Joe Bast responds to Dr. Judith Curry's post on Heartland

Luboš Motl put up a post on the billboard kerfufflle a few weeks ago that is worth reading:
http://motls.blogspot.com/2012/05/kaczynski-heartland-billboard-wasnt.html
A commenter earlier in the month indicated she or he would appreciate a humorous approach. I agree. It is hard to go wrong when you make people laugh.

Luther Wu, Carrie, sunshinehours1, wws and others who “adore the billboard”:
No, this is not about the sensitivities of your arch enemies. I’m thinking about the vast majority of people who “generally believe there is a climate problem associated with atmospheric CO2 and that it is generally a good idea to drastically restrict humans’ emissions of GHG.”
Most people are not in this trench warfare as is Joe Bast. And they will respond negatively to attacks which are tasteless. They still “trust scientists.” The MSM are watching. Copying egregious errors of the proponents of AGW will not win you any points from the very important “undecided.” I don’t care if Al Gore and David Suzuki are behaving like fools themselves. Let them.
Tallbloke’s assertion that Goldenberg’s representation about the meaning of the billboard was a lie (parsing the term “scientists” with “believers of CO2 controlled climate”) is really only a nuance, which will be missed by 99+%. The Billboard raised emotions, for sure … but the wrong ones.
Sorry, I’m with Ross McKitrick and Donna Laframboise on this one.
I’m more interested in reading about Goldenberg’s claim that Gleick was exonerated of forgery (since Steven Mosher’s keen eye flushed out Gleick as the forger in the first place, which led him to admit to impersonation, identity theft, etc.)! Andy Revkin of NYT Dot Earth reported that Gleick’s former institute hadn’t drawn any conclusions (two days after Goldenberg’s article claiming Gleick was cleared [of forgery] by an investigation/review), which leads one to conclude that the Guardian was quite careless to publish the article. (Not that I’m particularly surprised about that).
Kurt in Switzerland

Noelene says:
May 25, 2012 at 11:07 am
….. Personally I think the war has already been lost, and I am not talking about climate change.
______________________________
Unfortunately I think you may be correct. The problem is they do not give up – EVER.
As an illustration.
American Consumers and Farmers have been fighting the World Trade Organization’s Animal ID and Traceability for almost a decade. The “Regulations” made it to the Federal register in Febuary of 2007 and got a resounding HECK NO! of over 5,000 comments (I read most of them) Did that stop them? Of course not. They tried again in March of 2009 and then again last winter. Each time getting a resounding NO! So now the “Ruling” is going to be fast tracked to president Obama to sign because the USDA “found” a mad cow.
Given how the USDA “Found” test results showing “Mad Sheep” and destroyed a herd owned by the Fallices (Fallice is the scientist who found that Sheep Scrapies did NOT caused Mad Cow disease much to the disgust of politicians) I find this very suspicious. Especially when a Freedom of Information Act show 400 tests were actually performed and ALL WERE NEGATIVE

…A few weeks later, Linda Faillace heard there was more information held by the USDA and used the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) to request the data. Two weeks after the request, the FOIA revealed four hundred negative results on sheep, including additional negative tests on the four sheep that Rubenstein and the USDA claimed were positive. Davis Buckley asked the court to force the USDA to surrender their entire file, which consisted of over 1,000 pages.” link

(Rubenstein “POSITIVES” were done at an unlicensed lab using an unproven test method. He was also a pal of the USDA agent.)
We also have the defeat of the Cap and Trade bill followed by the EPA ruling CO2 a pollutant anyway.
We now have a government run by a bureaucracy that is not even bothering to give lip service to Congress. A PRIMER ON MONEY: SUBCOMMITTEE ON DOMESTIC FINANCE. COMMITTEE ON BANKING AND CURRENCY documents how control of US money was wrested from the US government by the Federal Reserve by signing the “Accord” in 1951 and then going to the media with the “Story”. The President and Secretary of the Treasury who was in the hospital at the time had a different interpretation of the “Accord” (pg 103 – 107)
The government-industry revolving door puts industry-friendly experts in positions of decision-making power. is of course well known.

