The Seminal has taken a special interest in unseating a few of America’s most unprogressive senators. One such character is Republican Senator Jim Inhofe from Oklahoma, famous for his virulent efforts to debunk the “hoax” that is global warming.

Inhofe, the Ranking Republican of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, has gone to near-obsessive lengths to make his claim that global warming is nothing more than empty fear-mongering. Late last year he had his staff prepare a report, formally attributed to the United States Senate, entitled “Over 400 Prominent Scientists Disputed Man-Made Global Warming Claims in 2007.”

Here are some fun tidbits from the report’s introduction, featured on a .gov website:

Many scientists from around the world have dubbed 2007 as the year man-made global warming fears “bite the dust.” In addition, many scientists who are also progressive environmentalists believe climate fear promotion has “co-opted” the green movement….This blockbuster Senate report lists the scientists by name, country of residence, and academic/institutional affiliation….Many of the scientists featured in this report consistently stated that numerous colleagues shared their views, but they will not speak out publicly for fear of retribution….The voices of many of these hundreds of scientists serve as a direct challenge to the often media-hyped “consensus” that the debate is “settled.”

Ah yes, this “blockbuster” report reveals that global-warming pushers are in fact a violent gang of ice pick-wielding climatologists, prone to subjecting their skeptical colleagues to scientifically terrifying forms of “retribution” should they attempt to go against the grain!

The “Inhofe 400″ as it is affectionally known in the environmental blogosphere, was the latest in Inhofe’s ongoing crusade to personally bring down the evil proponents of man-made global warming, most especially his arch-nemesis, Al Gore.

In December 2006, for instance, Inhofe’s office published A Skeptic’s Guide to Debunking Global Warming, a “color glossy 64 page booklet….[including] speeches, graphs, press releases and scientific articles refuting catastrophe climate fears presented by the media, the United Nations, Hollywood and former Vice President turned-foreign-lobbyist Al Gore.”

Last October Inhofe addressed the Senate floor for two hours on such diverse hoax-related subjects as NASA data that indicate 1934 was in fact the hottest year on record, the “booming” population of polar bears, and Hollywood’s unruly attempts to scare children:

(NASA, by the way, was founded in 1958, though climate science certainly reached the height of its sophistication in 1934.)

In addition to Gore’s entry last year into Hollywood fictional disaster films, other celebrity figures have attempted to jump into the game. Hollywood activist Leonardo DiCaprio decided to toss objective scientific truth out the window in his new scarefest “The 11th Hour!”

Within a day of the Inhofe 400 release, an avalanche of bloggers tore the credibility of his experts to shreds, most impresively here (though also here, here, here, here, here, here, and here, to name a few):

In the delirious tradition of American conspiracy theories (like that old farce, the Apollo 11 moon landing) Inhofe backs up categorical declarations with voluminous documentation…And, like any conspiracy theory, it just doesn’t hold up under scrutiny….By undermining the press and politicians on the issue, those global warming skeptics helped keep the problem from being recognized, let alone addressed, for years. One could say they stood squarely in the path of truth, and thwarted its progress, jujitsu-style, until finally being overrun by a triumphantly emboldened mass.

Apparently, being an Inhofe-grade expert on whether anthropogenic greenhouse gas emissions are causing global warming requires little in the way of qualifications. The case for discrediting Inhofe’s skeptics has been made and won, and I will therefore spare readers my own attempt to debunk the debunkers’ creds here.

For fun, however, I thought I’d take a peek at a few randomly-selected names from the list, to see if apart from being unqualified Inhofe’s skeptics were even actually “skeptical.” My findings were indeed enlightening.

Being an environmental economist by training, I found it interesting that 20 economists made it into the Inhofe 400 at all. One wonders why, if global warming were not a man-made problem, economists would be any more concerned with climate issues than they are with, say, photosynthesis.

Nonetheless, one Inhofe economist is Gwyn Prins of the London School of Economics, who, it turns out, believes firmly in the existence of man-made global warming. He just thinks the Kyoto Protocol is an ineffective way of handling it, which many climate change believers (myself included) generally agree with.

The well-hairsprayed TV weatherman Brian van de Graaff, who drives the H2 Hummer “Storm Chaser” when not weathercasting for ABC’s Good Morning Washington, also made it on to Inhofe’s list. The only thing he has said on record about global warming is that he tries to understand it but finds it “complex.” So, maybe “skeptical” isn’t the right word for him, so much as…”dense.”

Nigel Marven, who makes wildlife documentaries for Animal Planet, is also on the list. He recently put together a children’s TV series called “Polar Bear Week,” and has stated publicly that he believes in climate change. He just doesn’t believe polar bears are near extinction, having recently filmed them in droves.

Dr. Indur M. Goklany, who is indeed a world-renowned climatologist formerly associated with the UN IPCC, is yet another member of the illustrious Inhofe 400. However, he doesn’t deny man-made climate change at all. He simply thinks it’s the price we pay for wealth, and that adaption, rather than emission mitigation, is the appropriate solution. (Again, I wouldn’t call people like that “skeptical” so much as I would call them “elderly” and “not living in Bangladesh.”)

And so on.

The point is, Senator Inhofe clearly used taxpayer money to compile a monolith list of unqualified individuals with relatively meaningless opinions about a subject that is of grave national and international concern, and one on which many well qualified expert opinions exist already. Why on Earth, we should all be asking, would he do this?

If only the reasons were complicated. As has previously been noted here at the Seminal, Inhofe has collected nearly $1 million in campaign contributions from the oil and gas industry, second only to fellow fascist Senator John Cornyn (R-TX). Inhofe clearly works for his supporters, and his supporters need the causes of climate change to remain a debate about as desperately as they need war to persist in the Middle East.

Place all this in contrast to the man challenging Inhofe for his seat on the Hill, and the differences are refreshing. Not only does Andrew Rice “believe” in global warming (from his campaign page: “Global warming is real, it’s accelerated by man-made carbon emissions, and it is already eroding [Oklahomans'] quality of life”) but he supports the Lieberman-Warner climate bill, the mandatory carbon cap-and-trade bill that has to date had the most success in Congress. Rice fights a steep uphill battle by trying to run in Oklahoma without oil and gas support, but his election would restore the seat currently held by Inhofe to public, rather than private service.

There is healthy, informed debate, and there is plain old subversion, and the Inhofe 400 has nothing to do with the former. Rather, it is a testament to a political system that permits private interests to be in bed with government at the expense of progress and public well-being. Inhofe has egregiously exploited his position as Senator to undermine the movement toward a global warming solution, and no such man belongs in Washington.

WHAT'S NEXT?

Subscribe via RSS or Email  ::     ::  Leave a comment

Bookmark to: