From Andrew Bolt, my “mate” down under at the Herald Sun, comes this surprise. I’ll have to say, it is to George Monbiot’s credit to do this. I embrace his first statement, because it succinctly sums up the situation:
It’s no use pretending that this isn’t a major blow. The emails extracted by a hacker from the climatic research unit at the University of East Anglia could scarcely be more damaging(1). I am now convinced that they are genuine, and I’m dismayed and deeply shaken by them.
– George Monbiot on his personal blog
George seems to realize that, “it’s worse than we thought”.
From Andrew Bolt:
Even George Monbiot, one of the fiercest media propagandists of the warming faith, admits he should have been more sceptical and says the science now needs to be rechecked:
It’s no use pretending that this isn’t a major blow. The emails extracted by a hacker from the climatic research unit at the University of East Anglia could scarcely be more damaging. I am now convinced that they are genuine, and I’m dismayed and deeply shaken by them.
Yes, the messages were obtained illegally. Yes, all of us say things in emails that would be excruciating if made public. Yes, some of the comments have been taken out of context. But there are some messages that require no spin to make them look bad. There appears to be evidence here of attempts to prevent scientific data from being released, and even to destroy material that was subject to a freedom of information request.
Worse still, some of the emails suggest efforts to prevent the publication of work by climate sceptics, or to keep it out of a report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. I believe that the head of the unit, Phil Jones, should now resign. Some of the data discussed in the emails should be re-analysed.
Sure, Monbiot claims the fudging of what he extremely optimistically puts as just “three or four” scientists doesn’t knock over the whole global warming edifice, yet…
If even Monbiot, an extremist, can say that much, why cannot the Liberals say far more? And will now the legion of warmist journalists in our own media dare say as Monbiot has so belatedly:
I apologise. I was too trusting of some of those who provided the evidence I championed. I would have been a better journalist if I had investigated their claims more closely.
Scepticism is the essential disposition of our craft, yet too many journalists have abandoned it. Remember: the opposite of sceptical is gullible.
UPDATE: Here’s the screencap from Monbiot’s blog on the Guardian:
Click to see the original.
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CYA comes to mind, and there will be a lot of that in the days, weeks, and months to come. This whole sorted affair is taking on a life of its own. Now if Congress could only cut off all the funding for climate research immediately like they did with ACORN till this whole affair is sorted out… OK, I won’t hold my breath, but it would send the right message to the conspirators and would be conspirators, and that’s what I demand to be done right now.
How is this possible: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8375248.stm
With the bill still in Senate, how can the US make any official statement to cut CO2 emissions especially now we know that the entire data on which the IPCC based it’s IPPCC 2007 report has been cooked?
This is a nothing more but an unprecedented power grab and it’s in conflict with the constitution of the USA.
I think Monbiots post was a tongue in cheek apology.
He wants to appear as the “reasonable man” to his followers, but will be preaching hellfire come next week.
If he’s deleted my comment by morning then I’ll know his words were just posturing.
It certainly takes a huge dose of courage and humility to write what he has, but that silly adendum about the “Knights Carbonic” shows that he does not understand the roots of his own world view. You don’t need a vast “conspiracy” like the one depicted in G.K. Chesterton’s “The Man Who Was Thursday”, rather movements that start with the best of intentions and the highest ideals can split and transform into mirror images.
The Utilitarian School of Philosophy that arose in England during the Enlightenment championed human rights, democracy, an end to slavery, and championed the right pf women to vote. This movement split into a number of parts, one being the “Classical Liberalism” of thinkers like John Stuart Mill, which looked much like our modern Libertarianism and espoused free markets and limited government, while another , under Robert Owen, evolved into modern European Socialism.
At the beginning of the 20th century The Frankfurt School emerged in Germany, disenchanted Marxists who tried to retain the most intellectually rigorous aspects of Marxian thought and combine them with “modern” Freudian theory. It was oriented toward exposing the ways modern society supresses the individual. Much of modern social science can trace its roots back to these thinkers and tends to dominate the discourse. It is out of this tradition that people Saul Alinsky, and Herbert Marcuse, the Father of the American New Left, originated. The New Left initially opposed oppressive big government aligned with special interests (capitalism), but eventually came to see in big government the answer to social ills as well. This is a point of view which tends to dominate most universities today.
Which leads us to where we are today. It doesn’t take a vast conspiracy, all it really takes is for a single paradigm to become hegemonic.
“I’m confused though… is the apology sincere? Whats with the clearly ironic email at the end?”
My thought as well. Where, exactly, did the sarcasm start? He didn’t use the sarcasm font.
Larry M (20:17:28) :
“Better read the rest of that Monbiot blog. Doesn’t sound like an apology to me.”
I haven’t read it, but I’m willing to bet you are right. From his vile and nasty attacks on anyone who aren’t “believers,” I doubt his apology is sincere.
Does this look like the behavior of any sane person you know?
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/wales/7424785.stm
More calls for investigation:
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/11/23/climategate-both-sides-of-the-pond-demand-probes-into-data-manipulation-scandal/
But is this Saul on the road to Damascus? have the scales fallen from his eyes? or rather a shrewd opportunist who knows when to turn his coat? And do it so artfully that he can now manage to keep a foot in both camps until he perceives how the battle goes? And which way to jump.
