George Monbiot, who the other day voiced anger at the misbehaviour of so-called scientists at the University of East Anglia’s climate resarch unit, has reverted to his original mode of George Moonbat by attacking AGW skeptics as deniers who want to dupe the public in the service of Big Oil. It does not occur to this man that he, and others like him, also have made a very nice living out the AGW story. After all, research grants and academic careers have been built on it. Where’s there is muck, there is brass, as they say.
There is a whiff of desperation in the air from these guys, who resemble nothing so much as a bully confronted by those whom he or she has tormented. Opinion polls like this one show high levels of skepticism among the public about the claims made by alarmists, and the fact that the climate has not, on average, warmed up at all since 1998, is not quite helping their cause.
Monbiot and others like him need to drop the hysteria, the smugness, the bullying and the rest of it. They need to grasp the fact that their predictions are debatable and that the CRU leaks are intensely damaging to their agenda.
Even a BBC Breakfast TV presenter, who normally has all the interviewing manner of a soft cuddly toy, asked a guy on the show yesterday about “whether the UEA leaks are undermining the Copenhagen process”. This story is not going away.
To me the screamers, particularly in the media, resemble some dinosaurian ancestor of the lemmings – bellowing as they go over the cliff into the deep. Look at the Guardian-inspired editorial spread across the pages of, say, the Brunei Times and El Universal, demanding that the Copenhagen summiteers force us to “change our lifesyles.” Pretty amusing.
BTS, see “Ideology of news: The drowning”:
http://vulgarmorality.wordpress.com/2009/12/07/ideology-of-news-the-drowning/
They’re reverting to the familiar tactics that worked in the past, not least because they had a grain of truth back then: the tobacco industry did try to defend its interests, and when the UN withdrew funding from its long-term study that was finding little correlation between “passive smoking“ and cancer, it of course stepped into the breach.
But that doesn’t wash in the age of the blog. Assuming there’s no cover up of CRU proportions, nobody’s funding Anthony Watt, for example. Or Bishop Hill. Or Richard North. Moonbat himself has become a great deal better off through pouring ill-informed scorn on them than they have through attempting to cut through the propaganda and find the truth.
The wheels are beginning to come off the Big Government bandwagon (although they’ll stop at nothing in their attempts to bolt them back on).
Oops. Meant “resorting”.
There is another aspect to the CO2 regulation mania that no-one seems to have considered and that is what negative effect the reduction in CO2 levels might ultimately have. Ozone leyel hysteria and attempts at reduction produced such effects and Saint Rachel Carson’s hyasteria led to a world wide malaria holocaust of innocents. Looking at the on the one hand and on the other hand aspect of a “problem” seems beyond the capability of the George Monbiots and their ilk.
I’m old enough to remember the Miners’ Strike of 1984/5, when you would find crusties infesting the streets with collection tins for the miners’ wives and families (a bit sexist in retrospect, but true). Now the crusties (maybe their kids, who knows or cares?) are marching against coal and CO2 (a bit scientifically illiterate that one). The only constant is stupidity.
George Monbiot is the Savonarola of our time and his Bonfire of the Vanities resonates with a public that has been chastened by its inability to live high off the hog of the profits from rising house prices.
Also Climate Change is a never ending story, that, while it will never reach the paroxysm of a Death of Michael Jackson, is probably worth more when integrated over time.
So it has not been dealt a knockout blow yet.
I have to say that I am intrigued by the issue of all the private jets and gas-guzzling cars that are being used by the delegates at the Copenhagan conference. Obviously the “Deniers” are jumping on this matter with delight, but what does it all mean? Are the delegates just arrogant hypocrites who think that severe restrictions on fossil fuel consumption should be applied to everyone but themselves? Do they just understand that token cycling and travelling on buses would be viewed by the cynical media as the tokenism that it is, so what the hell, may as well travel in comfort? Or do they simply not believe the whole man made global warming thing at all, or just don’t care either way as long as they get to enjoy a huge junket at someone else’s expense? One of those someone elses by the way is me, who would either work fewer hours or retire earlier and as a consequence reduce his “Carbon Footprint” if he paid less tax.
So the skeptics are being funded by Big Oil. Look who is talking to Shell:
From: “Mick Kelly”
To: m.hulme@xxxxxxxxx.xxx
Subject: Shell
Date: Wed, 05 Jul 2000 13:31:00 +0100
Reply-to: m.kelly@xxxxxxxxx.xxx
Cc: t.oriordan@xxxxxxxxx.xxx, t.o’riordan@xxxxxxxxx.xxx
Mike
Had a very good meeting with Shell yesterday. Only a minor part of the agenda, but I expect they will accept an invitation to act as a strategic partner and will contribute to a studentship fund though under certain conditions. I now have to wait for the top-level soundings at their end after the meeting to result in a response. We, however, have to discuss asap what a strategic partnership means, what a studentship fund is, etc, etc. By email? In person?
I hear that Shell’s name came up at the TC meeting. I’m ccing this to Tim who I think was involved in that discussion so all concerned know not to make an independent approach at this stage without consulting me! I’m talking to Shell International’s climate change team but this approach will do equally for the new foundation as it’s only one step or so off Shell’s equivalent of a board level. I do know a little about the Fdn and what kind of projects they are looking for. It could be relevant for the new building, incidentally, though opinions are mixed as to whether it’s within the remit.
Regards
Mick
If all these scientists have been hired under a very generous government sinecure to find global warming, now they’ve found it, why are they still receiving taxpayer funded sinecures?
My money would be on that one.
I work for Big Oil and run a blog. If people are getting paid for promoting Big Oil’s viewpoint, where the hell is my cut? I’m expected to run projects and supervise reckless idiots for my wages, how come I missed the option of blogging on their behalf?