Guest essay by Brandon Schollenberger
You can’t make things like this up. James Hansen, one of the most vocal proponents of global warming, is now part of the global warming denial campaign.
I would never have imagined that until I read an article about a new paper, Institutionalizing delay: foundation funding and the creation of U.S. climate change counter-movement organizations, by Robert Brulle. It claims to investigate the financial status of the “climate change counter-movement” (CCCM), also referred to as the “denial campaign.” I was flabbergasted when I read this in its introduction:
What is the climate change counter-movement?
Here I argue that an efficacious approach to defining this movement is to view it as a cultural contestation between a social movement advocating restrictions on carbon emissions and a counter-movement opposed to such action.
According to this, it doesn’t matter if you believe in global warming. It doesn’t matter if you think global warming is a serious problem. It doesn’t matter if you demand taxes on fossil fuels to pay for investments in renewable energy and carbon sequestering to attempt to lower carbon dioxide emissions. All that matters is how you feel about “restrictions on carbon emissions.”
And it’s not just bad wording. The Conclusion section of the paper says:
The CCCM efforts focus on maintaining a field frame that justifies unlimited use of fossil fuels by attempting to delegitmate the science that supports the necessity of mandatory limits on carbon emissions.
Mandatory limits/restrictions on carbon emissions are known as cap and trade. Oppose those, and no matter what else you may say or do, you’re part of the “denial campaign.” That means when James Hansen writes things like:
But at the heart of his plan is cap and trade, a market-based approach that has been widely praised but does little to slow global warming or reduce our dependence on fossil fuels. It merely allows polluters and Wall Street traders to fleece the public out of billions of dollars.
…
It is not too late to trade cap and trade for an approach that actually works.
He’s part of the “denial campaign.”
Why then does Brulle not discuss people like Hansen in his paper? It’s simple. Brulle is playing fast and loose with definitions. Brulle’s Supplementary Material describes how he collected his list of organizations:
a consolidated list of all of the organizations identified in prior studies was created.
With an attached footnote that says:
Criteria and Studies utilized to compile this comprehensive listing of potential CCCM organizations are:
1. Organization represented by a speaker/sponsorship at any of the ICC/Heartland Conference
2. Organization participated in the Global Climate Coalition
3. Organization participated in Alliance for Climate Strategies
4. Organization participated in the Cooler Heads Coalition
5. Organization listed as a climate skeptic organization in Merchants of Doubt (Oreskes and Conway 2010)
6. Organization listed in the Greenpeace study of climate change counter-movement (Greenpeace 2010)
7. Organization listed in the Union of Concerned Scientists study of climate change counter-movement (Union of Concerned Scientists 2007)
8. Organization listed in NCRP study of Conservative Organizations (NCRP 1997: 46-53)
An obvious question is why do the first five bullets not describe “organizations identified in prior studies” as claimed? I don’t know. What I do know is all eight bullets deal with groups on the skeptical side. Brulle argues anyone who opposes cap and trade is a denier by simply pretending people like James Hansen don’t exist.
The problem goes beyond that. Brulle doesn’t exclude all people like James Hansen. He doesn’t exclude all people who oppose cap and trade but support other options. What Brulle does is far worse. He includes some people who want to take action to combat global warming but not others, and he does so arbitrarily. For example, the Global Climate Coalition declared:
the development of new technologies to reduce greenhouse emissions [is] a concept strongly supported by the GCC.
That is a course for combating global warming. People can disagree about how good a course it is, but there is no stated distinction between it and the course James Hansen endorses. Both oppose cap and trade, both endorse alternative approaches, but only one gets called a denier. Why?
Because Brulle didn’t make a list of deniers. He made a list of people he dislikes. Being a “denier” isn’t a matter of fitting his definition of the views of a “denier.” It’s just a matter of being disliked by Brulle and his sources.
In other words, “denier” is defined as, “Anyone I dislike.”
WTF?
Another example of rhetorical screed that will soon be cited in many articles as peer-reviewed science. Anyone want to start the betting pool for how long it takes to appear in mainstream media?
Wall Street traders aren’t fleecing the public, the government is.
I don’t advocate for unlimited use of fossil fuel. I advocate for their use until other fuels are less expensive. On an application by application basis.
So I guess I’m not in the targeted group.
Whew. Dodged another one.
It seems more and more that the alarmists are talking less and less about the science — maybe they think they’ve lost that battles — and are instead choosing to directly attack skeptics in an ad hominem manner. It means that the skeptics are winning.
Brulle seeks to force us to bury our resources into projects that have 1:100 worse economic returns than climate adaptation. He further commits the guilt by association logical fallacy. His actions will cause the greatest harm to the world’s 3 billion poor hindering their economic development.
Contrast the Cornwall Alliance Declaration on Global Warming.
I’ve been a denier for quite some time. Since I started hearing about this stuff and realized that carbon-trading, cap and trade or whatever you call it made no sense. When do I start getting my share of the big-oil money? Just curious.
This if the definition that was used:
“Here I argue that an efficacious approach to defining this movement is to view it as a cultural contestation between a social movement advocating restrictions on carbon emissions and a counter-movement opposed to such action.”
There are other methods to limit carbon emissions other than cap and trade such as a carbon tax.
“For example, the Global Climate Coalition declared:
the development of new technologies to reduce greenhouse emissions [is] a concept strongly supported by the GCC.”
I didn’t see anything indicating this group was including in their analysis.
I do support unlimited use of fossil fuel, if the alternative to ‘unlimited’ involves artificial statist control regimes.
That isn’t to say I oppose development of alternatives, or even modest government seed-funding of energy technologies. The problem comes when it leaves the lab and Uncle Sugar is still ponying up to take it to market.
As the measured global temperature continues to deviate from modelled predictions, the odds that these models are incorrect rises exponentially with time. That’s how statistics works.
And the extreme rhetoric of the alarmists seems to be rising exponentially with it. The desperation has definitely ramped up in the last few months, up to and including implementing censorship.
>Mandatory limits/restrictions on carbon emissions are known as cap and trade. Oppose those, and no matter what else you may say or do, you’re part of the “denial campaign.”
