Twenty years ago, on this day, January 4th, 2005, Senator James Inhofe (Republican, Oklahoma) was at it again…
To cite one of innumerable examples – provided by realclimate.org – during a speech given at the opening senate session on January 4, 2005, Inhofe said: “we are (…) in the midst of a natural warming trend that began about 1850, as we emerged from a 400 year cold spell known as the Little Ice Age”, which was a reference to the novelist Michael Crichton and contradicts all published scientific papers, including the IPCC’s 2nd Assessment Report, which states that human activities are having a significant influence on our changing climate.
http://www.campaigncc.org/climate_change/sceptics/hall_of_shame
Senator Inhofe on Climate Change
The amount of carbon dioxide in the air was roughly 379ppm. As of 2025 it is 425ppm, but check here for daily measures.
The context was that, after a brief period of agreement, largely that the greenhouse effect was a serious issue, the Republican Party had by the early 90s fallen largely into step with the fossil fuel and industrial interests it used to fully represent, and said that this was another liberal hoax.
You can read about the ways that the culture war started in the late Ross Gelbspan’s two books, The Heat Is On: The High Stakes Battle over Earth’s Threatened Climate, and then later The Boiling Point: How Politicians, Big Oil and Coal, Journalists, and Activists Have Fueled a Climate Crisis–And What We Can Do to Avert Disaster
What I think we can learn from this is that old white men have a heft their words, no matter how demented are given far more credence because of their positions, often
What happened next
Inhofe kept being Inhofe, until he died in July 2024. The emissions kept climbing and in and our fate is sealed. To be honest, it was probably sealed already before 20 years ago,
What do you think? Does this pass the ‘so what?’ threshold? Have I got facts wrong? Interpretation wrong? Please do comment on this post, unless you are a denialist, obvs.
Also on this day:
January 4, 1977 – US politician introduces #climate research legislation