Climate science denial is in a sorry state when big name deniers screw up the simplest of right-wing talking points. Take Stephen Moore [please!] “” the Wall Street Journal editorial board member, Cato Institute senior fellow, National Review contributing editor, and regular CNBC and Fox News commentator.  He was on the Diane Rehm radio show Wednesday about climate change impacts in the United States, with Obama science advisor John Holdren, American Progress president John Podesta, and Bush environmental advisor James Connaughton.  As you’ll see in this post from Wonk Room, Moore has no clue that the “1930s was a warmer decade than the last decade” talking point ain’t about global temperatures (see “Must read from Hansen: Stop the madness about the tiny revision in NASA’s temperature data!“).

Moore argued that the White House’s new climate impacts report is “Stalinistic”:

What I object to about this report is some of the language in this is sort of almost Stalinistic, that there’s an unequivocal conclusion that it’s inarguable that this is happening, that there’s overwhelming agreement among the scientists. None of that is true.

Listen:

Moore also cited the repeatedly debunked Oregon Petition and Bjorn Lomborg’s Copenhagen Consensus, arguing it is “highly irresponsible” not to debate the science of man-made climate change. Even though Dianne Rehm admonished Moore for his anti-science outbursts, he continued to pollute the airwaves with Pollyannish complacency . . .

- We’ve talked about global warming as climate improvement.

- The good news is that the bad news is wrong.

. . . an endless stream of discredited lies about global warming and carbon pollution. . .

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When we last left the New York Times, they were burying the exclusive they got on climate science impacts report that NOAA Administrator Jane Lubchenco called a “game changer” (see Memo to White House: The NYT buried the “exclusive” you gave them on the landmark U.S. climate impacts report).

[It was, of course, purely a coincidence that, the very same day, they ran a deceptive front-page ad by the company most responsible for pushing disinformation on climate science (see The New York Times sells its integrity to ExxonMobil with front-page ad that falsely asserts "Today's car has 95% fewer emissions than a car from 1970"³).]

One of the ways that the NYT intellectualized burying this landmark report is that they found a serious scientist who appeared to downplay the report’s importance:

Michael C. MacCracken, a leader of the 2000 study and a principal outside reviewer of the current one, said in an e-mail message that the new report was a useful overview of the state of current climate science in the United States, but “there is not much that is new.”

I said I would email Mike, a friend, to explain this absurd quote.  I’ve certainly been misquoted by reporters and bloggers many times, so it’s only fair to allow Mike his full response.

Also, I think this episode provides a very good lesson to anyone who talks to the media on how NOT to get your message out. One of my readers, Anna Haynes, got an even more thorough reply than I did, which she posted here and I’m reprinting below:

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