I’ve talked about the slimy “Forecast the Facts” campaign before, where they are attempting to label your local TV weatherperson/meteorologist as a “denier” and pressure TV station management into making that person “toe the line” by having a bunch of fake form letters sent by “local viewers”. It is simply paid astroturfing.
For example, look how they label KOAA-TV’s Brad Sowder for not even wanting to take a position because it is a “political issue”:
Political is right, because today, those flailing PR geniuses at The Center for American Progress aka Think Progress, a front organization for all things left and “progressive” with a now $30 million+ annual budget (From 2008: CAP, which has 180 staffers and a $27 million budget, devotes as much as half of its resources to promoting its ideas through blogs, events, publications and media outreach. Source: Bloomberg ) let it slip (whether by design or accident we don’t know) that THEY are behind this “Forecast The Facts” outfit.
We always wondered who was funding this hate campaign against your local TV meteorologist, now we know, here’s the screencap with the proof:
Even though there is no hint of this association on the “Forecast The Facts” about page. Pants on fire and all that.
For those who don’t know, Brad Johnson of Think Progress, is one of the worst offenders of political climate alarm hype on the planet. He’s paid to make up stuff like blaming the people who live in the south for their political views, and bad weather is the punishment:
Obviously Johnson has learned nothing in a year, because what he says today is the same brand of irrational ugliness and hate, bold mine:
Countless lives were saved this weekend by vigilant government officials who warned of deadly tornadoes in Oklahoma, Kansas, Iowa, Nebraska — states whose politics are dominated by anti-government, anti-science ideologues.Over 100 tornadoes struck down in 24 hours, but only six people died in Oklahoma, Sen. Jim Inhofe’s home state, thanks to warnings from the National Weather Service scientists he has worked to discredit
…
Wichita, Kansas, the headquarters of Koch Industries, suffered $280 million in damage from a ferocious twister, but the “ever-increasing government” demonized by the Koch brothers prevented any loss of life.
Support your local TV weathercaster and meteorologist, don’t let them be cowed by well funded political sliming coming from The Center For American Progress.
And the next time someone tells you that “skeptics are well funded”, remind them of how much money CAP gets and how they put it to use.
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Less that 24 hours after I made this report on the slip, TP rushed this CYA press release out with a FLASH attached to it. Heh, sorry, I already scooped you.
http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2012/04/17/465268/brad-johnson-joins-forecast-the-facts-campaign/
CAP and its ilk may be well funded, but how many people are actually paying attention? Those web traffic graphs that Anthony occasionally posts seem to indicate that CAP et al are preaching to a steadily dwindling choir. I’d be curious to know how many broadcast meterorologists actually give a skinny rat’s ass about being on CAP’s list.
I (guiltily) like my schadenfreude as much as the next guy, but not to the point of helping to resurrect that which is better left dead.
Sometimes the best response is no response.
Paddi Agree far too much attention is being given here to silly warmists blogs etc… stick to data I say
Using “liberal” and “left-wing” as labels for people like Brad Johnson is inappropriate. They are neither liberal nor left wing but truly “Lunatic Fringe.”
Man Bearpigg says:
April 16, 2012 at 10:54 pm
McCarthyism is alive and well…
…and being practiced by those who condemn it the loudest…
If they keep calling sceptics “deniers” then I think we need to associate them with the Nazi philosophy of “if you tell big enough lies, repeat them often enough and give them government backing, then most people will believe them”.
I have always thought of the CAGW extremist views as much like the error bars on an historic temperature chart, or the 1 sigma grey area on the ice charts in their effect on the public. (i.e. me) You can drag your audience above or below the line to a certain extent but as the rhetoric becomes increasingly bizarre you lose the audience. By crossing the error bar into the unknown you only carry the true believers with you. For example if you suggest a sea level rise of 12 inches you may well carry your entire audience but by the time you reach a prognostication of 20 feet you will have no-one but acolytes left. This is entirely independent of the veracity of the facts. it is all about the personal experiences of the public and how far beyond those experiences their psche can accomodate.. When you reach the heights of claiming that Tornados only strike oilmen and republicans you have kind of crept outside the error bar!
[snip – over the top – Anthony]
Rod says:
April 17, 2012 at 12:40 am
If they keep calling sceptics “deniers” then I think we need to associate them with the Nazi philosophy of “if you tell big enough lies, repeat them often enough and give them government backing, then most people will believe them”.
