Before the storm hit, the Virginia GOP launched a web ad mocking “12 inches of global warming,” attacking Democrats who had voted in favor of climate and clean energy legislation. Now, after hundreds of thousands of people lost power, several people have been killed, and states of emergency declared in West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Virginia, Maryland, and Delaware, Sen. Jim Inhofe’s (R-OK) family has joined in the mockery, building an igloo on the National Mall and calling it “Al Gore’s New Home“:

The Oklahoma Republican’s daughter, Molly Rapert; her husband, Jimmy; and their four children built an igloo — roomy enough to fit several people inside — at Third Street and Independence Avenue Southeast. They officially dedicated the humble abode in honor of global-warming crusader Gore, even posting a cardboard sign on the igloo’s roof reading “AL GORE’S NEW HOME” on one side and “HONK IF YOU [HEART] GLOBAL WARMING” on the other. Inhofe, the ranking member of the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee, is famously one of Congress’ most vocal critics of global warming. And he told HOH that he found his family’s ironic tribute to Gore — which came during one of Washington’s snowiest winters on record — “really humorous.”

In reality, winter snows do not invalidate the reality that the planet just experienced the hottest decade on record. Scientists have been warning for decades that global warming would increase the severity of winter storms.

This past January was the warmest January on record for the planet. And as National Wildlife Federation climate scientist Amanda Staudt notes, winter storms are getting fiercer even as the season gets warmer. “The last few years have brought several unusually heavy snowstorms as warmer and moister air over southern states has penetrated further north, colliding with bitter cold air masses,” she explains.

For the past week, Fox News host Neil Cavuto has been giving a daily “Fox News global warming alert,” which consists of him telling viewers how cold it is. “It is still cold,” Cavuto said yesterday, adding that it’s “not your recent garden variety global warming.” “It’s freezing across the entire globe,” Cavuto shouted on Saturday. Former Nixon speechwriter and actor Ben Stein responded, “Maybe somebody in the government will wake up and say, ‘Hey, it’s colder. It’s not hotter.’ Maybe all this talk about global warming needs to be rethought.” Watch a compilation:

Of course, a short-term cold snap in a few isolated regions does not disprove global climate change. In fact, the cold snap appears unrelated to climate change. As the AP reported, “experts interviewed…did not connect the current frigid blast to climate change,” instead pointing to “arctic oscillation”:

In the atmosphere, large rivers of air travel roughly west to east around the globe between the Arctic and the tropics. This air flow acts like a fence to keep Arctic air confined. But recently, this air flow has become bent into a pronounced zigzag pattern, meandering north and south. If you live in a place where it brings air up from the south, you get warm weather. In fact, record highs were reported this week in Washington state and Alaska. But in the eastern United States, like some other unlucky parts of the globe, Arctic air is swooping down from the north.

Temperatures in “most places” are actually “above average for this time of year.” Record high and low temperatures are set every year, but there have been consistently more highs than lows in recent decades, as the National Center for Atmospheric Research demonstrates:

The last decade was the hottest decade on record by far, and 2009 was also one of the hottest years on record. Climate Progress’ Joe Romm notes that this decade will likely have even higher temperatures.

As a citizen of the United States, and no more, I will ask those among my fellow citizens who share my sense of urgency to join in asking President Obama and the leadership of the United States Senate to set a deadline of April 22, 2010.

Watch it:

This deadline would allow the world to reconvene in July in Mexico City to complete a binding international deal before the ugly politics of the midterm elections in November. Gore said the decisions made by the United Nations Climate Change Conference and the US Senate will answer a fundamental moral question — who we are as human beings. “Instead of forthrightly addressing a mortal threat to the future of civilization,” if we “allowed this process to fall into paralysis,” Gore argued, the next generation “would be justified in asking us: ‘Who are you?’”

The deniers are persisting in an era of unreality. The entire North Polar ice cap is disappearing before our eyes. What do they think is happening? [...] It’s a principle in physics. It’s like gravity, it exists.

In turn, Palin responded on her Facebook, writing incredulously:

However, he’s wrong in calling me a ‘denier.’ As I noted in my op-ed above and in my original Facebook post on Climategate, I have never denied the existence of climate change. I just don’t think we can primarily blame man’s activities for the earth’s cyclical weather changes.

Both claims — that she’s never denied climate change and that she’s always doubted anthropogenic causes — are untrue. As early as last month, she was indeed denying the existence of climate change. Unable to understand the science, she asked Rush Limbaugh: “Are we warming or are we cooling?” And merely 15 months ago, Palin told voters during the 2008 campaign that human activity is contributing to climate change:

PALIN: I belive that man’s activities can certainly be contributing to the issue of global warming and climate change.

Watch it:

While warming temperatures — caused by the burning of fossil fuels — are prompting the bark beetle to devour a chunk of forest the size of Connecticut in Alaska, Palin is more interested in throwing political bombs. Like her phony “death panels” designed to kill health reform, Palin is making a mockery of science in order to stop clean energy reform.

Palin responded to Gore yesterday afternoon on her Facebook page, saying that “he’s wrong in calling me a ‘denier.’” Palin added that she believed “Climategate” proved that the “findings” of “the leading experts” in climate science “are flawed, falsified, or inconclusive.” On Laura Ingraham’s radio show today, Palin continued her attack on Gore. But when Ingraham asked if she would be willing to debate Gore on the issue, Palin demurred, saying that if it was in the wrong “forum” she would “get clobbered”:

INGRAHAM: Would you agree to a debate with Al Gore on this issue?

PALIN: Oh my goodness. You know, it depends on what the venue would be, what the forum. Because Laura, as you know, if it would be some kind of conventional, traditional debate with his friends setting it up or being the commentators I’ll get clobbered because, you know, they don’t want to listen to the facts. They don’t want to listen to some reasonable voices in this. And that was proven with the publication of this op-ed, where they kind of got all we-weed up about it and wanted to call me and others deniers of changing weather patterns and climate conditions. Trying to make the issue into something that it is not.

INGRAHAM: But what if it’s an Oxford-style, proper debate format. I mean, he’s going to chicken out. I mean, if you challenge him to a debate, do you actually think he would accept it?

PALIN: I don’t know, I don’t know. Oh, he wouldn’t want to lower himself, I think, to, you know, my level to debate little old Sarah Palin from Wasilla.

Listen here:

While the hacked e-mails may reveal that scientists might not have nice things to say about climate change deniers at times, they do nothing to change the scientific consensus that carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel use are raising temperatures and making oceans more acidic. As the right attempts to use the Climategate story to derail the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference this week, arctic sea ice is still at historically low levels, Australia is still on fire, the northern United Kingdom is still underwater, the world’s glaciers are still disappearing and today NOAA confirmed that not only is it the hottest decade in history, but 2009 was one of the hottest years in history. But how did the right-wing noise machine hijack the debate?

The methods for the right-wing political hit machine were honed during the Clinton years. Columnist and language-guru William Safire, a former aide to actual Watergate crook President Nixon, attached “-gate” to any minor post-Nixon incident as a “rhetorical legerdemain” intended “to establish moral equivalence.” (See phony manufactured scandals “Travelgate,” “Whitewatergate,” etc.) A right-wing echo chamber — including the Rev. Moon-funded Washington Times, the Wall Street Journal editorial page, talk radio, and the constellation of various conservative front groups and think tanks — would then blare the scandal incessantly, regardless of the truth. But the more troubling aspect of this gimmick is the increasing willingness for traditional media outlets, from the Evening News to the Washington Post, to largely reprint unfounded right-wing smears without context or critical reporting.

One of the most successful coups for right-wing hit men was the “SwiftBoat” campaign, a well financed effort orchestrated by lobbyists and Bush allies to smear Sen. John Kerry’s (D-MA) war record. But “Climategate” is no different, with many of the same conservatives actors playing their respective roles:

(Cross-posted from the Wonk Room. Click MORE to read the Wonk Room’s timeline of Climategate)

Nov. 17:

– RealClimate blogger Gavin Schmidt realized that someone was hacking his computer and downloading 160MB of files from a Turkish IP address. About an hour after the intrusion, a mysterious commenter at the climate skeptic blog Climate Audit posted a link to the hacked files with a note reading: “A miracle just happened.” Schmidt noted that, “four downloads occurred from that link while the file was still there (it no longer is).”

Nov. 19:

– Hackers then used a computer in Saudi Arabia to post the stolen e-mails, stored on a Russian server, on the climate skeptic website Air Vent.

– Skeptic blog “Watts Up With That” curiously is among the first blogs to posts the hacked e-mails.

– Chris Horner, an operative of the Koch Industries/ExxonMobil-funded Competitive Enterprise Institute, blogged giddily at National Review that although he had not been “able to fully digest this at present,” “the blue dress moment may have arrived” on climate science.

– Sarah Palin appears on Fox News’ O’Reilly Factor to discuss her new book. Palin and O’Reilly compare a young man who briefly hacked into her e-mail account in 2008, calling the incident “extremely disconcerting and disruptive” and “Watergate-lite.” O’Reilly and Plain do not discussed the hacked climate e-mails.

