A few days ago the media and leftward blogs reported uncritically on a leak of documents from Heartland Institute. There was no effort to verify the documents, as they were just too 'good to check,' or rather, nicely dovetailed with all the worst stereotypes the media and the left (but I repeat myself) holds about those who disagree with them on climate change. Heartland pointed out that of the 9 documents released, seven were obtained by criminal activity, one was a two year old tax return available on the internet, and one was a forgery. That forgery is the single document most quoted by those who on the left, because it's the only on that contained anything remotely questionable. Naturally so, since it is composed of material cut and pasted from the other documents, liberally sprinkled with fiction that could only have come from the fevered brain who imagined that those who disagreed with him politically really do talk like Batman villains, as Megan McArdle pointed out.
It was laughably obvious that it was a fake, although scores of commenters on the left kept saying they couldn't see what was so obviously fake. This is because they were thinking in comic book images. Seriously, the phony memo had Heartland people referring to themselves as being opposed to the teaching of science. This is the point of view of Warmists, not skeptics of themselves.
The documents refers to Heartland as wanting to 'undermine' the IPCC reports. Think of a cause you oppose, any cause. Do you speak in terms of wanting to 'undermine' the work of those with whom you disagree on that issue, or in terms of wanting to correct their disinformation? No matter which side you're on, they do the undermining, you do the correcting.
It refers to Forbes as a source that has been friendly, 'reliably anti-climate.' If that didn't send 'fraud here!' warning bells, lights, sirens, and screams to your skull, you need to recognize that you think in comic book villain imagery. NO skeptic frames his position in terms of being 'anti-climate.' That is rather shrill warmist propaganda, and more than a little silly.
I really like Delingpole's scathingly hilarious put down of this obviously blind way of seeing the 'opposition':
If you're going to pretend to be one of the "enemy" at least have the intelligence to try to think like the "enemy" would. I know this is going to come as a major shock to the kind of foam-flecked, cerebrally-deficient eco-zealots who scrawl in red crayons for DeSmog blog or earn lavish salaries as propaganda shills for the Grantham Institute or fester at the Guardian's environment pages, but here's an amazing fact…
Ready for your amazing fact, fruit loop eco-loons?OK. Here goes.We climate realists don't think of ourselves as anti-science.No, really. We think we're pro-science. That's what we want science teachers to teach kids in schools: hard science – physics, chemistry, biology. Stuff that's empirical. Theories that are falsifiable. Not the kind of junk science they teach in places like the school of "environmental" "science" at comedy institutions like the "University" of East Anglia. Because that's not science at all. It's computer-modelling, projection, which is more akin to necromancy.So, next time you try to fake your Protocols of the Elders of Climategate document, guys, at least try to credit the people you're trying to smear with a bit of integrity. Not everyone is like you, you realise?
Warmist Dr. Peter Gleick has now confessed. To most of it. Claims he didn't make up the fraudulent document, some anonymous source gave it to him via snail mail. Right. That's why a number of people had already suggested he was the true author of the fake document based on the similarities between it and his writing style, as well as internal evidence. But actually, careful parsing of his confession doesn't even mention the faked document. He merely says:
At the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy.I'm sure he hopes that readers assume this 'anonymous document' is the same as the forged memo, but it's odd that he doesn't come right out and say so. He does say this:
I made no changes or alterations of any kind to any of the Heartland Institute documents or to the original anonymous communication.We've already seen that two documents were not emailed to him by Heartland in response to his false claims as to his identity- one was the forgery. The other was a two year old tax document. Perhaps that's the 'anonymous communication.' Or maybe he's just still lying. He could be telling the truth, but long experience teaches most of us that liars who get caught and are thus forced to confess typically lie in their confessions as well. I consider the possibility that he's telling the truth about the fake document to be the least credible option.
As for internal evidence that he wrote the fake memo:
The writing style, which is covered well in Megan McArdle's article (portions of which she seems to have borrowed from Steven Mosher's comments at The Blackboard)
He doesn't like Revkin or Judith Curry, both are mentioned in Heartland's alleged memo as friendly to Heartland (Revkin as 'worth cultivating).
He just started blogging for Forbes, and is mentioned in the fake document as a formidable opponent of Heartland's, which is something only Gleick himself could imagine.
A commenter at Judith Curry's blog also notes two interesting points about the fake memo:
1. It builds up Gleick as a good climate scientist and an important Forbes commentator to be reckoned with.2. It’s claim that Heartland want to discourage teaching of science [i.e. AGW] in schools, is in stark contrast to Gleick’s new position with NCSE encouraging teaching science [i.e. AGW] in schools.
