by E. Calvin Beisner
Founder and National Spokesman
Cornwall Alliance

Major revelations of scientific misconduct by key climate scientists in the global warming alarmist camp, embarrassing errors by the U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and multiple research findings showing the effect of added greenhouse gases on global temperature to be much less than previously theorized have undermined the case for catastrophic anthropogenic global warming (CAGW) considerably in the last several years.

Meanwhile, citizens and politicians have been waking up to the cost of alternative energy sources, which typically run twice to six times that of traditional and nuclear fuels.

Consequently, public belief in CAGW and willingness to fight it with drastic, costly changes in energy systems has dwindled, cap and trade is dead in the U.S. Congress, and efforts at U.N. climate summits in Copenhagen in 2009 and Cancun last month to negotiate a new greenhouse gas treaty to start when the Kyoto Protocol ends in 2012 have come up empty handed.

One might think the true-believer climate activists would be going “back to basics,” and so they are, as Darren Samuelson reports at Politico.com.

You might think “back to basics” would mean reassessing the science and economics. You would be wrong.

Instead, as Samuelson reports, “Environmentalists, scientists and lawmakers have renewed public relations efforts.”

Seems to me I remember an American administration that’s trying something similar, figuring it’s not its policies but its messaging that turned voters away.

Robert L. Bradley of the free-market energy blog MasterResource.com critiques the new thrust in “Hey America: ‘Wonky’ Climate Alarmism Coming at You (Big Science, Big Environment want to scare you into energy, economic retrogression).”

Bradley makes a bold proposal:

Let’s debate! That means having qualified persons on each side of the issue to debate the fundamental questions. How about this for a title: “The Human Influence on Climate: How Much (or Little), How Bad (or Good), and Politics.” Let’s educate the public on the physical science … [a]nd on the economics … [a]nd on the public policy/politics ….

Great idea. But will climate alarmists take him up on it? We shall see. Up to now they’ve preferred pontificating while avoiding level-field debate.