Because anthropogenic global climate whatever is a non-falsifiable hypothesis, with no means of objective proof, it belongs squarely in the realm of faith-based conjecture, like religion and origin of species. Heretic really is the correct word for this, although a true scientist would prefer to be called a skeptic.  WE prefer heretic, because it tends to better cancel out the emotionally charged term, denier.  This political discussion exited the realm of pure science decades ago.

Folks should note that Professor Mass does (has always) subscribed to the belief that climate is changing (getting warmer) - but he does seem to recognize that there are legitimate questions about the many "whys" of it  - as a legitimate scientist should.
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Why One Should Never Use the Term "Climate Denier"
Professor Cliff Mass, UW Atmospheric Sciences
​May 28, 2018
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Some terms are simultaneously hurtful, destructive, counter-productive and misleading.  

Climate denier is a good example of such an inappropriate phrase, and one that is unfortunately in vogue among some climate activists and media outlets.

​There are so many reasons that the term climate denier should never be used, but let me provide a few:

(1)   It plays off the term "Holocaust denier".    For most of the second half of the 20th century, the term holocaust denier was given to those who denied the reality of the holocaust--- bottom feeders such as neo-Nazis and those with strong anti-Semitic tendencies.  The Holocaust is an historical fact in which 1/3 of the Jewish people were killed:  an obscenity and a crime against humanity.  It occurred.

But some "environmentalists" have decided to use adopt this term for folks that have a different view of climate change than they have, included those that agree that climate is changing and that mankind is making some contribution to it.    Furthermore, while the Holocaust is history and a known fact, climate change, and particularly anthropogenically forced climate change is another story:  there are still major uncertainties regarding climate change, including the magnitude of the human-forced warming and the local impacts.  Our models are very clear than increasing greenhouse gases will warm the planet, how much and spatially varying impacts have a lot of uncertainty.

In short, using the term "climate denier cheapens the term "denier" in a way that is painful to many in the Jewish community.

​(2)  The terms "climate denier" or "climate change denier" is usually used for anyone who does not "believe" that virtually all of the change in Earth's climate over the past half-century was caused by human emission of greenhouse gases.  

You are a climate change denier even if you accept that there has been climate change caused by natural processes, or if you believe that both natural variability and human forcing is behind the changes.    Seems strange to call someone a climate change denier if they accept that there is climate change and mankind is contributing.   

Many climate activists demand that folks agree with them that virtually all climate change is caused by humans--or they use the "D" word.  

This is really silly because climate scientists can not show that humans are entirely to blame for what has happened during the past fifty years.  We know that some modes of natural variability have had major impacts (like the Pacific Decadal Oscillation) and that the warming trend and sea level rise has been going on for over a hundred thirty years ago (since the Little Ice Age ended)--well before human emissions of greenhouse gases had a significant radiative effect (see sea level rise plot below)

From NASA Web Site

So many of my department, one of the leading research centers in atmospheric sciences of the country, should be considered climate change deniers.  Go figure.

(3)  Climate denier clearly is a pejorative, put-down term that does not win converts or friends.   Folks are irritated when they called a denier and a less likely to listen to the findings of climate science.   We need to build bridges to those who are doubtful about the impacts of increasing greenhouse gases, and calling them names can only push them away.  

A number of leading climate communicators understand the dangers of the "D" word.  Two weeks ago, Dr. Katherine Hayhoe of Texas Tech University, one of the current rock stars of the climate communication universe, spend a few days at my department.  She explained why the denier terminology is bad and says she doesn't use it.  Her favorite:  climate dismissal.

To secure real action on human-forced climate change one needs to build a consensus of folks with varied political backgrounds.  Calling names is not the way to do it.

​Some of the most active name callers (folks who love the "D" word) ironically are some of the least informed and the most dramatic stretchers of the truth.

Bill Nye, for example, loves to call folks deniers, while he makes exaggerated claims about the impacts of anthropogenic greenhouse gas forcing on extreme events (like major cold waves being caused by global warming).  He frequently makes serious technical errors (he is not a climate scientist by the way).  Why does such a poorly informed individual represent science?

​Al Gore also likes to sling around the "D" word and is constantly exaggerating the effects of greenhouse gases on extreme weather (yes, he also claims cold waves are caused by increasing CO2).    

Ironically, many of these name slingers don't seem concerned about their carbon intensive life styles, for example, jetting around the nation and the world, and owning big houses (or several houses in the case of Al Gore).  There is another letter for such behavior and is starts with "H" and it rhymes with "theocracy."

The ideas that the "deniers" are stopping progress on climate change is just nonsense.  Some of the most knowledgeable, progressive people I know have the worst carbon footprints.  Climate scientists are probably the worst of the bunch.  Left-leaning politicians who enjoy traveling to unnecessary meetings (like a certain governor) are another.   They know the truth, but they won't sacrifice in their own lives.  See all the big cars being driven around Seattle these days?....those folks are not deniers.  Most are good, card-carrying progressives.

