Minnesota Rep. Says Burning Coal Is Fine; Isn’t That Why God Gave Us Coal-Fired Power Plants?

Minnesota State Representative Mike Beard wants to end the moratorium on coal-fired power plants. He believes God would never let us run out of natural resources. Beard told Don Shelby of the Minnesota Post that the planet isn’t warming and we shouldn’t be afraid of coal. Beard, however, isn’t a scientist like Dr. John Abraham is.

Climate scientists say burning more coal could result in catastrophic harm to the planet and widespread human suffering. Most of them are convinced that there is a point at which we will never be able to put it all back together again.

Dr. John Abraham, a professor of thermal sciences at the University of St. Thomas and an expert on global warming science, read the transcript of Beard’s lecture on global warming. Abraham then wrote a letter to Beard and members of the committee pointing out where the published science disagrees with the representative’s claims.

But Beard says he gets his information from conservative blogs.

A lot of what Beard knows he learned in church. One Congressman, talking about global warming, recently said that God wouldn’t allow man to do anything to destroy the planet. Beard told me, “It is the height of hubris to think we could.” I asked him about nuclear war. He said: “How did Hiroshima and Nagasaki work out? We destroyed that, but here we are, 60 years later and they are tremendously effective and livable cities. Yes, it was pretty horrible,” he said, “But, can we recover? Of course we can.”…

Beard believes that “God is not capricious. He’s given us a creation that is dynamically stable. We are not going to run out of anything.”

Dr. Ben Santer, a climate researcher at Livermore National Laboratory, the lead author of Chapter 8 of the “IPCC Working Group Report,” says the troposphere above the tropics is warming. But he may not have the same view of God as does  Beard.

The research upon which [Beard] bases his public-policy decisions often comes from scientists working for fossil-fuel subsidized foundations and institutes. People seem to pick the science that fits their politics, whether the science is good or bad.

Santer recommended instead that Beard and everyone else on the planet read the 21 reports from the U.S. Climate Change Science Program that have been distributed to every member of Congress. The reports are written in plain English and require no advanced degrees, but they do require an open mind.

By: Alan

Alan Colmes is the publisher of Liberaland.