Climate Science: follow the money

Government monopsony distorts climate science, says SPPI

The climate industry is costing taxpayers $79 billion and counting

Washington, DC 7/22/2009 09:12 PM GMT from TransWorldNews

The Science and Public Policy Institute announces the publication of Climate Money, a study by Joanne Nova revealing that the federal Government has a near-monopsony on climate science funding. This distorts the science towards self-serving alarmism. Key findings:

Climate_money
The starting point in June 1988 - James Hansen's address to Congress

Some Excerpts:

The US Government has spent more than $79 billion of taxpayers’ money since 1989 on policies related to climate change, including science and technology research, administration, propaganda campaigns, foreign aid, and tax breaks. Most of this spending was unnecessary.

Despite the billions wasted, audits of the science are left to unpaid volunteers. A dedicated but largely uncoordinated grassroots movement of scientists has sprung up around the globe to test the integrity of “global warming” theory and to compete with a lavishly-funded, highly-organized climate monopsony. Major errors have been exposed again and again.

Carbon trading worldwide reached $126 billion in 2008. Banks, which profit most, are calling for more. Experts are predicting the carbon market will reach $2 – $10 trillion in the near future. Hot air will soon be the largest single commodity traded on global exchanges.

Meanwhile in a distracting sideshow, Exxon‐Mobil Corp is repeatedly attacked for paying a grand total of $23 million to skeptics—less than a thousandth of what the US government has put in, and less than one five‐thousandth of the value of carbon trading in just the single year of 2008.

Read the entire report here (PDF)

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David
July 23, 2009 10:12 pm

Anyone care to calculate a trend on that graph?
Monopsony indeed. Then again, there aren’t many jobs in the private sector involving this.

David
July 23, 2009 10:21 pm

Maybe juxtapose a graph of the deficit and compare trends?

Jeff Alberts
July 23, 2009 10:30 pm

Carbon Trading. Making money out of thin air.

Douglas DC
July 23, 2009 10:31 pm

From the film “The Right Stuff”(one of my all time favorites)”No Bucks No Buck Rogers”
Or, no bucks, no grants,-unless they meet ah, certain ah, criteria…

Mick
July 23, 2009 10:35 pm

This is one hell of a hockey-stick.
LOL/cry

pops
July 23, 2009 10:44 pm

Duh. Who didn’t already know this? But at least now it’s documented.

Graeme Rodaughan
July 23, 2009 10:51 pm

A similar time frame and $amount to Bernie Madoff…
Could almost be twins…
(of course there’s no comparison b/w AGW and Ponzi Schemes is there???)

Hi-Sci-Fi
July 23, 2009 11:03 pm

In case anyone’s interested -“This Is Where EACH of Your 1.421 Trillion Dollars Is Going In 2010” –
http://gizmodo.com/5320681/this-is-where-each-of-your-1421-trillion-dollars-is-going-in-2010

timetochooseagain
July 23, 2009 11:04 pm

Oh AGH! I HATE that phrase! Follow the ideas-funding is a real issue but “follow the money” (AGH!) is not what the issue is-the issue is bias (that is, ideas). Focusing on the fact that what is being exchanged is money makes the money itself sound bad. It’s from WHO it is coming and WHERE it is going and WHAT follows along with it that matters.
“Exxon‐Mobil Corp is repeatedly attacked for paying a grand total of $23 million to skeptics”
What this generally refers to are donations to think tanks which deal with issues of interest to the company. Often they give money because they like the ideas espoused-but the ideas espoused are not caused by the money, they “cause” the money. What’s more, Exxon donated to many think tanks which take many positions on many issues-including some which are “alarmed” about AGW. And rather ludicrously they have ceased giving any money at all to certain groups, from what I can tell because they were tired of being accused of funding “denial”-and yet the skepticism persists. What’s more, there are hardly any cases in which any more than tenuous “guilt by loose association” connections can be made directly between skeptical researchers and such coporations.
And of course, why is Exxon evil? Evidently because of AGW-but that’s the point to be proved! The “Exxon” screams are circular reasoning, or more likely, jealousy of “obscene” profits.

CodeTech
July 23, 2009 11:06 pm

It takes money to effectively brainwash people. Serious money.
Yeah, I’m with Mick – Laugh/cry. I figure you’re either laughing or crying when you watch stuff like this, I choose laugh.

