By Alan
Caruba
It is a
sure sign that the advocates of the “global warming” and “climate change”
hoaxes know that the public no longer believes that the former is occurring or
that the latter represents an immediate, global threat.
Even
though the “climate skeptics”, scientists who have produced research proving
false methodology and the conclusions based on it are quite few in number, an
effort to silence them by smearing their reputations and denying funding for
their work has been launched and it is based entirely on a lie.
Scientists
are supposed to be skeptical, not only of other scientist’s findings, but their
own. Good science must be able to reproduce the results of published
research. In the case of the many computer models cited as proof that global
warming was occurring or would, the passing years have demonstrated that none were
accurate.
As Joseph
L. Bast, president of The Heartland Institute and Joseph A. Morris, an attorney
who has fought in several countries to defend free speech, wrote in a February
24 commentary, “The Crucifixion of Dr. Wei-Hock Soon”, of an article co-authored
with Christopher Monckton, Matt Briggs, and David Legates, and published in the
Science Bulletin, a publication of
the Chinese Academy of Sciences “The article reveals what appears to be an
error in the computer models used to predict global warming that leads models
to over-estimate future warming by a factor of three.” (Emphasis added) Their commentary has
been downloaded more than 10,000 times!
“If the
work of Soon et al is confirmed by
other scientists, the ‘global warming crisis’ may need to be cancelled and we
can all enjoy lower taxes, fewer regulations, and more personal freedom.”
However, “having failed to refute the article, environmentalists turned to
smearing the authors.”
Little
wonder the “Warmists” are worried; the Earth has been in a cooling cycle since 1996. People are noticing just how cold this record-breaking and record-setting winter is.
The attack
on Dr. Soon began with a Greenpeace news release that was republished on the
front page of The New York Times on February 22nd. Despite its
august reputation, The Times' coverage of climate issues has been an utter disgrace for decades.
As public interest waned, it eliminated its staff of reporters exclusively devoted to
writing about the “environment.”
Myron
Ebell, a climate change skeptic and director of Global Warming and
International Environmental Policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute,
noted on February 27th that the Greenpeace attack on Dr. Soon of the
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics claimed they had secured $1.2
million in funding for his research over the past decade and that it came from
energy corporations, electric utilities, and charitable foundations related to
those companies. The truth, however, is “that
the grants were made not to Dr. Soon but to the Smithsonian, which never
complained while taking its sizable cut off the top.”
Columnist Larry Bell who is also an endowed professor at the University of Houston, disputed
the Greenpeace claim, saying, “First, let’s recognize that the supporting FOIA
documents referred to an agreement between the Smithsonian (not Dr. Soon) and
Southern Company Services, Inc., whereby 40 percent of that more than $1.2
million went directly to the Smithsonian” leaving “an average funding of
$71,000 a year for the past eleven years to support the actual research
activities.”
Focusing
on Greenpeace and its Climate Investigations Center which describes itself as “a
group funded by foundations seeking to limit the risks of climate change”, Bell
asked “Do these activist organizations make their estimated $360,000,000 annual
funding publicly available?” Bell said “Ad hominem assaults disparaging the
integrity of this leading authority on relationships between solar phenomena
and global climate are unconscionable.”
In his
article, “Vilifying realist science—and scientists”, Paul Driessen, a policy
advisor to the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), noted that in
2012 Greenpeace USA was the recipient of $32,791,149 and that this is true of
other environmental pressure groups that in 2012 secured $111,915.138 for the
Environmental Defense Fund, $98,701,707 for the Natural Resources Defense
Council, $97,757,678 for the Sierra Club, and, for Al Gore’s Alliance for
Climate Protection, $19,150,215.
“All told,”
noted Driessen, “more than 16,000 American environmental groups collect(ed)
total annual revenues of over $13.4 billion (2009 figures). Only a small part
of that comes from membership dues and individual contributions.” With that kind of money you can do a lot of
damage to scientist’s reputation.
They fear
that the public may actually learn the truth about “global warming” and the
fear-mongering claims about “climate change” does not stop with just the environmental
organizations. At the same time The New York Times was printing the Greenpeace
lies, U.S. Senators Ed Market (D-Mass), Barbara Boxer (D-CA), and Sheldon
Whitehouse (D-RI) joined together on February 25th to send letters
to 107 companies, trade associations, and non-profit groups demanding
comprehensive information about all funding of research on climate or related
issues.
Among the
groups receiving the letter were two for whom I am a policy advisor, The Heartland Institute and CFACT, but others include the Competitive Enterprise
Institute, the George C. Marshall Institute, the American Legislative Exchange
Council, and the American Energy Alliance.
Following
The New York Times article, Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-AZ), the ranking Democrat on
the House Natural Resources Committee, sent letters to the presidents of seven
universities asking them to provide details about seven professors who are
either prominent global warming skeptics.
As Rich Lowrey, editor of the National Review, pointed out on February 27th, that "Science as an enterprise usually doesn't need political enforcers. But proponents of a climate alarmism that demands immediate action to avert worldwide catastrophe won't and can't simply let the science speak for itself."
As Rich Lowrey, editor of the National Review, pointed out on February 27th, that "Science as an enterprise usually doesn't need political enforcers. But proponents of a climate alarmism that demands immediate action to avert worldwide catastrophe won't and can't simply let the science speak for itself."
This is
not fact-finding. It is an act of intimidation.
And it looks like a carefully
organized effort to quash any research that might dispute “global warming” or “climate
change” as defined by the Greens and by both the President and the Secretary of
State as the greatest threat we and the rest of the world faces.
The greatest
threat is the scores of environmental organizations that have been exaggerating
and distorting their alleged “science” in order to thwart development here and
around the world that would enhance everyone’s life. Now they are attacking
real scientists, those who are skeptical of their claims, to silence them.
This is what
fascists do.