Wikipedia:Articles for deletion/Climate Audit (2nd nomination): Difference between revisions

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Climate Audit

(Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL)

We need to take this through an afd, since some people insist the content should be deleted. I don't see any agreement on that. Nsaa (talk) 19:38, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

NB: After the AFD-request the page has been altered again. The AFD is about this version, not the current one as of 2010-04-10T22:30. Nsaa (talk) 22:30, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

NB: Well, the above is a trifle disingenuous. In fact the article was restored to the version that has been stable for a year now William M. Connolley (talk) 23:06, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You are disruptive with your removal of the content over and over again. Are you afraid that people may find more and better sources for the article? It's bad [1] and again [2]. (hint you see the small print above: Find sources: Google (books · news · scholar · free images · WP refs) · FENS · JSTOR · TWL?) Nsaa (talk) 22:03, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Inconveniently for the experts, global warming IS a con The Sun "In order to keep the reality hidden from sceptics, especially Climate Audit, he allegedly asked for emails to be deleted, data altered and on one occasion convinced the university not to release information to Climate Audit because of "the types of people" they were."
Professor Phil Jones’s leaked e-mails reveal climate of secrecy and distrust The Times "Many requests for data came from climate sceptics connected with the Climate Audit (CA) blog, which questions the IPCC’s conclusions. Climate Audit is edited by Steve McIntyre, a former mineral industry executive. In one e-mail sent in 2008, Professor Jones tells a colleague how he managed to persuade the university to refuse information requests from Climate Audit. “When the FoI requests began here, the FoI person said we had to abide by the requests. It took a couple of half-hour sessions — one at a screen, to convince them otherwise showing them what CA was all about. Once they became aware of the types of people we were dealing with, everyone at UEA (in the registry and in the Environmental Sciences school — the head of school and a few others) became very supportive.” In possibly the most damning e-mail, Professor Jones asks a colleague at another university to delete e-mails discussing contributions to the IPCC’s fourth Assessment Report. “Mike, Can you delete any e-mails you may have had with Keith re AR4?” "

Just checking the two first sources given by the search (ok, The Sun is a tabloid, but people read it, and they need more info about the Climate Audit blog like presented in the next article from the highly regarded The Times. Nsaa (talk) 22:18, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep, no deletion, no redirect. This is a well sourced article and adheres to Wikipedia:WEB and WP:GNG. Nsaa (talk) 19:41, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep no deletion, no redirect. Both are notable enough for their own articles mark nutley (talk) 19:45, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
redirect as is now William M. Connolley (talk) 20:10, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
redirect, weakly favor: I generally prefer to lump rather than split. Pete Tillman (talk) 21:03, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
redirect as before. Climate Audit gains its notability because Stephen McIntyre writes it, and McI is notable because of his involvement in the Hockey stick controversy... it has no notability by itself. --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 21:17, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Comment - Article's "full state" that is being deliberated can be found here, as opposed to the current redirect. --Darkwind (talk) 21:25, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Note: This debate has been included in the list of Websites-related deletion discussions. -- --Darkwind (talk) 21:26, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Redirect. It seems apparent that Climate Audit has no notability independent of its sole proprietor. It might be different if it was a group blog, but it's not. Compare the much more widely read The Daily Dish, which redirects to its author, Andrew Sullivan. -- ChrisO (talk) 23:39, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Comment - since the article was merged into Stephen McIntyre a year ago, we can't delete this article alone without deleting both articles. So either the parent article needs to be added here, or this needs to be closed on procedural grounds. This appears to be a "Request for de-merging" (see here) and not a real deletion nom, and is, IMO, outside the scope of AFD. Guettarda (talk) 23:41, 26 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
I think you have a point. I thought there was something not quite right about this AfD - I couldn't put my finger on it, but I was considering suggesting that it should go to Wikipedia:Redirects for discussion instead. -- ChrisO (talk) 00:10, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep as redirect and slap nominator with a trout. Hipocrite (talk) 01:09, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep as redirect. Climate Audit is an extremely WikiNotable blog and Wikipedia definitely should cover it. But the best place to cover it is in our Stephen McIntyre article, IMO: it is better, both for our readers and for editors, to have one not-particularly-long article than two shortish articles. CWC 03:13, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep The topic is notable, being covered in detail by good sources such as Assessing climate change. Colonel Warden (talk) 07:29, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Don't give a flying fuck The article wasn't "deleted by redirect" as Nsaa claims on the CA talk page, it was merged. The redirect cannot be simply deleted since content was actually merged from the Climate Audit article to the Stephen McIntyre article and it wasn't simply redirected. To delete the redirect, the McIntrye article would also have to be deleted. This AfD is Nsaa disrupting Wikipedia by proving a point, and this nomination should be speedy closed. Also, many thanks to the nominator who clearly doesn't understand why AfD is for, and for wasting everyone's time with pointless bureaucracy. You should also brush up on your English and learn the difference between a redirect and a merge. -Atmoz (talk) 17:04, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Nice one. Going after the person when you are short of arguments ("You should also brush up on your English and learn the difference between a redirect and a merge"). For the first. You may be aware that I nominated the article for deletion (and it's disputed content), not the prior redirect. It was no merge discussion at the talk page, It was just done without any discussion (this is the only mentioning of it after it happend Talk:Climate_Audit#Redirecting). I didn't in fact see it before now (yes I have not followed every article in this area, and I think that's the case for most people with day work, contributing here. Nsaa (talk) 21:57, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
The fact that your English sucks and you think you can contribute to the English Wikipedia is your problem, not mine. You don't see me trying to contribute to the Greek Wikipedia. As mentioned on the talk page, there is no requirement needed before a merge takes place. If you don't understand that, please read up on the English Wikipedia's policies and guidelines. As I mentioned, the article cannot be deleted unless the Stephen McIntyre article is also deleted. The content was NOT DELETED. It was simply moved to a different article. IT WAS NOT DELETED. This AfD serves no purpose, because the article cannot be deleted. Also, your edit summary of "AGF" is pointless. I'm not assuming anything. Simply mentioning that your English needs work. Also, if you actually read my comment you'd notice that my comment was not Ad hom. It is that the nominator doesn't understand the English Wikipedia's policy on deletion and how that differs from merging. An Ad hom would be, "Nsaa is stupid, therefore delete." My argument is, "Nsaa doesn't understand the difference between merging and deleting, therefore this AfD should be closed." If you want to de-merge it, use the talk page. -Atmoz (talk) 22:10, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Ok, then. Iff you find bad and not proper English from my contributions here you are welcome to point it out (in a friendly tone so I can learn from it). Again this is an attack on my ability to read, understand and write English. Yes it's not native, but I've never run into trouble before because of this. Just done some 25.000 edits to en-wp in my five years here. Yes, and I do understand the difference between a merge and a deletion. As far as I see most of the content is removed (deleted), with some of it merged into the bio. Nsaa (talk) 22:27, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
What information in the Climate Audit page (diff provided above) was not added to the McIntyre page (diff provided above)? If you can't tell that the entire page was merged, then your English isn't good enough. -Atmoz (talk) 00:07, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]
Keep as article. I was planing on creating this article sooner or later. I found enough information in Infotrac and in a couple of books I have that definitely confirm it's notability. This blog is currently used as a reference in at least one article. Above, KimDabelsteinPetersen recommends a redirect or deletion for this article. I find this odd since the same editor advocates using it as a source. Cla68 (talk) 22:46, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

What's that straw man good for? We don't need articles on any source - there is none on Journal of Automated Reasoning, for example. --Stephan Schulz (talk) 23:16, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

There should be. By the way, Climate Audit's Alexa ranking (54,309) is much higher than RealClimate's (73,509) and DeSmogBlog (75,807), both of which have their own articles. I started the DeSmogBlog article, in fact. Cla68 (talk) 23:25, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Yes? Is that an argument to AfD or merge RC or DeSmogBlog? Btw. as you well know Alexa (by Alexa's own recogning) is not reliable for information when the sites have this ranking - so why are you presenting it here? --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 23:36, 27 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Remember, Alexa rankings become more accurate the higher the traffic is for a site. So the traffic gap between RealClimate and Climate Audit may be even greater than the rankings indicate. Anyway, Climate Audit is a notable player in the AGW debate, along with RealClimate, Watts Up With That (15,539 Alexa rank), and DeSmogBlog, and merits its own article. Cla68 (talk) 00:16, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

No, the uncertainty becomes lower the higher the traffic. If uncertainty is higher than the delta between the sites, then it shows nothing - and Alexa is saying that the uncertainty at that level makes the figures unreliable. Unreliable == unreliable .... Not: 2Ah but the rankings are still good.". --Kim D. Petersen (talk) 01:16, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Please link to articles in Infotrac. I have access and can't find any. -Atmoz (talk) 00:21, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Really? Which Infotrac database do you have access to? I just checked Academic OneFile and found this: THE GREAT CLIMATE SCIENCE SCANDAL; Leaked emails have revealed the unwillingness of climate change scientists to engage in a proper debate with the sceptics who doubt global warming, writes Jonathan Leake, Environment Editor." Sunday Times [London, England] 29 Nov. 2009: 16. I haven't checked General OneFile yet. Which of the two do you have access to? Cla68 (talk) 00:31, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

I also found what looks like nine references to Climate Audit in ProQuest NewsStand. Actually 17 hits came up, but some of them are duplicates and a few appear to be letters to the editor. Do you want me to list them so that you can add them to the article? Cla68 (talk) 00:36, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Which part of The great climate change science scandal exactly would you add to the Climate Audit page? Talking about hits is all well and good, but if the hits produce crappy results they don't add anything. -Atmoz (talk) 01:11, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

That article confirms who the founder of the blog was, at a minimum. You didn't answer my question, which of the two main Infotrac databases do you have access to and why didn't you find the Times article when I was able to? Also, are you interested in using the NewsStand articles to expand and source the Climate Audit article? Cla68 (talk) 01:37, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Oh my god! It confirms who the author of the blog is! I change my vote to KEEP! Was anyone disputing that? Is that the best source you could find? List the other sources here and I'll evaluate whether they deserve to be mentioned in the article. -Atmoz (talk) 01:42, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

You haven't answered my second question. Actually, you didn't answer my first question either. Cla68 (talk) 01:45, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Re infotrac: appears I only get access to "Health Reference Center Academic" (whatever the heck that is) and some other minor things. I previously had access to the one you mentioned, but I haven't used it in a while. Perhaps it twas the other library that had the good stuff. But, if you provide me with sources, I'll evaluate whether they should be used in an encyclopedia article about Climate Audit. I can't guarantee that I'll use them because if they're anything like the "source" you provided above they shouldn't be used as sources. Were there any other questions? If not, would you please answer mine? Is that the best source for an article on Climate Audit that you can find? And if not, please provide better ones. -Atmoz (talk) 02:06, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Sure, I can do that. It really doesn't matter anyway. Even if the article gets changed back to redirect now I'll expand it later in my userspace then repost it. As DeSmogBlog shows, it is possible to take bits and pieces from different newspaper articles, including opinion columns, and fashion a complete article on a topic. Cla68 (talk) 02:10, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Here is a list of Newspaper articles from NewsStand that discuss Climate Audit. I concealed the article texts in footnotes to protect the copyrights:

Collapse of references that aren't about CA - but only briefly mention

The following discussion has been closed. Please do not modify it.

