UPDATE: (9:20 PST 10-17) the FOI request has been released, a copy of which is now linked below. This story will remain at the top of WUWT for a day or two. New stories will appear below this one.
CEI has learned of a UN plan recently put in place to hide official correspondence on non-governmental accounts, which correspondence a federal inspector general has already confirmed are subject to FOIA. This ‘cloud’ serves as a dead-drop of sorts for discussions by U.S. government employees over the next report being produced by the scandal-plagued IPCC, which is funded with millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars.
By Christopher Horner, CEI.org for WUWT
Although this is seedy and unlawful at any time, it also goes in the ‘bad timing’ file. Or it’s good timing, depending on one’s perspective.
Just as a brand new book further exposes the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)(which scam I dissected here, and in more disturbing detail here), and on the heels of the weekend surprise of a 2005 memo showing President Obama’s cooling/warming/population zealot of a ‘science czar’ John Holdren is the kind of guy Mitt Romney turns to to develop his ‘environmental’ policies, we’ve exposed the Obama administration and IPCC have cooperated to subvert U.S. transparency laws, run domestically out of Holdren’s White House office.
With this morning’s Freedom of Information Act request, the explaining they have to do must begin by providing the taxpayer certain records regarding — including but not limited to user name and password — for a backchannel ‘cloud’ established to hide IPCC deliberations from FOIA.
The IPCC, you will recall, is Al Gore’s co-recipient of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize. And the host over the years of numerous scandals involving fudged and twisted data, cut-and-pastes from student theses, popular magazine articles and green-group press releases and of course the infamous “hide the decline” in temperatures. This is not just one more scandal, however.
Until the FOI request is posted at CEI.org (later today), here is a snapshot:
CEI has learned of a UN plan recently put in place to hide official correspondence on non-governmental accounts, which correspondence a federal inspector general has already confirmed are subject to FOIA. This ‘cloud’ serves as a dead-drop of sorts for discussions by U.S. government employees over the next report being produced by the scandal-plagued IPCC, which is funded with millions of U.S. taxpayer dollars.
As our FOIA request details, the UN informed participants that it was motivated by embarrassing releases of earlier discussions (“ClimateGate” key among them), and to circumvent the problem that national government transparency laws were posing the group.
CEI reminds OSTP that this practice was described as “creat[ing] non-governmental accounts for official business”, “using the nongovernmental accounts specifically to avoid creating a record of the communications”, in a recent analogous situation involving lobbyist Jack Abramoff. CEI expects similar congressional and media outrage at this similar practice to evade the applicable record-keeping laws.
This effort has apparently been conducted with participation — thereby direct assistance and enabling — by the Obama White House which, shortly after taking office, seized for Holdren’s office the lead role on IPCC work from the Department of Commerce. The plan to secretly create a FOIA-free zone was then implemented.
This represents politically assisting the IPCC to enable UN, EU and U.S. bureaucrats and political appointees avoid official email channels for specific official work of high public interest, performed on official time and using government computers, away from the prying eyes of increasingly skeptical taxpayers.
CEI also reminds OSTP of a similar, ongoing effort by the administration to claim that records on U.S. government computers belong to the UN IPCC, refusing to produce them under FOIA. This practice was affirmed in a report by the Department of Commerce’s Office of Inspector General earlier this year.
As talks resume next month to forge a successor to the failed Kyoto Protocol, CEI looks forward to OSTP ceasing this unlawful activity, and providing prompt access to the requested records so the taxpayer can know what they, and the IPCC, are up to.
So this morning we requested all relevant records under FOIA, including all records sitting on that server, as they all were provided to U.S. government employees for official purposes. This was filed with OSTP run by controversial ‘science czar” and, we now know, former Mitt Romney ‘climate’ advisor John Holdren. The taxpayer deserves to know about this coordinated effort between OSTP and the IPCC to subvert U.S. law.
Possibly one Republican candidate will call in the next debate for ending US funding of the IPCC, now shown to be actively working (with the Obama White House) to subvert US law. Enough is enough is enough. Possibly Gov. Romney could defend Holdren and the IPCC.
In the meantime, we look for Rep. Henry Waxman’s outrage over Abramoff to prove it was also not political, and come down hard on the practice he so aggressively condemned and pursued, demanding preservation of records, threatening subpoenas, the whole works. With our request, that’s essentially what we’ve done, and we’d appreciate the company. You too, NPR.
Of course, it may not be of interest to the media because it only uncovers unlawful dealings to hide an effort impacting our entire economy, the premise for that “fundamental transformation” of America, with the sleazy lobbying operation being the UN. We’ll wait on OSTP’s response and hope for the best from the Hill and Republican candidates.
===============================================================
UPDATE: The FOI request document: OSTP_IPCC_Elec_Comm_FOIA1 (PDF 112k)
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So the IPCC is changing some parts of how some of its participants may communicate and the CEI is upset that they were not better informed on this. Yes Mr. Watts, you may have found the last nail in the AGW coffin. It is obvious that if the CEI is not personally informed of these types of changes, the whole of AGW is nothing but a socialist plot meant to destroy the freedom loving peoples of the world. Good work Mr. Watts in helping to put the last nail in this worldwide plot of nefarius wrong doers.
