It seems the process to get supporting evidence from University of Virginia has overcome a roadblock. From the Virginia Court System: h/t to WUWT reader Laws of Nature
Appeals Granted
Case
KENNETH T. CUCCINELLI, II, ATTORNEY GENERAL OF VIRGINIA v. RECTOR AND VISITORS OF THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA
(Record Number 102359)
From
The Circuit Court of Albemarle County; P.M. Peatross, Jr., Judge.
Counsel
Kenneth T. Cuccinelli, Wesley G. Russell, Jr., E. Duncan Getchell, Jr., Charles E. James, Jr., and Stephen R. McCullough (Office of the Attorney General) for appellant.
Chuck Rosenberg, Jessica Ellsworth, N Thomas Connally, Jon M. Talotta, Stephanie J. Gold, and Catherine E. Stetson (Hogan Lovells US LLP) for appellee.
Assignment of Error
- The circuit court erred in setting aside the CIDs based on the ground that the Attorney General lacked a “reason to believe” that UVa. may be in possession, custody, or control of any documentary material or information relevant to a FATA investigation because it is contrary to the statute and without support in the record.
- The circuit court erred in setting aside the CIDs based on the ground that the Attorney General’s “reason to believe” had to be stated on the face of the CIDs because it is contrary to the statute.
- The circuit court erred in setting aside the CIDs based on the ground that the CIDs failed to sufficiently state the “nature of the conduct” being investigated because that is contrary to the face of the CIDs.
- The circuit court erred in setting aside the CIDs based on the ground that FATA does not cover requests for payments made on the Commonwealth when the Commonwealth has been a recipient of a federal grant because that is an incorrect construction of FATA and ignores that money is fungible.
- The circuit court erred by limiting the remaining right of inquiry based upon the errors assigned above.
Assignment of Cross-Error
- Whether the circuit court erred in holding the University is a “person” subject to FATA’s CID provision, where the General Assembly specifically defined the term “person” in FATA not to include Commonwealth entities.
Date Granted
3-4-2011
Buzz Belleville says:
March 10, 2011 at 10:50 am
“Seruios question Mr. Berple — What “underlying data” do you believe climate scientists have hidden that would change the basic premises of AGW theory?”
How would data “change the basic premises of AGW theory” in any case. It could strengthen it or weaken it, but a theory is a theory. Seems the problem with the AGW theory is that there is no convincing evidence that it is significant given the background of natural variability. The only data supporting AGW appears to be variously ‘adjusted,’ and/or manipulated, and/or cherry picked.
The ice cores show the big picture, while the AGW gang fixates on short term blips, and tries to make people believe that short term trends can be extrapolated in straight lines into the future. But again, the ice core data and any understanding of recent of longer term climate history reveals the folly of that. Lest we forget, in the 1970s some people were forecasting an ice age based on a short term cooling trend… including Stephen Schneider.
YES!
Now since GMU is also in the Commonwealth of Virginia, we’ll get to see all of Joe Burton’s (and co-conspirators politically motivated) emails, M&M’s (and co-conspirators) emails, Wegman’s (and co-conspirators) emails, dozens and dozens of climate scientists who have all reaffirmed Mann’s original works, hunderds and hundreds of climate scientists who all will confirm the reality of HIGW/AGW, and on, and on, and on, it goes, ad infinitum, ad nauseam.
The proverbial tables will be turned, so to speak.
I can’t wait any longer, a total smackdown of the climate science disinformation crowd.
The final headline will read “Anti-climate science crowd meets its maker.”
It’s about time and long overdue.
With this VA case on top of the Wahl email excitement, things must really be heating up in Mann’s head… that may finally be the accelerating hockey stick he was imagining.
Buzz Belleville
“Seruios question Mr. Berple — What “underlying data” do you believe climate scientists have hidden that would change the basic premises of AGW theory?”
So close but still you can’t separate the apples from the “peers”.
It doesn’t matter whether the “underlaying data” change the basic premise since that’s not the case for an AG. The law is only interested in if it has been broken. For instance it is illegal for public officials to delete emails of official communications, unless of course they’ve been properly archived, but of course the communication within the emails might still be illegal (like for instance encouraging the deletion of official data belonging to the public that’s supposed to be properly archived according to the law.)
Ferd Berple,
Thanx for that excellent post @10:05 above.
