John Kerry: Climate Change 'As Dangerous' As a Nuclear Iran

Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) declared earlier this week that climate change "is as dangerous" as the possibility of a nuclear Iran.

Speaking on the Senate floor Wednesday in what was billed as a "major address and current assessment of the global climate change challenge," the 2004 Democratic presidential nominee called skeptics members of a "flat earth caucus" and part of a "concerted assault on reason."

"I believe that the situation that we face, Mr. President, is as dangerous as any of the sort of real crises that we talk about," Kerry said. "Today we had a hearing in the Foreign Relations Committee on the subject of Syria, and we all know what’s happening with respect to Iran, and nuclear weapons and the possibility even of a war."

He continued, “Well, this issue actually is of as significant a level of importance, because it affects life itself on the planet. Because it affects ecosystems on which the oceans and the land depend for the relationship of the warmth of our earth and the amount of moisture that there is and all of the interactions that occur as a consequence of our climate."

While not going after any of his colleagues by name, Kerry said there are "a bunch of people – some of them in the United States Congress itself" who deny climate change "against all the science" in part because of a disinformation campaign to paint it as outside the mainstream.

“Climate change, over the last few years, has regrettably lost credibility in the eyes and ears of the American people, because of a concerted campaign of disinformation — a concerted campaign to brand the concept as somehow slightly out of the mainstream of American political thinking,” Kerry said.

He added, “We have in effect, with respect to climate change in America today, what is fundamentally a flat-earth caucus, a bunch of people – some of them in the United States Congress itself – who still argue, against all the science, all the evidence, they argue that somehow we don’t know enough about climate change, or they argue that the evidence isn’t sufficient, or they argue that it just is a hoax.”

Watch Kerry's full speech below; "as dangerous" comments begin at the 8:06 mark.