Earlier this month, Fox Nation prominently featured a NY Post story, which began: Every day it seems new evidence emerges that the “evidence” for global warming has been exaggerated, manufactured or just plain wrong. Coincidentally, Texas Governor Rick Perry echoed this same theme last week, which was summarily refuted by the Washington Post’s resident factchecker. On…Continue Reading…
So this past week many of us have been feeding at the trough where religion, politics, and science is ground up. It’s not been a pretty sight. In this Poynter article, a truism is observed: [Tom] Yulsman, the Colorado professor, noted that a [Presidential] candidate’s positions on scientific wedge issues tend to serve as a proxy…Continue Reading…
Jon Huntsman’s callout of Texas Governor Rick Perry’s controversial statements on evolution and climate change has garnered much attention and highlighted what Andrew Revkin at Dot Earth calls “the fundamental Republican science problem.” Meanwhile, in a similar vein, but flying under the radar of the national media, another Republican governor has recently said Huntsman-like things about climate change that…Continue Reading…
This one is from the left, and it was laid out last week by Bill McKibben in a Washington Post op-ed, in advance of the climate protests now underway in Washington DC: The issue is simple: We want the president to block construction of Keystone XL, a pipeline that would carry oil from the tar sands…Continue Reading…
Republicans seem anxious to prove they are the party of scientific ignoramuses. No, not today, that was back in 2007, during the last Presidential election, as written by Reason magazine’s Ronald Bailey. Incidentally, note the use of the term, “evolution denier,” in the headline of his post. The usage is not as common in the vernacular…Continue Reading…
In Saturday’s Washington Post, Roger Pielke Jr., a University of Colorado professor and the author of The Climate Fix, was quoted as saying: Climate change has become a wedge issue. It’s today’s flag-burning or today’s partial-birth-abortion issue. I’m not sure how Roger intended this to be construed–as a commentary on the larger, endlessly politicized climate debate…Continue Reading…
Serious, science-based climate skeptics have a chance to separate themselves from the foaming-at-the-mouth lunacy that defines their public image. I mention this because I know that some of you skeptics chafe at the buffoonish antics of Christopher Monckton and the sweeping declarations of Republican Senator James Inhofe. As science writer David Brin has written (which I…Continue Reading…
Several weeks ago, I pointed out how several popular climate skeptic blogs had disingenuously parroted the headline from that skewed Rasmussen poll: 69% Say It’s Likely Scientists Have Falsified Global Warming Research Shortly afterwards, I noticed a similar copy and paste job by Ronald Bailey at his libertarian outlet. Like the climate skeptics I cited (Anthony Watts…Continue Reading…
Gail the Actuary, who often writes about peak oil and resource scarcity issues at The Oil Drum, makes the case here that we’re on borrowed time. But unlike Jeremy Grantham, she doesn’t think we can do anything about it: There is no real solution to our predicament. Even if a cheap liquid fuel could be found…Continue Reading…
Despite my many faults, I’m a nice guy. I can be too sarcastic for some, and lately I’ve been cranky because of a growing sleep deficit, but those who know me know I’m a caring, good-natured person. This is not meant to sound self-serving. Think of it as background context for the anecdote I’m about…Continue Reading…