The blog that broke created the Fakegate story, only to have it blow up in their faces when skeptics fingered Peter Gleick as the culprit, forcing him to admit that he’d been the one to steal the documents from Heartland, has had its 15 minutes of fame, and is now headed back into Internet obscurity.
On the graph below, one can clearly see the traffic spikes of Feb14th, when the story broke was first marketed, and Feb 2s1st when Gleick confessed made his limited hangout. Since then it’s been downhill for DeSmog.
Alexa global traffic rank for DeSmog and WUWT, lower number is better (for example Google is #1)
If found this graph at 3 months also very telling:
That’s what is known as a “dead cat bounce”. Even more cowbell Chris Mooney articles don’t seem to be helping DeSmog.
After this fiasco, I hope David Suzuki starts to wonder why he’s (allegedly) funding those guys. I’m guessing that there will be another traffic spike for DeSmog in the not too distant future, when indictments and lawsuits are handed out.
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Of course we contribute to an increase in CO2. We caused it to go up by 39% from 280 ppm to 390 ppm. But so what? It is not having a major impact on the climate. See the graph below. It shows RSS temperature data since December 1996 and the increase in CO2 since then. http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:1996.9/plot/rss/from:1996.9/trend/plot/esrl-co2/from:1996.9/normalise
Ian of Fremantle,
I don’t understand your argument.
Can you explain
1. Why it’s a problem for WUWT to continue to discuss the fraud, theft, dishonesty, forgery, and defamation perpetrated by DeSmogBlog and Peter Gleick?
-and-
2. Why WUWT should instead waste their time rebutting a non-scientific OpEd hit piece written by some obscure Australian columnist and stuck behind a paywall which seems to be little more than a regurgitation of the stolen documents and forged propaganda pushed by DeSmogBlog and Peter Gleick that you want WUWT to stop discussing?
Didn’t you reference them during that “blip” of increase? If you’d not mentioned them, would there have even been blip? 😉
IAN of Fremantle
To be fair to “The Australian” they do carry both sides of the argument. I’ve read quite a few articles in it denouncing warmist hysteria.
JIM of Brisbane
Ian of Freemantle
…..
Reply
I can understand, that you would like to see more direct science based articles and pure debate on those issues, rather than “side issues” of people behaving badly and the need to take them to infinite task and account.
Nice sentiment, but the fact is this has been an idealistic struggle with the politics strangling the science, done under the guise of science and saving the world. It really took us mild well mannered sceptics a long time to recognise what we were up against.
Only now. we are exposing the extent of the issues and pushing to get science back to the respect and authority the “team” destroyed. They spun bad science and politics for short term gain, a gain now exposed as willing scientist’s grunting accent with their noses firmly “hogging” the trough of research funding, while serving the aims of certain political agenda.
You have rightly highlighted the current situation in Australia, a political situation involving a small group of organised “scientist’s for the cause”, much like Americans faced five years back, but now under greater scrutiny by sceptical scientists and the voting public (thanks to Anthony and others). If you feel a need to start back where Anthony started and create an Australian mirror site in conjunction with Anthony, Jo Nova, and other sceptics scattered all over Australia, this is the (your) opportunity and of course you can then promote the content you see a need to promote in the interests of true science.
Western Australia is a good place to start a blog with these ideals in mind. Working closely with other sceptical blogs would speed up an ideal outcome for good citizens and scientists alike. In four or five years I would hope that you reach the results and probably the same decision point that Anthony has.
Perfect comeback regarding the log scale, Anthony. I choked on a grape!
As for those who fall back on the intellectually empty “concern troll” meme against those of us who are truly concerned, just know that while you may think you sound sophisticated and adept at the repartee of climate debate what I hear is the twin babble from the inbred offspring of inbred parents whose secondary education came at the expense of taxpayers funding Sesame Street and whose haberdasher knew only enough math to count the buttons needed for your drop drawer suspender overalls you wore at your advancement ceremony. And so you know, indoor plumbing is not only for washing your sock or brushing your tooth.
Ian. Being a long time WUWT reader I’m not sure I’ve been able to completely follow your reasoning. Are you looking for discussions here about man-made CO2 contributions? If so, I made a search for you:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/08/05/why-the-co2-increase-is-man-made-part-1/
Thanks Troed Sangberg (12.23 am). I wasn’t really looking for a discussion on human CO2 levels just wondering if a blog on the isotopes of carbon might be of interest. That said, I am aware that the reason CO2 is implicated is due to the climate models rather than to any empirical evidence from experimental observations. As you will have noted from a recent addition to this blog, Michael Mann has been given considerable exposure in Australia by the ABC which is national broadcaster. This coupled with the hatchet job on Lord Monckton by a reporter for the ABC and the recent pro-AGW piece in the national newspaper, indicates how much the public in Australia is being influenced by the proponents of AGW. Responses to this type of article that can quote the appropriate reliable scientific facts are far more effective than responses giving general comment on matters such as Climategate however justified these comments may be.
