"Climate Reality" is Al Gore's Gettysburg

Al might find himself pre-empted by events that are actually important.
Besides, you know what effect he has on our weather. We certainly don’t need that.

We have to be careful though – we don’t want lists of skeptics falling in to the hands of the ecoterrorists. They’ve already been given carte blanch to do what they want in respect to the environment or what hey perceive as an action against it. We are not dealing with mentally stable people remember. But we are smarer than them, that’s been proven scientifically.

Kipling said “THE ODDS ARE ON THE CHEAPER MAN”
My money is now on ANREA ROSSI`S ITALIAN/GREEK alliance and their E-CATS.

“Person, Topic, Date, Link, Quote, Comment and Context”
Exactly! That is the excerpted information I tried to provide to Anthony, albeit in text form with links. If we can do better, I’m all for it and will support. Until a better way is identified and agreed upon however, I’ll continue to research new quotes and forward them in text form with links, as time allows.

While I agree with the author, the battle of ideas has been fought and won. The truth, all the facts, and a pissed off public are on the side of sanity and freedom.
Al Gore is a neurotic self absorbed narcissist cult leader wannabe. America cannot afford his self indulgent pantomime horse charade. While America was once wealthy enough to put up with wasteful green planet saving “solutions” the fad is over. Algore is what he always has been, e.g. – Algore is a fat ass, has been, bloated tick. Algore wants to feed his life long habit at the public trough he helped drain. Statism is dead on its feet. It has collapsed upon its own weight and bankruptcy.
Algore is the poster boy of big government waste, fraud, and abuse.
And failure.
So welcome to the fight Mr Rasey. The bloody fighting is done, the battle is over, the war against science and sanity has been quelled for now.
Funny thing is, I don’t remember Mr Rasey when the barbarians were at the gate. A little late to the party….maybe we can put Rasey to work cleaning up Algore’s vomit stains…
ps, perhaps Mr Rasey can bring a pooper scooper and a snow shovel to Algore’s newest and coolest, greeniest and most meaningless sustainability Woodstock EVER!
You go and fight the big green monster Alogre Mr Rasey, the rest of us warriors will warm our battle tired bones beside the fire.

I think Julian @ 11:35 has the right idea. A big orchestrated campaign (to continue the military metaphor) is problematic on many levels.
I suggest each person prepare a short and well stated letter to you local and state officials hoping they will review evidence and not fall for the agenda being pushed by Gore’s event. Download a few things you personally can related to (e.g., sea level isn’t . . ., glaciers are not . . ., temperatures have not . . .), mention it in your letter and send a copy of the appropriate chart. Keep it short, clear, and friendly. A short letter to you local newspaper regarding Gore and the involvement of the U.N. and their desire to tax Americans without representation (remember that other war?) may be helpful.

@davidmhoffer let’s talk instead about what you are trying to do. Then we can talk about how to do it.
A very intelligent approach, David, because exactly what we need is still nebulous.
Let’s start at the atomic level, because Anthony’s request “I need your help..” resulted in a promising response, but in a fashion and format where much work remains to orgainize it. Replies that were links only make other people need to open them to find out their basics. Other people supplied some of the ‘meta data’ to each link like who, and when, but there was no template to standardize the type of replies.
So let’s imagine readers of this website wish to contribute to a bank, a database, a crossed-referenced resource of
Who, Said What, When, Where, and what is its significance to the debate.
It isn’t so much that we want to find out Who, but that we have 100 people contributing quotes on 20 people about 50 statements each from 300 sources with a fair bit of duplication.
Let us also imaging that we would like to easily access a list of these quotes
By Person
By Topic
By Claim:
By Source:
By submitter (hey, we have to know who submitted the quote)
Where can we go for an index list, a summary listing with hyperlinks to details, of all the misstatements, falsehoods, refuted and withdrawn source material, and failed predictions of Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth”? From Google:
Monckton 2007, 35 errors in Inconv. Truth: http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/monckton/goreerrors.html
Gpwayne 2007, “was accurate and represented the science as it stood.“ http://www.skepticalscience.com/al-gore-inconvenient-truth-errors.htm
How do we skeptics add to that list as time progresses?
What’s more, what is the easiest way to do it with the assets we have at hand? Keeping it simple is essential.
Let’s do the dumb things first. Take the results of Anthony’s June 16 call for help. How would we have liked the data to be submitted by volunteers, so that it can more quickly be organized by Person, Date, Source, and importance? Could a text encoding on this website help? Does someone have an existing website with a different structure that could help as an intermediate or final product?

The approach is dangerous. Any kind of index of notable warmers with thier projections would legitimise a list of deniers and thier “offences” which will be come a handy research/publishing blacklist. Except where there are clear grounds to suspect personnel malpractice lying or conflict of interest, we need to avoid going personnel. Lists of peer viewed papers both for and against and showing how they relate OK, but not comments by people on blogs, or on TV.

The site http://www.numberwatch.co.uk has an exhaustive list of ‘things that are caused by global warming’ with references.
I found http://www.green-agenda.com a mine of quotes by the ‘great and good’ of the AGW brotherhood.

it might be a good start to enumerate the anticipated arguments.
shame without factual refutations will have little effect – e.g., prince phillip wants to be reincarnated as a killer virus to wipe out much of the human race, yet that is not cause for reproach from his cronies.
the individuals whose ambitions are to pull off the biggest heist in human history are without shame.
btw- there is a distinction to be drawn between a subject and a citizen.
americans are not subjects.

Anthony’s site has gone green. Any mild criticism is memory holed and not responded to.
The author seems to think some large response to Algore’s latest mental episode is needed. None is needed. Algore is an oafish baffoon. Sit back, relax, and enjoy Algore’s latest parade of stupidity. At this late date, for reasonable men to muster a call to arms to defend against an idiot like Algore makes about as much sense as blasting air raid sirens to alert the citizenry of Manbearpig. Why raise Algore to any level of credibility at all? Why go throught the intellectual hysterics? Why pretend Algore is nothing more than a has been wannabe green cult guru fraud?
Go into your tizzy if you must. Green old moldy perverts like Algore don’t excite me.
[Reply: Note that your mild criticism has not been ‘memory holed’, and is responded to here.☺ ~dbs, mod.]