July 23, 2009 11:17 pm

$79 billion over 9 years (89 to 08) is peanuts. Obama’s cap and trade bill alone is around $5.7 trillion of carbon tax revenues over 18 years (2012 to 2030) is around $316 billion/year, and that’s for federal carbon taxes alone. Excluded there are carbon taxes by various states, counties and cities.
So spend $79 billion, even $150 billion over 10 years, scare the American public, scare the world, for big carbon tax revenues in the future, plus taxes on carbon trading among private corporations.
This is not big scam. It is monster scam.

Ray
July 23, 2009 11:19 pm

The year of 1992 was when Al Gore decided to run for Vice-President with Clinton… this correlates well with the rise of his climate tech investments. From then is stayed fairly flat until he lost his presidential bid and went full time on his climate related opportunities in 2002… this is when the curve starts again rising.

Brandon Dobson
July 23, 2009 11:52 pm

Does WUWT have a presence on Twitter or Facebook? Given that we can’t duplicate this level of funding, social networking can do the job of getting the word out about the bad science of AGW alarmism.

July 23, 2009 11:57 pm

Dittos to Nonoy’s comment. Carbon trading is a humongous scam. It is also one doomed to bubble bursting and phenomenal capital losses that will be borne by the usual patsies, us, the common proles. It’s Enron deja vu on a grand and global scale.
The only scam bigger than energy derivative trading is real estate derivative trading. We all know what happened when a tiny down tick occurred in that financial house of cards: global financial crisis and the institutional thievery of more than $10 trillion (the actual numbers are so big and so convoluted that they cannot be accurately estimated).
It’s a global banking pile on, and the giant sucking sound you hear is the extraction of equity, yours and mine.
So who can blame the scientists bought and sold like cattle, their scientific integrity proffered on street corners to johns with bags of money stolen from quasi-governments? We are all in the same boat; most go with flow while far fewer try to paddle upstream. Yes, many of us here are paddlers, contrarians with a conscience, wiser but poorer, and miffed at the flood of gravy being lapped up by syncophants posing as scientists. But don’t blame the hookers for your own burden of integrity. Yes, the game is rigged, fixed by thuggish fixers, but you knew that going in.

rbateman
July 24, 2009 12:02 am

David (22:21:15) :
Maybe juxtapose GISStemp global means onto it.
Never count your carbon credits before the political gas has risen.
They sure have invested a lot into this agenda.

John F. Hultquist
July 24, 2009 12:18 am

I think it is fair to say that good science and good scientific technology has resulted from the expenditures documented in this report. Some not so much and plenty misdirected toward supporting AGW, especially all the “what will happen” studies. The amount truly wasted (still unknown) pales in comparison to that to be drawn from the economy in coming years and diverted to non-science and non-climate concerns. The U. S. House’s “American Clean Energy and Security Act” has zip to do with saving Earth from warming and much to do with “pork” related re-election strategies and wealth redistribution and, yes, even “global democratic government.” [Use this last phrase as a search term if you are not already aware.]

Ron de Haan
July 24, 2009 12:44 am

Right, let’s make a huge effort and take care that this 7.9 billion dollar is wasted money.
NO CAP & TRADE is a good start.

Paul Vaughan
July 24, 2009 12:51 am

My interpretation of the rules for getting research money in my area (which has a carbon tax):
1. Prove global warming.
2. Project catastrophic consequences of (1).
Note how much legitimate (& important) climate research does NOT fit into this framework.
The monopsony is not in the best interest of civilization.
Suggested: Better balance, for starters.

Neven
July 24, 2009 1:31 am

I would have expected the funds for climate science (without the tech) to have risen far more sharply if it really were a scientific fraud on a large scale. It’s not so strange for climate technology to have risen so much, as satellites and their launching can be quite costly. I would think this technology helps to monitor various aspects of the climate.
Now, to put this article in perspective I would like to see a comparison to the funding for other sciences, such as let’s say genetic modification or weapon technology. And how long does 79 billion last in Iraq and Afghanistan? About 2 months?

Peter Hearnden
July 24, 2009 1:42 am

These figures ‘Climate related Expenditure’ surely include the vast cost of putting satellites into orbit and maintaining them there? Exxon-Mobil simply don’t do that kind of thing.
It’s simple not valid to compare the $23M Exxon-Mobil spend with the $79B – well not unless we think observational satellites are a propaganda exercise.

