This is no surprise, given Palin's extremist views. While Palin's ascension may delight the fundamentalist right, Republican political operatives seeking to retain power fear the electorate will turn against Palin's sunny brand of extremism if the implications of her views become known. That would sink McCain's bid for the White House, since he selected her.
So the Republican ticket concentrates on myth-building regarding Palin's purported confrontation with the "old boys network" while she served first as a small-town mayor and, recently, as Alaska governor. They couple that effort with staccato distortions of Barack Obama's positions and statements. That "blizzard of lies," as New York Times columnist Paul Krugman recently noted, foretells the kind of administration McCain and Palin would form, one whose use of dishonesty as a tool to manipulate public opinion would rival that of the Bush White House.
But while the mendacious character of their campaign may be telling, McCain and Palin's extremism on matters of domestic and foreign policy are more important still. Indeed, by their enthusiastic embrace of increased fossil fuel exploitation in the face of disintegrating polar ice packs, the Republican ticket distinguishes itself for reckless disregard of science and disdain for our posterity.
Palin is either a climate change denier or dissembler. Last month, responding to a question about climate change impacts to Alaska, Palin said she did not "attribute it to being man-made." Consistent with that view, when she argued in 2006 against listing the Polar Bear as an endangered species due to Arctic warming, the governor stated that there are "no discrete human activities that can be regulated or modified to effect change."
Palin's unreasoned views conflict with those of climate scientists in the U.S. and around the world. They conflict, as well, with McCain's prior statements on climate change. Indeed, in recent days, McCain advisers made Palin aware of the scientific consensus - accepted in recent years even by the Bush administration - that human emissions are the principal cause of climate change.
But Palin is nothing if not a quick study. In her much-heralded Sept. 11 interview with ABC News, Palin boldly tried to turn the issue around, arguing: "Show me where I have ever said that there's absolute proof that nothing that man has ever conducted or engaged in has had any effect or no effect on climate change. I have not said that."
Continuing, Palin stated: "Regardless, though, of the reason for climate change, whether it's entirely, wholly caused by man's activities or is part of the cyclical nature of our planet - the warming and the cooling trends - regardless of that, John McCain and I agree that we gotta do something about it."
But what we "gotta do" depends on the cause. Changing "the cyclical nature of our planet" is a bit different from changing human activities that emit greenhouse gas pollution. Although Palin appears ignorant of their work, climatologists have analyzed the contribution of natural fluctuation in carbon dioxide concentrations and atmospheric temperature.
They conclude that the combined impact of solar changes and volcanic events would have produced global cooling during the present period, not warming, if not for human-generated emissions. In other words, the net effect of human activities has overwhelmed the relevant natural variation.
Obama's proposals on energy policy and climate change include heavy investment in renewables, increasing restriction on greenhouse gas emissions, initiatives to improve energy efficiency. In total, Obama's plan is the most far-reaching of the major candidates for president, according to many climate policy analysts.
McCain's record, on the other hand, is mixed at best. McCain did sponsor unsuccessful legislation to cap and reduce emissions across several industries. But he also has voted against measures to promote renewable energy generation, ridiculed efforts to increase efficiency, refused to end tax breaks for fossil fuel interests, and pocketed significant contributions from big oil.
Now McCain has fully aligned his campaign with the fossil fuel industry's short-term interests, and his selection of Palin signals even that the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is back on the table for drilling.
If McCain and Palin abandon the fight against global climate change by their opportunistic fealty to dirty, old-guard, big energy, our children would be forced to bear the burden of their misplaced allegiance.
---
Dan Galpern is an attorney with the Western Environmental Law Center and the author of "Climate Change 101: Urgency and Response," recently published by the Journal of Environmental Law and Litigation.
