Rep. Gohmert Wants To Alter Earth and Moon Orbits To Fight Climate Change
ORBITS: Rep. Louie Gohmert (R-TX) asks whether the Forest Service or the BLM can alter the orbit of the moon or the Earth in order to fight climate change during a House Natural Resources hearing pic.twitter.com/yYiOyi2cMZ
— Forbes (@Forbes) June 8, 2021
Keith’s note: Resident science genius Rep. Gohmert (R-TX) asked someone from the Forest Service if they can alter the orbit of Earth and/or the Moon to deal with climate change. I guess there is a silver lining: we can all sleep well tonight in the knowledge that Rep. Gohmert knows that Earth orbits the sun.
Rep. Gohmert (R-TX): “I understand from what’s been testified to by the Forest Service and the BLM, you want very much to work on the issue of climate change understand that you want to work on the issue of climake change. I was informed by the immediate past director of NASA that the Moon’s orbit is changing slightly and so is the Earth’s orbit around the sun. And we know there has been significant solar flare activities. Um, and so, is there anything that the National Forest Service or BLM can do to change the course of the Moon’s orbit or the Earth’s orbit around the sun? Obviously they would have profound effects on our climate.“
Stunned Forest Service Representative: “I would have to follow up with you on that one Mr. Gohmert.”
Gohmert: “Yea. Well, if you figure out a way that you in the, uh, in the Forest Service can make that change, I’d like to know.”
The correct answer is, “probably, but we need 200 billion to study it”
. . . I would not say it’s impossible to move the orbit of either the Moon or the Earth. But it may take a while, to put it mildly.
And has anybody studied, even peripherally what the effects and untended consequences might be? Changing the Moon’s orbit could drastically affect the ocean tides, which could drastically affect weather, maybe not for very good! Suppose the Earth’s orbit were changed to move it further away from the sun. What affect might that have on the orbits of asteroids? Suppose the sun were to become less active after the move. What might happen…ice age? Not that such moves would be feasible, but, better consider such things anyway.
Of course, trying to get certain Earthbound nations to drastically cut their coal consumption might be just about as difficult!
It’s frightening that this clown is able to vote on serious matters of the nation.
This equals the “Guam will tip over and capsize” comments of Rep. Hank Johnson. It’s sad that ignorant people like Rep. Gohmert are in possession of large amounts of political power.
Gotta admire the composure of the Forest Service person. She is probably used to dumb comments by congresspeople at this point.
In the words of the immortal Lurch (from the Adams Family), “Ohhhhh!”
He doesn’t really think the moon’s orbit can be altered. He was making the dubious claim that there’s nothing we can do to mitigate climate change, because the origin is non-anthropogenic, and instead tied up with solar output and orbit variability. He’s absolutely wrong, but he’s not quite as dumb as he appears in the quote.
I’m sorry but he said what he said. Unless you. talked to him or can actually read minds.
I give the Congressman credit for a bit more subtlety. I think he was being sarcastic about BLM and the Forest Service wanting “to work on cllimate change” when neither agency has the technical capabillity of affecting the factors that cause climate change.
I concede Gohmert is not famed as one worried about coming climate change, and counters to such arguments as these can be made. (For instance: “The location of large forests and unforested areas has been shown to affect weather over continental sized regions; placement of forests is something we can accomplish here at ground level and over time this may well affect climate.”)
Other hand, given suitable encouragment (“We’ll fund you. We’ll publish your papers!”) virtually every scientist in federal captivity could probably demonstate important links between his current tasks and climate change. The question is whether all these scientists should be charged with making climate change their major interest or should different scientists continue to have different topics to work on? Ultimately this is a management issue, or perhaps an economic one, tather than displaying pseudo-religious zeal for particular right-vs-left burning issues. The Congressman’s entitled to make that point and even in a position to insist upon it.
He has not responded to inquiries to clarify his comments.
Good point. Not too surprising though — “I was just being sarcastic” never wins any arguments, even when true. Ah well; I don’t come to Nasa Watch for the purpose of defending particular Congress critters!
did anyone see the chinese scifi movie called Wandering Earth on Netflix? I think that has all the answers rep Gohmert needs to solve the problem.
Unfortunitally I did.
I am willing to bet that Rep. Gohmert is not exactly the sort of guy who’d look to China for help. Just a hunch.
This is the sign of mental decline. He needs help, not ridicule. Hopefully someone will get help him.
people make a fool of him but he is spot on what he says ! although we don’t have the capability to do it yet that would solve the problem as the sun heats up , no amount of rip of Green Tax’s will stop climate change as its been going on for millions of years.
Right. Get back to me when you actually know how to do this.
So you think changes in the Sun’s temp are the reason for anthropogenic climate change? You might want to check and see how those “changes” in the Sun’s temp correlate with changes in Earth’s average temperature.
https://www.bloomberg.com/g…
If the above isn’t enough, here’s a graph of changes in solar irradiance plotted along with changes in average surface temps on Earth.
https://climate.nasa.gov/cl…
I can’t believe people are still making this dumb argument, when there’s so much good information available with which to educate oneself: https://skepticalscience.co…
Charitably, the dumbest carbon-based life form on the planet.
How do these people get elected?!?!
AIUI. Usually by someone who is richer and smarter than them funding and staffing their election campaigns.
Definition of joke (from Merriam Webster)
1a: something said or done to provoke laughter
especially : a brief oral narrative with a climactic humorous twist
b(1): the humorous or ridiculous element in something
(2): an instance of jesting : KIDDING
can’t take a joke
Example: Many readers of NASA Watch can’t take a joke.
What on Earth are you talking about? Gohmert made these comments in a congressional hearing – not to the readers of NASAWatch. He has yet to clarify his comments claim that he was kidding, etc.