Among the many conservative think tanks faithfully pushing the skeptic message in Washington, D.C., few are as prominent—or, should I say, infamous—as the Heartland Institute. The “independent” research and non-profit group has the dubious distinction of having organized the first major denier-palooza, the “International Conference on Climate Change,” last year. Despite a less than stellar showing, and an even more lukewarm follow-up in March, it’s hoping that the third time will be the charm.

The likes of Senator James Inhofe, Lord Christopher Monckton and Anthony Watts will be descending on the Washington Court Hotel this week to discuss the “widespread dissent to the asserted “consensus” on the causes, consequences, and proper responses to climate change.” Its ostensible purpose will be to “expose Congressional staff and journalists to leading scientists and economists in the nation’s capital” and demonstrate that “global warming is not a crisis and that immediate action to reduce emissions is not necessary”—which it calls the emerging consensus view of (the handful of) scientists outside the IPCC.

The award for this week’s most understated headline goes to Politico’s Lisa Lerer for this little doozy: “GOP grapples with climate confusion.” Though little of her article actually breaks new ground, it perfectly encapsulates the Republicans’ current predicament – that of being stuck between a rock and a hard place when it comes to taking action on climate change.

On the one hand, the Republicans need to marshall their resources and come up with a coherent alternative to the proposed Democratic plan, lest they wish to lose the PR game and suffer another legislative defeat in the House of Representatives (the Senate, unfortunately, will be a much larger hurdle to overcome); on the other, they need to be wary of not alienating their base by devoting too much time to addressing a “hoax.”

There are cranky skeptics and then there are cranky skeptics. A perfect example of the latter – second only, perhaps, to our old favorite, Jim Inhofe – is John Coleman, the founder of The Weather Channel and San Diego weatherman. (As you might recall, Coleman very publicly broke with TWC last year when he accused the network of succumbing to “global warming alarmism.”)

Coleman has been peddling his brand of reactionary skepticism for years – memorably calling it the “greatest scam in history” – culminating in his recent appearance on Fox News’ “Red Eye,” during which he vowed to sue Al Gore for fraud. Yes, you read that right: sue him.

Watch it:

This is my final posting debunking professional climate denier Joanne Nova’s “The Skeptics Handbook.”

Nova's final pseudo-scientific arguments is greenhouse signature.

The greenhouse signature argument boils down to the following:

Because weather balloons haven’t yet been able to locate the “hot spot” – a patch of air above the tropics that should show signs of greenhouse gas-induced warming (hence, the greenhouse “signature”) – there must be something else causing the warming. This was somehow also proof that the models had it all wrong – since they had predicted that, in the tropics, the warming of the troposphere should have been larger than that of the surface.

In last night's interview with ABC's Charlie Gibson, Sarah Palin, shall we say, "bent the truth" regarding her stance on climate change. Jake Tapper has the scoop :