Buzz Belleville says:
“First off, if you believe any of the proxy information for Mann’s reconstructions are not available, you’re mistaken. How do you think M&M were able to attack the conclusions drawn from those proxies? If a reconstruction appears in a peer-reviewed journal, to my knowledge you can always access the underlying proxy info.”
If you’re serious, then you are simply not up to speed on the issue. Steve McIntyre had to fight for many years to extract Mann’s hidden data. Getting it was harder than pulling teeth; it was never given willingly. Read The Hockey Stick Illusion [available on the right sidebar]. You will see that Mann fought tooth and nail to keep from sharing his data, methodologies, metadata and code.
The Climategate emails show the same deliberate intent to avoid the requests for data and methodologies, to the extent of corrupting an FOIA officer and convincing her to take sides. The central problem with Mann’s climate clique is their lack of transparency.
Then there is the data itself. The Harry_Read_Me file flatly states that climate data was fabricated.
M&M were able to destroy the Hockey Stick through sleuthing and perseverance. Their requests for MBH98/99 data were rejected or ignored every step of the way. By chance they discovered an FTP file labeled “Censored,” which finally broke Mann’s hockey stick. As you can see, if Mann had used better available proxies, his temperature reconstruction would have declined instead of rising. So rather than use the better proxy, Mann deliberately hid it in the “censored” file. Michael Mann is a scientific charlatan, and Attorney General Cuccinelli has a few questions for him on behalf of the taxpayers who funded Mann’s grants.
Finally, you say: “If a reconstruction appears in a peer-reviewed journal, to my knowledge you can always access the underlying proxy info.”
That is simply untrue.
“Seruios question Mr. Berple — What “underlying data” do you believe climate scientists have hidden that would change the basic premises of AGW theory?”
The data typically doesn’t typically change the premises, only the conclusions
The conclusion that would be changed was the entire point of the hockey stick and the IPCC findings.
1) That temperature rise in the second half of the 20th century exceeded natural variability.
2) That there is no explanation for this temperature rise other than human activity.
Obviously, if the data was to show point 1 was false, then point 2 can be explained as natural variability, and there is no case to modify human activity.
Buzz Belleville says: March 10, 2011 at 10:48 am
snip… “But the subpoena seeks far more than just how Mann “spent” the grant money. You really should check out the breadth of the CID, then check out the NAS list of grant recipients, and imagine that every grant recipient has to turn over all of his or her e-mails to ideological opponents.”
——————————————————-
Whoa! This is about ideology and not science? I thought that there was at least some science in “climate science.” Are you saying that along with no skepticism, there’s also no accountability in climate science? I’m not as experienced in scientific procedure, but as an engineer, I WANT my worst critics to comment on my designs.
“Buzz Belleville says: March 10, 2011 at 9:22 am
Both McIntyre and Christy oppose the type of efforts being pursued by Cuccinelli here. It smacks of auditing the taxes of your political opponents. ”
And I for one disagree whole heatedly with them on that one. If they take public money, they are accepting public scrutiny and if that means getting the law involved then that is what they signed up for. Publish (all data & methods) or perish indeed!
EFS JR:
Wegman’s ? ??
FS_Junior says:
March 10, 2011 at 11:50 am
“YES!
I can’t wait any longer, a total smackdown of the climate science disinformation crowd.
The final headline will read “Anti-climate science crowd meets its maker.
It’s about time and long overdue.”
==============
So, you err, approve of Cucinneli’s actions?
Mr. Cuccinelli is doing his job–what he was elected to do. I am happy to see some progress. If the people of Virginia have been defrauded, the A.G. is the person with the clout and the mission to come to the rescue. I, for one, think Cuccinelli is doing exactly the right thing. The people of Virginia have truly no other practical recourse beyond Mr. Cuccinelli’s action.
There was a time where I might have agreed that this sort of investigation was not desirable.
That was before the Penn State whitewash and the even more egregious bouts of intentional ignorance on the part of the Brits.
If the institutions will not police themselves then we need someone who will.
I have never been convinced that Cuccinelli will go to court with this. I’m inclined to think that just making public the results of the inquiry will do everything that’s needed.
