A poll due for release on Wednesday shows that a large majority of Americans believe that this year’s unusually warm winter, last year’s blistering summer and some other weather disasters were probably made worse by global warming.
Most interesting point:
One of the more striking findings was that 35 percent of the public reported being affected by extreme weather in the past year. The United States was hit in 2011 by a remarkable string of disasters affecting virtually every region, including droughts, floods, tornadoes and heat waves.
As noted in a previous post, weather volatility is occurring in some of the most conservative parts of the U.S.
Places like Texas, where the political leaders are most likely to embrace climate-change denial. Same in Alberta:
Wildrose Party Leader Danielle Smith is refusing to clarify whether she doubts that global warming is being caused by human activities. …
Smith told reporters in Calgary again on Tuesday that the science around climate change isn’t settled.
But when Smith was asked twice on Tuesday whether she believes climate change is real, she didn’t answer.
The political dilemma for conservative politicians will become excruciating as reality trumps ideology. To use the science-is-unsettled argument as justification for delay becomes more and more untenable in the face of actual climate-related events. You come off looking obtuse, or worse.
But how bad do things have to get before deniability becomes indefensible? How much longer before it’s no longer possible to talk about oil pipelines and tar-sands production without mentioning greenhouse-gas emissions? Before dots are connected and time for delay runs out.
My guess: real bad.
Connect the dots eh? What like this you mean?
Ugh, this just became a pun.