Galling though it is to admit, Oklahoma Senator Jim Inhofe appears to be having wonderful success in redefining the media conversation about global cooling – I mean, global warming.

As this echo on the Business and Media Institute (BMI) website illustrates, major media are rising to address Inhofe’s charge that the current concern over climate change is just another scare story from a media that loves scare stories.

This is a home run for those who seek to confuse people about the science behind climate change. There is no sense of perspective in any of the current coverage, no clear illustration that the global cooling stories of the 1970s were one-off flights of fancy from a clutch of over-eager reporters. There are only big headlines saying, in effect, that this scare story is different from the last scare story – the logical response to which may be to dismiss the whole affair.

That, of course, is Inhofe’s goal. And Newsweek and the New York Times have played right into his hands. As the BMI story says,

It took Newsweek 31 years to correct its mistakes on global cooling. If they want to recant their latest global warming stance and start the calendar today, that means the next correction will run on October 23, 2037.

Clearly, Inhofe and company don’t mind being wrong. They quite apparently don’t care about anything other than oil company revenues. But if we follow their argument, we all have to wait three decades before t hey have to admit they’re wrong, in which time incaculable damage will have been done (and incalculable profits made).

If you doubt, even for a minute, the effectivenes of Inhofe’s campaign, read this, a column by wannabe conservative intellectual, Jason Dore (above), who parots Inhofe’s line precisely.

Once again, chalk one up for the bad guys.