Limbaugh on global warming

Rush’s opinion, for what it’s worth. 7

Want to read something truly, truly bizarre?

Here, via Chris Mooney, are Rush Limbaugh's thoughts about the recent study showing that Atlantic Ocean currents are shifting.

The strangest thing about it is that he summarizes the science pretty well. He's explaining the science, quoting from news reports, and then, out of nowhere ...

Now, you might be asking yourself, "Okay, how is global warming causing this cooling?" Well, the first thing you have to understand is that global warming explains everything! Global warming explains why Bush sent troops to Iraq. Global warming explains what happened to New Orleans and Hurricane Katrina. Global warming is said to be the reason for everything. Global warming is a political issue.

Global warming is a political issue, and as such, it cannot die; it will not die. It is an issue that leftists around world are carrying in their hip pockets and trumpeting from their mouths as a means of doing their best to destroy or weaken capitalist industrial societies.

And then it's back to summarizing the science.

He doesn't even seem to be questioning the science, or skeptical about it. Nor does he seem to notice that the science is directly at odds with his well-worn political screed about global warming. There's no sign of cognitive dissonance. It makes my brain hurt.

And then this:

Folks, don't get confused. I've not done a 180 and starting to buy this. I believe what may be happening could be happening, this conveyor belt business with the Gulf Stream and being interrupted. We've had ice ages on this planet, in case you don't know that, and we've had ice ages long before man was ever industrial, before we started burning all these fossil fuels and so forth. I have not abandoned my belief that whatever is going on is not caused by us.

So, I guess this is the new state-of-the-art rightwing position on global warming: Okay, fine, it's happening, but it's not our fault. And we certainly don't need to change anything we're doing!

I just think these wacko environmentalists take these naturally occurring climatic cycles and try to blame primarily America and other civilized industrialized nations for all this, and it's purely political. But these things are going to happen, and if this is happening, there's nothing we can do to stop it.

And just in case his fans are getting uncomfortable in the vicinity of awkward truths, a little red meat is called for ...

We've had ice ages. If you're in France, don't worry about it. You can burn cars! You've got all kinds of cars in France you can burn to stay warm.

Lovely.

David Roberts is staff writer for Grist. You can follow his Twitter feed at twitter.com/drgrist.

Advertisement
Advertisement
  1. Corey McKrill's avatar

    Corey McKrill Posted 6:13 am
    02 Dec 2005

    non sequiturSort of like the Manchurian Candidate.  The wiring gets a glitch and he almost sounds lucid for a second.  But then the system reboots and everything returns to "normal." Sounds like he had to reboot two or three times on this one ...

    http://grist.org/

    Permalink

  2. Biodiversivist's avatar

    Biodiversivist Posted 7:12 am
    02 Dec 2005

    The transition is now complete. He was the last.I have noted over the past two years the transition from denial that it exists, to "OK, it may exist, but we are not causing it." The next transition may be, "OK we may be causing it, but global warming is not such a bad thing."

    In the end, it all comes down to biodiversity. Help acquire and protect ecological hotspots, give to a conservation organization: http://www.saveourbiodiversity.com

    Permalink

  3. Corey McKrill's avatar

    Corey McKrill Posted 7:52 am
    02 Dec 2005

    either that or ...... "It's the environmentalists fault."

    http://grist.org/

    Permalink

  4. MikeCapone Posted 4:56 pm
    02 Dec 2005

    FactsHe doesn't seem to see a need to bother with such hings as facts, even when he actually knows them, it seems.

    --


    SUVs are squared-out minivans.

    Permalink

  5. amazingdrx Posted 8:37 pm
    02 Dec 2005

    Yep bio-dThere it is.  The half joking comments by the nut wing that once the arctic ice is gone, oil tankers will have shorter routes.  And think of all that Siberian and Canadian arctic coastal and offshore oil that will become available.
    They neglect the important fact, that those past ice ages were caused by natural phenomena like volcanoes and meteor strikes.
    This current climate disaster IS a result of human activity and thus preventable.
    Limbaugh's argument is very powerful, maybe he has switched his drug intake to more natural sources.  No more oxycontin rants?  Hehey.
    What he should say about arctic ice and ocean currents is that when the gulf stream slows the heating effect in the northern regions will be diminished and the ice restored.  Nature is self correcting.  Look for that next.
    Of course we can still defeat that argument against green energy by pointing out that it is economically and culturally beneficial to halt the human contribution to this global climate emergency.
    In purely capitalist terms, the cost in reduced economic growth from storm, drought,energy wars, and rising ocean levels justifies the shift to green energy that eliminates the human contribution to global climate change from greenhouse gas emmisions.
    It's the best course for business as well as each traveler on spaceship earth.

    Permalink

  6. odograph Posted 11:37 pm
    02 Dec 2005

    bounded rationalitylimitations of the human species

    Permalink

  7. jdhlax Posted 5:35 am
    05 Dec 2005

    It's Better To Concentrate On ...fighting air pollution in general.  When it's shown that humans are dumping all sorts of industrial pollutants into our atmosphere and doing so at very high levels, people can't argue that it doesn't matter or that air pollution is not caused by human activities.  Global warming is merely a symptom of air pollution and should be treated as such.

    Jeff Hoffman

    Permalink

Add a Comment

You are not logged in. Thus, you cannot post a comment. If you have an account, log in. If you don't have an account, well, by all means go make one! Meet you back here in five.

Hello, Visitor!    Why not register?

Viewed
More
Commented
More
Advertisement