Open Thread #3

41% of Britons believe in AGW: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1227745/Most-Britons-dont-believe-climate-change-man-made.html
Milliband is very cross with all the deniers…

Phil Clarke (07:10:14) :
“… and who represents himself as ‘a member of the Upper House of the United Kingdom legislature’ when he is no such thing and never has been?…”
I’d be very interested in seeing a citation for the quote since it is highly unlikely that Lord Monckton would use that phraseology himself. If you citation should, perhaps, be Wikipedia, then you fail the course. The discussion tab at Wikipedia is always so much more illuminating than the actual article:
Errors by Wikipedia in Lord Monckton’s biography
Please note that a well-funded campaign paid for by a convicted fraudster who owns a solar-energy corporation and thus has a vested interest in advancing the “global warming” scare is linked to various people who, full time, detrimentally edit the Wikipedia pages of scientists and others who question the alarmist viewpoint. They use automatic bots to monitor the pages, and automatically reverse within minutes any changes intended to restore the truth and remove inaccuracies. The Monckton biography is one of those pages that has been subjected to this corrupt form of editing. Users should note that the following are among the offending passages that have appeared, and may still appear, and which Wikipedia refuses to remove.
Offending passage 1: “.. and has attracted controversy for his public opposition to the mainstream scientific consensus on climate change”. Reason for correction: “Mainstream scientific consensus” is a matter of opinion, not of biographical fact. Furthermore, tendentious commentary of this kind has no place in what is presented as though it were supposed to be a factual biography. Proposed correction: Replace by “and opposes the theory that anthropogenic climate change may prove catastrophic”.
Offending passage 2: “Although he has in the past stated that he is ‘a member of the Upper House of the United Kingdom legislature,’[3] Monckton has never been a member of either the House of Lords or the House of Commons.” Reason for correction: Lord Monckton has never said he is a sitting member of the House of Lords: he is, however, a member of the Upper House by succession (hence his title), is registered as such on the list of Peers entitled to be elected by his fellow hereditary peers, and, as a member of the House in good standing, is entitled to use its facilities, though not to speak or vote in the Chamber, for it is in this sense alone that the House of Lords Act 1999 removes the right of membership from hereditary Peers. Proposed correction: Preferably, delete this damaging libel altogether. Otherwise, replace by “He is a hereditary peer, but his father’s automatic right to sit and vote, like that of most hereditary Peers, was terminated by the Peerage Act 1999”.
Offending passage 3: “… he later admitted he fabricated the story as a publicity stunt.” Reason: Lord Monckton fabricated no such story and has never said that he did so. We note that this passage is not referenced. Whatever the reference that may (or may not) underlie this libel, it is false. Proposed correction: Preferably, delete altogether. Otherwise, replace by “… he sold his house one month before he was required to pay the £1 million prize to the winners.”
Offending passage 4: “Monckton has been described as “a fervent, forthright and opinionated Roman Catholic Tory” [7] who has been closely associated with the “New Right” faction of the Conservative Party.” Reason: This is a tendentious, inaccurate, and somewhat pejorative misrepresentation of Lord Monckton’s opinions and political and religious affiliations. In particular, Lord Monckton has not been “closely associated with the ‘New Right’”. In fact, he is known chiefly for his expert knowledge of reforming taxes and benefits to end working-class poverty, a matter on which he advised Margaret Thatcher during her term as Prime Minister, leading inter alia not only to the sale of 1 million council houses to their tenants but also to major reforms of the structure of both taxes and benefits, including ending the separate taxation of husband and wife, to the great benefit of families; significant increases in child benefits as a step towards eradicating primary poverty; a root-and-branch reform and simplification of housing benefit; and the ending of large-scale homelessness by compelling local authorities either to put tenants in empty publicly-owned houses or to sell them at advantageous prices to poor people who could not otherwise afford to house themselves. None of these hallmark policies could by any stretch of the imagination be described as “New Right”, or right wing at all. Proposed correction: Delete the offending passage.