CTL @ur momisugly you ask
Can you explain
1. Why it’s a problem for WUWT to continue to discuss the fraud, theft, dishonesty, forgery, and defamation perpetrated by DeSmogBlog and Peter Gleick?
-and-
2. Why WUWT should instead waste their time rebutting a non-scientific OpEd hit piece written by some obscure Australian columnist and stuck behind a paywall which seems to be little more than a regurgitation of the stolen documents and forged propaganda pushed by DeSmogBlog and Peter Gleick that you want WUWT to stop discussing?
1 It isn’t a problem for WUWT to continue to discuss anything Mr Watts would like to discuss. Some discussions do seem more equal than others which gives them an importance that may not be entirely justified in the context of the global discussion on climate change
2 The “non scientific oped piece by some obscure Australian columnist” you so deride, reached, at least, some 800000 Australians according to the circulation figures for the newspaper. This of course does not include those who read the paper on line or access a copy of the newspaper they didn’t purchase. Although WUWT is, deservedly, a very successful blog I doubt that it gets that level of exposure in one hit. That is the power of MSM and that is why “non scientific OpEd pieces by some obscure Australian columnist” are of significance.
Well to Ian of Fremantle I’d just point out a couple of things you may have missed. I had followed the Mann hockey stick debate out of casual curiousity from its early days and took somewhat with a grain of salt what one might well have viewed as a conspiracy theory by a small band of skeptics about the mainstream climate science and its scientists. While feeding white noise into hockey stick models and producing same spelled the obvious, when the Climategate emails broke there before my very eyes was everything those skeptics had surmised so succinctly for so long. Frankly the general populace via the MSM were largely kept in the dark about that, but the increasingly lunar statements about weather events and similarly lunar Green policy prescriptions was what really broke Big Climate’s back.
Then along comes a high priest of warming like Gleick, a big wig scientific ethics scolder that swaggers about with the AGU and Govt accusing skeptics of dishonesty and ‘pay for science’ and then he does the unthinkable, given his position and general claim on the public purse. Do I have any shred of mercy for that crook and what he’s done to the noble pursuit of science? Not bloody likely. I’d have more mercy as judge jury and executioner for a homeless bloke under the same circumstances-
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/world/8436822/us-man-posed-as-woman-for-13-years
Read that last line in particular and now you tell me why Gleick is still free to roam the streets when that bloke isn’t, all things considered?
To: IAN of Fremantle
WUWT doesn’t need to comment on articles like those written by Mike Stekete because a few seconds of searching will point to articles like this one http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/01/28/spencer-pt2-more-co2-peculiarities-the-c13c12-isotope-ratio/ (sorry couldn’t make this into a link for some reason) that puts that kind of non-researched commentary firmly in its place. I wrote to the Editor of The Australian about this as well.
Any issue of fraud related to the AGW discussion is as relevant as any scientific discussion because the battle is not currently being fought with scientific arguments.
To: JIM of Brisbane
I read The Australian every day and not withstanding that they have declared, on a number of occasions, that their Editorial position is pro-AGW theory they rarely carry any of the major scientific announcements and discussions. While they may the best of a bad lot that does not in any way make them balanced on this issue.
Ian of Fremantle:
Regarding atmospheric CO2 origins:
At a given temperature, the concentration of CO2 in the air above the liquid in which it’s dissolved is in quasi-equilibrium, essentially regardless of the isotope.
On a larger scale, where the water is in the oceans, etc or our climate system, CO2 produced within the atmosphere thereby impedes the gassing-off of dissolved CO2 that would otherwise occur at that temperature. If we don’t add to the CO2, then the quasi-equilibrium is established by CO2 coming out of the water. “Excess” CO2 at the water’s surface is dissolved in the water, neutralising somewhat the basic/alkaline oceans.
Look up Henry’s Law.
Thank you Bernd Felsche. As a clinical biochemist I am very familiar with the concept of pCO2 as it is a fundamental measurement in blood gas analysis
Ian of Freemantle
I was going to post a comment regarding your original concerns about WUWT following the Gleick affair. But I think that the comment posted by Ally E. is a much better reply, so I’ll just point you there and leave it at that.
Ian of Fremantle,
The “non scientific oped piece by some obscure Australian columnist” you so deride, reached, at least, some 800000 Australians according to the circulation figures for the newspaper. This of course does not include those who read the paper on line or access a copy of the newspaper they didn’t purchase. Although WUWT is, deservedly, a very successful blog I doubt that it gets that level of exposure in one hit. That is the power of MSM and that is why “non scientific OpEd pieces by some obscure Australian columnist” are of significance.
You confuse the claimed circulation numbers of a particular newspaper with the number of people who have read a particular OpEd piece that appeared in an issue of that paper. I will guarantee you that nowhere near 800,000 people read that article.
