I was going to simply put this in the latest Fuel For Thought, but I didn't want to wait to share.
An online Christian Science Monitor article on global warming as world security threat recounts how Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, Bush's annointed nay-sayer on climate change, said at an international meeting that carbon dioxide levels were dangerously high and needed to be reduced drastically, immediately, to ensure humanity's survival. Dr. Pachauri replaced his predecessor as chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change because Exxon wanted someone less vocal in the role.
The article cites gfactor's diary on how this development is a major blow to the Bush Administration:
More after the bump....
In early January, Dr. Rajendra Pachauri, the chairman of the official Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), told an international conference of 114 nations gathered in Mauritius that the world has "already reached [a] level of dangerous concentrations of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere" and called for immediate and "very deep" cuts in the pollution if humanity is to "survive".
The statement was interesting because Dr. Pachauri was put in place in 2001 at the behest of the Bush administration. Oil giant Exxon had asked the Bush administration to replace his predecessor because he was too "aggressive" on the issue.
The blog Daily Kos reported two weeks ago that Pachauri's recent comments were very much a "blow" to the US position, especially since they saw him as a supporter of their "go slow" approach to battling global warming. [emphasis mine]
Gee, gfactor said "major blow", but that's pretty close. :)