@ur momisugly Kurt in Switzerland says:
May 25, 2012 at 12:41 pm
Luther Wu, Carrie, sunshinehours1, wws and others who “adore the billboard”:
No, this is not about the sensitivities of your arch enemies. I’m thinking about the vast majority of people who “generally believe there is a climate problem associated with atmospheric CO2 and that it is generally a good idea to drastically restrict humans’ emissions of GHG.”
******************************************************************************
Vast majority? I hope you have some reliable polling numbers for that statement. Last I heard the subject was last on the list of concerns. I doubt that the ‘vast majority’ have more than a nodding acquaintance with the subject at all.
Back up your claim, please.

Was the billboard successful?
Well it certainly is responsible for me comparing TK’s manifesto – with Mr Gores’. That is something I would not have researched on my own.

IMO MS Curry….did more harm to her scientific / research credibility by quoting Suzanne Goldenberg | The Guardian.
Ms Curry stated, in her defense, something like ” It was the only outlet covering Heartland at the time of my writing” [ not quoted verbatim – see her blog ]…..BUT Ms Curry, you used Suzanne Goldenberg | The Guardian to bolster your arguments.
C’mon!

I do not like Mud Slinging but it has been around in political fights for eons.
A History of Political Mudslinging and Character Assasssination
The Herman Cain campaign for president is a classic example in the recent press of just how effective mud slinging can be. Was there any truth to the accusations? Who the heck knows but $$$ can buy a lot of sexual harrassment accusations against a sixty year old guy especially if you do not have to prove anything in a court of law. Heck a major dislike of someone, few scruples and a media willing to pay for “tell -all” sound bites is all it takes.

Unforgettable Moments in Political Mudslinging
…Back in the 19th century, anonymous pamphlets wreaked havoc on politicians, much like comments left on today’s blogs. Then, as now, slurs centered on sexuality, origins and religion. And woe to the candidate with a funny-sounding name. Sometimes accusations were true, sometimes half-true, and often times as fanciful as unicorns. And they worked. One day a candidate was up, the next day, sayonora….

You can start with Andrew Jackson v. John Q. Adams go on to Lyndon B. Johnson v. Barry Goldwater, mud slinging has been around in this country’s politics from the beginning and unfortunately the nice guy often finishes last. However as the Elizabeth Dole v. Kay Haganmud slugfest shows you better not get caught in the lie or it will backfire on you.

Elizabeth Dole v. Kay Hagan
The 2008 US Senate race in North Carolina proves that women can be just as vicious as men in hitting below the belt. Or whatever. During the notorious battle between Republican incumbent Elizabeth Dole and challenger Kay Hagan, the Dole campaign hit upon a tactic that would surely take down her rival, who had been inching ahead in the polls. Hagan would be denounced as an atheist. An ad called “Godless Americans,” cooked up to target Hagan’s religion, featured a voice saying, “There is no God!” over a picture of the candidate’s face. The voice was not Hagan’s but the ad sure wanted you to think it was.
That was a sling too far for Hagan, who launched her own ad reminding voters that she was a Sunday school teacher. In the end, Dole’s repulsive ad backfired, and Hagan’s lead in polls doubled. “Godless Kay” beat Dole with a nine-point margin. http://www.alternet.org/election2012/154346/you're_an_atheist%2C_madam!_9_unforgettable_moments_in_political_mudslinging_/?page=3