No.
Cap and trade is only one scheme for placing limits/restrictions on carbon emissions. Totalitarian whackjobs like Jimmy “Death Train” Hansen don’t like cap and trade, because it uses markets to make the decision that enact the limits. Totalitarian whackjobs don’t cotton to that, as putting themselves in the position to make all of the decisions is why they’re in the game in the first place.
Hansen is against cap and trade in the same sense that Michael Moore is against Obamacare. Moore isn’t against you losing your current private health insurance that you like – he just wants it replaced with communized medicine instead of socialized medicine. Hansen isn’t against limits/restrictions on carbon emissions – he just wants ban and eliminate instead of cap and trade.
What Brulle is actually saying is plenty bad enough, and it can (and should) be ripped to shreds for what it is – political invective created from half truths, innuendo and double standards. There is no need to twist and stretch what he’s saying to make some silly “gotcha” point about Hansen.
Ken in Beaverton says:
January 6, 2014 at 2:52 pm
Wall Street traders aren’t fleecing the public, the government is.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
You forgot the rest of it. And the government politicians are taking the money and given it to their favorite buddies as subsidies for windmills and solar farms. Nancy Pelosi’s brother-in-law is given $737m of taxpayers’ money to build giant solar power plant
She is the House Minority Leader in the USA.
From Brulle’s page at Drexel
Education
BS, Marine Biology, U.S. Coast Guard Academy *
MA, Sociology, New School for Social Research
MS, Natural Resources, University of Michigan
PhD, Sociology, George Washington University, 1995
(* although down the page it says a BS in Marine Engineering )
Research and Teaching Interests
Critical Theory
Social Movements
Social Change
Environmental Sociology
I think the “Research and Teaching Interests ” say it all. Sounds like a man who was not cut out for the real world and scuttled back underground. Must have been tough at the US CG Academy.
And WTF ! He isn’t even a climate scientist!!
LOL
Madman2001:
Your post at January 6, 2014 at 2:55 pm says in total
I beg to differ. The skeptics have won and totalitarians are working to obtain their objectives (in the above case, “mandatory limits on carbon emissions”) by institutionalising them before the AGW-scare fades away.
The AGW-scare was killed at the failed 2009 IPCC Conference in Copenhagen when it was decided that there would not be a successor Treaty to the Kyoto Protocol. I said then that the scare would continue to move as though alive in similar manner to a beheaded chicken running around a farmyard. It continues to provide the movements of life but it is already dead. And its deathly movements provide an especial problem.
Nobody will declare the AGW-scare dead: it will slowly fade away. This is similar to the ‘acid rain’ scare of the 1980s. Few remember that scare unless reminded of it but its effects still have effects; e.g. the Large Combustion Plant Directive (LCPD) exists. Importantly, the bureaucracy which the EU established to operate the LCPD still exists. And those bureaucrats justify their jobs by imposing ever more stringent, always more pointless, and extremely expensive emission limits which are causing enforced closure of UK power stations.
Bureaucracies are difficult to eradicate and impossible to nullify.
As the AGW-scare fades away people will attempt to establish rules and bureaucracies to impose those rules which provide immortality to their objectives. Guarding against those attempts now needs to be a serious activity.
As I see it, promotion of “mandatory limits on carbon emissions” by vilifying its opponents is an example of the process which I predicted (on WUWT and elsewhere) in December 2009.
Richard
Thanks Brandon. I just loved the list of black lists.
Did they say anything about being in more than one black list?
I also don’t see “mandatory limits” as equaling Cap and Trade.
Well this explains something. When I have tried to engage some people about climate change, they don’t want to talk about climate change. They just say “don’t you want to save the environment?” Climate change does not matter to them – they are only interested in restricting the use of fossil fuels. They know that climate change is a Platonic lie (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Noble_lie) and thus the truth of it is irrelevant.
All this funding of skeptics has made temperatures go flat for 17 years.
I mean, really, the dark money funding has stopped temperatures rising, that’s how powerful it is. It even made the global warming climate models be off by 75%.
Obviously all you deniers have not heard about how CO2 is causing the polar vortex to break down slinging cold weather down here into the temperate zone. Good old global warming is at it again causing it to be colder than normal. When are you people going to wake up to the insidious evils of carbon. Heat your homes with electricity, drive electric cars! Oh, forgot that over 40% of electricity comes from coal. Never mind.
My Real Science comment:
Drudge reports: South Pole warmer than O’Hare…
“Well” the scare mongering eco-nerds will certainly say “there you go, the South Pole is set to become the only inhabitable place on the planet, when the rest of the world freezes over.” Yeah, in the meantime, there’s that little bit about the record levels of Antarctic ice that just doesn’t jive at all with the “scary scenarios” of runaway melting that the “experts” have been coached to make up.
“We have to offer up scary scenarios… each of us has to decide the right balance between being effective and being honest.” -Stephen Schneider, lead ipcc author, 1989
“Unless we announce disasters no one will listen.” -Sir John Houghton, ex ipcc chair
“The only way to get our society to truly change is to frighten people with the possibility of a catastrophe.” -Daniel Botkin, ex Chair of Environmental Studies, UCSB
“Global warming will kill most of us, and turn the rest of us into cannibals.” -Ted Turner
“Human beings, as a species, have no more value than slugs.” -John Davis, Earth First!
Brulle is a abusive epithet of choice
Try his
Twenty Lessons in Environmental Sociology”
Loo-in-doh-ski wannabee – isn’t it long past time they got the Sokal treatment? This self regarding pompous wing-nuttery is funded from our taxes sheesh ….
The word denier was specifically chosen to conjure up associations with the holocaust. The acronym CCCM was carefully crafted to harken back to the days of the CCCP soviet era.
Hmmmm… on the cutter they would pipe ” let loose the hounds” when we pumped the sanitation tanks. Brulle probably left the organization by that route.
Hope against hope that we did not fund his work.
George Orwell observed in “Politics and the English Language,” that “The word Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies ‘something not desirable.'”
