Kevin Vranes has a phud in Physical Ocean- ography and Cli- matology. He now studies sci- ence policy and politics at the If you've read closely, you've seen me berate climate commenters for being tribal. What is tribalism? It's the sort of "what group are you in?" mindlessness that passes for critical thinking on climate policy and you see it on both "sides" of the "debate." If you have a spare 3 days you can check the myriad comments on any of the posts here and here (for the most part, the posts themselves come off as generally non-tribal, much to the credit of the blog owners). Or if you don't want to weed through thousands of comments and just want a couple of short takes on the subject, you can also read previous posts by John Fleck (in which - juicy, juicy - he takes down another SBer) and myself (the latter has some good comments from y'all that are worth reading).
Two examples of tribalism:
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Halfway through the comments to this post, I linked to Lambert's collation of responses to the absurd CEI ad campaign from across the political spectrum. Lambert barely commented in favor of simply giving a list of outside sources. Steve Hemphill, of the "CO2 is life!" Tribe, instead of actually reading the content of the Lambert post, got on me for having the unmitigated gall to even link to Lambert (because Lambert's in the wrong tribe, apparently). Harumph!
Not realizing that bloggers, authors, journalists, scientists, contributors, politicians, etc. have absolutely NO control over who cites them or otherwise uses their words, an actual journalist (PDT on this page) posted the following comment to this post:
"I don't know what this study means. But Milloy at junkscience.com blogged on your post about Don Kennedy. It seems obvious where Roger's allies are."
Which was intended to mean, "Since Milloy is blogging about you, he must be/you must consider him your ally."
There are lots of examples of this kind of crap, but there are also many examples of free-thinking and the refusal to get pulled down into Tribal Wars. This morning RPJr., prompted by a Gregg Easterbrook NY Times op-ed, decided to publicly out those who aren't skeptical of climate science, but who are dissenters from the squishy mainstream on climate policy solutions. Roger calls these people "non-skeptic heretics" (NSH) and if he hadn't already put me on the in list, I'd be mailing in my check for admission. (The list is perhaps ironic though, isn't it? Grouping together people whose common cause is being non-tribal [and decidedly not amenable to grouping] on climate change and climate change policy....?)
Of course, in the comments Dave Roberts objects to the "absurd and transparently self-flattering" list and says, "Your eagerness to seen as a maverick completely distorts your perceptions." He could be right. But for myself I'd say I take pride in my intellectual honesty and ability to be self-aware and very self-critical. So I'm pretty sure I'm not eager to be a "maverick," couldn't care less if people see me as that or not anyway, and would hope my perceptions are usually honestly made. And my honest perception is that Roger and Easterbrook are right.
What I really think this is about, though, is this notion: Surprise, surprise kids!! While the vast majority of climate scientists think the globe is warming and humans are responsible, that DOES NOT mean that the same vast majority think it's an end-of-the-world problem or that pulling out of Kyoto was akin to dropping a nuke on Switzerland.
Comments
# 1 | Mark Hadfield | May 24, 2006 6:29 PM
But aren't you irritated that Roger has signed you up to the NSH tribe?
# 2 | Mark Paris | May 24, 2006 6:31 PM
There is a danger of polarization that is not mitigated by implying that only (self-characterized) "heretics" have the proper intellectual approach to global warming. I suspect that attributing exaggerated positions to the "opposite" side is at least as much of a problem as the positions that the opposite sides actually hold. Perhaps more.
For example: " While the vast majority of climate scientists think the globe is warming and humans are responsible, that DOES NOT mean that the same vast majority think it's an end-of-the-world problem or that pulling out of Kyoto was akin to dropping a nuke on Switzerland."
Who does this refer to? Nonscientist environmentalists? People who disagree with you?
# 3 | kevin vranes | May 24, 2006 6:39 PM
It's not a point lightly taken, Mark. My statement refers to my perception of the tone of conversation from most "global warming is happening" writing, both in the mainstream media and on blogs. There is obviously a lot of reasonable writing out there, but I sense a lot of "hysteria" as well that this (former?) climate scientist thinks is overblown.