"Politics fuel flap over climate prof's work: Conservative group doesn't trust Penn State panel, wants Legislature to probe Michael Mann's research." Frank Warner. McClatchy - Tribune Business News. Washington: Feb 5, 2010. [Details Climate Audit's response to and involvement in the Climategate controversy]^[1]
"National: Special report: 'Keep this quiet' - how climate scientists dodged data requests: Part three of a Guardian investigation reveals the covert efforts of researchers to fend off a rising tide of information demands from sceptics they believed were intent on demolishing their work," Fred Pearce. The Guardian. London (UK): Feb 4, 2010. pg. 14 [Mentions Climate Audit as McIntyre's blog].^[2]
"Inconveniently for the experts, global warming IS a con" [Scot Region], Donald MacLeod. The Sun. London (UK): Jan 30, 2010. pg. 33 [States that the CRU conspired to hide climate research data from Climate Audit staff].^[3]
"Scientist's leaked emails reveal climate of secrecy and distrust", Ben Webster. The Times. London (UK): Jan 28, 2010. pg. 16 [States that many of the controversial Climategate emails detail attempts to keep from giving data to Climate Audit staff].^[4]
"The enemies uniting to go for the kill at Copenhagen; A long-running eco-battle could cancel out any agreement in Copenhagen, says Jonathan Leake" [Scot Region], Jonathan Leake. Sunday Times. London (UK): Dec 6, 2009. pg. 5 [Explains that Climate Audit has a central role in AGW skepticism].^[5]
"Gill and Harry entangled in a southern scandal", Christopher Booker. The Sunday Telegraph. London (UK): Feb 8, 2009. pg. 14. [Comments on Climate Audit's response to media articles about Antarctic warming].^[6]
". . . Or not so hot air?" CAL. Virginian - Pilot. Norfolk, Va.: Aug 18, 2007. pg. B.7. [Explains Climate Audit's role in correcting incorrect GISS temperature data].^[7]
"Is global warming making hurricanes stronger?: Book looks at both sides of the debate over whether storms are getting stronger", Eric Berger. Knight Ridder Tribune Business News. Washington: Jul 17, 2007. pg. 1 [Mentions Climate Audit review of a new book].^[8]

You have got to be kidding? None of these articles are about Climate Audit, and only one of these mention it in more than 1 paragraph, 5 of the references mention it in a brief one sentence

Here are the links to the actual articles/Op-Ed's - and i've written how much CA is mentioned - as well as put a paranthesis around what focus it has (Climate Audit or McIntyre).

One sentence mention. (McIntyre)
One paragraph mention (McIntyre)
One paragraph mention (Climate Audit)
Two paragraph mention (Climate Audit)
One sentence mention (McIntyre)
One sentence mention (McIntyre)
One sentence mention (McIntyre)
One sentence mention (Climate Audit)

--Kim D. Petersen (talk) 08:00, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep as article - per Cla68. ATren (talk) 02:02, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

Keep as a full article. From the Guardian "McConchie Law Corporation, acting for Weaver, said that the National Post articles had "gone viral on the internet" and were reproduced on dozens of other websites, including prominent climate-sceptic sites Climate Audit and Watts Up With That.". Obviously notable as it gets noted. Weakopedia (talk) 05:27, 28 April 2010 (UTC)[reply]

