Dave Roberts over at the on-line eco-magazine Grist says:
Palin's climate skepticism is irrelevant
The Washington Post's Juliet Eilperin writes a piece on Sarah Palin's climate skepticism that seems, like so many articles in this genre, to dance around something obvious.
In the piece, upon finding out that Palin doesn't believe in anthropogenic climate change, one Alaska enviro is quoted saying "now I know why" Palin fought emission reductions.
That activist is pretending, and us readers are supposed to pretend, that ah ha, the reason Palin has blocked all efforts to list polar bears as endangered, restrain fossil fuel development, or lower emissions is that she has a good-faith disagreement about the causes of climate change. That explains it!
Here's an alternative explanation: Palin did that stuff because she's a Republican governor of Alaska.
Seriously. Does any sentient human being on the planet believe that Palin's decisions in Alaska were driven by her idiosyncratic understanding of climate change? She analyzed the science, came to a different conclusion, and governed accordingly? Really?
As an Alaskan leader, she's under immense pressure to bring Alaskans their petro-pork. And as a Republican, she's under immense pressure from her party to oppose government constraints on corporate activity. Perhaps these facts explain the climate skepticism rather than the other way around?
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The Overnight News Digest is posted and includes the story: Democrats to let offshore drilling ban expire.
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If you haven't already, please check out Ekaterin's Diary: Wow, Look at Senator Kennedy! Michelle Bachelet, the president of Chile who was tortured during the Augusto Pinochet regime, was in Hyannis Port to award Kennedy her country's highest award - the Order of Merit. That was for his long-standing opposition to military aid for the fascist dictatorship that came to power as a consequence of the infamous U.S.-engineered coup d'etat on September 11, 1973.