Category: Inhofe

Inhofe

Herb Van Fleet: With climate change, you can’t change the facts:

The International Panel on Climate Change is at it again.On Nov. 2, the IPCC released its latest report, “Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability — Fifth Assessment.” It was written by 306 authors from 60 countries and runs 1,820 pages. And consistent with previous reports, this one portends gloom and doom for the planet unless we begin to make a concerted effort to curb greenhouse gas emissions, especially carbon dioxide.

Also consistent with previous reports from the IPCC were the reactions from the climate change deniers, especially Republicans, and more especially Sen. Jim Inhofe, the 79-year old Tulsan who was just re-elected. Inhofe is set to become chairman of the Environment & Public Works committee in January under the new Republican-controlled Senate and will be heavily involved in any legislation regarding climate change.

With that in mind, consider Inhofe’s response to the IPCC report: “It comes as no surprise that the IPCC is again advocating for the implementation of extreme climate change regulations that will cripple the global economy and send energy prices skyrocketing.”

He apparently thinks his predictions are better than the IPCC’s.

Sen. Inhofe has been the champion of climate change deniers for years. In 2012, he wrote a book on the subject: “The Greatest Hoax: How the Global Warming Conspiracy Threatens Your Future.” Not surprising for someone whose campaign treasure chest is overflowing with money from the petroleum industry and related parties.

As an evangelical, Inhofe has also claimed that human-influenced climate change is impossible because “God’s still up there,” and that it is “outrageous” and arrogant for people to believe human beings are “able to change what he is doing in the climate.” Like many other religionists in the political theater, Inhofe confuses belief and dogma with science and facts.

If Inhofe had been around in the early part of 1492, I’m pretty sure he would have been absolutely convinced that Earth was flat and that Columbus’ proposed voyage West to find the Far East was doomed to fall off the edge.

Besides the outspoken Inhofe, there are many others, mostly conservatives, who deny that climate change is caused by humans and that it is a natural phenomenon over which humans have no control.

The carbon tax, the subsidies for alternative energy sources and the retrofitting of certain industries to reduce greenhouse gases, which are suggested as means of abating human contributions to climate change along with the attendant growth in government bureaucracies, are all anathema to the right wing of the political spectrum. Big business is better than big government, they say.

EPA, Gestapo, Inhofe

“Ignorance is associated with exaggerated confidence in one’s abilities, whereas experts are unduly tentative about their performance.”

The  Dunning-Kruger effect.  published in 1999.Appliesdirectly to the Andrew Bolt’s of this world when it comes to the denial of Climate change in particular those employed by Fox News and News Corp.

“Ignorance is associated with exaggerated confidence in one’s abilities, whereas experts are unduly tentative about their performance.”
 https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=wvVPdyYeaQU

Confidence and credibility

Unfortunately projected confidence as the most important determinant in judged credibility.

Does this mean that the poorest-performing — and hence most over-confident — expert is believed more than the top performer whose displayed confidence may be a little more tentative?

In contested arenas, such as climate change, the Dunning-Kruger effect and its flow-on consequences can distort public perceptions of the true scientific state of affairs, yes.

To illustrate, there is an overwhelming scientific consensus that greenhouse gas emissions. This consensus is expressed in more than 95% of the scientific literature and it is shared by a similar fraction — 97-98% – of publishing experts in the area.  Research has found that the “relative climate expertise and scientific prominence” of the few dissenting researchers “are substantially below that of the convinced researchers”. In other words Bolt and his denier sources are not only a minority but are below par when it comes to research. Those ‘for’ are counted in the 1000’s whereas those against wouldn’t fill  a small room. What News Corp and Bolt fail to recognize is the false balance they present is actually bias.

recognise (false) balance as (actual) bias?

‘I’m not an expert, but…’

How should actual experts  deal with the problems that arise from Dunning-Kruger, the media’s failure to recognise Bolt’s lack of “balance” as bias, and the fact that the public uses projected confidence  of commentators as a cue for credibility?

1 The pervasive scientific consensus on climate change IPCC report based on 100’s of the top climate scientists  In the same way as there is a consensus that smoking causes cancerThe public has a right to know that there is a scientific consensus on climate change.

2That the public wants scientists to work closely with managers and others to integrate scientific results into management decisions. This opinion appears to be equally shared by all stakeholders, from scientists to managers and interest groups. That decisions aren’t made on Bolt’s notion that “I’m not an expert but think of the economic harm therefore…..”

Advocacy or understanding?

Given the consensus “the only unequivocal tool for minimising climate change uncertainty is to decrease our greenhouse gas emissions”. In the same way that given the consensus on smoking and cancer quitting will minimise the risk of cancer.It is not advocacy.

Both statements are true. Both identify a link between a scientific consensus and a personal or political action.Neither  advocates any specific response or non response.— but both require an informed decision based on the scientific consensus.

Spurious accusations of advocacy which Bolt uses is merely a ploy to marginalise the voices of experts.removing their opinion from public debate. The consequence is that scientific evidence is lost to the public and is lost to the democratic process.Sober policy decisions on climate change cannot be made when politicians claim that they are not scientists while also erroneously claiming that there is no scientific consensus which immediately shows their advocacy and conservative bias.