^ (885 words) To see more of The Morning Call, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.mcall.com. Copyright (c) 2010, The Morning Call, Allentown, Pa. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA. Feb. 5--It's a whitewash. It's a smear campaign. Reactions to Penn State University's decision to drop three of four allegations of academic misconduct against global warming scientist Michael Mann were as varied as the political spectrum. A college panel of inquiry on Wednesday ordered that a new committee of five Penn State science professors investigate whether Mann violated university standards in his research. "It is what we predicted -- a whitewash," Joe Sterns, communications director for the Commonwealth Foundation, said Thursday. "They chose something relatively minor to investigate. What's stunning is the whitewash on the other three charges, particularly on the most damning passages in the e-mails." Penn State's preliminary inquiry was prompted by the unauthorized release in November of more than 1,000 once-private e-mails by climate scientists, including Mann. Sterns said the inquiry should have focused much more closely on the Nov. 16, 1999, e-mail from British scientist Phil Jones to Mann that mentions a "trick" to "hide the decline" in a 600-year chart of global temperatures. "They just completely glossed over what could be potential smoking-gun evidence of alleged data manipulation -- that being the trick to hide the decline," said Sterns, whose Harrisburg foundation is a conservative think tank. The inquiry, led by Graduate School Dean Henry C. Foley, found that the word "trick" referred to a technique to explain data, and not an effort to deceive. But Sterns said the Foley panel failed to examine what "hide the decline" meant. The Commonwealth Foundation wants the state Legislature to conduct an independent investigation into Mann's research. Sterns said there's an inherent conflict of interest in Penn State professors investigating a Penn State professor. Sterns said he is convinced the e-mails by Mann and the other scientists show that politics has distorted research to exaggerate the threat of global warming. "There's definitely a radical agenda being driven," he said, "and it's highly unfortunate for the taxpayers who fund Penn State and Michael Mann's research that this climate change agenda would be driven by faulty science." State Rep. RoseMarie Swanger, R-Lebanon, on Thursday called for the independent investigation the Commonwealth Foundation favors. She said the Penn State probe is "the fox guarding the henhouse." Jan Jarrett, president of the Penn Future environmental group in Harrisburg, said Mann's research already has been validated in reviews by the National Academy of Sciences and other experts. She also detects politics in the debate. "Oil and coal industries have invested heavily in their campaign to move their agenda ahead, to make sure we don't switch from energy made the way they produce it, by burning coal or by burning petroleum," Jarrett said. "This whole controversy really exists in an alternate universe that's been bought and paid for by... the folks who want to make sure we don't enact clean air legislation. In their universe, hot is cold. "The preponderance of the science overwhelmingly supports the conclusion that our climate is warming because of the excess carbon dioxide that human activities are pumping into the atmosphere." At Penn State's main campus at State College, the conservative Young Americans for Freedom have announced a Rally for Academic Integrity for noon next Friday. The YAF wants outside investigators. "It's really not fair to the university itself, to investigate itself, because it's going to leave us open to charges of conflict of interest later on," said YAF spokesman Samuel Settle, a Penn State sophomore. Rossilynne Skena, editor of the Daily Collegian, said Thursday that Penn State students aren't talking much about the Mann controversy in classrooms, but she has seen chalk graffiti on buildings and sidewalks that reads, "Climategate: Don't hide the decline." But Mann has his Penn State defenders. Jacqueline McLaughlin, an associate professor of biology at Penn State Lehigh Valley, said Mann has done valuable research. She is dismayed by the furor the e-mails have touched off. "I feel that it's blown out of proportion," said McLaughlin, who has worked with one of Mann's associates. "I hate to see when politics gets involved with science. "There's a huge gap between the scientists' understanding of research and the thinking of a politician," she said. "Research is interfacing with politics, and that can become uncomfortable. That interface gets real shaky when you have political sides." Mann's conclusion that humans are heating the planet is backed up by many other Penn State climatologists, "and they are the best in the world," McLaughlin said. She said she has followed the Mann inquiry closely and she trusts the university is handling it fairly and thoroughly. Meanwhile, online bloggers feverishly argued over the Foley panel's initial report. On his Climate Audit blog, global warming skeptic Stephen McIntyre complained that, contrary to Penn State policy, Foley failed to publish a transcript of the panel's interview with Mann. A new Penn State investigative committee now has one question for Mann: "Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any activities that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting or reporting research or other scholarly activities?" The new committee comprises Mary Jane Irwin, professor of computer science and electrical engineering; Alan Walker, professor of anthropology and biology; A. Welford Castleman, professor of chemistry and physics; Nina G. Jablonski, anthropology professor; and Sara M. Assmann, biology professor.
^ Few scientists realised that freedom of information laws being introduced in Britain, the US and elsewhere would impinge strongly on their work. But one who did was Dr Phil Jones, the man at the centre of the fallout from the emails stolen from the University of East Anglia. Thanks to his brushes with climate sceptics, he knew that the laws would put new powers in their hands. The emails reveal repeated and systematic attempts by him and his colleagues to block FoI requests from climate sceptics who wanted access to emails, documents and data. These moves were not only contrary to the spirit of scientific openness, but according to the government body that administers the FoI legislation were "not dealt with as they should have been under the legislation". But the emails also reveal deep and understandable frustration among the scientists at the huge amount of time and energy they were being asked to give up to deal with the requests. This was particularly galling as the sceptics making the requests were, in the scientists' eyes, more interested in picking holes in their analyses to suit an anti-global warming agenda than advancing human knowledge. Jones foresaw that his arch-inquisitor, the Canadian former minerals prospector and editor of the sceptic blog Climate Audit, Steve McIntyre, would be a thorn in his side. As long ago as 2005, before the incoming legislation had been tested in Britain, Jones was laying out his uncompromising views on protecting "his" data. In a note to the prominent US climate scientist Michael Mann in February that year, he noted that "the two MMs", McIntyre and his co-author the Canadian environmental economist Ross McKitrick, "have been after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I'll delete the file rather than send to anyone." Later, in 2007, Jones told his Chinese-American colleague Wei-Chyung Wang and Thomas Karl, director of the US government's National Climate Data Centre: "Think I've managed to persuade UEA to ignore all further FoI requests if the people have anything to do with Climate Audit." In December 2008 he wrote in an email to Ben Santer at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California: "When the FoI requests began here, the FoI person said we had to abide by the requests. It took a couple of half-hour sessions - one at a screen - to convince them otherwise, showing them what CA [Climate Audit, McIntyre's website] was all about. Once they became aware of the type of people we were dealing with, everyone at UEA . . . became very supportive." By and large, the records show, these requests were turned down. Of 105 requests concerning the Climatic Research Unit up to December 2009, the university refused 77, accepted six in part, had 11 outstanding, and had only 10 released in full. One was withdrawn. In May 2008 CRU received an FoI request from David Holland, an electrical engineer from Northampton, for all emails sent and received by its tree-ring specialist, Keith Briffa, relating to the IPCC fourth assessment of climate science (AR4)published the year before. The IPCC archives its formal review exchanges and puts that material online but Holland wanted to see emails between scientists about IPCC text conducted outside that process. Subsequent CRU emails discussed ways of avoiding complying with the request. They decided some emails had not come via IPCC and could be ignored as outside the terms of the request, for instance. Jones noted: "If only Holland knew how the process really worked!!" By 2008 the scientists had become used to dealing with, and usually rebuffing, requests for data. But this demand for their emails heightened their alarm. Days after receiving the request, Jones sent one of the most damaging emails to emerge from the leak. He asked Mann: "Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith [Briffa] re AR4? Keith will do likewise. Can you also email Gene [Eugene Wahl, a paleoclimatologist at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado] and get him to do the same . . . we will be getting Caspar [Ammann also from NCAR] to do the same." This seems to have been the email that persuaded the UK's Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) - the body that administers the FoI act - its handling of requests was not correct. The deputy information commissioner, Graham Smith, put out a statement last week which said: "The emails which are now public reveal that Mr Holland's requests under the Freedom of Information Act were not dealt with as they should have been under the legislation. Section 77 of the Freedom of Information Act makes it an offence for public authorities to act so as to prevent intentionally the disclosure of requested information." He said the ICO could not take action over the apparent breach because it occurred more than six months ago. There was more in a similar vein. That month Jones also wrote to Bradley, saying: "You can delete this attachment [probably Holland's FoI request] if you want. Keep this quiet also but this is the person who is putting FoI requests for all emails Keith and Tim have written and received re Ch 6 of AR4. We think we've found a way around this." The emailers took the view that, whatever the status of data, personal emails were sacrosanct. As Briffa told Ammann a month later: "Our private inter-collegial discussion is just that - PRIVATE . . . submitting to these demands undermines the wider scientific expectation of personal confidentiality . . . none of us should submit to these requests." One device for withholding the IPCC emails, revealed in the leaked emails, was to say that IPCC documents were not covered by British law. The University of East Anglia now says that no emails were deleted after this exchange. But seven months later, in December 2008, Jones revealed in an email to Santer discussing McIntyre: "If he pays pounds 10 (which he hasn't yet) I am supposed to go through my emails and he can get anything I've written about him. About two months ago I deleted loads of emails, so have very little - if anything at all." Mass deletion It is not clear that this mass deletion (if indeed it happened) was done to avoid FoI requests. Jones has been quoted elsewhere as saying: "We haven't deleted any emails. I delete my own personal emails a year at a time regardless of subject as I have too many, but the university still has the emails." In any case, the ICO apparently advised UEA that some requests for information did not have to be granted. Jones wrote to the Nasa climatologist Gavin Schmidt in August 2008: "All our FoI officers have been in discussions and are now using the same exceptions not to respond - advice they got from the information commissioner." During 2008 the debate among the emailers grew about coping with the rising tide of FoI requests. Most saw them as a threat to their work - not because they would uncover fraud, but because they took up their time. Schmidt, one of the hosts of the RealClimate website, wrote consolingly to Santer in December 2008 about dealing with McIntyre: "Whatever you say, it will still be presented as you hiding data. The contrarians have found that there is actually no limit to what they can ask people for and like Somali pirates they have found that once someone has paid up, they can always shake them down again." Others wanted to give some ground. The Stanford University climatologist Dr Stephen Schneider, who runs the journal Climate Change, wrote a round-robin to scientists in January 2009 in which he agreed that "this continuing pattern of harassment . . . in the name of due diligence is in my view an attempt to create a fishing expedition to find minor glitches or unexplained bits of code - which exist in nearly all our kinds of complex work - and then assert that the entire result is thus suspect." But Schneider argued that researchers should give enough data and information on their sources and methods so that those "who are scientifically capable can do their own brand of replication work." Even so, he felt "it would be odious requirement [sic] to have scientists document every line of [computer] code so outsiders could just apply them instantly. Not only is this an intellectual property issue, but it would dramatically reduce our productivity." Presciently, he added: "Good luck with this, and expect more of it as we get closer to international climate policy actions. We are witnessing the 'contrarian battle of the bulge'." Nightmare prospect In retrospect, it was clear that things were coming to a head by 2009. Freedom of information requests were piling up. The scientists were increasingly angered at how long it was taking to fend them off. Let alone what they regarded as the nightmare prospect of having to deliver the data being requested. Meanwhile stories began to circulate outside the university about how CRU was resisting legitimate requests from McIntyre. In early July 2009, when I asked Jones about this, he told me: "McIntyre has no interest in deriving his own global temperature series. He just wants to pick holes in those who do. It's just time-wasting." But Jones didn't know what was about to hit him. The day after the rejection of his demand for the station data, McIntyre announced that a "mole" had sent him a full set of the station data. He published some, from Lund in Sweden between 1753 and 1773 - "sensitive information indeed", he noted on his Climate Audit blog. The following day he claimed on the blog that the mole had been identified. Later McIntyre admitted there was no mole and he had simply found the material. Meanwhile, according to Nature's climate blogger Olive Heffernan, "between 24 and 29 July, CRU received 58 FoI requests from McIntyre and people affiliated with Climate Audit . . . the Met Office, which receives a cleaned-up version of the raw data from CRU, has received 10 requests of its own." With the threat of a "mole" in their midst, climate scientists outside CRU grew wary that their correspondence was not as secure as they might like. In September 2009 Jonathan Overpeck of Arizona University warned colleagues in an email: "Please write all emails as though they will be made public." In early July McIntyre appealed against being refused the station data, but was turned down by the university's director of information services, Jonathan Colam-French, in a letter dated 13 November, that McIntyre says he received on the 18th. McIntyre says the timing may be significant here. The first attempt to put online the file containing the CRU emails happened on the morning of Tuesday the 17th. It contained emails up to the 12th. McIntyre says he believes this shows the leak was probably an "inside job" by an aggrieved employee or student angry about the secrecy over CRU's data. Whoever carried out the hack, there is an irony for Jones and UEA buried in Jones's 2005 correspondence with Mann over the potential for a FoI Act in which he flagged up what a useful tool it would be for the sceptics. Advising Mann on how to avoid a security breach involving sensitive data that was left unprotected on an ftp (file transfer protocol) server, Jones wrote: "Don't leave stuff lying around on ftp sites - you never know who is trawling them." What damage has been done by the fresh criticisms of climate science? Twelve experts respond
^ THE lies, the untruths, the paranoid statements, the political point-scoring, the abuse of power, the secretive communications and the cover-ups -- not to mention the huge cost to the taxpayer. No, I don't mean the Chilcot Inquiry. Though let's face it, that liars' convention should have been sponsored by Dulux given the amount of whitewash being used. Nope. On this occasion my ire has been drawn to the rather inconvenient truths that have been uncovered, or should I say forcibly squeezed, from those whose main purpose in life has been to hysterically overstate the facts on the supposed threat of manmade global warming. Leaked emails now claim that Professor Phil Jones and his University of East Anglia team -- who report to the all-seeing, all-believing Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -- have been for years covering the real facts of global warming. In order to keep the reality hidden from sceptics, especially Climate Audit, he allegedly asked for emails to be deleted, data altered and on one occasion convinced the university not to release information to Climate Audit because of "the types of people" they were. How many other shenanigans he's been up to one can only guess. But any attempt to cover up vital data on such a sensitive and important subject has now convinced me and many others that global warming is just global paranoia. Three years ago I sat, watched and listened carefully to Al Gore as he explained in layman's terms how we were in a global crisis. That we had to change our ways or quickly go the way of the dinosaurs. That the planet was choking itself to death with pollution and large areas would become new deserts. That the ice was melting and sea levels rising at an unprecedented rate. That the water salinity was becoming so diluted, marine life was threatened and would die out, species after species would soon become extinct and ultimately so would we! Gore, left, was very convincing and I left that room totally bricking it, terrified of what was to befall our planet and my children's children. I was convinced that he was right and I and many others were wrong and guilty of stupidly ignoring his very inconvenient truth. Plus I had also watched The Day After Tomorrow! Not now. Prof Jones' leaked emails have finally convinced me that climate change is one huge global con. Natural The glaciers haven't all melted nor are they likely to in the next 100 years, the polar bears are not dying off but may have in fact multiplied, the salinity of the oceans isn't likely to change any time soon, sea levels are not rising any faster than they normally would and deserts are not forming over Southern Europe. The real data seems to suggest that whatever is happening to the world is not man-made but a natural cycle. Don't get me wrong, I am all for greener and cheaper fuel alternatives. I am also for cleaner air, cleaner seas and saving our rainforests. I like polar bears and penguins, I do not want our planet turned into one big polluted tip. But I do expect those charged with explaining what is happening to the Earth to conveniently tell the truth whether they like it or not. And not hide or delete the data and be inundated with demands under the Freedom of Information Act. So if they really want to gain our respect and support then they should stop acting like some oily politician, stop ducking and diving, tell the truth and get on with their vital jobs. Credit: Donald MacLeod
^ Professor Phil Jones and his colleagues at the University of East Anglia have been hounded by climate sceptics for more than a decade. They were targeted because their research underpinned the conclusion by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that the increase in temperature was likely to have been caused by man-made emissions. The sceptics made dozens of demands for information under the Freedom of Information Act. They wanted to see e-mails sent between the scientists discussing their contributions to the IPCC. They also wanted the computer code used by scientists in constructing their climate change models. Professor Jones believed that they were fishing for information to try to destroy his work. He also feared that they were seeking to distract him from his research by making him spend his time responding to requests. The leaked e-mails from Professor Jones and others reveal a culture of secrecy and a determination to release as little information as possible. In response to one request for data, Professor Jones wrote: "We have 25 or so years invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?" Sceptics also claimed that the e-mails show that Professor Jones attempted to manipulate data. There is little in the e-mails to support this. In an interview in The Times on Wednesday Professor John Beddington, the Government's Chief Scientific Adviser, said that it was wrong for scientists to refuse to disclose their data to critics. He said: "There is a danger that people can manipulate the data, but the benefits from being open far outweigh that danger." Many requests for data came from climate sceptics connected with the Climate Audit (CA) blog, which questions the IPCC's conclusions. Climate Audit is edited by Steve McIntyre, a former mineral industry executive. In one e-mail sent in 2008, Professor Jones tells a colleague how he managed to persuade the university to refuse information requests from Climate Audit. "When the FoI requests began here, the FoI person said we had to abide by the requests. It took a couple of half-hour sessions -- one at a screen, to convince them otherwise showing them what CA was all about. Once they became aware of the types of people we were dealing with, everyone at UEA (in the registry and in the Environmental Sciences school -- the head of school and a few others) became very supportive." In possibly the most damning e-mail, Professor Jones asks a colleague at another university to delete e-mails discussing contributions to the IPCC's fourth Assessment Report. "Mike, Can you delete any e-mails you may have had with Keith re AR4?" The recipient of this e-mail was Michael Mann, a climatologist at the University of Pennsylvania, who produced the famous "hockey stick" graph showing a sharp upward turn in global temperatures after 1900. Sceptics have dubbed Professor Jones, Mr Mann and their colleagues the "hockey team". Professor Jones wrote in 2005 that if anyone tried to use FoI legislation to obtain the code behind the computer models used to plot the global temperature record, he would be "hiding behind" data protection laws. Tom Wigley, another US climate scientist close to Professor Jones, attempted to warn him last year about the implications of refusing requests for information. He wrote: "The trouble here is that withholding data looks like hiding something, and hiding means (in some eyes) that it is bogus science that is being hidden." A one-handed balancing act Profile The Information Commissioner There are few organisations beyond the reach of the Information Commissioner, and Christopher Graham, the fourth holder of the role, faces a daunting set of responsibilities. He must ensure that every organisation that holds personal information does so responsibly and securely. This means ensuring that the data, which includes credit card details and Census information, does not fall into the wrong hands, is not covertly sold and is not used in ways to which the subject has not agreed. A more political role is to police the Freedom of Information Act. Under rules introduced in 2005, the public has a right to request any public information or document, so long as its release does not breach national security or diplomatic relations and is not too expensive. In cases where the commissioner suspects that details have been wilfully destroyed to avoid publication, they can fine or even prosecute senior figures in that body. In practice, however, the work of the commissioner is limited in three crucial respects. First, there are limited resources to reach verdicts on information requests. Second, there is no way of dealing with the biggest menace in freedom of information cases: delays during which public bodies sit on requests for months. And they do not have the final say, with the public able to appeal to the Information Tribunal. It may be a robust system, but it is not a fast one. To: Ben Santer Date: 13.57pm, December 3, 2008 When the FOI requests began here, the FOI person said we had to abide by the requests. It took a couple of half hour sessions - one at a screen, to convince them otherwise showing them what CA [Climate Audit, a website run by sceptics] was all about. Once they became aware of the types of people we were dealing with, everyone at UEA (in the registry and in the Environmental Sciences school - the head of school and a few others) became very supportive. I've got to know the FOI person quite well and the Chief Librarian - who deals with appeals. The VC is also aware of what is going on -at least for one of the requests, but probably doesn't know the number we're dealing with. We are in double figures. To: Mike Mann Date: 08.12am, 29 May 2008 Mike, Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith re AR4? [the fourth report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change]. Keith will do likewise. He's not in at the moment - minor family crisis. To: Wei-Chyung Wang Date: 04.22am, June 19, 2007 Think I've managed to persuade UEA to ignore all further FOIA requests if the people have anything to do with Climate Audit. To: Mike Mann Date: 09.41am, February 2, 2005 If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I'll delete the file rather than send to anyone. We also have a data protection act, which I will hide behind. Tom Wigley has sent me a worried email when he heard about it - thought people could ask him for his model code. He has retired officially from UEA so he can hide behind that. To: Tom Wigley Date: 15.20pm, Jan 21, 2005 I wouldn't worry about the code. If FOIA does ever get used by anyone, there is also IPR [possibly referring to Intellectual Property Rights] to consider as well. Data is covered by all the agreements we sign with people, so I will be hiding behind them. I'll be passing any requests onto the person at UEA who has been given a post to deal with them. The hockey stick graph Acquired its name because it shows the temperature in the Northern Hemisphere remaining relatively flat for almost a thousand years and then sharply increasing after 1900. It is used to claim that manmade emissions are the main cause of global warming Credit: Ben Webster Environment Editor
^ Ed Miliband was furious. His press conference should have highlighted Britain's role at the Copenhagen climate talks that open tomorrow -- but instead he faced questions on whether global warming was even true. "We have to beware of the climate saboteurs," the Climate Change Secretary barked. "The timing of this leak and the questioning of the science [are] not coincidental." Miliband was referring not only to the now infamous leaking of emails from the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit. His definition of "saboteurs" also included climate sceptics such as Lord Lawson, who recently set up the Global Warming Policy Foundation, and David Davis, the former Conservative frontbencher, who last week challenged the science in a newspaper article. "Whenever you get to a difficult political moment, a difficult set of decisions, there'll be people saying there's an easy way out," Miliband said. "The science is, however, clear and settled and we will push on in getting an agreement that is consistent with the science." The day he spoke, his words were being undermined -- by the man who has done most to make global warming a global obsession. Jim Hansen, director of Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said he shared the sceptics' hope that the Copenhagen talks would fail. "The whole approach [at Copenhagen] is so wrong that it is better to reassess the situation," he said. What Hansen was complaining about was not the science but the solutions to be proposed at Copenhagen. At first sight, his outburst has no link to the campaigning of these other so-called saboteurs, but the two anti-Copenhagen camps have much in common. Both reflect a backlash that is threatening to undermine the process and both can trace back their roots to the 1980s and 1990s. Peter Taylor, one of the British sceptics, explained what happened in his book Chill: A Reassessment of Global Warming Theory. "The scientists who believed in climate change outmanoeuvred the sceptics and turned their view of global warming into the official line," he said. "Ever since, the two sides have been polarised." Where did the sceptics go? Largely ignored by the mainstream media, they built an online community, centred on several prominent bloggers. This is the base from which most of the current attacks have sprung. The best known is Steve McIntyre, who set up the Climate Audit site. "I have been getting 6m hits a year for four years and now it has tripled to 60,000 hits a day," he said. His website has been followed by many more as sceptics put increasing presssure on the "warmists" as climate scientists are known. Meanwhile, the climate scientists have been building a bigger support base. Over the past decade the science supporting Hansen's view that the world is warming has grown ever stronger. However, it was his turn to be marginalised when it came to solutions. Hansen had always favoured a direct carbon tax -- in which oil, gas and coal are taxed at the point where they are extracted or imported. When world leaders met in Kyoto in 1997 they chose a cap-and-trade scheme under which every country gets a limit on carbon emissions. Copenhagen should extend this to a worldwide system. Hansen believes it will prove too complex; so now, like the sceptics, he and his supporters are working to undermine Copenhagen. We should know soon if this accidental alliance can derail a deal but in the short term it seems unlikely. That's because, over the next two weeks, about 100 world leaders will arrive in Copenhagen -- a change that has turned it from a conference to a high-level summit. Their presence will generate huge pressure for apparent success -- a pressure that means there will almost certainly be some kind of agreement. The question is: given the breadth of opposition, will it be worth anything in the long term? Credit: Jonathan Leake
^ THERE HAS been a hilarious twist to the campaign by the shock troops of the global warming scare to convince us that, contrary to all the evidence, Antarctica is warming up. Behind this claim were scientists associated with the US's leading pro-warmist blog, RealClimate, including Michael Mann, creator of the notorious "hockey stick" graph, and Dr James Hansen's colleague Dr Gavin Schmidt of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies. When their allies at Nature made a cover story of their claims, this hit headlines across the world, trumpeted by all the usual suspects, from the BBC to The Guardian's George Monbiot (aka the Great Moonbat). But they hadn't reckoned with the forensic expertise of two leading US science blogs, Anthony Watts's Watts Up With That and Climate Audit, run by Steve McIntyre, the chief demolisher of the "hockey stick". Combing through the data they discovered that the chief evidence for a warming Antarctica came from a single weather station, codenamed "Harry". But the data for Harry was not all it seemed. Secretly spliced in with it were lower temperature readings from a quite different weather station, Gill, so that the higher and later temperatures from Harry (cocooned for several years in snow) made it look as though there had been a warming which didn't exist. Dr Schmidt was so embarrassed when this sleight of hand was exposed that he pretended it had come to light through an "independent" observer, who was then revealed to be himself (after reading the blogs run by his more assiduous critics). But perhaps Nature, Moonbat and co should apologise to their readers for having been fooled by such chicanery.
^ IN EVERY CHILD'S life there comes a time when childhood fantasies are shattered and he or she is forced to accept reality . Grown-up scientists, theologians, historians, archaeologists and others who pursue facts and objective truths are rooted in reality and constantly adjusting their conclusions, theories and hypotheses when new information comes to light. Those who ignore facts and cling to outdated information, or outright falsehoods, can quickly embrace fanaticism. So it is with "global warming," the secular religion of our day that even has a good number of adherents among people of faith. Having decided to focus less on the eternal and whether anyone dwells there, global warming fundamentalists are pushing planet worship on us in a manner that would make a jihadist proud. The big media have been complicit in this censorship or ridicule of alternative views, mostly refusing to interview anyone who does not push the global warming faith. CBS News this week broadcast a four-part series on "climate change." Newsweek magazine recently slammed global warming "deniers." That brought a counterattack in the Aug. 20 issue from Newsweek contributor Robert Samuelson, who termed the article "highly contrived" and "fundamentally misleading." In 1975, Newsweek was just as convinced - using "scientific evidence" - that a new Ice Age was upon us. Many global warming fanatics have pointed to NASA as proof that their concerns about a warming planet are justified. They have repeatedly cited the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), whose director, James Hansen, has asserted that nine of the 10 warmest years in history have occurred since 1995, with 1998 the warmest. When NASA was confronted with evidence provided by Climate Audit, a blog run by Stephen McIntyre devoted to auditing the statistical methods and data used in historical reconstructions of past climate data, it reversed itself. Without the fanfare used to hype the global warming fanaticism it had earlier supported, NASA now says four of the top 10 years of high temperatures are from the 1930s. Several previously selected "warm" years - 2000, 2002, 2003 and 2004 - fell behind 1900. GISS now says its previous claim that 1998 was the warmest year in American history is no longer valid. The warmest year was 1934. Has any of this new information changed the minds of the global warming fundamentalists? Nope. Neither has much of it seen the light of day in the mainstream media, which continue to carry stories where seldom is heard an alternative word and the skies are polluted all day. The New York Times ran a story in its Sunday Business section last week that said it would cost a lot of money to fight global warming. The implication being that this money should come from government (and taxpayers), along with more government regulations and control over our lives by the very people who seem to have difficulty winning wars and controlling spending. The Earth has warmed and cooled over many centuries. One can get a sense of who is telling the truth about global warming by the company the concept keeps. Most of the disciples of global warming are liberal Democrats who never have enough of our money and believe there are never enough regulations concerning the way we lead our lives. That ought to be enough to give everyone pause, along with emerging evidence that the global warming jihadists may be more full of hot air than the climate they claim is about to burn us up. Cal Thomas' column is distributed by Tribune Media Services. E-mail him at Cal@CalThomas.com.
^ To see more of the Houston Chronicle, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.HoustonChronicle.com. Copyright (c) 2007, Houston Chronicle Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA. Jul. 17--Author Chris Mooney has written a new book, Storm World, on the question of global warming and whether it has made hurricanes stronger. The book captures an intense scientific debate in progress and concludes that neither side has the data to definitively prove its case. Mooney will speak about the book at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Barnes & Noble at 12850 Memorial Drive. Last week, he spoke with science writer Eric Berger about storms in a warming world. --Question: A lot of the book focuses on Kerry Emanuel, who is at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and is a leading proponent of the theory that hurricanes are getting stronger, and Bill Gray, at Colorado State, who believes otherwise. Why those two? --Answer: There are other protagonists in the story, but I think Emanuel and Gray neatly represent two different sides of the argument. And among those involved in the debate, Emanuel and Gray are the ones whose research careers go back the farthest on hurricanes. Gray's been at it the longest, but Emanuel, his work goes back 20 years. --Question: After writing the book, as often happens, are both sides mad at you? --Answer: In terms of the balancing, I'm actually getting pretty good marks. I was pleased that -- I don't know if you saw it -- the folks over at Climate Audit (a Web site skeptical of global warming) did a review. I have a track record with The Republican War on Science, and they're suspicious of me on that. But they actually thought it was fair, too. So I seem to have walked a line that both sides are pleased with, at least so far.--Question: A big problem is the fact that, for much of the world, reliable data wasn't collected for hurricanes before 1980. Do we really know enough about the past to reliably settle this debate in the near future?--Answer: A lot of scientists are diving into this field, a lot of different specialties, a lot of climate scientists who didn't study hurricanes before. That's a good thing because people are going to be picking apart the theory and the data from a variety of different angles and they're going to be doing new kinds of studies. For instance, what happens to storm size, has that changed over time? What happens to rapid intensification? Is that occurring more frequently? I think we're really going to have clearer answers in about five years. I'm not saying we're going to have all the answers. But that doesn't mean we have to wait, policy-wise. --Question: So what should we be doing policywise? --Answer: We should basically acknowledge there's a scientific debate. That's a fact. And we need to acknowledge that we're so incredibly vulnerable to hurricanes, and so underprepared, that the scientific debate can pretty much follow its course while we do practical things. Global warming is a problem, and global warming needs to be addressed with climate solutions such as emission caps and better fuel efficiency. Hurricanes need to be addressed with hurricane kinds of solutions, like greater preparedness, better building codes and better evacuation plans. eric.berger@chron.com Credit: Houston Chronicle

