First, Farenthold said that the federal government is a burden, not a help, but then within 24 hours turned around and begged the federal government to come help Texas deal with the drought, heat and wildfires.

Then, not long after Farenthold scoffed that global warming is just a scare tactic, the National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration released scientific data showing that the drought and wildfires currently afflicting Texas are part of an extreme climactic shift in which the United States as a whole is experiencing the second warmest summer ever, and Texas has endured the hottest average summer temperature recorded in any state ever.

Still, Blake Farenthold won’t admit that he was wrong. With the fires and smoke smothering Texas communities, Farenthold still pretends that global warming isn’t happening.

How much more suffering will Texas have to endure, before Blake Farenthold’s pride will allow his duty of public service to take precedence?

Global warming is real. Blake Farenthold is a fake.

Texas is enduring a record-breaking drought, record-breaking heat, and now has a record-breaking wildfire to add to the disaster-ridden year of 2011. There has never been in all of the history of Texas a wildfire as large as the one engulfing the city of Austin right now. People are dead. A thousand homes and counting are destroyed.

And Rick Perry sits in his Governor’s Mansion, repeating to himself over and over, “Global warming is a hoax. Global warming is a hoax.”

Don’t call it a natural disaster. This disaster is man made.

Away from the fantasy world that Rick Perry has concocted for himself, scientists have uncovered a vicious cycle: Global warming sparks more wildfires (here’s how). In return, increased wildfires accelerate global warming.

What can be done to stop this cycle from moving so rapidly out of control? People can work to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and slow the process of change so that we can figure out ways to deal with the growing wildfire cycle.

Rick Perry has refused to do that. He’s said that controlling carbon dioxide emissions would be bad for Texas.

Whatever impact greenhouse gas reductions may have had on the Texas economy, negative or positive, we can be sure that environmental regulations would not have resulted in hundred foot-high flames sweeping across the state of Texas.

The link between global warming and wildfires has been known to scientists and to serious public officials for years. Governor Rick Perry was warned that if he continued to deny the existence of global warming, there would be devastating wildfires in Texas.

Governor Perry chose to ignore the warnings. Now, Texas is paying the price for Perry’s refusal to face reality.

Global Warming is real. Rick Perry is a fake.

Yet, Texas Governor Rick Perry says he doesn’t believe in global warming. He doesn’t have any evidence, mind you. He says he just doesn’t believe in it – as if climatology is a religion.

It’s been generations since there was any reasonable doubt about the biological evolution of species through the process of natural selection. Natural evolution has been proven through so many independent streams of evidence that no one who has truly looked at the data and doesn’t have an axe to grind argues that evolution through natural selection doesn’t take place.

Yet, Texas Governor Rick Perry says he’s proud to include materials promoting Creationism, a fundamentalist religious ideology that attacks evolution using inaccurate information and antiscientific propaganda, in high school biology classes across Texas.

This isn’t just a Texas problem any more. Now, Rick Perry is running for President of the United States.

This bumper sticker is for serious scientific professionals who don’t want to see an advocate of pseudoscience in the White House. This bumper sticker is for scientists against Rick Perry.

If we’re going to enjoy those plants, though, why would we want to keep cutting them down? We work and work at our lawns, only to have them keep growing back, and watch the plants, thwarted, keep trying, never reaching fruition. It’s a frustrating experience.

Lawns are also terrible for the environment, of course. They take tons of synthetic fertilizer, and require us to pump out vast clouds of greenhouse gases with our lawn mowers.

What if we respected the growth of plants, instead of fighting it? What if we planted gardens where are lawns now are?

It’s a new year, and a new chance for us to get some real green. That’s what this bumper sticker encourages us to do: Lose the Lawn – Plant a Garden Instead.

For Congressman Benishek, oil drilling is literally a religious issue. “God gave us this planet and all its resources to meet our needs. America has expansive coal, natural gas, and oil reserves. We need to responsibly tap into these reserves,” Benishek writes. Interfering with this divine providence, in Benishek’s belief, is demonic environmental regulation.

