Fox News Tries to Put a Positive Spin On Global Warming

Posted by Faiz Shakir at 2:00 PM on October 8, 2007.

Faiz Shakir: Fox News looks at the melting ice caps as an opportunity to compete with other countries over oil reserves.

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This blog, written by Faiz Shakir, originally appeared on Think Progress

This past July, Robert Greenwald's Brave New Films released "Fox Attacks: The Environment." The short film documented Fox News' assault on global warming science. Watch it here

In a new series billed by Fox News as the "Race for the Arctic," the network has responded by sending a reporter to Greenland to document first-hand observations of glaciers receding, icebergs breaking off, and other drastic climate-changing effects.

But if you think that Fox's "race for the arctic" is a race to educate and inform the public about global warming, you are mistaken. In fact, from Fox's perspective, the "race" is actually a race for oil. Fox News reporter Jonathan Hunt explained:

The melting ice cap is making the Arctic's resources much more accessible. Now that is vital. Because beneath the Arctic Ocean, scientists estimate there may be a full 25 percent of the world's undiscovered oil reserves. There is now a race on to get to those reserves.

In its report, Fox News wasn't quite willing to concede the science behind global warming. Hunt reported:

Whatever you think of global warming, most of the scientists say that is the cause of this. Other people insist that this is just a cyclical phenomenon. But one thing is absolutely clear: Whatever the cause, the effect is indisputable. The ice cap is melting.

There is no debate about what's going on here. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change concluded in February that "global warming is 'unequivocal' and that human activity is the main driver, 'very likely' causing most of the rise in temperatures since 1950."

Tagged as: fox news, environment, global warming

Faiz Shakir is the Research Director at the Center for American Progress and serves as Editor of ThinkProgress.org and The Progress Report.