Nov. 20:

– In a front page article, the New York Times’ Andy Revkin reports that the e-mails “might lend themselves to being interpreted as sinister.”

– Myron Ebell, of the Koch Industries/ExxonMobil-funded Competitive Enterprise Institute, releases a statement pointing to the stolen e-mails to conclude that global warming science is “phony.”

– Reading reports on right-wing blogs on air, Rush Limbaugh dedicates a segment to the hacked e-mails, claiming they vindicate his belief that global warming does not exist.

– Conservative Ed Morrissey concluded the e-mails prove global warming is “not science; it’s religious belief.”

– Right-wing blogger Michelle Malkin cheers “the global warming scandal of the century,” adding: “The Chicago Way is the Global Warming Mob Way.”

– ExxonMobil-funded front group FreedomWorks blasts out an e-mail asking “Has the Global Warming Lie and Conspiracy Been Truly Exposed?”

– Marc Morano, a former Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) staffer who helps to distribute climate change denying propaganda to a network of news outlets and conservative organizations, broadcasts Climategate to talk radio.

— The Wall Street Journal’s environmental blog publicizes the conservative blogosphere’s furor: “this should get interesting … Maybe this will spice things up.”

Nov. 22:

– Sen. David Vitter’s (R-LA) staff distributes a letter claiming the stolen e-mails reveal what “could well be the greatest act of scientific fraud in history.”

Nov. 23:

– Heralding the stolen e-mails, infamous climate science skeptic Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) and Rep. Darrell Issa (R-CA) call for congressional investigations against climate scientists.

– Fox News’ Fox Nation headlines the e-mails: “Global Warming’s Waterloo”

– Glenn Beck devotes both his radio and Fox News program to covering Climategate, claims the e-mails show a “brand new reality” on climate science.

– Investors’ Business Daily editorializes that the e-mails show that global warming is “junk science.”

– The ExxonMobil-funded Heritage Foundation publicizes the stolen e-mails.

– Right-wing activist Viscount Monckton says climate scientists are “criminals.”

Nov. 24:

– Fox News’ Stu Varney begins his daily coverage of Climategate. He continues to attack global warming science, using the e-mails, on both the Fox News and Fox Business network.

– Washington Times editorial board, Drudge Report, both chime in to claim hacked e-mails show global warming is not real.

Nov. 29:

– Fox News regular Andrew Breitbart calls for climate scientists to be killed over Climategate.

Nov. 30:

– Rep. Candace Miller (R-MI) issues a statement to demand for an investigation of Climategate, and begins speaking about it on the floor of the House. In the following week, Reps Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI), Darrell Issa (R-CA), John Linder (R-GA), Bill Shuster (R-PA), Joe Barton (R-TX), Blaine Luetkemeyer (R-MO), Dana Rohrbacher (R-CA), Mike Rogers (R-MI), Dan Burton (R-IN), Steve Scalise (R-LA), Greg Walden (R-OR) and Charlie Dent (R-PA) begin blasting press releases on the subject.

Dec. 1:

– Newt Gingrich, who only 2 years ago said America must act “urgently” to address climate change, seizes on the stolen e-mails to spread skepticism of global warming science. Gingrich’s political attack group, ASWF, is heavily funded by coal interests.

Dec. 2:

– Right-wing billionaire David Koch, of the oil empire Koch Industries, sends his front group Americans for Prosperity to attend the Copenhagen conference to attempt to hijack the debate. AFP intends to “expose” the science using the stolen e-mails.

Dec. 3:

– Canada’s National Post reports that burglars and hackers have been attacking the Canadian Center for Climate Modeling and Analysis at the University of Victoria in British Columbia. In the lead up to the Copenhagen conference, Andrew Weaver — a University of Victoria scientist and key contributor to the Nobel prize-winning work of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change — noted that his campus office was broken into twice and that a dead computer was stolen and papers were rummaged through.

– Saudi Arabian climate negotiators for the Copenhagen summit endorse Climategate, charging that the e-mail show “there is no relationship whatsoever between human activities and climate change.”

– Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade says “damning” e-mails show scientists who “think … Antartica is becoming like the Bahamas.”

Dec. 4:

– NBC’s Nightly News with Brian Williams adopts right-wing Climategate smear: “Have the books been cooked on climate change?”

Dec. 7:

– ExxonMobil-funded think tanks the Heartland Institute and the National Center for Policy Analysis publicize the e-mails to “discredit” global warming science.

Dec. 8:

– The Wall Street Journal accuses climate scientists of being Stalinists.

