Green backlash begins — lamely

In condemning Rep. Marsha Blackburn's bill (H.R. 97) to amend the Clean Air Act to exclude greenhouse gases, Health Care Without Harm (HCWH) issued a media release quoting its president, Gary Cohen:

"Curtailing [the EPA's] efforts by placing our regulatory system in a stranglehold will sentence tens of thousands of people to debilitating, respiratory illnesses, adding to the burden of chronic disease in the nation and increased financial burden to the health care system.' said Gary Cohen, president of Health Care Without Harm.

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Cohen also stated,

"Greenhouse gases contribute to human morbidity and mortality in the same way that smog and soot pollution and other air toxins do…'

But consider the two graphs below. The first charts the change in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels during the 20th century. The second charts the change in life expectancy during the 20th century. Note that as CO2 levels increased, so did life expectancy — the best measure of public health. Although correlation does not necessarily equate to causation, we expect that life expectancy correlates very highly with per capita CO2 emissions around the world. Perhaps that's why HCWH's media release didn't present these graphs (or anything else for that matter to back up their claims), preferring instead to stick with ad hominem attack. BTW, what is Health Care With Harm? It describes itself as,

…an international coalition of organizations dedicated to reducing environmental damage by the health care sector.

Connoisseurs of junk science, however, know HCWH as a front group for the radical green agenda

Connoisseurs of junk science, however, know HCWH as a front group for the radical green agenda. Greenpeace, Beyond Pesticides, Environmental Defense Fund, Natural Resources Defense Council, Physicians for Social Responsibility, Environmental Working Group, and Sierra Club are just some of its "members". We challenge HCWH to cite a single credible scientific study demonstrating that greenhouse gases pose any threat to human health whatsoever. We define "scientific study' to be an empirical analysis of data published in the peer-reviewed scientific literature — as opposed some conclusory book report like the EPA's "endangerment finding.' We'll even accept a case study of someone harmed by greenhouse gases. How hard could that be since tens of thousands have been debilitated by greenhouse gases, according to HCWH? How about it Gary Cohen?