[Global Warming]

Faith-Based Science

Former Republican Congressman and chair of the Science Committee Robert Walker had this to say on Fresh Air today:

I don't think personally that there is anything that is in conflict between evolutionary theory and the Christian belief that there was in fact a creator who was responsible for the beginning of the universe. I believe that much of what is in the Bible--all of what is in the Bible--can certainly be reconciled with evolutionary theory as I understand it. Insofar as intelligent design simply allows a better understanding of that relationship between religion and science, I don't see that there's a huge conflict there.

Shockingly, Walker was on the program to refute Chris Mooney's assertion that the GOP has let business and evangelical Christianity drive its science. Pretty much the entire 20-minute interview exactly confirms what Mooney claims. In addition to his position on ID, Walker is also a global-warming denier, and was Bush's science consultant in 2004. On global warming, he offered this blatant lie*:

WALKER: If you look at the broad base of climatologists who have spoken out on the issue, they have been very circumspect about what they've said. They do believe that there is a warming trend, but most of them are unwilling at the present time to say that that trend is as a result of some induced activity, that it may well be a part of larger trends, and that that's one of the things that needs to be investigated.... A large portion of the climatology community has not yet come to that conclusion.

GROSS: Do you think it's a large portion, or a minority.

WALKER: No, I think it's a large portion of climatologists who are not prepared to say that we have global warming and that it is absolutely a result of human activity.

Walker is now chairman of Wexler and Walker, a lobbyist in the employ of, among many Fortune 500 companies: British Petroleum, Alliance of Automobile Manufacturers, Nuclear Energy Institute, and General Motors.

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*In addition to numerous international studies, Bush's own commission in 2001 wrote: "Greenhouse gases are accumulating in Earth's atmosphere as a result of human activities, causing surface air temperatures and subsurface ocean temperatures to rise."