– Fox News devotes a segment to a right-wing Rasmussen poll with a graphic that claims 120 percent of the public believes scientists falsified global warming data.

Dec. 9:

– Sarah Palin, who only weeks earlier decried the hacking of e-mails, writes in an op-ed that the Climategate e-mails are proof that anthropogenic global warming does not exist. The Washington Post publishes Palin’s op-ed, despite the fact it is riddled with errors and outright falsehoods.

This week, Stephen J. Dubner, co-author of SuperFreakonomics, embraced the fevered “Climategate” ravings of Rush Limbaugh, Glenn Beck, Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK), and other global warming deniers in an interview with Fox Business Network host David Asman. Dubner purports that the hacked University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit (CRU) emails reveal that the supposed consensus on global warming is because “everybody’s scared to be an outlier, everybody’s scared to be a skeptic.” After Asman compared climate scientists to Joseph Stalin and Adolph Hitler — Dubner did his own Glenn Beck impression, accusing “potent” scientists of “colluding” to “tell Al Gore what to say,” and “distorting evidence” to “make their findings be right for their position”:

You can’t read these e-mails and feel that the IPCC’s or the major climate scientists’ findings and predictions about global warming are kosher. You can’t. They may be, but if you read these you have to have a whole lot of skepticism about that. And of course, coming into Copenhagen these are going to have a big effect how the world looks at you. They’re going to say, “Wait a minute. You say these climate scientists have been telling us we have to stop burning fossil fuel tomorrow?”

Watch it:

The Wall Street Journal, New York Times, Washington Post, National Public Radio, Washington Times, and other news outlets are participating in this Swiftboat-style smear campaign, following the lead of actual Swiftboat smearer and former Limbaugh and Inhofe employee Marc Morano — instead of bothering to understand what the scientists were actually talking about in the hacked emails.

However, as climate scientist Richard Somerville explained yesterday, “The ice has no agenda.” Arctic sea ice is at historically low levels, Australia is on fire, the northern United Kingdom is underwater, the world’s glaciers are disappearing, and half of the United States has been declared an agricultural disaster area. And it’s the the hottest decade in recorded history.

By asking whether “we have to stop burning fossil fuel tomorrow,” Dubner — a top blogger for the New York Times — gets to the heart of why this bizarre theory of a cabal of all-powerful climatologists is getting support from conservative media and politicians. The incontrovertible science — based not on manipulated data but on decades of basic research — is that the burning of fossil fuels is drastically reshaping our planet’s climate and acidifying the oceans. And the only known way to restore conditions to those safe for human civilization is to dramatically reduce the use of fossil fuels. Doing so, however, would affect the incredible profits and power of the oil and coal industries, and of their ideological allies.

In fact, if we stop treating our atmosphere like a sewer, the climate system will heal itself over time, potentially more rapidly than we expect. That our past inaction will continue to bear consequences into the future is a reason to act with greater swiftness, not to dither further. The longer we delay, the more difficult and expensive the challenge to reduce pollution while adapting to a hostile world becomes.

Never mind the fact that there is no proof of man-made global warming.

Never mind the fact that Europe's "Cap and Tax" policies have failed to lower greenhouse gases.

Never mind the fact that the world has actually been cooling for the last ten years.

And never mind that there is no evidence that greenhouse gases have anything to do with global warming in the first place.

No sir! None of this matters to Barack Obama and the socialists in Congress.

Because what they really want is to control your life and mine . . .

. . . and we allow them to succeed at our nation's peril!

North goes on to attack windmill farms as “virtual bird eating machines.” The attached “petition to President Barack Obama” claims that the “dirty little secret” of global warming “is that it is a scam designed at increasing the wealth of frauds like Al Gore and nations like Red China at America’s expense.”

In reality, the “scientific evidence is clear,” as the American Association for the Advancement of Science said in 2006, that “global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now, and it is a growing threat to society.” In reality, the European Trading System has worked, and Europe is on track to easily beat its 2012 Kyoto Protocol commitments. In reality, the last ten years are the hottest decade in history. In reality, as Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) has said, climate legislation will allow us to “help this planet” that “is in peril, create millions of new jobs for Americans that need them, and to become energy independent to make us safer.”

But none of this matters to Ollie North and his conservative compatriots.

In the mailing, North notes that he “served in the United States Marine Corps for 22 years.” He does not, however, mention that he was convicted by a jury for illegally selling weapons to Iran during the Reagan administration.

Download the Freedom Alliance mailing and petition.

Source: Center for American Progress Action Fund, from Federal Election Commission data compiled by the LittleSis project of the Public Accountability Initiative.