Until Gore permits discussion in his profit led meetings it is difficult to see how a direct approach will work.
Keep filling the web with truth to counter the lies as and when they appear. There are a few big, relative, organisations such as SPPI but they probably need more help.
Main problem is the media is not on our side. In particular the BBC who insist in ignoring any accusation of bias or scientific inaccuracy or falsehood. Their science and environmental reporters are too set in their ways to look at facts.

I really don’t think we should trouble ourselves with Al Gore. He’s a spent force. A never-been has-been. The way to deal with Al Gore is to, frankly, ignore him.

No matter what strategy we devise or attempt to use, the real teacher is Nature. I don’t know whether we have time to wait for the lesson to be learned. Perhaps not, however, let’s try to avoid making the story about us. It should be about the real consequences to people of these ideas and the policies they support. We might also explain who is behind it, and perhaps what they hope to gain. I’m not sure scientists can make these arguments.
There must be a coordinated effort by various professionals and scientists to make a strong case describing domestic consequences of CAGW policies and regulations, backed by authentic science (that part we have). The real impact of the Green monster on freedom, jobs, and our future should be explained. We need healthy, economically secure, and strong families living in a sane society. Finally, we might consider roadmapping a better way forward.

I hope I don’t live long enough to see climate war re-enactors complete with slide rules and corporate sponsors.

Who is the target audience for such a list?
For the general populace, who are the target for all politicians espousing the need for carbon control, they are generally not interested in or don’t remember the facts, only the rhetoric.
Hence, in Australia, we have every talking head saying ‘pollution’ ad nauseum. Never mind the science, that has been pushed to the background in the rush to provide a political ‘solution’ to the ‘problem’ of ‘pollution’.
Our media is still placing smokestacks and cooling towers with false contrast to make the graphic darker behind every story concerned with our impending carbon tax. The fact that CO2 is odourless and colourless is irrelevant, it’s the spin that counts, not the facts.
If the warmists will not debate, this list may be a fruitless exercise.

Even though it is two years down here in the Antipodes until our next election is due, our two main parties are engaged in an election campaign focused on a single issue, Anthropogenic Global Warming and a Carbon Tax. Our incumbent government has an approval rating below 30% Our television news has been inundated recently with clips of people saying they do not trust our Prime Minister. The only reason that her party hasn’t replaced her is that they would be even more hated by the general public.

Why give the opposition ammunition. Wait and see what their strategy is. Gorehas limited credibility. Better to use guerrilla tactics keep focussing on rebuttal and specific targets. The military analogy referred to is out of date.

NOTE: Not commenting on the main post here, but I just have to agree with one comment.

davidmhoffer [July 16, 2011 at 10:47 pm] says:
” … my first rule when a client asks “is there a way to do X?” is to respond as follows:
Yes there is. Now let’s put that aside for a moment and let’s talk instead about what you are trying to do. Then we can talk about how to do it.”

ROTFLMAO! Truer words were never spoken.
In all things computer, the customer is almost NEVER right!
/NoSarc

Gareth Phillips says:
July 17, 2011 at 2:07 am ..dah dah dah…))
Are you serious or not up to speed. The AGW scam is, and always will be, a political war using the victims money to fund their carbon imprisonment. Read up on the Global Marshall Plan, Maurice Strong etc etc. Then get on board.
Gore is a frontman for Wall st banks. They stand to make billions annually.
The end result otherwise is a world enslaved to the UN sociopaths and their minions at national level. An Orwellian nightmare.
regards

“Climate Reality” is Al Gore’s Gettysburg
Yes, i agree, but it must be said the American electorate has had an extremely bad hand in selecting it’s President’s lately.

We need to laugh at dills like Al, the louder the laugh the better the media penetration!!

Read the following gem that matches the brainwashing in the USSR

Climate change must be ‘front of mind’ before persuasion works. Currently, telling the public to take notice of climate change is as successful as selling tampons to men. People don’t realize (or remember) that climate change relates to them.

http://bit.ly/owP83h

NEW attempt at deconstruction by the ABC:
Listen to this masterpiece of partiality by Australia’s finest :-
http://www.abc.net.au/rn/backgroundbriefing/stories/2011/3268730.htm

I got interested in the mendacity of AGWers in the early 2000s. Until 2006 and the first half of 2007 they were on a roll. Virtually no one contradicted the official line. Al had his Oscar and Nobel Peace Prize and most people believed the IPCC was an unimpeachable source of peer reviewed science.
Cracks began to appear midway into 2007, and with climategate the bricks were falling out of the wall.
Nowadays, Gore is increasingly a figure of fun, and AGWers seem to be distancing themselves from him. I’m reasonably confident his event will be a damp squib, much like the Live Earth concerts. He has lost his clout.
When you think of what the sceptics have achieved in a very few years it is truly remarkable. A huge backlash is developing even without financial backing and the MSM. Just look at the opinion polls and the comments on previously pro threads. Be very proud of that.
It will take time and I have no doubt we will prevail, but we are up against those who will not, or cannot let the AGW bandwagon stop. The wheels are loose, but they’re not off yet. I believe Al Gore is the least of our worries.
(Please excuse the overly idiomatic language above….got a bit carried away!)

Rob Vermeulen says:
July 17, 2011 at 12:46 am
Eventhough politicians might use scientific endience to guide their choices for society, scientists don’t base their conclusions on their political orientation.
Scientists are not supposed to base their conclusions on their political orientation, that much is true.

Careful with the Gettysburg comparisons. Some of us are still a might sensitive about that. A Gore is a Gore is a Gore! He Ain’t a Confederate. He ain’t Lee! And this ain’t Gettysburg, PA. The first rule in leadership is Don’t Tick Off Your Own People!
Ref. Climate Reality, use Gore to beat Gore. He’s been very good at shooting himself in the foot (and other body parts).

Send a donation to WUWT via the link provided onsite: (hit the “tip jar”.)

I know it is counter intuative to us reasonable folk but maybe we should take a leaf out of the oppositions book.
Noisy demo’s,shrill headline grabbing soundbites and the boycotting of firms who pander to this eco-bullcrap.

