Today at Huffington Post, a prominent soldier in the environmental movement wrote:
I was stunned by the industry’s shamelessness — and then chagrined at my own gullibility.
It seems the iPhone app “Our Climate” has caught the attention of the chairman of the Sierra Club, Carl Pope.
That quote above is from when he got suckered by an April 1st spoof app supposedly released by the coal industry (made up by another Sierra Club leader as a joke). As is typical for people that write with an agenda to discredit, he doesn’t examine any of the facts surrounding the topic or the application itself. Predictably, he’s used a collection of weasel words. Pope writes in the Huffington Post:
But truth, it seems, does imitate fiction, with only a few month’s lag time. For this week a prominent climate-cynics site, Watt’s Up With That, released a climate-misinformation iPhone app that contains far more damaging Orwellian language than the Sierra Club’s coal industry spoof. The app, called Our Climate, does indeed treat global warming as, perhaps, just the result of natural atmospheric rhythms. But then again, maybe the globe isn’t warming at all. Indeed, Our Climate is, in its own words, a “bite-sized” guide to how climate cynics argue — and as a result rarely have so many contradictions been encompassed in so little space: Climate is highly variable on its own, so people can’t be causing it to change . Then again, climate has self-correcting feedback mechanisms, so it can’t change, regardless.
But there is one consistent theme to all of the material contained on the Our Climate” app (and on its parent WUWT site). Taken in isolation, each bit of data is designed to send your brain the message, “There’s nothing to worry about (and no reason to stop burning coal and oil).”
Here’s the funny part. The app isn’t mine, I didn’t write it, and I make nothing from it. I only wrote about it a couple of times, as did many other skeptic blogs. Yet the Sierra Club chairman Pope gives WUWT all the credit for it, saying:
For this week a prominent climate-cynics site, Watt’s Up With That, released a climate-misinformation iPhone app
In fact, it was written in Australia, by Aeris Systems which is connected to WUWT only by the fact that they asked me to review it and post the press release.
Even though Pope links to the iTunes page for the app, which has no mention of WUWT, and that page links to the ourclimate.info website, where again there’s no mention of WUWT, he seems to have missed this basic bit of research on ownership. Oh but it doesn’t stop there. Pope also links to the Guardian smackdown by the other climate app developer, John Cook:
And, guess what? WUWT isn’t mentioned in that article either, neither am I. It’s pretty embarrassing when the chairman of the Sierra Club can’t take a couple of minutes to read the content in the links he cites. I have no idea how he came to the false conclusion that the app is mine.
Kids, this is what happens when you don’t do your homework. Will Pope fix it over at HuffPo? Doubtful – the Sierra Club traditionally doesn’t let facts get in the way of a good rant.
Looks like Sierra Club chairman Carl Pope may have been writing an autobiography with this book title:
Keith W. says:
August 11, 2010 at 10:03 pm
“Not directly related to the topic at hand, but I wonder if Mr. Pope does a lot of travel as the Sierra Club President? Might he be a “Green Hypocrite”?”
As to that, Wiki reports
“Pope recently expressed support for the Pickens Plan, an effort by T. Boone Pickens to reduce America’s dependence on foreign oil. Pickens, a billionaire oil investor, Republican, and financier of conservative causes, took Pope, via his $60 million private plane, to his ranch in west Texas, where Pickens and a group of investors plan to invest $12 billion in wind turbines.”
I failed to find a reference to a private plane that runs on wind turbines.
“Climate cynic” implies that we know CAGW is as bad or worse than the IPPC says, but we profit directly or are in the pay of those who will profit from the prevention of action. In other words, we are not fools, we are criminals.
Are we talking about the same W who almost died after choking on a pretzel?
And this is significant because it is a well known fact that only the unintelligent choke on pretzels.
The same W who unconstitutionally invaded a sovereign nation? Right.
Him and around forty other nations. (And I’d advise you to bone up on your constitutional law lest you fall into further error.) The ones that stayed out were more likely than not snout-deep in the megadeath directly resulting from the Food-for-Oil scandal. (“Jacques, Jacques, Jacques Chirac! How many kids did you starve in Iraq?”)
Of course, there are still those who would have preferred Saddam’s slo-mo genocide to continue indefinitely. And Saddam, having eventually stopped a well deserved bullet, to be followed by a godawful, unrestrained civil war a hundred times worse than what we’ve seen (with no US, UK+allies to hold the factions apart). As opposed to a functioning Muslim democracy in the very heart of the fertile crescent.
But some folks fail to think these things through.
How anyone with a heart and a brain could possibly have had any moral reservations concerning the invasion of Iraq after the mass graves were uncovered (a yet-continuing process), is something that continues to elude me.