I agree about the danger of polarization. I think the spirit of this is that this polarization must be avoided and these are people who try to avoid it or work around it, but you're right that there's a posible implication here of a mantle of authority. If that exists, at least I'd like to try to avoid it.
# 4 | Mark Paris | May 24, 2006 7:01 PM
Kevin, I agree that there appears to be a tendency for people on (for the sake of argument, let's call it) opposite sides of the issue to characterize those on the other side as not only mistaken, but also out to destroy civilization as we know it. (There, I did it, too.) Both sides demonize, and it tends to drown out anyone who tries to take a rational, considered approach. In my own work, I found that people do not want an answer anything like, "It depends." They want yes or no, not maybe. So we all take sides for "yes" or "no". I guess tribalism is as good a word as any for that.
I wish SB would fix the commenting problems.
# 5 | Benjamin Harrison | May 24, 2006 9:45 PM
but there are also many examples of free-thinking and the refusal to get pulled down into Tribal Wars.
Have to throw my hat in with the first comment... NSH as Pielke constructs it appears a rather specific indulgence in tribalism that accentuates the extremes of both pre-existing "sides" by continuing false dichotomy. The notion that any group is free thinking with respect to the majority in a given debate is distinctly self-aggrandizing.
Methinks a moratorium on labeling is called for, rather than externally or self-applying freedom of thought. Take an individual, ask: are his thoughts accurate/reasonable/practical on their own? Leave it at that.
# 6 | Brian S. | May 24, 2006 9:47 PM
I'd agree that Lovelock's "end of the world" position is an extreme outlier. I think there is a consensus though that it's a serious problem (just one uncontroversial example - it will make tropical storm damages at least 10% worse than they would otherwise be) and that there is a consensus that Bush's "do nothing" approach to AGW is a serious mistake.
# 7 | Kevin Vranes | May 24, 2006 10:35 PM
MH (and BH also) - in the spirit of "these are some people who aren't afraid to dissent from the conventional wisdom, even when dissenting gets them a lot of flak" then I have no problem being on the list. In the spirit of "here's a new club of people who all feel the same way" then I do have a problem being such described*. I'm pretty sure Roger meant it as the former, but I can see how some interpret it as the latter.
*I've never registered for a political party despite voting in every major election (and even after working for a member of one party), just to maintain my own sense of independence. I don't get to vote in primaries, but it's a price (quirk?) I'm willing to pay.
# 8 | Thomas Palm | May 25, 2006 12:08 AM
I see little new in this. It has been a long trend for contrarians to fall back to previously entrenched positions as the former get untenable. From "the world isn't warming" to "Well, it may be warming, but it's natural" to "well, it might not be natural but it's good for us" to "OK, it's not good for us but it's too expensive to do anything about it". Since the last point is their real goal, giving up the former aren't so bad.
# 9 | John Fleck | May 25, 2006 4:55 PM
Benjamin -
I don't think Kevin and Roger are improperly labeling. It's an empirical observation about how the players actually operate, with which I agree. The behavior is, indeed, "tribal", as disputants go about defining "self group" and others.
# 10 | kevin vranes | May 25, 2006 6:55 PM
TP - of course what you're describing isn't new. It's the same thing the anti-vaccination crowd does: mercury cannot be linked to autism? Well, something else bad in vaccines must be linked to some other problem in humans, thus proving that vaccines are evil. In both cases (vaccines and climate change) the speaker wants one thing (no climate change actions or no vaccines for reasons of their own), but battles from another position, usually wrapped in science.
But that's not what this is about. The people identified are specifically looking for climate change solutions, not trying to diminish the science or the need for action. The problem is that as described, these people point out uncomfortable facts of reality and are sometimes lambasted for it.
# 11 | Tom Dreves | May 25, 2006 9:58 PM
Kevin, as Roger has cross-referred to your blog I wonder if you'll be kind enough to post this, which he seems to have demurred on (my first attempt was anonymous):
"Roger, please allow me to note a few comments.