Is Nick Stokes TheFordPrefect’s sock puppet? He was using similar obfuscation, weasel words and moral equivalence arguments defending Santer/CRU/Jones/Mann et al over at ClimateAudit.
Anything for the Team, right Nick?
Have any of you seen Nick Stokes do anything else except to defend every single bad, dishonourable and downright deceptive practices by the AGW team and their patrons? It is par for course for that water carrier. Some people have no shame, honour or decency and have prostituted themselves to the altar of the CAGW scam.
Nick Stokes says on October 17, 2011 at 4:28 am
“The other is the IPCC using IPCC accounts for IPCC business.”
Nick, to correct you:
“The IPCC, a supposedly scientific body funded by public money, using private and hidden accounts for public business”.
The CEI FOIA request quoted this IPCC website entry for WG I:
So, the IPCC claims the public can see IPCC decisions but the public cannot see the process of making the decisions. That is unacceptable. The IPCC says it is transparent and open, then the IPCC says it isn’t transparent and open. That is unacceptable. This climate stuff is public interest and it is gov’t funded, yet we cannot see the decision making process of the IPCC. That is unacceptable.
The IPCC is denying me climate assessment information by hiding behind bureaucratic legalisms to hide their decision making processes. That is unacceptable.
There should be nothing to hide. The IPCC behavior is very suspicious . . . . no wonder trust is lost.
John
It may not be important semantically, but the law seems to treat avoidance and evasion differently.
ie. Avoiding taxes is legal and prudent but evading taxes – sends you to jail. Evasion involves subterfuge.
We probably should be saying evading or evasion of the FOIA requirement and intent. GK
sceptical says:
October 18, 2011 at 5:48 am
It is obvious that if the CEI is not personally informed of these types of changes, the whole of AGW is nothing but a socialist plot meant to destroy the freedom loving peoples of the world.
No, it’s been obvious that CO2 = CAGW is nothing but a gigantic Propaganda Op. “meant to [loot and] destroy the freedom loving peoples of the world” and that the ipcc and the latte’ Commie, Obama, are still trying to do it by whatever means necessary that they can get away with.
So what is it about individual free thought, freedom of information, freedom, the U.S. Constitution, and doing real science that bothers you so much? Losing your free lunch?
@Nick Stokes
Are these actions legal? Possibly. Legality can only be determined by a court of law. But judging behavior strictly by it’s legality is the lowest common denominator and is often used to justify nefarious actions. Usually this is a refuge used by people of low character.
G. Karst,
I think your distinction is correct. Thanks for bringing it up.
When I used the words “implies that the IPCC had an intention to avoid info exposure by FOIA”, I was thinking it is against the principle of transparency and openness . . . . therefore the IPCC was in violation not only of their own publically stated position on openness and transparency, but also in violation of the US gov’ts truth in gov’t policy if US gov’t employees (like Ms Abbott) were involved in the IPCC.
John
Excellent work, Chris, and thanks.
TO: FOIA legal beagles
Are there any legal FOIA beagles out there willing to offer some wisdom on the part of the CEI FOIA that goes into Exemption 5 (predecisional info)? It would be helpful.
NOTE: There were some comments over at lucia’s place by commenter George Tobin (Comment #84053 @ur momisugly October 18th, 2011 at 9:51 am on post ‘An IPCC backchannel ‘[…]‘ to hide IPCC deliberations from FOIA?).
John
Venter says:
“Have any of you seen Nick Stokes do anything else except to defend every single bad, dishonourable and downright deceptive practices by the AGW team and their patrons? It is par for the course for that water carrier. Some people have no shame, honour or decency and have prostituted themselves to the altar of the CAGW scam.”
Repeated for effect.
Government and government-funded organisations need to be transparent in terms of making information available to the public.
At the same time, there also needs to be a degree of confidentiality, for example for security reasons or where people need to be able to communicate “freely and frankly” without fear that their words will be used against them.
How each organisation balances these sometimes competing requirements is up to them, subject of course to legal requirements and the need for transparency.
It’s difficult to know the exact issues in this case, since Chris Horner has exceeded his own very high bar for incoherence, but given a requirement for confidentiality, there is nothing wrong in principle with an organisation providing a secure means of communication.
In fact, in the light of recent incidents of email hacking/leaking, the IPCC would be remiss not to provide the most secure facility possible.
Brendan H says:
October 18, 2011 at 11:09 am
// for example for security reasons or where people need to be able to communicate “freely and frankly” without fear that their words will be used against them. \\
Pretty sure this is not a CIA operation. Using their own words against them is exactly what is needed. This is not a military or intelligence operation no privacy attaches… This is Climate Science bought and paid for with Tax dollars. I believe the only mistake Chris made was requesting the FOIA to early. Given enough time and rope this group will assuredly hang themselves.
// there is nothing wrong in principle with an organisation providing a secure means of communication. \\
I agree it will ensure that when the data is turned over it will be of quality.
