Tuesday, March 22, 2016

Asked About Climate Risks, Trump is on to Cincinnati

Donald Trump sat down with the Washington Post editorial board and revealed in 2016's Republican Party, you can win the presidential nomination without knowing anything about anything.

Trump talked about how "double sanctions" work better than sanctions, that infrastructure is all about luxury airports, went on a 738-word rant about his hands, and rambled incoherently about Iraqi oil. The full transcript is worth reading to really soak in how much, in terms of chance of winning, it doesn't matter whether Democrats nominate Hillary Clinton or Bernie Sanders - either will mop the floor with Trump, who sounds way over his head the minute he can't shout his way out of a jam.

For climate activists, the section on global warming is the must-read. There are science deniers who know how to sound like they can talk smart, like Ted Cruz's made-up speech about satellite data. And then there are people like Trump who don't know anything at all about climate science (other than they're supposed to be against it) but can't help themselves from blabbling anyway:
HIATT: Last one: You think climate change is a real thing? Is there human-caused climate change?

TRUMP: I think there’s a change in weather. I am not a great believer in man-made climate change. I’m not a great believer. There is certainly a change in weather that goes – if you look, they had global cooling in the 1920s and now they have global warming, although now they don’t know if they have global warming. They call it all sorts of different things; now they’re using “extreme weather” I guess more than any other phrase. I am not – I know it hurts me with this room, and I know it’s probably a killer with this room – but I am not a believer. Perhaps there’s a minor effect, but I’m not a big believer in man-made climate change.

STROMBERG: Don’t good businessmen hedge against risks, not ignore them?

TRUMP: Well I just think we have much bigger risks. I mean I think we have militarily tremendous risks. I think we’re in tremendous peril. I think our biggest form of climate change we should worry about is nuclear weapons. The biggest risk to the world, to me – I know President Obama thought it was climate change – to me the biggest risk is nuclear weapons. That’s – that is climate change. That is a disaster, and we don’t even know where the nuclear weapons are right now. We don’t know who has them. We don’t know who’s trying to get them. The biggest risk for this world and this country is nuclear weapons, the power of nuclear weapons.

RYAN: Thank you for joining us.
In this answer, nuclear weapons seems to be Trump's version of we're on to Cincinnati. Don't like the question or any of the possible answers? Answer a different question!

Meanwhile, January and February shattered global heat records and climate scientists are now warning the climate crisis may be much worse and happening much faster than we thought. Thank you for joining us!

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