The unequivocal faith of the climate change quibblers

onJan 8, 2009 @ 15:34 PST

An article on the Heritage Foundation’s blog today shows just how little it takes for some people to put their head back in the sand when it comes to dealing with global warming.

Heritage staffer Conn Carroll declares Study Shows Global Warming Will Not Hurt U.S. Economy

Carroll pretty much leaves it at that. Other than including a single self-fulfilling quote cherry-picked from the study and another from US News correspondent James Pethokoukis who comes to this strange conclusion:

So if you do buy into the theory of man-made climate change, the next logical move would surely be to do nothing that would slow growth and technologcal [sic] advancement in rich countries — such as a cap-and-trade regulatory system or onerous carbon taxes — and do more to accelerate growth in poor ones through free trade and the exporting of democratic capitalism.

The paper titled “Climate Shocks and Economic Growth” (pdf) by Melissa Dell, Benjamin Jones and Benjamin Olken is actually very good. It certainly doesn’t draw any ridiculous conclusions like the one by Pethokoukis, nor does it present the evidence to make the claims that Heritage Foundation wants to make. Dell et al. do find that the impacts of global warming on developing nations could be potentially devastating.

They conclude that:

“… our contribution in this paper is to reject views that climate does not matter, show that climate’s effects are substantial, and identify a group of countries where climate appears to have large effects.”

And,

“… Extrapolated over 100 years, this implies that the median poor country’s income will be about 50% lower than it would be had there been no climate change. Moreover, because the effects are large for poor countries – and we estimate no impact on rich countries – the estimates in Table 9 suggest that climate change could substantially widen world income inequality.” [my emphasis]

It’s mind boggling how little evidence it takes for a free market think tank like the Heritage Foundation to be convinced that we should do nothing to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. With one paper issued at an annual general meeting and Heritage concludes unequivocally that Global Warming Will Not Hurt U.S. Economy. At the same time Heritage continues to ignore the massive amounts of evidence complied over decades by top scientists of the major negative impacts climate change will have on our way of life and the very nature of our planet.

Of course, it’s easy to take such a blind leap of faith for Heritage considering they’ve been attacking and spreading misinformation about the realities of climate science for years and have reaped the rewards from financially motivated fossil fuel companies like ExxonMobil.

By Kevin Grandia

Kevin is a contributor and strategic adviser to DeSmog. He runs the digital marketing agency Spake Media House. Named a “Green Hero” by Rolling Stone Magazine and one of the “Top 50 Tweeters” on climate change and environment issues, Kevin has appeared in major news media outlets around the world for his work on digital campaigning. Kevin has been involved in the public policy arena in both the United States and Canada for more than a decade. For five years he was the managing editor of DeSmogBlog.com. In this role, Kevin’s research into the “climate denial industry” and the right-wing think tank networks was featured in news media articles around the world. He is most well known for his ground-breaking research into David and Charles Koch’s massive financial investments in the Republican and tea party networks. Kevin is the first person to be designated a “Certified Expert” on the political and community organizing platform NationBuilder. Prior to DeSmog, Kevin worked in various political and government roles. He was Senior Advisor to the Minister of State for Multiculturalism and a Special Assistant to the Minister of State for Asia Pacific, Foreign Affairs for the Government of Canada. Kevin also worked in various roles in the British Columbia provincial government in the Office of the Premier and the Ministry of Health. In 2008 Kevin co-founded a groundbreaking new online election tool called Vote for Environment which was later nominated for a World Summit Award in recognition of the world’s best e-Content and innovative ICT applications. Kevin moved to Washington, DC in 2010 where he worked for two years as the Director of Online Strategy for Greenpeace USA and has since returned to his hometown of Vancouver, Canada.

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