Yesterday, E&E ran a story about Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy, a supposedly rare Republican who accepts climate science. Instead of embracing any sort of climate friendly policies, however, Cassidy prefers to throw his weight behind fossil fuels--specifically natural gas.
In practice, this is hardly different from denial. After all, if your answer to the problem of climate change is to burn more fossil fuels, you’re clearly in denial. Regardless, Cassidy gets praise from a fellow fossil-fuel state Senator, Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, who told E&E that “Republicans have just veered away” from climate change and “ceded that as an issue to the Democrats.”
Bob Inglis, former South Carolina Representative and current crusader for climate-conscious conservatism, closes out the story by predicting that the current GOP platform of “populist nationalism will [be] found out to be snake oil. And when it is, there will be a rebirth of conservatism."
But per Inglis, why does conservatism need a rebirth, and per Murkowski, why did Republicans cede the issue to the Democrats?
New research in Nature Climate Change suggests that, despite research showing the opposite, conservatives aren’t inherently more likely to accept the climate denial conspiracy theories. Instead, as study author Matthew Hornsey told the Guardian’s Graham Readfearn, blame can likely be placed on the concerted effort by vested interests to engage in “an organised campaign of misinformation around climate change.”
By comparing climate opinions among conservatives around the world, Hornsey found that conservatives in other countries were far more accepting of climate science than those in the US (and Australia). And what sets the US and Australia apart from other countries is the prominence of industry with a vested interest in preventing climate regulation: a massive coal industry in Australia and a seat of power for the oil industry in the US. Because “the vested interests are high,” Hornsey explains, “the fossil fuel industry and conservative thinktanks, media and politicians collaborate in an organised campaign of misinformation.”
This campaign successfully made it toxic for conservative leaders to embrace climate change. The few that did, like Bob Inglis, then faced a candidate with the backing of those vested interests. Rank and file conservatives, responding to the promise of industry campaign dollars, began incorporating climate denial into what it means to be conservative.
Hornsey ends his interview on a somewhat optimistic note, pointing out that conservative denial will erode as “the negative consequences of climate change become more severe and more immediate” and as climate solutions are presented in conservative-friendly frames.
And perhaps that’s happening, as a working paper finds that the Southeast, Trump Country, will take the biggest hit from climate change. Meanwhile Yale research finds that the decline in Republican acceptance of climate change that happened after Trump’s election has ended, and conservative worry over climate change has started inching back up.
Perhaps, then, and we acknowledge this may just be wishful thinking, once the tide turns and as Inglis expects, the snake oil of Trump’s know-nothing populism is revealed, climate could be an issue that the GOP comes back around on to prove it’s serious. After all, the fossil fuel industry’s influence over Trump’s EPA couldn’t be more obvious, and Trump’s embrace of climate craziness is well documented.
The question, though, is if the conservative rebirth envisioned by Inglis will happen before we lock in irreversible climate damages. How long will Republicans tolerate Trump’s hatemongering before the party is reborn? What’s the just-hate-shun period?
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