We’ve enough problems in the UK with Greenpiss, Fiends of the Earth and World WildLies Fund and the RSPB (Royal Society for Prostitution of Birds)
Don’t think the SeeError Club made it here yet. A small mercy.
But the trouble with all these amateur bunny hugging groups is that they shamelessly milk money from little old ladies who genuinely care about wildlife and nature and cynically fill their heads with a load of junk about the developed world’s wicked use of reliable and affordable energy. The people who have hijacked these bird spotters clubs work to an deeply political and cynical agenda.
Witness the RSPB who always bleat about the allegedly endangered raptors but who take £10 from BigWind everytime they get one of their Members to sign up to a “Green” electricity tariff.
see also
http://jamesdelingpole.com/blog/anyone-up-for-a-spot-of-red-kite-shooting-1084/
And, of course, the Government in the UK (not to mention the real Government in Brussels) pours millions into the pockets of Greenpiss, WWF and Fiends of the Earth whilst slashing funds for rebuilding decrepit schools!
Funny how free markets work considering iPhone is an Apple product and Al Gore currently sits as a director on Apple’s board. Absolutely wonderful.
Which makes me think, as a precaution, I wonder if Aeris Systems would produce the same app for Google’s Android system (just in case……… well you know I mean).
The Pope should read the Bishop’s book.
UN sanctions under Clinton killed about one million Iraqi children according to UNICEF. Far fewer civilians died under Bush.
Why did Clinton want sanctions? Because he was convinced that Saddam had WMD.
Isn’t it great watching the left rewrite history?
[REPLY – Yes, and amusing. But fear not. The faddish left of today has no staying power. A bunch of unliberal, anti-intellectual, third-rate second-handers. Chuckleheaded Chicken Littles. Their kind never survives the test of time. To quote Jenner, They’re thin, boys. As thin as piss on a hot rock. (And tiresome, whinging bores, to boot.) ~ Evan]
I am so proud to be a member of the WUWT climate science community that has greatly contributed in the destruction of the $trillion global governance scam. It’s a wonder I haven’t been banned from this highly influential blog, came close a few times rattling a lot of cages, but I survived and the carbon tax scam died. We Win!
History will remember Anthony Watts and maybe ctm for helping save the world from global economic enslavement to the very few global elite. I’m just glad I could do a little on my part to help.
Reply: I occasionally look over your older comments and delete many of them that the other moderators didn’t realize were as horrific as they are. I think it’s time to look again. ~ ctm
Popes are not concerned with facts for they have faith in their dogmatic beliefs so pesky facts have no chance with them. When faith based belief determines a person’s reality to the exclusion of actual verifiable hard evidence and the facts of life in the objective reality of Nature they got serious, ahem, delusions bouncing around the interior of their brain skull case.
Typo in first line – a prominent solider in …</i?
Frank: August 11, 2010 at 9:37 pm
Are we talking about the same W who almost died after choking on a pretzel? The same W who unconstitutionally invaded a sovereign nation? Right.
Give it a rest, Frank. Libs call anything they oppose “unconstitutional” — I heard one refer to the Second Amendment that way — and find an excuse to do inexcusable things by claiming Constitutionality, but without ever citing a reference.
“Bad organisations are like cess pits, the big lumps always float to the top.”
Seems this old adage is applicable to the environment distortion industry in the US.
These morons have a fool as a head. This man is shamelessly stupid. What are is credentials to be in charge of an environmental organization? Idiot Totalitarian? Hmmm. There was a book about that. Aha.
Alice In Wonderland.
The Red Queen. Fits perfectly.
evanmjones: August 11, 2010 at 10:44 pm
And, Saddam having eventually stopped a well deserved bullet…
Nup. He took a six-foot fall from a twelve-foot platform.
And so have about two hundred other dirtbags who were either caught setting up IEDs or assembling them — in schoolyards, bazaars, and along city streets — over the past couple of years.
[REPLY – How well I know. The bullet ref. is what would have happened to him had the US and allies not invaded: Saddam’s eventual assassination (probably after years of drawn-out genocide) — followed immediately by an inevitable horrific bloodbath. ~ Evan]
Frank, you are constitutionally a dullard.
“Is this the same Frank who could not tell time until 7th Grade?”
That is the extent of your cogitation.
If people like Pope ever bothered to be persuaded by reason, then they would no longer be Alarmists.
pat: August 11, 2010 at 8:25 pm
ICE to cut around half of 50-person CCX workforce
* 1st round of layoffs began July 23, more to come in autumn
* Sources cite U.S. climate inaction as main reason for cuts
* ICE collecting feedback on what to do with climate bourse
“ICE just came in one day and started hacking away … We were told the company was restructuring,” said one source, who declined to be named…
Oh, noes! Does this mean the ICE in Chicago is in a death spiral?
