Disclosure Obtained by ATI Environmental Law Center Shows the Wealth Keeps Flowing for Dr. James Hansen
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Monday, October 3, 2011
Contact: Paul Chesser, Executive Director, paul.chesser@atinstitute.org
As it waits for the resolution of its Freedom of Information Act lawsuit ( http://bit.ly/nnKpxS ) against the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), which seeks the outside employment permission records of global warming activist Dr. James Hansen, American Tradition Institute’s Environmental Law Center has received the belatedly filed 2010 public financial disclosure of the renowned director of the NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.
ATI obtained Dr. Hansen’s Form SF 278, which is required to be filed annually, also under the Freedom of Information Act. The disclosure revealed that Dr. Hansen received between $236,000 and $1,232,500 in outside income in 2010 relating to his taxpayer-funded employment, which included:
• Between $26,008 and $72,500 in honoraria for speeches;
• Between $150,001 and $1.1 million in prizes;
• Just under $60,000 in the form of in-kind income for travel to his many outside-income generating activities
The travel reporting marked the first time Hansen detailed such “in-kind” benefits, which included apparent first-class travel for him and his wife on trips to Australia, Japan, and Norway. The new detail raises the question of whether Dr. Hansen wrongly submitted forms in previous years, which he left blank and attested “none” in the space where he is required to report travel expenses taken as part of his outside employment, all in years in which he was busy with numerous paid outside activities of the same sort as he was in 2010.
“Now that Dr. Hansen’s outside income has come under scrutiny, we see a newfound attention to detail on forms where he reports about these sources,” said Christopher Horner, ATI’s director of litigation. “It also shows that Dr. Hansen continues to enjoy a healthy level of earnings that supplement – and for his curious exploitation of – the taxpayer-funded position he holds.”
As ATI detailed in its current lawsuit against NASA in federal court in Washington, Dr. Hansen admits this income began after he escalated his public – and often political – global warming advocacy, for which outside parties have spectacularly rewarded him.
ATI sued NASA because the agency refuses to make public any forms 17-60 – the application for permission for outside employment – by invoking the Privacy Act and calling their release “a clearly unwarranted violation’ of Hansen’s privacy.” These forms would demonstrate to the public and Congress whether NASA has signed off on Hansen’s lucrative activities, even though they raise serious questions under Ethics in Government Act rules. NASA’s withholding of the 17-60s is improper because Dr. Hansen, like other federal employees of the highest levels of pay and responsibility, waives certain privacy interests as a condition of his employment. Dr. Hansen is required to file the permission forms before most or all of his outside employment activities.
These requirements that cover Dr. Hansen include annual public financial disclosure that is vastly more detailed and personal than the one-page application for permission for outside employment and other activities. This is also true of senior government officials including Members of Congress, Supreme Court Justices, the President and Vice President.
ATI expects the media will share its curiosity about Dr. Hansen’s records at NASA, considering they have shown similar recent interest in others’ disclosures. For example:
• The Wall Street Journal‘s recent coverage ( http://on.wsj.com/oqypvi ) about Congress members’ public financial disclosures
• The Huffington Post on Thursday reported that some Democrats demand ( http://huff.to/oBI82s ) an investigation of Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas’s filings and the propriety of his wife’s income
• The New York Times‘ recently published a (serially corrected) 2700-word piece ( http://nyti.ms/pbIpcC ) that highlighted how public servants are “restricted from using their positions ‘for personal gain’ or on matters in which they have a direct financial interest,” and how they “must avoid outside work that can pose a ‘time conflict,’ and ‘detract from [the employee’s] full time and attention to his official duties,’” as those rules “were designed to promote the notion of a full-time [employee].”
“That Dr. Hansen very well may be the country’s first millionaire bureaucrat — thanks to this flood of outside income since 2006 all clearly related to his public employment – raises similar questions,” Horner said. “Given his high profile and the significant role attributed to him in the climate debate, his and NASA’s own record on this front should generate at least as much interest.”
See Dr. James Hansen’s 2010 SF 278 disclosure form here: http://bit.ly/oVJX1e
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Jesse Fell says:
October 4, 2011 at 6:19 am
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I disagree with everything you say (and I am not questioning Hansen because of his science).
1. This receiving cash awards stuff for what you do as a government employee – seems to me to be a way around the system, to reward people with cash in a way they can legally receive it.
2. I think any government employee should not be able to receive “gifts” for the work they do. These awards are gifts. I used to run into trouble trying to take government employees out for lunch when I was working on a contract they were paying me for. To establish an organization that turns around and awards them $600,000 for the great work they do? Come on. Is Hansen solely responsible for all the climate change work at NASA? Did he share his prize, or donate it over to NASA (which would have been the right thing to do)?