Stefan
July 24, 2009 1:57 am

The greenies accuse people of being deniers, but it looks like greenies are lacking a healthy dose of cynicism. They’ve yet to awaken to disenchantment with their utopian gaia visions.

Konrad
July 24, 2009 2:29 am

Douglas DC (22:31:59) :
The Right Stuff is one of my all time favorites as well. It shows a picture of America motivated by hope and aspiration rather than the present values of venality and fear. As I have posted on previous threads, I feel the appropriate phrase for climate research is “No b……t, no bucks”.

July 24, 2009 2:29 am

The breakdown of the spending might be of interest. From reference [2] in the SPPI report:
Climate Change Science Program, FY2008 actual budget by budget authority in millions of USD

NASA ............... 1,084
NSF ................   207
Commerce ...........   272
Energy .............   128
Interior (USGS) ....    34
Agriculture ........    65
USAID ..............    14
EPA ................    17
Smithsonian Inst. ..     6
NIH ................     4
Transportation .....     1
TOTAL .............. 1,832

NSF: National Science Foundation
USAID: U.S. Agency for International Development
NIH: National Institutes of Health
So about 60% of all CCSP spending goes to NASA. I would expect that the large majority of this chunk goes into Earth and Sun observing satellite development, construction and operation.

Ray
July 24, 2009 2:37 am

The year of 1992 was when Al Gore decided to run for Vice-President with Clinton… this correlates well with the rise of his climate tech investments. From then is stayed fairly flat until he lost his presidential bid and went full time on his climate related opportunities in 2002… this is when the curve starts again rising.
OH! You’re my new favorite blogger fyi

Freddie
July 24, 2009 3:38 am

Sorry, maybe I’ll look stupid. The graph shows me 7’900 Million $ is that not 7.9 Billion and not 79 Billion as stated??

Allan M
July 24, 2009 3:43 am

From Samuel Butler (1612-1680; a fierce satirist of Puritanism under Oliver Cromwell (UK history for you foreigners)):
What makes all doctrines plain and clear?
About two hundred pounds a year.
And that which was proved true before,
Prove false again? Two hundred more.
(Hudibras pt. 3, canto 1, l. 1277)
Only inflation has changed the numbers. Now its “trillion.” Still scans.

Allan M
July 24, 2009 3:49 am

John F. Hultquist (00:18:25) :
“global democratic government.”
I doubt if they have plans for it to be democratic, but they still have to say so.

Bruce Hall
July 24, 2009 3:56 am

I had a similar observation with regard to an email from Sen. Carl Levin’s office:
There is no reason to be duplicitous with the senators. Our Congressmen need to hear clearly the reasons and reasoning behind opposition to what they have been told is popular or obvious.
Perhaps they might listen for no other reason than, if they follow the money, it leads to those with a vested financial or power interest in the passage of the legislation in question… not necessarily to those who seek real, scientific answers. Real answers are more important ultimately… even if those answers are slightly more complex and difficult than ΔCO2 → Δ°. And the correct course of action may well have little or nothing to do with schemes to limit CO2 through massive government programs.
But maybe our Congressmen do not want to know the real answers. That’s a more difficult course than the simple, easy answers. And that’s a more difficult situation for those of us seeking real answers before starting unnecessary solutions.
http://hallofrecord.blogspot.com/2009/07/climate-data-shuffle.html

jeroen
July 24, 2009 4:35 am

If you want to have fair and honest scientist you should have a frozen amount of cash for 20years. I say the level of 1993. now they don’t have to worry that they are losing there funds when they say: ”There is nothing catastrofic about our climate change.”

July 24, 2009 5:32 am

Is the Sun Missing Its Spots?
BOULDER—Establishing a key link between the solar cycle and global climate, new research led by the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) shows that maximum solar activity and its aftermath have impacts on Earth that resemble La Niña and El Niño events in the tropical Pacific Ocean. The research may pave the way toward better predictions of temperature and precipitation patterns at certain times during the Sun’s cycle, which lasts approximately 11 years.
http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2009/solarcycle.jsp

Enduser
July 24, 2009 5:51 am

Freddie (03:38:38) :
Sorry, maybe I’ll look stupid. The graph shows me 7′900 Million $ is that not 7.9 Billion and not 79 Billion as stated??
Freddy, it didn’t say 79B per year, but 79B since 1988. The graph shows current spending of some 7.something spending per year.
Don’t worry about looking stupid, we all spazz out every once in a while [GRIN].

Pierre Gosselin
July 24, 2009 6:08 am

Thanks to someone here, this is now at Drudge.