Wow! Is the truth getting its boots on? Or will this also die in laziness, unwillingness to bell “the mighty cat”, indifference, apathy of the scientists, though skeptic?
As @Martin Brumby said “The thermageddonists hold virtually all the cards (MSM, the Scientific Societies, the great majority of politicians, the major “scientific” publications, Wall Street, the UN and EU and not forgetting limitless funds) I’m not convinced that our “rag tag army” can win.”
This battle might be won. IMHO it mostly depends how many little bloggers are enabled and multiplied, as indeed the MSM will never cooperate, lobbying politicos is quite hopeless,(unless they are honest ones), the only hope would come IF ALL would start blogging like mad, as many among us are already painstakingly doing daily, and I am not talking about Facebook. Get a WordPress blog and find your particular niche and audience, and start getting visits. In between your normal posts, insert powerful WATTS articles. Yet in order to reach normal people–as I have mentioned here long ago–WATTS has to come up with a new line of easily digestible science articles.
You have reached the scientists. 90 % have already decided for or against AGW, by ideology, but mostly for reputation & resources (fame & funds!) In that respect the debate is over. But now you scientists have to come down from your ivory to reach the simple populace with simplified science, to win votes! The alternative media will only reprint WATTS articles they easily understand, (I ought to know!) so make a new line of General Public articles with lots of pictures. The Greens (because of the money) are way ahead of you with lots of graphics and easy headlines, they get lots of photo footage. “Here is Greenpeace hanging a sign on the Sidney Opera house roof! They never raised a sign against BP killing the Gulf water, animals and people, but hey that is RedPeace for you. Globalist outfit funded by Wallstreet, will never embarras their Sponsor BP! Are you kidding? Ha!)
Only ONE major fact is on your side! NOBODY normal wants another carbon TAX, except the fanatic Green watermelons, red collectivist globalists on the inside! And they are lethal (No pressure?) and from what I have seen, mostly much more motivated than the salon skeptics, armchair generals within the scientific community. Yeah, you could set up a databank of statements, but average Joe will never be reached that way, who reads warmist Yahoo or the AGW China Post, and all other MSM and fortune magazines. Even architectural magazines are preaching Green technology! How do you want to win that war, unless you dig in your heels and start being the media! Otherwise save your breath!

Being in the ad game, I’m trying to figure out what Alex Bogusky will bring to the party. He is (was) a big name in the business but is as self-absorbed as Gore. I can tell you that their presentations will be well crafted and persuasive, but like Bogusky’s TV spots, they will have no substance because the “Global Warming brand” does not live up to it’s promise.
The Gettysburg analogy is apt. The first objective for me is to determine the other side’s strategy, then what tactics it will use to reach it’s goal. It will be an all out assault on TV and online, think of it as RC directed by Steven Speilberg, written by Saul Alinsky, it will appeal to emotions, create titanic villians, and will attempt to stifle any criticism or debate through guilt and false association. The main weaknesses of its armour are “follow the money” and the sheer narcissism of its general, George Armstrong Gore. Fix bayonets.

My sense is to just rely upon Al to do his own damage. Skeptics provide only credibility to him to meet him on his battlefield so to speak. It will be obvious what it is going on that day – a political stunt.
My view is that Americas “BS” detectors are already upon full alert with this guy; I suspect that he won’t be able to restrain himself from his shrill hysterics yet again and he will do further damage to their cause. His ego has no bounds.

To focus on the “Gore Climate Reality Event” gives it standing, credence that It does not deserve. Only the scientific questions do. Only the scientific truths, constantly challenged by skepticism based on “real” data, that all the algores of the world are trying to bugger for their financial and political advantage, deserve the primary attention of scientific “warriors”. If this is to be an orderly project, then I suggest the following. The science, the scientists, then all those giving false witness, in order of potential influence on a wide audience.
““Find every false, misleading, scary, idiotic, non-scientific statement they have made in the past twenty years.”
1) Begin with the truth, not with algore, with the science, sub-research area, by sub-research area, Summarize the data, and possible interpretations. After this, list the “deniers” of “scientific reality” along with their stupidities. I would turn the “epithet” “denier” back on them. They are denying (or altering, even more serious) the scientific data or possibilities. “Skeptic” is a useful term for all scientists, as is “Realist”, so long as it is not reified.
2) Next the scientists by their stature in their discipline (what do they claim? how do they know — or do they — the science they are professing? what evidence, authorities do they use? in what ways are these claims false? who pays their salaries and who gives them the grants on which their claims are based?)
2) Next amateurs, “lay” scientists – algore thinks he qualifies, as do most of those on IPCC reports — who profess scientific credentials (what do they claim? what is false? where do they get their evidence? what is their source of remuneration? does it come from “green” activities?)
3) next owners of “mass media”, the “mass” to be defined by some basic circulation, readership numbers (who are they? how is their publication, and their financial empire, tied to green money? what do their publications claim? (I think it is important to notice whether or not their viewer-, reader-ship is declining or increasing, as also their profits. In other words, does giving “false witness” lead to their downfall? Then let them be hoist themselves on their own petard. WUWT readers only need to go to war when there is necessary. Otherwise, let them sink into their own slime.)
4) NGOs, including all those once-upon-a-time-in-a-land-far-far-away wonderful “environmental” groups. Similar questions
5) Heads of regulatory agencies in the relevant countries. Similar questions
6) Political leaders (I put heads of regulatory agencies ahead of political leaders because it seems that in the U.S. the EPA is a government unto itself with the ability and freedom to wreck state economies and individual businesses.)
8) Heads of crony corporations
9) Science advisors for elementary and secondary education on the federal and state levels. Approvers of basic text books.
10) Science reporters including website owners. (This last category, website owner, should find an appropriate level according to audience and influence, e.g., WUWT)
11) All others

This public approach of collating statements seems to smack of research by consensus and reminds me of the very public search for communists which resulted in a black list.
Rather, the research group should agree on a null hypothesis and then proceed to test it. A very public survey (what have you read about predicted ice free Arctic conditions?) was sent to us, and we provided our input. Bad form. Private emailed correspondence instead of a public posting should have been used. The data should then be examined by the research group in a private setting (no public list of names please), publish the results, and then make the raw data and code available.
One further comment. No statement based on a gray paper should be used. Else we are no better than the last IPCC report. Statements of predicted ice free conditions should only be lifted from published, peer reviewed research (with the warning that climate scientists seem to be okay with quoting gray papers and personal correspondances in their published articles). A reference to gray paper statements can certainly be made in the opening segments of the final paper. That statement should also include why such quotes were NOT used in a gold standard article.
On the other hand, if the purpose of an article is to collate gray paper and media statements, you should exclude peer reviewed research articles where such statements are made. Indeed, by separating the subjects thusly (gray/media papers from research papers), you open the door for two substantial and corroborating papers that have both teeth and muscle.
But let’s do this privately via email or snail mail.

