[Congressional Record Volume 160, Number 5 (Thursday, January 9, 2014)]
[House]
[Page H86]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]




                             CLIMATE CHANGE

  (Mr. MORAN asked and was given permission to address the House for 1 
minute and to revise and extend his remarks.)
  Mr. MORAN. Mr. Speaker, most Americans this week felt as though they 
were living on the North Pole. There was a condition called ``the polar 
vortex'' that became part of our common vernacular. Normal routines 
were disrupted. Schools closed, water mains ruptured, car batteries 
failed, and, tragically, weather-related deaths went up. So it didn't 
take long for conservative commentators to offer this cold weather 
phenomenon as proof that the planet isn't warming, that this is all a 
hoax or some left-wing liberal ideology.
  But the fact is that scientists have told us that the real and 
measurable decline of Arctic sea ice that is the direct result of 
warmer weather and climate change is creating this polar vortex that 
allows weather conditions that normally remain fixed over the Arctic to 
spin out of control. They slip south and they subject us to Arctic-like 
weather conditions.
  Now, this is a fact that we need to recognize and do something about 
or weather conditions are going to become far more common and far more 
severe.

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