James
July 24, 2009 6:27 am

Wow that is one terrible article.
What is wrong with spending money to better understand how our climate works? After all it has a significant effect on the lives of everyone on the planet and to better understand it can allow us to prepare and mitigate the effect of events such as sea-level changes and/or regional droughts.
She’s obviously claiming that this is all some huge government conspiracy to prove AGW and …. actually I’m have no idea what she thinks the government will gain from this.
I don’t think there is any evidence to support the idea that all or even any of the spending and research is intentionally designed to ‘prove’ AGW. In fact the data from at least 1 of NASA’s satellites is regularly used on this site as evidence that the temperature is NOT rising and AGW is NOT happening.
I don’t do any work to do with climatology and probably never will. I prefer working in developing technology to help us kill each other. Take a look at how much NASA get for military applications and you’ll really see how to ‘follow the money’ 🙂

Wade
July 24, 2009 6:40 am

Did anyone read the late Michael Crichton’s book State of Fear. Although he used global warming, the point of the book was not about global warming, stated directly at the end. The point of the book was basically what this study shows, that scientific studies tend to follow those who fund them. Therefore, scientific funding should be blind so as to remove bias.
Human nature is to start with a belief and then try to prove it. We start with the answer and try our best make the answer true. “Climate change is real, how do I prove it?” What we should be doing for all our beliefs is to start with the question and try our best to find the truth. “Is climate change real?” This is not just with science, but many beliefs including religion, politics, and personal opinion. But science is supposed to be the search for truth. Yet far too often, it is a search to verify an opinion or a search to keep the funding going. The truth becomes inconvenient.

Bill Hutto
July 24, 2009 7:12 am

“Nothing produces insulation from reality more effectively than power and money. Power means that decisions based on the prevailing vision over-ride others’ decisions, beliefs, or evidence, regardless of what the facts may be. Money means that support for the ideologically preferred conclusions can be purchased not only from ‘hired guns’ but also by funding the research and writings of those committed to the same viewpoint, for whatever reasons, while those who disagree are left unfunded.”
Thomas Sowell – “The Quest for Cosmic Justice”

July 24, 2009 7:34 am

She’s obviously claiming that this is all some huge government conspiracy to prove AGW and …. actually I’m have no idea what she thinks the government will gain from this.
Cap and Trade Taxes.
We also see this with the drug war. The lies about every drug are astounding. All backed by government “research”. What does the government get out of it? Taxes without question.
Read The Consumer Union Reports and then compare it to Government “reports”.
http://www.druglibrary.org/Schaffer/LIBRARY/studies/cu/cumenu.htm
You think climate “science” is any different? Not when fleecing the taxpayer is concerned. If you are paying attention this is definitely not the first time this sort of thing has been done.

Crust
July 24, 2009 8:09 am

Presumably some (tiny) piece of this is funding for skeptics. E.g. I imagine Lindzen’s NSF grant is included. And a decent chunk of it is presumably relatively neutral data gathering.

