Tuesday, April 21, 2009

Put a Sock in It   [Chris Horner]

So everyone's favorite mass-emailer, Dr. Michael Schlesinger, sends along this whine with apparent approval from a resident genius at Discover magazine who (while accurately taking John Boehner to task for mistaking that global-warming alarmists allege carbon dioxide is a carcinogen), steps in it in his rush to sneer at the ignorance of others:

"Cows producing carbon dioxide when they “do what they do”? You can’t make this stuff up — it can only emerge from a state of deep, deep confusion."

Of course, Boehner doesn't need to make that one up, though confusion does apparently reign here. As is so often the case with global-warming alarmists, they know what they know regardless of what observations or data say.

Not to leave self-imposed humiliation at a minimum, our braintrust goes on:

"Boehner’s flubs — confusing carbon dioxide with carcinogens and with methane — make you wonder whether the guy even knows what global warming is. Can somebody get him a science adviser? Any graduate student will do — in any field, honestly."

Yes. Honestly. Or, just get this fellow Wikipedia if Discover doesn't possess sufficient resources.

Admittedly, it is bad form to ascribe false views to one's political opponents. So it is surprising that our heroes have not expressed similar outrage over President Obama's persistent use of straw men — "some say we should do nothing," etc., etc. But notice how Boehner's dismissal of the (nonexistent) charge that CO2 is also a carcinogen is morphed into him being the one making the claim? By the same reasoning, it appears safe to conclude that Obama was the one saying we should do nothing. Got it.

Here we see how confused one can get when placing one's own dizzying intellect on such a lofty pedestal.

04/21 12:00 PMShare