II owe an apology to all readers for the temporarily reduced frequency of posting. I’m currently in Italy on a family vacation. On multiple occasions over the past several years, I have taken family vacations— including to semi-developed places like Russia and Vietnam — without significant effect on my ability to post on the blog. However, the internet service where I currently find myself in Italy is remarkably poor, and not sufficient to support the kind of research it takes to do one of my usual posts. So please have patience. I’ll be back to my usual routine next week.
Meanwhile, let me relay some information that people have sent me. Greg Wrightstone, Executive Director of the CO2 Coalition, sends along some truly shocking information about ongoing big tech censorship of the climate debate. Things may have improved at Twitter over the past few months, but Twitter is only one of several of the big tech behemoths. At the others, little has changed. Indeed, things may be continuing to get worse.
If you are unfamiliar with it, the CO2 Coalition is the premier organization of scientists and science-oriented people who are skeptical of the claims of the weird pagan cult that currently dominate public debate on the subject of climate. The large majority of top-rank climate scientists who actually know what they are talking about are members of the Coalition. (The exceptions are generally people who have declined to join because of well-founded fears of adverse career consequences should they associate themselves with the group.). Dr. William Happer, the senior atmospheric physicist at Princeton, is the Chair of the Coalition. The Coalition also includes as members various science-oriented people who regularly contribute to the public climate debate. In that category, I joined by invitation a couple of years ago.
One of the more notable recent additions to the Coalition is a guy named John Clauser. Clauser happens to be one of the winners of the latest (2022) Nobel Prize in physics. The work for which Clauser won the Nobel Prize is on a specific issue called “quantum entanglement.” But he is clearly a brilliant physicist, and physics generally is highly relevant to the subject of the world’s climate. Also, like many other actual top scientists, Clauser is a “climate skeptic.” Finally, Clauser has not only joined the CO2 Coalition, but in May he became a board member.
On June 26 in Seoul, Clauser gave a keynote speech at a conference called Quantum Korea. Wrightstone was provided with an English version of the remarks, and excerpted several key lines to create a page on the CO2 Coalition website and also a Facebook post. Here (from the CO2 Coalition site) are some quotes and paraphrases from Clauser’s presentation, with quotation marks indicating which are direct quotes:
- “The world we live in today is filled with misinformation. It is up to each of you to serve as judges, distinguishing truth from falsehood based on accurate observations of phenomena.”
- “Misinformation is being spread by those with political and opportunistic motives.”
- Dr. Clauser, known for his stance [with respect to] climate change, diagnosed the current situation as not being a climate crisis and criticized the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) for spreading misinformation.
- He stated, “I don’t believe there is a climate crisis” and expressed his belief that “key processes are exaggerated and misunderstood by approximately 200 times.”
According to Wrightstone, here is what happened next at Facebook:
Our post and ad promoting it [were] removed by Facebook on July 1.
Wrightstone provides the following screenshot from Facebook:
The picture shows Clauser delivering his address at the conference in Korea.
And then:
Next, one day later, an ad promoting the image that adorns our Facebook page and carries our unofficial motto “We Love CO2 and So Should You” was removed and censored. The only text we posted was “What’s not to love?”
Here’s a screenshot of that rejected ad, and Facebook’s response:
Wrightstone concludes: “These are troubling times we live in.”
I should also mention that Wrightstone and the CO2 Coalition have been permanently banned from LinkedIn. Wrightstone calls it “Linked Out.”
The stupids are truly in control of much of the world right now. We’ll see how long it continues.
I abandoned LinkedIn some time ago when it became clear that reach was being arbitrarily restricted.
“Don’t Get The Idea That Internet Censorship Is Diminishing”
Er, where on Earth would I get that idea? Look around….
They’ve only just got started following the successful pandemic pilot. Now that we know that the Wuhan lab was the source, who cares about the blatant censorship, the cancellations and yes, the lies? Why isn’t Fauci in the dock?
It’s on to the next thing.
Did you know?
“Nigel Farage, broadcaster and former leader of the Brexit Party, has made a striking allegation. In a video he posted on social media yesterday, Farage claims that two months ago his bank of more than 40 years suddenly announced that it would be closing his personal and business accounts – without offering any proper explanation as to why.
After many calls, emails and letters, he says that all he could get out of his bank was that it was dropping him as a customer for ‘commercial’ reasons. Stranger still, when he tried to set up an account elsewhere, he was rebuffed. By seven separate banks, he says.
Shortly after he went public yesterday, Farage claims his bank (he has decided not to name it ‘for now’) called him up, offering him a personal but not a business account with one of its affiliates. He has refused and says unless things change he may well have to leave the country.
