Mean Jimmy Carter Calls Climate Deniers 'Nutcases,' Ruining Chances Of Amicable Compromise

Former President and solar water heater aficionado Jimmy Carter went to Aspen, Colorado, this week to accept a lifetime achievement award at the "American Renewable Energy Day summit." (If he flew there in an airplane, be sure to call him a hypocrite.) There he said people who deny global warming are "nutcases," prompting howls of outrage on the Right, we figure -- they're always howling and outraged, after all. Oh, yes, just checked Twitchy, and all nine of the fulltime staff were indeed very, very sad at the unfortunate tone taken by the former President.

Carter of course was the energy-conserving, no-fun-allowing President who wore a sweater and a catalytic converter in the winter and created the Department of Energy, which was the "oops" that Rick Perry forgot he wanted to eliminate from the government. He was not hopeful that in the current political climate (ha! ha!) there's much hope for large-scale action on carbon emissions, because he believes that "almost anything President Obama advocates, Congress is going to oppose.”

While Carter was glad that President Obama has supported stricter carbon emissions limits through the EPA, he also wished that Obama had taken action sooner, and noted that other countries are doing far better than the United States at using renewable energy.

“The United States is right at the bottom, with only 10 percent of our energy coming from renewable sources,” he said. “So we still have a tremendous opportunity to do what we haven’t done. I would say the biggest handicap we have right now is some nutcases in our country who don’t believe in global warming. I think that they are going to change their position because the evidence of the ravages of global warming is coming or is already there.”