3. Just because the guy is 70 years old doesn’t make him above anything. I’ve met old people who are totally corrupt. Judge Hansen by what he says and by what he does. For a guy to be so passionate about climate change and then turn around and accept $600,000 in awards while the climate industry complains of big oil funding on the denier side. Come on people. This isn’t right.
4. Jesse – if you really don’t see a government employee receiving cash awards directly for the work he does through his government in cooperation with others who are also just as dedicated as he is AS A PROBLEM – well, I give up.
Frank K. — “Hey, I’m just the messenger…you seemed surprised that someone would dare say that Hansen’s done something illegal.”
Here? I’d be surprised if a thread about Hansen did not contain comments about him doing something illegal.
J. Felton — “And to J. Bowers, who equated Hansen with Rosa Parks, your analogy is about as pathetic…”
I’d have thought it pretty obvious my point was that civil disobedience is a great American tradition, which has led to positive change in many instances in American history. If you call Hansen a criminal, then you need to call Rosa Parkes and Thomas Jefferson criminals, too (and many did at the time).
J. Felton — “…as Gore’s when he compared Global Warming sceptics to people who don’t think smoking causes cancer.”
If it walks like a duck, looks like a duck, quacks like a duck, and uses the same PR manual and methods as a duck… it’s a duck.
Dude, my man is 70 and has no declarable investment assets to speak of (granted he has a government pension coming) . Let him take the cash – it is money poorly awarded and the more reactionary groups give to guys like this, the less they’ll have to brainwash kids with.
Steve from Rockwood,
James Hansen began to receive awards only at the end of his career, years after the work for which he is known was finished. I’m not sure I see the mechanism by which his acceptance of these awards would be able to imbue his work in decades gone by with retroactive bias. The idea that he began to do research on climate change forty years ago, in the hopes of receiving the Dan David Prize in 2007, does not seem to me to be serious enough to merit consideration.
If he violated his terms of employment in accepting these awards, he should be held accountable for that. If he did not violate his terms of employment, it is hard to see how he can be accused of betraying the taxpayer by failing to live up to undefined and supernumerary ethical standards.
In the meanwhile, the leaves on the tree outside my window have been falling off, dry, brown, and curled in upon themselves. The local meteorologists say that this is because it has been staying warm at night; cold nights are required to produce the calendar-perfect foliage that we look forward to here in New England. And according to the computer models cdreated by “corrupt” scientists such as James Hansen, one of the first ways that global warming will manifest itself will be — warm nights.
Blue Planet Prize = 50 million Japanese yen = 650 550 U.S. dollars
Many of the commenters just don’t get it.
It is illegal for a Federal Employee to take compensation for speaking on matters related to his or her official position. You cannot receive money from any private source for anything connected to your official position. You cannot receive a gift valued at more than $25. You cannot even accept a free meal if you think its value is more than that.
Lets say you are invited to the Lions Club to speak about something related to your official capacity, and the meeting includes a meal. You actually have to find someone to pay for the meal, and force them to take it, even if they refuse payment. I myself have been in numerous embarrassing situations like that. It may seem unreasonable to some. but its the law. Period.
S. Basinger,
As I wrote, if he broke NASA regulations, he should be held accountable. More so, if he broke Federal Law.
So, why hasn’t be been fired or prosecuted, or both?
All I can say is that the world seems awash in awards, prizes and honor aria; and, as usual, they are bestowed unreasonably on particular individuals–generally those well past their prime, and sometimes people who did relatively little in their prime. Around the mid 1990s I recall a letter in the American Journal of Physics where the writer was complaining about some prize being offered Carl Sagan. The writer asks is their no one else they can give this prize too? Things like this repeat. I cannot imagine attending a talk by Hansen.
Hansen’s NASA supervisors and others have recommended and asked for Hansen to be fired and prosecuted for criminal violations of the Hatch Act. His former NASA supervisor, John Theon, said:
“I have publicly said I thought Jim Hansen should be fired,” Theon said. “But, my opinion doesn’t count much, particularly when he is empowered by people like the current president of the United States. I’m not sure what we can do to have him get off of the public payroll and continue with the campaign or crusade. I think the man is sincere, but he is suffering from a bad case of megalomania.”
Theon described how Sen. John Kerry and his wife directed money to Hansen in violation of Federal law.
