Despite claims, climate ranks low on public priorities
Joe Romm, who runs the Climate Progress blog, has launched another set of hysterical attacks on the Breakthrough Institute, comparing Michael and Ted to Karl Rove for their latest LA Times op-ed.
Disregarding the histrionics, Romm revealed multiple absurd assumptions in this piece, but one stood out above all the rest. Despite all the empirical evidence, Joseph Romm believes global warming is a high public priority. Quoted from his post:
"Here they recycle the standard GOP talking points that nobody really cares about global warming. In fact, even though S&N are pollsters themselves, they seem completely unaware of the fact that the overall Gallup poll numbers mask a sharp break between the views of Democrats and the views of Republicans"
And in response to my question in the comments, "do you think the primary reason why global warming is a low public priority is because of right-wing disinformation?" he said:
"This is not an issue that can be answered so simplistically nor do I accept the claim that "global warming is a low public priority.""
And here:
Global warming is not a low public priority, especially for those who haven't been the target of a disinformation campaign...
But even more egregiously, he goes on to suggest in his Slate piece today, "A can't-lose debate strategy for Joe Biden," that climate is one of the greatest issue priorities for swing voters. His opening paragraph:
"Democratic vice president candidate Joe Biden has been given a gift that I don't think any politician of either party has ever received. He gets 45 minutes of free airtime in front of a huge national audience to debate his opponent with little fear of substantive rebuttal. Sarah Palin simply lacks the knowledge to rebut any detailed factual charges, especially on clean energy and climate, two issues of great concern to swing voters."Romm (and apparently others) think global warming is a high public priority -- so high that they would advise Biden to strongly emphasize it in his debate with Palin tonight. Unfortunately, this belief is false -- and here's the evidence to prove it.
