January 08, 2009 Inconvenient Astronaut: NASA Moonwalker Joins Skeptics Despite Gore's Claim Skeptics Believe Moon Landing was 'Staged' Gore’s frequent comparison of global warming skeptics to people who "believe the moon landing was actually staged in a movie lot in Arizona" was delivered a major blow when Moonwalker and Award-Winning NASA Astronaut/Geologist Jack Schmitt who flew on the Apollo 17 mission declared he was a skeptic. “The ‘global warming scare’ is being used as a political tool to increase government control over American lives, incomes and decision making. It has no place in the Society's activities,” Schmitt said. See: Astronaut Jack Schmitt Joins Skeptics & For Gore, a very inconvenient moonwalker. The question looms: How can Gore claim skeptics are akin to people who believed the moon landing was “staged” when one of the moonwalkers himself is a skeptic? Schmitt is featured in the U. S. Senate Minority Report: More Than 650 (and rapidly growing) International Scientists Dissent Over Man-Made Global Warming Claims Below is Schmitt’s full entry in the Senate’s 650 Plus Scientist Report: Award-Winning NASA Astronaut/Geologist and Moonwalker Jack Schmitt, formerly of the Norwegian Geological Survey and the U.S. Geological Survey, who flew on the Apollo 17 mission, has received numerous awards in his career including the Space Center Superior Achievement Award and the NASA Distinguished Service Medal. Schmitt, a member of the Geological Society of America, American Geophysical Union, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science, rejected man-made climate change concerns in 2008. “The ‘global warming scare’ is being used as a political tool to increase government control over American lives, incomes and decision making. It has no place in the Society's activities,” Schmitt wrote on November 17, 2008. “As a geologist, I love Earth observations. But it is ridiculous to tie this objective to a "consensus" that humans are causing global warming when human experience, geologic data and history, and current cooling can argue otherwise. ‘Consensus,’ as many have said, merely represents the absence of definitive science,” Schmitt explained. Posted by Marc Morano Communications Director Senate Environment and Public Works Committee (EPW) Inhofe Staff 202-224-5762 202-224-5167 (fax) marc_morano@epw.senate.gov www.epw.senate.gov