In his final State of the Union speech, President Obama waved the dreaded Consensus flag, and insisted only certain especially dim-witted lichen, now extinct, could possibly still doubt global warming alarmism. Even though there is new research suggesting that in fact a significant percentage of climate scientists doubt global warming hysteria, perhaps Mr. Obama would say that this research was undoubtedly commissioned by the dimwitted and extinct lichen, desperately clinging to some flyover country rock like conservatives do to their guns and religion.

So set aside Obama’s claim about a nonexistent scientific consensus. Let’s focus instead on another part of his argument that should really get doubters to sit down and shut up fast. Obama informed America, “If anybody still wants to dispute the science around [global warming], have at it. You’ll be debating … business leaders.”

Now that’s a threat. Who wants to debate business leaders on subjects on which they are largely ignorant? It can only lead to heartburn.

Imagine, for instance, debating business leader Tom Steyer, a billionaire (he made a lot of his money on coal) and environmental activist who supports Mr Obama’s “battle” to stop “climate change.” This is, of course, impossible. No power on earth can stop the climate from changing, and I don’t just mean the weather or the seasons. I mean the climate. It’s been changing for eons and will go right on doing so. But since Mr. Obama and business leader Steyer think they can do the impossible by making “decisive and irrevocable” moves, you can see that a debate with them on the topic would go nowhere.

Steyer keenly believes, or at least publicly claims to believe, that the world is doomed by global warming, and that the only hope for salvation is for the government to subsidize — the proper euphemism is “invest in” — what he and Mr. Obama call “clean” energy, businesses in which Steyer has an interest. For instance, he’s one of the “managers” of Kilowatt Financial, “a green energy company that finances solar and energy efficiency projects.”

“Clean” energy, as it turns out, makes for dirty politics. Maybe this is why Steyer is throwing a lot of money at the “non-profit” group NextGen Climate, a group which released the report “Threat Multiplier: Climate Change & the State of Our Union” in time for Mr. Obama’s speech.

The report is a marvel of the pseudo-science common in political discussions of climatology. It says, “As temperatures rise due to climate change, productivity in the workforce will decline.” Which is why nobody works in the summer, right? And why, say, Northern Alaska is teeming with industrial action.

A bold headline in the report promises that “American families and agriculture workers will be hit the hardest by failing to act on [global warming].” American families and agriculture workers? Are agriculture workers not part of American families? And if farmers and families will be hit, what about baseball and apple pie? Surely they’re also doomed.

And then there are statements like this: global warming will cause a “risk up to a 70 percent loss in average annual crop yields by the end of the century.” This is true, but only because “risks” up to 70% loss are logically possible. A loss of 100% is also logically possible. But then so are “risks” of increases in crop production. And, according to Department of Agriculture, this is exactly what we’ve seen: increases.

Since agricultural productivity is up, should we thus encourage more global warming? We’d have to first start by encouraging any, because, according to satellite measurements, there hasn’t been any global warming for nearly 20 years. There have been increases in carbon dioxide over this period, it’s true, but carbon dioxide is plant food, which might partially account for why crops are doing so well.

NextGen Climate says that “transitioning to clean energy will grow our economy” and that government subsidies “will create over a million jobs by 2030 and up to two million jobs by 2050.” They don’t say how many of these will be new government bureaucrats hired to manage the redistribution of money from taxpayers to “clean” energy mavens like Steyer. Somehow NextGen’s “study” also shows that “electric bills will be reduced by $41 billion.” Since, unsubsidized, “clean” energy is much more expensive than coal and gas, this would be a true scientific miracle.

But these studies, common and shifty as cockroaches, are largely fiction. They work like this. Step 1: Create a model which insists, “If we increase ‘clean’ energy by X%, electric bills will decrease by Y”. Step 2: Make the assumption that we increase “clean” energy by X%. Step 3: Release report that claims electric bills will decrease by Y. Step 4: Collect subsidies.

My suggestion for a new Step 5: Weep for what has become of science.

All experience proves that when the government wraps its regulatory fingers around a thing, costs increase. Yet when asked whether global-warming “regulations come with a greater cost to business,” Steyer said, “Absolutely not. I think that’s complete hogwash … On a pure numbers basis, I totally reject the idea that there is a cost to this.”

Well, he has to say things like that. If he told the truth, then Kilowatt Financial, LLC, and other similar entities, like Solyndra, which burned through half a billion in government “clean” energy money, would find their palms ungreased.

Being honest wouldn’t help Steyer’s chances at the ballot box, either. Reports are that he’s planning some sort of run in Colorado around a platform of “fairness in society, including climate.”

And “clean” energy.