EPA, Inhofe, Republicans

Climate change denier Jim Inhofe in line for Senate’s top environmental job

Climate skeptic nad Republican Senator Jim Inhofe

Obama faces a fight to protect his climate change agenda after midterm results suggest Senate’s top environmental post will fall to Republican stalwart of climate denial

The Senate’s top environmental job is set to fall to Jim Inhofe, one of the biggest names in US climate denial, but campaigners say Barack Obama will fight to protect his global warming agenda.

Oklahoma Republican Inhofe has been denying the science behind climate change for 20 years – long before it became a cause for the conservative tea party wing. Following midterm elections which saw the Republicans take control of the senate, he is now expected to become the chairman of the senate environment and public works committee.

However, advocates believe Obama will work to protect his signature power plant rules from Republican attacks, and to live up to his earlier commitments to a global deal on fight climate change.

“We think he sees this as a critically important part of his second term legacy and there is no reason why he should not continue to go forward on this… both domestically and around the world,” Gene Karpinski, president of the League of Conservation Voters, told a press briefing.

The campaigners were less clear, however, how far Obama would be willing to fight to block the Keystone XL pipeline project.

Obama will get a chance to show he is still committed to fighting climate change during a trip to Beijing next week, where the US and Chinese are expected to announce new energy co-operation.

Extracting a pledge from China to cut emissions is hugely important now for Obama, who faces growing pressure from Republicans to demonstrate that other countries beyond the US – especially the high-emissions, rising economies – are acting on climate change.

“It is a domestic political imperative for the president to gain emissions reductions from China and other major emitters as much as it is an international policy goal,” said Paul Bledsoe, a climate change official in the Clinton White House.

“The president is under increasing pressure to gain emissions reductions from China and other major emitters in order to justify US domestic mitigation policy. That is going to be the spin Republicans put on it – that we are wasting our time with domestic emissions reductions because they will be swamped by developing countries’ pollution.”

Obama is going to feel that pressure the most from Congress. With his opponents now in control of both houses, the top slot on the Senate’s environment and public works committee passes from a climate defender, the California Democrat, Barbara Boxer, to Inhofe.

He published a book in 2012 calling global warming a hoax, and has compared the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to the Gestapo.

A spokeswoman for Inhofe said his first concern was passing the defence budget, and that he would make no comment on his leadership roles until next week.

But if, as expected, Inhofe becomes the new committee chair next January, he will probably try to dismantle the EPA rules cutting greenhouse gas emissions from power plants – the centrepiece of Obama’s environmental agenda.

Industry lobbyists and campaigners said Inhofe lacked the votes to throw out the power plant rules entirely.

Obama would also veto any such move, said Scott Segal, an energy and coal lobbyist with Bracewell & Giuliani.

“I’m not sure we have the votes to advance those across the finish line particularly if they are vetoed,” Segal told a conference call with reporters. Instead, he said he expected “tailored changes”, which could weaken the rules.

Bledsoe did expect, however, that Obama will sign off on the controversial Keystone XL project early next year.

Republicans have said approving the pipeline, built to pump tar sands crude to Texas Gulf Coast refineries, would be an early order of business.

Obama in his post-election press conference gave no indication what he would decide. But Bledsoe said: “I actually believe the president is likely to approve the piepline and in the process deny Republicans a politically potent issue.”

From his perch in the Senate, Inhofe is expected to launch multiple investigations into the EPA – including Republican charges that the agency leaned heavily on a campaign group in drafting the proposed new rules.

But as committee chair, Inhofe is unlikely to indulge in quite the same level of theatrics on climate denial, said RL Miller, a California lawyer and founder of the grassroots organising group, Climate Hawks Vote.

“I expect we are going to see less headline-grabbing efforts on the EPA and more of simply throttling their budget,” Miller said. “If he touches climate denial at all he is going to be ridiculed in public and in the media. If he is smart, he is going to be very quiet publicly, and it will be death by a thousand cuts in the kind of budget battles that people like Jon Stewart don’t pay attention to.”

Despite their upbeat postures, Tuesday’s results were a big setback for campaign groups which had invested an unprecedented amount in trying to elect pro-climate candidates to Congress.

The former hedge fund billionaire, Tom Steyer, spent nearly $75m on advertising and organising in only seven races, making him the biggest known single spender in these elections. Only three of his candidates won.

“There is no way to dance around the issue that in too many races we lost good allies,” Michael Brune, the director of the Sierra Club, told a briefing. “We see those people being replaced by people that are against our values.”

But the environmental leaders blamed the poor showing on low turnout in an off election year – and continued to insist that climate change was becoming a top-tier issue.

They insisted their effort had put climate change on the electoral map – a big shift from 2012 when virtually no candidates would even utter the words climate change.

This time around, Republican candidates were forced to back away from outright climate denial, the campaigners said.

They noted Cory Gardner, the newly elected Republican Senator from Colorado, had appeared in campaign ads with wind turbines, after earlier disparaging climate science. “Climate denial is an endangered species,” Brune said.