Dueling messages to Qatar climate conference
Republican Jim Inhofe and Democrat Barbara Boxer released dueling videos to their respective audiences at the UN Climate Change Conference in Doha, Qatar, Thursday.
The chairman of the committee, California Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer, stressed the need to confront climate change, cheered President Obama for his role in carbon emissions reductions, and claimed that Hurricane Sandy foreshadowed the devastation of further climate change.
In his video, played at a global warming skeptic event near the conference, Oklahoma Republican Sen. Jim Inhofe, the ranking member on the committee and a vocal opponent of the green agenda, accused the Obama administration of “quietly handing over billions of dollars to the United Nations in the name of global warming” and explained that he believes the true goal of international conferences like Doha is wealth redistribution.
“Of course, the focus of this year’s global warming conference — like all the conferences before — is not the environment,” he said. “It’s about one thing: spreading the wealth around. As the Associated Press reported, ‘one of the main challenges will be raising climate aid for poor countries at a time when budgets are strained by financial turmoil.’”