Senator Inhofe Says Climate Changed Disproved by Cold Weather

Baby, it’s Dumb Outside: Senator Inhofe Says Climate Changed Disproved by Cold Weather

by Laurin Suiter

The global scientific community has been humbled.  Decades of testing, data gathering, and rigorous peer reviews have all been for naught.  Senator James Inhofe (R-Snow Miser), using his ability to watch cold weather stories on television, concluded that climate change is just an evil UN plot.

Inhofe is echoing what passes for deep analysis on Fox News.  He asserted that the extremely frigid weather now taking a large frosty bite out of the U.S. is evidence that climate change is a hoax.  After all, we all know that climate and weather are one and the same, and if a few days of cold temps refutes years of research, then forget what a bunch of pointy-headed scientists say.

Except that climate is not weather, and Inhofe is no more a climate scientist than Fox is a news source.

The senator did not rely on the current U.S situation alone to make his claim, citing the recent rescue attempt of various boats stuck in Antarctic ice. So there you have it: Ships stuck in ice on the coldest place on Earth means climate change is a big lie.

His lack of cold facts doesn't end there. He conveniently overlooks the record heat his native Oklahoma experienced last summer.  If he must keep looking beyond home for rebuttals, he could do well to visit Australia, which just experienced a record heat wave.  Still, the weather down under (or down home) doesn't confirm climate change any more than the current deep freeze refutes it. ScienceBlogs.com  explains why the polar vortex in no way negates climate change:

[box type="shadow"]The cold air mass that usually sits up on the Arctic during the northern winter has moved, drooped, shifted, gone off center, to engulf part of the temperate region … The Polar Vortex, a huge system of swirling air that normally contains the polar cold air has shifted so it is not sitting right on the pole as it usually does. We are not seeing an expansion of cold, an ice age, or an anti-global warming phenomenon. We are seeing the usual cold polar air taking an excursion. So, this cold weather we are having does not disprove global warming.[/box]

Not that the facts could ever put Inhofe's fallacies on ice.  His stubbornness can't simply be dismissed as a conservative's resistance to change. With conservatives, the most popular motive is usually money. According to Open Secrets, Inhofe received $1,561,246 in campaign contributions from oil and gas interests  -- the main culprits behind industrial greenhouse gases.  The fossil fuel industry fears that a cap and trade tax will be implemented to curb carbon emissions.

An avalanche of scientific data cannot bury his stacks of cold, hard campaign cash.  Inhofe and others who deny climate change are just pulling a snow job to front a corporate tax dodge.

h/t: Opposing Views

Laurin Suiter