“Yes, that is absolutely illegal,” Theon said. “There is a law called the Hatch Act, which prevents any civil servant, including Jim Hansen from endorsing any political cause publicly and he certainly did that. That alone is grounds for firing, and if not imprisonment or fine.”
Theon continued, saying:
“People have complained to me, the inspector general of NASA, and they say because of Hansen’s very powerful political connections, it has had no effect to date,” he said.
See the full article from 2009:
Former Hansen Supervisor Calls for the Global Warming Alarmist’s Dismissal: Retired NASA atmospheric scientist John Theon tells ICCC that Hatch Act is grounds for media darling’s firing. By Jeff Poor, Business and Media Institute; Wednesday, March 11, 2009 6:56 AM EDT
http://www.mrc.org/bmi/articles/2009/Former_Hansen_Supervisor_Calls_for_the_Global_Warming_Alarmists_Dismissal.html
This article and other news articles paint a picture in which Hansen defied the rest of the NASA policymakers to repudiate the official NASA findings and substitue Hansen’s own propaganda with an impunity provided by Al Gore, John Kerry, and other leading Democrats in the U.S. Congress, the Carter Administration, Clinton Administration, and the Obama Administration. NASA’s own Inspector General has been sidelined by political obstruction of justice. Science is being subverted by a broad political cabal in which Hansen serves as a useful political tool.
Max Hugoson says:
October 3, 2011 at 9:06 am
This brought a smile to my face, John Kenneth Galbraith earned $270,000 p,a,“helping the poor and down trodden”.
It reminded me of a 60’s MAD Magazine feature on “Phony Joany” (Joan Mitchell) who used to sing about poverty at $10,000 a show.
D. Patterson,
The first point to make is that whether James Hansen violated the Hatch Act has no bearing on the question of the validity of his scientific research. We don’t dismiss Francis Bacon’s writings on the nature of science because Bacon was a scoundrel; neither should we dismiss Hansen’s research because we happen to believe (as I do not!) that he is a scoundrel.
About the Hatch Act (http://www.osc.gov/hatchact.htm), the question seems to be whether Hansen is a “less restricted” or “further restricted” Federal employee.
“Less restricted” federal employees can engage in most forms of political advocacy, including making speeches on the issues and in support of candidates in partisan elections. All Federal Employees are less restricted except those working in a list of agencies that the Act provides; NASA is not one of these agencies. Thus, Hansen is a less restricted federal employee, and it is perfectly legal for him to engage in public advocacy of particular causes.
Further, receiving awards for one’s lifetime achievement are not on the list of activities prohibited for less restricted federal employees.
And, for whatever it’s worth, John Theon was never Hansen’s boss or supervisor at NASA. The director of GISS reports to the director of GSFC (Goodard Space Flight Center), who reports to the NASA administrator. Theon was never in this line of command.
Jesse Fell says:
“The first question is whether Hansen has violated any NASA regulations in accepting the awards that he has. If he has, it’s an issue between him and his employer.”
It’s not a matter of violating “NASA regulations.” Hansen violates the federal Hatch Act every day. Hansen’s ultimate employer is the taxpaying American public. So let’s bring on this “issue” between the thoroughly corrupt James Hansen and the common working folks, who are unwillingly forced to fund his anti-American, false alarmism and self-serving payola scam to its legal conclusion, and let the chips fall where they may.
That is a false argument, because much of his research is dismissed by virtue of its all too obviously impossible and failed forecasts. Hansen’s forecast for the inundation of Manhattan Island, for one example, has long ago come and gone past. At this point in time much of Hansen’s forecast work is a dismal joke.
Although Hansen’s position is less restricted in certain respects, he is nonetheless liable to many of the other restrictions upon any and every Federal employee. Theon and others clearly find Hansen in blatant violation of these Federal employment restrictions despite the denials of Hansen and his political sponsors.
That is what James Hansen and Gavin Schmidt claim, but it appears their claims are deceiving and false, according to Theon and others.
It appears that Hansen and Schmidt cannot be trusted to recognize and acknowledge the superiors they worked for at NASA, much less faithfully testify the NASA results before Congress instead of their own personal agenda and findings. In most organizations, private and governmental, such behavior was grounds for immediate termination of employment. The evidence is abundant that political obstruction by powerful Democrat sponsors is the principal means by which Hansen and others have retained their employment with NASA. A person can only wonder how many well qualified scientists who happen to disagree with Hansen have been denied employment and/or promotions at GISS by Dr. Hansen, while he enjoys political patronage?