The green energy carpetbaggers are already among us.

Wrong metaphor, if Gore is Lee. Foragers or even slave hunters would fit better.

My personal strategy in real life is to just drop remarks like “It’s not warming” when someone brings up the Global Warming scare story. Or “The Sahel zone is greening” when someone goes into a dystopian breakdown about desertification. People will look at me frustrated because i just interrupted their downfall fantasies but i will provide links if asked; and they usually have never before seen the actual data, satellite pictures or statistics as all they usually get is lies by the MSM. And normal people are actually thankful for such information; they are not the indoctrinated KoolAid drinkers you would expect, say at GISS.
And that’s all you need to do. Tip: When looking for a source of data to bolster your argument, go to images.google.com (their search parsing is better than Bing when you use longer phrases) and enter the coordinate descriptions of your desired graph, like “olr versus co2” or the likes. You get a whole lot of charts this way. Use the images as the key for your search. It’s quicker than wading through mountains of websites.
As for Gore’s offensive, i don’t think he can even rally much of the MSM around him these days, they’re busy with the various currency crises.

John F. Hultquist says:@ July 17, 2011 at 12:34 am
“I suggest each person prepare a short and well stated letter to you local and state officials . . .”
We tried that already. Here in Solano County I went beyond the letter writing and spoke at the county supervisors meeting the day they voted on the “Climate Action Plan” and sea level rise mitigation program. Of the five supervisors, three were already skeptical, one was swayed by my presentation on sea level rise (that it was unlikely it would rise 10″ in the next 90 years, let alone the “conservative” 55″ rise expected in the report). The fifth supervisor was already in the AGW tank and stupidly so — so much that she was laughed at openly in chambers, even by fellow supervisors! But they passed the Climate Action Plan unanimously anyway. Why? —under threat of litigation by Jerry Brown’s minions (the Brown Shirts), like they did to Stockton, CA, in 2008.
We must realize (and quickly) that it is not a battle between good science and bad science. Rather it is a global Progressive Collectivist movement committed to Social Justice/Environmental Justice and all the nefarious meanings those code words represent. The PC’s are simply using AGW as a scare tactic in their political dogma. They are effectively using the principles of Group Think, crowd psychology, and propaganda. Those techniques are quite effective. Glittering generalities, universal appeal, ad hominem attacks, and logical fallacies are all tools used effectively by the likes of Algore. Yes, we know he is wrong in truth and rotten to the core, but he is effective in convincing the masses and leading the cult. Try talking with the cult members and supporters of AGW. They parrot the talking points, but once you engage them and they discover you understand the science better than they do, their eyes glaze over and they terminate the conversation with a parting shot that we just don’t understand.
Ansel Adams once told me that “contrast is the fundamental element of perception.” We skeptics need to put good science, observation, and reason next to the many absurd notions of AGW and through that contrast, reveal how the entire movement is simply a Progressive agenda to redistribute the world’s resources though climate policy.

Gettysburg. A good analogy I suppose. But like all analogies, its not the full story.
I have spent the last 15 years deploring the warmistas use of politics, spin and systematic character assassination. I still deplore it. I wish you well but I wont take part
dont fight fire with fire
we must fight fire with water. trust in the scientific method
EO

Dear Stephen –
May I suggest you are confusing the scientific and political battlefields. The tide in the scientific war has turned against the Warmists, the rest being only a matter of time. On the political battlefield, the Warmists have tacitly admitted defeat, and are only fighting for scraps on a few domestic fronts (having clearly lost the international war). The main danger, as I see it, is that the Global Warming movement has been so successful over a period of decades, that it is sure to be repeated in spades, in other fields.

I’m reading a book review written by Andrew Revkin this morning, in which he makes the tired old claim that an “overwhelming majority of scientists agree that….humans are exerting a growing and potentially calamitous influence on climate.”
This it seems to me is emblematic of the kind of thing we’re up against. Revkin’s a smart guy. I also presume he’s honest. So how can he make such an unequivocal statement? Where is his data? It just strikes me as at the very least, unfounded.
I just don’t get this kind of stuff.
Anyone?

A good start would be a referenced list of AlGorisms circulating around blogsville. Such as his statement about the temp of inner earth being millions of degrees. Public ridicule is the only way to beat this guy.

I think Al Gore’s ‘Choose Reality’ will turn out to be a non-event. The MSM in my neck of the woods (Denmark/Germany) haven’t even bothered to mention it.

Stephen Rasey
I think I’ve got a pretty good idea of what you are trying to do. At day’s end, you are looking for a way to make crowd sourcing of rebuttals to warmist propoganda efficient to gather, search, index, and be made available to others easy, efficient, and effective. I think you have a number of challenges to consider:
o standard formats for something like this will likely be cumbersome as there will be a tremendous number of situations in which the standard just doesn’t allow for the unique needs of the specific topic at hand.
o horespower; you’ll need lots of it. gathering the data is one thing, making it available to millions of people to search and cross reference quite another thing.
o keeping it current; corporations fall into this trap all the time. They embark on a grand plan to document (for example) everything there is to know about their customers (in order to serve them better). The data becomes stale faster than it can be gathered. AGW arguments evolve daily, and rebutting any given one is frequently more complex that can be captured in a few sentences, and so the rebuttals ALSO have to evolve and be kept current.
o context, context, context!; the same arguments mean different things to different people. CO2 is logarithmic for example. That means one thing to physicists and engineers, another thing to warmists, and another thing to high school students.
For what it is worth, I suggested this same sort of idea a long time ago, hence my support for it. Also, I think writing custom code or spread sheets won’t get you to where you want to be. I think leveraging infrastructure that already exists and is low cost makes more sense. In other words, why create something when you already have a great tool that can be used instead? Its called WordPress.
I’m time limited right now as I have some RFP deadlines staring me in the face, but if you’ll drop an email my way it might be easier to discuss that way. david.hoffer AT mts.net

R.Gates MUST be a comedy writer. I have NEVER read anything that made me laugh SO hard. It brought up so many memories of things like Gore buying ocean front property, leaving his lights ON during “earth hour”, family money from oil AND tobacco, leaving the limo running during his “save the planet” vomitting. I mean the list of hypocrisy is incredible. Gates just HAS to be on our side, …….