Who is Gleick?
He wrote a scathing review of a book most people believe he hadn't read- based on the fact that his review made claims about the book's contents that were demonstrably false. Although he later insisted he had read it, he refused all requests to prove it by showing a timestamped receipt for the books' purchase to show he'd bought it when he said he did.
Peter Gleick is also the just announced American Geophysical Union chair of the AGU task force on scientific ethics and integrity.
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2011EO470009.shtml
AGU’s new task force on scientific ethics and integrity begins workOkay, within 24 hours of his confession, he is no longer listed as the chair, which is a good thing.
Peter Gleick
Pacific Institute, Oakland, Calif., USA
...As noted by AGU president Michael McPhaden, “AGU can only realize its vision of ‘collaboratively advancing and communicating science and its power to ensure a sustainable future’ if we have the trust of the public and policy makers. That trust is earned by maintaining the highest standards of scientific integrity in all that we do. The work of the Task Force on Scientific Ethics is essential for defining norms of professional conduct that all our members can aspire to and that demonstrate AGU’s unwavering commitment to excellence in Earth and space science.”
He's also somebody the National Center for Science Education in Oakland appointed to their board for the purpose of
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/01/19/comparing-climate-skepticism-to-creationism-in-the-classroom/
He has lectured Judith Curry on integrity in the past, something she finds ironic.
Watts has quite a round up of Gleick's own tweets and commentary exposing himself as a mean-spirited, dishonest hack.
This guy set up a phony email account for the express purpose of fraudulently obtaining private documents from a private organization because he doesn't like their politics. He then published those documents without redacting the private contact information of anybody in them- something the skeptics did not do with the Climate-Gate emails, btw. And there's every reason to suppose that he then created another document out of his own frightened, cliche-ridden little brain and passed that on to his cronies, who published it without question, because it matched up so tidily with all the cliches and comic book villains they carried around in their own little minds. While claiming he received it 'early this year,' the fake document's internal data demonstrates that it was scanned on Feb. 13, 2012, on the West Coast.
Note well, NPR, the WaPo, The NYTIMes, the Guardian, ThinkProgress, DeSmog Blog and others all reported this uncritically, without making any effort to fact check. They all reported an obvious hoax to you as factual because it matched their stereotyped view of those who disagree with them.
In his slimy 'apology,' he claims he was 'driven' to fraud because he desires debate, and he was frustrated by “the ongoing efforts — often anonymous, well-funded, and coordinated — to attack climate science and scientists and prevent this debate..." Heartland Institute has repeatedly invited Gleick himself, as well as other warmists, to come to their conferences and present their information. They refuse. As for “anonymous, well-funded, and coordinated”, this is projection. We've seen that the well funded description applies far more to the Warmists, and the Climate Gate emails revealed how they coordinate thier dishonest attempts to quell discussion. The 'apology' is another false, unsubstantiated, smear attack, isn't it.
Gleick has Democratic operative Chris Lehane,Al Gore’s 2000 presidential campaign press secretary, helping him with 'communication issues.' . Gleick has hired a criminal defense attorney, John Keker.
It's instructive to consider the difference between this and the ClimateGate emails.
With Climate Gate the skepptical blogosphere took time to make sure what they had was authentic. DeSmog blog had a complete post with many background links up in an hour. Nobody asked Heartland to comment.
With ClimateGate private contact information was redacted. Not true with Heartland's stolen documents.
With ClimateGate, the e-mails came from computers and servers paid for by taxpayer dollars, were written by people paid for by the public, doing work paid for by the public and were legitimate topics of FOIA requests illegally denied.. Heartland is a private organization that runs on private donations.
With ClimateGate, there is every reason to believe this was a leak from within.No investigation has shown any 'hacking.' With Heartland, within days we have a half baked confession to fraud.
The NYT refused to print the ClimateGate emails because they alleged they were stolen documents. The Heartland documents are stolen, the theif admits it, and the NYT printed them without questioning their accuracy.
With ClimateGate, the skeptics provided the ISP of the anonymous FOIA sender of the emails. That did not happen with FakeGate. Warmists covered up for the thief.
Andres Revkin writes about Climate change (AKA Global Warming) for the New York Time, and curiously, claimed early on that the forged document was authentic. That post, btw, has gone down the memory hole without explanation or apology
Andrew Revkin Finds Journalism Religion After Posting Fraudulent Document
Flashback: "Revkin told POLITICO on Wednesday that he’s been able to confirm that the documents are legitimate"
Steve McIntrye has a timeline of events. Note the speed with which the usual suspects on the left rushed to publish, leaving no time for fact checking (because they had no interest in facts?).[Note that when I posted the link above at 3:15pm Central yesterday, the text in quotes above was still in the Politico article. Now the text is gone, with no explanation by Politico.]
