Disinformation

I could hardly believe my eyes when I read this in the NYT…

According to Rasmussen Reports, 44% of U.S. voters say “long-term planetary trends are the cause of global warming, compared to 41% who blame it on human activity.”*

There’s a stark contrast between the parties: 59% of Democrats believe global warming is caused by humans, while only 21% of Republicans do.

Here’s the kicker (if the magnitude of that misinformation isn’t enough for you): two and a half years ago, “46% of voters said global warming is caused primarily by human activities, while 35% said it is due to long-term planetary trends.”

What happened?  How did we get less informed? And how do we fix the greatest crisis of our era if we can’t even agree on what is causing it?

* Just in case you’ve suffered a blow to the head and need a refresher, this is from a report released last week:

A group of 3,146 earth scientists surveyed around the world overwhelmingly agree that in the past 200-plus years, mean global temperatures have been rising, and that human activity is a significant contributing factor in changing mean global temperatures.