First, the simple reason why there is a growing number of people to add to your new NSH club (although the acronym seems more suited to those who might want to identify themselves as the "No Skeptics Here" club) is that the evidence for AGW - both the projections, sensitivity and present manifestations of AGW - has become so strong that only fools (or clear industry hacks) can deny it. Accordingly, is there anything particularly heroic or laudable per se in former skeptics joining your new club?
Second, as for adaptation, there's a no-brainer of a policy, which actually says very little - "we're changing the world, so we'd better get used to it". I'm not sure that anyone was advocating that mankind NOT adapt to the coming changes, but what are the useful policy prescriptions for adaptation, other than an implicit conclusion that we should throw in the towel on mitigation (which would be a huge concession to rent-seekers who have managed to forestall meaningful policy in the US so far)? Presumably we are looking at adaptation policy options either from the pure libertarian position of doing nothing (that is, leaving adaptation up to the market without governmental interference), to a wide range of governmental programs to accelerate or subsidize adaptation to anticipated changes.
Is it any surprise that either former skeptics or long-time members of your club would support adaptation, since it is self-evidently needed, and actually means very little, except that those who have been feeding at the public trough (by grazing free of charge on the global commons) can continue to do so, with the potential for government handouts for a new set of pigs? A public choice analysis would lead me to be very skeptical of a pro-adaptation, no-mitigation position, since we can see that this is simply more of the same - a gravy-train for favored interests. Naturally there will be a wide range of views over which pigs are most deserving. The only really serious question will be whether we will have the political will to divert valuable tax dollars from domestic uses and rent-seekers to help those lesser-developed and even more poorly-managed nations - that are expected to suffer the brunt of the severest climate changes - to make the institutional changes needed to grow economically and to adapt to the changes that are bring forced on them.
In other words, from the rent-seeker's point of view, there is nothing "heretical" about the NSH position, since it is really just business as usual.
Third, I find it very puzzling that you chose now to trumpet a new NSH club, just when (1) our economy has shown itself capable - by riding with nary a bump the doubling of oil prices and gas prices that the war in Iraq (which has already exceeded the global costs of implementing Kyoto) and Katrina/Wilma have produced - of smoothly handling the out-of-pocket economic costs that may be incurred in mandatory mitigation measures and (2) critics of mitigation measures are abandoning in droves their opposition to the AGW science.
We know that an ounce of prevention is worth far more than a pound of cure; even though we are already stuck with a potentially catastrophic warming based on emissions to date, there remains no economic or ecological justification for ignoring the existing market failure. Mitigation measures should minimally remove the nonsensical and counterproductive public subsidies now in place for GHG emissions by creating private markets for such emissions and for sequestration. A focus solely on adaptation is a continued sell-out to the vested interests that have blocked effective policy to date, and will compound both the ecological damage and the costs of adaptation.
Now that a consensus is finally developing that serious climate change is a real and not an imagined phenomenon, this is the time those with a policy bent should focus on breaking the mitigation log-jam. We are close to doing so already, as now both the full US Senate and the House Appropriations Committee have resolved that mandatory GHG measures are needed.
Since substantial costs can be avoided through mitigation and our markets are better equipped than government to handle domestic adaptation measures, a clarion call for adaptation seems to be a case of rallying the troops to head in the wrong direction. We need to continue to keep our principal focus on mitigation!"
Sincerely,
Tom
# 12 | Steve Bloom | May 26, 2006 2:40 PM
From Kevin's response to TP: "The people identified are specifically looking for climate change solutions, not trying to diminish the science or the need for action."
Kevin, I know you read the list Roger produced, so your statement above confuses me. There are people on it (Lomborg, e.g.) who are rather the opposite of your description. Probably half of the list can be fairly characterized as doing one or the other (diminishing the science or the need for action), if not both. As others have noted, the difficulty with lauding such people for finally coming around on the science (which as I noted not all of them have) is that it's an obvious credibility-enhancing transition to undertake for those whose bottom line is to avoid or minimize near-term mitigation. Is that a "tribal" view on my part? Maybe, but I think of it as just being realistic.