Offending passage 5: “In more recent years, he has been associated with the Referendum Party, advising its founder Sir James Goldsmith, and in 2003 he helped a Scottish Tory breakaway group, the People’s Alliance”. Reason: This passage is misleading. In fact, it was Lord Monckton’s consultancy company that acted, in a professional capacity, for Sir James Goldsmith, and also for the Scottish People’s Alliance. The words “Scottish Tory breakaway group” are a matter of opinion and have no place in a supposedly unprejudiced biographical entry. Proposed correction: Preferably, delete altogether. Otherwise, replace by “Lord Monckton’s consultancy company has acted for several political parties, among others Sir James Goldsmith’s Referendum Party, providing it with the names of many hundreds of candidates, and the People’s Alliance (later the New Party), whose first manifesto he helped to draft.”
Offending passage 6: “Monckton’s views on how the AIDS epidemic should be tackled have been the subject of some controversy.” Reason: This formulation goes beyond a mere biographical entry. Proposed correction: Either delete the entire passage about AIDS altogether or replace by “Lord Monckton’s recommendations in 1985/6, following advice from specialist medical researchers into HIV, that AIDS should be treated like any other fatal infection were not acted upon. Since that time, according to UN statistics, some 25 million people have died of AIDS, and 40 million more are infected. Lord Monckton regards this as a cruel and continuing tragedy, and is currently working with academic medical specialists to find a cure, which is to be tested shortly.”
Offending passage 7: “… there is only one way to stop AIDS. That is to screen the entire population regularly and to quarantine all carriers of the disease for life. Every member of the population should be blood-tested every month … all those found to be infected with the virus, even if only as carriers, should be isolated compulsorily, immediately, and permanently.” Reason: this quotation has been wrenched out of context, and is incomplete and, consequently, unfair to Lord Monckton. Proposed correction: Either delete the entire passage about AIDS altogether or add: “Lord Monckton made plain, however, that isolation of the infected – the standard method for containing fatal communicable diseases to spare the uninfected – should be humanely done, and need not be as drastic as that which had helped to eradicate previous fatal infections.”
Offending passage 8: “Monckton has since modified his views on AIDS, stating that ‘the article was written at the very outset of the AIDS epidemic, and with 33 million people around the world now infected, the possibility of [quarantine] is laughable. It couldn’t work.’ Reason: Lord Monckton has not “modified his views on AIDS”: he considers that, at the time when it could have been prevented from killing tens of millions, the usual public-health measures ought to have been taken. Unfortunately, now that there are 40 million infected, it is no longer possible to contain the disease as he had recommended 20 years ago. Proposed correction: Delete this passage altogether.
Offending passage 9: “His petition for judicial review was dismissed by the court for want of relevancy”. Reason: this passage unfairly omits to state that the judge expressed considerable sympathy for Lord Monckton’s position throughout the case, and is unfairly pejorative in the circumstances. Proposed correction: Replace by “The court expressed considerable sympathy for Lord Monckton’s position, and only found against him when a line item was discovered in that year’s European Union budget authorizing the expenditure by the UK on the social chapter of the Maastricht Treaty which Parliament had previously and expressly refused to sanction. The Government of the day took Lord Monckton’s challenge seriously enough to put up the Lord Advocate in person against him; and the outcome was such that the Lord Advocate was unable to recover his expenses in the cause.”
Offending passage 10: “His views have attracted controversy and strong criticism from scientists and environmental activists, including Al Gore and George Monbiot.” Reason: Neither Al Gore nor George Monbiot has any qualifications in any climate-related science; and it seems unfair that what is supposed to be a straightforward, biographical article should not only contain tendentious material of this kind but should also fail to mention the numerous scientists who have cited Lord Monckton’s work with approval, and have even cited him in peer-reviewed papers as having assisted them. Proposed correction: Delete the offending passage.
