because again, everyone is just supposed to already know that polluters are rich old white guys who buy pictures of non-rich old white guys to make themselves look like they care about non-rich old white guys.

Again, I think conservationists need to do more to reach out to Hispanics and African-Americans. Excluding them isn't just wrong, it's bad business - polls show minorities are exceptionally strong supporters of climate action in particular and clean air & water in general.

But much like the media holds polluters and their allies to a much lower standard ethically, they're held to no standard on diversity.

A True Change Election

If Republicans can't get enough old white dudes to support their extremist policies, they have to cheat by trying to prevent young & brown people from voting - and even that doesn't work anymore.

That's what I'll remember most about the 2012 election. Yes, I'll remember Mitt Romney making class warfare explicit with his 47% comment, Paul Ryan making generational warfare explicit in the vice presidential debate, Rick Santorum explaining that he's against welfare for blah people, George Allen running a campaign that made Fred Thompson look passionate & energetic, and Scott Brown begging Elizabeth Warren to stop bringing his party into their campaign. Oh, and Mitt wanting to fire Big Bird.

The 2012 elections have revealed just how much the GOP's exclusionary extremism - against brown people, against women's rights,  against LGBT equal rights, against young people, against low-income families, against conservation, against cities - have narrowed Republican path to victory. It was breathtaking (and little admitted in a media that ate up Romney's claims of a Secret Plan to Win the Rust Belt) how much the GOP has narrowed its field of play, as Buzzfeed visually explained.

When you hear that Mitt Romney barely scraped out a win in North Carolina while losing Ohio, Virginia, Colorado, New Hampshire, Iowa and likely Florida ... and that a Senate that was supposed to be primed for GOP takeover is now a Democratic gain ... if I was a Republican, I'd be wondering how Karl Rove's plan for a permanent conservative majority has suddenly flipped into a minimum of eight years of playing defense.

As Duncan Black put it at Atrios, "For awhile it was 'the heartland' and 'the South' and now it's simply 'white dudes in the heartland and the South.'" And with that core constituency, the plan still worked! They not only won big percentages of white men, they turned them out in high numbers. The GOP's percentage of the white vote was the highest it's been since George H.W. Bush clobbered Mike Dukakis in 1988.

But in 2012, that's not enough to win a national election - or even a statewide election in much of America. Look at Jon Tester pulling out a surprise win in Montana, or Bill Nelson destroying Connie Mack in Florida.

I wish I could say that I was confident today that Republicans across America are blinking their eyes, wondering how they could've fallen under the spell of Karl Rove, Rush Limbaugh & David Koch as they lined their own pockets and marginalized the entire party. In an ideal world, a Republican Party interested in broadening its base could return to that pragmatic past and play a critical role in hammering out solutions to some of our biggest problems - from immigration reform to climate action to easing skyrocketing student loan debt burden.

I grew up in a New England that was filled with reasonable Republicans, people like Lincoln Chafee, Bill Weld and Jim Jeffords. Having strong, sensible Republican candidates on the ballot kept Democrats honest & on their toes. (And unlike Christine O'Donnell, Richard Mourdock & Todd Akin, they actually won statewide elections.) But you know how this story ends: Chafee, Weld & Jeffords were all subsequently cast out of the GOP.

But today those same hucksters are telling Republicans that they didn't go far right enough. It was Sandy! And the media! And the blahs! And Mitt was never one of us in the first place! And if you'll just write a check to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce or Karl Rove's Super PAC, next time it'll all be different. They promise.

Toles: GOP Mascot Should Go Back to the Future

With Republican Party leadership rejecting the realities of modern science, Washington Post editorial cartoonist Tom Toles suggests it's time to update the GOP mascot:

Four Ways Climate Reality Looms Over the 2012 Republican Convention

With reality denial dominating the Republican Party platform, how will Republican National Convention delegates reconcile that the start of their 2012 gathering in Tampa was delayed by climate-fueled extreme weather?

First, let's be clear: It's Big Oil-funded GOP leadership that's the problem, not rank-and-file Republicans. While virtually every Republican member of Congress and national party leader rejects climate science, 43% of rank-and-file Republicans see “solid evidence of global warming” according to the Pew Research Center.

Dig a little deeper and those numbers should be even more eye-catching for GOP leadership. Among moderate Republicans, 63% see evidence our climate is changing. And what about Republicans who say they still haven’t made up their minds in the presidential race? Cooperative Campaign Analysis Project polling shows they’re only half as likely to deny the scientific reality of global warming as Republicans on the whole. Polls show Republican voters support solutions, from a revenue-neutral carbon tax to giving Americans more low-carbon transit options.

