Guest essay by Eric Worrall
The Competitive Enterprise Institute has just been subpoenaed, as part of Al Gore’s Climate Witch hunt. This is a move which so blatantly reeks of McCarthyite abuse of power, even some proponents of climate action are horrified at the attack on freedom which this subpoena represents.
The following is the statement of the Competitive Enterprise Institute;
CEI Fights Subpoena to Silence Debate on Climate Change
The Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) today denounced a subpoena from Attorney General Claude E. Walker of the U.S. Virgin Islands that attempts to unearth a decade of the organization’s materials and work on climate change policy. This is the latest effort in an intimidation campaign to criminalize speech and research on the climate debate, led by New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman and former Vice President Al Gore.
“CEI will vigorously fight to quash this subpoena. It is an affront to our First Amendment rights of free speech and association for Attorney General Walker to bring such intimidating demands against a nonprofit group,” said CEI General Counsel Sam Kazman. “If Walker and his allies succeed, the real victims will be all Americans, whose access to affordable energy will be hit by one costly regulation after another, while scientific and policy debates are wiped out one subpoena at a time.”
The subpoena requests a decade’s worth of communications, emails, statements, drafts, and other documents regarding CEI’s work on climate change and energy policy, including private donor information. It demands that CEI produce these materials from 20 years ago, from 1997-2007, by April 30, 2016.
On March 30, 2016, Attorney General Schneiderman, former Vice President Al Gore, and attorneys general from Massachusetts, Virginia, Connecticut, Maryland, Vermont, as well as Attorney General Walker, held a press conference in New York City to announce “an unprecedented coalition of top law enforcement officials committed to aggressively protecting and building upon the recent progress the United States has made in combating climate change.” Schneiderman said that the group, calling itself “AGs United for Clean Power,” will address climate change by threatening criminal investigations and charges against companies, policy organizations, scientists, and others who disagree with its members’ climate policy agenda.
CEI has long been a champion of sound climate change policy, and opposed previous attempts to use McCarthy-style tactics by officials aiming to limit discussions between nonprofit policy groups and the private sector regarding federal policies. CEI is being represented in this matter by attorneys Andrew M. Grossman and David B. Rivkin, Jr., who recently founded the Free Speech in Science Project to defend First Amendment rights against government abuses.
Source: https://cei.org/content/cei-fights-subpoena-silence-debate-climate-change
The text of the subpoena is here.
Here is a response from Bloomberg, which frequently takes a pro climate action position;
Subpoenaed Into Silence on Global Warming
The Competitive Enterprise Institute is getting subpoenaed by the attorney general of the U.S. Virgin Islands to cough up its communications regarding climate change. The scope of the subpoena is quite broad, covering the period from 1997 to 2007, and includes, according to CEI, “a decade’s worth of communications, emails, statements, drafts, and other documents regarding CEI’s work on climate change and energy policy, including private donor information.”
My first reaction to this news was “Um, wut?” CEI has long denied humans’ role in global warming, and I have fairly substantial disagreements with CEI on the issue. However, when last I checked, it was not a criminal matter to disagree with me. It’s a pity, I grant you, but there it is; the law’s the law.
(I pause to note, in the interests of full disclosure, that before we met, my husband briefly worked for CEI as a junior employee. We now return to our regularly scheduled programming.)
Speaking of the law, why on earth is CEI getting subpoenaed? The attorney general, Claude Earl Walker, explains: “We are committed to ensuring a fair and transparent market where consumers can make informed choices about what they buy and from whom. If ExxonMobil has tried to cloud their judgment, we are determined to hold the company accountable.”
That wasn’t much of an explanation. It doesn’t mention any law that ExxonMobil may have broken. It is also borderline delusional, if Walker believes that ExxonMobil’s statements or non-statements about climate change during the period 1997 to 2007 appreciably affected consumer propensity to stop at a Mobil station, rather than tootling down the road to Shell or Chevron, or giving up their car in favor of walking to work.
…
Prosecutors know the damage they can do even when they don’t have a leg to stand on. The threat of investigation can coerce settlements even in weak cases.
Read more: http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2016-04-08/subpoenaed-into-silence-on-global-warming
In my opinion, this hysterical executive overreach will be the downfall of the climate alarmist movement in America, just as outrage at the excesses of the McCarthy era brought an end to that dark period of American history.
You don’t have to be a climate skeptic, to recognise that an attack on freedom of speech, in whatever guise, is an attack on everything which America stands for.
More than anything, this authoritarian, un-American attempt to silence dissent betrays the weakness of those perpetrating this attack on the CEI. In a Republic, people who have a compelling case to offer, don’t have to intimidate their political opponents into silence, to win the argument.
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We still have spring, summer, fall, and winter in Canada. Which makes me wonder which of these climates have changed in America? You know – the one (climate) they’re suing for that’s now missing?
I cannot imagine the AG has a legal leg to stand on in its pursuit of that information.
As I say later, it doesn’t matter if there is no case to be made, or legal leg to stand on. It is the process that is the weapon and punishment. The AG can spin this out as long as his political allies control the government purse.
