In my latest DeSmogBlog piece, I weigh in on the climate science messaging discussion that has been restarted by Joe Romm and this Huffington Post piece. I don't think there are any easy answers here (and neither does Romm), but I tried to clarify the issue, and to end with a suggestion:
First, I think that the White House absolutely should have responded to “ClimateGate.” Romm suggests plans were ditched to do so. If so, that was a big mistake, because it allowed deniers to define the issue at a time when they had a far bigger media megaphone than they usually do. We’ve been living with the consequences ever since. Second, I think president Obama should have seized the initiative more during the first two years of his presidency with a major speech on climate change—science and all—to put far more weight behind the issue than he ultimately did. That was the time to hit the issue hard, and to make a convincing case to the public, at least in part a scientific case. And it wasn’t done. Third, I think that making people realize how climate change is going to affect them, wherever they live, is very important. States and localities should be hearing regularly about how their world is going to be changing, because it is doing so already. Communicating about local impacts of climate change is an ongoing process and, in fact, needs to be a constant and unending one. Fourth—if we want to talk about the science of climate in a more concerted way right now, I want to throw out there the suggestion that the message may actually be about the scandal of anti-science. It would be an expansion of the theme that Paul Krugman hits today—the complete outrage of ignoring science at our peril.
There's much more in the DeSmogBlog piece--you can read the full item here.