But Mitt Romney’s website doesn’t even mention climate change. While Romney himself once advocated for clean energy & carbon pollution cuts, he now rejects climate science. Romney’s energy plan unveiled last week contains mostly giveaways to the oil industry and polls show it hasn’t helped him with voters - no surprise considering Big Oil remains the most hated industry in America by a wide margin.

At a time when global warming & extreme weather are dominating the headlines, Republican Party leadership is increasingly step with the American mainstream:

1. Isaac bears down on the Gulf Coast. The Republican Party was forced to cancel the convention’s first day in Tampa as Isaac sent tropical storm warnings up along the Gulf Coast. Isaac is now forecast to make landfall as a hurricane near New Orleans late Tuesday. Global warming is making storms more intense by adding the fuel of warmer air & water to their fire, while rising sea levels raise the launching pad for storm surges. 
2. Bracing for a storm surge at the pump. The threat of Isaac is already shutting down oil rigs in the Gulf of Mexico, threatening to raise gas prices. It’s one of many ways that global warming threatens America’s energy infrastructure, and a problem that won’t be solved by relying more on offshore oil drilling.
3. Arctic Sea ice melt scorches previous record. This summer’s Arctic Sea ice has already receded past the previous record - and there are still weeks of melting time to go. That’s bad news for the polar bears and other wildlife who depend on sea ice for survival. There’s also increasing evidence that a warming Arctic means more weird weather here in America.
4. America’s sweltering summer. This year has been the hottest on record in the United States, with July 2012 going into the record books as America’s hottest month ever. Globally, 2012 has been the 10th-hottest on record, nearly 1 degree F above the 20th-century average. That it’s only 10th speaks to how much & how quickly our climate is changing – up until 1998, 2012 would’ve been the hottest year on record.

From a strictly political perspective, here's the real problem for Republicans: Advocating inaction isn't just stupid, it makes Republicans look weak. Reasonable people can disagree on the best way to respond to climate change, but who gets excited about a candidate who denies we have a problem and bad mouths America's ability to solve it? Mitt Romney's clean energy opposition is already costing him votes in farm states that have seen the economic windfall that harvesting clean energy can bring. 

Crazy Train Wreck? Solyndra-Obsessed Stearns Losing Primary

Rep. Cliff Stearns (R-FL) is one of Congress' craziest members, a birther who's led the GOP's witch hunt on clean energy investments and called for women who have abortions to be thrown in prison. But after last night's primary, it looks like he'll be going from crazy Congressman to crazy private citizen - he's narrowly losing his Republican primary to a local veterinarian named Ted Yoho.

This is usually where I'd copy & paste some trenchant news analysis, but ... no one seems to know quite why Stearns is down by about 800 votes. Even the local Gainesville Sun seems to have no idea what happened, other than to speculate Yoho's attacks on Stearns as a corrupt career politician may have worked. But while politicos like to espouse Unified Theories that prove they're Savvy Insiders, it could simply be that in a multiple-candidate, low-turnout primary in the dog days of August, anything can happen.

Yoho is being called a Tea Party candidate, but it's hard to imagine he could get much further right than Stearns, rated more conservative than GOP VP nominee Paul Ryan by the National Journal & called one of Congress' conservative leaders by the American Conservative Union. If you're a sitting Republican member of Congress, you could look at Stearns' likely loss one of two ways: How crazy do you have to be for Tea Party if Stearns may not have been crazy enough? Or, if even Stearns' craziness didn't satisfy the Tea Party, maybe Republicans are better off just doing what they think is right & playing to the middle?

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-VA) had stood by Stearns through all of his nuttiness. Heckuva job, Eric.

Republicans for Environmental Protection Keeps Swimming Upstream

Today's generation of Republican leadership has long since abandoned its party's historic tradition of supporting science and conservation, selling out their values to everyone from Big Tobacco to the Koch brothers. Nowhere is that generational contrast more stark than here in Virginia, where George Allen's fancy designer cowboy boots have replaced John Warner's muddy riding boots.

But Republicans for Environmental Protection is still fighting the good fight, trying to get its party's leadership to back off its attacks on clean air, clean water and public lands:

"Ronald Reagan signed more wilderness bills than any other president, before or since his administration. And what we're trying to say is that conservation is conservative. It is part of the conservative ethic to care for the land and to be good stewards."

