"The jury's still out on... science..."

Will Arnett playing an outlandish caricature or Rick Santorum

?

Not even a week after throwing his hat in the ring, Rick Santorum made it exceedingly clear where he stands on the climate issue, calling it "junk science...just an excuse for more government control of your life". In doing so, Santorum drew a clear comparison to one of my favorite TV characters, Gob, from Arrested Development, who, after being confronted by his brother with scientific evidence, responded with the gem, "The jury's still out on... science."

The best part of all of this was Santorum's rationale for being a climate change skeptic:

"I believe the earth gets warmer and I also believe the earth gets cooler," Santorum said. "And I think history points out that it does that and that the idea that man, through the production of CO2 — which is a trace gas in the atmosphere, and the man-made part of that trace gas is itself a trace gas — is somehow responsible for climate change is, I think, just patently absurd when you consider all the other factors, El Niño, La Niña, sunspots, moisture in the air. There's a variety of factors that contribute to the Earth warming and cooling."

Moisture in the air? The Niños, I get. But you are going to make the claim that billions and billions of tons of anthropogenic greenhouse gases aren't worthy of our attention and concern because of moisture in the air?

Will Arnett had the excuse that he was merely portraying a caricature of the rich, spoiled, and lazy group idiot. Santorum has the excuse that he's portraying a reasonable candidate for the Tea Party nomination. I don't know that there's much of a difference.

Image credit: http://sunskier.com/2009/03/11/do-you-believe-in-magic/