Bridenstine's Climate Record Is Different Than You Thought
House lawmakers back amendment requiring Pentagon climate change report, The Hill
“The House Armed Services Committee’s annual defense policy bill will include a provision requiring a Defense Department report on the effects of climate change on military installations. The amendment – brought up by Rep. Jim Langevin (D-R.I.) in the readiness portion of Wednesday’s markup – instructs each military service to come up with a list of the top 10 military installations likely to be affected by climate change over the next 20 years. The report would include a list of possible ways to combat such climate change threats as flooding, droughts and increased wildfires. … Rep. Jim Bridenstine (R-Okla.) backed up Bishop’s line of thinking. “It’s just a report and there are strategic implications that we need to be aware of,” he said.”
House Poised To Approve National Defense Authorization Bill, NPR
“MCEVERS: So the House armed services committee has already approved this bill. Does that mean that Republicans are going along with this amendment?
WELNA: Not only did they go along with it in a clear voice vote. They even talked it up. Here’s Jim Bridenstine, who’s a Navy veteran from Oklahoma.
JIM BRIDENSTINE: There are real changes in the Arctic that do affect the Navy. The Arctic ice is disappearing. There are strategic changes that are being implicated here. And it’s important for the Department of Defense to report to Congress on this. We’re talking about a report here.”
Keith’s note: Bridenstine’s support of this amendment – one that recognizes that climate change is something that needs to be paid attention to – was widely seen as being instrumental in its passage. So its probably not prudent to just dismissively categorize him as a climate denier. He may have said some things that certainly suggest this but he then went and voted in a way that clearly admits that there is something to climate change that warrants serious future study. I suspect we’ll hear more about this at his upcoming confirmation hearing.
The NAVY has been examining climate change for decades, and released one report in 2014 regarding the Artic. Reports in 2008 developed risk assessments on climate change, stating that implications on 100s of ports and air bases, where many become unusable.
Folks that lie to allow the carbon industry to deny liability for trillions in costs or sign no carbon tax pledges are not leaders, nor critical thinkers. No one should be rewarded for costing the world trillions.
All this data and evidence was present during his 12 year reign.
Q: Do you believe human activity causes climate change? (2012)
A: No. There is no credible scientific evidence that greenhouse gas concentrationsincluding carbon dioxide, affect global climate. I oppose regulating greenhouse gases. And folks want this ignorance to speak for scientists and engineers?!
“Global warming should not drive national energy policy without clearer evidence.” 2012
Bridenstine signed a letter to let the wind energy production tax credit to expire (renewables is about 5B /yr), even though the world spends 5 Trillion annually on fossil fuel subsidies, 0.1% of the world total, flowing disproportionately, guess what, to the wealthy.
Not qualified for an entry level position, but if he really did understand the implications and trillions of cost of climate change, the daily Oklahoma earthquakes, then his actions are ………
And what does this data dump have to do with this thread?
THAT: Bridenstine had access to the data (only summarized above) and science for a long time, THEN either incorrectly made ‘executive decisions’ – based on his own analysis, – selected the wrong folks do do the analysis for him, – or lied about the effects which would cost trillions to support his carbon donors.
IOW – not qualified for an entry level position–‘there is no credible evidence that greenhouse gas concentrations including carbon dioxide affect global climate” -2012. ‘Out of the mouth of babes’. QED.
And what is your evidence that he read the report? Or are you just guessing as usual?
Perhaps not qualified for an entry level position. However, historically, people in much more senior positions (e.g. congressmen) have said and done things that are inconsistent with either the facts or their own opinions.
So you have to lie or be inconsistent to become a Republican member of Congress? Let’s add some data to see if ‘everyone does it’.
PolitiFact, run by the Tampa Bay Times, sorts politicians’ claims into one of six categories: true, mostly true, half true, mostly false, false, and pants on fire.
Dems vs POR
True, Mostly True >> 55% vs 18%
Half True-Mostly False, 35% vs 50% <<
False, PonFire 13% vs 32%<<
Its not even close. 18% True or Mostly True!
The top 10 liars of the presidential candidates were all, you guessed it…from the same party. Few will forget HC: “No one will lose coverage. There will be insurance for everybody. Healthcare will be a “lot less expensive” for everyone.” “people will choose not to buy something they don’t like or want”
“everyone else does it” is not ‘leadership’ and as always, the statement is meant to deceive.
