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Quote from: Minister Polarius on January 10, 2010, 11:12:45 AM

You do have to divine whether he was citing Beck or the scientist one of the two politicians who was on his show.

I fixed it for you, Pol. There wasn't a scientist on the show. There was Glenn Beck and two conservative politicians.

Scientists.  Politicians.

You say to-ma-to, I say to-mah-to.   

I think Glen Beck is a prime example of everything that is wrong with the right wing politicians in  America.

There probably were facts in his source material, and may have even supported his position, but he just doesn't understand what he is talking about.  (To be fair, though, that is common among TV personalities and those that write opinion pieces.)

Example: Apparently his first experience with the internet.  (Jump 30 seconds in.)

Glenn Beck: Cash For Clunkers is a government scam to gain access to your computer

(Warning, rude comments if you continue to Youtube.)

What does it matter whether his guest speaker was a scientist or politician?

It matters as Pol's entire response to Alex_Olijar was predicated on Monckton being a scientist. To respond to Alex_Olijar's claim that Beck was biased by pointing out that the two guests on his show were right-wing political figures would have made no sense whatsoever. So, it matters for the same reason Pol's initial claim matters.

It also matters because Pol claimed the man was a scientist. This claim is false. As there is no actual mention of Lord Monckton's background on the video, any person unfamiliar with the topic may have been misled by Pol's false claim. While the internet makes spreading falsehood easier than ever we should still hold truth in some regard.

He stated scientific facts. Whether he's a budhist, a Christian, a liberal, a conservative, he states FACTS.

Whether Lord Monckton states FACTS is open to considerable dispute. You can read Monckton's deliberate manipulation for an example in this arena where he has acted less than honestly. Given a track record of prevarication in the field, please provide evidence that what was said in the Glenn Beck snippet was both truthful and relevant.

Global warming is a cross between conspiracy and a scientific theory

There's nothing to deny. "Global warming" is (and has been since the 20's) the pet mantra of the left. The left is anti-Capitalist, and if they can get enough people to believe any sort of global climate change is caused by man (completely ridiculous to any student of history), they can hurt businesses and make themselves richer at the same time via bogus environmentalist taxes/fines.

It's the nature of Conservatism to deny everything unless proven. Global warming as a man-caused phenomenon has been nowhere near adequately proved even for normal common sense, let alone to overcome the conservative inertia. It is also part of the nature of Conservatism to be suspicious of the Government. So far, every practical measure that is proposed to "fight Global warming" has the net effect of making the Government bigger and more powerful. Therefore, we are naturally suspicious of the premise.

Pardon my ignorance, but is it a Christian thing or a Republican thing to deny global warming? There's enough overlap that I haven't figured it out yet, nor can I think of a simple reason why Christians/Republicans would deny it and not non-Christians/Democrats.

Unfortunately, something that should be decided by science has turned into something political.

To answer your question, though, it's not anyone's "thing" to deny something that science has shown to be false.  However, some top people have convinced people who don't do the research themselves that there is global warming and have said it so much that people believed them.  Same can be said with the separation of church and state.  It’s been said so many times that most people believe that it is law (and some believe it’s actually in the constitution).  Those of us who see the evidence contrary to popular believe are trying to let people know not to listen to the polar bear ads about how awful they are for killing them and to look at the facts.  The people who believe in global warming also believe that we need to stop our “contribution” to it (which, in all honesty, could you blame them (if you believe that disposable diapers were going to one day destroy the earth and harm future generations, wouldn’t you want to figure out how to stop the use of disposable diapers (somewhat ridicules example but for some reason, that’s what pop into my head ))).  Unfortunately, the side who believe in it and try their best to stop it are either ignoring or just ignorant of the facts to the contrary.

Hope that makes sense.

Unfortunately, something that should be decided by science has turned into something political.

I don't even think it should be decided by science.  It should just be recorded in Farmer's Almanac and then we all move on with our lives.