The pope's encyclical on climate change was leaked a few days before the formal release, and deniers and delayers alike have flocked to Twitter to voice their criticisms.
For example, Mike Shellenberger of the Breakthrough Institute, known for its techno-optimism (or "egomodernism") ranted about how, in his view, the encyclical warns against the perils of technology, wealth and cities. In his tweets, Shellenberger defends greed, suggests that the Pope is a hypocrite for condemning wealth despite the Vatican's riches, claims St. Francis (whose name the pope chose for his regnal name) would be the opposite of Pope Francis, and suggests that the Pope visit the Congo to see what a world that followed the encyclical's advice would be like. This prompted a tweet pointing out that the pope has already been to the Congo. Shellenberger's most arrogant tweet, though, is probably the one where he accuses Pope Francis of blasphemy. Overall, it's a pretty embarrassing outpouring from Shellenberger.
However, Shellenberger's tirade was not nearly as bad as the tweets from Steve Milloy. Milloy, of JunkScience.com, is a former communications executive for Murray Energy, one of the largest coal companies in the world We don't know for whom he's working, but given his history of undisclosed punditry-for-hire, odds are he's not collecting unemployment checks and advocating for fossil fuels just for fun.
After a string of run-of-the-mill science denial, Milloy starts getting ugly. In the course of reacting to the encyclical, Milloy calls Pope Francis "quite a people-hater" and tries to connect the pope's message with the KGB, before describing the encyclical as "adolescent, insipid, primitive, embarrassing."
Which, as it turns out, is a pretty apt way to describe Milloy. Perhaps a little generous, even, given Milloy's career defending tobacco and fossil fuels.
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