Climate Denial Crock of the Week

President Obama’s aggressive stance on climate displayed in the State of the Union address is more evidence that Climate will no longer be a side issue in future Presidential campaigns.

Now, while sounding out the potential for a White House bid in 2016, Mitt Romney has signaled that he has (again) shifted course on climate – proving that, while the GOP does not like science, they can read polls. (above, see his snide and sarcastic mention of climate change at the 2012 GOP convention)
More evidence that Republicans are being forced, kicking and screaming, by reality to re-calibrate their climate stance.

Des Moines Register:

Romney, though, kept his focus on the issues. He said that while he hopes the skeptics about global climate change are right, he believes it’s real and a major problem.

He said it’s not enough for Americans to keep their own carbon emissions in check when much of the rise in greenhouse gases globally is coming from countries such as China and India.

Climate change drew little attention from either candidate in 2012, when Romney sought to deny President Barack Obama, a second term. At that time, Romney said he believed global warming was occurring but he was skeptical of its man-made origins and questioned spending to curb carbon emissions.

Mother Jones:

For Romney, this is his second about-face on climate change. In his 2010 book, No Apology, he called human activity a “contributing factor” to melting ice caps. And in the run-up to the 2012 Republican primaries, Romney backed a reduction in emissions to curb anthropogenic global warming. “I believe based on what I read that the world is getting warmer,” he told the Manchester Union-Leader in 2011. “And…I believe that humans contribute to that. I don’t know how much our contribution is to that, because I know there have been periods of greater heat and warmth in the past, but I believe that we contribute to that. So I think it’s important for us to reduce our emissions of pollutants and greenhouse gases that may well be significant contributors to the climate change and the global warming that you’re seeing.”

But as the 2012 campaign evolved, Romney reversed course. He said that he opposed curbing carbon dioxide emissions. He declared, “We don’t know what’s causing climate change on this planet.” Instead, he pledged to increase coal production and ramp up oil exploration. At the Republican convention in Tampa, he turned climate change into a punch line. “I’m not in this race to slow the rise of the oceans or to heal the planet,” he remarked during his nomination speech—a jab at President Obama’s 2008 campaign promise that his victory would mark “the moment when the rise of the oceans began to slow and our planet began to heal.”

A Romney spokesman says the former governor’s remarks on Monday are “consistent with what he said on the trail in 2012 about climate change.” Perhaps. It just depends which 2012 comments he’s referring to.

Here, an ad from Tom Steyer’s Next Gen climate political action group that ran in the DC area during Obama’s SOTU speech – compares climate deniers to flat earthers and tobacco shills.