The fact that Heartland is still the focus of such a concerted and ethically challenged effort to destroy it is evidence enough for me to suspect that they are still being quite effective, although it must be admitted that they never have nor likely never will amount to more than a flea on the back of a Bull Mastiff versus the CO2 demonization machine which has been so successful in embedding the Big Lie of Evil Carbon in the collective human consciousness that, even among the mostly skeptical crowd here, very few rise to challenge the implicit fallacy that reducing carbon is an unquestioned good. A seeming majority still cling to the naive notion that this civilizational war can only be won by maintaining our arguments within a cocoon of “scientific” purity.A view which requires ignoring the fact that among those most responsible for creating and maintaining the antiCO2 movement the science has always been a pretext and a distraction from their real plans.
Of course, actually accepting that fact will get you branded as a “conspiracy theorist” which is just another indication of how effective they have been at manipulating the language of the debate to suit their purposes. I have never been willing to call their plans a conspiracy because, to my mind, a conspiracy requires an effort to be covert and these folks have never made the slightest attempt to keep their true goals secret. They could be secure in their transparency knowing that every major path of information transmittal ( journalism, academia, and entertainment) was thoroughly dominated by like minded individuals and the only statements they made that would see the broad light of day would be the ones that they desired to do so. The Internet has assured that their strategizing efforts will always be accessible, but their multigenerational program to transform education has also assured that few will be left with the curiosity to seek them out.
That transformation of education is also why focusing on the science will never do much to curtail their plans. The notion of education as a system to develop the capacity for critical thought has been replaced by a system whose goal is the develop revolutionary consciousness. If you doubt this check out the works of Bill Ayres, Obama’s old mentor, who went from terrorist murderer to a leading light in educational philosophy and who is also utterly transparent about his goals. Goals he and his Weather Underground colleagues, most of whom who have not assumed room temp are now in academia, have been so successful at implementing that in recent years a number of graduate schools of Education have actually attempted to enforce a philosophical litmus test as a requirement of admission.
Polls about CAGW are notoriously unreliable, mostly because the language of the debate has been completely corrupted, but many recent ones suggest that doubts about the consensus view are moving to a majority position. But even if a large majority can be made to see that weakness, if they can’t be made to see, and more importantly actively resist, the harmful consequences of the regulatory despots and green subsidizers who have embedded themselves throughout human culture, winning the scientific battle will mean nothing because we will have lost the war. The real consequence of that loss will be the virtual elimination of any chance for humans to live in circumstances where they have any actual opportunity to live in real freedom.
I have long maintained that our Founders in accomplishing the American Revolution created what was and still is the only real revolution in human history. Throughout history and even today over most of the world the proper role of people vis a vis their governors was to be subjects. The men who drafted our Constitution sought to reverse that and make governance subject to its citizens. Recognizing that the will to power was of constant of human nature they constructed a structure with intricate checks and balance and sharply enumerated limits on government authority hoping restrain the natural human tendency toward despotism. The power hungry among us have been whittling away at that structure from the very beginning. We now have as President, a supposed Constitutional scholar, who believes those restraints were not the primary genius of the American experiment, but that they are a primary weakness. The forces of freedom have been engaged in a long delaying action for over a century, but recent years have turned the struggle into a philosophical version of Sherman’s march through Georgia. At this point I fear we have about as much chance of reversing the war between human freedom and despotism as the Confederates did of reclaiming their cause after Sherman but, if there is any hope, we are well past the moment where the gloves need to come off
The notion that those pushing the consensus cause deserve any kind of respect or deference is a nicety that we can no longer afford. Even if, in what seems to be a highly unlikely circumstance, they are sincere in what they choose to believe and espouse the solutions to this phony crisis that they are promoting are such a clear and present danger to the entire human community that they must be resisted by any and means available. Personally I am not all that hopeful that the task is achievable. Too many have already been assimilated by the environmental Borg, but even if “Resistance is Futile” I still think it is an effort we need to make.
Rant/off

@Gail Combs. Yes like a Trojan Horse, I suppose but it reminds me more of Aesop’s fable of the Scorpion and the Frog. In the end, the scorpion had to strike – it was its nature after all.
Pointman

Kurt in Switzerland is absolutely correct on this matter. I rarely find myself in complete agreement with anyone.
Most people care about the economy, their family and how they will make things better for all.
Global warming is a fringe interest. They have no knowledge of what is going on. They don’t need to; it’s not important to them (they think).
But guilt by association is dirty. It is not what people want to agree with. It is self-smearing.
Raise the profile of the issue by pointing out the fraud (Tiljander, Yamal, the fiddling of GISS). Do not raise irrelevancies like random nutters spouting rubbish.
The billboard lost the high ground.

Moby, is that you?