We may observe that such a trend occurs with an increasingly large number of words that are understood at once to have a negative connotation by the listener: they come to be applied liberally to anything that someone may wish to delegitimize.
@tomo-I believe the term you are searching for is *moon-battery*.
This (Brandon Schollenberger’s) piece is a cheap strawman based upon his invention that “mandatory limits/restrictions on carbon emissions are known as cap and trade”. It will be burnt to shreds like all strawmen should. The author may feel it “bullish”, I would suggest a small addition would describe it down to a t.
A WUWT own goal.
Gail Combs says:
January 6, 2014 at 3:18 pm
Ken in Beaverton says:
January 6, 2014 at 2:52 pm
“Wall Street traders aren’t fleecing the public, the government is.”
Nancy, of the puffed face, is indeed a piece of work but remember that the money our “government” people like her obtain for their campaigns comes in bushels full from Wall Street. Why do you suppose the fed keeps printing money through their “open market operations/quantitative easing”? Most of it ends up on Wall Street and then a good percentage goes right back to our “representatives” and “officials” in DC. Sure as hell is not hitting Main Street.
A LCDR and out at 20. For those who know that is the absolute minimum for an officer. Its the participation prize which allows you to get the pension as they push you out of the door.
His work in the service must have matched this effort.
Well, the CAGW bunch certainly are a “social movement” in the neo-Marxist sense, blaming humans and evading facts..
Proving again there is a crazy and batshit crazy.
Why not focus on the most fundamental disinformation aspect of the “big oil” conspiracy funding claims? Namely, large interests like “big oil” benefit from the AGW politics and in fact all restrictive supply policy of greenshirts. “Supply and Demand”, it’s covered in the Communist Manifesto so you know they are familiar. You restrict something the price rises. AGW mitigation restricts supply driving “big oil” profits higher.
Why would Exxon ever side with skeptics on short-term economic grounds? AGW is an established carbons dream by basically raising the price of existing assets and supply chains and discouraging new supply through restrictions and government intervention.
If you wanted to reduce the grip of expensive oil and gas you would drill in ANWR, build the XL Pipeline and approve a thousand similar North American projects as a start.
Climate Change Counter Movements?
I wish someone had told me about these movements before, but they are just the product of some sad individual’s over active imagination.
But I guess this sums it all up; if you are capable of imagining these movements exist, then it is obviously not very difficult to take the next step and imagine Thermageddon in the not too distant future. Imagination creates fantasies and that is what far too many of today’s climate scientists do: they just live a life dedicated to creating scary fantasies,which they then peddle to gullible politicians,
The sad thing is we all have to pay for their arrant nonsense.
JJ says:
January 6, 2014 at 3:15 pm
…..No. Cap and trade is only one scheme for placing limits/restrictions on carbon emissions. Totalitarian whackjobs like Jimmy “Death Train” Hansen don’t like cap and trade, because it uses markets to make the decision that enact the limits…..
The markets can do a wonderful job of enacting limits ….. within a state/economy and targeting precisely the industry/pollutant or activity required. Witness the method of control of sulphate emissions from power plants: government issued licenses for a fee, trade-able between power plants. Brilliant. The eventual true cost of control measures was elicited by the falling price of licenses as scrubbers were eventually fitted to all power plants.
To think this concept can be applied to something as complex as so called ‘carbon emissions’ from almost every aspect of human existence is the stuff of dreams. More so if the concept is that this price operates internationally.
The differences in economies, currencies, wages, unemployment, costs of living, industrial development, education, etc means a huge bureaucracy will rise in attempts to iron out the discrepancies. As will a huge class of traders and trading corporations. And existing international corporations will be best situated to deal with and profit from the arrangements.
The only winners will be ballooning government and international bureaucracies, and giant international corporations.
Everyone understands that the CCCP $900m+ figure is entirely false? It isn’t the CCCP denial funding. It is the ENTIRE cumulative budgets of the organizations identified as funding denial regardless of how much went to other causes.
By that metric since FedGov funds climate alarmism their budget is $3.2 trillion.
I need to smarten up because I just don’t get it. Read it twice too.
What is he planning to do with his list?
Perhaps he is going to politely ask people on the list to change their minds.
I have found the psychological term projection to describe virtually all liberal attitudes towards those with which they disagree.
They take money to espouse a line, others must be taking it to disagree.
They are afraid they are not in control of their emotions, others must be disarmed.
They feel that black Americans can’t get by on their own abilities, talents and labor and can only live with the support of a kindly government, others who disagree must be racist.
Across the board.
An Inquisition against those who question the authority of the self acclaimed high priests of Climate Change. But where is their power to hold the trials and punish the “deniers”? If we do not fear them why should we take any notice of their peculiar court?
This will backfire because having deliberated on who they hate and who they want to crucify to their Gods they will be seen to have no power or authority to carry their divine justice further. They will look like feeble fools who live in a irrelevant bubble world of unreality.
Apparently in Oceania, ‘facts = counterculture”. Let that settle in for a moment and tell me you have hope for the future. I was going to be sarcastic, as per the norm, but moments like this call for sombre reflection, not a silver tongue.
The greens are dangerous. They are blind parishioners on a crusade who parrot the psalms of Algore and his ilk, spitting on those who disagree or dare question the Sacred Text of their gray literature. In a beautiful streak of irony, they oft scream that the US is becoming a theocracy; how bizarre that they are oblivious to the fact that they are the ones ushering it into power. To make matters worse, they have no concept of the religion they have created. Unless they begin to acknowledge the monster they have created, so long as they inhabit positions of power, we are all doomed.
(And for the record, not that it should matter, but I don’t attend church or hold any religious beliefs. Sad that I feel the need to say such things when dealing with simple facts.)
So “They” come up with a total of 7.2 billion dollars to fund “skeptic” science, most of which never ends up going thru peer review, and you ignore that? I looked at the paper for less than one minute and I saw that as a major point, but you are worrying about who is called a skeptic as being someone’s unfriend?
I think when you decide to go on a rant about some minor beef about a paper, it is only fair that you discuss the major claims. Sheesh.
