Excerpts from The LA Times story:
U.S. Chamber of Commerce seeks trial on global warming
By Jim Tankersley
August 25, 2009
Reporting from Washington
The nation’s largest business lobby wants to put the science of global warming on trial.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, trying to ward off potentially sweeping federal emissions regulations, is pushing the Environmental Protection Agency to hold a rare public hearing on the scientific evidence for man-made climate change.
Chamber officials say it would be “the Scopes monkey trial of the 21st century” — complete with witnesses, cross-examinations and a judge who would rule, essentially, on whether humans are warming the planet to dangerous effect.
“It would be evolution versus creationism,” said William Kovacs, the chamber’s senior vice president for environment, technology and regulatory affairs. “It would be the science of climate change on trial.”
The goal of the chamber, which represents 3 million large and small businesses, is to fend off potential emissions regulations by undercutting the scientific consensus over climate change. If the EPA denies the request, as expected, the chamber plans to take the fight to federal court.
The EPA is having none of it, calling a hearing a “waste of time” and saying that a threatened lawsuit by the chamber would be “frivolous.”
EPA spokesman Brendan Gilfillan said the agency based its proposed finding that global warming is a danger to public health “on the soundest peer-reviewed science available, which overwhelmingly indicates that climate change presents a threat to human health and welfare.”
…
The chamber proposal “brings to mind for me the Salem witch trials, based on myth,” said Brenda Ekwurzel, a climate scientist for the environmental group Union of Concerned Scientists. “In this case, it would be ignoring decades of publicly accessible evidence.”
…
The proposed finding has drawn more than 300,000 public comments. Many of them question scientists’ projections that rising temperatures will lead to increased mortality rates, harmful pollution and extreme weather events such as hurricanes.
In light of those comments, the chamber will tell the EPA in a filing today that a trial-style public hearing, which is allowed under the law but nearly unprecedented on this scale, is the only way to “make a fully informed, transparent decision with scientific integrity based on the actual record of the science.”
Read the complete LA Times story here
Website of the US Chamber of Commerce here
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Bad idea imho…While it is true that the brainwashing about “saving the planet” is becoming incredibly annoying, that I believe that we prepare a quite nasty society when the youth of all western countries are constantly submitted to this kind of “green khmer” propanganda, and that the polemic around AGW is maybe not the best example of a sound scientific process…I still prefer scientific debate FAR FAR FAR above legal processes and lawsuit. I do not understand this fascination for a legal procedure, the standard of such are much below those of science. A lawsuit is closer to a mix of political debate, actor performance, mob ruling, witch questioning and a little bit of so-so science between carefully selected expert than to a scientific debate… even when the science is poluted by media and political consideration, it is still preferable than to call for lawyer “judgement”…
As a lawyer and sometime litigator, I’m uneasy with the idea. The trial format is not really designed to ferret out the truth. Global Warming either is or is not real and some judge’s decision (which undoubtedly will be affected by his own biases) can’t substitute for the scientific process of theory tested against reality.
Now if the chamber of commerce could find an unbiased panel of climate scientists, maybe they’d be on to something. But more likley it will just be a bit of theatre that will be ignored by the media if the CoC wins and trumpted from the highest parapets if they lose.
Publicly accessible evidence? WHAT? Uh, CRUTemp anyone? Jones won’t realise the information even if you do a FOIA request. What a joke.
Roger Sowell (07:01:41) : A key piece of evidence should be the findings of E.M.Smith as displayed on his chiefio.wordpress.com blog: The March of the Thermometers. It appears that the warming was fictitious, and mainly due to adding thermometers from hot places.
I’d like to see that piece here, please. Up the profile. E M Smith?? Anthony??
“SCOTUS ruled that CO2 is a pollutant and the EPA must regulate it or show that it causes no harm.”
Stop breathing today and save all mankind……!!!
I would expect that there is a built in balance mechanism for CO2, otherwise, I don’t animals would exhale it and plants use it. If it was a man made compond other than CO2 causing AGW, I might have a different opinion.
The major benefit of bringing this into the courts, will derive from the discovery process. With subpoena power involved the climate establishment will no longer be able to stonewall on their data, methodologies, adjustments, and modelling parameters. They will also not be able to rely on sympathetic media to conceal the web of interconnected political and financial interests that underlie this “crisis”. That being said the courts are often a crapshoot, but since our political process is now controlled by people who feel no necessity to be responsive to the wishes of the public, they may offer the strongest possibility of derailing this runaway train before it slams us all into green hell.
There are miles to go before we are fully awake, but this may be an auspicious beginning. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has a wide membership, and maybe has the deep pockets needed to spearhead a viable counteroffensive against the worldwide brainwashing that has been done for years by the AGW hysterians, many of whose livelihood-income and power depend on it.