Other Reactions:
Ben Pile:
The sums of money involved here are minute, compared to the budgets of companies, NGOs, governments and bodies like the EU and UN to spend on environmental propaganda.And this epitomises yet again the environmentalist’s failure to develop a sense of proportion. Not only are the Heartland’s funds dwarfed, there is no substantial relationship between it, the state, and other policy-making processes, as there are between NGOs, national governments, scientific research organisations and the UN, and of course, huge firms....If oil companies really were concerned about protecting themselves from regulation (in fact corporates benefit from tight regulation), why wouldn’t they spend $tens or $hundreds of billions on campaigns? Why wouldn’t they spend $billions — they have the resources, after all. But, of course, this ‘oil companies fund denial’ nonsense is a zombie argument; it’s been put back to death so many times, it’s barely worth repeating: oil companies also fund research and organisations that are impeccably green. As do people with substantial interests in oil — my favourite being Jeremy Grantham, who employs climate big mouth, Bob Ward at the Grantham institute. Grantham funded the Grantham Institute to the tune of £12 million — way more than the budget available to the Heartland — presumably, some of which came from dividends from the $1.5 billion dollars he has invested in oil company stock.
Indeed, yes, let's chat funding:
So what the expose shows is that the Heartland Institute punches far above its weight with an incredibly efficient budget...
The hypocrisy is flagrant. The Sierra Club listed a category for $1,000,000 donations by “anonymous donors” in their 2010 annual report. Strangely DeSmog didn’t froth with anticipation. Their Sierra Club annual report mentions “Matching Gifts”, and apparently supporters who matched gifts include the evil Exxon, not to mention GoldMan Sachs, Barclays, Google, Monsanto, Nestle, Yahoo, Bank of America, and many many more. But that’s alright then.
And if Bob Carter receives an honorarium type amount of $1500 a month, the pull of those big dollars must be powerfully tempting for people like Tim Flannery who struggle along on about $1200 each day he works.
As I always say when these matters are raised, YES Please. Let’s do talk about the funding.
JoNova: These stolen and fraudulent documents don’t tell us anything about the planetary climate, but they do tell us how comfortable the alarmist PR team is to cheat and lie.
Steve Salmony,of the Forum on Science and Innovation for Sustainable Development:
Peter Gleick is standing up for the nobility of science. He deserves support for doing so. It is the abject failure of many too many scientists to stand up for what they believe to be real and true about the global predicament facing humankind that is unacceptable and pernicious. The silence of so many scientists has allowed the ideological idiocy Peter has exposed to triumph over science for way too long. At this moment, I want to salute Peter Gleick. That scientists follow his example is long overdue. Peter, thanks for standing up and speaking out so loudly and clearly.
Judith Curry:
It is fine for people (and scientists) have political ideologies. The problem comes in when you use politics to defend your science, and you use science to demand policies.
Gleick’s unethical action with respect to integrity has been to push fealty to the UNFCCC/IPCC ideology under the guise of promoting integrity and ethics in science.[...]
The end result of Gleick’s actions are to cede the high ground to Heartland, especially in light of the fact that Heartland had invited Gleick to a debate shortly before the theft of the documents occurred.
DeSmog Blog:
Whistleblowers – and that’s the role Gleick has played in this instance – deserve respect for having the courage to make important truths known to the public at large. Without condoning or promoting an act of dishonesty, it’s fair to say that Gleick took a significant personal risk – and by standing and taking responsibility for his actions, he has shown himself willing to pay the price. For his courage, his honor, and for performing a selfless act of public service, he deserves our gratitude and applause.
http://www.collide-a-scape.com/2012/02/21/climate-wars-reach-new-lows/#comment-99931
ProgContra on the weakness of Gleick's confession:
Heartland's reaction to Gleick's confession can be read here. In short, that confession is just not good enough.
David Appell:
Gleick's apology doubled down on his false and discredited accusations. Heartland notes that and defends themselves against the lies. That's only choosing to stay in the muck and mire in a world where moral compasses point south.
Steve McIntyre:
The Wall Street Journal Editorial’s take is “The Not-So-Vast Conspiracy “.
Kevin Knoblach the President of the Union of Concerned Scientists:
More projection and blaming the victim for the lack of ethics on the part of the attacker.