Farage has aired a few theories as to why this might have happened. The corporate world, he says, will never forgive him for Brexit. (Which is absolutely true, whether or not that had anything to do with this.) He has also pointed to the ‘politically exposed person’ regime, which means politicians and other public figures are subject to extra checks to guard against foreign influence and bribery.”
https://www.spiked-online.com/2023/06/30/nigel-farage-and-the-corporate-war-on-dissent/
He hasn’t named the bank, but we know which bank it is – Coutts
“Coutts, known as the Queen’s bank for having served every member of the royal family since George IV, is trying to bolster its environmental and social reputation ”
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2021/jul/28/the-queens-bank-coutts-joins-the-ranks-of-ethical-brands
There are many businesses which provide software enabling extremely detailed reports ( including UN Sanctions lists, eg) for mandatory FCA anti money laundering (AML) process checks which are very complex; they are also a moveable feast to some extent with FCA regulated business A interpreting FCA regs slightly differently than FCA regulated business B. From ( personal, professional experience ), FCA businesses can access every legal required checks for ~£1 per report. PEP status also needs mandatory referral to “senior management” – Farage et al having their accounts closed can only happen AFTER “senior management” involvement. If PEP higher level checks were done and “passed”, the “10 UK Banks” have some explaining to do – past Treasury Committees have not thought AML/PEP regs are well thought out…..
PEP status is not new; it covers, among others, eg UK ministers, MPs, ambassadors, and Supreme Court judges. How many MPs past and present, officially criticised for receiving undeclared lobbying payments or for cheating with illegal expense’s claims have had their bank accounts cancelled? Has Couts ( or any of the other reported 9 Banks UK FCA regulated bank ) submitted, eg, an Unexplained Money Source report or other “suspicions” to the National Crime Agency as they are legally required to do for any person whose accounts have been closed? Bryant shooting his mouth off in the HoC should be referred to and required by the Parliamentary Standards Committee to disclose what information he has got about his claim Farage receiving £500K from a Russia source…perhaps Ms Harman can opine on that before she chairs that referral.
It also covers: Close associates are people connected to a politically exposed person professionally or socially, or through a business relationship.
So, the sanctimonious and previously Sky sanctioned Ms Burley and other media people who have a “professional” connection with a PEP person – past interviewing etc – are theoretically subject to the same rigour – no prizes for guessing if that has happened to date?
“He has also pointed to the ‘politically exposed person’ regime, which means politicians and other public figures are subject to extra checks to guard against foreign influence and bribery.”
We need some of that here in the United States! Joe Biden should be first on this list.
Without providing any evidence, the BBC is claiming “a source” told them the issue was Farage’s funds fell below £1m which meant automatic closure of his account.
Coutts refused to comment.
That ‘source’ was Natwest who have, apparently, been in contact with Coutts. Nigel Farage has pointed out that he has roughly the same amount of money in the bank as he always has. The timing is interesting – this happened less than 2 days after Farage and GB News trounced the media establishment at the TRIC awards ceremony, with much booing and heckling from said personages.
Thanks, Francis, and enjoy your vacation. I believe the problem is not only stupid, but outright dishonesty. The CAGW theme is just one of the tools the unholy alliance utilizes to instill fear, solicit cooperation, quell dissent, and gain control. There was a switch to the LGBTQI+ theme, but that is receding. The possibly most disgusting aspect is the Politicians who post themselves as Useful Fools to front for this corruption. Keep up the good work, especially as there is still a long struggle ahead.
If you go to this site Just Stop Net Zero https://www.juststopnetzero.com/
You will see copies of the front pages from the New York Times (1989); The Times (1976); and a screenshot from NASA website 2010.
The Times bans people for even referring to the existence of those items.
These illustrate the march toward zero integrity.
“However, the internet service where I currently find myself in Italy is remarkably poor, and not sufficient to support the kind of research it takes to do one of my usual posts.”
Heck, you’re in Italy- a beautiful country with endless things to look at and enjoy. Eat, drink, and be merry, forget about the climate until you’re home. 🙂
I love Italia…
We went out with friends last night to an Italian restaurant – run by a Pakistani family. The food was excellent.
I live a long way from Italy, so I too hope you enjoy your trip!
Since 1997 we’ve been to Italy and Sardegna (Italy in name only) many times. From the Jazz Festival in Perugia to the Truffle festival in Alba to all of our favorite wineries in the Veneto and walking through the streets of Pompeii, Naples, Sorrento, the Amalfi coast, Agrigento, Etna, the beaches near Alghero, cocktails with George on Lake Como (just kidding).
In 2019 we spent a month driving around Northern Italy just before things hit the fan. Driving was a real experience, especially in the big cities, like Rome or the Superstradas in the North.
Using the Post Office was a real hoot – now I understand a real bureaucracy!
I think the tourist industry is still recovering from the stupid Covid regs.
