GOP presidential candidate Rick Santorum is perhaps the best example of how far the right wing has fled from scientific reality. At a campaign event in Columbus, Ohio, Santorum attempted to portray President Obama’s rejection of the proposed Keystone XL oil pipeline—a decision made because of a lack of adequate time for review of the project’s environmental impact—as some kind of green radicalism. “It’s about some phony ideal, some phony theology,” he said, to what The New York Times calls “wide applause.” “Oh, not a theology based on the Bible, a different theology. But no less a theology.” Explaining further on CBS’s Face the Nation, Santorum said that this “theology” “elevates the earth above man” and consists of “radical environmentalists” who are in a conspiracy “to give more power to the government.”

By now Obama supporters have gotten used to veiled implications that the president is not a Christian, and the even more prejudiced view that non-Christians are somehow less American. But Santorum has gone further than a casual use of dog-whistle politics. He has labeled environmental scientists and activists as part of a fringe cult, undermining our reality-based approach to solving serious global issues by proclaiming the entire movement an extension of a mythical religious war. Santorum has gone even further since, speaking in Tucson about “evil forces” confronting the country. Presumably environment and climate scientists are on his list.