Smokey the astroturfer says: March 10, 2011 at 9:36 am
Really? You don’t think an AG should investigate possible misappropriation of funds and defrauding of taxpayers? Cuccinelli just wants to ask Mann some questions. If Mann has done nothing wrong he should be happy to answer them.
I suppose with your multiple online persona you do not have time to read the text of the demands.
They wish to read the used toilet paper from the toilets that mann or any of his mates may have used. It is ridiculous.
I have been waiting five years to see this guy exposed.
I had a strong, immediate and negative reaction to Mann’s “disappearing” of the MWP, due to the fact I’d been focused on the work of archeologists and historians who studied the travels and travails of the Greenland Vikings. Not only did Mann’s blithe dismissal of the MWP seem to erase all the evidence their hard work had gleaned, but it also put these archeologists in the position of gathering data that was politically incorrect, which made it harder for them to get funding.
It never was easy to get funding in the first place. After all, the past is dead, and who really cares what happened to twenty generations of Vikings, or where they wound up?
It took a sort a madman to go cold places in the summer, and trudge about where the mosquitoes are so thick that they can carry you off and eat you for lunch. Not to mention that the shorelines are all changed by the Isostatic uplift of a thousand years, (or in a few cases, the Isostatic depression,) which means you can’t walk on the sandy shore but instead have to press through prickly pines or squelch through coastal tundra. The fellows were nuts, but were dedicated nuts, and I really liked the bits of evidence they found, such as chainmail in northern Canada.
Then along comes Mann, and suddenly any proof it was much warmer up there, back in Vikings times, is something that will get you frowned at, among the university bigwigs. Abruptly these fellows have to tiptoe, and their funding, which was never plentiful, is even scarcer.
What this meant in my life is that I stopped getting my fix of Viking studies. The only studies that appeared were these lame efforts which always attempted to cool down the MWP, and reduce the Viking populations, or the size of their herds of cows, goats and sheep on Greenland. (One even said there were no cows.) Even the illustrations in magazines changed, replacing the hale Viking of 1200 with the withered, hobbit-sized final-survivors of 1430. It was ridiculous; but very, very politically correct.
Therefore I wanted to strangle Mann. I didn’t need to do any math. I didn’t need to dredge through facts and figures. I just knew right off the bat, with a sort of instinct, that I could smell a rat, and it was a rat that was wreaking my hobby.
But now? Now I’ve had to go through five, long years of math, which I never liked. I have had to study facts and figures, and learn all sorts of annoyingly intricate stuff about politics and the law. The entire time I’ve continued to smell a rat. I’m tired of the stench.
The worst part is that enduring the stench will drag on for many more months, I fear.
The only good thing is that Mann himself has not suffered the quick death of a mercy killing. If I’d been in charge I’d have been far less civil than Anthony, or the people over at Climate Audit. (In fact I’ve been snipped over there, for frothing at the mouth and contributing nothing to the discussion.)
I fear there are times I am a bit like Saddam Husain, and want to sent certain individuals on a quick trip through a shredder. This is, of course, unspiritual and wrong of me, but I am just confessing how exasperated I get, especially after five, long years.
However then I think of how it must be for Mann. Not even on vacation in Hawaii does he get peace. He hears about the latest email revelations, and about the setback (for him) in the UVA case. Rather than a quick trip through a shredder, it is like a very, very slow trip through a shredder.
I almost feel sorry for him.
But I’ll really be glad when this is all over, and I can get back to studying Vikings.
This is a huge error. You’re either a terrible troll, or you’re joining this story when the climax is about to start all while acting like you know what the opening scene was. This whole skeptic movement started because Michael Mann refused to turn over his proxy data to McIntye for replication. Yes, it’s available now, it wasn’t available when it should have been.
If Michael Mann had simply shared his methods and proxy data from MM98 with Steve McIntyre when asked, and engaged him in worthwhile scientific debate to improve his methods. NONE OF THIS WOULD HAVE EVER HAPPENED. Instead, he circled the wagons and played turf-defense because of the political ramifications that he didn’t like if his methods were called into question.
Years later, we’re here.
Now please restate your nonsense in the proper context.
walt man says:
“I suppose with your multiple online persona you do not have time to read the text of the demands.”
I post as Smokey. That’s it.
Buzz, you really should stop trying to redirect the debate. The question is not what did Mann spend the money on, but did he spend it fraudulently. To answer that question, the DA needs to determine whether Mann engaged in fraud in the production of the work that was being paid for. In order to do that, the DA has to see the work. All of it.
