We note another time-waster in the Utah Legislature with the House's passage of House Joint Resolution 12, which purports to smack down so-called climate alarmists for their inability to connect global warming with the current downturn in global temperatures.
HJR12 is sponsored by Rep. Kerry Gibson, R-Ogden. Gibson is a dairy and crop farmer. A strong backer of the resolution -- which urges the Environmental Protection Agency to not regulate pollution attributed to climate change "until a full and independent investigation of the climate data conspiracy and global warming science can be substantiated" -- is the Utah Farm Bureau.
Sometimes we wonder if there are rooms in the Utah Legislature where Rush Limbaugh is piped in while issues are debated.
HJR12 now moves into the Senate. Before its House passage, the "conspiracy" language was watered down a bit.
Global warming, climate change, whatever one wants to call it, is a hot topic in the news. Advocates for climate change improvements were bitterly disappointed at the failure of the December Copenhagen climate change summit to achieve a global consensus on reducing carbon emissions. Climate scientists have also been embarrassed by overzealous colleagues fudging data or supressing contradictory information in order to "promote" global warming.
On the other hand, blanket opposition to curbing carbon emissions as a way to combat global warming is mostly politically based. The majority of scientific experts do believe that the earth is at risk of unhealthy warming from man-made carbon emissions. We should all seek ways to make the earth cleaner.
But Gibson's resolution doesn't want to do that. It's just a message bill. It's not the responsibility of the Utah Legislature to create policy that is the equivalent of an applause line at a political rally. To be fair, we would have the same objection if legislators more favorable to Al Gore's position on global warming pushed through a politically charged resolution as well.
Another problem with this type of resolution is that its supporters are too eager to push pseudoscience or conspiracy theories as a rationale. For example, one of the most fervent supporters of Gibson's HJR12 is Rep. Mike Noel, R-Kanab. Noel is well known as a vocal critic of global warming. He argues that efforts to reduce carbon emissions are a plot to place global controls on world population.
Sigh. The Legislature has wasted taxpayers' money and embarrassed itself with HJR12. The House would have been better off listening to 11 Brigham Young University scientists who pointed out the folly of HJR12 and defended climate science.
That made no difference to most House members because HJR12 is not about science -- it's about politics.
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