Inhofe's Grand Climate Conspiracy Theory: It's All About Barbra Streisand

Let me say up front, I get Inhofe mixed up with Coburn. I have no idea why! 2 average looking middle aged white guys who wear glasses from Oklahoma?? Maybe! So I might have imbued INHOFE with some rationality and even intelligence, thinking he is Coburn (Coburn is a conservative, but smart and seemingly principled). HOLY (*)(*)(*)(*)!! I won't make that mistake ever again!! I'm C&P'g a chunk because the author has buried the lead....Streisand's 'fault' is down in the article...


Inhofe's Grand Climate Conspiracy Theory: It's All About Barbra Streisand

That's what the GOP senator who'll be taking control of the environment committee told me several years ago.
—By David Corn | Tue Dec. 2, 2014 6:30 AM EST

Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) surrounded by reported at the 2009 UN climate summit in Copenhagen, Denmark Virginia Mayo/AP
The recent news on the front page of the New York Times was stark. As thousands of diplomats were gathering in Lima, Peru, to work on an agreement to limit greenhouse gas emissions, scientists and climate policy experts were warning that it now may be impossible to prevent the temperature of the planet's atmosphere from rising by 3.6 degrees Fahrenheit. According to a large body of scientific research, that is the tipping point at which the world will be locked into a near-term future of drought, food and water shortages, melting ice sheets, shrinking glaciers, rising sea levels and widespread flooding—events that could harm the world's population and economy.

But with an effort under way in Lima to protect the difference, as the newspaper put it, "between a newly unpleasant world and an uninhabitable one," one fellow in Washington is readying himself to prevent any progress toward a climate accord: Sen. James Inhofe. The 80-year-old Republican from Oklahoma is one of the most notorious deniers of human-induced climate change. He has contended that God controls the Earth's climate, not Homo sapiens, and he has quoted the Bible to make this point: "As long as the Earth remains there will be seed time and harvest, cold and heat, winter and summer, day and night." And Inhofe, thanks to the recent elections, is in line to chair the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee when the Republicans assume control of the Senate next month. He has vowed to do all he can to block regulations aimed at cutting emissions.

With diplomats in Lima wrestling with the challenges of climate negotiations and Inhofe counting the days until his likely ascension to one of the most powerful environment-related positions on the planet, I'm reminded of a bizarre encounter I had with the senator at a previous climate summit.

In December 2009, the United Nations hosted a global gathering in Copenhagen to hammer out what some participants hoped would be a binding accord that would compel a reduction in emissions around the world. Thousands of diplomats, policy advocates, and scientists flocked to the Danish city for the session, and thousands of reporters were there to chronicle the talks. Inhofe came too. To troll. Or, as he put it, to be "a one-man truth squad." He slithered in and out of the cavernous media filing center, ever at the ready to speak to reporters looking for the other side quotes denigrating the proceedings, claiming that climate change was no more than a hoax, and celebrating the summit's failure to produce a binding and comprehensive treaty.

Inhofe was usually mobbed by reporters—especially non-American journalists who found it newsworthy that a US senator would say such things. Judging from the smile on his mug, Inhofe enjoyed skunking up the party. After watching this for a few days, I could not resist the urge to engage.

As he strolled through the media center one afternoon, accompanied by several camera crews recording his pronouncements, I approached and politely asked if I could put a question to him. Sure, he said, in his folksy, avuncular manner.

Look around us, I said, spreading my arms wide. There are thousands of intelligent and well-meaning people in this gigantic conference center: scientists, heads of state, government officials, policy experts. They believe that climate change is a serious and pressing threat and that something must be done soon. Do you believe that they have all been fooled?

Yes, he said, grinning.

That these people who have traveled from all points of the globe to be here are victims of a well-orchestrated hoax?

Yes, he said, still smiling.

That's some hoax, I countered. But who has engineered such a scam?

Hollywood liberals and extreme environmentalists, Inhofe replied.

Really? I asked. Why would they conspire to scare all these smart people into believing a catastrophe was under way, when all was well?

Inhofe didn't skip a beat: To advance their radical environmental agenda.

I pressed on: Who in Hollywood is doing this?

The whole liberal crowd, Inhofe said.

But who?

Barbra Streisand, he responded.

I nearly laughed. All these people had assembled in Copenhagen because of Barbra Streisand. A singer and actor had perpetuated the grandest con of the past 100 years?....

http://www.motherjones.com/politics/2014/12/james-inhofe-barbra-streisand-climate-change-hoax

 

Streisand responds
“My Foundation started supporting climate change work in 1989, when I donated a quarter of a million dollars to support the work of environmental scientist Dr. Michael Oppenheimer at EDF. Since then, I, and others have spent countless millions on this issue.”

When you want to mock something best not to confirm it.

 

The Dixie Chicks famously said that George Bush made them ashamed of being from Texas. Having been born in Oklahoma, Inhofe makes me ashamed of being from the Human Race.

Just one of the reasons I escaped from Oklahoma.

 

Here is the interesting thing.

