In a slickly produced commercial with an outright bizarre message, Carly Fiorina, the Republican frontrunner vying for the US Senate, ripped her opponent, Democrat incumbent Barbara Boxer, for describing climate change as an issue of national security. The ad shows a 2007 clip of Boxer, in a tiny video frame (no doubt intentional), saying, “One of the very important national security issues we face, frankly, is climate change.” To which Fiorina, whose image now fills the frame, retorts, “Terrorism kills—and Barbara Boxer is worried about the weather.”
Really, Fiorina? This is demon sheep stuff here. No one doubts that terrorism, as Fiorina mentions, is a major national security issue. But, according to the Pentagon, climate change is, too. Indeed, the mighty Pentagon has been warning for years, even during the Bush administration when climate change wasn’t believed by the White House, that climate change be could a destabilizing force throughout the world, stoking ethnic, racial, and economic conflicts. In the Quadrennial Defense Review released earlier this year, the Pentagon said “While climate change alone does not cause conflict, it may act as an accelerant of instability or conflict, placing a burden on civilian institutions and militaries around the world.” And the CIA, an institution Fiorina name-drops in her Boxer-bashing ad touting her experience having worked on an external committee there, has opened a intelligence center on climate change to collect data on its effects around the world. The question is: With the US’s major defense and intelligence organizations saying climate change is a national security issue, how Fiorina say otherwise and retain any credibility?
And back to the “weather” rhetoric. The evidence supporting global climate change is so abundant, so voluminous, that to call it “weather” is appalling. Even Fiorina herself has previously said, “I think there is growing consensus that the issues of climate change and energy independence are inextricably linked,” and that climate change “matters to a lot of people.” Now: “weather.” Talk about a flip-flop.
Here’s the full ad for your viewing pleasure:
