The American Spectator

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Turning Up the Heat

12.12.06 @ 12:01AM

MITT CONSISTENCY
Re: W. James Antle III's Mitt Giving Fits:

Any one who knows Mormons well and has studied their doctrines, understands Gov. Romney has been consistent in his beliefs regarding gays and abortion. Due to their history, Mormons make a major theological point of separating individual freedoms from the rights of organizations. Because of their beliefs, their leaders were murdered, the believers discriminated against, and they were forcefully driven from Ohio, Missouri, and Illinois prior to settling in Utah -- only to have the federal government send an army to occupy the place. Hence, they take strong exception to any person, state, or organization engaging in discrimination or restricting individual freedoms coupled with a belief that the only power an organization should have over an individual is admittance or expulsion from its membership; it may speak for or against a belief or practice, but not force an idea or practice. The distinction often confuses outsiders. Mormons don't believe that gays should be discriminated against in employment, housing, or even politics while at the same time preaching against homosexuality and denying them membership in the church. The boy scouts have a right to deny membership to gays -- but not to harass them.

A similar misunderstanding of doctrine occurs regarding abortion. Mormons believe that abortion for the purpose to birth control is tantamount to murder and will result in the member's excommunication. The only exception is in the case of rape, incest, or when the life of the mother is in jeopardy -- and even then, only with prayerful consideration. The attitude is "legally you have the right to have an abortion for birth control -- and to send yourself to hell." This makes abortion in the faithful Mormon community so rare that most outsiders misunderstand its doctrine as "no abortion -- ever." I have a Mormon friend that became pregnant as the result of rape. After much prayer, she had the child and raised it with the same love she devoted to her other children. Governor Romney's statements have been consistent with those of his faith and consistent over the years. His religious beliefs regarding abortion should not be considered pandering to the left, especially when contrasted with those of Senators Kennedy and Kerry.
-- Larry Zacharias

Mitt Romney is no more a hypocrite than conservatism's icon -- Ronald Reagan. President Reagan cut income taxes then raised them twice, praised the self-sufficiency of the self-employed then doubled their payroll tax, condemned Iran's extremism and then armed the mad mullahs, promised to fight terrorism and then tucked tail and bolted from Lebanon. Conservative pundits have turned President Reagan into a caricature of himself to promote agendas he never would have endorsed (border control and bashing Hispanic illegals being the most obvious) and insured no conservative can live up to their "ideal." Thus, insuring moderates and liberals will win in 2008.

"Conservatives" in their haste to demean President Bush (who has more guts than all his detractors combined) have proven like liberals they prefer political posturing to straightforward leadership. As one who serves his nation in the GWOT I'm truly mystified by the destructive whining of my fellow conservatives. If we want to win in Iraq and 2008 we've got to end the melt down that gave the mid-term elections to the Democrats and promises to hand them the Presidency in under two years.
-- Michael Tomlinson
Jacksonville, North Carolina

Are conservatives that gullible? Romney's campaign is really a Bush directed anti-McCain campaign.

The Bush people are lined up, money is being raised for a one-term social liberal. Anyone who watched Mitt run the Salt Lake City Olympics knows this guy is about money -- big money, and he's a moderate.
-- Stan Froelich

TURNING UP THE HEAT
Re: Patrick J. Michaels' Losing It:

Thank you for a rational article.
-- Ed Greif

Lamenting proposals scientists use two by fours to settle the outcome of the Climate Wars. Pat Michaels protests "Most of the people being shouted down aren't even guilty as charged. Almost every scientist I know will tell you that the planet is warmer than it was, and that the burning of fossil fuel has certainly contributed to the warming of recent decades."

What a hoot ! Though a comparative stranger to the experimental atmospheric sciences, State Climatologist Pat has contributed long and voluminously to the warmth of the debate in the press. Now that even the insurance companies have read the handwriting on the wall when it comes to warming, he insists "The science is pretty simple... Hard to deny." Indeed -- but that being the case, what has deterred him from agreeing with his colleagues on so many elementary matters? On every level, from satellite radiometers in orbit to heat flows in the deep blue sea -- you name it, and at some time in the last decades he has denied that it signifies humanity is making the planet warm enough to engage the wheels of policy. It seems to be his job.

On August 19, 2004, Cato published Patrick's "Meltdown for Global Warming Science. With coauthors S. Fred Singer, and David H. Douglas, Michaels commences: "How many times have we heard from Al Gore and assorted European politicians that 'the science is settled' on global warming?"

They continue, "Well, the science may now be settled, but not in the way Mr. Gore and [UN official Hans] Blix would have us believe. Three bombshell papers have just hit the refereed literature that knock the stuffing of Mr. Blix's position and that of his company, the United Nations, and its Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). ...The surface temperature record shows a warming rate of about 0.17 degrees Celsius (0.31 degrees Fahrenheit) per decade since 1979. However, there are two other records -- one from satellites, the other from weather balloons -- that tell a different story....which record is right, the U.N. surface record showing the larger warming or the other two?... The odd-record-out turns out to be the U.N.'s hot-surface history."

So much for Michaels claims to have been swimming all along in the warm mainstream of the IPCC's much maligned consensus. One of the cardinal rules of science is that when you are wrong, you should publish a retraction, and none has been forthcoming in Michaels' case. Deplorable as Jim Hansen's call for 2x4's may be- physicists have a long tradition of not shooting other physicists, there is no scientific way of denying that Pat has invested so much heavy timber in the petard on which we see him hoist that you ought to engineer other arrangements for TAS anticlimactic retreat from the field of climate denial. At the rate Pat's rhetoric is skidding downhill, he may come to rest as South Park's official meteorologist before the ski season is out
-- Russell Seitz
Cambridge, Massachusetts

"Losing It" is a clear, rational and scientifically supportable thesis on global warming. These factors are exactly why it will be vilified and repudiated by the loony left. The purpose for the falderal about global warming is to raise money for those who make a living from "disasters'. We have the-death-of-all-American- seniors-if-the rest-of the-country-doesn't-pay-all-our-medical-bills- for-us crowd; we have the whales are all going to nuke us disaster pending; not to mention polar bears and let us not forget fur seals and buffalo. The most vocal of each of these groups are those whose table is set by the ill-gotten proceeds of their instilling panic.

Letter to the Editor

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