The climate is going to warm up by that much regardless of what we do and every scientist admits at least that, they only argue the timeline of it. So rather than dealing with that inevitable threat, the liberals wish to kick that can down the road to future generations as long as they are safe in the here and now.

Rather than spending money on silly little programs that aren't going to stop the problem, only delay it, shouldn't they be building Sea Walls to hold the water back, pushing for building communities further inland, or protecting agriculture and industry from rising water that will surely happen. They are extremely irresponsible and refuse to deal with an issue that they themselves admit will happen.

Liberals are selfish..

- - - Updated - - -

And the Dixie Chicks paid a heavy price for that.

As they should have.

Another hypocrisy here from liberals. They deride conservatives all the time for saying its wrong to criticize the president yet here the Dixie Chicks did it and were applauded by the left.

 

Again you speak out of both ends and it still stinks. While you claim "every scientist at least admits that", Inhofe and his ilk don't. They continue to argue everyone is lying, the world is just the same, nothing needs to be done. Even acknowledging a problem looms in front of us is something Progressives have fought for all along. If Conservatives admitted there is a problem coming then you could at least start the conversation over what to do about it.

Meanwhile, you also advocate about half of what the Progressives would like to fund, preparatory actions. The DoD would like to start adapting domestic harbors preparing for sea level rise. All types of infrastructure such as sewage treatment, utility lines, roads, and docks will also need preparation. It has been the Conservatives that have blocked all action because of "budget constraints".

Meanwhile, you seem to object to the other half of the agenda, trying to mitigate the forces causing the changes. We clearly know the mechanisms and physics of the forces driving climate change. We control many of these forces. There needs to be a concerted effort to limit these forces by the entire species. Carbon treaties, renewable research, proof of concept projects for cutting edge technology, energy storage systems, there are any number of other things we urgently need to do. Every year we delay the start heightens the effects we will suffer later.

Paid the price? The Dixie Chicks comments at worst hastened their plans to quit touring and raise their children. Ignore fixing the underlying problems of climate change and run the very real risk of leaving a world that will not support your children.

 

Everyone admits, even the most ardent climate change scientists, that regardless of what we do, the natural process of the Earth will still eventually heat it up. You could remove every human from the planet and remove every negative thing we have ever done to it and it would still happen.

Nobody debates that, they only say that we don't need to speed it up.

That is what I was referring to.

 

What would be surprising would be if...

an old man....whose constituents are reactionary rightwingers and religious fundamentalists....from a state that pumps oil....

DIDN'T deny man-made climate change and DIDN'T say "God won't allow it"

50 years from now Jim Inhofe's grandchildren will STILL be apologizing for Pops.

 

The repub position on the environment is that, since the water supply is polluted, it's OK for them to crap in your dishwasher - as long as their friends can make a profit polluting and selling you a new dishwasher .

 

It would be surprising if someone on the left could actually come out with proof of climate change being the fault of man. Instead, their reports are filled with hypothesis based on conjecture based on guesses.

How many times have we seen them say for 100% certainty that their information was accurate only to see them change it at a later date? According to Al Gore, all the permanent ice should be gone by now, I guess he was wrong huh?

What about that supposed massive increase in global temps we were supposed to be undergoing at this point yet what we are seeing is massive drops in temps all across the globe.

Global warming as morphed into climate change because the "scientists" realize their data does not support a global warming theory.

They basically don't know yet.

Now, when you have scientists that can conclusively give us dates for the temperature increases that occur naturally and they can compare them to current temperature increases we can do some simple subtraction and know that the remaining portion is due to human causes.

Why can't you do this yet?

 

You got that hypocrisy thing backwards.

 

It works both ways of course.

I don't put conservatives on any higher moral pedestal than liberals.

 

they're all lying, there is no global warming. Get over it. What exactly is your plan?

 

Not sure why. There is nothing that is going to happen in his children's or grandchildren s time frame. mumbo jumbo

 

I don't know if you are being argumentative or just deliberately ignorant. You can't even keep the propaganda points straight.

There's no scientific argument about climate change, global warming, or the effects it is having under any label you want to use. I can find more "experts" that say cave men use to ride around on the back of dinosaurs 6000 years ago that scientists that question man made global warming. You just refuse to recognize that the poltical shills that try to muddy the water aren't scientists. Why? Because scientists know the physics. To believe anything else requires you to disavow everything man has learned about Physics, Chemistry, and Mathematics. Climate change is now among the most measured, studied, data mined, modeled, and cross tested endeavors in history. The only errors we have measured in the last 25 years is we have consistently underestimated the rate of change.

What are you going to believe next, George Bush personally blew up the World Trade Centers? Your conspiracy theory crap about scientists cooking to books for some ulterior motive is much more unlikely than that. It's not that hard and scientists from every country, trained in every school, from every discipline, from every culture, using different methods and different tools all arrive at the same conclusion.

"Yes sir, they accepted the 3 years of test data. Yes, 25,000 rounds were fine. Yes sir, it meets or exceeds all Requirements. No, they won't sign off because it's green and they don't know what would happen if it was painted blue instead."