The Gift That Keeps On Giving: Dana Perino Reveals The Awesome Benefits Of Global Warming

While White House Press Secretary Dana Perino may lack the showstopping musical theatre skills of her doppelganger, Kristin Chenoweth, she nevertheless provides us with almost daily entertainment. She's also recently remarked that parody and criticism of her efforts don't bother her in the least. When asked if ribbing of the sort she's been receiving from Doonesbury this week "gets under her skin," she brushed it off: "I hardly have time to check it out." Bully for her! She won't mind, then, if we put her under the microscope. Please join us on these pages for "The Gift That Keeps on Giving," and if something at the gaggle makes you gag, feel free to share your thoughts.

While the California wildfires and the upcoming Iraq supplemental bill dominated the early part of yesterday's presser, the conversation eventually turned to the testimony of CDC director Dr. Julie Gerberding, whose testimony on the public health impact of climate change was alleged to have been "heavily edited" by the Washington Post (well, the Post says "heavily edited," anyway--their source says "eviscerated").

When directly questioned on the deletions (which included Gerberding's blanket conclusion, "CDC considers climate change a serious public health concern"), Perino launched into a four paragraph dodge in which she claimed to not have seen the edits, touted the administrations "open book" policy on climate change, and orated a lengthy filibuster in praise of the CDC. Near the end of these remarks, however, Perino took a flying leap into the eternal sunshine, saying: "And so the decision on behalf of CDC was to focus that testimony on public health benefits -- there are public health benefits to climate change, as well, but both benefits and concerns that somebody like a Dr. Gerberding, who is the expert in the field, could address."

Public health benefits? Yea, verily, this was a theme Perino tried to advance, in spite of the fact that she was simultaneously attempting to tout the President's concern over the issue:

Anybody who wants to look at what the President thinks about climate change looks -- needs to only look back three weeks ago to when he gave a major address on climate change when he invited all 15 of the major economies of this world to come together to work on a solution -- work on a path to get to a solution to help the growth of greenhouse gas emissions.

Still, you have to be intrigued at the prospect of possible health benefits from global warming. As Steve Benen of the Carpetbagger Report blueskies, "Less hypothermia? Fewer instances of frostbite? A steep decline in the number of snowball-fight-related injuries?"

Lest you think that Perino had blinded the White House Press Corps with pseudo-science, someone did eventually question her assertion. Perino's response:

...this is an issue where I'm sure lots of people would love to ridicule me when I say this, but it is true that many people die from cold-related deaths every winter. And there are studies that say that climate change in certain areas of the world would help those individuals. There are also concerns that it would increase tropical diseases and that's -- again, I'm not an expert in that, I'm going to let Julie Gerberding testify in regards to that...

Uhm...but they didn't let Gerberding testify to that, did they?

Comments

[gala1]

It's not whether the glass is half-full or half empty......it's what's (not) in the glass.

gala

[sword]

This is nothing less than evil.

[GuyRC]

How do people who make a living doing what she does live with themselves?

[starrianna]

Maybe she'll get cancer too.

KARMA

[starrianna]

P.S. How ironic it would be if poor Miss Perino got a horrible form of cancer, and the only possible cure would be in a little tiny plant that, unfortunately went extinct in the Amazon last year due to global warming.

How tragic.

P.P.S. "Planet In Peril" with Anderson Cooper, Jeff Corwin & Dr. Sanjay Gupta last couple nights was AMAZING...made me cry actually when they showed the poor polar bears and the animals being sold in tiny cages while they're misearable...really really sad. People suck.

And so does Ms. Perino.

[getoffthecross]

I'm guessing a steady diet of anti-depressents are being fed into her bubble.

[Dantana]

Bush doesn't want to hear the truth, he's made that clear. It would cost his big business buddies/campaign donors too much to tread a little more lightly on Mother Earth. Amen.

[fetchezlavache]

Bush, his handlers (Cheney and Rove) and his minions are people without empathy. It's all a game in which they win more money and get that macho feeling that comes from causing wars in which they can do vicariously what they were too chickenshit to do in person.

[RandyRanson]

Yeah right! If you're an Eskimo and you're tired of wearing sealskin.

[LiberalRebel2]

hey boy, do not crap on them Eskimos, soon your sorry ass will be begging them to teach you how to build an igloo, first there comes heat waves..and then...subfreezing cold weather boy. But then again, that might be good on the long run for mother earth, to be rid of the virus called humans. he he he he!

[ellocoliberal]

It's like when you finally die, you don't have to suffer through life's indignities anymore! Such as hyperthermia!

Yes Dana peraGenius- people die when they get too hot as well as too cold!

Damn its tricky- no more fall (maybe no more winter), but the summer gets way hotter! Go figure.

