NASA’s chief climate scientist joined policymakers from outside the space agency on Thursday in criticizing agency Administrator Michael Griffin’s doubt about whether mankind should address global warming. ‘I was shocked by his comments,’ said James Hansen, who shapes NASA’s climate research as the head of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies in New York. ‘It was a remarkable statement. I don’t know if it was planned, or it just slipped out of his mouth.’ Even the White House, which has been accused of ignoring a looming global crisis over a rise in temperatures linked to industrial activities, sought to distance itself from remarks made by Griffin in an interview that aired Thursday on National Public Radio’s morning show. The interview was broadcast on the same day the White House unveiled its proposal to limit the production of greenhouse gases by 15 industrialized nations, including the U.S. The gases are linked to a warming trend. ‘I have no doubt that global - that a trend of global warming exists,’ Griffin told NPR in the taped interview. ‘I’m not sure it’s fair to say that it is a problem we must wrestle with.’ Griffin, who is […]