You also ignored the fact that this obscure single-paper, non-scientific opinion column was little more than a regurgitation of the stolen documents and forged propaganda pushed by DeSmogBlog and Peter Gleick that you want WUWT to stop discussing. The “power of the MSM” is in its relentless repetition (e.g. as the OpEd in question does with the falsehoods Gleick and DeSmogBlog vomited forth). It would be wasteful for WUWT to abandon scrutiny and criticism of the source of these falsehoods as you suggest and instead spend its time trying to rebut every specific repetition of these falsehoods individually.
I still don’t see how you can in good faith claim that WUWT has “gone sideways” by continuing to discuss the fraud, theft, dishonesty, forgery, and defamation perpetrated by DeSmogBlog and Peter Gleick while simultaneously deriding WUWT for not addressing a rather banal individual instance of the regurgitation of those fraudulent claims which appeared in one paper’s OpEd section. Your two stances are completely at odds with one another.
CTL there’s no point in discussing anything with you as, from what you write, you’re neither capable of rational thought processes or of mounting an argument that has any basis in logic
Ian of Fremantle says:
CTL there’s no point in discussing anything with you as, from what you write, you’re neither capable of rational thought processes or of mounting an argument that has any basis in logic
———————-
Like I said, Ian is just a Troll. And like all Trolls, once you prove them wrong the just make some ad hominem and announce that the argument is over and that they win by default.
So, let me reply in kind. Yes Ian, Take your ball and go home. We weren’t interested in it in the first place. Just don’t expect us to join you the next time you show up demanding that we play your game instead of what we were already doing.
All Right, I’m done feeding the Troll.
Troll mission (thread highjack and deflection) successful.
As for the press in Australia, it’s a minor symptom of the Gawd-awful mess you elected yourself into.
Every Aussie needs to hang prominently on every wall in the house: “Elections Have Consequences!!”
Fools and their freedoms, and all that.
Brian H says:
March 18, 2012 at 4:42 pm
Troll mission (thread highjack and deflection) successful.
—————–
Ha. I’ll admit, I thought that myself. It’s so hard to avoid feeding the Trolls, even when you should know better.
Ian, give it up, so far it appears you’ve had 9 fights for 2 loses and 7 utter thrashings.
Personally I love seeing these AGW quacks get poisoned on their own snake-oil and seeing PR hacks lose their relevance, I also enjoy seeing the bridge fall on trolls heads.
I can tell a bit about you, you are a middle-class Statist, revealed primarily by your meaningless argument that you believe successful Anthony’s blog should not follow his whim but your anonymous opinion ! He, not you, has to date the winning formula.
If you don’t like his direction, start your own blog mate – or don’t you want to put in the time and hard work that Anthony has put in ? Is it envy of his ‘hits’? Why would he change except to appease thermophobes ?
And what are the “scientific aspects ” of climate change you want ?
Perhaps, Hansen’s comical raving that the “seas will boil” or Mann’s ‘hockey stick fraud’ or maybe Gore’s oxymoron of “settled science” or how about data perversion on all continents or the revelations of Climategate 1 and 2, or the worlds leading authority on all things warming, the IPCC using WWF opinion as fact.
AGW is no longer scientific, it’s the material of a future ‘socio-comedy’.
It could be titled, “AGW, Science for the Unsettled.”
This isn’t about science mate, its about the politics of fearful, controlling and fear mongering people who anoint themselves our superior but constantly prove themselves inferior to the ordinary man.
The fact that they need to lie, use fear, manipulate, deceive, attack the man, slavishly appeal to authority, use the base PR spin of Orwellian newspeak oxymorons like “Carbon Pollution” or fantasy nonsense like “tipping points” and all the plethora of fear based hyperbole of us “drowning whilst we fry in storms” is just proof that they are incapable of convincing others by using right, truth, reason, logic or common sense to win the day.
Those who need to deceive to convince must be by that nature, lesser people than those they seek to control.
It not that ordinary people are too stupid to grasp it, it’s that they can eventually discern a con.
Anyone who believes deceit is a valid tool of social influence is helping build a dystopia, not a better world.
Thanks Peter Laux
I work so I’m working class not middle class. I don’t know what statist means but if you mean a states rights advocate then I’m not. Yes I did get 2 losses and 7 thrashings or perhaps even 9 thrashings but so what? They’re not injurious and every one (even me) is entitled to their opinion. What you guys seem not to do however is read all sides of the argument on climate change Despite the antagonistic comments I’ve received here, I like WUWT and read it daily but I also read RealClimate and Open Mind. I hate to read the sneers of Gavin Schmidt and Grant Foster (Tamino) when they refer to posters on WUWT as “deluded deniers” or “ignorant trolls” and refer derisively to WUWT as “unscientific rubbish that seizes on any piece of denier material to justify its presence”. If that is what you want then fair enough but I think WUWT deserves much better.