Quick Fact: On Beck, Gray falsely claims Gore “admitted the entire premise for An Inconvenient Truth wasn't really true”

Special Programs Climate & Energy

Written by Todd Gregory

Published

On Glenn Beck's radio show, Pat Gray falsely claimed that Al Gore “admitted the entire premise for An Inconvenient Truth wasn't really true” because Gore said during 2007 congressional testimony that it "[s]ometimes ... has been true in the past" that increases in global temperatures have preceded increases in the level of CO2 in the atmosphere. Gray's claim is undermined by Gore's very next remarks -- part of which were aired, and which affirm the consensus on global warming -- that "[t]he opposite has also been true in the past. But what's happening now is that we because of human action are overwhelming all of those cycles

From the December 10 edition of Premiere Radio Networks' The Glenn Beck Program:

GRAY: Al Gore -- I just found this audio yesterday. Actually, testimony from 2007. I hadn't seen this before. Apparently, he's admitted CO2 doesn't necessarily drive temperature; it can be the other way around. Temperature drives the CO2 up. And here's where -- this is Congressman Joe Barton of Texas pushing him on it.

[begin audio clip]

BARTON: Temperature goes up before the CO2 goes up.

GORE: Sometimes that has been true in the past. The opposite has also been true.

[end audio clip]

GRAY: OK. So, he just admitted the entire premise for An Inconvenient Truth wasn't really true.

Fact: Gore's testimony affirmed the central premise of global warming consensus

Gore: "[W]hat's happening now is that we because of human action are overwhelming all of those cycles." On March 21, 2007, during a House Energy and Commerce subcommittee hearing, Barton stated, “I have an article from the Science magazine ... that explains historically a rise in CO2 concentrations did not precede a rise in temperatures but actually lagged temperature by 200 to 1,000 years -- yes, lagged. CO2 levels went up after the temperature rose. It appears that temperature appears to drive CO2, not vice versa.” During his response, Gore stated, "[T]he fact that more CO2 traps more heat in the lower part of the Earth's atmosphere is really beyond dispute. I mean, it's not -- that's not me saying that; that's what the scientists have known for 180 years. And for 100 years they've done the calculations on pretty much exactly what the magnitude of the heating effect is." After Barton then claimed that “the temperature goes up before the CO2 goes up,” Gore responded:

GORE: Sometimes that has been true in the past. The opposite has also been true in the past. But what's happening now is that we because of human action are overwhelming all of those cycles. [Joint House committee hearing, 3/21/07 (from the Nexis database)]