All Aboard the Bandwagon

What does it say about the current leadership and the shifting political winds when even Newt Gingrich begins to sound reasonable? The former Speaker of the House, remembered for his "Contract with America," appears likely to join the 2008 presidential race and has written a new book called -- get this -- Contract With the Earth, in which he apparently changes his tune on global warming, now calling it an urgent issue requiring immediate action.

That's a big shift from Gingrich's last political treatise, in which the staunch Republican wrote that "the history and science of climate change is far more complex and uncertain than the politically driven mass hysteria of scientists who sign on to ads about a topic for which they have no scientific proof." In a debate with Senator John Kerry at New York University yesterday, Mr. Gingrich was asked what he would say to his brother-in-arms, Senator James Inhofe of Oklahoma, who persists in scoffing at the scientific consensus on global warming. The former speaker said, "My message is the evidence is sufficient that we should move toward the most efficient possible means to reduce carbon in the atmosphere."

Huh. The evidence is sufficient? Eighteen months ago it was politically driven hysteria from know-nothing scientists. What happened? Could it be that Gingrich has been watching the popularity ratings of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger as well as those of his nemesis Al Gore? Could embracing the challenge of global warming now be considered politically expedient? It would seem so. And that can only be considered a good thing. For his part, Senator Kerry also has a book coming out, written with his wife Theresa Heinz Kerry, called This Moment on Earth. Hopefully, Al 'Ozone Man' Gore makes it into the acknowledgements of these books for having led the way. After all, Gore published his Earth in the Balance fifteen years ago, when doing so involved considerable political risk and thus required something called courage.