… this time on CO2 emissions. I have heard or read this particularly laughable GOP Talking Point on carbon dioxide scores of times from various points in the bubbling gutters of the right-wing Mediasphere, but to hear it from someone elected to public office, or a presidential candidate, demonstrates either just how far the Establishment Republicans have encamped in Clueless Crazytown, or that the GOP Elite are lying and actually know better but flacking for the oil and energy interests who want to finish depleting their profitable resources without encumbrance by annoying federal regulation or pesky public opprobrium. If I were betting $10K, I’d come down on the latter being true. Two things: 1.) This sounds like a Frank Luntz-inspired eye-roller, but I’m surprised it’s so lame. 2.) Last year I heard some enthusiastic GOP Teabagger Whizkid, somehow entrusted by the voters with a public office, riffing about how carbon dioxide emissions were safe — hey, CO2 comes from trees and plants and even what we expel when we breathe! Whenever I see these obvious baseball-bat-to-the-groin insults to centuries of human progress paraded openly on my TV box, I wait for the host or interviewer (this wasn’t Fox News, incidentally) to challenge the Republican knucklehead with some grade-school science. In this case, I think the host should have asked the grinning idiot to emit his carbon dioxide into a plastic bag tightly covering his head and then monitor the results of a few minutes of inhaling the ‘safe’ CO2 gas. Of course, this being the two-sides-to-the-Flat-Earth-theory and Preserve Access MSM, the irresponsible host let the moment pass untouched, no doubt convincing some of the more gullible it must be true, since it went undisputed. Here, Bob Cesca elucidates:
The Republican Lie About Carbon Dioxide, And The Idiots Who Believe It
by Bob Cesca
Bob Cesca.com
May 26, 2012[From my daily column at The Daily Banter.]
One of the memes I often have to repeat is, simply put, the Republican and conservative leadership routinely lies to its followers. I mean, outright lying on just about every issue.
They tell their people that President Obama has doubled the deficit (he’s reduced the deficit), raised taxes (he’s lowered taxes) and increased government spending (he’s lowered spending). They tell their people that tax cuts and deficit reduction boosts economic growth during a recession (not true). They tell their people that President Obama is undermining capitalism when, in fact, corporations are showing record profits and the Dow has doubled during the president’s first term. They tell their people there are death panels and forced euthanasia in the healthcare law. They tell their people an army of IRS soldiers will storm through neighborhoods enforcing the individual mandate. The list goes on and on.
One lie in particular is so utterly ridiculous and so outside the purview of reality that we can draw no other conclusion besides the obvious: conservative leaders think their followers are really, really stupid. And considering how many followers repeat this lie, the leaders might actually be right.
Here it is. Human breathing, they say, creates CO2 emissions and therefore liberals want to regulate human breathing in order to prevent the climate change “myth.”
An actual member of the U.S. Senate repeated this one Tuesday. I give you Senator Sensenbrenner (R-WI) [minor correction: he’s a Republican congressman]:
“CO2 is a natural gas. Does this mean that all of us need to put catalytic converters on all our noses? The fact that people think CO2 is a pollutant … basically goes into propaganda.”
We’ve heard this one before.
“Carbon dioxide is basically this. (Exhales.) Look at how much pollution I just put out.”
“We exhale CO2. If were a poison, it wouldn’t be part of the way we stay alive.”
“Carbon dioxide is a natural byproduct of nature.”
“Now I know there is also a movement to say that carbon dioxide should be guided or should be managed by the Environmental Protection Agency. I disagree with that. I exhale carbon dioxide. I don’t want those guys following me around with a meter to see if I’m breathing too hard.”
We know exactly what’s going on here. The right-wing leadership has decided to ignore the incontrovertible scientific consensus in lieu of appealing to the moronic reasoning of simpletons. On the surface, this breathing silliness sounds like it might be true — if you’re really into uneducated, simplistic explanations for very complex topics. Republican followers don’t want to accept that human consumption is hurting the environment because they’d prefer to be gluttons — proudly driving cars too large for their needs and destroying natural resources for the grand cause of human convenience. And so their leadership is feeding them this handy bumper-sticker level lie. Humans exhale carbon dioxide. Oh. Okay. So everything is going to be fine.
Wrong.
Read the rest and see the emissions chart here.