You are correct, he doesn’t have a legal leg to stand on.
More like Lysenkoism than McCarthyism.
Last year marked the 800th Anniversary of Magna Carta. I suggest these AG’s and Al Gore should actually read it, probably for the very first time.
Magna Carta is the source for our Rule of Law, and the peace and prosperity enjoyed by all the nations that benefit from it. Rule of Law is now under threat from scoundrels and imbeciles.
Cl. 39 and 40 of Magna Carta read as follows:
http://www.bl.uk/magna-carta/articles/magna-carta-english-translation#sthash.lcxMkhuB.dpuf
[39] No free man shall be seized or imprisoned, or stripped of his rights or possessions, or outlawed or exiled, or deprived of his standing in any other way, nor will we proceed with force against him, or send others to do so, except by the lawful judgement of his equals or by the law of the land.
[40] To no one will we sell, to no one deny or delay right or justice.
Regards to all, Allan
The Magna Carta was incorporated into U.S. law at the time of the founding of the country. SCOTUS has also ruled on this as valid.
Will Americans have to fall back on the Magna Carta to protect themselves?
Barbara asks: “Will Americans have to fall back on the Magna Carta to protect themselves?”
Let’s hope it goes only that far.
Remember, there’s always recourse to Rule .308 (known as “Rule .303” in Canada).
Unfortunately, this is not hysterical executive overreach but a concerted, planned and coordinated attack on political enemies, using the apparatus of the “justice system”. Remember, with all these without-law cases, it is the process that is the punishment.
These actions by the AG of the US Virgin Islands constitute Misfeasance in Office – the AG can be sued by his victims and if the lawsu9it is successful he could be removed from office.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malfeasance_in_office.
“Malfeasance in office, or official misconduct, is the commission of an unlawful act, done in an official capacity, which affects the performance of official duties. Malfeasance in office is often grounds for a for cause removal of an elected official by statute or recall election.”
In Commonwealth countries it is termed Misfeasance in Public Office.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Misfeasance_in_public_office
CEI was not the only company to get a subpoena. DCI Group also did.
Have you all acquired your guns yet because that would be the next thing on their agenda. A disarmed populace is easily controlled. It is getting very close to the real tipping point in these matters.
The AG for the US Virgin Islands?? Really? Why not the NY, VT or MA AGS (all in Al Gore’s anti-skeptics club)? Maybe because their states have anti-SLAPP laws!
Good call Rick re US Virgin Islands. Note from below:.
“It has been argued that the lack of uniform protection against SLAPPs has encouraged forum shopping.”
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Strategic_lawsuit_against_public_participation
Twenty-eight states, the District of Columbia, and Guam have enacted statutory protections against SLAPPs.[27][verification needed] These states are Arizona, Arkansas, California, Delaware, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Illinois, Indiana, Louisiana, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Minnesota,[28] Missouri, Nebraska, Nevada, New Mexico, New York, Oklahoma, Oregon, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Tennessee, Texas,[29][30] Utah, Vermont, and Washington. In Colorado and West Virginia, the courts have adopted protections against SLAPPs. These laws vary dramatically in scope and level of protection, and the remaining states lack specific protections.
There is no federal anti-SLAPP law. The extent to which state laws apply in federal courts is unclear, and the circuits are split on the question. The First,[31] Fifth[32] and Ninth[33] circuits have allowed litigants from Maine, Louisiana and California, respectively, to use their state’s special motion in federal district courts in diversity actions. The D.C. Circuit has held the reverse for D.C. litigants.[34]
It has been argued that the lack of uniform protection against SLAPPs has encouraged forum shopping; proponents of federal legislation have argued that the uncertainty about one’s level of protection has likely magnified the chilling effect of SLAPPs.[35]
In December 2009, Rep. Steve Cohen (D–Tennessee) introduced the Citizen Participation Act in the U.S. House.[36] This marks the first time the Congress has considered federal anti-SLAPP legislation, though the Congress enacted the SPEECH Act on the closely related issue of libel tourism.[37] Like many state anti-SLAPP laws, H.R. 4364 would allow the defendant of a SLAPP to have the suit quickly dismissed and to recover fees and costs
Allan MacRae observes that:
Open question: what would be the characteristics of an ideal federal anti-SLAPP statute?
Citing Wikipedia on McCarthy is like citing Wikipedia on Climate Change.
In many cases, McCarthy was right http://www.anncoulter.com/columns/2012-08-08.html
It’s never a bad idea to draw a brief quotation from a work cited. From Ms. Coulter’s 2012 article:
Of course, recent history gives us Hitlery, her multitude of malfeasances in public office, and the National Socialist Democrat American Party (NSDAP) indifference thereto as something quite “comparable to it.”
I’m suprised nobody has posted this…
WOW!
So Al could only buy the “Attorney General” of the U.S. Virgins Islands! U.S. Virgin Islands, an unincorporated though organized territory of the U.S., just a few kilometers from the British Virgin Island, known for tourism and money laundering operations and mentioned very prominently in the “Panama Papers”.
Al outs Al yet again to great fanfare.
