Issac Chotiner gets this exactly right:
If you read, say, The Corner on global warming, you get the sense that many of the contributors are skeptics not because they spend time with other skeptics or because being a skeptic is broadly consistent with their worldview. Rather, you get the distinct impression that they don't want to believe in global warming because they want to embarass and annoy Al Gore and company.
There's nothing earth-shattering in there, but it's useful to keep in mind. Tribalism is often the force motivating outlandish convictions and actions that are often chalked up to corruption. So Matt says:
One doubts that any of these various rightwingers were actually humming along and then got bribed by energy companies to come up with the outlandish conservative arguments you here on this score. Rather, the money's just sort of out there ready to flow to individuals who make outlandish arguments and to publications and institutions that associate themselves with such people and such arguments.
But it's hardly necessary. Some of these folks would gouge their own eye out with a spoon if doing so would make Al Gore look pompous. That's not to say there's no money flowing to individuals willing to lay a thin film of superficial empiricism atop global warming skepticism, but the wide resonance of their arguments on the right has little to do with money or science and everything to do with a visceral hatred of treehuggers. The global warming skeptics have to be right because the right wants the left to be wrong. It's a rather immature approach to a calamitous trend that threatens the lives of millions, but have you ever met a hippy? They smell bad.