R. Gates said:
July 17, 2011 at 5:49 am
[Gore], to the very core of his being, truly believes in what he says and does related to climate change. To not understand this, is to not get a fundamental truth about those you would oppose.
==============================
Yeah, that’s why he bought ~$4M beachfront property in San Francisco; a place he claims will soon be awash in CAGW rising seawater. And that’s why he uses more energy in one month at one of his five domiciles than the average American does in a year.
Fundamental truth about Gore: snake oil peddler.

Stephen Rasey
Interesting analogy, thanks for the post.
“Today we are engaged in a great Civil War of testing whether our nation, or any nation, conceived in liberty and individual freedom, can long endure the calls to “save the planet” through strong government and world government to better control the use of energy, land, and air by constraining the freedom of its subjects.”
This statement rang a bell concerning something I read at http://www.nationalacademies.org/nrc/
Report # 12- Climate Change, the Indoor environment, and Health. It’s a free read, 300+ pages.
The goals they state are so pervasive that, well, make up your own mind.

David Ball says:
July 17, 2011 at 10:46 am
R.Gates MUST be a comedy writer.
_____
The first person to even come close to what I do for a living!
But more to your point, the first rule of war is to know your enemy, and if you want to misunderstand what Mr. Gore is really all about, then go on believing that he is simply in this for some kind of power or money play. He, and millions of so called “greens” truly believe this is a cause to save mankind (and the majority of currently existing species) from a climate that will change so severely, that the majority of species could go extinct. If you want to “do battle” against them, you need to convince them that there is no threat of this happening. And this perceived threat comes not just from warming or climate change, but from a general breakdown of the systems that support life on this planet as we’ve come to enjoy it during the Holocene.
If you want to do battle against Gore and the Greens, you will fail if you think they are not true believers that the earth’s life support systems are in peril. This is one of their core beliefs.

See if we can get the manbearpig episode of SouthPark to air the night before to get the young ‘uns tuned up and at the same time Penn and Teller to get the old ‘uns primed.

Here is a potential WordPress solution to continue the thinking toward the simple and flexible.
In the Climate Fail category (or some other):
Create an index page of Names, leaders of the climate change scientific and political realm.
For each name, Link it to one or more pages. For instance there could be a Hansen-1980s, Hanson-1990s, etc.
On each page, Commenters can post information about quotes in a simple text template format, such as
Quote:
Link:
Source:
Date:
Topics:
Other Authors:
Rebuttal Tag:
RebuttalLink:
Rebuttal Tag:
RebuttalLink:
This is only to be a medium level index.
Put no discussion here. Put that in the linked rebuttal docs or bookmarks.
Limit the Rebuttal Tag to a short phrase. XML could be used, but I would rather keep it humanly friendly. Contributors keep to the format or the moderators will hose the contribution regardless of content. Can we handle errors and graffiti?
With standardized tags, it would be fairly easy for data to be normalized and load later for better database search, but this first order organization could be an 80/20 solution, at least to get started with the first 1000 quotes.
This structure allows for volunteers to take a page and publish a new one page with a sorted by importance and consolidated by topic and moderators can add the new page to the highest index.

“The overriding problem isn’t lack of proof of the mendacity, stupidity, self-deception or carelessness of “scientists” and their lackeys, but treasonous abandonment of MSM’s investigative journalism in favor of propaganda spewing.”
I’d not use the inflammatory language, but in essence I agree. If there were a list of villains in this mess, I’d put the NYT’s right up with Al Gore. Their abandonment of anything that even remotely smacks of journalistic integrity has been stunning.

Is anyone else having a problem with A Lovell’s link (July 17, 2011 at 1:25 am) to the numberwatch.co.uk/warmlist.htm site?
I’ve tried from a search engine and get the same problem.

Stephen Stasey;
your wordpress description is sort of what I had in mind. At days end though, regardless of how small the database is, the question becomes how many people have access to it? If the input is crowd sourced, lots and lots. If the use of it is opened up to crowd source for assembly of rebuttals, other web pages, lots and lots. If only a handfull of people interact directly with the database, nope, you don’t need much horsepower. If thousands do….different story. If you set it up so that web pages can link to it…now we’re talking millions of threads.
Keep in mind also the first rule of application development. Upon presentation of the final application to the end user, the invevitable comment is “that’s exactly what I asked for, but its not what I meant”. The second rule is that when you get the thing running, the avalanche of requests for tiny changes to make it “actually useful” will exceed the work that went into the initial project by several orders of magnitude. The third rule is that any attempt to make the application to straight forward so as to be fool proof, will instantly yield the evidence required to show just how clever fools are.
What I had in mind was more like no database at all. By using crowdsourcing to gather content, you can also use crowd sourcing to keep it updated and current. You don’t need a searchable database (in my opinion) you need a list topics with a summary of the relative issues and CURRENT facts at the top, and the crowd sourced information to debate and justify them below. So…
Wordpress already provides for that type of functionality. you can have categories and pages and comments below each page. So set up the issues, arguments, science, stories, etc how you would like, one to a page. Crowdsource the material (comments just like Anthony got will appear in droves, and some people will post in the standard you ask for and some people…most people…won’t). The moderator for THAT page keeps the top updated with an accurate summary of the issue, the claims, and based on the crowdsourced material documented in the comments below, a summary rebuttal with links to relative sources, web sites and cross topics. If you can get sufficient attention for the crowd sourcing, and sufficient number of moderators, there’s no need for an application at all. WordPress already has search tools, and the “database” will grow itself as commenters post links and present facts, and the moderator keeps the most important of these summarized at the top.
Those who need only the summary and current state of affairs have it right there for easy reference, and those who want to dispute the summary, or provide additional information, or debate the fine points are free to do so in the comments. Warmists can comment just as freely as skeptics, just like on Anthony’s blog, but on that specific issue only. If you want to have an Al Gore page, you could even have an open invitation to Al Gore to set the record straight on any misinformation and so on.
You could easily break things up into categories. One for people, the claims they make, and the facts like you have in mind for Al Gore. Another for favourite talking points like the plight of polar bears and the actual facts, or another might be the “big oil funding” rhetoric which would include lists a various research groups, including skeptic ones, and who their known funding sources are.. with an invitation to those groups and anyone else to post comments showing otherwise.
Crowdsourced articles on Al Gore’s bullarky for example, might link to both public documentation, but part of the rebuttal might also be a more detailed explanation of a particular issue. For example, Al Gore’s public retraction of his stance on ethanol might include links to external sources where he was quoted to that effect, but also a link to a science page focused on the current known science on the net benefit of ethanol.
No need for a database app in my mind, just some up front work settting up the categories and topics and recruiting enough moderators to keep the discussions under control and the summaries up to date.
I hereby volunteer to moderate the “CO2 is Logarithmic” page.

