CNN's Miles O'Brien: Global Warming Skeptics "Bought and Paid For" By Fuel Industry

Megan McCormack
February 9th, 2006 4:50 PM
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Viewers of today's American Morning on CNN were treated to co-host Miles O'Brien's view of scientists who dare question the validity of global warming. In a debate between Reverend Jim Ball, director of the Evangelical Environmental Network, and Reverend Richard Land, president of the Southern Baptist Convention's ethics commission, shortly after 8:15am, O'Brien revealed his beliefs.

Miles O'Brien: "You know, I know that science and religion are often at odds, but the scientific evidence is overwhelming at this point. Are you denying that?"

Reverend Richard Land: "There are scientists who deny it. There are scientists who've said -- "

O'Brien: "Scientists who are bought and paid for by the fossil fuel industry, usually."

Land: "Well, not, not necessarily. I'm not going-"

O'Brien: "Mostly, yeah."

Mr. O'Brien, in setting up a question to Reverend Ball regarding his organization's ad campaign to encourage evangelicals to take action against climate change, declared global warming to be a fact: "Reverend Ball, there, there really isn't a scientific debate anymore over global warming. This, this is about how to deal with it, isn't it?"

Regular viewers of American Morning should be familiar with Mr. O'Brien's vehement stance on this issue. As reported by Brent Baker in this CyberAlert, Mr. O'Brien declared back on August 24th, 2005, "Well, you know, let's face it, the scientific jury is in, folks. The planet is getting warmer, we're making it worse."

Mr. O'Brien has debated his American Morning colleague, meteorologist Chad Myers, about global warming several times. During one discussion on October 13th, 2005, co-host Soledad O'Brien set up the debate on a Washington Post report of the shrinking polar ice cap.

Soledad O'Brien: "Because-now, is this, all of this global warming then, that we hear about, or no? Or related to global warming?"

Miles O'Brien: "Yeah, I know you're a skeptic on this, Chad, but it's happening."

Chad Myers: "I'm a scientist on this thing. There could be a feedback mechanism on this, Miles. If you get more heat in the atmosphere, you therefore get more humidity. If you get more humidity, you get more cloud cover. More cloud cover bounces-"

M. O'Brien: "Right. No, no, you're right."

Myers: "-the sunshine back, and so you could be cooling the atmosphere at the same time. The only problem with that theory is that if you have thin clouds, the sun can get in and then the heat doesn't come back out. So we don't have all the answers to be-to say no-"

Mr. O'Brien was then forced to admit that Myers' argument was correct, before continuing on with his diatribe.

M. O'Brien: "...It is true that the models which predict climate change, and all those, do not really deal with clouds very well. That is true. But the fact is the greenhouse gases which we are injecting in the air-"

Myers: "Yes."

M. O'Brien: "-can do nothing but make matters worse."

Given Myers' reluctance to wholly endorse the theory of global warming, one wonders if Mr. O'Brien considers Myers to be a tool of the "fossil fuel industry."