The full quote is more appropriate here: “If you tell a lie big enough and keep repeating it, people will eventually come to believe it. The lie can be maintained only for such time as the State can shield the people from the political, economic and/or military consequences of the lie. It thus becomes vitally important for the State to use all of its powers to repress dissent, for the truth is the mortal enemy of the lie, and thus by extension, the truth is the greatest enemy of the State.”
Goebbels knew human nature — and WUWT is one of the greatest enemy of the Statists…
“We always wondered who was funding this hate campaign against your local TV meteorologist, now we know…”
It’s called CAP and Tirade…
This 2008 NYT article has the Sandler Foundation as the start-up for CAP:
http://www.nytimes.com/2008/03/09/magazine/09Sandlers-t.html?_r=2
“Since the late 1980s, the Sandlers used their wealth to finance a variety of nonprofit organizations, including Human Rights Watch, the American Civil Liberties Union and Acorn, the grass-roots organizers. In 2003, they started the Center for American Progress, which is intended to be a liberal counterweight to the heavyweight policy centers of the right, like the Heritage Foundation and the Cato Institute. So far, (2008), the Sandlers have given around $20 million to the center.” (Last year Soros announced a $100 million award for Human Rights Watch over ten years).
More on CAP funding here, (including $500,000 from Walmart), although the Sandlers aren’t mentioned. http://www.groupsnoop.org/Center+for+American+Progress.
Soros was an initial funder and still donates via Open Society Institute. John Podesta was Clinton’s Chief of Staff, co-chair of Obama’s transition team and has advised him on by-passing Congress with Executive Orders and use of Federal Agencies, http://tinyurl.com/2w3ldwm. He is a member of the Leadership Council of the Joint Ocean Commission Initiative, (an interesting web page): http://www.jointoceancommission.org/leadership-council.html
Former EPA head and Climate “Czar” for the start of the Obama presidency, former Gore assistant Carol Browner, is on the board at CAP, as is Van Jones.
Campus Progress is active in cultivating EPA and promoting student action against coal plants etc:
As I’ve always said, global warming is a conspiracy created by scientists, the science organizations, the research journals, the universities, the government, NASA, the EPA, the liberal media, the liberal politicans, the green movement, the hippies, and of course the progressive bloggers, all doing the bidding of George Soros, Al Gore and James Hansen hiding out in their underground lair (below sea level of course) who concocted the whole thing in order to control your life, your money and your precious bodily fluids.
I think Peter here has succinctly summarized in one clear sentence what some people believe to be true. He did this without resorting to “it’s not this and it’s not that” weasel words to avoid taking a firm stand. He just comes straight out with positive affirmations. A lot of scientific organizations (AAAS, NAS, AGU, etc.) have written policy statemements on global warming that do much the same thing.
Here’s what I want to read: I want to read a sentence from Anthony Watts stating what he believes is the truth about global warming. Not the “it’s not this and it’s not that” sort of ambiguity, but the same sort of positive affirmation language that Peter incorporated.
[REPLY: Peter writes a caricature that you think is an accurate reflection of skeptical thinking and then you demand that Anthony provide a statement that you hope you can use later to play gotcha games? There are some people frequenting this blog who need to get a life even more than the moderators do. -REP]
So there is a well-funded anti-science conspiracy after all.
Funny how only another alarmist would be gullible enough to fall for Peter’s snark and take it seriously. Are all of them really this dense?
and how typical is the overtly self-righteousness in the demands – “I want to read a sentence…” blah blah blah. Because for him it is ALL about belief! Here’s an idea – how about “we believe that the Science should be pursued honestly and completely wherever it leads, and when there is scientific uncertainty that needs to be communicated just as completely as any scientific certainty is. No “narratives”, no wishcasting, no apocalyptic alarmism to try and achieve some political goals; just SCIENCE, plain and simple.
And done by real SCIENTISTS, not “media experts” with expertise in astroturfing and little else.
Phil C, I want a winning lottery ticket.
Funny thing one of the characteristics of a politically left leaning person is never being taught the word no at a young age and as they grow older this morphs into thinking everybody should do what they say, the difficult bit when they get to adults is how they then deal with someone saying no, it usually leads to adolescent tantrums .