_Jim says:
July 17, 2011 at 1:37 pm
R. Gates says on July 17, 2011 at 11:53 am
So you believe a country run by the Corporate elite would have your best interests at heart?
Simpleton, NOBODY wants dirty air or dirty water. Those ‘corporate elites’ have to breathe, bathe and drink water too.
Extrapolating the past into the future belies your narrow perspective; we are no longer using tube-powered IBM mainframs to perform payroll calculations …
___
Thanks for the personal attack. But keeping to the issue: If nobody wants them, then why is the environment so destroyed when there aren’t any government controls?
It is you, I fear who are simplifying the way the world is. With the age of large multi-national corporations with lots of foreign ownership, many of the corporate owners don’t even live in this country, as foreign ownership has expanded greatly over the years (http://www.reuters.com/article/2008/08/27/us-companies-ownership-usa-idUSN2744743020080827) . If they can find a place to build with less government regulation on their potential pollution causing activities, they’ll do it. Anything for profits. Or, if corporate owner are American citizens, they’ll live far from where their potential pollution causing activities are…most likely behind their walled communities, in their nicely manicured, and separate little utopias.
You give far too much credit to the powerful and primary need of companies to make profits, with concern for the environment among most (but certainly not all) companies not high on the list of priorities. China, and all its pollution woes is a perfect example of what happens when all government control is taken away and profits and growth become the only imperative. Do you not think the Chinese would want to breathe clean air and have clean water to drink? Sorry, but the demand for profits trumps all in the world of complete unrestricted capitalism with no government controls.

A database of all the exaggerations, errors and false prophesies on its own will do no good. No matter how extensive and thorough and rigorous, it will be dismissed as having been compiled by serial deniers funded by big oil. Getting a fair hearing in the MSM will be impossible. It the coming battle the alarmists have decided the field of battle and have impenetrable armour.
To be brief, there needs to be two analogies brought to the fore.
First is the legal analogy. If there is a case for CAGW, it must be demonstrated by primary, empirical evidence. That evidence must be tested by opponents. It is not the bits, that may be true – like lots more CO2 will cause some warming. But that there is sufficient CO2 to cause some warming, which will be magnified by positive feedbacks to cause even greater warming, and this substantive warming will destabilize the planet weather systems in a highly negative way. The counter-argument is two-fold – that many of dire, immediate, forecasts have been highly exaggerated and more importantly, the compound uncertainties that have been vastly underestimated. That the case is weak is shown by the prominence given to what is hearsay evidence, such as the consensus, or the proclamations of groups of scientists, or to the image of the hockey stick. In some cases, it has been tantamount to jury-tampering.
Second is the medical analogy. A medical doctor, in proscribing a painful and potentially harmful course of treatment, should at last have a strong professionally-based expectation that post treatment the patient will be better off than if nothing was done. The very qualities that make politicians electable – of being able to make build coalitions by fudging, projecting an image, and undermining the opponents by polarizing views – make them patently unfit for driving through and micro-managing effective policy to reduce CO2. They will of necessity overstate the benefits and massively understate the costs, whether financial or in human suffering. They will not admit that the problem is beyond their capabilities, nor that errors had been made. The problem is even worse in powerful dictatorships than democracies.
I have tried to suggest a method (for those who are familiar with microeconomics) the IPCC/Stern case for containing CO2 here.
http://manicbeancounter.wordpress.com/2011/02/11/climate-change-policy-in-perspective-%E2%80%93-part-1-of-4/
Also, why there is no effective, global political solution possible.
http://manicbeancounter.wordpress.com/2011/02/13/climate-change-in-perspective-%E2%80%93-part-2-of-4-the-mitigation-curve/
What is missing is why the costs of global warming have been grossly exaggerated.

davidmhoffer says:
July 17, 2011 at 2:33 pm
R Gates wants to argue that large corporations already control almost everything that goes on in Washington and in the next breath asserts that the only reason those same corporations aren’t running rampant over the environment in the pursuit of their one and only goal (profits) is the strict control the government has over them. Oddly, they have all that control yet can’t use it to achieve their only goal. Do you even listen to yourself R Gates?
_____
Do you understand the battles that are constantly going on in Washington? Multiple groups with multiple agendas are constantly battling for control? These battles rarely have anything to do with what the “people” want or need, but more to do with the control of money and power. Some of these groups are corporations, whose goal is to create a legislative environment that favors maximizing their profits. They represent a huge cross-section of the business sectors, from corporate farming and telecommunications, to big pharmaceuticals to oil and military contractors. They pay lobbyists (many of whom were former senators and members of congress) big money to push their legislative agendas. There are about 10 lobbyists for every senator and congress person in Washington, and, in a very real sense, the majority of our laws are crafted by these lobbyists to position their companies or industries.
It was during those “radical” 1960’s that a popular movement arose to do something about the dirty water and air that America was breathing, and drinking, and bathing in. 1060’s Books like “Silent Spring” by Rachel Carson, in which she outlined the dangers of chemical such as DDT, created public awareness that all was not well with the environment in America. Industry groups of course opposed any sort of new regulatory agency to oversee pollution control, but under a lot of public pressure, and not wanting yet another reason for social unrest (he had the Vietnam war on his hands after all) Richard Nixon reluctantly signed into the law the creation of the EPA in 1970.
But let’s be clear here, many companies despise the EPA and would love to see it abolished, and it seems they can get thousands of unwitting minions to spread this message around under the pretense of “Big Government hurts business”. What they are really meaning of course is that those pesky environment regulations cut into our profits.
So yes, there is still some areas that big business has not been able to completely control in Washington, with the EPA being one of the last big ones, as there are honest government employees who continue to carry out the protection of our air, water, and soil. It is not surprising then that the EPA has become the focus and symbol of “big government red tape” among those who wittingly or unwittingly carry out the agendas of big business. So you can be sure that it is not for a lack of trying to get rid of these laws by big corporations, and you can be sure that in some areas of regulation, it is a matter of tolerating these regulations, and allowing this little victory for the common folk and the environment, so long as they can win big and control the larger financial picture.