jim brobeck
July 24, 2009 8:12 am

The Science and Public Policy Institute (SPPI) is a global warming skeptics group which appears to primarily be the work of Robert Ferguson, its President.
Robert Ferguson is the President of the Science and Public Policy Institute (SIPP), an organization that promotes the views of global warming skeptics and was founded in mid-2007.
Ferguson is a speaker at the International Conference on Climate Change (2009) organized by the Heartland Institute think tank.
He has an undergraduate degree in history from Brigham Young University, and a master’s degree in legislative affairs from George Washington University.
Work for Frontiers of Freedom
Ferguson was previously the initial Executive Director of the Center for Science and Public Policy (CSSP), a project of the corporate-funded Frontiers of Freedom Institute (FOF). Exxon had provided $100,000 in 2002 specifically for the “Center for Sound Science and Public Policy” (sic) as well as a further $97,000 for “Global Climate Change Outreach Activities”, and a further $35,000 for “Global Climate Change Science Projects”; In subsequent years Exxon continued it support for the project including $50,000 for “Project Support – Sound Science Center” in 2003, $70,000 for “Project Support- Science Center & Climate Change” in 2004, $140,000 to the organization in 2005 but without a specific amount for CSPP identified, $90,000 for the “Science & Policy Center” in 2006 and $90,000 for “energy literacy” in 2007.
FOF’s 2004 annual return submitted to the Internal Revenue Service states that for his work for CSSP Ferguson was paid $100,000 and also lists him as one of the Director’s of the think tank] In FOF’s 2007 annual return, Ferguson is listed as working 40 hours a week on CCSP duties and as director of the organization, but without being paid.
Praise for climate skeptics
In a February 2007 interview with Michael Coulter for the Heartland Institute’s publication Environment & Climate News, Ferguson stated that “there are quite a few environmental groups who bring scientists to the Hill, but CSPP is the only group that tries to bring in both sides.” Ferguson stated that “misdirected global warming policies will likely create a monstrous misallocation of resources. We could give housing and clean water to the entire world, and eliminate all major diseases, for just a fifth of what proposals such as the Kyoto Protocol and the British Stern Report might end up costing.” He went on to prise [sic -ed] the role of the global warming skeptics. “It is my experience which guides my firm support of the proposition that skeptics and those who have the courage to support them are actually helpful in getting the science right … They do not, as some improperly suggest, ‘obfuscate’ the issue: They assist in clarifying it by challenging weaknesses in the ‘consensus’ argument, and they compel necessary corrections,” he said. Michael Coulter’s article made no mention of the role of Exxon in funding the CSPP.
Background
A biographical note states that he “has 26 years of Capitol Hill experience, having worked in both the House and Senate. He served in the House Republican Study Committee, the Senate Republican Policy Committee; as Chief of Staff to Congressman Jack Fields (R-TX) from 1981-1997, Chief of Staff to Congressman John E. Peterson (R-PA) from 1997-2002 and Chief of Staff to Congressman Rick Renzi (R-AZ) in 2002. He has considerable policy experience in climate change science, mercury science, energy and mining, forests and resources, clean air and the environment. His undergraduate and advanced degrees were taken at Brigham Young University and George Washington University, respectively. Ferguson served active duty in the US Army from 1966-1970.”
[edit]
Speaking engagements
November 14, 2007: Ferguson was a speaker, along with Lord Monckton, at the “the Eastern Coal States Coalition” conference at the Marriott Griffin Gate Conference Center in Lexington Ky. The announcement for the event by the West Virginia Coal Association stated that Ferguson would “present his new text — ‘Essential Readings in Climate Science'”

OceanTwo
July 24, 2009 8:36 am

James (06:27:28) :
Wow that is one terrible article.
What is wrong with spending money to better understand how our climate works? After all it has a significant effect on the lives of everyone on the planet and to better understand it can allow us to prepare and mitigate the effect of events such as sea-level changes and/or regional droughts.
There’s absolutely nothing wrong with spending money to study such things. Since governments, politicians and the individual policy makers have no agenda, we have completely neutral, bi-partisan results. Right?
The issue is that you have to have a result to justify the expenditure. We are seeing the fallout from this with drug approvals through the FDA; their job is to ‘prove’ that drugs are safe – basically, proving a negative. Think of it this way, how much money is required to prove that drinking water is safe? 1, 10, 10 million or 10 trillion dollars? You can spend anywhere from 1 to 10 trillion dollars and come to the same, safe, conclusion. Why spend 10 trillion when you can spend 1 dollar?
So, government funding goes: to justify [10 million, or whatever] it has to ‘prove’ something. The very demands the public put on our politicians and governments – that spending is justified – can bite back. We vote for representatives who’s agenda aligns with our own, and investment is made to demonstrate our views are confirmed.
In addition to that, the political agenda expects results meet specific political goals; what politician is going to invest (other peoples) money in something which doesn’t further their agenda?
And so, considering AGW, it’s actually very hard to ‘prove’ it isn’t so – proving a negative – while very easy to create evidence for a doomsday scenario. Luckily, the AGW arguments tend to be extremely flawed. That leaves us with demonstrating that the argument used to ‘prove’ AGW doesn’t actually do so, even though it doesn’t ‘prove’ that AGW doesn’t exist.

P Walker
July 24, 2009 9:16 am

jim brobeck (08:12:35) What is your point ? Plenty of corporations fund both liberal think tanks and climate change research .

Gary Pearse
July 24, 2009 9:17 am

Allan M (03:49:31) :
John F. Hultquist (00:18:25) :
“global democratic government.”
I doubt if they have plans for it to be democratic, but they still have to say so.
Note that all governments that have or have had the word “Democratic” as part of their country’s name: Deutsche Demokratische Republik; Democratic Republic of the Congo; Democratic People’s Republic of Korea; or the synonym “Peoples’ Republic” – none are democratic and none are the creation of their “Peoples”. The term is an example of “..protesteth too much” category.