Some think us skeptics did quite well last year; funded or not!
http://www.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2014/01/04/the-10-biggest-winners-of-2013/
We came in sixth – from the article:
“6. Climate Skeptics
…, the next big winners of 2013 are a loosely organized group of non-state actors. Climate skeptics, those who either disbelieve in what they call AGW (‘Anthropogenic Global Warming’) or oppose efforts for a global climate treaty, had much to celebrate in 2013 as the hopes of climate activists for effective global action continued to fade…”
Hmm…“dark money”…is that like Trenberth’s missing heat also known as “dark heat”?
For a list of 20-some things that aren’t happening but would be happening if Climate Contrarianism were actually well-organized and well-funded, see my WUWT guest-thread, “Notes from Skull Island” at http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/12/16/notes-from-skull-island-why-skeptics-arent-well-funded-and-well-organized/
don,t worry the gooses are digging them selves a bigger hole the quicker they complete we can all go back to being normal
dark heat
dark matter
dark energy
dark money
Is there anything dark can’t do?
This is a well timed publication to go along with the Marxist/Leftest “surge” in the USA’s political scene. Note Obama’s declared & undeclared 2014 agenda for closing coal plants, restricting emissions, closing down oil exploration, attempts at besmirching tracking, etc, etc.
The Left Wing Lunacy never ends.
I don’t get this whole “Big Oil” conspiracy. Why would they send any money to “Denialists”? What do they gain? If they are smart (or crafty), “Big Oil” could simply say “In order to prevent any further Global Warming, we unilaterally will reduce oil production by 50%”. Then watch the world go batcrap crazy and the price of anything petro-chemically derived (just about everything) go through the roof.
I’ll need to dig out my Marxistjargonese decoder ring for this one (and a hew pack).
We can see the obvious line of attack….. demonize us. Call us crazy. Push us to the margins with smear and slander. Lets hope they continue down this road. Eventually they will creep out a majority of the population.
We are here because we value free inquiry. Because we are not afraid to ask “how do you know” They betray their fear with their slimy tactics. And that fear of being discovered is not irrational.
Robert Brulle wants me to choose between his cerebral muck and crude oil muck? I wish everything in life was that easy.
“climate science denial” Or “climate denial”
How can anyone deny there is a climate? Or the science of Climate?
Anyone that does must live in a cave.
Proper terminology should be “CAGW denial” or something to that effect.
And it’s not just bad wording. The Conclusion section of the paper says:
We have hundreds of years of coal reserves that can be used for power or fuel production. It is probably best to use coal for power and NG for heating and fuel, but Fischer-Tropsch technology can convert either into clean burning paraffinic hydrocarbon fuel that works in the existing infrastructure. Once minable coal is exhausted, un-mineable reserves can be used via underground coal gasification.
The real energy challenge for the next generation is how to recover methane hydrates which represent perhaps 10X the energy reserves of coal and oil.
Technology exists right now to make all the fuel we need for power, heat and transportation, and, if we desire, to be independent of foreign imports. This is not necessary, but may be desirable to reduce dependence further than we have since the advent of shale gas and oil.
No matter what, as long as the government doesn’t interfere, we have more than sufficient energy reserves to maintain our economy.
I think this is a simple matter of projection. They have things like Fenton Communications and various NGOs that coordinate together as a coordinated “movement” and have deep pocket sources of funding and so maybe he just naturally assumes anyone opposed to their views do, too. It’s possibly someone just projecting the state of their own side of the debate onto the other side. It must be very frustrating for them to have spent so much money and so much ink and so much bandwidth trying to scare people into accepting their socioeconomic agenda only to gain little traction among anyone who wouldn’t have already bought that agenda in the first place and didn’t need a “global warming” boogieman to scare them into it.
I say it’s just another indication of how badly they are now flailing in their attempt to explain their failure. Of course THEY could not have been the problem, it must be some evil forces on the other side that has thwarted their plan. Good thing is I don’t believe anyone except their loyal base of supporters is going to believe it but that might be who this is aimed it. It might be some sort of last ditch effort to keep their base of support from drifting away.
Jim G says: @ January 6, 2014 at 4:00 pm
Gail Combs says:
January 6, 2014 at 3:18 pm
…Why do you suppose the fed keeps printing money through their “open market operations/quantitative easing”? Most of it ends up on Wall Street and then a good percentage goes right back to our “representatives” and “officials” in DC. Sure as hell is not hitting Main Street.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I am with you there. The value of that freshly printed money is coming from the devaluation of Main Street’s wages and the increase in cost of living.
However don’t let _Jim catch you saying that. For him the Fed and Wall Street can do no wrong, Jekyl Island is a mythical place only to be found in conspiracy dreams and Bankers have only our best interests at heart.
Brulle is just whining and lashing out because in his heart he knows he has already lost his effort to impose AGW claptrap on the rest of us.
The raping of science to support genocide (which is what happens when cheap energy is taken away from groups of people). Now where has this been used before? I can’t quite recall….oh yes….I remember….
Those who forget the past are destined to repeat it. It would not surprise me to find out that someone, somewhere, has proposed that we dispose of dead bodies as an alternative fuel source.
Chances are, this post will be snipped, but damn it, this cough-cough scientific paper is a bridge too far! It allows the flood gates to be opened to watermelon nut cases who feel like they have been given the green light to eco-bomb the black list.
Rob Dawg says:
January 6, 2014 at 4:39 pm
…By that metric since FedGov funds climate alarmism their budget is $3.2 trillion.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Now add in every other country that also funds CAGW.
Off topic, but on two different internet tools I no longer see the links to other websites on the right side of the WUWT web page. Has something changed permanently, or is this temporary?
This is not unique to Brulle. Has not Nuccitelli, Foster, and Appell done the same thing before? The facts do not matter to the totally indoctrinated. Neither does debate. Instead they are out to destroy those they simply take a disliking to.
Descending into a quagmire of semantics, Watts; but the globe will continue to warm despite your protestations.
Steve from Rockwood says: @ January 6, 2014 at 4:52 pm
I need to smarten up because I just don’t get it. Read it twice too.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
It is called Bafflegab in the advice given to gives his fellow academics by J. Scott Armstrong. Simply put, “If you can’t convince them, confuse them.”