I do not know, but I do know it pays to be on the winning side: and that there are always new fashionable causes to champion with your pen.
After all Defoe was a master at it: but I do not suppose Monbiot to be any Defoe.
For make no mistake, as I said on here a few months ago I sensed a change and it seems that battle, so long avoided by the AGW camp, is now joined. It will be a long affair, you cannot turn a great liner on a sixpence and this one has many vast and monied interests.
Who will win I cannot say, nothing is certain in this world, Pharsalus do you think? I do not know but I do know which side I am on: for I am a true diehard who fights for his beliefs.
But if I am right then as the walls wash away like those of a sandcastle before the incoming tide how many more of these creatures are we going to see? You may yet be amazed. After all poor things they were deceived you see. They could not possibly be to blame and so deserve our sympathy.
Well not mine. They may have been hired knaves paid to lift their staves but if so they were well educated ones out to profit from their knavery.
So I for one will not congratulate Mr. Monbiot, all I see is a shrewd Grub Street hack planning an escape route off what is likely a sinking ship.
And no matter where an astute rat ends up in some pasture new when he may yet again gorge himself upon the fat of the land: a rat is still a rat. Or longtail if you prefer.
Kindest Regards
Well blow me down with a carbon credit!
I did a quick search of “sunspot” in those files. They mention that when they (sunspots) return (along with an el-nino coming), there will be another “dramatic upward spike”, somebody says volcano’s often occur “co- incidentally” in sunspot minima periods, there is a “nice correlation” between the last 400 years of sunspots and d18O in N-pachy, and finally, somebody says when the sunspots return, their grandchildren will find it “exceedingly warm.”
I thought the general consensus among climate researchers was that sunspots play no role in climate?
The way I read it is that he does not like the actions of some of the researchers but has not changed his mind on the topic in general. No suprise that the actions of a few wouldn’t change his outlook.
Whenever I read the word “MonBiot”, my brain says “moon bot.”
I don’t trust Monbiot as far as I can spit. I don’t believe his apology is motivated by anything other than damage control, especially after reading the second part of his blog article. He has been a point man for East Anglia for years, don’t forget.
In the article he calls for the resignation of one man (Dr. Phil Jones), concedes the damaged credibility of three or four others, and suggests that certain data discussed in the emails should be re-analysed. But then he sets up his heavily sarcastic Communist World Government fake email with two very interesting sentences that refer to the CRUtape emails:
“They raise questions about the integrity of one or perhaps two out of several hundred lines of evidence. To bury manmade climate change, a far wider conspiracy would have to be revealed.”
He is still a true believer willing to sacrifice Phil Jones for the cause.
He is acknowledging the mistakes but saying the battle is lost but the war is far from over. Good on him for seeing the mistakes made by jones et al. as being serious.
Cheers
Michael
I am taking the view expressed by several other commenters.
I am still a strong skeptic–of Monbiot’s sincerity.
He is still a believer !
So it was the grant money that corrupted the scientists so it’s not really their fault. It’s the governments fault who dangled the money in front of them. Not. I think finger pointing and laying blame is the first order of business. Everyone who is directly, and those indirectly involved where evidence is found ie government officials, need to be sought out, prosecuted, and justice served to them on a silver platter as soon as possible. Heads must roll.
The CRU crew will now do lunch under the Bus, for that is the ticket they have earned for themselves, and it’s high time for it to be punched.
I’ll credit Monbiot for standing up and being honest about things.
Now, don’t forget that Dr. James Hansen is also in on a lot of those emails.
It’s dead Jim, and so is your credibility.
There is one catch, though. Before re-analysis can take place, data worldwide must be authenticated as being unaltered. That will take years. So be it.
Nothing short of Criminal! A massive and costly scam! I want my tax dollars back and I want criminal charges brought!
C’mon.. it’s SARCASM! hehe
Anybody, even the moonbat, can see that there’s trouble ahead.
His apology came, not in his post but as a response to a commenter who had demanded it.
He called for Jones’s resignation; that would be a very risky gameplay in the circumstances.
My impression was that the preponderance of commenters was either sceptics or warmers disavowing Mann, Jones et al. They weren’t all moderated away.
He’s not doing a U-turn, just ducking down some back alleys. AGW is not dead and he’d look really silly giving it all up in one fell swoop.
Judging by the entire content and context of Monists blog, I can only conclude that while his “faith” in some have been shaken, his conviction that all will be well with the CAGW world remains intact.
This was no apology.
I see no conversion on the road to Damascus. The latter 2/3 of his post was extremely sarcastic. Rhetorically, he equated some of our belief that an alleged (albeit false) conspiracy has been revealed – and is mirrored in that fatuous “Carbonic Knights” email.
Yes, the messages were obtained illegally.
Huh, really? We don’t know yet if they were.
Yes, all of us say things in emails that would be excruciating if made public.
Huh, we do?
A Jones: Your writing is why I still long for England after all these generations. Sigh. Well put and with all the correct words. Please now, resume.