Benishek warns of an impending, and irreligious, energy disaster. Energy exploration has come to a near standstill, according to his vision. “Radical environmentalism has rendered energy development next to impossible,” Benishek says.

The facts show, however, that energy development is moving forward at a fast pace. Over 8,000 leases are currently active along the coasts of the USA. Data from the Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement from this morning show that, over the last half year, over 3,200 new permits for offshore drilling activity have been granted. Add to these statistics the large number of drilling operations on land, and you get a picture of a thriving energy industry that’s making money hand over fist.

And where is that oil money going to? Well, some of it is going to Dan Benishek. Benishek’s campaign last year took substantial amounts of cash from oil and mining companies.

These contributions appear to have interfered with Benishek’s judgment. On issues of energy and the environment, Dan Benishek is out of touch – with voters, and with reality.

Farenthold has pledged to undo the progress that has been made with health care reforms that are bringing medical care to increased numbers of Americans. Farenthold buys in to all sorts of strange conspiracy theories about what he calls “Obamacare”. He contends, for example, that government-provided health care has deprived people of the freedom to choose what they eat.

Can anyone point to a single story of government-run health care taking away their freedom to eat as they choose? Of course not.

The people of Corpus Christi and Brownsville need better than to be represented by this kind of corporate-backed buffoon. That’s why residents of the 27th congressional district in Texas are already organizing to replace Farenthold in 2012.

Goodness knows that Solomon Ortiz was not progressive enough, but Texas can do much better than Blake Farenthold. Spread the word with one of these bumper stickers: Brownsville Against Blake Farenthold and Texans Against Blake Farenthold.

The Daily Mail notes that “global warming is the least of the cares of the average American.”

ESTV adds that “climate change is not a popular topic these days”.

So what? If you’re heading down a road at 100 miles per hour, straight toward a concrete wall, and three quarters of the people in the car don’t believe you or don’t care, what does that matter? If you can, you push down on the brakes – fast.

Global warming has diminished as a fad, but it was never as a fad that global warming mattered. The science of climate change is clear, and overwhelming, and unaffected by popular opinion. The fact that people are so disconnected from the planet they’re living on that they don’t care much about the planet’s biosphere is part of the problem, not a good excuse to justify inaction.

Confronting climate change may not be popular, but it’s the right thing to do.

It’s true, and the Republican candidate for Governor made it unavoidably plain. When he was asked “Would you support offshore drilling in the waters off the Maine Coast?” in a televised gubernatorial debate in May of this year, Paul LePage gave an unequivocal one-word answer: “Yes.”

We’ve seen what happened to the fishing and tourism industries of the Gulf Coast after BP’s recent oil disaster. Is this what you want to see happening in Maine’s future?

1. Save Our Oceans, Stop Overfishing bumper sticker
2. No More Oil Spills, No More Excuses: Red Slash through BP oval sticker
3. Had Enough? sticker
4. Red Slash Through GOP bumper sticker
5. Re-Elect Harry Reid campaign sticker
6. O: Barack Obama oval presidential sticker
7. Veterans for Obama sticker
8. Red Slash through sb 1070 oval sticker
9. How’s Drill, Baby, Drill working out for you? bumper sticker
10. Texas Democrat bumper sticker

The dominance of environmentalist themes of frustration in this list is unmistakable.

If you feel that this kind of statement makes Joe Barton a tragedy of the first proportion in Congress, you’re not alone. But wait: it could get worse. Did you know that if the Republicans regain a majority in the House in November, Joe Barton will be made Chair of the Energy and Natural Resources Committee?

Don’t let it happen. Make your public stand against the likes of Joe Barton with this anti-Barton bumper sticker (or, if you prefer, with this made-in-the-USA anti-Barton t-shirt).