So he’s Pro-nuclear power, right.
“Mandatory limits/restrictions on carbon emissions are known as cap and trade. ”
No. There are other forms of a mandatory limit. There are caps without trading. There is the 1 gigaton limit.
Essentially, you force a reading of his text which creates a conflict in his position.
So, you are either misreading his text, misunderstanding his position, or his position is confused.
If I have to choose between your interpretation which classes Hansen with skeptics, and deciding that you misunderstand. I will choose that you misunderstand.
Anthony-
Wanted you to see today’s damage control from Lewandowsky on the images from the stuck Antarctic ship. http://theconversation.com/an-icebreaker-gets-stuck-in-the-ice-photos-are-used-to-mislead-21736?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Latest+from+The+Conversation+for+7+January+2014&utm_content=Latest+from+The+Conversation+for+7+January+2014+CID_95a20db5ce0b38d4567ab53c8ed37e0f&utm_source=campaign_monitor&utm_term=An%20icebreaker%20gets%20stuck%20in%20the%20ice%20photos%20are%20used%20to%20mislead
Deniers just do not properly understand Antartica’s weather.
Hey Robert Brulle and your silly little pie chart whining about the money the private “Davids” have from private donations – what do you have to say about the amount of money your thug “Goliath” has and how he obtained it? Go ahead, take a look, I dare you. http://www.whitehouse.gov/sites/default/files/microsites/ostp/2014_R&Dbudget_climate.pdf
You don’t want people to know about THAT spending do you? .. of course not, hiding the truth is your modus operendi and that of the climate shake-down artists you worship.
Pipped Kool says:
January 6, 2014 at 5:14 pm
So “They” come up with a total of 7.2 billion dollars to fund “skeptic” science….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
WHAT “7.2 billion dollars to fund “skeptic” science”?
As has already been stated they take the ENTIRE BUDGET of a foundation or whatever and count it when a very small fraction actually goes to “fund “skeptic” science”
And even if it is $7.2 billion dollars? Who gives a crap? Doesn’t the other side get to do any research? Aren’t people allowed to give THEIR OWN MONEY to fund what ever research the want to outside of weapons development?
OH that’s right TAX PAYERS get ripped of for billions to produce the propaganda used to shape their opinions, so of course we have no say, no rights, no freedom in how our own money is used to counteract that propaganda.
Government burn $70 billion a year subsidizing renewables, and wild claims of “fossil fuel subsidies”
And then there is money for ‘research’.
What a bunch of cry babies. You get beat in a fight with the other guy crippled by a lack of money and then you have the audacity to complain that someone might have tossed him a few crumbs in funding?
HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAH….
Another commenter in another arena posted this little quote from Lewis Carroll and it seemed to me to be spot on:
“When I use a word,” Humpty Dumpty said, in rather a scornful tone, “it means just what I choose it to mean—neither more nor less.”
“The question is,” said Alice, “whether you can make words mean so many different things.”
“The question is,” said Humpty Dumpty, “which is to be master—that’s all.”
Robert Brulle admits his findings do not actually support this claim. His list of recipients is as others have noted, is highly suspect to start with.
But a A closer read of Brulle’s work shows his claim is really about the TOTAL money to these organizations. He admits the his research does NOT identify, nor attempt to identify, funding spent on “climate change activities”
In a response to The Guardian Brulle makes this point clear that The Guardians use of the “$1 Billion” number does NOT reflect the money to these organizations in support of climate change activities.
Which means ALL HIS WORK DOES is document funding to organizations he thinks might be somehow involved in climate change activities. His conclusion really is that these organizations, that he has arbitrarily believes have SOME relationship with climate change activities, received appx $900,000 million in total funding. He admits he has no proof or clue if ANY of that money is spent towards climate related activities.
The study is worthless. The selection criteria are specious – little more than opinion. And he reaches NO CONCLUSION on whether ANY funding is provided for climate change activities.
His complaint to The Guardian may be accurate – but it makes his paper look sillier yet. It is carefully crafted to walk and talk like a paper that condemns the funding received for the work of skeptics, yet it reaches ZERO conclusion on that premise.
Brulle’s protestation to The Guardian notwithstanding – their story is EXACTLY what the paper was intended to accomplish. There are a myriad of sources promoting the same false “$1 billion funding received by climate skeptics” claim … mission accomplished.
In my opinion this paper was no different than Lewandowsky’s Moon Landing Hoax garbage, and was created for the same purpose.
The Guardian story:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/dec/20/conservative-groups-1bn-against-climate-change
Gail Combs says: “Simply put, “If you can’t convince them, confuse them.””
In engineering circles it’s, “If you can’t dazzle them with brilliance – baffle them with bull ****.”
AussieBear says:
January 6, 2014 at 5:53 pm
I don’t get this whole “Big Oil” conspiracy. Why would they send any money to “Denialists”? …
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
They don’t or only send a token to give the rumors legs. ‘Big Oil” is solidly behind CAGW. Shell and BP funded CRU. Ged Davis, VP of Shell Oil was an IPCC big wig who wrote the scenarios for the climate models Climategate e-mail
In the USA and eyewittness says Enron, joined by BP, invented the global warming industry. I know because I was in the room. This was during my storied three-week or so stint as Director of Federal Government Relations for Enron…
The tracks are all over the internet if you bother to look. Heck Maurice Strong Chair of the UN First Earth Summit, the start of this mess in 1972 and later chair of Kyoto made his billions through oil.
I am not paid for my man-made global warming/man-made climate change denial activism. However I’ve been doing it hard for free since mid 2009 for selfish reasons and to seriously screw over certain people on planet Earth. I’m selfish because I don’t want to pay my money on carbon dioxide energy taxes to a world global government taxing regime. I also wanted to lay waste to the worlds corporate oligarch overlords who devised this stupid global government scam for their own benefit. Our owners thought they could get away with it too. Now their heads are exploding because they’re not getting that biggest thing they wanted most, king of the world status. Kiss that 1984 vision come true good bye control freaks. We’re also tearing your big brother NSA operations a new one as well.