As Nazi Reichminister of propaganda Joseph Goebbels once put it, “If a lie is repeated often enough, people will eventually come to believe it.” Similar AGW mass-brainwashing will require deep pockets and plenty of time to “de-program” the afficted, and this is at least a start by a big outfit whose wide membership can wield plenty of clout.
But where is the National Association of Manufacturers, assuming not all of its members have decamped and headed for a more realistic (if slightly blacker), carbon-fueled business pasture in China and India? Where is the Teamsters Union, whose independent truckers may eventually be driven into bankruptcy by skyrocketing fuel costs?
Where is the UAW, whose members will suffer big job losses when the recession deepens under the burden of an unnecessary carbon tax that affects every facet of our struggling economy? Where is the AFL-CIO? Are leaders of the big unions unable to understand the danger AGW brainwashed-hysteria poses to the welfare of their members?
Is their Democrat political devotion to Barack, Nancy and Harry, with their brainwashed carbon-tax agenda, more important than their union jobs and livelihoods? Will the U.S. C of C’s suggested “trial” for AGW be a wakeup call for the NAM’s leaders, its industrial workers, and some union members, too?
Bob Paglee, Sr., P.E., (Ret.)
George E. Smith (13:18:07) :
No the connection between the court system, and the truth, is about as good as the connection between the wind direction and the Dow Jones Industrial Average.
!!!
Egads… *Mark quickly changes investment strategy*
Mark
I would love to see Algore take the stand against someone who has a clue, and wont throw any softball questions.
I voted “yes”, but I think that certain naysayers are right that we need to be careful what we wish for.
A cautionary “definition” from Bierce:
Inadmissible, adj. Not competent to be considered. Said of certain kinds of testimony which juries are supposed to be unfit to be entrusted with, and which judges, therefore, rule out, even of proceedings before themselves alone. Hearsay evidence is inadmissible because the person quoted was unsworn and is not before the court for examination; yet most momentous actions, military, political, commercial and of every other kind, are daily undertaken on hearsay evidence. There is no religion in the world that has any other basis than hearsay evidence. Revelation is hearsay evidence; that the Scriptures are the word of God we have only the testimony of men long dead whose identity is not clearly established and who are not known to have been sworn in any sense. Under the rules of evidence as they now exist in this country, no single assertion in the Bible has in its support any evidence admissible in a court of law. It cannot be proved that the battle of Blenheim ever was fought, that there was such as person as Julius Caesar, such an empire as Assyria. But as records of courts of justice are admissible, it can easily be proved that powerful and malevolent magicians once existed and were a scourge to mankind. The evidence (including confession) upon which certain women were convicted of witchcraft and executed was without a flaw; it is still unimpeachable. The judges’ decisions based on it were sound in logic and in law. Nothing in any existing court was ever more thoroughly proved than the charges of witchcraft and sorcery for which so many suffered death. [bold]If there were no witches, human testimony and human reason are alike destitute of value. – Ambrose Bierce [/bold]
Just a question. Wasn’t it so that the EPA itself was forced by a lawsuite to treat CO2 as a polutant? It so, they actually should welcome this lawsuite, because if they loose, they may be of the hook!?
Or did I miss the point?
It would be nice to see the members of the scientific associations stand-up with the Chamber?
I think before we restructure our entire civilization based on the AGW theory we should give it a good hearing. It escapes me why any rational person would be against making sure that we are doing the right thing before we make such momentous changes to the future of humankind.
I tried to vote again but got rejected. Looks like I’m only allowed one vote. In peer-review I’m allowed to vote ad infinitum with my et al references. Democracy sucks!
Assuming a neutral educated judge to decide this important issue with trillions of US tax dollars at stake, I say “Yes, let the show begin!”. I would watch every minute of it on TV. Can you image Al Gore and James Hanson under oath having their CO2 greenhouse theory being torn apart by a smooth talking educated skeptic lawyer? Perhaps this trail can not only decide how the EPA can or can not place CO2 as a dangerous substance harmful to society, but it may also give the skeptics a superstar figure that becomes the star witness. Who could this person be? I nominate Anthony Watts, who would you nominate as the skeptic’s main figure head?
Democracy sucks!
Just as well we’re getting rid of it!
@ur momisugly Paul Penrose (16:07:31) :
I think before we restructure our entire civilization based on the AGW theory we should give it a good hearing. It escapes me why any rational person would be against making sure that we are doing the right thing before we make such momentous changes to the future of humankind.
I assume you mean against a legal proceeding/trial? Easy. Because legal proceedings (as has been mentioned ) are not about truth. They are about “winning”. Totally different thing and the truth does not always win.