[1] (885 words) To see more of The Morning Call, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.mcall.com. Copyright (c) 2010, The Morning Call, Allentown, Pa. Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA. Feb. 5--It's a whitewash. It's a smear campaign. Reactions to Penn State University's decision to drop three of four allegations of academic misconduct against global warming scientist Michael Mann were as varied as the political spectrum. A college panel of inquiry on Wednesday ordered that a new committee of five Penn State science professors investigate whether Mann violated university standards in his research. "It is what we predicted -- a whitewash," Joe Sterns, communications director for the Commonwealth Foundation, said Thursday. "They chose something relatively minor to investigate. What's stunning is the whitewash on the other three charges, particularly on the most damning passages in the e-mails." Penn State's preliminary inquiry was prompted by the unauthorized release in November of more than 1,000 once-private e-mails by climate scientists, including Mann. Sterns said the inquiry should have focused much more closely on the Nov. 16, 1999, e-mail from British scientist Phil Jones to Mann that mentions a "trick" to "hide the decline" in a 600-year chart of global temperatures. "They just completely glossed over what could be potential smoking-gun evidence of alleged data manipulation -- that being the trick to hide the decline," said Sterns, whose Harrisburg foundation is a conservative think tank. The inquiry, led by Graduate School Dean Henry C. Foley, found that the word "trick" referred to a technique to explain data, and not an effort to deceive. But Sterns said the Foley panel failed to examine what "hide the decline" meant. The Commonwealth Foundation wants the state Legislature to conduct an independent investigation into Mann's research. Sterns said there's an inherent conflict of interest in Penn State professors investigating a Penn State professor. Sterns said he is convinced the e-mails by Mann and the other scientists show that politics has distorted research to exaggerate the threat of global warming. "There's definitely a radical agenda being driven," he said, "and it's highly unfortunate for the taxpayers who fund Penn State and Michael Mann's research that this climate change agenda would be driven by faulty science." State Rep. RoseMarie Swanger, R-Lebanon, on Thursday called for the independent investigation the Commonwealth Foundation favors. She said the Penn State probe is "the fox guarding the henhouse." Jan Jarrett, president of the Penn Future environmental group in Harrisburg, said Mann's research already has been validated in reviews by the National Academy of Sciences and other experts. She also detects politics in the debate. "Oil and coal industries have invested heavily in their campaign to move their agenda ahead, to make sure we don't switch from energy made the way they produce it, by burning coal or by burning petroleum," Jarrett said. "This whole controversy really exists in an alternate universe that's been bought and paid for by... the folks who want to make sure we don't enact clean air legislation. In their universe, hot is cold. "The preponderance of the science overwhelmingly supports the conclusion that our climate is warming because of the excess carbon dioxide that human activities are pumping into the atmosphere." At Penn State's main campus at State College, the conservative Young Americans for Freedom have announced a Rally for Academic Integrity for noon next Friday. The YAF wants outside investigators. "It's really not fair to the university itself, to investigate itself, because it's going to leave us open to charges of conflict of interest later on," said YAF spokesman Samuel Settle, a Penn State sophomore. Rossilynne Skena, editor of the Daily Collegian, said Thursday that Penn State students aren't talking much about the Mann controversy in classrooms, but she has seen chalk graffiti on buildings and sidewalks that reads, "Climategate: Don't hide the decline." But Mann has his Penn State defenders. Jacqueline McLaughlin, an associate professor of biology at Penn State Lehigh Valley, said Mann has done valuable research. She is dismayed by the furor the e-mails have touched off. "I feel that it's blown out of proportion," said McLaughlin, who has worked with one of Mann's associates. "I hate to see when politics gets involved with science. "There's a huge gap between the scientists' understanding of research and the thinking of a politician," she said. "Research is interfacing with politics, and that can become uncomfortable. That interface gets real shaky when you have political sides." Mann's conclusion that humans are heating the planet is backed up by many other Penn State climatologists, "and they are the best in the world," McLaughlin said. She said she has followed the Mann inquiry closely and she trusts the university is handling it fairly and thoroughly. Meanwhile, online bloggers feverishly argued over the Foley panel's initial report. On his Climate Audit blog, global warming skeptic Stephen McIntyre complained that, contrary to Penn State policy, Foley failed to publish a transcript of the panel's interview with Mann. A new Penn State investigative committee now has one question for Mann: "Did you engage in, or participate in, directly or indirectly, any activities that seriously deviated from accepted practices within the academic community for proposing, conducting or reporting research or other scholarly activities?" The new committee comprises Mary Jane Irwin, professor of computer science and electrical engineering; Alan Walker, professor of anthropology and biology; A. Welford Castleman, professor of chemistry and physics; Nina G. Jablonski, anthropology professor; and Sara M. Assmann, biology professor.

