Robert Parry: Bush's Global Warming Foot-Dragging

[marmar]

via Truthout:


Bush's Global Warming Foot-Dragging
By Robert Parry
Consortium News

Friday 01 June 2007

George W. Bush snared front-page attention for his supposed shift on global warming, but the President's tepid "aspirational goals" - and comments from his NASA chief that a hotter planet might actually be beneficial - continue to reflect Bush's long-held doubts about the urgency of the problem.

Since running for the presidency in 2000, Bush has justified his foot-dragging on the issue, in part, through reliance on coal-industry-financed research embracing the same notion expressed by Bush's NASA administrator Michael Griffin, that global warming may turn out to be a good thing.

For instance, in a major energy policy address on September 29, 2000, candidate Bush turned to research from the Greening Earth Society, a think tank financed by the Western Fuels Association, a cooperative owned by seven coal-burning utilities.

In the speech, Bush offered the surprising assessment that technological breakthroughs, such as the Internet, were draining the nation's electrical grid and required construction of many new power plants, including coal-fired generators.

"Today, the equipment needed to power the Internet consumes 8 percent of all the electricity produced in the United States," Bush declared, an assertion that drew little press attention but astounded many energy experts who consider the Internet and similar advances, on balance, a way to improve productivity and reduce energy demands.

...(snip)...

Given the administration's mixed messages and the fuzziness of Bush's plan, many environmental groups reacted skeptically. Some critics suggested that Bush was doing little more than paying lip service to a grave problem.

Nevertheless, Bush's speech earned respectable coverage as the lead story of the Washington Post on June 1, with the headline "Bush Signals Shift on Warming" and with critical reactions confined to the jump on an inside page.

The New York Times also led its editions with Bush's speech, declaring "Bush Proposes Goal to Reduce Greenhouse Gases." The Times did include some environmentalist criticism of Bush's announcement on Page One, including concerns that Bush offered no clear indication of "what steps the United States would take to limit emissions over the next 10 to 20 years."

Perhaps more timely coverage of where Bush was getting his information - back during Campaign 2000 - would have alerted more voters to the global risk that Bush represented when the other leading candidate was Al Gore. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.truthout.org/docs_2006/060207E.shtml