In fact, I have found a strong correlation between heavy use of the phrase climate denier and NOT knowing much about climate.   There are a few exceptions to this (like Professor Michael Mann of Penn. State), but most folks fixated on going after climate denial have very weak backgrounds in climate and atmospheric sciences.

Instead of using fact-based arguments, such fervid "anti-denialists" often use a near-religious use of authority, pushing a baseless "97% agreement" among scientists about global warming.   John Cook of Skeptical Science and Naomi Oreskes of Harvard are the worst offenders.

The media has used the "climate denial" narrative as a crutch.  Instead of spending the time on learning about the highly technical details of climate science, it is far easier to cover (and participate in) the name calling.  In many ways, this reflects the hollowing out of science coverage in U.S. media and the reduction in science journalism.

The solutions to greenhouse gas emissions are not name calling or laying on  guilt trips.  The solutions will be technological, with new energy sources displacing fossil fuels.  And eventually we will learn how to pull CO2 from the atmosphere on an industrial scale..

Putting down other people and calling names, might make some folks feel better, and perhaps represents  "virtue signaling" in some quarters (such as with the staff at the Seattle Stranger tabloid), but it is counterproductive, without scientific basis, and hurtful.

Time to drop the "D" word.
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WE don't recall ever having quoted Barack Obama.  But if ever there were a good time to cite the man it would be now.  The Big O gave a speech in a reach-out to Vietnam about healing the wounds that remain after the Vietnam War.  And he said,  "...a new future is possible when we refuse to be prisoners of the past."

Much of the nation seems to have lost its mind in the last few years, virtue-signaling and engaging in race based guilt-shaming.  The shame is principally limited to the descendants of european migrants who made the mistake of stepping onto these shores. Whether those immigrants were aching for freedom and opportunity, or simply coming to join loved ones, in the 21st Century almost all of our young are taught daily that 'europeans' had no place here.  And no matter when a pale forefather arrived, collective guilt for slavery and indian wars is constantly laid at the feet of persons "not of color."  WE are often struck at the cruelty and stupidity of what's become so trendy, but even more we're struck by the extent of bitter "get-even" tactics and the return of religious concepts like original sin and sins of the father - brands of blame and bias that can never be cleansed from one's DNA.  Alas, much of this hatred is a cultivated strategy, a politic, and a pox.  This article about the bludgeons being used - "yesterday sticks" - is insightful.  Read on.
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Kneecapping America with ‘Yesterday Sticks’
By Elaine D. Willman, MPA
 
One of the most mean-spirited emotional weapons is what I call the Yesterday Stick. Here’s how it works: A long-time married couple has survived a long-ago spousal affair, but one spouse never forgets and  raises that Yesterday Stick as a power tool frequently in their marriage. Or a recovering alcoholic has successfully turned his/her life around with several years of sobriety, but relatives continually remember that “we knew you when!” Or a convicted felon who has paid the consequences and transformed his/her life is forever stained with the Yesterday Stick.
 
Yesterday facts are unfortunate events that cannot be changed. Slavery is one. Tribalism is another. Black Lives Matter radicals rely upon the Slavery Stick to continually demean all of America’s ancestors and founders. Our country stopped this madness over a century ago, but weaponizing yesterday’s flaws today works marvelously to spread false guilt and inferiority to our fellow Americans in this and future centuries. Until we stop it. Just stop it.

​INDIAN TREATIES: A YESTERDAY STICK
 
The same can be said for long-ago dead Indian treaties. The legal industry thrives on conflict, so asserting ancient Indian treaty rights in the present creates instant conflict in light of contemporary demographics, towns and counties on reservations today. The Washington State “Culvert” case in front of the U.S. Supreme Court today is a prime example. The case asserts that old treaty rights are superior to state sovereignty. Yet, life has dramatically changed with predominantly non-Indian populations on reservations that include state, county and municipal jurisdictional authorities within reservation boundaries. Tribal constitutions limit their governance to their enrolled members and their Indian lands, only. That’s likely why tribal governments and the legal industry are rapidly reclaiming old dead treaty rights for off-reservation and “aboriginal” rights.

RESERVATIONS' REALITY
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On most reservations it is the non-Indian economy that provides abundant resources and quality of life to tribal and non-tribal reservation residents. And yet, the growing trend of reasserting treaty rights sends a message that all Congressional statutes and judicial rulings from the 1850’s forward are irrelevant, and that only treaty rights are perpetual and cannot be supplanted. What a whopper of a lie is this Yesterday Stick.
 
