Why are some Republicans changing their mind on AGW?

Purely politics. John McCain is a great example. He's being challenged this year in a primary election by a very conservative Republican.

http://articles.latimes.com/2010/mar/26/nation/la-...

McCain feels that if he doesn't adopt some more conservative views, he'll lose his job. And unfortunately, global warming denial is seen as a conservative view, even though it shouldn't have anything to do with politics since it's a scientific issue.

Other Republicans are changing for the same reason. Tim Pawlenty was a major supporter of addressing global warming when he was governor of Minnesota, but now that he wants to run for president, he's started to deny that it's a problem because he feels that's the only way to win the Republican nomination.

http://climateprogress.org/2010/02/22/the-gold-med...

It's unfortunate the Republican Party is becoming so anti-science, but that's what happens when radicals start taking over the party (Tea Partiers).

I would gladly challenge anyone saying that the data is fake to cite what data they are talking about and show exactly how it is been faked. In politics you can get away with changing your mind while pretending nothing ever happened and make claims that people will believe without ever citing anything concrete. That doesn't work in science, and folks blowing hot air about data without actually citing it regardless of whether they support in AGW or not have no place in a scientific debate.

As for the actual question, it seems to be mostly political. Some of the things we need to do in the long term as far as energy use and production need to be done regardless of AGW or not. A few years ago it was alright for there to be some agreeance between Democrats and Republicans, but many congress folk often mention how "toxic" the stage is now in the newspapers. Republicans basically don't want anything to do with the Democrats in most cases, so issues like these tend to get covered up.

It's not so much the phrasing of the issue as it is the issue it's self. All tho' - Alarmists tendency to label anyone who does not fallow along in their dogmatic discussions, as "deniers", liars, stupid, lazy or dumb. All so has a tendency to shut down any chance of having a reasonable conversation, immediately. Any actual and meaningful thoughts would be ignored and the conversation is left dead. Hmm - my Original "edit", was edited - out, by "someone". Which, in itself, confirms some people react instantaneously, by their emotions - rather than fair logic.

YA in-depth before. I'll just take one example. The 1930's was not that worldwide warmest year on record. It was approximately tied with the warmest year on record for the US alone, less than 2% of the total planet surface area, due to what would later become known as the Dust Bowl. It was characterized by severe drought and put even more stress on the recession of the time. The Dust Bowl was caused by a changing jet stream that caused the moist winds coming from the Atlantic to completely surpass the interior of North America.

The Republicans are trying to differentiate themselves from the Democrats.

For instance the Democratic party commits financial and environmental fraud. The Republicans handle lying about non-existent threats from much smaller countries. It's kind of a division of labor sort of thing. Either way both of them are lying.

Because they're towing the party line. We don't get to know what they think, only what they're told to think.

Palin as VP candidate "it’s real; we need to do something about it"

Palin after losing "global warming is a bunch of snake oil science"

They are changing their minds for the same reasons many scientists are changing their minds...new data.

Five years ago, some folks still believed Dr Mann's now-infamous "Hockey Stick" graph was something more than academic fraud. Now we all know his methodology was deeply flawed, predetermining the "Hockey Stick" forecast no matter what random series of meaningless numbers were plugged in as historical data.

Three years ago, some folks still placed at least some credence on the historical temperature record of the past 200 years or so compiled by Dr Jones at East Anglia. Now we know that even Dr Jones is incapable of checking his own math (because he "lost" the source data for most of his work), or going back to the source data to allow other scientists to see which adjustments were applied where, why those adjustments were applied, and the affect of those adjustments on the overall reported record. We also did not know then that Dr Jones has what his colleagues call "poor organizational skills"; he admits as much himself. Seriously, can you think of a less-desirable trait for someone who is assigned the task of compiling, and adjusting as necessary, the global temperature record of the last 200 years - from literally thousands of different sources, using several different measurement techniques with widely varying levels of reliability, over a 20 year period. "Poor organizational skills" would seem to be an automatic dis-qualifier for such a task, while Excellent organizational skills would be an absolute must.

Five years ago, we did not know that NONE of the much-ballyhooed multi-century computer models of the AGW alarmists would prove accurate over even a 10 - 15 year time-frame. Additionally, the fact that all of the computer models were wrong not only in degree but also in the direction of change over the 12 year period strongly suggests a man-made bias in the man-made models. If even one of the models had proven even somewhat reliable over a 12-year span, folks might still place a little faith in such things, but the fact that they were all so uniformly wrong - in both degree and direction - strongly suggests that they were never more than fanciful rubbish.

Two years ago, the world was not aware that the temperature record had been "tricked" in several instances to adjust into nothingness the inconvenient results of the raw data. The folks involved in "Climategate" offered some lame explanations, but every statistician in the world knew exactly, and instantly, what they were talking about in those e-mails; obscuring the measureable facts with highly theoretical, undisclosed, biased, and unproven adjustments.

Three years ago, we weren't all aware of the critical flaws in so many of our ground-based data collection sites. Data collection sites surrounded by asphalt, next to AC units, on asphalt roofs, attached to wind-sheltering buildings, and myriad other artificial heat sources from encroaching urbanization cannot do anything but show a warming trend from when they stood in an open field surrounded by grass to their current highly-urbanized environments.

Three years ago, few people were aware of the fact that the warmest year of the last century was in the mid-'30s instead of the erroneously reported late-90s.

Three years ago, few people were aware that the current warming trend started in the mid-1800s, when anthropogenic Co2 emmissions were next to nothing - as our population at that time was roughly 1/7 the size of our modern population and roughly 90% of the populaiton was engaged in subsistence farming.

Three years ago, few people were aware that roughly 80% of the warming recorded over the past 160 years occurred before World War II - before the modern industrial age and its attendant increase in anthropogenic Co2 emmissions.

In science, new data often results in a modification of the previous theory. In religion, folks cling to the old theory, refusing to consider, let alone accept, new data which runs contrary to their faith. We see that in this age with The Church of Anthropogenic Global Warming persisting in their faith in the disproven models and deeply flawed data, while many, including many scientists and Republicans - among others, have given full consideration to the new data and, at least partially, discarded the theory which does not fit the known set of facts. One is faith, the other is religion.

The question is, will you choose to constantly consider new data as it becomes available and adjust your beliefs accordingly (i.e., science), or will you choose to discount all scientific discovery which post-dates that irredeemably idiotic movie starring The Goreacle of Doofi?

Because they will do what they can to get re-elected. If you want to look at wishy washy people look no further than politicians who change their opinions based, not on the science, but on the opinions of people that follow them.

Tiny280: Your response is ridden with mistake after mistake after mistake, many of which have been talked about and discussed on YA in-depth before. I'll just take one example. The 1930's was not that worldwide warmest year on record. It was approximately tied with the warmest year on record for the US alone, less than 2% of the total planet surface area, due to what would later become known as the Dust Bowl. It was characterized by severe drought and put even more stress on the recession of the time. The Dust Bowl was caused by a changing jet stream that caused the moist winds coming from the Atlantic to completely surpass the interior of North America.

I voted for AGW before I voted against it....uh....er....scratch that comment.

Essentially its because many citizens don't believe in AGW. Only 50% of Americans believe that AGW is happening. The politicians will do anything to gain support.

I really wonder why 50% of Americans don't believe in AGW. After all, most scientists do.