The nation’s leading scientist has a new posting titled “Obstruction of Justice.” I have the greatest respect for Hansen as regular readers know (see links below).

Indeed, Hansen has been right on the climate threat longer than virtually anyone else (see “Right for 27 years: 1981 Hansen study finds warming trend that could raise sea levels“). But he misunderstands climate politics, or else he never would have written about the election and the “climate problem”:

There are differences between Presidential candidates, but neither appears to “get it.”

That puts him in the Ralph Nader crowd, which I just can’t stomach. If Hansen doesn’t understand the difference between the two presidential candidates on global warming, he should simply keep his views to himself.

In particular, McCain has a phony climate plan (see “McCain speech, Part 2: Relying on offsets = Rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic“), has walked back on his climate advocacy for a year now, and actually chose a global warming denier for his running mate (see “Turns out McCain doesn’t care about global warming, the greatest threat we face“).

Furthermore, McCain has a track record of opposition for clean energy that is indistinguishable from that of the Senate’s leading global warming denier (see “The greenwasher from Arizona has a record as dirty as the denier from Oklahoma“).

As for climate policy, Hansen writes of the two candidates:

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The NY Times Wheel blog interviewed a number of analysts, including me, about “The Candidates’ Clean Car Plans.” These plans include McCain’s $300 million challenge for a next-generation battery, and Obama’s “more detailed plan” whose cornerstone is “an ambitious goal to put a million plug-ins on the road by 2015.”

I have never had much love for McCain’s pointless prize (see “McCain proposes another energy gimmick. Is this $300M to ExxonMobil?“). Turns out not many other experts do either:

“The key technology is lithium-ion batteries,” said David Cole, chairman of the Center for Automotive Research in Michigan. “We know how to make them, but not inexpensively. So each generation is better than the last, and nobody is going to jump to fill orders for a million units and then find out their investment is wiped out because we’ve since developed something much better. A million plug-in hybrids by 2015 is probably a stretch. Is it impossible? No, but it’s very difficult.”

Mr. McCain’s $300 million “is small change in this business,” Mr. Cole added. “It’s not insignificant, but it’s the cost of a paint shop in an auto factory.”

Charles Territo, a spokesman for the Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, agrees. “Our industry in the U.S. spends more than $18 billion per year on research and development,” Mr. Territo said. “There are some manufacturers who have estimated they spend as much as $1 million an hour investing in new technologies. The McCain initiative is helpful, but these manufacturers are already spending billions of dollars bringing plug-in hybrids and other advanced technologies to the market.”

According to the NYT‘s Jim Motavalli, I am one of the “optimists out there” [and here you all thought I was one of the pessimists out there]:

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Our guest blogger is Daniel J. Weiss, a Senior Fellow and the Director of Climate Strategy at the Center for American Progress Action Fund.

Sen. John Sununu (R-NH) is a longstanding supporter of big oil companies, and they have been kind to him. During his career, he received $265,000 in campaign contributions from oil and gas interests. To obscure his support for ExxonMobil and friends, Sununu brags about his opposition to big oil subsidies. In a debate on October 21st with former governor Jeanne Shaheen, Sununu said, “We also repealed tax subsidies for oil companies, which I supported.”

But seconds later he was forced to admit he supported tax breaks for big oil before he opposed them. He gave a tortured explanation for filibustering a bill that would have closed oil tax loopholes last December:

I was the deciding vote . . . I voted to take a large tax package off a conservation bill because it would have killed the bill. You’re correct about that vote, but it was on the legislation to raise fuel efficiency standards for cars, something I supported and wanted to see signed into law. If that tax package had stayed on the bill, it would have been dead, killed, vetoed, no conservation measures, no improvement in fuel efficiency standards.

Watch it:

Sununu’s record on breaks for big oil is clear — it’s identical to Bush’s policy. Here are the facts. In 2007, Senators Max Baucus (D-MT) and Chuck Grassley (R-IA) made three attempts to eliminate billions of dollars of big oil tax breaks. And three times, Senator Sununu voted “Nay”: Read more

I have repeatedly recommended Nate Silver’s fivethirtyeight.com for hard-core political junkies who want the best analysis of the blizzard of state, national, and tracking polls (see here and here). Sadly, the site is a junkie itself for that sweet coal-industry-front-group money from the American Coalition for Dirty Clean Coal Electricity.

Nate, just say no!

The NYT‘s Andy Revkin has the sorry story here:

For a 13-month stretch starting in March 2005, three environmentalists working for the Chesapeake Climate Action Network [CCAN] were listed in a Maryland State Police data base as being “suspected of involvement in terrorism.” The description went on to note that the police had “no evidence whatsoever of any involvement in violent crime,” and the listing, and possible tracking, did not continue.

I’m good friends with the founder of CCAN, Mike Tidwell, and regularly appear on his radio show, Earthbeat, most recently on September 30 to talk about “The Candidates & a New Green Economy.” Mike is as much a terrorist as Barack Obama, notwithstanding certain equally absurd attacks on the Illinois Senator.

On his blog, Mike responds and urges everyone to email Maryland Gov. Martin O’Malley:

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Plus §a change…

I guess it’s the 50th anniversary of ignoring warnings. Perhaps the show should have been titled, “Its a wonderful life — not!”

So Dr. Frank Baxter beats Dr. James Hansen by 23 years (see “Right for 27 years: 1981 Hansen study finds warming trend that could raise sea levels“).

As for the myth that climate scientists used to believe in global cooling a couple of decades ago, it has been utterly debunked in the scientific literature (see “Another denier talking point — ‘global cooling’ — bites the dust and links therein).

Sir Nicholas Stern, author of the Stern Review on the Economics of Climate Change, has a good article in the UK’s Guardian, “Green routes to growth.” The former chief economist with the World Bank offers up “two crucial lessons we must learn from the financial turbulence the world has been facing”:

First, this crisis has been 20 years in the making and shows very clearly that the longer risk is ignored the bigger will be the consequences; second, we shall face an extended period of recession in the rich countries and low growth for the world as a whole. Let us learn the lessons and take the opportunity of the coincidence of the crisis and the deepening awareness of the great danger of unmanaged climate change: now is the time to lay the foundations for a world of low-carbon growth.

High-carbon growth – business as usual – will by mid-century have taken greenhouse gas concentrations to a point where a major climate disaster is very likely. We risk a transformation of the planet so radical that it would involve huge population movements and widespread conflict. Put simply, high-carbon growth will choke off growth. To manage the climate, we must cut world emissions by at least 50% by 2050, as recognised by the G8 earlier this year. Given that rich countries’ emissions are far above the world average, their cuts should be at least 80%, acknowledged in Europe and the UK, with the adoption of that target last week.

Stern notes that spending is needed to promote growth at this point, but equally important, “We must promote growth that can be sustained.” He argues it is time to accelerate the inevitable spending on energy infrastructure, but make sure it is low carbon:
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