As we mentioned recently in regard to a certain “Obama scientist,” deniers who pretend they’re Serious-Thinking Democrats, yet built up a public persona using conservative media as a venue for criticizing environmentalists, are increasingly common now that outright denial is gauche.
An established member of that “sure I think climate change is real, but…” club is one Michael Shellenberger, who’s the subject of a quietly stinging profile by Scott Waldman at E&E. Waldman introduces Shellenberger as Republicans’ “new ally to help deliver their global warming message,” describing him as the “pro-nuclear, pro-fracking former Democractic gubernatorial candidate from California.” But even that is somewhat generous, as he was hardly a serious candidate, and didn’t even come close to making it out of the primary. He ran a vanity campaign that consisted primarily of Tucker Carlson appearances and netted him 0.5% of the vote, putting him in 9th place.
After that though, Waldman’s generosity runs out. He points out that if the “redeemed activist” role Shellenberger plays “seems straight out of Fox News, it’s because it is. The network has repeatedly booked Shellenberger to air his views.” Ouch! Not a whole lot of actual Democrats are invited back on to Fox, at least not as anything more than a punching bag, which Shellenberg is definitely not. But Waldman isn’t exactly being mean either, or in any way misrepresenting Shellenberger’s persona.
For example, in an interview with E&E, Shellenberger apparently thought the best retort to how some portray him based on his most incendiary commentary, “which can at times be seen scrolling across a Fox News chyron,” Waldman notes, is to use some lovely homophobia-adjacent language.
“You may want to go and find something” Shellenberger told Waldman, “that I know a lot of progressives are butt-hurt about, a lot of climate alarmists are butt-hurt about. That would be cherry-picking one particular thing in my nearly 20 years of writing on this topic and trying to suggest that it stands for the whole.”
… okay but if you use the phrase “butt-hurt” in an on-the-record interview in the same way countless rightwing trolls have used it in comment sections, you might deserve to be judged for it.
Shellenberger certainly talks like a right-wing hack. And aside from this story, his media hits are all Fox News and the like, while Waldman notes that Shellenberger has been invited by Republicans to testify in congress six times since January 2020. Yet he remains committed to the ruse, as Waldman indicates in a parenthetical that “Shellenberger claimed he was invited by both parties because the official invitation he received was signed by the Democratic committee chair as well as the ranking Republican.” What’s more, he was invited to the Republican retreat in Florida last month where he gave them talking points about how renewables would drive up prices and cause more blackouts. (But he’s definitely totally different from other deniers, really!)
Probably the biggest indication that Shellenberger just plain sucks is that Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Cancun) likes him, tweeting praise for his book, just like denier groups have done, Waldman reports. CO2 Coalition and CFACT, two denial organizations that exist solely to turn industry money into Republican talking points, love Shellenberger, as do Breitbart News and the Daily Caller, which Waldman writes “regularly touts Shellenberger’s public claims with headlines such as ‘Here’s How Renewable Energy Actually Hurts the Environment.’”
So this guy’s supposedly a Democrat, totally isn’t a denier, but went on the Heartland Institute’s podcast to say “Thank you, guys [he’s right to use the gendered language, not too many women in denierland] for sounding the alarm on these issues longer than I have, and I’m sorry it took me so long to basically get into a position where I could tell the truth.”
But apparently he only goes on fossil-fueled media because “progressive media figures won’t engage with his ideas for fear of upsetting their audience,” Waldman writes.
Shellenberger said the real question is “Why won’t Rachel Maddow have me on her show; why won’t Anderson Cooper have me on his show; why won’t Stephen Colbert have me on their show?”
Well, Michael, maybe because Stephen Colbert is a comedian with a comedy show, and he can see what an incredibly unfunny joke of an attention-seeking grifter you are.