Steve, Evan, Stan, EvanMJones,
You guys make me proud. I saw today that GW and Laura surprised a group of returning soldiers today/yesterday at DFW. Very classy act.
[REPLY – How well I know. The bullet ref. is what would have happened to him had the US and allies not invaded: Saddam’s eventual assassination…]
*memo to self: examine sentence structures for future conditional tense before commenting and revealing self as forgetful idiot*
REPLY – Heck, if you even know what the future conditional tense is, you’re well ahead of the game. ~ Evan
Huff Post has now replaced the word “released” with “promoted” – entirely changing the nature of the article. This is a sneaky edit – without noting it is a correction and without changing the time stamp of the article. I thought the Huff Post had more class than this. And I think Ariana needs to be made aware of what her editors are doing. If anyone can get a note through the staff to her – please do.
From his comments I would pre suppose that Mr Pope is an ardent reader of WUWT so maybe he would like to add to the comments section?
Benjamin P. says:
August 11, 2010 at 8:16 pm
It’s funny to see folks talking about the money in “global warming” when it seems their is just as much to be made on the “denier” side of the aisle.
What? There’s money to be made in “Denial of Global Warming”? My goodness – I had better get my hand out for some…
Mind you accept the CO2 is a GHG, I also accept that there was a level of warming in the 19th and 20th century.
But you seem to be a man made global warming (MMGW) believer. Riddle me this than – just what are the specific falsification criteria for the MMGW concept?
For example, Einsteins relativity theory predicted that light would bend around a star. This novel phenomenon was empirically observed during the transit of venus in 1919 (if memory serves). if the phenomenon had not been observed, the theory would have been disproved.
So what observations if they were observed would disprove MMGW?
I note that the GCMs predict a troposheric hot spot – which has not been found in the empirical data. I note also that the ERBE and CERES satellite data is also in contradiction to MMGW theory.
So we have two real world pieces of empirical evidence that show that MMGW theory is wrong…
Do you realise that if your “scientific conversation” is limited to ((Theory + Models) – Empirical Tests) then you are not actually testing your theory.
If you can’t admit to the risk of falsification – you are clinging to dogma, and immersing yourself in a pseudo scientific cult.
Empirical test trumps all theory.
Bill Tuttle says:
August 12, 2010 at 12:13 am
pat: August 11, 2010 at 8:25 pm
ICE to cut around half of 50-person CCX workforce
* 1st round of layoffs began July 23, more to come in autumn
* Sources cite U.S. climate inaction as main reason for cuts
* ICE collecting feedback on what to do with climate bourse
“ICE just came in one day and started hacking away … We were told the company was restructuring,” said one source, who declined to be named…
Oh, noes! Does this mean the ICE in Chicago is in a death spiral?
Maybe the CCX will get a bailout – will it be deemed to big (important???) to fail?
I just downloaded the app and glanced through the information with critical eyes. My conclusion so far is that I think it’s a very careful and modest presentation, very far from “misinformation”. The only item I found which I thought was one-sided, was the presentation of the non-warming since 2002 with the help of the HADCRUT data ending in 2009, since both GISS and UAH data tell a different story, with a 2010 spike that’s close to 1998 even for UAH. On the flip side of the coin, they don’t discuss the fact that all land data sets may be overestimating the century-scale warming trend, but more or less take the HADCRUT data for granted.
The comments section takes Carl Pope apart. Here is a taste:
“WUWT just took you to task. Carl Pope, are you going to admit your error or ignore the facts?”
“WUWT did not produce this app. Please do your homework in the future. You might, for starters, check your own links.”
“Please do a guest post on WUWT. It would be most illuminating.
However, do be absolutely certain of all your “facts” and be prepared to cite credible references, you would not like to be shown to be a complete ignoramus and purveyor of half-truths, would you? ”
“My goodness, Carl, at least get your facts straight before opening your mouth and inserting your foot. And do not take the advice of these folks who are asking you to post over at WUWT.”
http://sierraclub.typepad.com/carlpope/2010/08/apple-fools-day.html
we should feel sorry for these people. I live an internet life – I’m online all day and I work with clients internationally and when I take a break I check joNova and WUWT etc.
These guys don’t – they work their butts off in competitive business attending meetings here, filing report pages here etc etc.
they don’t get to smell the roses, if they did they’d realise their roses have no smell.
I’d like to feel sorry for them but that would be patronising.