WASHINGTON — Republicans are scrambling to save one of their platform’s most valuable assets: science denial.
According to a recent bipartisan report issued by senior officials from the Reagan, Clinton and Bush administrations, the dangers associated with climate change will cost the U.S. economy trillions of dollars.
For decades, the GOP has prided itself on completely disagreeing with the most basic scientific findings. Its steady contradiction of academic studies has helped the party win countless races from the local level on up to the United States Senate.
Now, the principle of science denial — which conservatives have relied on so successfully in the past — is in danger.
“We have several strategists on the case,” said RNC Chairman Reince Priebus. “One possibility, which we’re strongly considering, is to once again convince the public that the Earth is flat. After that, it should be pretty easy to paint liberals as ‘those hoity-toity round-earth elitists.’
“Painting half the country as your enemy is crucial to maintaining power,” he added, demonstrating his math-denying abilities.
Senate Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., who has a remarkably consistent track record of denying reality, did not mince words.
“Once the Miami area is underwater, I don’t know how I’m going to convince Kentuckians that it isn’t,” he said. “Especially when all their cousins from Florida have come to live with them.”
David Brat, the Tea Party challenger who recently unseated House Minority Leader Eric Cantor, R-Va., was particularly dismayed.
“Feigning ignorance of climate change was one of the cornerstones of my campaign,” Brat told Newslo. “If I can’t drum up the same kind of delusional fervor next time around, I’ll be a one-term congressman.”
Still, some well-established Republicans, such as Senator James Inhofe, R-Okla., are tightly holding onto their science-denial roots. Inhofe has repeatedly called global warming a hoax, often citing the Bible as his source.
“This gravy train hasn’t let me down yet,” said Inhofe. “Like my steadfast belief that only God can change the climate, I have complete faith in the illiteracy of the American people.”