The Scopes trial is indeed a bad analogy, as it was a set up publicity stunt. The Piltdown man or Cold Fusion would be better–but then they didn’t threaten us with living under Waxman-Markey Thermageddon regulations.
I agree that scientific theories should not have to pass legal muster–but methodologies are another matter. Get the popcorn ready.
Lucy Skywalker (04:24:58) :
“The problem is how to give some folk appropriate ways to change their tune without losing face. ”
Blame will be the most common out cited. “I believed the experts”.
Also the judge’s closing statements (whoever wins) will likely be of most interest. I’m sure he would blast the documentation methods of the scientists involved. Good may come out of the whole thing with regard to processes and searchable documentation. His/her recomendations will be very interesting and will have long term repercussions.
Gentlemen,
There is no problem with putting this on trial. Most scientists agree that the issue is not settled but there is very little evidence that the world is warming more than normal and mankind bears very little responsibility for warming if any. The only problem is that polititians have bought into the precautionary principle to the extent that they are willing to sacrifice all of our future growth and even some human life to satisfy a very vocal mob of activists that really don’t care about humanity and may even despise it (google: “Who is Maurice F. Strong”, Most people have never heard of him but he is very well connected, attracts lots of money, and believes strongly in population control.) A complete airing of this issue will give polititians cover to resist those who would destroy all the advances that technology has given man and give the media a better perspective on what the majority of non subsidy (financial grant) seeking scientists really believe. This will give normal economics and technology and real truth seeking scientists the time to correct any real problems man, in his selfserving ways, has created for himself. I believe that the the Al Gores and James Hansens of this movement won’t go away easily, there is simply to much money to be had by being green today and even subsidy seeking corporations are joining the movement (Get to know the people and supporters of the Apollo Group). Don’t worry things will work out OK. Just make sure your heart is in the right place and keep on fighting. I have been reading your posts for some years and have a great deal of respect for Anthony and all of the posters here. You are all doing a good job. I think I will take a moment and make a financial donation to WUWT.
Lesson from the Former Soviet Union as it became modern Russia:
Going from Communism to free elections (political change) and State Run Economy to Free Market at the same time was a recipe for disaster. They suffered immensely.
Going from an Unregulated Free Market to Bailout Bonds (economic change) plus going from a Regulatory Depopulationist / Socialized Agenda fringe government with no representation is an equal recipe for disaster.
The issue has to have it’s day in the Sun.
Perhaps that is the agenda: Foment unrest and take the US down from within. They are being very sucessful in that endeavor.
I don’t want my country turned upside down and destroyed.
“DAV (06:50:09) :
I voted NO. This is dumber than the Scopes trial. Do you really want the outcome to rest in the hands of one person?”
Sure, if that one person is Judge Judy!
That the courts are no place to evaluate scientific hypotheses, much less settle scientific disputes, is true. But the innocent-sounding hypothesis of Anthropogenic Global Warming is no mere speculation. It has become the putative rationale and excuse for a massive political movement aimed at undermining the foundations of modern civilization.
If the Congress, the Administration, and other Western legislatures and governments are in thrall to this dangerous ideology, then the only place to turn is to the courts. A trial will not serve to decide whether AGW or any other hypothesis about climate is true. But it could serve to reveal the ideological and political motives of the AGW proponents. That has to be the thrust of any case against the EPA and other agencies: not that AGW is necessarily false, but that the science is not ‘settled’ and the extremists who would pursue policies to curtail ‘carbon’ are not interested in truth, but political aggrandizement.
Kudos to the Chamber of Commerce. Let’s bring all the hidden agendas of the so-called ‘climate scientists’ out into the light. It’s those agendas that should be on trial, not science.
/Mr Lynn
One possible way to structure an EPA carbon dioxide Endangerment Finding trial would be to use something similar to the UK legal system, where the technical issues are settled by the respective side’s technical experts, with a three retired senior judge tribunal serving as a legal review board. Discovery would be critical as would full un-redacted disclosure of data and methodology used by both sides.
The AGW (Al Gore’s Wrangle) debate has for a long time had two Camps.
Camp 1: Natural Climate Change Deniers (i.e. AGW Supporters)
Camp 2: AGW Deniers (i.e. Natural Climate Change Supporters)
However there is now a growing number in a third Camp, and they are people moving from Camp 1 to Camp 2 !
The problem with being in Camp 1 is that you have NO empirical evidence to support your theory ! (CO2 plant food results in a rise in temperature)
Best of luck in any trial BS has worked before and I suppose it may work again, Sheeple are Sheeple where ever they live in this crazy 21st Century World !