“Climate Reality” should read “Climate Unreality” or better “Climate Surrealism” I think.

R. Gates @3:55PM
I’m not going to bother responding to your diatribe. You’re original statement was a complete contradiction of itself, and you can go into as much detail as you want, but you can’t suck and blow at the same time no matter how many words you use.
As for your attempt to use China as some sort of example of the evils of large corporations, please, just stop. China is a dictatorship, their entire government system is corrupt from top to bottom, and the environmental problems they have are a direct result of government mandated economic growth at all costs. Drawing a parallel to democracy and free markets is ridiculous.
If you don’t like being accused of being a simpleton, then stop behaving like one.

R Gates, your argument is wishful thinking or a weed-hazed, Forrest Gump fog.

Comparison of miliary confrontation (Gettysburg) to climate related intellectual/scientic confrontation has limited use, but I appreciate Stephen Rasey’s caution about not underestimating the September Gore media blitz.
I think the Gore event will be conducted with the help of expensive PR consultants (covert).
Some independent/skeptical efforts to out think their protagonists could be useful irrespective of the September Gore events.
John

R Gates, re: China
I’m sure my brother who lives in Shanghai would love to chime in here, but it seems that the government controls his Internet service and restricts some of the things he’d like to say… Or watch… Or read…

Haven’t had time to read all the Comments, but one point:
The AGW catastrophists will be defeated when a few prominent scientists and political leaders, those with enough celebrity to demand media attention, stand up and denounce the ‘global warming’ conjecture and the policies advanced to deal with it as an out-and-out fraud.
/Mr Lynn

Jeff says:
“Government can favor small, growing companies, or large companies looking to protect what they have. It cannot do both.”
____
Completely erroneous. There is no logical reason that federal, state, and local governments can’t be pro-business without prejudice as to the size of the businesses they encourage while at the same time still protecting the environment from exploitative practices that degrade ecosystems. It simply takes wise and dedicated leaders who have the best interests of the community in mind as opposed to being beholden to those who may have paid for their outrageously expensive election campaigns.
As it turns out, those who complain that government is “in the way” of allowing businesses to be profitable are simply playing into the hands of businesses who’d like to get this notion instilled in the minds of simple-minded voters. It seems to be working with a certain segment of the voting population.

R.Gates, kudos for your tenacity around here. Straight up. Do you not see the hypocrisy in Mr. Gore’s “do as I say, not as I do” approach, especially considering he stands to benefit financially if people believe him? Same for government. Aren’t you concerned that big brother is drooling over this, too? With ZERO benefit to the environment. From where I sit, none of these factions ( IPCC included) are interested in anything to do with “saving the environment”.

Pascvaks says:
July 17, 2011 at 6:25 am
How about instead of Gettysburg we substitute Custer’s Last Stand, with Gore as Custer of course. Yeah, I know it shows great disrespect to Custer but the situation reflects Gore’s situation rather well. Everyone should know that Custer foolishly charged into his Last Stand, so it could have been called Custer’s Last Charge.

Theo Goodwin says:
July 17, 2011 at 9:44 pm
Pascvaks says:
July 17, 2011 at 6:25 am
How about instead of Gettysburg we substitute Custer’s Last Stand, with Gore as Custer of course. Yeah, I know it shows great disrespect to Custer but the situation reflects Gore’s situation rather well. Everyone should know that Custer foolishly charged into his Last Stand, so it could have been called Custer’s Last Charge.
____
Actually, it shows great disrespect to Native Americans to equate them with skeptics, especially considering their strong environmental roots.

This has to be extremely well organized. My suggestion is to take all comments that Al Gore makes and label each with a number and two or three words, such as “#4 tornadoes increasing” Now let us suppose he raises 30 points. Then we would have 30 numbers and 30 sets of responses. For anyone working full time and deciding to spend an hour or two reading WUWT, it is extremely daunting to see that there are 1000 responses and you may feel you have a good idea or good web site, but you need to look at each one to see nothing is repeated. So let us assume someone has a good graphic or other website or a good rebuttal for points 4 and 16, that person would just have to look at the entries for points 4 and 16 to see if something has been said already. Alternatively, if #4 has 50 comments and #16 only has 2 comments, that would be a good and fast indication where the rebuttals are weakest and are most needed.
This also has the advantage that others can key in on their area of expertise very easily and augment or rebut comments without reading hundreds of comments they have no real interest in.
Others have offered to help in some way. I have an engineering degree from 40 years ago and will be retired by September. So I am strong in chemistry and physics but weak in biology and computers. If you think you can use me somehow, please let me know.

The R Gates approach to science.
R. Gates; I can prove that man has never been to the moon, it is all a scam. The big corporations took all the money and hid it for themselves and faked the whole thing.
Sane Individual; Really? What evidence do you have?
R. Gates; Mosquitos.
Sane Individual; Huh? What do mosquitos have to do with it?
R. Gates; If they can’t even get rid of tiny little things like mosquitos, how could they possibly send a man to the moon?
Sane Individual; I see the issue here, yes it is clear to me.
R. Gates; It is? So you agree with the obvious then?
Sane Individual; No… I said I see what the issue is.
R. Gates; And? You can’t refute it, you’re not dumb enough to claim that they CAN get rid of mosquitose are you? Because that would show how stupid you are.
Sane Individual; No…that’s not it. The issue is that I am a Sane Individual. And you are not.

R. Gates says:

Actually, it shows great disrespect to Native Americans to equate them with skeptics, especially considering their strong environmental roots.

I usually ignore your yapping, Robot gates, but did you read what you just wrote there? Really? I’m pretty sure that rates high on the stupid scale. With all due respect. ALL. Due.