[2] Few scientists realised that freedom of information laws being introduced in Britain, the US and elsewhere would impinge strongly on their work. But one who did was Dr Phil Jones, the man at the centre of the fallout from the emails stolen from the University of East Anglia. Thanks to his brushes with climate sceptics, he knew that the laws would put new powers in their hands. The emails reveal repeated and systematic attempts by him and his colleagues to block FoI requests from climate sceptics who wanted access to emails, documents and data. These moves were not only contrary to the spirit of scientific openness, but according to the government body that administers the FoI legislation were "not dealt with as they should have been under the legislation". But the emails also reveal deep and understandable frustration among the scientists at the huge amount of time and energy they were being asked to give up to deal with the requests. This was particularly galling as the sceptics making the requests were, in the scientists' eyes, more interested in picking holes in their analyses to suit an anti-global warming agenda than advancing human knowledge. Jones foresaw that his arch-inquisitor, the Canadian former minerals prospector and editor of the sceptic blog Climate Audit, Steve McIntyre, would be a thorn in his side. As long ago as 2005, before the incoming legislation had been tested in Britain, Jones was laying out his uncompromising views on protecting "his" data. In a note to the prominent US climate scientist Michael Mann in February that year, he noted that "the two MMs", McIntyre and his co-author the Canadian environmental economist Ross McKitrick, "have been after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I'll delete the file rather than send to anyone." Later, in 2007, Jones told his Chinese-American colleague Wei-Chyung Wang and Thomas Karl, director of the US government's National Climate Data Centre: "Think I've managed to persuade UEA to ignore all further FoI requests if the people have anything to do with Climate Audit." In December 2008 he wrote in an email to Ben Santer at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California: "When the FoI requests began here, the FoI person said we had to abide by the requests. It took a couple of half-hour sessions - one at a screen - to convince them otherwise, showing them what CA [Climate Audit, McIntyre's website] was all about. Once they became aware of the type of people we were dealing with, everyone at UEA . . . became very supportive." By and large, the records show, these requests were turned down. Of 105 requests concerning the Climatic Research Unit up to December 2009, the university refused 77, accepted six in part, had 11 outstanding, and had only 10 released in full. One was withdrawn. In May 2008 CRU received an FoI request from David Holland, an electrical engineer from Northampton, for all emails sent and received by its tree-ring specialist, Keith Briffa, relating to the IPCC fourth assessment of climate science (AR4)published the year before. The IPCC archives its formal review exchanges and puts that material online but Holland wanted to see emails between scientists about IPCC text conducted outside that process. Subsequent CRU emails discussed ways of avoiding complying with the request. They decided some emails had not come via IPCC and could be ignored as outside the terms of the request, for instance. Jones noted: "If only Holland knew how the process really worked!!" By 2008 the scientists had become used to dealing with, and usually rebuffing, requests for data. But this demand for their emails heightened their alarm. Days after receiving the request, Jones sent one of the most damaging emails to emerge from the leak. He asked Mann: "Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith [Briffa] re AR4? Keith will do likewise. Can you also email Gene [Eugene Wahl, a paleoclimatologist at the National Centre for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado] and get him to do the same . . . we will be getting Caspar [Ammann also from NCAR] to do the same." This seems to have been the email that persuaded the UK's Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) - the body that administers the FoI act - its handling of requests was not correct. The deputy information commissioner, Graham Smith, put out a statement last week which said: "The emails which are now public reveal that Mr Holland's requests under the Freedom of Information Act were not dealt with as they should have been under the legislation. Section 77 of the Freedom of Information Act makes it an offence for public authorities to act so as to prevent intentionally the disclosure of requested information." He said the ICO could not take action over the apparent breach because it occurred more than six months ago. There was more in a similar vein. That month Jones also wrote to Bradley, saying: "You can delete this attachment [probably Holland's FoI request] if you want. Keep this quiet also but this is the person who is putting FoI requests for all emails Keith and Tim have written and received re Ch 6 of AR4. We think we've found a way around this." The emailers took the view that, whatever the status of data, personal emails were sacrosanct. As Briffa told Ammann a month later: "Our private inter-collegial discussion is just that - PRIVATE . . . submitting to these demands undermines the wider scientific expectation of personal confidentiality . . . none of us should submit to these requests." One device for withholding the IPCC emails, revealed in the leaked emails, was to say that IPCC documents were not covered by British law. The University of East Anglia now says that no emails were deleted after this exchange. But seven months later, in December 2008, Jones revealed in an email to Santer discussing McIntyre: "If he pays pounds 10 (which he hasn't yet) I am supposed to go through my emails and he can get anything I've written about him. About two months ago I deleted loads of emails, so have very little - if anything at all." Mass deletion It is not clear that this mass deletion (if indeed it happened) was done to avoid FoI requests. Jones has been quoted elsewhere as saying: "We haven't deleted any emails. I delete my own personal emails a year at a time regardless of subject as I have too many, but the university still has the emails." In any case, the ICO apparently advised UEA that some requests for information did not have to be granted. Jones wrote to the Nasa climatologist Gavin Schmidt in August 2008: "All our FoI officers have been in discussions and are now using the same exceptions not to respond - advice they got from the information commissioner." During 2008 the debate among the emailers grew about coping with the rising tide of FoI requests. Most saw them as a threat to their work - not because they would uncover fraud, but because they took up their time. Schmidt, one of the hosts of the RealClimate website, wrote consolingly to Santer in December 2008 about dealing with McIntyre: "Whatever you say, it will still be presented as you hiding data. The contrarians have found that there is actually no limit to what they can ask people for and like Somali pirates they have found that once someone has paid up, they can always shake them down again." Others wanted to give some ground. The Stanford University climatologist Dr Stephen Schneider, who runs the journal Climate Change, wrote a round-robin to scientists in January 2009 in which he agreed that "this continuing pattern of harassment . . . in the name of due diligence is in my view an attempt to create a fishing expedition to find minor glitches or unexplained bits of code - which exist in nearly all our kinds of complex work - and then assert that the entire result is thus suspect." But Schneider argued that researchers should give enough data and information on their sources and methods so that those "who are scientifically capable can do their own brand of replication work." Even so, he felt "it would be odious requirement [sic] to have scientists document every line of [computer] code so outsiders could just apply them instantly. Not only is this an intellectual property issue, but it would dramatically reduce our productivity." Presciently, he added: "Good luck with this, and expect more of it as we get closer to international climate policy actions. We are witnessing the 'contrarian battle of the bulge'." Nightmare prospect In retrospect, it was clear that things were coming to a head by 2009. Freedom of information requests were piling up. The scientists were increasingly angered at how long it was taking to fend them off. Let alone what they regarded as the nightmare prospect of having to deliver the data being requested. Meanwhile stories began to circulate outside the university about how CRU was resisting legitimate requests from McIntyre. In early July 2009, when I asked Jones about this, he told me: "McIntyre has no interest in deriving his own global temperature series. He just wants to pick holes in those who do. It's just time-wasting." But Jones didn't know what was about to hit him. The day after the rejection of his demand for the station data, McIntyre announced that a "mole" had sent him a full set of the station data. He published some, from Lund in Sweden between 1753 and 1773 - "sensitive information indeed", he noted on his Climate Audit blog. The following day he claimed on the blog that the mole had been identified. Later McIntyre admitted there was no mole and he had simply found the material. Meanwhile, according to Nature's climate blogger Olive Heffernan, "between 24 and 29 July, CRU received 58 FoI requests from McIntyre and people affiliated with Climate Audit . . . the Met Office, which receives a cleaned-up version of the raw data from CRU, has received 10 requests of its own." With the threat of a "mole" in their midst, climate scientists outside CRU grew wary that their correspondence was not as secure as they might like. In September 2009 Jonathan Overpeck of Arizona University warned colleagues in an email: "Please write all emails as though they will be made public." In early July McIntyre appealed against being refused the station data, but was turned down by the university's director of information services, Jonathan Colam-French, in a letter dated 13 November, that McIntyre says he received on the 18th. McIntyre says the timing may be significant here. The first attempt to put online the file containing the CRU emails happened on the morning of Tuesday the 17th. It contained emails up to the 12th. McIntyre says he believes this shows the leak was probably an "inside job" by an aggrieved employee or student angry about the secrecy over CRU's data. Whoever carried out the hack, there is an irony for Jones and UEA buried in Jones's 2005 correspondence with Mann over the potential for a FoI Act in which he flagged up what a useful tool it would be for the sceptics. Advising Mann on how to avoid a security breach involving sensitive data that was left unprotected on an ftp (file transfer protocol) server, Jones wrote: "Don't leave stuff lying around on ftp sites - you never know who is trawling them." What damage has been done by the fresh criticisms of climate science? Twelve experts respond

