I couldn’t agree more with what Senator Sheldon Whitehouse had to say on climate change. Here’s an excerpt:

Let me tell you some of the government agencies who are so-called colluding together. How about NASA? We trust them to send our astronauts into space. We trust them to deliver a rover the size of an S.U.V. to the surface of Mars safely and drive it around, sending data and pictures back from Mars to us. You think these people know what they’re talking about? … How about the United States Navy? The commander in chief of our Pacific Command? Is he colluding when he says that? …

If you want to ignore the federal government, if you live in a world in which you think the federal government colludes with itself to make up things that aren’t true, okay. But look at the property casualty insurance and reinsurance industry. They’re the people with the biggest bet on this. They have billions of dollars riding on getting it right, and they say climate change is real, carbon pollution is causing it, we’ve got to do something about it. So does the U.S. Conference of Catholic Bishops, because they care about the poor and the effect this will have on the people who have the least. So does every major U.S. scientific society. Every single one.

Now the extraordinary part. Here is the proposed resolution:

Resolved, That it is the sense of the Senate that global climate change is occurring and will continue to pose ongoing risks and challenges to the people and the Government of the United States.

Here is the full resolution. 

Despite Whitehouse’s argument, however, the resolution — which required unanimous consent — failed with Inhofe’s objection. So as demonstrated by that non-action, the Senate has no official position on whether climate change is real or not, much less whether it poses a threat to American citizens.

Here is the entire proposed resolution, which failed:

S. Res. 524

Whereas the 2014 National Climate Assessment stated “The
most recent decade was the nation’s warmest on record. U.S.
temperatures are expected to continue to rise.”;
Whereas the 2014 National Climate Assessment was drafted by
over 300 authors and extensively reviewed by the National
Academy of Sciences and a Federal Advisory Committee of 60
members;
Whereas the United States Global Change Research Program
found that “[i]n the United States, climate change has
already resulted in more frequent heat waves, extreme
precipitation, wildfires, and water scarcity”;
Whereas the United States Global Change Research Program
coordinates and integrates global change research across 13
Government agencies including the Department of Defense, the
Department of State, the Department of Energy, the Department
of Agriculture, the Department of Commerce, the Department of
Health and Human Services, the Department of the Interior,
the Department of Transportation, the Environmental
Protection Agency, the National Aeronautics and Space
Administration, the National Science Foundation, the
Smithsonian Institution, and the United States Agency for
International Development;
Whereas the 2014 Quadrennial Defense Review of the
Department of Defense of the United States stated “The
pressures caused by climate change will influence resource
competition while placing additional burdens on economies,
societies, and governance institutions around the world.”;
and
Whereas a Defense Science Board report concluded that
“[c]limate change will only grow in concern for the United
States and its security interests”: Now, therefore, be it
Resolved, That it is the sense of the Senate that global
climate change is occurring and will continue to pose ongoing
risks and challenges to the people and the Government of the
United States.