D. Patterson,
You wrote: “hat is a false argument, because much of his research is dismissed by virtue of its all too obviously impossible and failed forecasts. Hansen’s forecast for the inundation of Manhattan Island, for one example, has long ago come and gone past. At this point in time much of Hansen’s forecast work is a dismal joke.”
My point was that his violation of the Hatch Act would not invalidate his scientific findings. Your assertion that they would be invalidated by being false and impossible is certainly true — a thing is invalidated when shown to be invalid — . but this has nothing to do with the Hatch act and its bearing on the robustness of Hansen’s science.
Hansen’s “forecast for the inundation of Manhattan Island”, as the blogs love to discuss, was based on an offhand remark looking out his office window while being interviewed by a journalist. It was not made in a published report on his research.
Hansen’s projections have been spot on, for the most part. Unfortunately for all of us.
Jesse,
Please check the following link on NASA official policy.
http://www.nasa.gov/offices/ogc/general_law/ethicsfaq.html
I will leave it to your common sense to determine if these guidelines are breached by someone accepting a “prize” of cash. But a few interesting clips from NASA.
Direct from NASA:
“What’s the point of all this ethics stuff?”
Thomas Jefferson enunciated the basic principle of public service: “When a man assumes a public trust, he should consider himself as public property.” This sentiment has been expressed by numerous others, over time becoming the familiar principle “Public service is a public trust,” which has been formalized in Executive Order 12674.
Gifts From Outside Sources
If you’ve been in the Government any length of time, you know that civil servants usually aren’t supposed to accept gifts from outside sources. However, because of the myriad situations in which gift issues can arise, application of the rules can be complex. The actual gift rules are found at 5 CFR §§ 2635.201-2635.205.
“What is a gift?”
Almost anything of monetary value, such as cash, meals, paperweights, trips, concert tickets, and services.
“I have a business at home, and my computer here at work has exactly the software package I need to keep my mailing lists.”
Stop right there. Employees may not use Government property for other than authorized purposes. NASA computers and networks are provided to employees for conducting official business only. Official business means internal and external communication and preparation and delivery of products or services which are part of one’s duties and require the use of NASA’s computer equipment, software and networks. Supervisors may permit limited personal use of Internet services (World Wide Web) provided the use does not interfere with the employee’s work or the work of others, and provided this privilege is not abused. It is not permissible to access, download, or print material which would offend others or create a hostile work environment. Access to the Web should be limited to brief periods when it can reasonably be assumed by supervisors, other employees, and the public, that the employee is in a non-duty status, such as during the lunch break. Expressly prohibited use of NASA computers and networks is that which is clearly not related to official business, such as conducting commercial or non-profit personal business; performing personal work (finances, investments, purchases, legal correspondence); performing work for non-work related organizations (social, political, religious); sending chain letters or social messages; playing computer games; or engaging in partisan political activity.
Steve from Rockwood,
NASA’s regulations allow it to grant waivers in cases where the employee’s acceptance of cash awards does not involve conflict of interest; as would be the case if an employee were to receive a gift from a manufacturer of devices that measure outgoing longwave radiation, and the employee is in charge of determining how many such devices are needed to arrive at correct measurements.
Awards are prohibited in such cases because they can influence what the recipient of the award will subsequently do in his official capacity — for example, double his estimate of the number of infrared sensors that NASA needs.
Dr. Hansen’s is clearly not such a case. The awards he has received have been in recognition of his life’s work — they look back in gratitude, and not forward in anticipation. And the fact is that Hansen is nearly 70 years old and his scientific achievements are years and decades in the past. He has had his say, scientifically, and there is little that he can do now except cross the T’s and dot the I’s on the body of his work. (Dr. Hansen, forgive me if you are reading this.)
It would not have made sense to bar Dr. Hansen from receiving awards in honor of his life’s work — not even mean, narrow sense — which is evidently why NASA did not bar him.
Jesse Fell says:
“Hansen’s projections have been spot on, for the most part.”
Hansen’s predictions are wrong. All of them.
Furthermore, as head of GISS, Hansen has the past temperature record falsified in order to show faster warming.
If you ignore Hansen’s blatant scientific misconduct in repeatedly altering the past temperature record [and always in a way that is most alarming to the public], then you have no interest in the truth.
