You'd have to see it to believe it. They you'd have to decide if you want to laugh out loud at the silliness of it all or cry because a grown man's too scared to utter the simple words "climate change".
A two-minute long video that's been laughed at or jeered at over 150,000 times on YouTube shows a scared Brian Koon, Chief of Florida Division of Emergency, unwilling to say the words "climate change" at a Florida Senate hearing last week, said MSNBC.
In the video, State Sen. Jeff Clemens (D) asked Koon about climate change mitigation requirements needed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency. FEMA mandates that states have "climate change plans" to receive preparedness dollars.
The resulting exchange between Koon and Clemens is hilarious.
It starts with Clemens asking Koon if it's true states need to have "climate change plans" to qualify for that federal money.
Koon agreed, saying it required "language to that effect."
"I used 'climate change,'" Clemens replied, "but I'm suggesting that maybe as a state, we use the term 'atmospheric reemployment.' That might be something that the governor could get behind".
Fellow senators and spectators spontaneously burst out laughing.
Koon later avoided saying "climate change", stating the state's mitigation plan required "language discussing that issue."
"What issue is that?" Clemens asked.
"The issue you mentioned earlier," Koon replied as the senate panel and the audience broke into laughter once again at Koon's pathetic performance.
In the most eloquent way possible, Koon silently and decisively confirmed that his boss, leading climate denier Gov. Rick Scott, had gagged all Florida state employees from either writing or saying out loud those seditious words "Climate Change" and "Global Warming".
Scott, of course, denied he'd issued a "written" order to this effect, but Florida state employees said it was an unwritten rule they followed. And to prove what would happen if an employee had the guts to stand against this unwritten order, an employee, Bart Bibler, of the Florida Department of Environmental Protection was suspended for standing by his views on climate change.
The YouTube video of the exchange between Koon and Clemens is as https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BLVYjACDN1E