Cites nearly half a million dollars in state grant-funded climate research conducted while [Dr. Michael ] Mann— now director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State— was at UVA between 1999 and 2005.
From The Hook, it seems satirical YouTube videos will be the least of Dr. Mann’s worries now.
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No one can accuse Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli of shying from controversy. In his first four months in office, Cuccinelli directed public universities to remove sexual orientation from their anti-discrimination policies, attacked the Environmental Protection Agency, and filed a lawsuit challenging federal health care reform. Now, it appears, he may be preparing a legal assault on an embattled proponent of global warming theory who used to teach at the University of Virginia, Michael Mann.
In papers sent to UVA April 23, Cuccinelli’s office commands the university to produce a sweeping swath of documents relating to Mann’s receipt of nearly half a million dollars in state grant-funded climate research conducted while Mann— now director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State— was at UVA between 1999 and 2005.
If Cuccinelli succeeds in finding a smoking gun like the purloined emails that led to the international scandal dubbed Climategate, Cuccinelli could seek the return of all the research money, legal fees, and trebled damages.
“Since it’s public money, there’s enough controversy to look in to the possible manipulation of data,” says Dr. Charles Battig, president of the nonprofit Piedmont Chapter Virginia Scientists and Engineers for Energy and Environment, a group that doubts the underpinnings of climate change theory.
…
The Attorney General has the right to make such demands for documents under the Fraud Against Taxpayers Act, a 2002 law designed to keep government workers honest.
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more at The Hook
h/t to Chip Knappenberger
mikael pihlström, April 30, 2010 at 11:22 am:
“Mann’s hockey stick has survived an exceptional scrutiny by 3-4 statisticians!”
Mikael, who are you trying to fool here? Your statement above is not credible. It may get a pass on realclimate or climateprogress or tamino. But not here.
Michael Mann’s original hockey stick chart was debunked by McIntyre & McKittrick.
As a result of their debunking of Mann’s chart, and the Wegman et al. Report to Congress validating M&M’s falsifying of Mann’s paper, Mann’s original Hokey Stick can no longer be used in the UN/IPCC’s Assessment Reports, even though the IPCC would love to continue using it. Mann’s chart was their best visual propaganda. Very scary. But wrong.
The IPCC is now forced to use pale imitations of Mann’s original chart. But the imitations lack the alarming visual impact of Mann’s chart, and the fact that they use inferior hokey stick charts shows, more than anything, that the IPCC acknowledges that Mann’s attempt to erase both the MWP and the LIA has been thoroughly debunked.
Hmmmmmm…. I wonder if the RICO Act would apply? Given the hypothetical collusion intimated by several of the Climate Gate emails, coupled with potential criminal activity spanning years also intimated in the emails (diversion of public funds, FOI Act violations, funding acquired by fraudulent means, etc), it just might.
“The Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act is a United States federal law that provides for extended criminal penalties and a civil cause of action for acts performed as part of an ongoing criminal organization….”
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racketeer_Influenced_and_Corrupt_Organizations_Act
See also: http://www.ricoact.com/ricoact/nutshell.asp
for a lay mans summary of applicability.
Smokey says:
April 30, 2010 at 11:50 am
“Michael Mann’s original hockey stick chart was debunked by McIntyre & McKittrick. ”
M & M showed that Mann’s statistical method was not good. This
was confirmed in a publication by a third party , concluding
however that it did not change the essence of the matter (the
stick). If I remember correctly all this was reported in the last IPCC
report.
Yes! Time to release the Kraken.
I don’t know if Mann’s original grant proposals are available to the public. Presumably, he proposed to use proxies, such as tree rings to estimate average temperatures over the last 2-3,ooo years. Since his salary was probably paid by the university, most of the budget probably went to pay for graduate students, postdocs and technical help. He published a number of papers based on the grant proposal work, presumably based on the methods and work found in the grant proposal. Unless some of the money was misappropropriated, it seems likely that he used the money for its intended purpose. I doubt that the AG is well qualified to weigh in on the assumptions and quality of the analysis.
mikael pihlström … and why would the IPCC have any credibility? Those who wish for the essence of the hockey stick to be upheld wrote their views into the IPCC report. This is independent?
Your statement would have some power if a competent statistician stated that the essence of the hockey stick was confirmed. Related parties are not confirmation. A statement that the method is bad, but which deliberately does not comment on the validity of the results is not confirmation either.
Re: James, April 30, 1150:
RICO: I don’t think there is any statute of limitations on RICO at the federal level. Several states have equivalent laws on the books. The VA AG is just the first round in what promises to be decades in court litigating the perpetrators and willing participants in this fraud. I’m buying popcorn.
I believe that the AG has got something on Mann, although it may be small. (E.g., blogging at RC during time that he was billing to the UVA.) The AG wouldn’t have entered into something as potentially embarrassing as this if he didn’t have some assurance that he wouldn’t come out empty handed.
