Ted Cruz to Koch Group: No, Global Warming Is Not Real By Eliana Johnson
http://www.nationalreview.com/node/421930/print
Dana Point, Calif. – Senator Ted Cruz on Sunday got perhaps the most enthusiastic applause of any Republican presidential candidate to appear before the 450 donors drawn to Southern California for the Koch brothers’ summer conference with a point-blank denial of global warming.
Politico’s Mike Allen moderated a question-and-answer session with the Texas senator, who said of global warming simply, “The data and facts don’t support it.”
The Texas senator, who dominated his time on stage, leaning into Allen and at one point waving off a question from the moderator, went on to deliver a full-throated denial of global warming and a scathing evisceration of its proponents. The riff showcased Cruz in all of his rhetorical glory – relentless, uncompromising, and witty, talking about an issue on which many Republicans have softened. Cruz at times grate on conservatives, but the off-the-cuff riff was something his supporters will surely point to as a high-point of the campaign season and a reason why this is their guy.
Allen asked Cruz if he is concerned by a Boston Globe story published on Saturday that suggests Republicans will pay a price in 2016 for their skepticism about climate change. Cruz’s response? “Not remotely.”
He went on to recall the 1970s panic over global cooling and a coming ice age. “The solution they proposed was massive government control of the economy, the energy sector, and our lives. Then the data disproved it,” he said. ”Then it became global warming. Interestingly enough, the solution was identical: massive government control over the economy, the energy sector, and our lives. Then the data didn’t support it, so they entered theory number three, climate change. Now, to any power-greedy politician, this is the perfect theory, it can never, ever, ever, be disproven, if it gets hotter, if it gets colder, if it gets wetter, if it gets drier.”
The climate issue is in the news once again with the administration set to unveil sweeping new regulations on carbon emissions from power plants. President Obama earlier in the day released a video that warns of “hotter summers, rising sea levels, and extreme weather events.”
Asked whether the president is exaggerating, Cruz said, ”You know, there’s a different word than exaggerating.”
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