God gave me the greatest weapons you overlords can’t beat. Solar cycle 24 grand solar minimum and E.J.Snowden. Eat that. HaHa.
I have a new term for likes of those who maliciously and by design fabricate stories and twisting of facts, if any. They’re called “Fabricateurs.”
Perhaps we should form a union, and approach Big Oil for some sort of salary, stipend, or honorarium, for standing up to the army of watermelons. We’re outnumbered 97 to 3, out financed 800 to 1, and out media’ed 100 to 1 (fox), and yet we have managed to prevent the globe from warming for almost 20 years, and kept the One World Government enthusiasts at bay. I have to admit that the Climate has helped, but where’s my check?
/sarc
Chris, oddly I found your check right where I found mine – http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fb/Yes_check.svg
Looks like Brulle is a proponent of eco fascism and totalitarian government by the fascists. The US Constitution is at odds with this kind of control monger.. That however has not stopped the likes of Obama and his eco facist EPA from trying to force that too down our throats… Brulle is just the mouth piece of the rest of those who’s agenda is control.. Its never been about science. It has always been about CONTROL!
Maybe “cap-and-trade” should be renamed to “cap-in-hand”
Petticoats showing and stood up, left at the altar of global warming, the lady doth protesteth far too much…
Resorting to sociology, psycho-babble because there is panic in the halls of academia and in the plush offices of the UN, EPA, NGO’s the world over – their stillborn hypothesis [man made warming] never made it – shot down by a bunch of amateurs [but sharpshooters] and the few brave but real scientists.
We held the Alamo and beat them darn well and they still won’t, no actually refuse to ‘get it’.
Very likely the “increase” in the AGU fees from last year are in part funding this effort thanks to the former and current “President” and “Executives” and fully “A O.K.ed by the ‘Focus Group Nazis’.”
I’m popping pop corn. Supply increasing.
Bemused says:
January 6, 2014 at 6:58 pm
“Descending into a quagmire of semantics, Watts; but the globe will continue to warm despite your protestations.”
And you are basing this prediction on climate models – which have failed to predict the lull in temperatures over the last 17 years; in other words, they have been shown to be broken.
I am bemused that you would do such a thing, because it doesn’t make sense.
Adopt a noble cause (Earth’s climate)
Exaggerate the threat to the noble cause (global warming will kill us all!)
Purpose the one and only solution that will save the noble cause (Carbon tax via cap-n-trade)
Demonize those who oppose your solution as being against the noble cause (deniers)
Demand the sacrifice of freedom and money needed to implement solution
It is the same recipe used every time by would be despots. They have only one play in their play book. They keep doing it because, amazingly, it still fools some people. Steps 2-5 are all based on lies, so the more successful these people are, the more harm they will end up doing to the noble cause!
It has always been thus.
Epitaph on an Army of Mercenaries
These, in the day when heaven was falling,
The hour when earth’s foundations fled,
Followed their mercenary calling,
And took their wages, and are dead.
Their shoulders held the sky suspended;
They stood, and earth’s foundations stay;
What God abandoned, these defended,
And saved the sum of things for pay.
A.E. Housman
If I were a climate researcher with a recent publication in “Climate Change”, I’d be embarrassed to have my paper published in a journal that lets this kind of rubbish through. But I guess it illustrates well what’s wrong with the whole field…
@ steve (rockwood apology if wrong) “I read it twice ” and still could not understand , so I guess there is two of us then Phoee I am relieved I thought I was alone,. But I think I have figured it out.These people invent new language and dictionaries as they go along. You know the dictionary with pictures to show our kids with no ice in Antarctica and Polar bears roaming around on 10′ square ice floes and by golly Chicago on January 6 2014 just baking in the sun? And don’t you forget. Steve it is now the fault of global warming, you see the (non existent according to Dr. Turney) ice has now reflected so much radiation back into space it has caused more HO2 and that has now seen large amounts of never exposed tundra release methane……. oh I am getting confused (Lots of sarcasm), I wonder, really wonder how they are going to spin this fiasco, maybe they should get together with the WH they are pretty good at it as well.
A denier is simply a person that is critical to the political established UNFCCC and or the agenda 21. (And the real political agenda behind both of them, radical change of society.)
The word denier is not a scientific term. It’s one and only just an ideological/political label that is used on those that are not conform or critical to the UNFCCC and the Agenda 21,
“Espen says:
January 6, 2014 at 10:11 pm
If I were a climate researcher with a recent publication in “Climate Change”, I’d be embarrassed to have my paper published in a journal that lets this kind of rubbish through. But I guess it illustrates well what’s wrong with the whole field…”
It’s basically one and only ideological/political ruler techniques in what should be a scientific debate.
Actually it’s a good sign for the science debate because it means that they have run out of arguments and instead attack the critical person.
“I always cheer up immensely if an attack is particularly wounding because I think, well, if they attack one personally, it means they have not a single political argument left.
Margaret Thatcher”
“To me, consensus seems to be the process of abandoning all beliefs, principles, values and policies. So it is something in which no one believes and to which no one objects.”
Margaret Thatcher
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/m/margaretth153832.html#sXP3t81ZfdklmboP.99
“If my critics saw me walking over the Thames they would say it was because I couldn’t swim.”
Margaret Thatcher
Read more at http://www.brainyquote.com/quotes/quotes/m/margaretth127087.html#3hu7K6ALZLkYvltU.99
In the mean time, Samsung’s CEO went on a rant about climate change and extreme weather events being up 200% since 1990 during his CES keynote…
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2014/01/07/samsung_introduces_professional_tablet_line/
“A cultural contestation between a social movement advocating restrictions on carbon emissions and a counter-movement opposed to such action”?
Strange. I see an advanced, knowledgable, technological civilisation fighting off a barrage of vacuous attacks from an over-powerful clique of arrogant, scientifically illiterate fascists. Must be a percertion thing. Who is this cipher, anyway?
^^ Perception … early morning here …
Like JJ upthread, I’m not sure why it is necessary to stretch the article to name James Hansen. He is quite capable of embarrassing himself without any help from his critics.
