The Guardian Is “Bemused”
by Steve McIntyre, Climate Audit, 6 August 2011
David Leigh of the Guardian has been added to the list of UK journalists who’ve engaged in phone hacking and other illegal/unethical conduct. Some of the more questionable conduct by UK journalists has involved their acquisition of information from police that police were not legally entitled to disclose either for payment or as a favour. David Leigh also had a role in the Empire Strikes Back phase of Climategate early last year and, in today’s post, I’ll discuss the connection.
Leigh’s admission of phone hacking is discussed at Bishop Hill here; Guido Fawkes here. Leigh himself admitted here.
There is certainly a voyeuristic thrill in hearing another person’s private messages…
Leigh differentiated his illegal phone hacking from that practised by News of the World because his cause was noble:
unlike Goodman, I was not interested in witless tittle-tattle about the royal family. I was looking for evidence of bribery and corruption.
Now the Climategate connection.
In February 2010, a couple of months after Neil Wallis of Outside Organisation had been retained by the University of East Anglia to help them strike back against critics, Leigh authored a smear against Paul Dennis of the University of East Anglia, entitled:
Detectives question climate change scientist over email leaks: University of East Anglia scientist Paul Dennis denies leaking material, but links to climate change sceptics in US drew him to attention of the investigators
Leigh’s smear began by reporting that Norfolk police had interviewed Paul Dennis (as, presumably, other faculty of the University of East Anglia.) However, Dennis had “refused to sign a petition in support of Jones when the scandal broke”. Furthermore, according to Leigh’s apparently disapproving “university sources”, Dennis was reported to have sent a letter to UEA head of department Jacquie Burgess “calling for more open release of data” – suspicious activity indeed. Dennis had also refused to observe the fatwa against communication with climate blogs that were critical of CRU and the Team and had even sent an article on isotopes to Jeff Id.
Leigh’s article disclosed two pieces of information that were not in the public domain.
First, Leigh “outed” Jeff Id by name, occupation and hometown. To that point, “Jeff Id” had been anonymous. His registration at WordPress was anonymous and his gmail account was anonymous. To Jeff’s knowledge, there was no public information that would enable Leigh to identify him.
Complete writeup here at Climate Audit
=======================================================
Bishop Hill writes here:
Leigh’s name has come to prominence in recent days, with the UK’s premier political blogger, Guido Fawkes, accusing the Guardian man of being involved in phone hacking. The evidence seems pretty incontrovertible, and Leigh appears to be highly unamused to have it broadcast to all and sundry. All good clean family fun.
h/t to Benny Peiser at The GWPF.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
What in the world do dancing squid have to do with climate?
Brian says:
August 7, 2011 at 2:15 am
Peter, please don’t refer to me (Brian) as a troll. Up to the last couple of day I have not posted to any climate skeptic website but it’s been an interesting exercise.
Dave says you can only post to these sites if you have something of scientific significance to say.
It’s the same brian or one just as thick. Don’t feed it.
“The white washes of this are as complicit as the original perps. ”
Completetly agree, Wayne. I remain astonished that the “enquiries” were conducted without the “enquirers” reading the whole set of emails – they even had a few presented to them to read by… Phil Jones!!!
And the BBC “documentary” by Paul Nurse (on ‘climate skepticism’) was as shoddy a piece of crud as I have seen in a long while – complete with ‘sad music’ for shots of Phil Jones and wide eyed, mouth open shots of P Nurse being shown graphics at NASA of ‘weather’ taking place ‘exactly as the models said it would’… as if.
Shameful.
Beesaman says:
August 7, 2011 at 8:03 am
Apparentley, the Guardian Media Group’s 50.1 percent stake in Trader Media Group gives it a portfolio of magazine titles, including Auto Trader, Top Marques, Bike Trader, and Truck Trader. It also owns of 32.9 percent of Emap.
I wonder how they balance their green credentials against their greed crendentials? Profits from industry obviously pay off debts of consience in this case.
Those mags are all that is keeping the Grauniad afloat. Look at their published accounts.
Hope Jeff makes an official complaint to the Police and information commissioner.
Jeff, do it, do it.!!!!!!!
Ellen: your
What in the world do dancing squid have to do with climate?
Dancing squid are caused by climate change? Can I add it to the List?
