Climate

On March 12, in Biloxi, Mississippi, Rick Santorum said: “The dangers of carbon dioxide? Tell that to a plant.”

On the day Santorum made what was possibly the most appallingly ignorant statement in a GOP primary season full of dangerous nonsense, record high temperatures were reported by 121 National Weather Service stations across the country, with another 17 stations tying existing records. (One record and two ties came from Santorum’s home state of Pennsylvania.)

The weird weather of March 12 was no anomaly. In March, 7,775 weather stations across the country broke high-temperature marks — the most record highs reported in a single month since the government began collecting data in 1895. And March fit into a larger pattern — capping the hottest year-long span on record.

The Republican primary process has served the purpose of winnowing out the Republican party's sideshow candidates. But not before they succeeded in inflicting real harm on the country — in small ways and in much larger ones, such as convincing a segment of the public that the scientific research on which the future of the planet depends is not valid.

God on Climate Change:

"'Never again will I destroy all living creatures as I have done.' I believe that's the infallible word of God and that's the way it's going to be for his creation...." —Rep. John Shimkus on climate legislation

As the climate legislation debate shifts from the House to the Senate, Kate Sheppard, the political reporter for the online environmental magazine Grist (www.grist.org), examines Republican arguments against the House bill. —L.D.

On May 13, 1999, George W. Bush, then governor of Texas, changed his position on global warming. "The last time, I wasn't certain of the science," Bush said. "I've had some briefings recently, and I'm becoming more convinced that the science proves there's global warming." Bush was the front-runner in the campaign for the Republican Party's presidential nomination—although he wouldn't officially declare his candidacy until the legislative session ended a month later. He was responding to a question I asked him at a press conference in Austin, where I was working on a book about his candidacy. Neither Bush nor his press secretary, Karen Hughes, explained when "the last time" was. Nor would either elaborate on what briefings about what science had led him to depart so radically from the position he'd held since he was elected governor five years earlier. Up to this point he'd said there was no proof that the earth was warming.