Roger Pielke Jr. of the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado has started an interesting blog series concerning the growing realism on the political side of the climate-change debate.  He begins:

The political consensus surrounding climate policy is collapsing. If you are not aware of this fact you will be very soon. The collapse is not due to the cold winter in places that you may live or see on the news. It is not due to years without an increase in global temperature. It is not due to the overturning of the scientific consensus on the role of human activity in the global climate system.

It is due to the fact

Rep. Edward Markey (D-MA) spoke here in Houston today at a conference sponsored by the Cambridge Energy Research Associates (hosted by CERA chairman Daniel Yergin). Trying to defuse controversy (he is addressing an industry that he dislikes), Markey told the Houston Chronicle: “The headline should be: ‘I agree with T. Boone Pickens’.”…

My recent editorial in Investor’s Business Daily, “What Happened to Business Prudence?”, offers examples of politically correct and politically derived business practices in order to show how such “profit” opportunities can be bad for both shareholders and the broader economy.…

People who use the phrase “homes served” to describe the potential output from one or more wind turbines either do not understand the facts about wind turbines, believe false claims put forth by the wind industry, or are trying to mislead their reader or listener.

False statements about “homes served” by wind developers and their lobbyists are bad enough, but it is discouraging to hear politicians, reporters, and others adopt and regurgitate them.…