Scoffers Can’t See Beyond Bottom Line Warning The World More Than 1,500 Scientists, Including 102 Nobel Laureates, Are On Board.

Let’s talk junk science, and let’s start with the tobacco industry.

For decades, this industry lied to its customers and to Congress. Cigarette smoking doesn’t cause cancer, tobacco industry officials testified, their faces as bland as their lies were bald. Why did they lie? For billions of reasons - each one a dollar of profit.

Today, the country’s major polluters - the oil, gas, utility and auto industries - adopt a similarly brainless stance and simply deny the work of respected scientists.

Of course global warming is a serious threat to the planet. More than 1,500 scientists, including 102 Nobel laureates, have joined together to warn the world of this impending danger. These experts have called for significant cuts in the emission of carbon dioxide. It’s the gas most responsible for unnaturally cranking up the heat in that enormous greenhouse we call the Earth’s atmosphere.

Why would this country’s major polluting industries lie about such a dangerous prediction? The Earth’s surface temperatures have been steadily increasing since 1860, when record-keeping began. Glaciers are melting. Sea levels are rising. The 10 warmest years on record have occurred since 1982 - an era marked by summer heat waves, devastating floods and hurricanes, and tropical diseases moving north.

Has anyone in the Inland Northwest forgotten last November’s ice storm? Certainly, local insurance companies haven’t. Nationally, insurance corporation execs are taking the threat of global warming very seriously, visions of millions of claims adjustment forms dancing in their heads.

President Clinton is right in pushing for new, worldwide restrictions in carbon dioxide emissions. These restrictions will help slow our use of the Earth’s limited supply of fossil fuels. They will also begin to safeguard the world of our children’s children.

Concerned about powerful interest groups living in Never-Never Land? Don’t worry about this nation’s senior scientists. It’s America’s top polluting corporations that are the real Peter Pans here.

So why would these corporations - and their paid scientists and conservative think tank pals - lie?

They have billions of reasons. , DataTimes MEMO: For opposing view, see “Chicken Littles running scared”

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