Met some locals who are now lifelong friends, will never forget the memories.
The people will literally give you the shirt off their back.
All in all a great country with some amazing history.
The people pushing net zero, do they think they will be spared from its ravages? It would seem that they are in effect volunteering to be enslaved. (the little people, not the billionaires)
From the article: “Things may have improved at Twitter over the past few months, but Twitter is only one of several of the big tech behemoths. At the others, little has changed. Indeed, things may be continuing to get worse.”
Yeah, we haven’t even determined how many FBI agents these other social media platforms have censoring the output. Twitter had its cadre of FBI agents censoring. You can bet all the other social media outfits also have the same thing going on, other than the few conservative social media sites that have sprung up recently.
We need to know the federal government’s role in all this censorship going on, especially since Biden got in office. I believe they turned the spying and censoring of Americans up to 11 about that time.
One more investigation for the House of Representtives to take up.
I see where a Federal Judge yesterday has called out the Social Media outfits and the Biden administration for violating First Amendment rights of Americans by censoring their speech on social media platforms and the judge has ordered the Biden administration to stop it.
A very fine ruling on the Fourth of July. How appropriate!
Thanks Francis Menton, your posts here at WUWT are top notch.
About LinkedIn, I posted this last year and didn’t get any warnings. Beneath the radar, perhaps.
https://www.linkedin.com/posts/daviddibbell_wuwt-contest-runner-up-professional-nasa-activity-6951589878233018368-GzL1?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop
The link is to this post on WUWT.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/05/16/wuwt-contest-runner-up-professional-nasa-knew-better-nasa_knew/
Interestingly, Clintel and the CO2 coalition are on LinkedIn and they can be followed.
There are quite a few dissenting comments regarding the climate cult.
I also looked up Kathryn Porter after she got this write up on DeSmog
https://www.desmog.com/2023/06/22/climate-sceptic-goes-unchallenged-on-bbcs-today-programme/
As a result I see quite a few posts and comments now that would normally be “cancelled”
Maybe we still have a chance!
She is evidently getting under their skin. Good. I was introduced to her work by Euan Mearns at Energy Matters when she started out on her own. I have been commenting at her blog regularly, and we have worked together on submissions to BEIS and OFGEM by sharing ideas and research. She really knows her stuff because she had real jobs in the industry, and started with a physics degree.
Of course, the debunk is full of such lies as pretending that renwables are cheap and that fossil fuel posed a blackout risk when at no time were gas stocks close to running out last winter. It was rather the need to pay top dollar to secure interconnector imports and coal and diesel generation when the wind failed that led to the biggest risk of blackouts – and the need to impose demand side reductions. Then the writer there comes from Left Foot Forward and the BBC, so would have no idea about the real world.
Funnily enough, I think the success that GB News is currently enjoying may be a wake-up call for the BBC – they have been far too entrenched in their positions and they may have realised how out of touch they’ve become. If they’re starting to give air time to sceptical views then yes, might not be quite as bleak as we feared.
They don’t censor you, they shunt you into a No-mans land of adverts
The Marxists would have complete control of the media if it weren’t for the internet. And they
‘re working on that. Time for normal people to fight back and boycott is the answer. Already Black Rock has declared a back down from promoting ESG. The way to support Capitalism and Democracy is by giving your business to those that support them as well.
Macron’s cabinet made it easier for “anti hate”/censorship groups to operate by making available the list of corporations putting ads on a media, so they can be coerced. Macron is pure leftist/soviet with a Wall Street suit.
At the core I think Macron is a dirty punk born in the wrong body of the wolf of Wall Street toyboy.
“The stupids are truly in control of much of the world right now.”
Not stupids. They’re very smart, look how much they’ve been able to accomplish. Now, the average person who believes their propaganda is indeed stupid. But those in charge? Not.
Don’t conflate smart with evil solipsistic cunning. If they were truly smart, they would do something useful instead of destructive.
Smart doesn’t have to equal good. Evil cunning is still “smart”. Wisdom is another thing entirely. They are not wise.
In Australia were losing free speech fast than we did during the covid lockdowns.
New laws will censor anything deemed misinformation and disinformation.
The A.C.M.A. will decide what every Australian can say and read online.
Every type of media will be subject to this type of Communist control.
Australian’s now face the biggest threat to democracy since the Japanese bombed Darwin.
The Australian Government is asking for feedback here;
https://www.infrastructure.gov.au/have-your-say/new-acma-powers-combat-misinformation-and-disinformation
Have your say before what little free speech we have left is lost.
The White House and other agencies don’t need to conspire with Big Tech to censor social media. The government merely needs to make its wishes known. Do you recall the State of the Union speech Obama made criticizing the Tea Party? The IRS got the message and unlawfully denied tax exempt status to several Tea Part-related organizations and other conservative groups.