In a bizarre way, I feel grateful to Robert Brulle and hope he can produce a longer list. And I hope it is accurate. Then sceptical bloggers like Bob Tisdale will have a list of potential sponsors to contact. If they can access these allegedly large amounts of money sloshing around, then that might mean they can blog full time and give up the day job.
Mkhaelwiseguy I am with you, I am a 70 years old and we can see what the big boys and are up to and us old boys are going to put a spanner in the works of the warming gooses, they rely on the young who don,t give a dam about anything but we out number them
Ken in Beaverton says:
January 6, 2014 at 2:52 pm
Wall Street traders aren’t fleecing the public, the government is.
You’re right. Wall Street traders don’t fleece the public: they f*** the public.
Just remove the words ‘carbon emissions ‘ from the definition of what the CCM is and replace it with ‘Jews’ to get the mindset of these people.
Adolf would be so pleased…
Brulle’s polemic fits neatly beneath the flimsy parasol of Lewandowsky’s conspiracy ideation paper.
Of interest would be whether Brulle considered the Moon landing to be a hoax.
So Brulle admits his peer reviewed article is a scam. Then what does that say about where it was published? One thing implied by his scam article is that what the AGW fanatics are really after is to intimidate or silence all groups who could possibly be involved with any resistance at all to the AGW apocalyptic scenario. The hardcore AGW kooks are not going to cheerfully admit that their CO2 Armageddon scenario was clap trap, and that their concerns were misplaced. They don’t want truth, they their critics silenced.
@ Bruce says:
January 7, 2014 at 12:30 am
Bruce, does Wall St. rewrite laws it does not like, have police powers to impose its will, or IRS agents to harass citizens?
Interesting to note in Brulle’s Supplementary material that Climate Audit and SufaceStations.org are classified as U.S National Climate Counter-movement Organizations.
However neither Climate Audit nor SurfaceStations.org are listed in the income distributions tables.
Sounds like Lewandowsky-Mann Statistics, if you receive zilch from “big oil”, you are in the the pay of “big oil” because you have received funding to the amount of exactly zero dollars. /sarc
C’mon you “big oil” guys, fund these two organisations with millions of dollars to justify them being in the list.
Bemused:
Your post at January 6, 2014 at 6:58 pm says in total
The globe stopped warming at least 17 years ago.
And humans had no more effect on the stopping of global warming than they had on the cause of the previous global warming.
Please try to keep up: you are lagging more than 17 years behind reality.
Richard
Much more to gag over on his CV. Dont worry, its not as if anyone takes Drexel seriously. Walk two steps off campus and Killadelphia will get you llloonng before global warming…
http://www.pages.drexel.edu/~brullerj/research.htm
o/t But a facinating story regarding publishing science conference papers: http://retractionwatch.com/2013/12/31/punked-2-0-indian-engineer-uses-my-cousin-vinny-to-publish-fake-paper-expose-science-conference/
This might be part of throwing Hansen under the bus and regrouping. I am sure that there are those who think that he has done the CAGW cause (and the backers) more harm than good, and sacrificial goats are required.
SIG INT Ex says:
January 6, 2014 at 8:55 pm
Very likely the “increase” in the AGU fees from last year are in part funding this effort….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
The increase in AGU fees is probably do to trying to make up for the decrease in membership aa honest people leave in disgust. I left ACS (American Chemical Society) because of their stance on CAGW.
Has anyone ever though about how very odd it is for ‘scientific’ societies to declare “The science is settled and we believe in CAGW.”
They might as well have declared “We no longer believe in science.” There roll was to promote science and discussion and not to promote the belief in Consensus and Censorship.
What great harm these ‘Scientific’ Societies have done to themselves and to science. A world wide descent into Lysenkoism ‘Science’ in the halls of Academia, Societies and learned Journals. The Dark ages have truly arrived.
For what it is worth so has global cooling. It is 9 °F (-12°C) here the record low was 15 °F (-9°C)
michael hart says:
January 7, 2014 at 12:08 am
……Then sceptical bloggers like Bob Tisdale will have a list of potential sponsors to contact. If they can access these allegedly large amounts of money sloshing around, then that might mean they can blog full time and give up the day job.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Or researchers like Frank Lansner and Tony B. (climate reason) can devote themselves full time to their research.
hunter says:
January 7, 2014 at 12:58 am
@ Bruce says:
January 7, 2014 at 12:30 am
Bruce, does Wall St. rewrite laws it does not like, have police powers to impose its will….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Sorry to disillusion you but Wall Street DOES write US laws via lobbists and then has the “police powers to impose its will’ via the corporate government revolving door that places people like Mike Taylor, Monsanto’s Lawyer in charge of the FDA.
One guy (sancho) mentioned his brother worked for the EPA. He was told to forget Exon-Mobil and to go after the Mom and Pops. A better illustration is John Munsell & A Trip To The Woodshed With The USDA (humorous recounting) and SHIELDING THE GIANT: USDA’s “Don’t Look, Don’t Know” Policy
I should still love to see Mann’s financing of his expensive lawsuits. Darkest money ever?
Gosh, I’ve never been part of a ” counter-movement” before. That has a cool 1960’s retro-Woodstock ring to it. 😉
John Bochan says: @ January 7, 2014 at 1:17 am
Interesting to note in Brulle’s Supplementary material that Climate Audit and SufaceStations.org are classified as U.S National Climate Counter-movement Organizations.
However neither Climate Audit nor SurfaceStations.org are listed in the income distributions tables….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
He was ashamed to list the dribbles into The Tip Jars and where it came from because it would show the organizations were truly grassroots.
The fact that we are truly Grassroots and not Astroturf has to be hidden at all costs. This is why ‘Den!ers’ MUST be funded by big oil.
Grassroots ‘Den!ers’ battling the Goliath of the Establishment is not the picture you want young activists to get. It is deadly to a cause.