This Salon piece is interesting: http://www.climateark.org/articles/reader.asp?linkid=56789 . I hadn't previously seen the poll result showing the trend on people concerned about AGW to the point of being willing to act on it, but I'm not at all surprised by it. This is why Roger's stuff about "83% of Americans are convinced, so we can put that part behind us" is so utterly wrong. When I see someone with Roger's qualifications make that kind of trivial error, truly it makes me wonder where he's coming from. I seem to have a lot of company.
I have to run now, but I'll have some more nuanced things to say about this on the weekend.
# 13 | Dano | May 26, 2006 3:54 PM
Tom, outstanding comment.
Best,
D
# 14 | kevin vranes | May 26, 2006 4:53 PM
TD - I'll always indulge comments that are longer than most posts! 8-) I like long comments.... but it'll take me a while to respond. One thing I'd say straight off is this: what you're describing is somebody who says, mostly thoughtlessly, that adaptation is it, case closed, no reason to keep talking. I'd agree that those people are hacks and not worth engaging. I think Roger is trying to highlight people who may talk adaptation along with other aspects, but in general are giving the subject sincere thought. Which leads to...
SB - admitedly I have not read thoroughly all the people Roger listed and was refering to those I know well (Sarewitz, Lahsen, Dessler, Nordhaus and others). I haven't even read Lomborg's book, just other stuff he has written, so I may be off base here, but my take on Lomborg's position is "there are other problems more worth worrying about, such as ___, ___ and ___." If Lomborg backs up that arguement with data, reason and intelletually-honest analysis rather than just boilerplate ostrichism, then even if I disagree with the analysis I am willing to engage. In other words, the content of the arguements is less important than how they are justified. Notice that somebody like M. Bahner is not on the list....8-)
# 15 | Tom Dreves | May 29, 2006 8:05 AM
Kevin, happy that the length of my post was not too irking for you. Roger would have none of it, even after I shed anonymity.
I certaintly don't know what's driving particular commentators, but it is clear to me that what underlies the whole policy blockage is driven by a marriage of convenience between politicians, who have found that selling the "fear of enviros" has allowed them to spin "uncertainty" about climate change, thus keeping a firmer grip on political power while selling of our common hreitage for chump change to favored interests.
What's happening now is that the evidence is becoming clear enough the climate change IS a problem that this greed coalition has realized it has to re-cast the discussion - to one where they cry, with crocodile tearrs, that mitigation is "too expensive" and "will hurt the poor", so we should simply focus on "adapatation", which conveniently will call for the government to take more money out of our pockets and hand it over to yes, more favored industries, all the while allowing the existing pigs to keep eating for cheap.
This needs to be exposed and denouced in no uncertain terms. It is more than ironic to hear "libertarians" calling for the government to be involved in adaptation - because theoretically the market will handle adaptation best, and the government merely skew the needed changes that will take place anyway through millions of private decisions.
As to Lomborg and others pointing out that there is a question of where limited dollars are best spent, there are two little points to be noted: first, who is really serious in suggesting that the trillions needed to help the third world is actually going to be spent there? Certainly not from the right. Second, the choice presented is false to begin with - in the case of mitigation, the money spent will be largely private money in adapting to the actual costs of emittng CO2, whereas in the case of assisting the third world, government funds will be required. Two different problems, two different budgets and loci of responsibility.
Regards,
Tom
# 16 | laurence jewett | May 29, 2006 4:18 PM
I agree with many of the staments by Tom Dreeves, who has posted above one of the more thoughtful comments that I have seen on this issue.
Among those of us who think something should be done to offset potential climate change, there are undoubtedly many who believe that the best avenue of approach is probably a combination of mitigation AND adaptation.
But unfortunately, I would have to agree with Tom that focusing on adapatation tends to divert attention (and resources) from mitigation efforts which MIGHT yield relatively large dividends. I suspect that the "ounce of prevention" saying has some applicability in this case -- as it has in so many others.
