Only One in Five Americans Believe the Climate Change Debate is Settled

“The global warming climate change debate is settled!”  “There is widespread consensus in the scientific community!”

Apparently most Americans disagree.  According to a Rasmussen poll released today only 20% of Americans who are likely to vote in the general election believe that the climate change debate is over.  Compare that to 63% who disagree.  17% of Americans are not sure.  Only 27% of Democrats polled believe the debate is over.  Also 48% of voters think there is still significant disagreement within the scientific community over climate change, and they would be right.

Only 35% believe that scientists generally agree on the subject.

Al Gore is probably throwing a snit fit at the moment.

42% of Americans believe that the media hypes the problem, 20% believe they downplay it (I don’t know what network they are watching – probably Fox News), and only 22% believe the media is portraying it accurately.

Considering media outlets like BBC and the Los Angeles Times ban comments from those who deny climate change we can safely assume that the media is complicit.

49% of voters do not believe that climate change is a serious problem, with 14% who say it is not a problem at all.  Even among those who do believe it is a serious problem 57% believe the debate is not yet over, and by a 15 point margin disagree that media outlets should ban skeptics.

It’s good to know that they still believe in the First Amendment.

Only 30% of voters believe that President Obama should take executive action.  59% say that the Federal government should do only what is approved by Congress and the President agree on.  Only 41% are willing to pay more in taxes or utility costs to generate cleaner energy and fight climate change.

“Clearly the effort by climate alarmists to persuade the public that the debate is over has failed, despite the slavish complicity of the mainstream media. The public is showing itself more discerning and better informed than those media decision makers. This should be no surprise. Most members of the Society of Environmental Journalists long ago openly abandoned any commitment to objectivity and became advocates,” Calvin Biesner, founder of the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation, told Caffeinated Thoughts.  “As a former newspaper reporter, editor, and publisher myself, I find that a complete betrayal of the journalistic duty to ensure that the public has access to varied information and opinions so they can form well-informed and freely chosen opinions. Kudos, though, to courageous climate scientists like Roy Spencer, John Christy, Richard Lindzen, William Gray, David Legates, and literally hundred of others who are setting the record straight by showing the huge discrepancies between the alarmists’ climate models and real-world observations.”

The poll was taken on July 7-8, 2014 with 1,000 likely voters with a margin of error of +/- 3%.