Palin In Washington Post: Obama Should Boycott Copenhagen

Well, that's not going to happen but Palin's Op-ed is a good primer of the ClimateGate scandal. Most interesting to me is not her recap or call for Obama to stay home but a few paragraphs on her personal experience with the issue.

This scandal obviously calls into question the proposals being pushed in Copenhagen. I've always believed that policy should be based on sound science, not politics. As governor of Alaska, I took a stand against politicized science when I sued the federal government over its decision to list the polar bear as an endangered species despite the fact that the polar bear population had more than doubled. I got clobbered for my actions by radical environmentalists nationwide, but I stood by my view that adding a healthy species to the endangered list under the guise of "climate change impacts" was an abuse of the Endangered Species Act. This would have irreversibly hurt both Alaska's economy and the nation's, while also reducing opportunities for responsible development.

Our representatives in Copenhagen should remember that good environmental policymaking is about weighing real-world costs and benefits -- not pursuing a political agenda. That's not to say I deny the reality of some changes in climate -- far from it. I saw the impact of changing weather patterns firsthand while serving as governor of our only Arctic state. I was one of the first governors to create a subcabinet to deal specifically with the issue and to recommend common-sense policies to respond to the coastal erosion, thawing permafrost and retreating sea ice that affect Alaska's communities and infrastructure.

But while we recognize the occurrence of these natural, cyclical environmental trends, we can't say with assurance that man's activities cause weather changes. We can say, however, that any potential benefits of proposed emissions reduction policies are far outweighed by their economic costs...

If nothing else, this is a prime example of the power of ClimateGate. Palin never would have gotten a Climate Change op-ed piece published without the news hook of the scandal. Yes, the coverage has been less than stellar and honest at times but the embargo is broken and we have a breach in the narrative ("the science is settled") we can exploit.

Naturally the left is freaking out that the Post gave Palin this platform. Funny but they are never that upset when the Post or NY Times turns their Op-ed page over to terrorists.

All in all, a solid piece from Palin that annoys all the right people. What's not to love?

posted by DrewM. at 11:45 AM

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