Progress Illinois

Late on Friday, we posted some video of GOP Rep. John Shimkus' ridiculous remarks at a Capitol Hill climate change hearing last week.  In the days since, the two clips have been burning up the internet.  They provoked great responses from Think Progress, Matt Yglesias, and The Washington Monthly.  But the best rebuttal has to come from University of Minnesota-Morris biologist PZ Myers (pictured right) on the blog Pharyngula.  Here he is on Shimkus' contention that capping CO2 emissions could have the unintended consequence of "taking away plant food" and "doing just the opposite of what the people who want to save the world are saying":

Could one of you voters out there in Illinois take Shimkus aside and explain to him with short, simple words and short, simple sentences that global warming isn't going to destroy the world? It's not an argument anyone is making. It could very well make the world more tropical, and it could be of some advantage to certain kinds of plants.

However, please note: human beings aren't plants (well, most of us, anyway — John Shimkus does seem to share some similarities with root vegetables). The concern with global warming is change that will cause economic disruption and environmental disturbances and damage to places we like…like cities. Honestly, if nations collapse, we know that algae will still thrive. We just happen to generally take the side of humanity.

Meanwhile, our clip of Shimkus reading Bible verses at the hearing and declaring "The earth will end only when God declares its time to be over" has attracted 22,000 views on YouTube.