"Climate Change: the Readers' Choice Winner"

The claim that man-made climate change is a hoax won the "Lie of the Year" poll among readers of Politifact.

"Climate change was in the news this year, starting with the polar vortex at the beginning of 2014 and continuing with the Keystone XL pipeline and proposed carbon-cutting regulations on power plants.

But what stuck with readers were the claims that flat-out denied climate change science. The statement "Climate change is a hoax" won PolitiFact’s annual Readers' Poll for Lie of the Year with 31.8 percent of the vote.

That claim was the title of a five-minute video released by congressional hopeful Lenar Whitney, a Republican from Louisiana. Several climate scientists told PolitiFact that Whitney’s claim was 'laughable,' 'deeply misguided,' 'uninformed,' 'disgusting' and 'absurd.' We called it Pants on Fire. Whitney, meanwhile, didn’t even make the run-off."

Lauren Carroll reports for the Tampa Bay Times' PolitiFact.com December 17, 2014.

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Comment: "Jeb Bush May Be 'The Smart Brother' – But He's as Much of a Climate Denier as Any Conservative" (Guardian/Suzanne Goldenberg)