“Mr. Johnson is an all-access purveyor of misinformation on serious issues such as the pandemic and the legitimacy of American democracy, as well as invoking the etymology of Greenland as a way to downplay the effects of climate change.”
The Times then detailed Johnson’s downplaying of the climate crisis during his first run for the Senate in 2010:
“‘You know, there’s a reason Greenland was called Greenland,’ Mr. Johnson told WKOW-TV in Madison. ‘It was actually green at one point in time. And it’s been, you know, since, it’s a whole lot whiter now so we’ve experienced climate change throughout geologic time.'”
Which, as the Times points out, isn’t true!
Greenland’s name came from a sort of bait-and-switch effort by explorer Erik the Red, who called the massive island Greenland “in hopes that the name would attract settlers,” according to the government of Greenland.
And of course, climate change is real. But Johnson’s mistaken Greenland backstory conveniently fits into his overall narrative about the climate crisis.
When the Times gave Johnson a chance to correct the record on Greenland last week, he said this:
“‘I could be wrong there, but that’s always been my assumption that, at some point in time, those early explorers saw green,’ Mr. Johnson said. ‘I have no idea.'”
A similar pattern has emerged with Johnson’s ongoing incorrect statements about the January 6 insurrection, like his claims that “there was no violence on the Senate side, in terms of the chamber,” as he said over the weekend.
That’s not fully true either. Insurrectionists broke windows on the Senate side of the Capitol and Capitol Police Officer Eugene Goodman confronted rioters just outside of the Senate chamber. But Johnson’s own narrative is all part of his efforts to downplay the attack’s severity.
The Point: From the history of Greenland to the Capitol insurrection, just because the story is told a certain way doesn’t change the facts.
