GOP Science Denialism (Part 2)

In my last post we considered the GOP front-runners on a couple of well-settled scientific questions regarding the age of the Earth and how life arose here. This time we are going to look at the same candidates and where they stand on a much more recent scientific discovery: anthropogenic global warming, otherwise known as climate change.

Donald Trump – Trump is an utter denialist on climate change, and he announces this to the world with all the nuance and aplomb of Archie Bunker.

It’s snowing & freezing in NYC. What the hell ever happened to global warming? — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) March 21, 2013

Ice storm rolls from Texas to Tennessee – I'm in Los Angeles and it's freezing. Global warming is a total, and very expensive, hoax! — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 6, 2013

This very expensive GLOBAL WARMING bullshit has got to stop. Our planet is freezing, record low temps,and our GW scientists are stuck in ice — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) January 2, 2014

Jeb Bush actually sounds pretty good on the science on this issue, especially when compared to his competition. For example, in this relatively recent interview with Bloomberg BNA.

The climate is changing; I don’t think anybody can argue it’s not. Human activity has contributed to it. I think we have a responsibility to adapt to what the possibilities are without destroying our economy, without hollowing out our industrial core.

Sounds reasonable enough, though he goes on to say that he would like to weaken the EPA’s ability to restrict carbon emissions.

Scott Walker may be “the most dangerous candidate on climate change” based on his gubernatorial record in Wisconsin, but it is difficult to find any examples of him directly addressing whether climate change is actually happening. He did go on record at the Western Conservative Summit with the following:

[President Obama] literally looked in the eyes of the American people and said “The greatest threat for future generations is climate change.” Well I got a message for you Mr. President, the greatest threat for the American people–the greatest threat for the people of the world–is not climate change it is radical Islamic terrorism, and we need leaders who are willing to stand up and do something about it.

Radical Islam is undeniably a threat to our lives and our liberal values, but it is not an excuse to ignore a looming global environmental catastrophe. An American president has to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time.

Ben Carson remains unconvinced as to whether the Earth is warming or not.

There’s always going to be either cooling or warming going on. As far as I’m concerned, that’s irrelevant. What is relevant is that we have an obligation and a responsibility to protect our environment. You can ask it several different ways, but my answer is going to be the same. We may be warming. We may be cooling.

It doesn’t take a brain surgeon to see that “We may be cooling” is just plain counterfactual.

Mike Huckabee is exactly wrong about global warming, according to Phil Plait. However, there is some reason to believe that he actually knows better but has since learned to feign scientific ignorance in order to appeal to the GOP base.

Ted Cruz – “If you look at satellite data for the last 18 years, there’s been zero recorded warming.”

Alas, the good Senator did not provide a link to the source data he was talking about. Perhaps he knows something the climate scientists don’t? I have to give him some credit for going with the bold-faced lie instead of waffling around with essentially vacuous claims. Speaking of which . . .

Marco Rubio used to be a straight-up climate denialist, but he has since moved to a somewhat more confusing and frankly spineless stance on this issue:

Humans are not responsible for climate change in the way some of these people out there are trying to make us believe, for the following reason: I believe the climate is changing because there’s never been a moment where the climate is not changing. The question is, what percentage of that … is due to human activity?

That is a good question, actually. The answer may well surprise him.

Rand Paul sounded like a climate agnostic in his interview with David Axelrod, but he also made some ridiculously hyperbolic claims regarding scientists allegedly doomsaying about the Atlantic rising to drown the Statue of Liberty. This is presumably a recurring nightmare for Paul, portentously laden with frightful political symbolism.

John Kasich used to believe the science underlying climate change, but has recently flip-flopped on the question, saying “We don’t want to destroy people’s jobs based on some theory that’s not proven.” He knows which way the winds are blowing around his party base.

Chris Christie

I think global warming is real. I don’t think that’s deniable. And I do think human activity contributes to it. . . . There’s no use in denying global warming exists. The question is what we do to deal with it.

Christie has almost no chance of becoming the GOP nominee, but it is a refreshing change to hear someone say something somewhat sane, here. If nothing else, Christie saves me from having to admit that Bush leads the field on this issue.

Carly Fiorina also avoids straight-up denialism, admitting that climate change is real and caused by man-made activity. She still gets pretty much everything else wrong, but she does so in a very smooth and polished way. She could school Bush and Christie on how best to concede ground on the science while muddling minds on the politics.

In summary, then, all of the top-tier of GOP contenders agree that there is little to nothing Americans can do to mitigate the effects of climate change. Most of them do this do this by straight-up denying the overwhelming scientific consensus that a problem exists to be solved, but a few of them (notably Bush, Christie, and Fiorina) do this by launching the usual free-market attacks on the efficacy of top-down regulation.

To my knowledge, none of them have yet mentioned that global warming is a paradigmatic example of a tragedy of the commons economic problem, one which defies obvious Lockean solutions rooted in privatization. Hopefully once we get past all this science denialism and political obfuscation, we can start to seriously address how best to coordinate international action in an enforceable and efficient way.