This gives him license to ask for the records; and having the records he can fish for other things that might turn up. But there’s nothing unprecedented about that; “discovery” proceedings, which are quite legal, have the same effect. Ditto when the police execute a search warrant and find unexpected incriminating evidence.
A chilling effect would occur only if the AG were to prosecute or seek restitution on a flimsy basis, or seek excessive restitution. Those would be objectionable (constituting a “blackwash”?), but we haven’t got there yet, and I doubt that we will. (For one thing, it would surely backfire.) That’s the place to draw the line, not here. An inquiry shouldn’t be considered impermissible merely because it might turn into a star chamber exercise. That fear of what might happen would rule out all inquiries.
Oh, this is what the AG is doing:
“In papers sent to UVA April 23, Cuccinelli’s office commands the university to produce a sweeping swath of documents relating to Mann’s receipt of nearly half a million dollars in state grant-funded climate research conducted while Mann— now director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State— was at UVA between 1999 and 2005.”
He wants to look at the university records of how the money was spent. This really has nothing much to do with Mann’s research per se. A grant project has different categories: personel, supplies, equipment, travel, indirect costs. The university keeps a record of those accounts. So, the AG will get a pile of records of the bills and payroll. That should keep some clerks in the university accounting department busy for a few days. It will say anything about data and how the data were analyzed and interpreted. Seems to me that this is unlikely to have any effect on Mann–it’s only a test of whether accounting is keeping good records. Certainly, the accounting department and their records do not bear on how the research was carried out and how its results were interpreted.
When a professor moved from one university to another, he or she often has to leave equipment behind. But you can be assured that the data books and files move with the professor and that no one at the university has an interest in archiving the raw data.
AG Cuccinelli is an engineer before law school. He of course has entered a suit against the EPA and it’s rulings and standards.
Sorry Mann. You won’t get to apply your emotional arguements and pass. More recent engineers also study computor programs, modeling and have extensive math and physics. I am sure if the AG does some of the questions under oath, Mann will not be able to justify his political position by claiming conservatives don’t care about the planet.
Since I am handy dandy with fortran, I can e-mail the code to the lawyers that show what Mann tried in terms of raising and lowering temps to get the slope he wanted on his graph.
It doesn’t take 500,000 dollars to Mann ipulate the software and push down the MWP and raise a hockey stick.
Somewhat off topic, but it seems to me that the supporters of AGW/CC react to challenge and requests for proof, in much the same way evolutionists respond to the absence of proof.
Henry chance:
Raising/lowering temps like this?
If that (dislike of findings) were the AG’s sole motivation, he’d have launched this inquiry many years ago. This launch is, I suspect, due to information that has recently come to his attention, and/or that he has decided to treat more seriously in light of Climategate, which is smoky enough to justify a check for fire.
Maybe Minnesotans for Global Warming can draw a picture of him in a pointed hat and riding a hockey stick.
Sharkey, the word you’re looking for is “cojones.” Kahunas are Hawaiian “big men.”
Toby, good to see you follow Rahm’s dictum: “Never let a good recto-cranial inversion go to waste.” Alger Hiss wasn’t “probably” guilty, ask the KGB.
Well it can be bad Karma. Sometimes people sit on a secret and come out when theey find a problem is exposed. Let me paint a scenario. Some rather sharp student gets put down a few notches by Mann at Virginia. They then read the e-mails and see his attitude in writing is cocky and disrespectfull like he as when they sat in his classes. Here now we have a 500,000 dollar grant and the student was put to a keyboard to enter the data and Mann did some heavy duty armchair science. He snagged a little tree ring daa from Briffa, wrote a little program and used a little canned software, attaches thits to a little powerpoint presentation and voila, we have 500,000 plus a little student slave labor and a little work for Michael turninto a famous report.
It is very likely Michael was tattled on. Yes, I am saying someone carried this case into the AG office. Resentment and a little bitterness can trigger the CRU leak and it is siometimes even the trigger before people embezzle money.
I am not saying the ideas for this case originated by head scratching on the part of the AG.
From what I read, there was not 500,000 dollars worth of heavy lifting by Mann et al. or at all. I do see the net procedes for the study may have a heavy overhead burden, but he didn’t do 40,000 dollars worth of work.
What’s this about witch hunt? Witch hunt? Against people who have been fanning the greatest fraud ever on taxpayers?
Let those who have created this fraud feel the fury of the taxpayer, feel the fury of those who live in beautiful landscapes ruined by useless windmills, the fury of those who have been deprived of refrigeration in hot countries, of electricity to run hospitals and all those who have suffered in many other ways, by this ridiculous vilification of CO2.
Perhaps Ken Cuccinelli and Dr Charles Battig, riding the Fraud against Taxpayers act 2002 will at last come to the rescue. It’s about time Anthony Watts and all the other brave lone fighters get some big guns behind them.