Why not have a wiki? We just need to do it a little different than Wikipedia. Instead of allowing just anyone to sign up and edit, how about a wiki that has moderated inclusion and moderated topics? By moderated inclusion, I mean anyone can request access, but only those known to be “non-CAGWists” will be given access to modify entries.
A moderated wiki sounds easier than having someone create a monster database.
Just my 2 cents,
wermet

R. Gates is trying… in every sense of the word

I have managed to Google up something that echoes mightily many of R. Gates themes as espoused here and elsewhere. It may prove to be very informative.

http://en.internationalism.org/wr/2010/332/new-green
Understanding capitalism’s drive to destroy the environment
Submitted by WorldRevolution on March 9, 2010 – 18:50
…
Book Review:- A new green history of the world: the environment and the collapse of great civilizations
In the light of the recent concerted propaganda campaigns undertaken by large industrial concerns, some politicians, Christian fundamentalists and various capitalist apologists against the science of global warming, and given Conoco Phillips, Caterpillar and BP’s recent defection from Obama’s token US Climate Action Partnership, Clive Ponting’s book, which underlines the threats to our very existence, provides a welcome antidote.
This is a revised edition of a book of Ponting from 1991. Why has the author felt the need for a new edition in which every chapter, apart from the first, has been revised, rewritten and expanded? The answer lies in the deterioration and increasing destruction of the planet and capitalism’s inability to even begin to deal with it. (…) Indeed, the major concern of the USA to maintain and develop its military capacities against all rivals leaves it not only incapable of focussing on the dangers but actively contributing to them. Ponting also notes the question of ‘positive feedback’ and irreversible changes, where global warming affects the elements that further exacerbate global warming and threaten to spiral out of control. Though most of these effects are, they do not necessarily have to be man-made. Take the example of the release of methane from under the Siberian tundra, a natural phenomenon far more dangerous for global warming than CO2, but one that capitalism will do nothing about. This second edition is much more pessimistic about capitalism’s ability to solve any of the problems facing the global environment.

It then discusses the many ancient pre-capitalism civilizations that eventually collapsed due to lack of sufficient environmental concern leading to ongoing catastrophic environmental destruction, starting after humanity got away from hunter-gatherer societies. Then came capitalism, influenced and shaped by religion, which has lead to ongoing catastrophic environmental destruction.

Christianity decreed the superiority of man over flora and fauna and, though there was some dissent from this within Christianity and Judaism, this was God-given, eternal and part of the Divine Plan. Even in the eastern religions, where man was more at one with nature, unlike the Judaeo-Christian and Islamic religions, the economic and political forces in these areas also plundered the earth. The classical civilised idea in rising capitalism was that everything in nature is there for the provision of man and, though this idea was strongly undermined by Darwinism, it remains the blind ideology and driving force of capitalism today in its rapacious destruction of the planet and its unquenchable thirst for profits.
…
Ponting clearly details the horrors of the rise of capitalism and its destruction of life through work, disease, pollution, urban sprawls, short-termism, poverty and its wanton destruction of the structure of the planet. He also points out that, contrary to previous societies, under capitalism it’s not the shortage of food itself but the shortage of money to buy food that causes starvation and malnutrition. He details the massive wastages of shipping commodities around the world, built-in obsolescence and advertising. One telling example that he gives in relation to capitalism’s ability to deal with global warming (for which he underlines the evidence) is the way it dealt with the depletion of the ozone layer. This is a relatively easy problem to deal with involving scrapping one cheap, easy to produce chemical and replacing it with another, safer one. Capitalism fought against this tooth and nail because profits were at risk and, to date, at least a million people have died from cancers due to this problem. It took years of denial and years of endless meetings until the problem was addressed, and then only when profits were assured. Ozone levels will be back to 1974 levels by 2065 at the earliest, so many more will still die. Global warming is a much more extensive and complex problem that goes to the heart and soul of capitalism and its necessity for profits. We can have no illusions that capitalism will seriously address this question.

They did find a significant problem with the book, the rejection of Marxism.

(…) But Ponting sees communism as a particular part of capitalism, a totalitarian expression of it where there is a direct line: Marx and Engels, Lenin, Stalin, the abomination of the Soviet Union. In this respect, he’s a straight purveyor of bourgeois ideology.

Indeed, going by the work of John Bellamy Foster it is seen how capitalism cannot fix the environment, but Marxism can:

(…) Capitalism is incapable of working with nature and its very operation violates nature as the drive to accumulate profits intensifies its destructiveness.
A last word from Marx (Capital, volume 3, chapter 46): “From the standpoint of a higher socio-economic formation, the private property of individuals on the earth will appear just as absurd as the private property of one man in other men. Even an entire society, a nation, or all simultaneously existing societies taken together, are not the owners of the earth. They are simply its possessors, it beneficiaries, and have to bequeath it in an improved state to succeeding generations, as boni patres familias” (‘good heads of the household’ in terms of working for future generations).

Thus in this learned obviously-well-researched book lies broad agreement with the many concerns espoused by R. Gates, mainly how capitalism given free rein will inexorably lead to environmental destruction. I will take issue with the view about religion’s ties to environmental destruction due to long being taught in church about the call to be “good stewards of the land” as mankind does not own the Earth, it is the Lord’s and we as stewards should seek to improve it, leave it better than we found it, not despoil it. Indeed, the language used, including leaving it in an improved state for future generations, directly mirrors the quoted section from Marx.
But that is but a minor quibble. I’m certain reading this enlightened tome would give me further insight into and provide evidential confirmation of R. Gates many well-reasoned viewpoints. I’m adding it to my one bucket list, the one to be followed when I need to be absolutely convinced there’s no reason to keep living at all and it’s time to move on.

R. Gates:
“There is no logical reason that federal, state, and local governments can’t be pro-business without prejudice as to the size of the businesses they encourage while at the same time still protecting the environment from exploitative practices that degrade ecosystems.”
– Your position is interesting given that you complain at length regarding lobbyists, who naturally tend to over-represent the interests of large, mature firms. But, even assuming such “protection” succeeded in being non-prejudicial domestically, you have failed to address the fact that unless all foreign governments undertake equally costly protections, U.S. firms are placed at a competitive disadvantage by such regulation.
“It simply takes wise and dedicated leaders who have the best interests of the community in mind as opposed to being beholden to those who may have paid for their outrageously expensive election campaigns.”
– Yes, and it would be great if environmental NGO’s were not beholden to the corporate interests they sold themselves to in return for their use as proxies, but some of us live in the real world.
“As it turns out, those who complain that government is “in the way” of allowing businesses to be profitable are simply playing into the hands of businesses who’d like to get this notion instilled in the minds of simple-minded voters.”
– The question is WHICH business, and the issue is jobs. In order to grow, the economy must create jobs in excess of workers entering the market. Unemployed can be supported, but cannot generate economic growth. Most new jobs are created by small, growing firms. Create a situation where large firms with influence (lobbyists) protect their profits, but small firms cannot create enough new jobs, and the inevitable mathematics set in.