Concord Monitor Nails Scott Brown's Climate Science Flip-Floppery

Climate science supporters often get too caught up in worrying about knowing every scientific detail. All you need to know is climate scientists say man-made carbon pollution is fueling rapidly-accelerating global warming and our politicians not only need to accept that reality, they need to have a plan to deal with it.

If a politician rejects that reality or, like Mitt Romney, accepts science when he's courting moderates but denies science when he's courting big-money polluting donors, he's asking for his leadership to be questioned. Today the Concord Monitor editorial board simply and directly calls out Scott Brown's climate science cowardace:

When running against Sen. Elizabeth Warren in Massachusetts, Brown said climate change is real and in part driven by human activity. In New Hampshire, when asked if he believed man-made climate change has been scientifically proven, he said “no.” We await his general election position.

Oh! In the face! IN THE FACE.

Condescending Wonka Talks to Scott Brown About Climate Change

Why Won’t Inhofe’s Pro-Pollution, Anti-Women Tour Stop in MA for Scott Brown?

Hey, Sen. Jim Inhofe! You forgot to include Scott Brown in your "give me a Republican Senate so I can let Big Oil and Big Coal murder the Environmental Protection Agency" tour!

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) is hitting the road to fire up support for GOP Senate candidates opposed to Obama administration rules on coal and other energy sources.

Inhofe's due to stop in Montana, Missouri and Ohio. Surely, it must be some sort of oversight that Sen. Inhofe isn't making a stop in Massachusetts, amirite?

“We’re real close to a presidential election win and close to an election that will elect [Montana Republican Senate candidate] Denny Rehberg and give us a majority," Inhofe said, according to the Billings Gazette. [...]

Montana was Inhofe's first stop on a three-state swing in which he will stump for candidates who want to repeal environmental rules the Oklahoman opposes. The current ranking member of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, Inhofe is in line to take the chair if Republicans control the Senate.

Elizabeth Warren detailed the Brown-Inhofe connection at the first debate:

Sen. Brown has been going around the country talking to people saying you've gotta contribute to his campaign because it may be for the control of the Senate. And he's right. This race may really be for the control of the Senate. But what that would mean is, if the Republicans take over the Senate, Jim Inhofe would become the person who would be in charge of the committee that oversees the Environmental Protection Agency. He's a man who's called global warming a hoax. In fact, that's the title of his book. A man like that should not be in charge of the Environmental Protection Agency overseeing their work. I just don't understand how we could talk about going in that direction.

Read more about why electing Scott Brown would help Sen. Inhofe run wild in a Republican Senate, leading to disaster for our climate, air & water quality and for women's rights, at KeepTheSenateBlue.com.

5 Ways Scott Brown's Climate and Energy Debate Answer Was Wrong

A viewer question focused on climate change in last night's U.S. Senate debate between Sen. Scott Brown (R-MA) and Democratic challenger Elizabeth Warren. Watch it starting at 22:25:
The question: Do you believe climate change is real, and if so what should the federal government be doing about it?

BROWN: Yes, I do. I absolutely believe climate change is real, and I believe there's a combination between manmade and natural. That being said one of the biggest things we can do is get an energy policy and we don't have one. Wind, solar, nuclear, hydro, geothermal, coal, siting, permitting, conservation, a true all of the above approach as I have. Professor Warren has a none of the above approach. She's in favor of wind and solar. She's against the Keystone pipeline which will help create union, all you union guys listening out there, she's denying union jobs and non-union jobs. Making sure we can get more energy on the world market to stabilize those costs that you're paying at the pump. When's the last time we permitted a nuclear facility to make sure we can have that clean energy? I could go on and on but right now the role is actually a balancing role. To find that balance, Jon, because you can't just have one or this or that. she's in favor of putting wind turbines in the middle of our, uh, greatest treasure, on the Nantucket Sound. I, like, President, uh, Senator Kennedy before me believe that's not right because those ratepayers are going to pay a tremendous amount more in their daily costs, and that's not right.

Sen. Brown's response is completely wrong here in at least five different ways:

• He's wrong about climate science. "The human impact on climate during this era greatly exceeds that due to known changes in natural processes," reports the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. And if climate action and protecting our clean air and water are so important to Sen. Brown, why are they nowhere to be found on his website?
• He's wrong about our electricity sources. Sen. Brown forgot to mention hydrocarbon gas, which provides more than half of Massachusetts' electricity generation right now. The extremely low cost of "natural" gas is what's putting coal out of business right now, not clean air regulations. And while the nuclear power industry likes to portray itself as the victim of those big, bad anti-radiation activists, we don't build nuclear power plants anymore because they're wicked expensive.
• He's wrong on what will stop climate change. More coal and the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline? Our dependence on dirty coal is what's fueled our climate crisis in the first place. And building a new pipeline for tar sands - one of the dirtiest fuels on the planet - could be game over for stopping climate catastrophe.
• He's wrong about energy jobs. The Keystone XL pipeline would create only a fraction of the clean energy jobs that already exist in Massachusetts. TransCanada's original application estimated just 3,500-4,200 short-term construction jobs. Massachusetts' clean tech economy already employs 71,000 people.
• He's wrong about oil prices. Saying the U.S. can control the global oil market is like saying a junkie can control the cost of a hit. We have just 2% of the world's oil reserves but consume 20% of the world's oil supply. Even under the most optimistic scenarios, drilling in all of our wilderness areas desired by Big Oil combined would only mean a 4-5 cent reduction in the price of a gallon of gasoline by 2025. The only way we can reduce what we pay at the pump is by using less of it - exactly what the Obama administration is doing.
• Does even Scott Brown know what Scott Brown believes on clean energy? Says he supports wind energy, bashes Cape Wind - classic Both Ways Brown.