Plain enough for you yet?
As to the CID being broad. Have you ever read a search warrant? They are always written as broadly as the judge will permit.
Buzz Belleville says:
March 10, 2011 at 9:22 am
Spencer, Lindzen, et al better be ready to have their hard drives searched as well.
I suppose that some warmists, in spiteful retaliation, may seek to search the correspondence of these and other sceptical scientists. Unless thy have been engaging in the same kind of dishonesty, manipulation and deception that Jones, Mann et al so clearly have been, (and I know of no evidence that they have), this is hardly going to alarm anyone.
I also seriously doubt the Spencer, Lindzen, Christy etc would put up a legal fight to keep their publicly funded correspondence secret. The fact that Mann, UVa etc are SO keen to keep their secrets, is of course one of the main reasons we are interested – honest science invites scrutiny, so we want to know why these people don’t.
Buzz, the basic premise of the AGW theory is nothing without the background data that was used to generate and buttress that theory. To date, little to none of that data has been forthcoming.
Jones has gone so far as to state that he has “lost” the data from which his original papers were generated.
“They wish to read the used toilet paper from the toilets that mann or any of his mates may have used. It is ridiculous.”
That’s how search warrants are always written. That way they don’t have to keep going back to the judge each time they find a new hiding place.
I thought part of the issue here was that UVA isn’t releasing Mann’s emails via some FOI requests? If this is what’s happening, this is pure bunk, don’t you think?
Buzz Belleville says:
March 10, 2011 at 9:22 am
Both McIntyre and Christy oppose the type of efforts being pursued by Cuccinelli here. It smacks of auditing the taxes of your political opponents. Mann is being chased by Cuccinelli solely because Mann reached conclusions with which Cuccinelli does not agree. Spencer, Lindzen, et al better be ready to have their hard drives searched as well.
———————————————————————————————–
Hey Buzz, only one problem with that… You see it is not Spencer and Lindzen who lie every time they open their mouth. It is not Spencer and Lindzen that are feverishly deleting data. It is not Spencer and Lindzen who try to “trick” us. I could go on, but you get the point. Do you think Mann would hand over the data if Spencer and Lindzen do?
Yeah, I thought so… I am fairly confident that Mann’s data will never see the light of day. I figure Mann and Co. think it will cost them less in the end if they get punished for hiding what they did rather than admit their crimes. The current plan is deny, deny, deny.
Robert says:
March 10, 2011 at 8:54 am
While I admit that language is pretty opaque, one reading of that is the circuit court held that Cuccinelli couldn’t subpoena documents because the University is a “person”, and the Supreme Court is saying they don’t buy it.
Buzz Belleville says: March 10, 2011 at 10:30 am Messrs Russell and Bronson — First off, if you believe any of the proxy information for Mann’s reconstructions are not available, you’re mistaken. How do you think M&M were able to attack the conclusions drawn from those proxies? ~ ~ ~
Jeremy says: March 10, 2011 at 1:21 pm{…}This whole skeptic movement started because Michael Mann refused to turn over his proxy data to McIntye for replication. Yes, it’s available now, it wasn’t available when it should have been.
If Michael Mann had simply shared his methods and proxy data from MM98 with Steve McIntyre when asked, and engaged him in worthwhile scientific debate to improve his methods. NONE OF THIS WOULD HAVE EVER HAPPENED. Instead, he circled the wagons and played turf-defense because of the political ramifications that he didn’t like if his methods were called into question.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Wish I could believe you.
You overlook that Seitz at George C. Marshall Institute, was already hard at work developing and organizing specific strategies to ‘manufacture doubt.” The Mann 98 et al. “hockey stick” drama was more manifactured hyperbole, > taking a few degrees of fact and morphing it into a false narrative that ignored all that was inconvenient to the political cause.
A review reveals way more political motivations behind these attacks, than sincere interesting in the science or learning from it. Smoke’n mirrors all the way down. Sad part is here in 2011 the global warming “hockey stick” is alive and well, while Cuccinelli et al. are still beating a 12 year old study that received an OK stamp from the National Academy of Sciences and that has been superseded many times over by more refined studies.
It’s this whole turning scientist’s into enemies that really awful.