Furthermore, it is not unreasonable to suspect that there may be some Johnny-come-lately's to accpeting the science on global warming who are adopting a pro-adaptation stance emerely as a last ditch effort to foreclose action on the mitigation front.
With regard to "tribalism", I would simply comment that it's human nature for individuals to identify with a group. Some like to belong to big groups (ge, the majority of climate scientists), others like to identify with smaller groups -- of "Outsiders" (Heretics). But the latter is still a group, just the same. Lone individuals (eg, Ludwig Boltzmann) are an exceedingly rare breed.
Group membership need NOT necessarily be "mindless" (though it certainly can be). Some of the greatest humankind's greatest accomplishments have been made by the collective effort and thinking of individuals in groups.
# 17 | Tom Dreves | May 30, 2006 9:02 AM
laurence, thanks for your support. Let me just clarify that I am very sympathetic to a libertarian (Misean) position on regulation of envirnmental matters generally; I just think that this position has been hijacked by special interests in the case of climate change and that a purely libertaraian position won't work - there is a clear market failure that requires government action and international coordination to address.
I do share the libertarian view that, as to mitigation, the government should generally just try to stay out of the way, since if it plays arole greater than one of providing information or coordination services, it will simply tend to gum up the process or favor special interests. Those who have opposed mitigation measures from a libertarian viewpoint but are taking a pro-government position on adaptation are not being honest, and betray that they have been giving cover to special interests all along.
At the risk of being pedantic, libertarians prefer governments not to regulate economic/environmental matters, both because they find government action inherently wrong and because of the history of government regulation is rife with cases where the supposed "benefits" to be gained are lost as a result of bueaucratic/regulatory/legislative inefficiencies and through the predictible "rent-seeking" behavior of by which concerned parties manipulate the government for their own benefit at the costs of others. (Once the government gets involved in a problem, it frequently never lets go of "solving" it, despite the fact that much regulation is not as efficient as possible, may have many perverse effects, and gets in the way of private solutions that tend to move towards increasing efficiency.)
While there is much to respect in the libertarian criticism of government and of economic/environmental regulation, unfortunately in the case of climate change libertarians conveniently ignore that doing nothing is essentially a continuing subsidy to vested interests, and libertarians wrongly fail to criticize the rather blatant rent-seeking in which fossil fuel producers and manufacturing concerns have already successfully engaged.
In fact, it is this sell-out of our domestic and foreign policy on this matter that I find most outrageous, and it bothers me to no end that purported "libertarians" and other "skeptics" will rail about the "fear-peddling" "enviros", but ignore that they are doing exactly the same thing - peddling fear, but about enviros - either as deliberate or unwitting stooges for big corporate interests who prefer to push the costs of their free use of the atmospher off onto others generally and to future generations.
That a purely libertarian position simply won't work should be obvious, given that this is a global tragedy of the commons issue. Without government, it is impossible to create a private-property solution such as tradeable emissions permits, or to solve the free rider issues. Accordinglay any "reasonable" libertarian skeptics would recognize this and push for quasi-libertarian solutions that are least meddlesome, while not forgetting to rail at the influence-peddling and purchasing that has deadlocked us into a do-nothing mitigation policy.
Mitigation policies make eminent sense, provided we are willing to use some muscle and carrots to bring along China and India (to eliminate free riders) and to coordinate with other devloped nations (to ensure least-cost solutions).
# 18 | TTT | June 1, 2006 3:13 PM
With regard to Lomborg's zero-sum game:
Let's not kid ourselves. Lomborg is an unrepentant purveyor of two of the more gross slanders aimed against the climate science community.
1. "They all toe the party line so they'll get a huge payout in the form of grant money." A very common sentiment among non-scientists (like Lomborg) who don't comprehend the degree of scientific competitiveness or the rigor with which grants are audited.
2. "They all believed in global cooling 30 years ago." It's 2006, can we just call everybody who says this anymore a liar?