July 24, 2009 9:24 am

When Joe romm and the other Soros sock puppets put all the hostility into the expression BIG oil.
They can’t find a font size big enough when they blame all planet troubles on BIG OIL.
Enron was once big and funded and started the mess. They paid off James Hansen
GE wind owns the remnants of Enron wind and Warren Buffett owns the gas pipeline from Enron we once knew as Internorth.
Buffet is big OIL. liberal and tight with the agenda.

Nogw
July 24, 2009 10:59 am

Are you sure the chinese will lend you the money?

Pamela Gray
July 24, 2009 3:03 pm

Anyone who has written a grant knows that your submission must follow the parameters of the grant’s purpose. For example, it would be usual to see parameters of grants related to climate change in terms of the affects of AGW. If you submitted a proposal to disprove AGW, you would not get funded under that grant. Grants whose purpose is to refute AGW would be far and few between. The deck is stacked. I would venture to guess that there are NO government grants with that purpose in mind.

SandyInDerby
July 24, 2009 4:19 pm

Jeff Alberts (22:30:15) :
“Carbon Trading. Making money out of thin air.”
Best T-Shirt slogan ever

Hvordan
July 24, 2009 4:19 pm

This site should start collecting a list of all the scientist who have been rejected publication or have had grants denied because of their anti-AGW stance.
This site does have a large following, and would be the perfect place to collect the voices of all the scientists who have been gagged by the government and peer review journals.

Allan M
July 24, 2009 4:37 pm

SandyInDerby (16:19:18) :
“Jeff Alberts (22:30:15) :
“Carbon Trading. Making money out of thin air.”
Best T-Shirt slogan ever”
I have another:
CO2: Feed the plants: Feed the People

Ron de Haan
July 24, 2009 5:08 pm

This is an unbelievable story.
It’s about a prominent scientist who, in my opinion, has sold his scientific integrity for his political views.
And for this we have won the freking Cold War?
Jul 24, 2009
Why We Disagree About Climate Change: Understanding Controversy, Inaction and Opportunity
Book review by Joseph Bast
Having participated in the national and international debate over climate change for more than 15 years, I eagerly bought and read this book in the hope that it would examine the ideas and motives of both sides in the global warming debate. But that is not what this book is about.
The author, Mike Hulme, is a professor of climate change at the University of East Anglia, in the UK. He helped write the influential reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and many other government agencies that are commonly cited by alarmists in the debate. He has been one of the most prominent scientists declaring that “the debate is over” and that man-made global warming will be a catastrophe.
In this book, Hulme comes clean about the uncertain state of scientific knowledge about global warming, something alarmists almost never admit in public. For example, he writes, “the three questions examined above – What is causing climate change? By how much is warming likely to accelerate? What level of warming is dangerous? – represent just three of a number of contested or uncertain areas of knowledge about climate change.” (p. 75)
Later he admits, “Uncertainty pervades scientific predictions about the future performance of global and regional climates. And uncertainties multiply when considering all the consequences that might follow from such changes in climate.” (p. 83) On the subject of the IPCC’s credibility, he admits it is “governed by a Bureau consisting of selected governmental representatives, thus ensuring that the Panel’s work was clearly seen to be serving the needs of government and policy. The Panel was not to be a self-governing body of independent scientists.” (p. 95)
All this is exactly what global warming “skeptics” have been saying for years. It is utterly damning to the alarmists’ case to read these words in a book by one of their most prominent scientists.
How does Hulme justify hiding these truths from the general public? He calls climate change “a classic example of … `post-normal science,’” and quoting Silvio Funtowicz and Jerry Ravetz, defines this as “the application of science to public issues where `facts are uncertain, values in dispute, stakes high and decisions urgent.’” Issues that are put into the category of “post-normal science” are no longer subject to the cardinal requirements of true science: skepticism, universalism, communalism, and disinterestedness.
In “post-normal science,” consensus substitutes for true science. Political processes run by government bureaucracies, like the IPCC, are created to determine the views of a majority of carefully selected scientists. Any questioning of their statements and claims is dismissed as coming from the “fringe” of the scientific community. From this reasoning comes the claims of James Hansen, Al Gore, and many other alarmists that “the debate is over” and there is “virtually unanimous consensus” about the causes and consequences of global warming, even though according to the rules of true science, and scientists like Mike Hulme, the debate is definitely not over and there is no consensus.
Having freed himself from the restraints of true science, Hulme can indulge his political biases. In another amazing admission, he says his views on global warming are inseparable from his politics–he’s a self-described socialist. He writes, “The idea of climate change should be seen as an intellectual resource around which our collective and personal identities and projects can form and take shape. We need to ask not what we can do for climate change, but to ask what climate change can do for us.” (p. 326)
According to Hulme, climate change can do a lot: “Because the idea of climate change is so plastic, it can be deployed across many of our human projects and can serve many of our psychological, ethical, and spiritual needs.”
In other words, socialists like Hulme can frame the global warming issue to achieve unrelated goals such as sustainable development, income redistribution, population control, social justice, and many other items on the liberal/socialist wishlist.
Like the notorious Stephen Schneider, who once said, “We have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts one might have. … Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest,” Hulme writes, “We will continue to create and tell new stories about climate change and mobilise them in support of our projects.”
These “myths,” he writes, “transcend the scientific categories of `true’ and `false’.” He suggests that his fellow global warming alarmists promote four myths, which he labels Lamenting Eden, Presaging Apocalypse, Constructing Babel, and Celebrating Jubilee.
It is troubling to read a prominent scientist who has so clearly lost sight of his cardinal duty–to be skeptical of all theories and always open to new data. It is particularly troubling when this scientist endorses lying to advance his personal political agenda. See review here.
From icecap.us

