Climate: Why Find the Facts?

The IPCC is the leading international scientific body studying climate change. Despite criticism — much of it manufactured by climate-change deniers — the panel has for more than a decade provided rigorous and balanced information to policy makers to help guide their efforts to prevent and mitigate the potentially disastrous effects of global warming.

Regrettably, politics trumps science among House Republicans, who recently voted to zero out this country's extremely modest $2.3 million annual commitment to the IPCC. The bill also slashes spending on a half-dozen domestic programs that study the causes and effects of climate change.

For more, see On Climate, Who Needs the Facts? Editorial, March 4, 2011 at NYTimes.com.