From the New York Times today:
A top NASA climate expert who twice briefed Vice President Dick Cheney on global warming plans to criticize the administration's approach to the issue in a lecture at the University of Iowa tonight and say that a senior administration official told him last year not to discuss dangerous consequences of rising temperatures.
The expert, Dr. James E. Hansen, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies in Manhattan, expects to say that the Bush administration has ignored growing evidence that sea levels could rise significantly unless prompt action is taken to reduce heat-trapping emissions from smokestacks and tailpipes.
Many academic scientists, including dozens of Nobel laureates, have been criticizing the administration over its handling of climate change and other complex scientific issues. But Dr. Hansen, first in an interview with The New York Times a week ago and again in his planned lecture today, is the only leading scientist to speak out so publicly while still in the employ of the government.
...
Dr. Hansen, 63, acknowledged that he imperiled his credibility and perhaps his job by criticizing Mr. Bush's policies in the final days of a tight presidential campaign. He said he decided to speak out after months of deliberation because he was convinced the country needed to change course on climate policy.
Dr. Hansen rose to prominence when, after testifying at a Senate hearing in the record-warm summer of 1988, he said, "It is time to stop waffling so much and say the evidence is pretty strong that the greenhouse effect is here."
The degree to which prominent scientists such as Hansen are getting involved in politics this year is unprecedented in my memory. And for good reason, given the Bush administration's virtual total disregard for the scientific process.
Mr. Hansen's decision is probably too late to play a significant role in this campaign, especially since conservatives will, unfortunately, find it easy to dismiss him as a partisan, given the $250,000 award he received from the Heinz Foundation in 2001 (mentioned in the New York Times article). Nonetheless, I am always encouraged to hear scientists speak up about what has been going on.
Unfortunately, the White House's "science adviser", in this article, reveals yet again that, despite his apparent earlier background as a respected scientist, he has become a complete patsy for his bosses:
Dr. John H. Marburger III, the science adviser to the president, said he was not privy to any exchanges between Dr. Hansen and the administrator of NASA. But he denied that the White House was playing down the risks posed by climate change.
"President Bush has long recognized the serious implications of climate change, the role of human activity, and our responsibility to reduce emissions,'' Dr. Marburger said in an e-mailed statement. "He has put forward a series of policy initiatives including a commitment to reduce the greenhouse gas intensity of our economy.''
The whole idea of "greenhouse gas intensity" is meaningless in the context of fighting global warming. It is a phrase coined by the White House a few years ago to make it appear as if their policies are reducing something important, when in fact they are not.
"Greenhouse gas intensity" is supposed to be the amount of greenhouse gases emitted per GDP value of our economy. This number has been gradually decreasing since long before Bush took office, even as total greenhouse gas emissions (the actual problem!) have significantly increased. Bush's policies do nothing to cut total greenhouse gas emissions and only serve to perpetuate the status quo. Pretending that this status quo reduction in "greenhouse gas intensity" does anything to combat global warming is scientific malpractice, in my mind, and Marburger should be ashamed to participate in this deception.
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