The top beneficiary of this outpouring of conservative cash is the Republican National Committee, which has received over ten times as much money from the Chamber’s board as the Democratic National Committee — $1,257,201 versus $102,950. Contributions went 4.5 to 1 for John McCain ($373,150) versus Barack Obama ($82,150).

Source: Center for American Progress Action Fund, from Federal Election Commission data compiled by the LittleSis project of the Public Accountability Initiative.

Of the board’s 116 members, 96 have made major political contributions. Sixty-eight directly contributed to the campaigns of George W. Bush or John McCain. In contrast, only 27 gave to the campaigns of Al Gore, John Kerry, or Barack Obama. Forty-seven board members, including Chamber of Commerce president Tom Donohue, have contributed more than 90 percent to Republicans, averaging $74,634 in GOP contributions. Only seven members have contributed more than 90 percent to Democrats, averaging $3,529 to Democrats.

The political giving is dominated by leading Republican billionaire George Argyros, the Bush pioneer who served a disastrous term as the U.S. ambassador to Spain. Argyros is also one of the top backers of Newt Gingrich’s right-wing American Solutions for Winning the Future. The following visualization of Chamber of Commerce board member contributions is a sea of red surrounding a few small islands of blue. The size of each box is proportional to amount of total contributions per person, with the shading indicating percentage of Republican versus Democratic contributions:

The Chamber’s Board: A Right-Wing Money Machine

Source: Center for American Progress Action Fund, from Federal Election Commission data compiled by the LittleSis project of the Public Accountability Initiative.

Cross-posted at the Wonk Room.

BECK: I’m siding with PETA on this one. Once again asking Al Gore if you really want to save the planet, Al, why don’t you put down the cheeseburger and pick up the veggie burger? Time for, maybe, soy milk and tofurkey?

Watch it:

Sawyer somehow failed to note that Beck denies the science of climate change and has claimed efforts to build a green economy are “fascism.”

Of course, Our Choice addresses the question. Chapter Ten of Our Choice, “Soil,” discusses the complex range of challenges and opportunities related to food production and consumption, noting in particular the costs of industrial agriculture. The chapter concludes with a series of recommendations, including practical ones for American consumers, like supporting farmers’ markets and eating less meat. And Gore follows his own advice:

There is a serious issue about the connection between the growing meat intensity of diets around the world and damage to the environment. And like a lot of people, I eat less meat now than I used to. I’m not a vegetarian, don’t plan to become one, but it’s a healthy choice to eat more vegetables and fruits. So it’s not a laughable issue.

Sawyer laughably replied, “So, tofurkey for you.”

I’ve been somewhat surprised at how angry people are. The global warming chapter, you don’t deny global warming. You don’t say that CO2 isn’t a factor, but they feel you are betraying environmentalism or our world. Why are people so mad?

Watch it:

SuperFreakonomics mischaracterizes the field in order to argue that “moralism and angst” has blinded scientists and policymakers from pursuing the “cheap and simple solution” of geoengineering. Although the book condemns scientists for fearmongering and promotes a radical alternative to existing policy, Levitt tells Stewart, “I don’t try to pretend I know the science.”

In reality, the critics of Levitt’s treatment of climate science and policy are not “dogmatic” believers of a “secular religion” — they are highly respected climate scientists, energy experts, and economists, including climate scientist Ken Caldeira, who has said Levitt and Dubner misrepresented his views. The widespread criticism isn’t based on the book’s personal attacks on Al Gore or its mocking of global warming as a “religion,” but on the multitude of factual errors, misrepresentations, and false conclusions that the authors use to promote their mindless contrarianism. As science journalist Eric Pooley writes, “The book claims the opposite of what Caldeira believes.”

Levitt recommends untested, planetary scale geo-engineering to block the sun as a “band-aid” that “buys us time” if “we might need to do something,” because carbon dioxide stays in the atmosphere for a long time. However, scientists concerned that global warming needs to be reduced rapidly have already found a well-proven approach that’s cheaper and safer than pumping unlimited amounts of sulfur dioxide into the stratosphere: stopping black carbon emissions of soot from diesel and biomass burning.

Stewart rightly concluded, “I really don’t know what I’m talking about, do I?” However, he failed to understand his mistake when he added that he had “apparently frightened our audience by suggesting that conservation isn’t the only way out of any of our problems.”

Stewart has excoriated other media darlings for their laissez-faire approach to serious issues, from Tucker Carlson to Jim Cramer, and just last week skewered CNN for its failure to do even basic fact-checking of its guests. Unfortunately, in this instance, there was nothing funny about Stewart’s inaccuracy.

