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Success is the important thing. Propaganda is not a matter for average minds, but rather a matter for practitioners. It is not supposed to be lovely or theoretically correct. I do not care if I give wonderful, aesthetically elegant speeches, or speak so that women cry. The point of a political speech is to persuade people of what we think right. … We do not want to be a movement of a few straw brains, but rather a movement that can conquer the broad masses. Propaganda should be popular, not intellectually pleasing. It is not the task of propaganda to discover intellectual truths.

Thus is a statement at the core of the now decades-long, deceitful truthiness-laden campaign to confuse and distort when it comes to issues of climate change and Global Warming.

Whether ghost-written shallow absurdities from the likes of Sarah Palin or densely footnoted, falsehood filled treatises from the likes of “Lord” Christopher Monckton, the dedicated energies (whether fossil-fuel funded or simply fossil foolish) to denigrate science, knowledge, and reality-based policy making focus on “success [as] the important thing,” with utter disdain for truthful discourse.

Considering this simple truth, it is amazing that serial climate denier Lord Monckton chose to attack 50 chanting youth, who were far from wearing ‘brown shirts’ or swinging clubs, as “Hitler Youth”.  Monckton did so ‘in the heat of the moment’ when 50 young climate activists took over the astroturf Americans for Prosperity press conference (which only had 3 non AFP members there other than the youth climate activists).

While some might wish to excuse this as “heat of the moment,” Monckton has decided to keep with this framing and attack.  Today Monckton stated to a Jewish climate activist, “I will not shake the hand of climate youth.”

Brian Angliss’ challenge to the climate skeptic community:

However, the more interesting point is that Monckton publicly cracked. It’s one thing to say intemperate things about your ideological opponents in private email correspondence that you never intend to make public, but it’s something else entirely to do the same in a public forum. Clearly, when being badgered, even a practiced speaker like Monckton can get frustrated and publicly say things that are intemperate at best.

The way I see it, climate disruption deniers have only two courses of action they can take. Either they can condemn Monckton’s intemperate public remarks just as they have condemned the private intemperate remarks of climate scientists in the illegally-obtained CRU email archives. Or they can forgive Monckton his public remarks and similarly forgive the climate scientists their private remarks as well.

Forgiving Monckton but condemning the CRU climatologists would be hypocritical.

Does Brian really think that the climate disruption deniers, such as Marc Morano, have any concerns about avoiding hypocrisy?

There is a different issue at play here, if one wishes to look toward hypocrisy.

Who is the pot to call the kettle black?

Considering the willingness of climate ‘doubters’ to distort and deceive when it comes to the science behind climate change and the reality of what is happening in the world, should we question whether Lord Monckton is closer to Joseph Goebbels than a youth climate activist (Jewish, by the way) chanting “Americans for Prosperity are Americans for Clean Energy” is to being a Hitler Youth?

Monckton, George Will, and other self-proclaimed climate ‘skeptics’ have shown themselves willing (enthusiastic) to repeat falsehoods, time and again, even after having been provided conclusive evidence of even basic factual errors in their statements.

With the “Hitler” (e.g., Nazi) word being thrown into the mix, the question becomes who the following quote more accurately reflects when it comes to the discussion of climate science?

“If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.” Joseph Goebbels

UPDATE: Monckton speaks to interviewer on this:

This is a man, who has in the past called for quarantining everyone who is diagnosed with AIDS but today argues against government interference, who the Republican Party holds up as someone to be listened to, having had him as a witness for two different Congressional hearings this year.

As John Aravosis discusses it:

“The number of people being killed by this misplaced belief in climate change is if anything greater than the number of people killed by Hitler.” – Lord Monckton, the chief architect of climate change denialism.

He also said that young people who are pro climate change are akin to the Hitler youth. “I don’t care whether the Hitler youth thought they were doing the right thing. I don’t care whether the Hitler youth of today think they’re doing the right thing. The consequences in both cases are deaths of people that we don’t care about as much as we should.”

This is who is leading the battle against climate change. We have a far larger problem than the fact that some people are denying climate change. Conservatives in this country have taken to a rather disturbing extremism that embraces McCarthyism (labeling everyone a socialist and a Maoist, and doing it with a straight face), and literally believing that climate change advocates are worse than Hitler – not just making the dumb comparison, but actually believing it. These people are certifiable. And dangerous. And they’re the intellectual leaders of today’s Republican party. And at some point, the Republicans are going to be back in office, with these people guiding them. And then we’re all in trouble.