Offending passage 11: “Gavin Schmidt has criticised Monckton’s analysis of climate sensitivity as “sleight-of-hand to fool the unwary” [1]. Dr. Stephan Harrison criticises Moncktons’ articles as “full of errors, misuse of data and cherry-picked examples” [2]. The British writer and environmentalist George Monbiot has criticized Monckton’s arguments as “cherry-picking, downright misrepresentation and pseudo-scientific gibberish.”[18] Reason: Once again, Wikipedia has cherry-picked statements made by scientists at the invitation of Monbiot, whose newspaper was compelled to print a strongly-worded correction by Lord Monckton the day after Monbiot had published a scientifically-erroneous article attempting to criticize Lord Monckton inappropriately for having misunderstood the fundamental equation of radiative transfer, of which Monbiot had no knowledge, and which Monbiot had himself grievously misunderstood. Proposed correction: Delete this passage.
Offending passage 12: “Monckton’s critics charge that “[his] science is self-taught and his paper qualifications nonexistent”[15] and that “he is trying to take on the global scientific establishment on the strength of a classics degree from Cambridge.”[23] For his part, Monckton takes the view that it is “a very modern notion that you need paper qualifications to pronounce on anything and it comes from the socialist idea that people need to be trained in the official, accepted, dogmatic truths.”[15] Reason: Yet again, only pejorative opinions of Lord Monckton’s research are cited. Proposed correction: Delete this passage.
Offending passage 13: “… part of Frontiers of Freedom, a conservative organization funded by ExxonMobil that has campaigned against the screening of An Inconvenient Truth in U.S. schools.[27]” Reason: This passage is not only tendentious but is at all points factually incorrect. The Science and Public Policy Institute is not and was not ever a part of “Frontiers of Freedom”; nor has it ever campaigned against the screening of Al Gore’s sci-fi comedy horror movie in schools, though it has recommended that, by way of balance, schools should also show Lord Monckton’s movie Apocalypse? NO! Proposed correction: delete the offending passage.
Offending passage 14: “He is also funding the distribution to schools of the controversial documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle as a riposte to Gore’s film.”[23] Reason: This passage is both tendentious and inaccurate: tendentious because it describes one film as “controversial” without describing the other as controversial (a High Court Judge, after all, has described Al Gore’s “Armageddon scenario” as “not based on any scientific view”); inaccurate because Lord Monckton is not funding any distribution to schools, nor has he ever said he is doing so or will do so. It appears that, yet again, Wikipedia has readily accepted and repeated errors detrimental to Lord Monckton and published in an unverified source, without having checked it with Lord Monckton. Indeed, on no occasion has anyone from Wikipedia ever checked Lord Monckton’s entry with him before publishing it on the Web. Proposed correction: Delete this error entirely.
Offending passage 15: “He is a supporter of The New Party, which lent its political support to the litigation over Gore’s film, and wrote part of its manifesto.” Reason: This passage is inaccurate. Lord Monckton’s consultancy provided professional help to his then clients the New Party (then the Scottish People’s Alliance) by assisting in the preparation of its first manifesto. He is not and has never been a member or supporter of the New Party – indeed, contrary to the false impressions scattered throughout the libelous Wikipedia entry now complained of, he does not in fact belong to any political party, and has not done so for many years, though he was simultaneously a member of the Conservative and Labour Associations at university so that he could familiarize himself with both sides of the political debate. He was not even a member of the Conservative party during his four years as a special adviser to Margaret Thatcher at 10 Downing Street. Proposed correction: Delete the offending passage.
Offending passage 16: “… described as “showing Monckton presenting a slide show in a vitriolic attack on climate change science.”[23] Reason: Yet again, only a pejorative comment has been selected for inclusion, when a properly-constructed biographical entry would merely have reported the fact that Lord Monckton had made a movie questioning Gore’s [proven scientifically-inaccurate] representations of climate science; and a balanced entry, even if it had decided to include comments, would have included some of the numerous favourable comments that Lord Monckton’s movie has received, by way of balance to the above-quoted pejorative comments. Proposed correction: Delete the offending passage.
The link to the Wikipedia discussion page is here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Talk:Christopher_Monckton,_3rd_Viscount_Monckton_of_Brenchley
Now, Phil, please take your discussion elsewhere.

When you rush things you make mistakes. “discussion POINTS” is what I meant. “Discussion Points.” Honest discussion is always welcome; talking points are not honest discussion.