Here's Elizabeth Warren's response:

WARREN: Sen. Brown says that he's about a balanced approach. He's not - he's about a rigged playing field. Our clean energy industry - an industry that works here in Massachusetts - has to fight uphill against the oil subsidies. That's what tilts the playing field, and Sen. Brown has helped tilt it for the oil companies. That works against clean energy. The Keystone pipeline? Look, that's not going to produce nearly as many jobs as if we invested that same money in clean energy - that's where you produce real jobs, and that's where Massachusetts has a real advantage. But you know, I just want to stop on this one for a minute, because I think this one is really important. Sen. Brown has been going around the country talking to people saying you've gotta contribute to his campaign because it may be for the control of the Senate. And he's right. This race may really be for the control of the Senate. But what that would mean is, if the Republicans take over the Senate, Jim Inhofe would become the person who would be in charge of the committee that oversees the Environmental Protection Agency. He's a man who's called global warming a hoax. In fact, that's the title of his book. A man like that should not be in charge of the Environmental Protection Agency overseeing their work. I just don't understand how we could talk about going in that direction.

And she backs up the talk with a real plan. Check out Elizabeth Warren's comprehensive climate & energy plan.

Yes Scott Brown, a Border Fence is a Conservation Issue

The League of Conservation Voters came out with a new ad last week pointing out that since Sen. Scott Brown (D-MA) arrived in Washington, Sen. Brown seems a lot more concerned with making his new polluter lobbyist friends happy than protecting wildlife and public health. Sen. Brown's re-election campaign responded in part, "The LCV Includes Non-Environmental Votes Taken By Senator Brown, Including His Support For A Border Fence".

Look, if you want to argue a border fence is necessary from a national security perspective, that's fine. You have to explain why it's worth spending $4 million per mile for a fence that can be easily scaled in less than 20 seconds by young women, and maybe deal with the Herman Cain let's kill the Mexicans perspective, but the root concern around national security is valid.

But you can't say a border fence isn't a conservation issue. Wildlife have not spent eons building their seasonal migration patterns around 2011's geopolitical concerns. As Defenders of Wildlife explains, a border fence cuts right through the commuting routes of dozens of species:

Many imperiled species depend upon borderland habitat for their continued existence. In Arizona alone, the Border Patrol estimates that 39 species protected or proposed to be protected under the Endangered Species Act are already being affected by its operations.

Much of this country’s most spectacular wildlife, including jaguars, ocelots, wolves, and hundreds of bird species depend upon protected public lands along the border for migration corridors between countries.

If Scott Brown is trying to refute the League of Conservation Voters' charge that he doesn't care about conservation issues, showing complete ignorance of the conservation issues surrounding a border fence probably isn't the best way to do it.

New LCV Ad: Scott Brown Thinks Washington is Wicked Awesome

This League of Conservation Voters ad is brilliant because I don't think Sen. Scott Brown came to Washington planning to vote against conservation every single time ... but well, it just makes life so much easier to be able to ask the polluting billionaire Koch brothers to write you huge checks, you know? And when you vote against the public health protections, all the lobbyists are so much friendlier! You get taken to lunch at The Palm all the time.

So will Sen. Brown vote to continue multi-billion-dollar handouts to Big Oil? Tell him to take a stand for Massachusetts for once. That way when he loses to Elizabeth Warren, at least he can't say you didn't warn him.

New LCV Ad in MA Senate Race

A Clean Energy Champion for Senate: Martha Coakley

The Green Miles is in Boston for the weekend. Was just driving down the Southeast Expressway and spotted this new ad on a long-standing windmill. It's for Senate candidate Martha Coakley (D-MA). Here's an image from her primary campaign ad (since updated to Coakley 2010 for the January 19th general election):
Coakley has been endorsed by the Sierra Club & League of Conservation Voters. The ad is especially appropriate since Coakley is a vigorous supporter of wind power, including the Cape Wind project, opposed by wealthy landowners & dirty energy interests. The late Sen. Ted Kennedy was one of my political heroes, but his opposition to Cape Wind wasn't his finest moment.

Coakley's opponent, Scott Brown, doesn't have much going for him, other than his cozy relationship with the teabagging crowd. I'd slam him for having absolutely no plan to address our energy & environmental problems, but it's nothing personal -- Brown's website lists no specific plans at all for any issue. In fact, his "issues page" could be summed up by "whatever solution the Democrats propose, I'll try to stop them!"

Here's hoping Coakley cruises to victory on the January 19th!