[3] THE lies, the untruths, the paranoid statements, the political point-scoring, the abuse of power, the secretive communications and the cover-ups -- not to mention the huge cost to the taxpayer. No, I don't mean the Chilcot Inquiry. Though let's face it, that liars' convention should have been sponsored by Dulux given the amount of whitewash being used. Nope. On this occasion my ire has been drawn to the rather inconvenient truths that have been uncovered, or should I say forcibly squeezed, from those whose main purpose in life has been to hysterically overstate the facts on the supposed threat of manmade global warming. Leaked emails now claim that Professor Phil Jones and his University of East Anglia team -- who report to the all-seeing, all-believing Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change -- have been for years covering the real facts of global warming. In order to keep the reality hidden from sceptics, especially Climate Audit, he allegedly asked for emails to be deleted, data altered and on one occasion convinced the university not to release information to Climate Audit because of "the types of people" they were. How many other shenanigans he's been up to one can only guess. But any attempt to cover up vital data on such a sensitive and important subject has now convinced me and many others that global warming is just global paranoia. Three years ago I sat, watched and listened carefully to Al Gore as he explained in layman's terms how we were in a global crisis. That we had to change our ways or quickly go the way of the dinosaurs. That the planet was choking itself to death with pollution and large areas would become new deserts. That the ice was melting and sea levels rising at an unprecedented rate. That the water salinity was becoming so diluted, marine life was threatened and would die out, species after species would soon become extinct and ultimately so would we! Gore, left, was very convincing and I left that room totally bricking it, terrified of what was to befall our planet and my children's children. I was convinced that he was right and I and many others were wrong and guilty of stupidly ignoring his very inconvenient truth. Plus I had also watched The Day After Tomorrow! Not now. Prof Jones' leaked emails have finally convinced me that climate change is one huge global con. Natural The glaciers haven't all melted nor are they likely to in the next 100 years, the polar bears are not dying off but may have in fact multiplied, the salinity of the oceans isn't likely to change any time soon, sea levels are not rising any faster than they normally would and deserts are not forming over Southern Europe. The real data seems to suggest that whatever is happening to the world is not man-made but a natural cycle. Don't get me wrong, I am all for greener and cheaper fuel alternatives. I am also for cleaner air, cleaner seas and saving our rainforests. I like polar bears and penguins, I do not want our planet turned into one big polluted tip. But I do expect those charged with explaining what is happening to the Earth to conveniently tell the truth whether they like it or not. And not hide or delete the data and be inundated with demands under the Freedom of Information Act. So if they really want to gain our respect and support then they should stop acting like some oily politician, stop ducking and diving, tell the truth and get on with their vital jobs. Credit: Donald MacLeod

