Header information Name of film: Climate of Doubt Date viewed: May 2, 2014 Your name: Trigg Ruehle Names of others in your party group (if any): Trigg Ruehle Today’s date: May 2, 2014

In 2008, the presidential candidates agreed that climate change was a huge issue demanding urgent attention. Since then it has somewhat dwindled and become a lesser issue. But that national call to action has disappeared and in the past four years public opinion on the climate issue has cooled. This election cycle, the presidential candidates barely discuss climate change. And new studies find that only about half of Americans believe global warming is caused by human activity. In Climate of Doubt, FRONTLINE correspondent John Hockenberry explores the inner workings of the movement that changed the debate on climate change.

In numerous interviews that take him across the country, Hockenberry discovers how climate skeptics mobilized, built their argument, and undermined public acceptance of a global scientific consensus. Tim Phillips, President of Americans for Prosperity, explains how the movement was able to find a voice and gain momentum as the economy failed.Climate of Doubt describes the individuals and groups behind an organized effort to attack science by undermining scientists, and to unseat politicians who say they believe there is current climate change caused by human activity.

FRONTLINE also investigates the funding that powers the skeptic movement in the name of free market, anti-regulation, small government causes. Hockenberry finds that funding has shifted away from fossil fuel companies to more ideological, and less public, sources. According to Robert Brulle, a sociologist studying the funding patterns of these groups, “The major funders of the climate counter-movement are ideologically driven foundations that are very much concerned about conservative values and world views.”

I felt this movie shows a great deal into why climate change has started to suddenly dwindle

the years since the 2008 election. Though 98 percent of climate scientists agree that climate

change is real, and mostly human-caused, groups like the Heartland Institute and the Americans

for Prosperity have not only called these claims into doubt, but continually framed politicians

and scientists who believe in climate change as alarmists or conspirators who manipulate data.

They say the science "isn't settled," and that the consensus on global warming is not a scientific

consensus, but a political one.

By challenging the consensus, these groups have made climate change seem like one of many

theories. Politicians like Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrinch, who just a few years ago

reached across the aisle to join Democrats in saying that climate change was a serious issue

that needed attention, have now taken to saying that the science on climate change is

inconclusive. Even President Obama has been quiet on the issue. The skeptics are more than

happy to take credit for this change. I felt this movie did a very good job showing why climate

change has started to turn into an opinion rather than scientific fact.