Ha ha ja ja
When this has all run its course, I don’t think that those US Virgin Islands will be virgin any longer.
[snip – fake name, fake email address, sockpuppeting -mod]
[snip – fake, name, fake email address, sockpuppeting -mod]
If you go to St. Thomas V.I. you can visit the castle of the vicious pirate Blackbeard. Maybe he is making a comeback.
Boycott the USVI’s.
Donate to any defense fund.
Demand that climate imperialists be held to account for their attacks on civil society.
I hope CEI’s computer hard drives crash like the one at the IRS did in the targeting of tea party groups.
And I also hope that CEI delays, delays, and delays the release of whatever they have. Eff the left.
A few facts by way of background and not necessarily pertinent to the lawsuit.
The US Virgin Islands produces most of its energy from oil and runs oil-fired desalination plants.
Until 2012 it had a mega oil refinery. It went broke and was closed down, much to the chagrin of the US Virgin Islands government, who wanted it to remain open. They are suing Hess Corporation over this. It is now just a storeage facility.
Tourism is a major industry. They have two airports but most tourists arrive on cruise ships fuelled by ExxonMobil’s finest, or perhaps someone else’s finest.
I can’t find current figures, but I suspect the US Virgin Islands has a higher per capita C02 output than the USA as a whole.
The AG should sue his own Governor.
Don’t like the use of “McCarthyite” in a negative context as Joe McCarthy was right about all of the communists in Hollywood and there are even more today. They just call themselves Democrats now.
Anthony,
Is there an account I could contribute towards the legal costs?
If there is none, I think it should be set up. I recon many readers here would be more than happy to pitch in.
Hi Janus,
You can easily go to http://www.cei.org/donate to help CEI!
Next step – by presidential decree there will be a warmista pledge that must be spoken by every American. “I formally declare that I believe in catastrophic human-driven climate change.” Anyone who refuses to take the pledge will be sent for “re-education.”
Eric Worrall,
Just read this post and don’t know if you’re still monitoring or whether this has been addressed before, but PLEASE, PLEASE, STOP letting them define the issue, write the narrative, and put yourself on the defensive!! When they say “Climate Change,” respond with “Global Warming!” That was the issue and that is the issue, and it is not happening. That’s why they changed the narrative to “climate change.” Keep pushing back with global warming, and sooner or later someone on the prosecutorial side will have to address it.
But they are not just predicting “global warming” – people like John Holdren, Obama’s science advisor, in my opinion have placed an each way bet on what will happen to the climate.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/09/16/the-morphology-of-global-warming/
Despite the obvious attempt to intimidate and silence people who have the right to express their views this
is exactly what the fraud called global warming needs . The massive scale of lies from the global warming cult will be on full display. It is disturbing that this type of behaviour is even condoned in a democratic society where rights people fought to preserve are dismissed by the earth has a fever promoters .
Climate changes( shocking isn’t it ) ,and thankfully it has been warming as we come out of an ice age .If humans play some small role well great, drinks all around . Warming when it occurs with associated higher levels of CO2 are beneficial to life on earth . Proven fact .
If the government really could provide evidence that warming is the big bad wolf they claim then why are green houses trying to create CO2 to foster plant growth ? And they are legal ? Wouldn’t fish benefit from a bigger swimming pool ? Let’s hope for more warming . Hey even less fossil fuels will be needed and maybe 40,000 people per year in Europe won’t die because of fuel poverty caused by stupid government policy blunders and subsidies to bird blenders .
Mother nature rules, and despite the global warming industry cult being full of self important hypocrites ,humans are not setting the earth’s thermostat now or ever . Any nut job that thinks some jackasses are going to sit in a room and prescribe the optimal earth temperature needs help .
Agree with me or not I don’t care but F!@k with my right to say what I think and we have a big
problem .
There seems to be an incoherent skeptical movement that never takes off and gets any real steam. What is the main problem getting the message out about the flaws in the AGW theory?
It seems inconceivable that no one in the entire skeptical movement can simply explain the position of skeptics well enough that people overall get the picture that CO2 is a tiny quantity of mass amid a much, much larger mass, and if it were leveraging something unusual everyone would already be aware of that usage in common hobby, industry, and even experimental education.
CO2 has lower specific heat than air as a whole.
The sole possibility for temperature change is more CO2, to be loading the system through more H2O and it’s (H2O’s) higher specific heat.
Someone should print a pamphlet explaining how the temperature of a volume of atmospheric air is calculated and simply say – there isn’t any reference to any particular ”effect” in calculating these temperatures.
Don writes: “It seems inconceivable that no one in the entire skeptical movement can simply explain the position of skeptics well enough….”
Well, there are a number of fairly simple and accessible pamphlets that had been prepared by Jo Nova and her associates. These have been maintained online via her Web log:
The Skeptics Handbook (June 2009)
The Skeptics Handbook II: Global Bullies want your money (November 2009)
Climate Money: The Climate Industry: $79 billion so far – trillions to come (21 July 2009)
The information aggregated in these digital pamphlets is sufficiently robust that Ms. Nova obviously hasn’t felt much need to utter revised editions.