[4] Professor Phil Jones and his colleagues at the University of East Anglia have been hounded by climate sceptics for more than a decade. They were targeted because their research underpinned the conclusion by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that the increase in temperature was likely to have been caused by man-made emissions. The sceptics made dozens of demands for information under the Freedom of Information Act. They wanted to see e-mails sent between the scientists discussing their contributions to the IPCC. They also wanted the computer code used by scientists in constructing their climate change models. Professor Jones believed that they were fishing for information to try to destroy his work. He also feared that they were seeking to distract him from his research by making him spend his time responding to requests. The leaked e-mails from Professor Jones and others reveal a culture of secrecy and a determination to release as little information as possible. In response to one request for data, Professor Jones wrote: "We have 25 or so years invested in the work. Why should I make the data available to you when your aim is to try and find something wrong with it?" Sceptics also claimed that the e-mails show that Professor Jones attempted to manipulate data. There is little in the e-mails to support this. In an interview in The Times on Wednesday Professor John Beddington, the Government's Chief Scientific Adviser, said that it was wrong for scientists to refuse to disclose their data to critics. He said: "There is a danger that people can manipulate the data, but the benefits from being open far outweigh that danger." Many requests for data came from climate sceptics connected with the Climate Audit (CA) blog, which questions the IPCC's conclusions. Climate Audit is edited by Steve McIntyre, a former mineral industry executive. In one e-mail sent in 2008, Professor Jones tells a colleague how he managed to persuade the university to refuse information requests from Climate Audit. "When the FoI requests began here, the FoI person said we had to abide by the requests. It took a couple of half-hour sessions -- one at a screen, to convince them otherwise showing them what CA was all about. Once they became aware of the types of people we were dealing with, everyone at UEA (in the registry and in the Environmental Sciences school -- the head of school and a few others) became very supportive." In possibly the most damning e-mail, Professor Jones asks a colleague at another university to delete e-mails discussing contributions to the IPCC's fourth Assessment Report. "Mike, Can you delete any e-mails you may have had with Keith re AR4?" The recipient of this e-mail was Michael Mann, a climatologist at the University of Pennsylvania, who produced the famous "hockey stick" graph showing a sharp upward turn in global temperatures after 1900. Sceptics have dubbed Professor Jones, Mr Mann and their colleagues the "hockey team". Professor Jones wrote in 2005 that if anyone tried to use FoI legislation to obtain the code behind the computer models used to plot the global temperature record, he would be "hiding behind" data protection laws. Tom Wigley, another US climate scientist close to Professor Jones, attempted to warn him last year about the implications of refusing requests for information. He wrote: "The trouble here is that withholding data looks like hiding something, and hiding means (in some eyes) that it is bogus science that is being hidden." A one-handed balancing act Profile The Information Commissioner There are few organisations beyond the reach of the Information Commissioner, and Christopher Graham, the fourth holder of the role, faces a daunting set of responsibilities. He must ensure that every organisation that holds personal information does so responsibly and securely. This means ensuring that the data, which includes credit card details and Census information, does not fall into the wrong hands, is not covertly sold and is not used in ways to which the subject has not agreed. A more political role is to police the Freedom of Information Act. Under rules introduced in 2005, the public has a right to request any public information or document, so long as its release does not breach national security or diplomatic relations and is not too expensive. In cases where the commissioner suspects that details have been wilfully destroyed to avoid publication, they can fine or even prosecute senior figures in that body. In practice, however, the work of the commissioner is limited in three crucial respects. First, there are limited resources to reach verdicts on information requests. Second, there is no way of dealing with the biggest menace in freedom of information cases: delays during which public bodies sit on requests for months. And they do not have the final say, with the public able to appeal to the Information Tribunal. It may be a robust system, but it is not a fast one. To: Ben Santer Date: 13.57pm, December 3, 2008 When the FOI requests began here, the FOI person said we had to abide by the requests. It took a couple of half hour sessions - one at a screen, to convince them otherwise showing them what CA [Climate Audit, a website run by sceptics] was all about. Once they became aware of the types of people we were dealing with, everyone at UEA (in the registry and in the Environmental Sciences school - the head of school and a few others) became very supportive. I've got to know the FOI person quite well and the Chief Librarian - who deals with appeals. The VC is also aware of what is going on -at least for one of the requests, but probably doesn't know the number we're dealing with. We are in double figures. To: Mike Mann Date: 08.12am, 29 May 2008 Mike, Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith re AR4? [the fourth report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change]. Keith will do likewise. He's not in at the moment - minor family crisis. To: Wei-Chyung Wang Date: 04.22am, June 19, 2007 Think I've managed to persuade UEA to ignore all further FOIA requests if the people have anything to do with Climate Audit. To: Mike Mann Date: 09.41am, February 2, 2005 If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I'll delete the file rather than send to anyone. We also have a data protection act, which I will hide behind. Tom Wigley has sent me a worried email when he heard about it - thought people could ask him for his model code. He has retired officially from UEA so he can hide behind that. To: Tom Wigley Date: 15.20pm, Jan 21, 2005 I wouldn't worry about the code. If FOIA does ever get used by anyone, there is also IPR [possibly referring to Intellectual Property Rights] to consider as well. Data is covered by all the agreements we sign with people, so I will be hiding behind them. I'll be passing any requests onto the person at UEA who has been given a post to deal with them. The hockey stick graph Acquired its name because it shows the temperature in the Northern Hemisphere remaining relatively flat for almost a thousand years and then sharply increasing after 1900. It is used to claim that manmade emissions are the main cause of global warming Credit: Ben Webster Environment Editor

[5] Ed Miliband was furious. His press conference should have highlighted Britain's role at the Copenhagen climate talks that open tomorrow -- but instead he faced questions on whether global warming was even true. "We have to beware of the climate saboteurs," the Climate Change Secretary barked. "The timing of this leak and the questioning of the science [are] not coincidental." Miliband was referring not only to the now infamous leaking of emails from the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit. His definition of "saboteurs" also included climate sceptics such as Lord Lawson, who recently set up the Global Warming Policy Foundation, and David Davis, the former Conservative frontbencher, who last week challenged the science in a newspaper article. "Whenever you get to a difficult political moment, a difficult set of decisions, there'll be people saying there's an easy way out," Miliband said. "The science is, however, clear and settled and we will push on in getting an agreement that is consistent with the science." The day he spoke, his words were being undermined -- by the man who has done most to make global warming a global obsession. Jim Hansen, director of Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, said he shared the sceptics' hope that the Copenhagen talks would fail. "The whole approach [at Copenhagen] is so wrong that it is better to reassess the situation," he said. What Hansen was complaining about was not the science but the solutions to be proposed at Copenhagen. At first sight, his outburst has no link to the campaigning of these other so-called saboteurs, but the two anti-Copenhagen camps have much in common. Both reflect a backlash that is threatening to undermine the process and both can trace back their roots to the 1980s and 1990s. Peter Taylor, one of the British sceptics, explained what happened in his book Chill: A Reassessment of Global Warming Theory. "The scientists who believed in climate change outmanoeuvred the sceptics and turned their view of global warming into the official line," he said. "Ever since, the two sides have been polarised." Where did the sceptics go? Largely ignored by the mainstream media, they built an online community, centred on several prominent bloggers. This is the base from which most of the current attacks have sprung. The best known is Steve McIntyre, who set up the Climate Audit site. "I have been getting 6m hits a year for four years and now it has tripled to 60,000 hits a day," he said. His website has been followed by many more as sceptics put increasing presssure on the "warmists" as climate scientists are known. Meanwhile, the climate scientists have been building a bigger support base. Over the past decade the science supporting Hansen's view that the world is warming has grown ever stronger. However, it was his turn to be marginalised when it came to solutions. Hansen had always favoured a direct carbon tax -- in which oil, gas and coal are taxed at the point where they are extracted or imported. When world leaders met in Kyoto in 1997 they chose a cap-and-trade scheme under which every country gets a limit on carbon emissions. Copenhagen should extend this to a worldwide system. Hansen believes it will prove too complex; so now, like the sceptics, he and his supporters are working to undermine Copenhagen. We should know soon if this accidental alliance can derail a deal but in the short term it seems unlikely. That's because, over the next two weeks, about 100 world leaders will arrive in Copenhagen -- a change that has turned it from a conference to a high-level summit. Their presence will generate huge pressure for apparent success -- a pressure that means there will almost certainly be some kind of agreement. The question is: given the breadth of opposition, will it be worth anything in the long term? Credit: Jonathan Leake

[6] THERE HAS been a hilarious twist to the campaign by the shock troops of the global warming scare to convince us that, contrary to all the evidence, Antarctica is warming up. Behind this claim were scientists associated with the US's leading pro-warmist blog, RealClimate, including Michael Mann, creator of the notorious "hockey stick" graph, and Dr James Hansen's colleague Dr Gavin Schmidt of the Goddard Institute for Space Studies. When their allies at Nature made a cover story of their claims, this hit headlines across the world, trumpeted by all the usual suspects, from the BBC to The Guardian's George Monbiot (aka the Great Moonbat). But they hadn't reckoned with the forensic expertise of two leading US science blogs, Anthony Watts's Watts Up With That and Climate Audit, run by Steve McIntyre, the chief demolisher of the "hockey stick". Combing through the data they discovered that the chief evidence for a warming Antarctica came from a single weather station, codenamed "Harry". But the data for Harry was not all it seemed. Secretly spliced in with it were lower temperature readings from a quite different weather station, Gill, so that the higher and later temperatures from Harry (cocooned for several years in snow) made it look as though there had been a warming which didn't exist. Dr Schmidt was so embarrassed when this sleight of hand was exposed that he pretended it had come to light through an "independent" observer, who was then revealed to be himself (after reading the blogs run by his more assiduous critics). But perhaps Nature, Moonbat and co should apologise to their readers for having been fooled by such chicanery.