Brian! For the sake of humanity! PLEASE stop using any modern convenience! You’re killing the planet!!!
That’s what we hear from most environMENTALists. Do you agree that such a thing would be meaningful? What “positive action” do you feel would make a bit of difference regarding “global temperature”?
>>The Guardian is also known as the Grauniad after its record of missprints
>>including its own name over the years. It has a falling circulation.
More than a falling readership, the Grauniad also has precipitous revenues. It was employed by the previous Labour government to disseminate the government’s liberal/green propaganda, and in return got every single civil service advert in the country (even though it is only read in the South East). We don’t do overt corruption in the UK, only back-door corruption.
The ads pages have now diminished from 50 to 60, down to 5 or 6, and the Grauniad will soon be going under. Hopefully, its liberal/green propaganda machine will go under with it.
.
>>flamenco
>>And the BBC “documentary” by Paul Nurse (on ‘climate skepticism’) was
>>as shoddy a piece of crud as I have seen in a long while
Hear, hear, to that one…
If you can find a copy of this BBC Horizon documentary on the CRU’s Climategate, it is worth watching. Horizon is the BBC’s flagship documentary series, in continuous production since 1964, no less. Paul Nurse’s ‘Climate Skepticism’ edition of Horizon was the most cynical, childish and disgraceful episode ever broadcast in all of those 45 years.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/b00y4yql
.
RE: McIntyre: From Climategate To Guardiangate
I have been somewhat dubious of the implication that over-aggressive newsgathering techniques attributed to NOTW and News Corp were unique and limited to those organizations. This story lends credibility to the assumption that these methods might be endemic practices in the British tabloid news industry.
RE: Les Johnson : (August 7, 2011 at 3:22 am)
“There is always some imminent disaster, isn’t there? But peak oil? Its been predicted since the late 1800s, and new predictions come at about 10 year intervals. Each prediction has proven false.”
It seems like we are always moving anticipated events much closer to our own time than they actually might be. By the expectations of the 1950’s, we should have a fusion-powered society, self-sufficient colonies on Mars, and perhaps be well on the way to understanding how to accomplish faster-than-light space travel by now.
In any case, I think may soon reach or have reached the peak *cheap* petroleum production. That is the maximum production of Oil that is easy to find and exploit. As petroleum is non-renewing, (not being replaced as fast as it is being used,) it *will* run out eventually, if we keep on using it. As raw petroleum becomes more expensive as the supply runs down; we will eventually reach a point where it becomes more economical to convert to the use of a now more-expensive, alternative energy source.
This is not an ‘oh dear the sky is going to fall’ issue; it’s just the way things must be for all non-renewing exhaustible resource deposits.
@ur momisugly JohnH says:
“The Green leaning Guardian is kept afloat by its very non green subsiduary http://www.autotrader.co.uk”
The Guardian is funded by the Scott Trust which is based in an offshore tax haven
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scott_Trust
The Guardian consistently runs at a financial loss, which without the trust subsidies would have been flushed down the toilet years ago.
Guido Fawkes, aka Paul Staines, gives the Guardian and it’s editor a good going over here http://order-order.com/2011/08/03/data-journalism-guardian-style/
Hth.
“Is there no one who will rid me of this troublsome priest?” Yes, a fine old tradition!
Some information for US bloggers who may (proudly?) believe they have the worst newspaper in the world, namely The New York Times. Well they are mistaken: the Guardian is significantly the worse of the two.
The BBC (the biased broadcasting corporation) and the Guardian share a common belief that anyone who does not agree totally with their views on anything – but especially on AGW, big government, euro-federalism, child-centred education and restrictions on scientific freedom, – is intrinsically evil and should be silenced.
Virtually all UK residents subsidise the Guardian whether they like it or not through the BBC licence fee (compulsory), as all BBC staff appointments are advertised uniquely, and at great expense, in the pages of the Guardian.
Good God! I’ve just realized that the image at the top is not a 19th century portrait, it’s a photograph!
