Florida bans government workers using term "climate change"

Huffington Post - Florida has banned the phrase "climate change," at least as far as the staff of the state's environmental agency are concerned. Also "global warming." And "sustainability" is verboten, too, according to an investigative report in the Miami Herald.

This policy seems to have started in 2011, when Florida Governor Rick Scott -- who has repeatedly insisted that he is unconvinced that climate change is caused by human activity -- appointed Herschel Vinyard Jr. as director of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection. Thereafter, DEP employees were warned "to beware of the words global warming, climate change and sea-level rise" -- "these words were to be prohibited for use from official DEP policy-making with our clients."

The department denies that there is any such policy in place, but the Herald reported that "former DEP employees from offices around the state say the order was well known and distributed verbally statewide."

One former DEP employee told the Herald that "using the terms in reports would would bring unwanted attention to their projects."

Such restrictions on the free flow of scientific discussion are neither new nor confined to Florida:

* In 2007, two employees of the Fish and Wildlife Service attending an international conference on Arctic research were ordered "not to speak on or answer questions about 'climate change, polar bears and sea ice.'"

* NASA climate researcher James Hansen endured years of politically-based censorship, and was instructed to submit his lectures, papers, and interview requests for approval from his supervisors.

* Legislators in North Carolina have attempted to shield the state from sea-level rise by forbidding state employees from considering sea-level rise in projections.