Through Lomborg's analysis--in which he lowballed the potential damage of AGW while selecting the highest costs of mitigation attempts--of course it doesn't make sense to pay money to solve the problem. But, honestly, who cares?
I'll never understand why, years after his rigorous scientific debunking, Lomborg's name even comes up anymore. For goodness' sake, the man argued that increased fish catches required that the oceans' productivity had risen, and that bird biodiversity was unaffected by the extinction of island taxa because they were simply replaced by introduced exotics.
Let's see a serious, trained, intellectually-honest scholar look at the likely range of damages of AGW and come back saying mitigation today is more expensive than recovery tomorrow.
As is, Lomborg was probably just trying to appeal to liberal guilt, hoping environmentalists would decide to agitate for, say, kids with cleft lips instead. And then he'd get to continue saying he out-argued them and mastered them in their own fields, which as a careerist academic and media-fed iconoclast would be great for him.
# 19 | kevin v | June 1, 2006 9:04 PM
TTT - like I said, I haven't read Lomborg closely. If the first two items you throw up there are accurate, then yea, he's way off base. But, I was at Columbia U when Stuart Pimm was in temporary residence, which was when Lomborg's book came out. Word was that Pimm was trying to blackball Lomborg from appearances and/or university job opportunities in the U.S. If true, that's a worse sin to my way of looking at the world.
# 20 | Tom Dreves | June 2, 2006 1:26 AM
Kevin, I'm still hoping for your longer response you indicated you might provide to my first post.
Meanwhile, you indicate your anger at possible attempts from academia to blackball Lomborg from appearances/positions in the US, and state to me that "Roger is trying to highlight people who may talk adaptation along with other aspects, but in general are giving the subject sincere thought." In response, let me note the following:
- I am puzzled at what you and Roger see yourselves at trying to achieve. If your goal is to make sure that the scientific debate is open and honest, I commend you. However, the discussion of climate policy in the US today is not even chiefly a scientific one, but rather one about how laws should be structured and what the consequences of those laws are likely to be (who will bear costs and who will benefit). The struggle over policy need not corrput the scientific debate, but it is inevitable that the various participants in the policy debate will try to affect or at least spin the science debate.
- If your goal (and Roger's) is to influence policy, for you to take any positions other than to say that climate change is a looming problem that must be addressed - to a large degree significant warming is unavoidable so we should get ready, but we may also mitigate future changes by slowing and reducing GHG emission - then let me say that both of you are fish out of water and are making yourselves available for manipulation.
It seems to me that many listed as NSHers by Roger are not climate scientists, or otherwise are clearly expressing a policy view. Why is Roger taking on this task of trying to structure the policy debate in a science blog? There are plenty of other fora where policy is being discussed.
- It is obvious that societies will have to adapt to unavoidable climate change; mitigation remains an option if we wish to avoid the damage to the environment and additional adaptation costs of further, uncommitted climate change, but the dividends will not be immediately felt and in any event mitigation actions are fraught with free rider issues. It is these issues that have hindered develoment of coordinated, effective action on mitigation until now, and it is clear that groups benefitting from inaction (fossil fuel producers and dependent industry, and politicians) have been working hard to spin the science and the policy debates. For the reasons noted above, I see no reason to pat on the back scientists or other participants in either sets of the debate for now recognizing, after meaningful mitigation action has been postponed for so long, that we will have to start getting ready to adapt to climate change. Also, as I noted, for those who have benefitted from delaying mitigation action, shifting the focus to adaptation is a personally costless way to continuing to avoid mitigation costs: the uncertainty of science can be spun to continue to deny the need to impose costs on particular industries, but these folks have no problems with the government handing out money to others. To the extent scientists start talking about adaptation, I think it is inevitable that you will end up being patsies for those who are trying to avoid paying for mitigation costs.
Can you clarify what it is that you and Roger are trying to achieve?
Rgeards,
Tom
# 21 | kevin v | June 6, 2006 12:59 PM
Tom - yea, it's in the queue. Unfortunately the queue is long.
I am puzzled at what you and Roger see yourselves at trying to achieve.