Those stories, if you read them, are about why the fact-checking statistics aren’t necessarily accurate. People who are in the news more often or are considered more “interesting” to readers are fact-checked more often than others. That biases the statistics.
When will many of these 100’s of ports and air bases become unusable?
This question is absolutely fantastic!: GW does not ‘magically’ stop– it takes decades to dissipate the effects–it may be too late to recover from past emissions.
The Infographic on the Global Carbon Budget should be periodically viewed by everyone on this planet.
Fortunately, even while Bridenstine was disputing the basic science of greenhouse gases in 2012, parts of Oklahoma in the same year began installing wind farms, and now produce 7,625 megawatts with 2,000 coming online, saving customers $1.2B annually each year-no emissions, clearly showing the parties lack of exec. leadership skills.
When politicians dispute science and one man can try to disrupt wind, or back out of IPCC, due to Citizen’s United and Gerrymandered Districts, the stalemate results in nothing being done, folks buying gas guzzlers which will be on the roads for 20 years, carbon subsidies, … the bridge to nowhere, destroying Mother Earth.
I’m asking a factual question. Is it 10 years or 100 years or 300 years? If it’s not known, that’s a sign that the problem is not well understood.
Technology will likely drastically improve in the next 10 to 50 years and costs decline making it better to use tomorrow’s technology for tomorrow’s problems.
Many or most buildings likely won’t last 50 years. About the only reasonable current planning for ports or bases would be to acquire higher elevation land or evaluate any new construction to verify it will be high enough for the next 50 years or so.
How much loss in capability or increase on operations cost of a navy base is required before either naval capability is sourced from different bases or the base is reconfigured?
The nature of climate change isn’t sudden in time or uniform geographically of course. That is the nature of weather, however, and there is a relation.
https://www.pri.org/stories…
You mentioned – “Many or most buildings likely won’t last 50 years.” That article says that pier was built in the 1940s so that’s a little more. Also, Naval Station Norfolk was first built in 1917 and of course it’s still in the same spot. “In the area around Norfolk, seas are projected to rise between 4.5 and 6.9 feet by the end of this century. Much of the station lies less than 10 feet above sea level.”
http://www.ucsusa.org/globa…
You have some good points including with the technology idea. Who knows, maybe we won’t have (many) navy ships in 100 years. They do seem like easy targets for rockets and such.
Though that is correct, if those 100 or 300 years pass by and you look back, I’d suspect that statement would just seem useless. People and the Navy would have acted and reacted as needed. And that would have happened whether or not the problem was much better understood or not.
If prevailing theory were correct, I imagine some port and base infrastructure will need to be adjusted, reconfigured, rebuilt. Yes, planning for new construction will help a lot. But I’m sure also some overall port and base infrastructure will need to be adjusted, rebuilt – much like the pier in the quote above.
Again looking back from 100 years in the future, I guess the question would be how did that occur? How costly was it?
I suspect for some things, it will be fine (and cheaper) to wait until really pressed up against new conditions force a change. Though again, that change wouldn’t be sudden (except in the case of storms or flooding events). So it will still take a decision at some point.
And I suspect for some other things, it would be better to plan ahead, spend a little more now planning or rebuilding so that it doesn’t cost much more money in the future rebuilding, money in the additional operational costs until that rebuilding, and in loss of capability during that time.
Don’t get your hopes up, it’s a pretty common Denier tactic to occasionally pretend to accept “climate change”, but actually claiming that the current warming is merely a natural “cycle”. It doesn’t mean they don’t still believe in a global leftist scientific conspiracy, nor that they aren’t trying to destroy climate research.
(And then, a little while later, to go back to regurgitate the “there’s no evidence of warming” line again. Consistency is not required.)
And this name calling is exactly why it’s impossible to have a rational discussion on how to address it. It’s either accept my views and solution 100% or you are the (insert current name you use to belittle your opponents here…).
Thanks Keith for pointing out its not black and white as many folks treat politics now.
The problem is that his comments about climate change show no nuance (no gray) and are full of scientific inaccuracies. They pretty much put him on the side of those that deny anthropogenic influences. As I posted, hopefully he was just throwing red meat at the core. But he’ll face tough questioning at his confirmation (as he should).
As are the statements of