Where did they find her? Let me guess: Bob Jones U? Oral Roberts U? Liberty U? Some other right wing Christian U?
Such fun now a days.

Ple

[Misanthrope2]

She actually spent time in a town I grew up in.

Perino was born in Evanston, Wyoming, and grew up in Denver, Colorado. She attended Ponderosa High School in Parker, Colorado, a suburb of Denver.[1] Perino graduated from the University of Southern Colorado (now known as Colorado State University-Pueblo) in 1994 with a bachelor's degree in mass communications and minors in both political science and Spanish. While attending the university, Perino was active on the debate team and with KTSC-TV, the campus-based PBS affiliate where she served as host of Capitol Journal, a weekly summary of Colorado politics, and producer of Standoff, a weekly public affairs program. From there, Perino attended graduate school at the University of Illinois at Springfield (UIS). Perino obtained her masters at UIS in Public Affairs Reporting while also working as a daily reporter covering the Illinois Capitol for WCIA-TV, a CBS affiliate.

[LiberalRebel2]

cool, another freaky fan hits it all up on wikipedia. nice to have when it fixes your own terms doesn't it trolls?

[fetchezlavache]

One benefit: you can solve the problem of social security and medicare. Look at the statistics of the deaths in Europe in the big heat wave that killed thousands. They were mostly the elderly. If you don't care much about your elderly, I guess you won't worry about global warming. But you won't be much of a human being.

[Cassandra2]

One can only assume Perino's angling for the replacement spot for dumbass bubble-headed blonde on the View (or resident expert on Faux News - same thing).

[blooddoc]

One can, appropriately, heap blame on the current administration, but a bigger problem is a populace that insists on staying ill-informed (you watch Fox News? Really?) and are thus easily misled. Until people decide to participate in the democratic process and hold BushCo et al accountable, the fate of our democracy will hang in the balance.

[Deni]

I live in a town where most people take Rush and Fox News as the Gospel Truth. Trying to point out the difference between "facts" and "opinion" to people that choose to create their own reality really sucks.

[fetchezlavache]

Will someone please tell me what makes people keep listening to Rush? They know he is nasty; they read about his illegal drug use; they've heard him insult people that they care deeply about (like the US military and little children with disabilities). Just looking at that face ought to be enough to want to smack it hard. But they keep on listening. WHY?

[LiberalRebel2]

"the fate of our democracy will hang in the balance."

Democracy?

When could you buy the highest seat in a Democracy?

What you guys have there is far from Democracy.

You can scream your selves bloody but you can never change a four thousand year old idea on behalf of a Nation less then 1776 - 2007 years old (you do the counting. LOL!)

I say that it was a nice idea turned to a banana republic of the biggest magnitude ever. but then again, it might be able to turn it self back on track. Some turtles do you know..ROLMAO!

[satanesque]

I get it now. They can't deny global warming is happening anymore, so now they're going to say it's good for us. What a bunch of twats.

[laocoon]

Can we open a discussion of how terrorist attacks may have some benefit to us. Certain views are less obstructed now in lower NYC. The heightened state of alert may help us catch some other problem early. Some victims may have had an undetected illness that would have caused slow painful death but they mercifully died quickly. The pentagon got in some practice dealing with an attack. Lets see, I am sure there are many if we are going to play this parlor game.

[NYC07]

To speak the name of Kristin Chenoweth, in the same breath with that stupid brainless bimbo the Bush administration insults the Washington Press Corp and the rest of the nation with, is an outrage !!!!

[sword]

The press could have all sorts of attitudes. Thiers is that there is nothing we can do. Bush is all powerful. The power media is most definitely the enemy of decent people. Bush would not have raided the preseidency without the power media's help; indeed it was the power media more than anything that got the Bush junta in there. They should have had outrage in the first instance of outrage. Now they act like they are on the side of good and decency.

[bluesnot]

Can poison be bland?

[BIGBONEDED]

What an evil hollow headed bitch , their lies know no bounds no matter what the subject at hand may be.

[KarlRoves3rdchin]

Dana Perino only cares about money -she does not care if she's telling lies all day long for the criminal Bush administration -as long as she gets a big fat paycheck! Perino is a paid for Bush whore

[SirReal1]

Nice of Dana to "let Julie Gerberding testify in regards to that", now if only she could convince her boss to do the same.

Not that they are particularly adept at the ploy, but this administration employ's obfuscation, obstruction, and double-speak on every major issue when faced with an opposing, contradicting, or even questioning view from their own distorted perspective.

I contend that they are not "adept" because these attempts are obvious to anyone who is paying attention. Therein lies the problem, if the MSM, and a significant number of private citizens comments are any indication, there are a whole lot of people who aren't really paying attention.

I guess they figure their children and grand-children can worry about it.