Former GOP Rep. Bob Inglis is “urging conservatives to stop denying that humans are contributing to global warming.”

Inglis, a South Carolina Republican beaten by the Tea Party in 2010, is launching the “Energy and Enterprise Initiative” at George Mason University to push “conservative solutions to America’s energy and climate challenges.”

The National Journal (subs. req’d) reports:

The campaign will push one policy: a new tax on carbon pollution or gasoline consumption, paired with a cut in the income or payroll tax, creating a revenue-neutral, market-driven solution to an environmental problem while cutting taxes that conservatives dislike.

In short, the party of monolithic knee-jerk climate denial turns out to be bilithic. Okay, technically, a bilith is “a prehistoric monument composed of two stones usu. constituting a pillar capped by a slab.”

And it’s true that the national GOP is now prehistoric when it comes to climate science (see National Journal: “The GOP is stampeding toward an absolutist rejection of climate science that appears unmatched among major political parties around the globe, even conservative ones”). But as recently as 2008, climate change was not a hyper-politicized issue — the presidential candidates’ position on climate science was a nonissue since both agreed on the science. Republicans today, however, have become synonymous with climate denialism, staying silent as the country bears the hottest 12 months on record.

But we at Climate Progress prefer to see the glass as 1/10 full rather than 9/10 empty — or, if you prefer a more optimistic spin, a glass that’s completely full (but mostly with air). After all, this new initiative isn’t just Inglis:

On its own, Inglis’s voice might not be enough to change the Republican conversation about climate change. But he has the support of Gregory Mankiw, economic advisor to the Mitt Romney campaign and the former chief economist of President George W. Bush’s Council of Economic Advisers; Douglas Holtz-Eakin, president of the influential conservative think tank American Action Forum, former head of Bush’s Council on Economic Advisers, and economic adviser to John McCain’s 2008 presidential campaign; Art Laffer, the prominent conservative economist and former senior adviser to President Reagan; and George Shultz, Reagan’s secretary of State, along with a slew of other conservative economic thinkers.

We have previously noted that “Bipartisan Support Grows for Carbon Price as Part of Debt Deal.” And not only has Americans’ understanding of global warming rebounded to 2009 levels, but, an April poll found that “75 Percent of Americans Support Regulating CO2 As A Pollutant, 60 Percent Support Revenue-Neutral Carbon Tax.” And that means a lot of non-Tea-Party Republicans support serious climate action.

Indeed, Inglis said in an interview with Grist’s David Roberts, that he believes there are conservatives “in foxholes on this hill,” who are remaining silent in order to avoid the Tea Party’s fire. In the short-term any climate legislation is near impossible, and Inglis looks to 2015 or 2016 for policy change.

Although Romney’s economic adviser supports the campaign, the candidate falls into the latter category Inglis describes, where “attacking the science is an easier way to dispense with the question” of how to change behavior.” A Romney administration would make 2015 look far-fetched. But if there is an Obama second term, a carbon price could be considered much sooner, whenever there is a debt deal or tax reform package.