Sorry Mr. Phelan, reality’s call is sometimes very brutal! 😉
tallbloke says:
August 6, 2011 at 1:55 pm
“What a lying unethical slimeball this man is.”
tallbloke, you really should make every effort to say what you really mean. Do you intend to imply that a man who has described different ethics for different situations: that is that a journalist may hack and lie, but no others must; is a man who is in any way different to others of his ilk? My dear sir, you have missed the prime opportunity to tar all these bastards with the same brush. The bottom line: no modern “journalist” is ethical in any sense of the word as it has been commonly understood.
Les Johnson : (August 7, 2011 at 3:22 am)
“There is always some imminent disaster, isn’t there? But peak oil? Its been predicted since the late 1800s, and new predictions come at about 10 year intervals. Each prediction has proven false.”
Les, It helps keeps the price up and allows wells that would be classed as, “non producing”, to be viable. The scare also keeps a lot of offshore guys in a job and (heaven help us!) keeps our cars and industry moving!
Yes! I am that “Oil Industry Shrill” they keep harping on about! 😉
Friends:
Humans did not “run out” of stones, antler bone, bronze, iron, or any other ‘exhaustible resource’.
We will not “run out” of oil for the same reasons.
But what I want to know is. what the H*ll does ‘peak oil’ have to do with the fact that corrupt journalism assisted the cover-up of the Climategate scandal?
Richard
Richard: your
But what I want to know is. what the H*ll does ‘peak oil’ have to do with the fact that corrupt journalism assisted the cover-up of the Climategate scandal?
At a guess, if one is losing the argument, change the subject. But why one would change to a false and certifiably wrong subject, is beyond me.
Spector: While fossil fuels are technically finite, there is demonstrably several hundred years worth of fossil fuels in North America.
For all intents and purposes, we can consider this infinite, from our view point in time.
RE: Les Johnson says: (August 8, 2011 at 2:44 am)
“Spector: While fossil fuels are technically finite, there is demonstrably several hundred years worth of fossil fuels in North America.
“For all intents and purposes, we can consider this infinite, from our view point in time.”
Yes, there is no current action indicated in our life-spans except to continue the study of technical alternatives. When petroleum goes, we will need to find a new energy delivery method for transportation. I think we should understand that mankind will eventually be faced with a planet devoid of naturally concentrated rare surface resources, provided we don’t become extinct first.
RE: “Leigh differentiated his illegal phone hacking from that practised by News of the World because his cause was noble:”
Speaking of self-defined noble causes, I see that Jonathan May-Bowles, aka standup comic ‘Jonnie Marbles’ has been sentenced to six weeks in jail for assaulting Rupert Murdoch with a foam pie. I do not know if he still stands in jeopardy of a Contempt of Parliament charge.
spector: your
I think we should understand that mankind will eventually be faced with a planet devoid of naturally concentrated rare surface resources,
This is contra-indicated by the evidence. ie; I am aware of no material that has been depleted globally, to the point where it was no longer available. Some material has become more expensive, and replaced with something else, but that is as close as we have come.
RE: Les Johnson says: (August 8, 2011 at 7:17 am)
“I am aware of no material that has been depleted globally”
Quite true. All I am saying is that naturally concentrated, easy to recover, surface deposits will *eventually* be exhausted. That does not mean that we won’t be able to use more expensive artificial concentration methods to obtain the same rare resource from less productive sources.
Spector:
At August 8, 2011 at 1:31 pm you say:
“naturally concentrated, easy to recover, surface deposits will *eventually* be exhausted.”
I think that should be
naturally concentrated, easy to recover, surface deposits will *eventually* be destroyed when the Sun becomes a Red Giant.
Long before then the Guardian will have gone broke and the Climategate so-called ‘scientists’ will have become as reviled as Lysenko.
Richard
RE: Richard S Courtney says: (August 8, 2011 at 4:17 pm)
“I think that should be naturally concentrated, easy to recover, surface deposits will *eventually* be destroyed when the Sun becomes a Red Giant.”
I believe resources in that category, such as water, do not qualify as being ‘rare,’ unless man is soon to go extinct. I understand that Portugal is the main source of tungsten in Western Europe. There may come a period when the best source of this element might be 20th century landfills.
RE: “…Climategate so-called ‘scientists’ will have become as reviled as Lysenko…”
Judging by the language being used by a former Vice President, this may be happening now, or at least too many (in his view) may believe these scientists allowed what they thought was a ‘Noble Cause’ or a ‘Funded Cause’ to cloud their scientific judgment.