[7] IN EVERY CHILD'S life there comes a time when childhood fantasies are shattered and he or she is forced to accept reality . Grown-up scientists, theologians, historians, archaeologists and others who pursue facts and objective truths are rooted in reality and constantly adjusting their conclusions, theories and hypotheses when new information comes to light. Those who ignore facts and cling to outdated information, or outright falsehoods, can quickly embrace fanaticism. So it is with "global warming," the secular religion of our day that even has a good number of adherents among people of faith. Having decided to focus less on the eternal and whether anyone dwells there, global warming fundamentalists are pushing planet worship on us in a manner that would make a jihadist proud. The big media have been complicit in this censorship or ridicule of alternative views, mostly refusing to interview anyone who does not push the global warming faith. CBS News this week broadcast a four-part series on "climate change." Newsweek magazine recently slammed global warming "deniers." That brought a counterattack in the Aug. 20 issue from Newsweek contributor Robert Samuelson, who termed the article "highly contrived" and "fundamentally misleading." In 1975, Newsweek was just as convinced - using "scientific evidence" - that a new Ice Age was upon us. Many global warming fanatics have pointed to NASA as proof that their concerns about a warming planet are justified. They have repeatedly cited the Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), whose director, James Hansen, has asserted that nine of the 10 warmest years in history have occurred since 1995, with 1998 the warmest. When NASA was confronted with evidence provided by Climate Audit, a blog run by Stephen McIntyre devoted to auditing the statistical methods and data used in historical reconstructions of past climate data, it reversed itself. Without the fanfare used to hype the global warming fanaticism it had earlier supported, NASA now says four of the top 10 years of high temperatures are from the 1930s. Several previously selected "warm" years - 2000, 2002, 2003 and 2004 - fell behind 1900. GISS now says its previous claim that 1998 was the warmest year in American history is no longer valid. The warmest year was 1934. Has any of this new information changed the minds of the global warming fundamentalists? Nope. Neither has much of it seen the light of day in the mainstream media, which continue to carry stories where seldom is heard an alternative word and the skies are polluted all day. The New York Times ran a story in its Sunday Business section last week that said it would cost a lot of money to fight global warming. The implication being that this money should come from government (and taxpayers), along with more government regulations and control over our lives by the very people who seem to have difficulty winning wars and controlling spending. The Earth has warmed and cooled over many centuries. One can get a sense of who is telling the truth about global warming by the company the concept keeps. Most of the disciples of global warming are liberal Democrats who never have enough of our money and believe there are never enough regulations concerning the way we lead our lives. That ought to be enough to give everyone pause, along with emerging evidence that the global warming jihadists may be more full of hot air than the climate they claim is about to burn us up. Cal Thomas' column is distributed by Tribune Media Services. E-mail him at Cal@CalThomas.com.

[8] To see more of the Houston Chronicle, or to subscribe to the newspaper, go to http://www.HoustonChronicle.com. Copyright (c) 2007, Houston Chronicle Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune Information Services. For reprints, email tmsreprints@permissionsgroup.com, call 800-374-7985 or 847-635-6550, send a fax to 847-635-6968, or write to The Permissions Group Inc., 1247 Milwaukee Ave., Suite 303, Glenview, IL 60025, USA. Jul. 17--Author Chris Mooney has written a new book, Storm World, on the question of global warming and whether it has made hurricanes stronger. The book captures an intense scientific debate in progress and concludes that neither side has the data to definitively prove its case. Mooney will speak about the book at 7 p.m. Wednesday at Barnes & Noble at 12850 Memorial Drive. Last week, he spoke with science writer Eric Berger about storms in a warming world. --Question: A lot of the book focuses on Kerry Emanuel, who is at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and is a leading proponent of the theory that hurricanes are getting stronger, and Bill Gray, at Colorado State, who believes otherwise. Why those two? --Answer: There are other protagonists in the story, but I think Emanuel and Gray neatly represent two different sides of the argument. And among those involved in the debate, Emanuel and Gray are the ones whose research careers go back the farthest on hurricanes. Gray's been at it the longest, but Emanuel, his work goes back 20 years. --Question: After writing the book, as often happens, are both sides mad at you? --Answer: In terms of the balancing, I'm actually getting pretty good marks. I was pleased that -- I don't know if you saw it -- the folks over at Climate Audit (a Web site skeptical of global warming) did a review. I have a track record with The Republican War on Science, and they're suspicious of me on that. But they actually thought it was fair, too. So I seem to have walked a line that both sides are pleased with, at least so far.--Question: A big problem is the fact that, for much of the world, reliable data wasn't collected for hurricanes before 1980. Do we really know enough about the past to reliably settle this debate in the near future?--Answer: A lot of scientists are diving into this field, a lot of different specialties, a lot of climate scientists who didn't study hurricanes before. That's a good thing because people are going to be picking apart the theory and the data from a variety of different angles and they're going to be doing new kinds of studies. For instance, what happens to storm size, has that changed over time? What happens to rapid intensification? Is that occurring more frequently? I think we're really going to have clearer answers in about five years. I'm not saying we're going to have all the answers. But that doesn't mean we have to wait, policy-wise. --Question: So what should we be doing policywise? --Answer: We should basically acknowledge there's a scientific debate. That's a fact. And we need to acknowledge that we're so incredibly vulnerable to hurricanes, and so underprepared, that the scientific debate can pretty much follow its course while we do practical things. Global warming is a problem, and global warming needs to be addressed with climate solutions such as emission caps and better fuel efficiency. Hurricanes need to be addressed with hurricane kinds of solutions, like greater preparedness, better building codes and better evacuation plans. eric.berger@chron.com Credit: Houston Chronicle

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@@ Line 49: / Line 49: @@
 :::::::::Re infotrac: appears I only get access to "Health Reference Center Academic" (whatever the heck that is) and some other minor things. I previously had access to the one you mentioned, but I haven't used it in a while. Perhaps it twas the other library that had the good stuff. But, if you provide me with sources, I'll evaluate whether they should be used in an encyclopedia article about Climate Audit. I can't guarantee that I'll use them because if they're anything like the "source" you provided above they shouldn't be used as sources. Were there any other questions? If not, would you please answer mine? Is that the best source for an article on Climate Audit that you can find? And if not, please provide better ones. -[[User:Atmoz|Atmoz]] ([[User talk:Atmoz|talk]]) 02:06, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 ::::::::::Sure, I can do that.  It really doesn't matter anyway.  Even if the article gets changed back to redirect now I'll expand it later in my userspace then repost it.  As [[DeSmogBlog]] shows, it is possible to take bits and pieces from different newspaper articles, including opinion columns, and fashion a complete article on a topic. [[User:Cla68|Cla68]] ([[User talk:Cla68|talk]]) 02:10, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
 *Here is a list of Newspaper articles from NewsStand that discuss Climate Audit.  I concealed the article texts in footnotes to protect the copyrights:
+{{hat|Collapse of references that aren't about CA - but only briefly mention}}
 :*"Politics fuel flap over climate prof's work: Conservative group doesn't trust Penn State panel, wants Legislature to probe Michael Mann's research." Frank Warner. ''McClatchy - Tribune Business News''. Washington: Feb 5, 2010. [Details Climate Audit's response to and involvement in the [[Climategate]] controversy]<ref> (885  words)
@@ Line 354: / Line 356: @@
 Credit: Houston Chronicle</ref>
+:You have got to be kidding? None of these articles are about Climate Audit, and only one of these mention it in more than 1 paragraph, 5 of the references mention it in a brief one sentence
+:Here are the links to the actual articles/Op-Ed's - and i've written how much CA is mentioned - as well as put a paranthesis around what focus it has (Climate Audit or McIntyre).
+:# [http://articles.mcall.com/2010-02-05/news/all-a1_5emails.7169672feb05_1_global-warming-global-temperatures-inquiry One sentence] mention. (McIntyre)
+:#  [http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/03/climate-scientists-freedom-information-act One paragraph]  mention (McIntyre)
+:# [http://www.thesun.co.uk/scotsol/homepage/news/papercolumnists/donaldmacleod/2831667/Inconveniently-for-the-experts-global-warming-is-a-con.html One paragraph] mention (Climate Audit)
+:# [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7005327.ece Two paragraph] mention (Climate Audit)
+:# [http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/copenhagen/article6945810.ece One sentence] mention (McIntyre)
+:# [http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/4550448/Charles-Darwin-zealots-have-made-science-a-substitute-religion.html One sentence] mention (McIntyre)
+:# [http://townhall.com/columnists/CalThomas/2007/08/16/not_so_hot_air One sentence] mention (McIntyre)
+:# [http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl//4972783.html One sentence] mention (Climate Audit)
+:--[[User:KimDabelsteinPetersen|Kim D. Petersen]] ([[User talk:KimDabelsteinPetersen|talk]]) 08:00, 28 April 2010 (UTC)
+{{hab}}
 *'''Keep as article''' - per Cla68. [[User:ATren|ATren]] ([[User talk:ATren|talk]]) 02:02, 28 April 2010 (UTC)