Perhaps the remedy is to actually acknowledge these treaty rights and remove all other benefits that Congress and communities have provided to tribal governments for 200 years. Restore reservations to the 1850’s – no more annual funding to tribes, no electricity, no flat screen TV’s, no cell phones, no cars, no casinos, nothing that non-tribal Americans created for the benefit of all. Return reservations to their Old Life Ways under their old dead treaties. Yes, were we to succumb to the Treaty Yesterday Stick, the irony is that the resulting  lifestyle would be one Native Americans truly would not want today. Instead, we have heavily rewarded tribal government with ongoing largesse while getting sand kicked in our teeth.​
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​Justice Antonin Scalia in agreement with Justice Clarence Thomas, have clearly described America’s racial problem in a 1995 Indian law Supreme Court ruling as follows:

“More than good motives should be required when government seeks to allocate its resources by way of an explicit racial classification system…the basic principle of the Fifth and Fourteenth Amendments to the Constitution protects persons, not groups…distinctions between citizens solely because of their ancestry are by their very nature odious to a free people."  —Adarand v. Pena, USSC (1995) 

We are clearly not a free and equal people while racial classifications exist in any form in America. We will never be a free people while American taxpayers are indentured to annually subsidize all the basic needs of just one ethnicity— 567 Native American tribal governments.

FEDERAL AGENCIES:  YESTERDAY STICK IMPLEMENTERS

So how are these Yesterday Sticks implemented? Within Columbia Law Professor Philip Hamburger’s acclaimed body of expertise on Administrative Law in America, we learn that the Executive Branch has created a powerful workaround that transfers power from Congress and the Courts to federal “regulatory” agencies.
 
There is no better example than the enormous Bureau of Indian Affairs, staffed by thousands of predominantly tribal employees, funding all basic needs of 567 tribal governments composed of a mere 0.06%                          of our country’s population. Yet another example is the thuggery implemented upon landowners across the country by Environmental Protection Agency, the Bureau of Land Management, U.S. Fish and Wildlife, U.S. Department of Agriculture, et al.
 
Each of these federal agencies has their own Administrative Law Courts. They make the rules, set the fines and penalties, impose and enforce their regulations upon persons and private properties (bypassing state authority), then stand as judge and jury when a citizen objects. The Interior Board of Indian Appeals is a prime example of an agency Administrative Law Court. Imagine any objectivity in such a court. Federal agency autonomy, coupled with their administrative law courts, is a debilitating system that far exceeds the intent of the balance of power between the three branches of government succinctly defined in the U.S. Constitution.
 
In addition to Administrative Law, there is the onslaught of The Diversity Principle, fueled by 156 separate ethnicities identified by the U.S. Census Bureau, each category of which sets the stage for racially- based funded programs. Diversity propaganda over the past decade has turned “Equality” into an undesirable term…now politically incorrect. Americans are consistently categorized by skin tone in a racial hierarchy that trumps our Constitutional Amendments and puts equality six feet underground.
 
THE RIGHT REMEDY: AMERICANISM 
The entrenchment of these racial Yesterday Sticks is such that their removal from our American governance would be an earthquake shift among federal and state agencies, but it can and should be done. Just suppose that all federal funding were based solely upon one single and neutral requirement—annual household

income. Period. Annual household income would not involve race, religion, marital status, sexual lifestyle; nothing except household income. It would simply be a calculation of the number of persons within an American household, and an established poverty income threshold level. That simple. Such fairness would collapse race-based programs throughout the maze of federal and state agencies, including the Bureau of Indian Affairs. The simplicity of Annual Household Income would eliminate most, if not all, of the Yesterday Sticks, and restore the principle of equality to its rightful place in this country. No American household in poverty would be ineligible.
 
Remedy will not come easily, but could begin with an Executive Order that requires elimination of all race- based federally funded programs within a reasonable time; perhaps two to three years. Congress could then follow the lead of the Executive Branch and ensure that America ceases its racial preference funding.

Tribalism is communalism based upon race, and was never contemplated as a governing system in the U.S. Constitution. Communalism is socialism, antithetical to the government our Founders provided. The federal government should return back to the tribes all lands acquired by tribes and donated to the federal government to be held in “trust” title by the United States on behalf of Indian tribes. Tribally owned lands should be restored to the authority and jurisdiction of the state, like all other lands ceded to the states upon statehood.
 
The severity of tribalism and diversity Yesterday Sticks is truly kneecapping equality and individual civil rights in this country. It is not too late to end these debilitating forces, but if nothing is done, it soon will be too late.

___________ 
Elaine Willman, MPA, served from 2002 – 2007 as National Chair of Citizens Equal Rights Alliance (CERA), an organization of community education groups and citizens in 25 states who reside within or near federally recognized Indian reservations. She is a retired career municipal administrator, and author of Going to Pieces…the Dismantling of the United States of America (2005), and Slumbering Thunder…a primer for confronting the spread of federal Indian policy and tribalism overwhelming America (2016). Email her at: toppin@aol.com.