SuperFreakonomics, the forthcoming sequel to the pop-economics bestseller Freakonomics by economists Steven Levitt and Stephen J. Dubner, devotes 44 pages to a contrarian view of climate change, calling global warming a “religion.” Much of the chapter praises Microsoft billionaire and scientific dilettante, Nathan Myhrvold, whose solution to global warming is to pump acid rain pollution into the atmosphere. Levitt and Dubner also claim that prominent climate scientist Ken Caldeira does not think carbon dioxide is the “right villain”:

Caldeira is thoroughly convinced that human activity is responsible for some global warming and is more pessimistic than Myhrvold about how future climate will affect humankind. He believes “we are being incredibly foolish emitting carbon dioxide” as we currently do. Yet his research tells him that carbon dioxide is not the right villain in this fight.

Levitt and Dubner’s portrayal of Caldeira is false. As he told Climate Progress’s Joseph Romm in an e-mail interview, he believes carbon dioxide is the central villain:

Every carbon dioxide emission adds to climate damage and increasing risk of catastrophic consequences. There is no safe level of emission. I compare CO2 emissions to mugging little old ladies.

Levitt and Dubner spend much of their time channeling conservative columnist George Will, complaining about a “drumbeat of doom” growing louder from “doomsayers” even though the average global temperature, they say, “has in fact decreased.” The book also repeats Will’s obsession with a supposed consensus about “global cooling” in the 1970s.

U.S. journalists Laura Ling and Euna Lee, accompanied by President Clinton and CAP President and CEO John Podesta, arrived back home in California this morning after being held for five months in North Korea while reporting for Current TV. Current co-founder Al Gore released a statement, reading, “Our hearts go out to them – and to their families – for persevering through this horrible experience.”

Two former employees of Xe — the private military company formerly known as Blackwater Worldwide — have alleged that founder Erik Price is complicit in the murder of individuals who were working with federal authorities investigating the company.

MoveOn.org recently announced it would place ads to pressure centrist Democrats on health care reform but yesterday, President Obama told Senate Democrats that he wanted “left-wing groups” to back off. “In this context about the less productive tone of the debate in Washington, he said he didn’t like to see ‘left wing groups attack fellow Democrats,’” a While House official said.

Groups on all sides of the health care reform debate are “pouring tens of millions of dollars into advertising campaigns designed to push the cause of reform forward, slow it down or stop it in its tracks.” According to the Campaign Media Analysis Group, more than $52 million has been spent nationwide on health care related ads.

Democrats in Congress are worried that with the intense focus on health care reform, “a major climate change bill may be left on the cutting-room floor this year.” Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) has asked Senate committees to complete their work on cap and trade legislation by Sept. 28.

Prison employees and residents of Standish, MI want to keep the city’s maximum corrections facility “open at all costs, even if that means becoming the new home of Guantanamo Bay detainees.” While Gov. Jennifer Granholm (D) opposed moving the detainees to Michigan, local residents “are most concerned about keeping some of the 340 jobs and other economic sustenance the prison provides.”

The city of New York has accused Lehman Brothers of underpaying its taxes by $627 million since 1996. The city is working to persuade a federal bankruptcy court in Manhattan to move it up the list of Lehman’s creditors.

And finally: Washington, DC had fun yesterday celebrating President Obama’s 48th birthday. Z-Burger — where President Clinton recently stopped by and picked up a “double burger (hold the mayo), onion rings, french fries, apple pie milkshake” — gave out free burgers and cake during lunchtime. The 250-pound cake, which took three days to construct, had “images of Obama throughout his life.” Employees at Madame Tussauds also put together “a wax birthday party.”

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In a confused monologue, Shimkus attempts to follow new Republican talking points and portray himself as a defender of the little guy against corporate greed. But he can’t stop himself from also praising the corporations as his friends:

We’re fighting for the ratepayer. This debate is: “Who protects the ratepayer?” The corporate titans are my friends! I’m a Caterpillar supporter. I’m an Exelon supporter. I’m an Ameren supporter. A lot of these companies that have negotiated deals, they support me. But I know that they’re in the room to protect shareholder wealth, the wealth of the bond holders, the wealth of the stockholders. And that’s okay.

Watch it:

Caterpillar ($54,250), Exelon ($48,749), and Ameren ($39,500) are indeed some of Shimkus’s top contributors. But unlike Shimkus, an ideological global warming denier, these “corporate titans” recognize the reality of the threat of climate change and the need for a new clean energy economy. Caterpillar and Exelon are members of the U.S. Climate Action Partnership, a corporate-environmentalist coalition supporting Waxman-Markey, and even coal-powered Ameren supports global warming pollution mandates.