I can't speak for Roger. Honestly, I'm just trying to achieve open dialogue. Nobody is served by "mild McCarthyism" and I do think that it exists to a certain extent (much more latent and subtle than the eponymous methods).
Affect policy debate? Not really specifically right now. Just debate. In blogging I'm just being myself, which is a feather-ruffling devil's advocate who just likes to stir up shit. I do try to affect policy in my own more inside, down-low ways. And if I do come up with something I think solid enough to be policy-worthy it'll be published rather than blogged about.
I'm also a "question all assumptions" type of guy. An assumption you've put out there (in your last paragraph) is that those with incentives to do so (fossil fuel producers) have spun/used the science to delay policy actions by sowing doubt. I don't think so. I think the political climate and present make-up have delayed action, not interest groups. Interest groups have simply provided a small amount of cover for (in)action that would have happened anyway.
For the reasons noted above, I see no reason to pat on the back scientists or other participants in either sets of the debate for now recognizing, after meaningful mitigation action has been postponed for so long, that we will have to start getting ready to adapt to climate change.
I disagree. If you're talking about somebody who had sincerely-held and well-considered views and then later came around to change their minds, I think that's very admirable. And let's also admit that all along adaptation has been the most necessary step we're going to have to take. Even if we had started mitigation years ago we'd still be committed to a good deal of warming and consequent water resource shifting (the issue I focus on most in the climate change policy picture); we'd still be adapting right alongside our mitigating. Maybe some saw that in advance and said "we might as well just adapt and forget about mitigating since we'll need to adapt anyway." I'm not saying I agree with that POV, but I think it is a legit POV.
# 22 | Tom Dreves | June 12, 2006 12:28 AM
Kevin: Your system just rejected my last post, so here is an abbreviated version.
Are you serious??? Most dissenting pundits have been funded by interested parties - industry - and have enjoyed bashing what they see as the opposing tribe of muddled headed enviros who wish to destroy America and/or capitalism and to create a global government. This is clear from their own fevered, fear-mongering writings, and there is plenty of documented evidence of how much industry support has gone to these folks - money that was significant and not trifling, and spent to achieve exactly what was accomplished, namely, postponing regulatory action that would impose costs on those providing the funding. Just do a Google search on CEI and Exxon, read Chris Mooney's piece "Some Like It Hot" in Mother Jones last year, or read the crap that the National Association of Manufacturers posts at its blog: http://blog.nam.org/archives/global_warming/.
This is similar to the money that tobacco companies used to spend on denying the link between smoking and cancer, but worse because the costs have been pushed onto all of us and on future generations, and on our ecosystems (quite unlike individual smoking). Also, the free rider effects related to this global commons problem has meant that meaningful action worldwise has been held up, simply because no one wants to impose costs on their industry and fossil fuel users if the US has no intention of doing so.
There may be a few serious scientists who have been skeptics, but industry, media and political supporters of the Administration have turned them into tools, and given them voices far beyond their limited peer-reviewed work.
Yes, pundits have been sycophants of industry and the Bush Administration. But why has the Administration largely been a denier? Because it (1) felt it had more to gain politically by mocking and undermining the credibility of its opponents, and by selling the fear of enviros (as it has with the fear of terrorists, Islamofascists, liberals and gays), (2) felt it to be a tough sell to trade delayed future benefits for the costs of regulation now, (3) was essentially isolationistic to begin with, with no desire to cooperate with Europeans or to have tough negotiations with the Chinese and Indians to deal with free rider problems, and (4) as it has shown it other ways, the Administration and Republicans are financially close to energy interests and quite willing to provide benefits to such intersts from the national treasury that benefit them narrowly but at the cost of our collective longer-term interests.
Pushing for "adaptation", unless it is done in a way to point out how extensive and expensive the likely damages to climate change will be, is likely to be used for those who have benefitted most from delay to continue to shift costs to others - as well as to be used by the Administration to avoid the discussion of how costly delay and denial have been and the responsibility it bears for such delay and denial.
Regards,
Tom