You are using a false and misleading argument by trying to link an apparent violation of the Hatch Act with the quality of Hansen’s scientific publications, which is not what his critics are doing. Hansen’s critics are challenging the quality of his scientific publications, scientific opinions, and activist public policy statements, apart from his misconduct as a Federal employee. You are limiting the scope of the misconduct only to violations of the Hatch Act, whereas the Hatch Act is only a part of the wider range of misconduct the critics are concerned about. For example, Hansen took it upon himself to unilaterally reverse the actual position of NASA with respect to testimony before Congress about global warming, contrary to and without the prior knowledge or permission of his superiors. This act alone was gross insubordination worthy of immediate termination. The only obstacle to such a firing and ruination of his career was the political interference provided by Democrats such as Gore, Clinton, Obama, and Democrats in Congress responsible for the appropriations of the NASA budget.
There was nothing “offhand” about Hansen’s statements to Bob Reiss, author of the alarmist book, The Coming Storm. Hansen even reaffirmed the comment and his prediction years afterwards. Likewise, Hansen still maintains his claims about sea level rise causing the flooding of the West Shor Highway and other New York locales: “Severe flooding with increased frequency could flood the FDR Drive, the West Side Highway, West Street, Battery Park, sections of East Harlem, Coney Island and entire neighborhoods in Staten Island. Almost the entire subway system in NYC is underground and is potentially vulnerable to flooding as well.”
Your statement that “Hansen’s projections have been spot on, for the most part,” is just plain ridiculous. Hansen predicted sea level rise at New York City in measurements of many meters, whereas reality has measured up to only two inches. This Website is replete with other past discussions of Hansen’s failures.
http://icp.giss.nasa.gov/research/ppa/2002/impacts/introduction.html
D. Patterson,
When Hansen is talking about “flooding”, he is referring to what storm surges from a hurricane could do to NYC; he is not saying that NYC is going to be submerged simply by rising sea levels. In the article pointed to by your link above, he writes:
“Sea level in New York City has risen on average 0.27 cm/year or 0.2286 – 0.381 cm/year over the last hundred years. Looking ahead, it is expected that sea levels in the area will rise on average 0.3885 cm/year or anywhere from 0.175 – 0.602.”
His contention that tropical storms are increasing in intensity has been corroborated by Kerry Emmanuel of MIT, who has found that the total dissipation of energy by tropical storms (as gauged by their intensity and duration) has increased by roughly 50% since the 1970s. Emmanuel now believes that there is a link between the increased in the power of tropical storms and the warming of ocean water.
Jesse Fell says:
“Emmanuel now believes…”
You should get some kind of award for promoting “Team” propaganda. There is no way that hurricanes [or tropical storms] have increased in ACE. Observations trump Emmanuel’s conjectures.
You are wrong and making another untruthful statement. A careful reading of the Webpage reveals an ambiguous discussion of both flooding and storm surges, permitting plausible deniability to be exercised when confronted. In this manner Hansen can attempt to have it both ways when criticized. Further reading of Hansen’s other statements at other times and places uncovers his artful ambiguity and misleading of readers and listeners. For one such example:
Note how Hansen in 2006 is predicting a 25 meter increase in sea level by the end of the 21st Century, and his earlier comment to Bob Reiss predicting a sea level inundation of New York City was made about 18 years earlier. Since a 25 meter increase of sea level per century averages one-fourth of a meter per year, anyone can see how Hansen is in effect confirming in 2006 his earlier comment that he predicts the West Shore Highway and New York City can expect to be inundated by the sea level rise in the 21st Century. Hansen explains away the mammoth discrepency between the 25 meter prediction and the lesser prediction related to the storm surges by simply saying: “None of the current climate and ice models predict this. But I prefer the evidence from the Earth’s history and my own eyes.” In other words, whenever his own disreputed modeling fails to suffice in doom and fear, he is perfectly willing to abandon science and simply make it up as he goes along.
Like a faithfulo religious acolyte, here you are making stuff up as well with only a regard for the useful half-truth.
Hansen has been so well rewarded by his political patrons, he could entirely forgo his salary as a Federal employee and still be a very wealthy man. This situation begs the question, who does Hansen really work for, legally or not, the taxpayers of all political persuasions or Hansen’s special political patrons? As matters now stand, Hansen and his political patrons have made the situied access to the Mation very clearcut. Submit to their self-dclared consensus and be rewarded with a career, promotions, prizes, and awards far in excess of your already substantial Federal salary and retirement benefits; or resist and be scourged from the undergraduate schools, denied a career, denied promotions, denied peer reviewed publication, denied acess to Congress, denied unbiased access to the mainstream news media, denied lucrative and prestigious prizes and awards, and be denied leadership roles in the professional societies. Jim Hansen and Michael Mann are poster boy examples of how your perhaps otherwise prior lackluster prospects for a career may prosper by serving the interests of your political patrons.