GINGRICH: I am an amateur paleontologist. I would be glad to take the Vice President to the Smithsonian or the American Museum of Natural History, where we can all look at all sorts of marine invertebrate life, which is collected as fossils because in fact, they use carbon quite effectively.

ThinkProgress assembled a compilation of Gingrich’s personal attacks on Gore. Watch it:

As ThinkProgress has noted, Gingrich appeared last year in ads for Gore’s “We” campaign, promoting the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions. Republican members present at the hearing appeared to mimic Gingrich’s strategy, spending their time hurling personal attacks at Gore and his credibility, rather than discussing the legislation or the science underpinning climate change.

The largest corporate carbon polluters in America, 14 years ago, asked their own people to conduct a review of all of this science. And their own people told them, “What the international scientific community is saying is correct, there is no legitimate basis for denying it.” Then, these large polluters committed a massive fraud far larger than Bernie Madoff’s fraud. They are the Bernie Madoffs of global warming. They ordered the censoring and removal of the scientific review that they themselves conducted, and like Bernie Madoff, they lied to the people who trusted them in order to make money.

Watch it:

Gore concluded, “These corporations ought to apologize to the American people for conducting a massive fraud for the last 14 years.”

Transcript:

BARTON: I was somewhat taken aback, Mr. Vice President, by the list of current environmental problems contributed to global warming. You did miss a few, though. the dallas cowboys have not won a playoff game in 10 years. You didn’t mention that. And you also, as Mr. Markey pointed out to me, the New England Patriots did not make the Super Bowl. I would add those to the list of problems you enumerated.

…

GORE: Congressman Barton, I want to address the point you made about the science. I do not question your sincerity for one moment.

BARTON: And I do not question yours, so we are equal on that.

GORE: Thank you. I believe it is important to look at the sources of the science that we rely on. With all due respect, I believe that you have relied on people you have trusted who have given you bad information. I do not blame the investors who trusted Bernie Madoff, but he gave them bad information.

BARTON: I have never talked to Bernie Madoff.

GORE: I’m not saying that you have, but he gave them that information and committed a massive fraud that ended up hurting most of all the people who trusted him. Senator Warner made reference in his opening statement to the story on the front page of the New York Times this morning, absolutely incredible. The largest corporate carbon polluters in America, 14 years ago, asked their own people to conduct a review of all of this science. And their own people told them, “What the international scientific community is saying is correct, there is no legitimate basis for denying it.” Then, these large polluters committed a massive fraud far larger than Bernie Madoff’s fraud. They are the Bernie Madoffs of global warming. They ordered the censoring and removal of the scientific review that they themselves conducted, and like Bernie Madoff, they lied to the people who trusted them in order to make money. And the CEO of the largest . . .

BARTON: I will stipulate that CO2 concentrations are going up. there is no debate about that. there — they are about 380 parts per million and they’re going to rise to about 500 parts per million in the next 50 to 100 years. I will stipulate that. Now, the consequences of that, and that is because of man-made CO2, I think are debatable. I do not know about the scientific peer review that you just talked about, but if somebody lied about something 14 years ago, I am sure Mr. Waxman and Mr. Markey will conduct am investigation oversight hearing into that. My question to you was about the cost of the allowance system. How are we gonna to pay for it? How many jobs are we going to lose? if you’ve got information about something that happened 14 years ago, I am sure, again, our chairman and subcommittee chairman — Mr. Stupak, who’s the oversight subcommittee chairman — will look at it. But answer the question about costs, please.

GORE: It is on the front page of the New York Times today, by Andrew Revkin. They themselves conducted review and found a science about it’s valid. And to the point you made a moment ago: they verified in their own studies that man-made global warming is raising temperatures and causing this crisis. Like Bernie Madoff, and they lied about it in order to make money. And they themselves profited. The ceo of the largest got a onetime payment of $400 million. Now, again, those who have trusted them and believed them are due an apology. These corporations ought to apologize to the American people for conducting a massive fraud for the last 14 years.

Today, Gore testified before Congress in favor of clean energy economy bill Waxman-Markey, calling it “one of the most important pieces of legislation ever introduced in the Congress.”

Gingrich is following Gore, appearing as the Republican witness to encourage the defeat of Waxman-Markey. Gingrich’s remarks reveal that he is taking a starkly different view than the proactive sentiment he displayed in the “We” ad:

GINGRICH: This bill is wrong for our national security. This bill is wrong for our economy. This bill is wrong for the government of, by and for the people. What this bill will do is continue to push us along that path of destruction.