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/04/16/booker-mentions-mann-mann-has-a-twitter-tantrum/
Peter writes a caricature that you think is an accurate reflection of skeptical thinking
I never wrote that I think it’s an accurate reflection of skeptical thinking. I wrote that some people believe it to be true. Big difference.
then you demand that Anthony provide a statement that you hope you can use later to play gotcha games?
I never wrote that I demand Anthony provide a statement. I wrote that I want to know what he believes to be true. How stating what one believes to be true is a “gotcha game” escapes me. Big difference again.
Phil C proves that he fundamentally does NOT understand Science at all!!
Science is about PROOF, not Belief!!! But ironically, Phil C’s statement stands as pretty good proof that his entire climate stance is his religious vehicle of choice – no wonder he is so outraged at any heretics who might challenge his preferred orthodoxy!
“I wrote that I want to know what he believes to be true.” Torquemada became infamous for making exactly the same demands of his victims several centuries ago.
Phil C
“I wrote that some people believe it to be true. Big difference.”
No. You believe that some people believe it to be true. Big difference.
Phil C — He (peter) did this without resorting to “it’s not this and it’s not that” weasel words to avoid taking a firm stand. He just comes straight out with positive affirmations.
Just want to make sure I’m following your thought correctly Phil – So if I responded to another commenter; “I never wrote that I think….” or ” I never wrote that I demand…” you (phil) would consider those “weasel words” and/or not “positive affirmations”?
But ‘progressing’ on from silly destractions to the topic at hand, if there is anyone here that wishes to defend the well-funded astroturf bullying tactics of CAP aka Think Progress directed at local TV weatherpersons or meteorologists, this post would be a great time to make your case. Any takers?
Phil C says:
April 17, 2012 at 5:26 am
Anthony is more a real scientist than is Phil C. When studying something with a noisy signal, answers are not clear. Strong beliefs generally get in the way of understanding anyway, hence problems with when Himalayan glaciers will melt or using the wrong sign on Tiljander(sp) data goes uncorrected for so long.
Until we get a better idea of just how the climate drivers fit together, I doubt you’ll see a clear statement from Anthony. Ditto from any scientist worth paying attention to.
It makes no difference what my “religious” views are or what I “believe” to be true regarding the facts of climate change. As Daniel Patrick Moynihan famously said: “Everyone is entitled to his own opinion, but not to his own facts.” I thought this website is a vehicle for the facts behind climate change, and I simply would like to know unambiguously what climate science facts Anthony Watts stands behind.
So Phil, now you want to talk about “Facts”??? Up until now, you were all about beliefs! But I suspect that those words mean the same thing to you, which may be why you’re incapable of questioning your own.
But you want facts – so here’s a few. How about the “Fact” that all the “facts” which the warmist model depends on fall apart under any kind of honest and open scientific scrutiny? Or how about the Fact that your movement’s patron saint, Peter Gleick, is a self-admitted Liar and a Thief? And how about the “Fact” that a warmist wouldn’t know a true scientific fact if it jumped up on the counter and played a pennywhistle while singing “I Am A True Scientific Fact!!!”
are those enough “facts” for you?
Hugh K — If you go back to my complete post, you’ll notice that I followed my “I never wrote” with a repeat of what I did write. The moderator characterized my original post as “an accurate reflection of skeptical thinking” when I made no such assertion. I take offense with the moderator’s putting words in my mouth that way, so I am simply setting the record straight with what I did write.
Same with the suggestion that I “demand” facts as a way to play “gotcha games.” Again, I made no demands; I’m looking for people to back up their claims with verifiable facts.
wws writes: How about the “Fact” that all the “facts” which the warmist model depends on fall apart under any kind of honest and open scientific scrutiny?
Then it should be a no-brainer to produce a detailed line-by-line refutation of the most recent IPCC technical report, which has been available for four years. Where is it?
“Forecasting the Facts”. A bit oxymoronic. Something like the invert, “Hindcasting History”, which Think Progress is really expert at.
Phil C says:
April 17, 2012 at 12:34 pm
Hey, how about a big oil supported group the size of the IPCC dedicated to do that?
Oh yeah, no big oil supported group. So we have to rely on a lot of examinations of pieces of interest. E.g. Donna Laframboise’s (sp) looks into the IPCC’s references to the popular press.
Also, a line-by-line review is a very reactive response. Things like the http://nipccreport.org/ is much more proactive.
Perhaps you’d like to produce a line-by-line refutation of that. It’s shorter than the IPCC reports, and probably just as much a no-brainer for you to knock off.