Al Gore: climate science "reality" versus Republicans

By Deborah Zabarenko, Environment Correspondent

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - For Al Gore, the choice is obvious: Either accept scientific reality about climate change or believe what the fossil fuel industry is paying some Republican candidates to say.

"Anti-climate lobbyists ... give massive campaign contributions and they're not shy about making it clear to the candidates they support that there's a quid pro quo. In return for getting their money, these candidates have to pretend that they really believe this nonsense," the longtime climate change campaigner said on Wednesday in a telephone interview.

Asked whether Republican candidates who have accepted contributions from fossil fuel industries are compelled to toe the skeptical line on climate change, Gore replied: "That is absolutely the case."

Gore -- a Nobel peace laureate, former vice president and star of the Oscar-winning documentary "An Inconvenient Truth" -- said "too many" in his own Democratic Party have done this too but did not name them.
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Gore said he has no doubt that massive floods in Pakistan, Australia and along the Mississippi River, heat waves and droughts in Russia and Texas, and other severe weather events are related to human-influenced climate change.

"The deniers claim that it's some kind of hoax and that the global scientific community is lying to people," he said. "It's not a hoax, it's high school physics."

Flashback: Obama biggest recipient of BP cash - Erika Lovley - POLITICO.com

BP and its employees have given more than $3.5 million to federal candidates over the past 20 years, with the largest chunk of their money going to Obama, according to the Center for Responsive Politics. Donations come from a mix of employees and the company’s political action committees — $2.89 million flowed to campaigns from BP-related PACs and about $638,000 came from individuals.