There is a time and place for all things. This is neither.
Jeremy says:
October 17, 2011 at 7:44 am
Ditto
I think we can at least congratulate IPCC for its “Team-effort.”
Would not be good if others (the people) could read mails about “changing the peer review as we know it”, or any “travesty’s”, or about “fudge factors”, or “hiding any declines”, or some lone tree in Yamal, or whatever is going on behind the scenes.
Must close ranks and keep the others out. Very important.
It is all just another day at the office.
martyn says:
October 18, 2011 at 5:14 am
you missed a “p” out mate
—
What’s scary is that you actually picked up on that.
Venter says: October 18, 2011 at 6:45 am
“Have any of you seen Nick Stokes do anything else except to defend every single bad, dishonourable and downright deceptive practices by the AGW team and their patrons? It is par for the course for that water carrier. Some people have no shame, honour or decency and have prostituted themselves to the altar of the CAGW scam.”
No.
I use his mere presence to indicate something dishonest is being hiden by these alarmists. Works like a charm.
[Bogus email address – a valid email address is required to comment here, see the policy page – Anthony]
Brendan,
Yes, the email system should be made as secure as possible. Everyone’s email system should be secure. Nobody wants people who don’t belong to the IPCC tampering with their communications. This is pretty much true for all organizations, though. Everyone should have a secure system. This seems pretty obvious to me. Not sure why this issue needs to be raised.
The content of the IPCC emails is another matter entirely. Public servants cannot assume that they have the same right to privacy that is enjoyed in the private sector. This is even more important for the IPCC because their findings could have a potentially gigantic (literally) impact on economies if politicians decide to act on these findings. Actually, countries have already acted on the findings, which now appear to be in doubt.
Every message that they write must be made public. That is the bottom line. There is too much at stake here. The time for more stupid cat and mouse games with the public has past. The reputation of climate science has suffered serious damage, and opening the IPCC would be a great first step to restoring the joke that has become climate science.
This article cheapens wattsupwiththat.com. The second paragraph in the news “article” is one giant run-on sentence. It poorly tries to smear Jon Huntsman, Mitt Romney, and Obama, all in an article about IPCC practices? What is this, some kind of Newsmax op-ed piece?
If this site wants to remain credible, it needs to refrain from providing a soapbox for such immature language.
Chris Horner says
for a backchannel ‘cloud’ established to hide IPCC deliberations from FOIA.
——–
Let’s look at this ‘cloud’ thing.
Cue sinister music and Mike Myers playing Dr Evil making air quote gestures around the word cloud.
Chris is trying really really hard to give the impression that there is something sinister, underhanded and extra legal about using the ‘cloud’. The truth is using the ‘cloud’ is subject to legal process like everything else including FOAI and the issuance of subpoenas etc.. As far as I know Chris Horner is a qualified legal practitioner and therefore he should know that. If he does not he is incompetent.
Chris does not mention which ‘cloud’ service is being used. I am sure he knows. If he told you it was the microsoft cloud, the apple cloud, the amazon cloud or the google cloud it would not seem so sinister.
Chris reckons the ‘cloud’ is being used communications back channel. Those of you who use email know that it has various limitations such as file size. To solve this problem people often use drop boxes. There is nothing sinister about using drop boxes. Drop boxes have perfectly legitimate uses.
Chris reckons the backchannel was set with the intent to ‘hide’ communications. How does he know what the intent was? Does he have a document from the IPCC saying that is the intent or did he simply read their minds?
Altogether there is too much framing here. Too much information is being kept hidden. I am deeply suspicious that this is being done to give a false and misleading impression by allowing peoples imagination to fill in their own favorite story line.
Until there is actual evidence in the form of actual IPCC documents I am calling this spin.
REPLY: Call it whatever you want, your anonymous opinion is of no consequence. At least Mr. Horner has the courage to put his name to his words, and to challenge in the full glare of sunshine, unlike you. – Anthony
I’ve had a look at the Chris Horner’s FOAI request.
It seems that the information about secretive illegal activity Chris is referring to comes from a announcement on the IPCC’s very own website. Evidently it is the view of the IPCC that it’s subject to the FOI laws and that it’s internal prepolicy discussions are protected as specified in those very same laws.
Chris has come up with a technical legal argument that amounts to the conclusion that the IPCC both is and is not subject to FOI. In effect if this argument is correct the IPCC is more exposed under FOI than is a US government agency, especially to the extent that it uses seconded US government employees. It’s quite a clever argument, though I would say that it defeats the intent of the FOI laws.
So sorry guys, no illegal plots.
LazyTeenager, Horner doesn’t argue the IPCC is subject to the FOIA; he argues communication between a government agency and the IPCC is subject to the FOIA. He’s correct. The only exception would be if the IPCC were acting as an outside consultant to an agency as part of the deliberative decision-making process within the agency.
When a politician makes a big deal of promising something, e.g. “transparency”, brace for a blast of the opposite. The Big Lie is meant to provide cover for getting things rolling so far and fast they can’t be stopped.
As for LT, there is no Warmist malfeasance too egregious for him to indignantly justify.