Brandon Dobson
July 24, 2009 6:01 pm

Here is a good summary of the state of global warming grantsmanship from physicist and meteorologist Craig Bohren, distinguished professor emeritus at the Pennsylvania State University:
“Skeptics about global warming are often painted as hirelings of the oil and automotive industries. Such claims irritate me. I have never earned a nickel as a consequence of my skepticism. Indeed, I have lost hundreds of thousands of dollars by it. First, you have to understand how a large research university operates. The professors are expected to obtain research grants, and in the atmospheric sciences these grants come mostly from government agencies.
In the atmospheric sciences it is difficult to get grants unless you can somehow tie your work to global warming, that is to say, to scare science. Because of my reputation, I immodestly believe that I could have jumped onto the global warming bandwagon. But I refused to do so because I would have found this repugnant.
At some universities, professors get only a fraction of their salary from the university, the rest coming from contracts and grants. Research associates and research professors often must scrounge for 100% of their salaries.
Professors not only directly profit from their research grants (summer salaries), they also indirectly profit. If Professor X has grants amounting to millions of dollars, this gives him leverage. He wants more money so he threatens to leave and take his bags of money with him if he doesn’t get a whopping raise. Or he plays one university off against another. He gets an offer from another university in order to pressure his present university to increase his salary. I have seen this done many times. The system of federal grants, which hardly existed before (World War II), has created a professoriate with greater allegiance to government agencies than to their universities.”
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/columnist/aprilholladay/2006-08-07-global-warming-truth_x.htm
And here we have a good example of grantsmanship in the making, from that major source of global warming alarmism, “ScienceDaily”:
Federal Funding Gap Cited For Research On Human Health Impacts Due To Climate Change
“ScienceDaily (Mar. 26, 2009) — Climate change will seriously impact public health, but the United States has yet to allocate adequate research funding to understand and prepare for these impacts, according to a report published in Environmental Health Perspectives, the journal of the U.S. National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences.
The report suggests that the current knowledge gap regarding climate change and public health is putting multitudes at risk and calls for a major expansion of research to tackle this problem.”
Yeah, right…
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2009/03/090326150554.htm
LOL – Even though rational thinkers consider the global scare essentially dead, the stale corpse of AGW will still be trotted around like a rerun of Weekend at Bernies –
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Weekend_at_Bernie's
“In February 2007, Oregon Governor Ted Kulongoski asked the president of Oregon State University to stop George Taylor from calling himself the state climatologist because of Taylor’s skeptical stance on global warming.”
At what point will Kulongoski apologize for this?
http://blog.oregonlive.com/pdxgreen/2008/02/controversial_state_climatolog.html

JT
July 24, 2009 7:11 pm

Its basically $79 Billion of welfare for do-gooders and tree huggers.

