Editorials Circuitous attempts to smear AGW skeptic scientists
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August 29 2010
Ed. note: Russell Cook, author of the recently published article Silencing Global Warming Critics, sent us the following email and asked that we publish his rebuttal to some of the comments he read. We're happy to oblige.
One particular comment from an AGW believer following my article brings home the entire reason why I stopped focusing exclusively on finding science reports, papers and assessments that contradict the IPCC, to instead focus on accusations that skeptic scientists are 'corrupted by big oil, coal, tobacco, etc. Commenter "Derecho64" wondered why my comments were stuck on "Ross Gelbspan" (the anti-skeptic book author who is largely credited with 'exposing the corruption of skeptics'), and asked for my opinion of the recent James Hoggan / Richard Littlemore "Climate Cover-Up" book that supposedly proves skeptic scientists are corrupt.
"Derecho64" apparently was oblivious to the fact that Hoggan / Littlemore had to take an oddly circuitous route in their book to cite Ross Gelbspan for their source of the infamous 1991 "reposition global warming as theory rather than fact" coal industry internal PR memo that is the subject of my 7/6 American Thinker article which CCF reproduces here. Hoggan / Littlemore cite Naomi Oreskes' famous 2007 PowerPoint presentation as the source. (PDF file transcript here)
Oreskes' PPT cited pages 51-52 of Gelbspan's 2004 "Boiling Point" book for the source, in which Gelbspan cites his own 1997 "The Heat is On" book as the source. But of course, in his first book, he never said where he got the "reposition" memo, an inconvenient truth I pointed out in my 7/6 article.
The primary reason I ever got into this 'accusations against skeptics' angle was the result of an inadvertent prompting from Society of Environmental Journalists board member Robert McClure. That's the individual I mention in my 12/29 American Thinker piece " The lack of climate skeptics on PBS's 'Newshour' ", which CCF has here.
In his own blog last October, where McClure and I had an entertaining back-and-forth about skeptic scientists, McClure assured me "The first person to document widespread payments by industry to “skeptic” scientists, as far as I know, was journalist Ross Gelbspan in his book, circa 1997, “The Heat is On.” But it’s been documented since then, too." Dr S Fred Singer joined in the comment section there immediately afterward.
My questions to McClure about others 'documenting' the alleged corruption went unanswered. And that was the kicker - if he had those 'others' memorized or could look those up among his notes as a simple matter of educating me, why did he not do that?
It wasn't many days after that incident that I stumbled across the "reposition global warming" phrase in a web forum where I had seen it before, but had dismissed it as simply a preposterous accusation. That, and McClure's claim about Gelbspan and 'others', prompted me to look for answers on my own.
I didn't find nice easy answers, I kept finding book authors and article writers citing Gelbspan as their source for the "reposition" phrase. I began to wonder why this all kept spiraling back down to Gelbspan. Then I started finding book authors citing the phrase whose books predated Gelbspan's. All of this prompted more questions than answers, and more searches through name associations, which only provided more questions and more bizarre paths to follow.
This all isn't simply an issue about the science anymore, it spreads to all the unanswered questions about the way skeptics were and are being characterized deliberately or accidentally by the mainstream media and the internet, who collectively never seemed to have checked the voracity of the accusations. Would AGW have died of natural causes long ago, if it weren't for all these highly questionable efforts to make sure the public got only a particular impression of skeptic scientists, and only saw one side of the issue?
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Comments
Mr. Cook, are you familiar with the GCC and this document that was leaked?
documents.nytimes.com/global-climate-coalition-aiam-climate-change-primer
Besides, do you think Pat Michaels' self-admitted "40%" figure does not mean corruption? Please explain.
deepclimate.org/2009/12/02/in-the-beginning-friends-of-science-talisman-energy-and-the-de-freitas-brothers
You may present all the guilt-by-association accusations you want about Michaels or any other skeptic scientist, but as I said before (and I repeat myself), if you are unable to establish any kind of direct link between money and fabrication of false science paper conclusions or assessments, you've proven nothing. In case you didn't bother to read a word of the GCC memos, I can point out they simply reproduce contradictions to the IPCC. Just like the 1991 ICE PR campaign, there's not a word in there that indicates this is any kind of directive to cause skeptic scientists to fabricate false science paper or follow orders from GCC administrators. The very last sentence of the final memo said the GCC was established "to coordinate business participation in the scientific and policy debate on global climate change." Notice the word "debate", meaning the open challenge to be proven wrong.
And as I said before, AGW believers' continued reliance on unsupportable smears of skeptic scientists begs the question: why do they work so hard to silence and discredit them, rather than debate them first, prove the skeptic science wrong, then prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that the skeptic science errors were a result of industry-directed influence? The half-backwards approach of 'accuse them first but don't follow up with hard evidence' is suicidal to the entire cause, if more and more start looking into who started and perpetuated the accusations.
Stay tuned, friends, this whole coal/oil/tobacco ICE/GCC smear of skeptic scientists spirals back to perhaps just around a dozen or so people, all of whom hoped no one would check the voracity of their accusation.
And, notice in Gary's comment here, dissent is silenced. This happened to me as well, over at an AGW believer's web site, the site owner resorted to an IP address trick to prevent me from even looking at her web pages, much less offer tough questions, as I initially attempted to do with the following verbatim statement: "I am amazed you cannot recognize how a defeat of skeptics by directly refuting their science conclusions will assure you unquestioning approval of the general public. Do you not then see why the IPCC / Gore view of global warming is constantly eroding when such efforts to defend the conclusion are avoided? Smear skeptics with unsupported accusations, and the public will look at you with ever increasing suspicion, saying, 'Why are you doing that instead of answering simple questions? What to you have to hide?'"
Aside from money laundering charges his credibility is well... he has none.
His silly little site "DesmogBlog" is a mouthpeice for the FruitFly Scientist Suzuki.
Its main purpose is to smear the reputations of honest and respected scientist in a lame attempt to divert attention away form real science.
I used to coment there regularily. In Fact i and another commentor embarrassed them so much, they closed their site to members only and now restrict who can be members.
Since then, hardly anybody reads or comments on their silly drivel.
They like to think they are influential but well ...... Pathetic.
Their Book is simple another venue for thier baseless smears. It sells well with the AGW fringe as it gives them comfort from the reality of their weak agenda.
More projection from the alarmists, they are truly deranged.
The real reason is he couldn't find any reputable studies that contradict the mountain -- neh mountain range -- of peer-reviewed scientific papers available in support of AGW.
www.populartechnology.net/2009/10/peer-reviewed-papers-supporting.html
Now where are those 2 papers I have been asking you about for months now? Oh, yeah, I better restate completely. And make sure you rememeber, Mr forgetful.
Please provide even ONE peer reviewed paper that either refutes natural variability as the cause of recent climate change or even ONE peer reviewed paper that proves man made CO2 is altering the Earth's climate.
Oh, and Adam is still looking for you. After you ran away. Remember?
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