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Only one of the White House contenders, former Utah governor Jon Huntsman, has come out with force to proclaim a belief in man-made climate change, as he condemned his party’s hostility to science. – AP Photo
WASHINGTON: Many of the Republican candidates vying for their party’s nod to take on President Barack Obama, dismiss science in favor of strong evangelical faith, playing to a hardline conservative electorate.
Only one of the White House contenders, former Utah governor Jon Huntsman, has come out with force to proclaim a belief in man-made climate change, as he condemned his party’s hostility to science.
“To be clear, I believe in evolution and trust scientists on global warming. Call me crazy,” he wrote in an August post on micro-blogging site Twitter.
“The minute that the Republican Party becomes the anti-science party — we have a huge problem,” the former US ambassador to China later told ABC television’s “This Week.” Other major political figures, such as New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg, have lambasted the lack of scientific faith of Republican hopefuls seeking the highest office of the world’s first superpower.
“We have presidential candidates who don’t believe in science. I mean, just think about it, can you imagine a company of any size in the world where the CEO said ‘Oh, I don’t believe in science’ and that person surviving to the end of that day? Are you kidding me? It’s mind-boggling!” Bloomberg told an economic forum in November.
The importance of the ultra-conservative vote, championed by a religious, anti-evolution electorate, is not lost on the contenders seeking their party’s nod to face Obama in November’s presidential election.
In Iowa, where caucuses kick off the months-long nominating process on Tuesday, just 21 per cent of Republican voters said they believe in global warming, and 35 per cent in the theory of evolution, according to a Public Policy Polling survey.
Frontrunner Mitt Romney, a Mormon former governor of Massachusetts, has reversed his pro-science support in favor of more conservative views in a bid to gain favor among the more conservative base of his party.
The shifts in position go to the core of the mistrust from his critics, who label Romney a “flip-flopper.”As Massachusetts governor, he introduced in 2004 a statewide Climate Protection Plan, billed as “an initial step in a coordinated effort to reduce emissions of greenhouse gases.”And as recently as 2007, he defended the theory of evolution.
But at a New Hampshire town hall meeting in September, he changed his tune.
“The planet is probably getting warmer. I think we’re experiencing warming,” Romney said. “I believe that we contribute some portion of that. I don’t know how much. It could be a lot, it could be a little.”Later he sought to clarify himself, saying: “My view is that we don’t know what’s causing climate change on this planet.”Other candidates are not so nuanced in their views. Texas Governor Rick Perry came out strongly against climate science by claiming the data had been “manipulated” by scientists in exchange for funding money.
Representative Michele Bachmann, who in April voted for a House bill preventing further regulation of greenhouse gases, similarly spoke of “manufactured science.”Former senator Rick Santorum has also dismissed fundamental theories of man-made climate change as “patently absurd,” and Representative Ron Paul has labeled the science “the greatest hoax.” The Republican Party “has a strong religious base and the evangelical vote is a significant part of that,” said Andrew Kohut, director Pew Research Center for the People & the Press.
There are however, “a fair number of more secular and more moderated religious people who have doubt about global warming.” The larger issue, Kohut said, is how the federal government uses power to regulate global warming, and the issue is politicized, as Republicans fight what they see as government encroachment into the lives of Americans.
If a Republcan candidate bases his campaign on religion and a bending of science to suite him and his candidacy, I will not vote for him. Under certain conditions he/she would be dangerous to the country and the people of this country. Harden Ervin
Why not just wait it out; see if global warming starts to destroy most living things. If we experience extreme drought, massive food shortage, massive flooding in other areas, climate refugees, increased aggression over scarce resources, then we will know the scientists were right. If, as predicted, the south and mid-range Us has temperatures over 100 degrees day an night for 100 continuous days per year and the electrical grid cannot keep up, then we will know. Until then, business as usual. Whats wrong with that?
The GOP doesn't know how their anti-science stance costs them many moderate leaning conservatives votes. They pander to the extreme religious right. DNA finally settled the evolution debate once and for all. The President of the USA needs to be someone who has solid footing in reality and needs to accept the facts. Evolution isn't an opinion or a belief system, it is the only system that explains all the facts we see in nature. Kind of like the theory of gravity. Gravity isn't a belief system or an opinion don't believe in it just jump off of a 25 story building.
For decades the world of “SCIENCE” denied the dangers of their pesticides that poisoned our plant in the first place and studying the effects, not causes of an assumed to be real crisis isn’t lying, it’s worst case scenario research. So that leaves trusting the lazy copy and paste media and politicians. Not good enough for this planet lover to condemn my children to the greenhouse gas ovens. And the former believer voting majority is both liberal and glad a crisis was a tragic exaggeration, not disappointed we missed unimaginable suffering for all life on Earth. These lab coat consultants led us to another BUSH like false war. Spread love now, not needless panic. Pollution IS real. We get it. But death for all by Human CO2 is not, thankfully.