Lance
July 24, 2009 8:12 pm

Before the money, there was Al Gore & Roger Revelle
http://www.kusi.com/weather/colemanscorner/40867912.html
“While serving as Director of Scripps, Revelle and one of his researchers wrote the first modern scientific paper that linked carbon dioxide released into the air from the burning of fossil fuels and the greenhouse effect and the warming of temperatures. This triggered an avalanche of research that eventually became the impetus behind the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and the entire global warming movement.”
Then a twist.
“In 1988 Roger Revelle was having major second thoughts about whether carbon dioxide was a significant greenhouse gas. He wrote letters to two Congressmen about it. And in 1991 he co-authored a report for the new science magazine Cosmos in which he expressed his strong doubts about global warming and urged more research before any remedial action was taken.
At that point Mr. Gore pronounced Revelle as senile and refused to debate global warming. He continues to refuse to debate today. Many offers of 10s of thousands of dollars have been made such a debate. Today Gore sequestered the media at this event and set forth rules, no questions, no interviews. ”
Alas this turned into a court case with Singer who coauthored with Revelle ,
The Revelle/gore story,
http://www.urban-renaissance.org/urbanren/revelle-gorestory.pdf
Al gore is a BIG part of this ridiculous science mess.

July 25, 2009 3:04 am

So spend a few billion a year to justify collecting 500 plus billion a year in taxes, strgenthen polical power, and use this tax money pretty much however you like. Humm? sounds like a great political investment, even more so consi
dering that the oringinal investment came from taxes in the first place.
Now where is the Govt sponorsed study quantifying the economic saving from the fact that without this 100 part per million increase in CO2 we would need 12 percent more water just to grow the current amount of food we produce.
The agenda is proven by the fact that the govt only studies “possible” catostrophic negative consequences, and does not study observable positive
effects. The agenda is proven by attempts to silence decent. The agenda is proven by refusal to release data and methods of how “scientific” studies reached their conclusion, rendering these studies incapable of being reproduced.

Hi-Sci-Fi
July 25, 2009 6:38 am

Sounds like a lot of money – then again:
“Fed Refuses to Disclose Recipients of $2 Trillion”
http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=apx7XNLnZZlc
“A Few Trillion Missing from Pentagon”

“Financial bailout’s cost to U.S. could total almost $24 trillion”
http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/32010841/ns/business-us_business
“What Does A Trillion Dollars Look Like?”

So, I guess things “could” be worse and even without the climate “science” funding…

Brian in Alaska
July 25, 2009 8:15 pm

“The problem with science, you know, is that it’s like a religion. There are fashions or beliefs which are considered dogmas like in a religion. And you have to believe in it. And if you don’t, you are not executed, you are not burnt now but you are put away out of the field. You don’t have money, it is very difficult to exist or persist. So you have to follow the fashion.” – Luc Montagnier recipient of the 2008 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine.

Mikko
July 28, 2009 2:28 am

Regarding Joanne Nova’s astonishing report on climate science funding, I thought about the money a bit. I took fiscal year 2008 as a sample, in which, according to said report, 1 864 million dollars was spent on climate science. That’s a frikkin’ big load of money! It did make me wonder at where all that money is spent, and Nova for sure is certain that it is spent against the benefit of the tax payer and against what she describes is “good” science. Being a layman in these financial matters, I took to google and checked to get a comparison to that sum of 1 864 million dollars. What else is being done in the US with similar amounts?
From this page ( http://www.infoplease.com/ipa/A0104772.html ) I found a “Summary of Federal Government Expenditure” for the fiscal year 2006.
I tried to find some number from this government statistic for fiscal year 2006 that would match the 2008 amount spent on climate science. One number (there were many options) was the amount that the state of New Hampshire spends on grants: 1 743 million dollars. And that is for GRANTS only. This state of New Hampshire has a population of 1,3 million approximately (estimate for 2008).
So, the amount spent on climate science for 2008 roughly equals the 2006 amount New Hampshire spent on grants. Total expenditure for said year for the state is 8 875 million dollars.
It does kind of put Joanne Nova’s “shocking” figures into perspective, doesn’t it?

Jeff Alberts
July 28, 2009 3:07 pm

Being a layman in these financial matters, I took to google and checked to get a comparison to that sum of 1 864 million dollars. What else is being done in the US with similar amounts?

It’s certainly not being used to re-write archaic, and poorly-written applications which manipulate the station temps. Apparently some of it is going towards running RealClimate.org, since at least one NASA employee maintains it during work hours. So some of it is directly used for propaganda and to stifle dissent.