Richard (06JAN14 3:23),
It seems that even if the body is dead already, the head hasn’t worked it out yet:
http://www.rtcc.org/2014/01/06/figueres-not-backing-2015-climate-change-treaty-will-be-unacceptable/
and the backpedalling about “weather isn’t climate…” is already in full swing as North America freezes it’s arse off:
http://america.aljazeera.com/articles/2014/1/5/cold-weather-snapbringsconfusionoverclimatechange.html
What’s really worrying is how many poeple there are out there who remain quite convinced that the cause is just (refer to the comments and the comments in the Guardian article suggesting papers shouldn’t publish sceptical articles)
And there’s me thinking that the Koch Foundation also supports the University of Mike Mann.
“Both oppose cap and trade, both endorse alternative approaches, but only one gets called a denier. Why?”
You tell me. Hansen believes cap and trade too weak and ineffective and advocates taxing carbon fuels at source. This would raise energy prices immediately and leave no wriggle room for trading emissions. Nobody in their right mind would call Hansen a climate denier so why are you surprised he is excluded?
As for Global Climate Coalition, I know nothing of them. But I would be willing to bet their position is that co2 isn’t a pressing problem. Ie, a long way from Trains of Death Hansen. (I will Google GCC just too see what they stand for).
Erny72:
Thankyou for your post at January 7, 2014 at 6:33 am which comments on my post at January 6, 2014 at 3:23 pm.
You say of the AGW-scare
Again, I beg to differ.
In my post I said
Your post provides links to activities which I think are examples of such attempts.
However, I agree with you that at the “grass roots” of the AGW-alarmists there is increasing extremism. And think your examples of that are good. But such extremism (e.g. attempt to prevent alternative information being published) indicate desperation of ‘minions’ who can see the scare is being lost but fail to understand it is in its death throws.
Richard
Have just Googled GCC. The following extract summarises what they were about.
“The Global Climate Coalition (GCC) was one of the most outspoken and confrontational industry groups in the United States battling reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.”
I use the past tense because they disbanded in 2002 as they were loosing members.
Seems strange that the author of this article thinks James Hansen should be placed in the same group as GCC.
If this is all the article is trying to say, then we should be lamenting the waste of electrons.
Gail Combs says
“However don’t let _Jim catch you saying that. For him the Fed and Wall Street can do no wrong, Jekyl Island is a mythical place only to be found in conspiracy dreams and Bankers have only our best interests at heart.”
Crony capitalism is very close to facism and is rampant in “free market” countries. As long as boards of directors are allowed to sit on one and others’ boards, pay themselves ridiculous compensation, and give money freely to politicians, nothing will change. I have been there and seen that of which I speak. Don’t rock the boat is the number one rule to be admitted to the club. Money runs the world, always has and always will as far as I can see, irrespective of political system.
Just another case of “Publish or be Damned”.
I will respond by modifying the lyrics to an old American rock band The Monkees http://www.songlyrics.com/the-monkees/now-i-m-a-believer-lyric/
Then I saw the facts, now I’m a denier,
There’s not a trace of doubt in my mind.
Jim G says: @ January 7, 2014 at 8:08 am
Crony capitalism is very close to facism and is rampant in “free market” countries….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
I am completely with you. Some call it Neo-Corporatism, though that is not quite the correct term since the original meaning uses the word corporation as meaning socio-political organizations. Others call it ‘The Third Way.’ E. M. Smith has a good comment on the subject.
Mike M says:
January 6, 2014 at 8:28 pm
Chris, oddly I found your check right where I found mine – http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/f/fb/Yes_check.svg
———————————————-
Thanks, that’s the one for which I’ve been looking, although a Canadian cheque would be nice too. 🙂
Well I don’t know about anybody else, but I’m glad there are conservative and libertarian organizations funding advocates. I’m also glad that there are environmental orgs funding advocates. I wish there were more orgs to fund dedicated people like Bob Tisdale. I’d even include tobacco orgs. I think the way smokers, who tend to be lower income earners, are treated is a real issue.
What I’d really like to see is both sides on these issues have dialog and debate instead of whining about how big of a voice the other side has. I think there should be more funding of think tanks and bloggers. Hell, I think they should fund commenters!
Tim Clark says: “I will respond by modifying the lyrics to an old American rock band The Monkees”
FYI – The entire song was parodied by the Minnesotans for Global Warming three years ago. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Vx-t9k7epIk
Others where that came from – http://m4gw.com/category/videos/
this is not surprising when you consider in the context laid out in this blog
http://anonymousconservativ.ipage.com/blog/
M Seward says:
January 6, 2014 at 3:21 pm
From Brulle’s page at Drexel
Education
BS, Marine Biology, U.S. Coast Guard Academy *
MA, Sociology, New School for Social Research
MS, Natural Resources, University of Michigan
PhD, Sociology, George Washington University, 1995
(* although down the page it says a BS in Marine Engineering )
ETC. *********************************************************************
Looking at the George Washington University’s sociology department page, I note that they do not offer a PhD in Sociology. The have a very narrowly focused affliated “PhD in Public Policy and Public Administration with a specialation in race, ethnicity, and public policy at the Trachtenberg School.”
Curious and assuming that others would have been awarded a PhD in the same year as Brulle, I copied “PhD, Sociology, George Washington University, 1995” into a search window and the top hit was to Brulle’s page. I’m not suggesting that he fibbed. It just seems odd. Perhaps the university awarded PhDs in sociology formerly?
http://departments.columbian.gwu.edu/sociology/academics/graduate
Gail Combs says:
January 7, 2014 at 6:05 am
Your second link corrected: http://www.whistleblower.org/storage/documents/Shielding_the_Giant_Final_PDF.pdf
Woah. I didn’t catch that this post went up. That’s pretty bad. There ought to be an e-mail sent out to people to inform them when something they’ve written has been posted.
Normally I try to respond to people while what I write gets discussed. Sorry I didn’t this time!
By the way, if anyone wants a response to me, I’m easy to get in touch with. Not only is my e-mail account obvious (my name, separated by a period, at gmail), I have a blog (of sorts) where this was originally discussed. You can get a timely response via either.
REPLY: Brandon, I thought you checked WUWT regularly, especially since you offered this essay to me for WUWT. I’ll make sure you get a notice on any future publications – Anthony