Jonathan Adler has some interesting thoughts on scepticism at everyone's favourite US law blog, the Volokh Conspiracy. His article was prompted by the decision of New Jersey governor Chris Christie to first veto some green legislation (on the grounds that it wouldn't work) but to simultaneously acknowledge that greenhouse gases affect the climate, a position that has led to much criticism from his own side.
Those attacking Christie are suggesting there is only one politically acceptable position on climate science — that one’s ideological bona fides are to be determined by one’s scientific beliefs, and not simply one’s policy preferences. This is a problem on multiple levels. Among other things, it leads conservatives to embrace an anti-scientific know-nothingism whereby scientific claims are to be evaluated not by scientific evidence but their political implications. Thus climate science must be attacked because it provides a too ready justification for government regulation. This is the same reason some conservatives attack evolution — they fear it undermines religious belief — and it is just as wrong.