Of the 19 bills, two were sponsored by Virginia Republican Congressman Rob Wittman. One promotes restoration of Chesapeake Bay and the other deals with an extension of the Wetlands Conservation Act. [ REP spokesman Jim] DiPeso understands that Congress has been swamped, but says there is no good reason to delay bills that lawmakers actually agree on.

"When we wrote that letter to Speaker Boehner, we were pointing out, 'Look, you have all these conservation bills that have Republican sponsors. Let's go ahead and pass 'em.'"

I wish REP luck, but the truth is its party's leaders have long since turned their backs on anyone who'd dare stand up for America's natural resources. Moderates like Lincoln Chafee, Jim Jeffords and Arlen Specter knew it all too well and left the party, while others like Bob Bennett, Mike Castle and Charlie Crist have been cast out as insufficiently extreme.

The GOP misses leaders like Teddy Roosevelt who knew the outdoors were a place to be men - a literal man cave. But today's Republican leaders only like the great outdoors when they're using it as cover for extramarital affairs.

UPDATE: REP just announced it's changing its name to ConservAmerica.

Perry on "Solynda": Is It a Gaffe in a Party Where Ignorance is a Virtue?

To the surprise of absolutely no one, presidential candidate and Gov. Rick Perry (R-TX) said something else dumb:

But his attempt to turn this tough talk into an attack on the current administration came with a few of the verbal misstatements that have plagued other public appearances by Perry. While criticizing President Barack Obama for picking winners and losers in the energy industry, he bungled the name of the most famous energy company to go under despite government assistance.

"No greater example of it than this administration sending millions of dollars into the solar industry, and we lost that money," Perry began. "I want to say it was over $500 million that went to the country Solynda."

For the record, Solyndra was a company, not a country, and its bankruptcy was a small fraction of a broadly successful program to incentivize solar power.

After Republicans suffered a series of defeats in the 2011 elections, the media tried to frame the results as a rejection of the GOP "overreaching" by passing extremist policies. But as Karl Frisch pointed out, "Republicans did not overreach. What they did is who they are. It is what they stand for. It is what they campaign on."

Republicans have spent years devaluing intelligence & thoughtfulness. Republican voters keep picking candidates on the "incompetent & incapable" or "genuinely stupid" end of Bob Cesca's spectrum of ignorance like Sharron Angle & Christine O'Donnell over "genuinely smart but wrong" folks like Mike Castle & Sue Lowden. And Rick Perry seems to be not just ignorant but unserious, repeatedly making mistakes that show he's not even bothering to put in the time to try to get it right.

If Republican primary voters don't punish candidates for ignorance & mistakes, can Rick Perry's errors really be considered "gaffes"?

Why I'm Sorta Glad Jon Huntsman Flip-Flopped on Climate Science

Presidential candidate Jon Huntsman might be best known for tweeting his support for the science of evolution and climate change. But at a blogger event today at the polluter-funded Heritage Foundation, TPM reports Huntsman was flip-flopping his way back to the GOP presidential pack's consensus science denial:

Jon Huntsman attended a packed blogger sit down at the Heritage Foundation in Washington, D.C. on Tuesday. TPM’s Evan McMorris-Santoro attended, pressing the GOP presidential candidate about his position on climate change.

In August, Huntsman acknowledged the broad body of science pointing to climate change. Seated at an elite conservative think tank, however, Huntsman played a different tune, saying climate scientists “owe us more” information before we can decide if climate change is real.

“I think there’s probably more debate to be played out within the scientific community,” he said.

Obviously, it can't be considered a good thing when the leaders of a major political party are required to reject mainstream science. But then again, it wasn't exactly helping the scientific cause to have Huntsman be the only GOP candidate in the field to fully accept climate science ... while polling at 1%. And it was crazy to see reporters overlooking Huntsman's extremist plan to raise taxes on seniors, veterans & the poor to fund huge tax cuts for the 1%, calling him "moderate" solely based on his support for science.

What IS heartening is that the Republican field's climate science denial may actually be turning some voters into climate science believers. A Reuters/Ipsos poll showed the public’s awareness of climate threats up in recent months. Meanwhile, majorities of Republican voters continue to say the world’s temperature is going up, and that it’s partly or mostly due to human activities. And a new Pew poll shows the GOP primary race hurting the party among independents, with 29% taking a dimmer view of the party, compared to just 10% with a more favorable view (the unmoved 61% is probably a testament to just how few voters are paying attention yet).

So do I wish Huntsman had stuck to climate reality? Sure. But Huntsman's abandonment of the truth says a lot more about his own desperation to get in lockstep with an out-of-touch GOP field than it does about climate science.