He's been quoted but misunderstood

CATHY YOUNG'S Jan. 15 op-ed "Common sense in the warming debate," which quotes from my weblog, attributes to me ideas I do not share.

My essay argued for exploring ways of reflecting more sunlight back into space as part of the solution to the global warming problem. I also criticized what I take to be a tendency by some enthusiasts to overstate the immediacy and gravity of climate change and to prefer regulatory to technical solutions.

Young suggests that overenthusiastic environmental advocates are just as far from the truth as people who, for reasons of interest or ideology, deny that human action is changing the climate in dangerous ways and that something must be done . That carries evenhandedness to an extreme. Broadly speaking, the environmental movement got global warming right, and the anti-environmental coalition of polluters and extreme "free-market" opponents of regulation got it wrong.

So while I'm flattered to be quoted, I must decline Ms. Young's efforts to enlist me as an ally in making her point. The anti-environmentalists insisted on a nonsensical position, and their credibility deserves to suffer for it. When they've taken the beam out of their own eyes, they'll be able to better see the mote in Al Gore's.

MARK A.R. KLEIMAN
Los Angeles

The writer is a professor of public policy at University of California, Los Angeles.