Far from a “path of destruction,” Waxman-Markey will cap carbon dioxide emissions while investing in the creation of a green economy with millions of quality clean energy jobs. Rather than addressing the dangers of global climate change or pursuing solutions for developing a clean energy economy, Gingrich will use his hearing time to rehash his tired calls for more offshore drilling. While Gingrich has gone to great lengths to try to greenwash his image, he has always supported a pro-polluter agenda — from his Contract With America goals of slashing major environmental laws, to his successful work stopping the joint government-industry effort to develop a super-efficient car, to his mocking of simple steps to improve fuel efficiency.

Though Gingrich’s sheer hypocrisy is apparent, it should come as no surprise given he is well-funded by oil and coal interests.

Congress is launching the “mother of all climate weeks” today, where 54 witnesses will “testify on climate change legislation in three full days before the House Energy and Commerce Committee.” Among the witnesses set to testify are former Vice President Al Gore, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson, Energy Secretary Steven Chu and Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood.

The debate over health care reform is intensifying as liberals are warning their Democratic allies to resist caving. Recently, more than 70 House Democrats “warned party leaders that they will not support a broad health reform bill that does not offer consumers a government-sponsored policy, and two unions withdrew from a high-profile health coalition because it would not endorse a public plan.”

A new poll released yesterday found that 67 percent of Cuban-Americans “now support the removal of all restrictions for travel to Cuba, an 18-point increase from three years ago, when the same question was asked.” Despite the community’s “reputation for loyalty to Republicans, the poll found widespread approval for Mr. Obama,” with 67 percent having a favorable or somewhat favorable opinion.

“House leaders in both parties were publicly mum” in the wake of a CQ report yesterday alleging that Rep. Jane Harman (D-CA) “engaged in a quid pro quo with a suspected Israeli agent to advance her stature in Congress.” Further, “the Republican messaging machine, usually quick to churn out e-mails alerting reporters to every alleged ethical misstep by a Congressional Democrat, stayed silent on the news.”

Three Bush administration lawyers who signed the OLC torture memos — John Yoo, Jay Bybee, and Steven Bradbury — “are the subjects of a coming report by the Justice Department’s ethics office that officials say is sharply critical of their work.” The office has the “power to recommend disbarment or other professional penalties or, less likely, to refer cases for criminal prosecution.”

As of 8 am ET this morning, more than 3,000 of you have taken action to urge the House Judiciary Committee to begin impeachment hearings against Jay Bybee. Please join our campaign by clicking here.

CongressDaily reports that, “despite criticism of earmarks by House Republican leaders during completion of the FY09 appropriations process,” many are still requesting them. Reps. Jerry Lewis (R-CA) and Bill Young (R-FL) are among those in the Republican leadership still asking for and receiving millions in earmarks.

Yesterday, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton called for the “speedy release” of Iranian-American journalist Roxana Saberi, who has been convicted of spying by a court in Tehran. Iranian Nobel Peace Prize laureate Shirin Ebadi has agreed to take up Saberi’s defense, and the head of Iran’s judiciary, Ayatollah Mahmoud Hashemi Shahroudi, has spoken out calling for a fair trial.

On Thursday, President Obama will meet with credit card executives “to tell them to support strict measures that curb lending abuses or face the wrath of angry consumers and a determined Congress.” Lawmakers are launching efforts “to crack down on credit card companies for such practices as arbitrarily raising interest rates on existing balances…and charging interest on debt that was paid on time.”

A TARP watchdog report said “the Treasury should take steps to better manage its financial-rescue effort so that taxpayer dollars are safeguarded and programs are more fraud-resistant, accountable and transparent.” The report also said the total bailout price tag could reach $3 trillion “when Federal Reserve loans, Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. guarantees and private money are factored in.”

And finally: George W. Bush has “gone from commander-in-chief to chief pooper-scooper.” Speaking to an audience in China on Saturday, Bush recounted how he recently took his beloved Scottish terrier Barney on a walk — and brought along his own baggies to clean up the mess. “I was picking up what I had been dodging for eight years,” Bush said, “scoring laughs” from the crowd.

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An Inconvenient Truth reached millions of people with the message that the climate crisis is threatening the future of human civilization and that it must and can be solved. Now that the need for urgent action is even clearer with the alarming new findings of the last three years, it is time for a comprehensive global plan that actually solves the climate crisis. Our Choice will answer that call.

As with “An Inconvenient Truth,” Gore will donate 100 percent of the proceeds from his new book to the Alliance for Climate Protection.