I want one of the cases to end up with a subpoena for Al Gore. It would be wonderful to see him take the stand and actually have to answer some questions.
Roger Knights says:
April 30, 2010 at 1:46 pm
If that (dislike of findings) were the AG’s sole motivation, he’d have launched this inquiry many years ago.
The AG would have found it impossible to “launch his inquiry” many years ago, since he was just elected in November 2009, and assumed office on January 16, 2010:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ken_Cuccinelli
This launch is, I suspect, due to information that has recently come to his attention, and/or that he has decided to treat more seriously in light of Climategate, which is smoky enough to justify a check for fire.
Or maybe it’s just a political gimmick, like saying he will not get a Social Security # for his seventh child, because “it is being used to track you”.
The former Virginia AG, also a lawyer and a Republican, had no such “recent information” on this UVA assistant professor who left in 2005.
mikael pihlström says:
April 30, 2010 at 12:03 pm
“…that it did not change the essence of the matter (the
stick).”
Wrong!
Watch this all the way through.
http://www.blip.tv/file/3539174
RockyRoad says:
April 30, 2010 at 10:51 am
Reply: I don’t give much credibility to headlines–those are constructed to raise blood pressure and pull in readers rather than convey facts
Virginia Attorney General goes after Mann and UVA
This headline I referred to was written by Anthony Watts.
You should show more respect to the founder of this website – he has done a good job getting people of very diverse backgrounds to discuss climate science and associated issues. This headline is hardly “constructed to raise blood pressure and pull in readers rather than convey facts“.
Well I do believe that I have read this entire thread.
And I don’t have any quarrel with those who say it is quite proper and to be expected, that a researcher be able to account for his usage of grant funding. My dearest and longest lifetime friend whom I went to grade school with, worked his entire life in Academia living solely on Government Grant funding for his Research; as did his wife; who is as distinguished in their field as he is. Even in retirement his services are still sought by the CDC in Atlanta. So I do understnat Grant funding; although I have never been in that position myself.
I also acknowledge that by all accounts Mann’s “hockey stick” has been discredited; although I cannot claim that I understand the Statistical issues involved. I also hold a jaundiced view of dendrothermometry.
And I have read the Climategate e-mails that talk of using “Mike’s Nature trick.” And I do believe that those who paid for the acquisition of his data; should have access to that and to the methodoligies of his processing of that data.
But I don’t think you send in SWAT teams to seize his computers, and logs etc to feather the electoral ambitions of some activist politician either. There are proper avenues of enquiry and investigation.
But if you are gung ho for the firing squad; well I will just keep your preference in mind; just in case you ever go astray.
George E. Smith says:
April 30, 2010 at 3:18 pm
The have already sent in swat teams against ordinary citizens here in the USA.
“This is the nightmare abuse of power by the government we have all been fearing …Danny Henshaw were awakened by their local Virginia game warden, who arrested Danny on an apparently trumped up Class 2 Misdemeanor charge….Danny was released from custody in 2 hours and allowed to return to the farm where he and Cindi were controlled around the clock by armed guards from September 12th through September 22nd.” http://nonais.org/index.php/2006/09/29/henshaw-incident/
Documents at http://nonais.org/index.php/2006/10/02/henshaw-documents/
I have a friend who traveled to the Henshaw’s farm and was an eye witness to the blood trails, human feces and the rest of the mess left by the “swat” team.
Who said anything about a SWAT team? Are you grasping at straws to find something wrong with this?
Now the nightmare is fully revealed…
Foxnews has a copy of the letter AG Cuccinelli sent to the University of Virginia.
The breadth of Cuccinelli’s request is staggering.
Smells more like a fishing expedition, rather than a targeted investigation, to me.
(and just for the record, I am certainly caught up in all of this)
-Chip Knappenberger
George E. Smith says:
April 30, 2010 at 3:18 pm
Well I do believe that I have read this entire thread.
And I don’t have any quarrel with those who say it is quite proper and to be expected, that a researcher be able to account for his usage of grant funding.
Indeed it is, bear in mind that the grant is awarded to the university and the PI has to justify expenditure to the university.
I also acknowledge that by all accounts Mann’s “hockey stick” has been discredited; although I cannot claim that I understand the Statistical issues involved. I also hold a jaundiced view of dendrothermometry.
Bear in mind that the ‘Hockey stick’ paper was published while Mann was at UMass so wouldn’t be the subject of this investigation. As far as I can tell from his CV Mann was a co-PI on one grant from Va: “Resolving the Scale-wise Sensitivities in the Dynamical Coupling Between Climate and the Biosphere”, University of Virginia-Fund for Excellence in Science and Technology (FEST) [Principal Investigator: J.D. Albertson; Co-Investigators: H. Epstein, M.E. Mann] U.Va internal award: $214,700
And I do believe that those who paid for the acquisition of his data; should have access to that and to the methodoligies of his processing of that data
Which may prove not to have been the state of Virginia.