Let me take you down...

Living is easy
with eyes closed
misunderstanding all you see
It's getting hard to be someone
but it all works out
It doesn't matter much to me...


On Sunday (Halloween), the Oregonian ran a story on p. 2 wih the banner, “Focus on politics.” The headline was Climate change skepticism, denial run deep in tea party movement. The story originally ran eleven days earlier in the New York Times (http://www.nytimes.com/2010/10/21/us/politics/21climate.html). I’m not sure what precipitated the Oregonian’s delay in running the story or if I should even read into it. Reading it was enough.

Understanding the world begins and ends here.
Norman Dennison, founder of the Corydon Tea Party in southern Indiana was quoted in the article as calling climate change a “flat-out lie.” He said he based his view on the preaching of Rush Limbaugh and the teachings of Scripture. “I read my Bible. He made this earth for us to utilize.”

Kelly Khuri, founder of the Clark County (Indiana) Tea Party Patriots calls the “so-called climate science just ridiculous.” She believes it’s “all just a money-control avenue.”

The article states that these views are “spread by a number of widely followed conservative opinion leaders, including Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sean Hannity, George Will and Sarah Palin, who oppose government programs to address climate change and who question the credibility and motives of the scientists who have raised alarms about it.”

Because scientists usually have untoward motives for their findings, right?

“The oil, coal and utility industries have collectively spent $500 million since the beginning of 2009 to lobby against legislation to address climate change and to defeat candidates who support it.”

What was I saying about motives?

The article quotes a recent New York Times/CBS News poll, which found that 14% of tea party supporters said that “global warming is an environmental problem that is having an effect now, while 49% of the rest of the public believes it is.”

“More than half of tea party supporters said that global warming would have no serious effect at any time in the future, while 15% of other Americans share that view, the poll found.”

“And 8% of tea party adherents volunteered that they did not believe global warming exists at all, while 1% of other respondents agreed.”

What does all of this mean?

Aside from the fact that if, as predicted the Republicans (re: Tea Party candidates) take control of either or both houses of congress, nothing will get done, specifically any climate change legislation. It also means that the fat cats, like the notorious Koch Brothers will continue to dominate the willingly ignorant into thinking they’re empowered and free, all the while, they accelerating the death of the planet. Kind of reminds me of a Bob Dylan song. In fact, it could have been written today...