IBD picks up my article on the US cooling trend

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“IBD picks up my article on the US cooling trend” (2011-11-11). Wow, the mainstream media gets it! Anthony Watts has made it to the big time!

Oh, the “IBD” is the Investors Business Daily. Seems they love them some stupid, which makes their Watts-miration quite understandable.

Here’s some tidbits from their deeply scientific editorial Don’t Stop Doubting, mixing Muller-spin with garden-variety denialist chart pumping (an old standby in investor circles too).

The alarmists, of course, leveraged Muller’s statements to suit their agenda.

But Muller’s [conclusion] is not the “consensus” position of the team.

Now comes meteorologist Anthony Watts armed with data showing the continental U.S. has not warmed in the last 10 years

Granted, the Lower 48 aren’t the entire world, [but] “heat islands” — big cities — [] should be skewing temperature data upward.

we remain skeptics and would be even if [Muller] were right.

Seems oddly emphatic for a subject so far out of their area of expertise. I guess it’s unsurprising that it’s so short on substance too. Still “don’t stop doubting” is good advice even if the IBD editors swallow Anthony’s line in a single gulp (they even think he’s a meteorologist). I know I won’t be taking scientific advice from a stock-picking website.

10 thoughts on “IBD picks up my article on the US cooling trend”

  1. Nice bunch of stale cherries they pick at “Investors Business Daily” on the subject of climate change denial heads in the sand! Sadly, if you read the investor section of the same journal, for some of the hottest growth stocks, they are all in the Alternate/Clean energy field. Oh, the sad irony of the double down dealing!

    In the meantime, in any given decade since 1880, I can show the exact same cooling trends as the foolish writer, that is, until I join them all together, and it goes from a cooling trend to a heating trend only!

    “Men are not prisoners of fate, but only prisoners of their own minds.” Franklin D. Roosevelt

    “There are many ways of going forward, but only one way of standing still.” Franklin D. Roosevelt

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  2. I used to subscribe to IBD for investment news but their ultra right anti-science editorial section became too much. IBD is extreme denialist on all environmental issues. They will quickly and uncritically accept the most outlandish ideas that fit their idealogy. I think that even Anthony would be embarassed by some of what they publish on the editorial pages, at least he shoulde be

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    • Nothing is too embarrassing for a Denialist, take Goddard, Morano or Monckton. When the non-Denialist world points out a particularly flagrant event the Denialist organisation will morph, shifting shape to change the latest Imbeciles position in the Oraganisation away from the ‘scene of the stupid’, they don’t reject their soldiers of stupid, they reserve them for a later attack on reality.

      I used to think that the increased evidence of a changing Climate would erode Denialist position ’til there were none, now I think they will always be.

      Science has failed when it cannot describe the current Extinction level event to people in a way that leaves no room for inaction. Denialists are the bastard spawn of this failure.

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  3. I know I won’t be taking scientific advice from a stock-picking website.

    Given their inability to understand some fairly simple concepts and observations in climate science, I don’t know if I would want to follow their stock picking advice in the complicated field of economics and business.

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  4. “Arrrggh! Let’s help Time with Pachy’s “voodoo science”” (WUWT,Nov16,2011)

    1. Anthony trumpets the 2035/Himalayan glacier mistake (that everyone recognizes) made by a Time reporter. While ignoring the article itself, about the catastrophic failure of the moraine dams holding back multi-seasonal glacier melt water lakes.

      He apparently would rather ignore this additional consequence of global warming. As would all but two of his commenters.

    2. I’ve just noticed that WUWT’s link to SkepticalScience is now all by itself in a new category: “Unreliable*”.

      “*Due to (1) deletion, extension and amending of user comments, and (2) undated post-publication revisions of article contents after significant user commenting.”

    Conspicuous by its absence is any complaint about the trustworthiness of SkepticalScience’s information.

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  5. You are worrying ole wmar over at Dot Earth. He has mentioned your work 3 times in recent days. I just wouldn’t be Dot Earth without wmar.

    [I think you’ve got the wrong Ben… – Ben]

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  6. Oh dear more evidence of the duplicitous behaviour of your heroes Ben, please tell me that as a scientist you don’t condone the way these boys go about their business.
    This isn’t how scientists are supposed to conduct their work, is it any different with them these days, one has to assume that it is the same. Even the IPCC seem to be saying the games up, what the hell is going on is the planet in danger or not

    [This is merely a rehash of the same batch of stolen e-mails from two years ago. How’d that turn out, “enid”? So is scientists arguing amongst themselves and making derisive comments about anti-science bufoons somehow proof of a united conspiracy to hide ‘the truth’ in your mind? Two-year old turkey. – Ben]

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  7. ClimateGate 2.0 : Anthony Watts likes this one, ‘cos he is mentioned approvingly by Tom Peterson:

    “I must say in fairness that, considering the photographs of how not to observe temperature on Anthony Watts’ blog, Mr. Watts gave a well reasoned position. For example, when asked if the stations with poor siting were removed from the analysis would it show less warming, Mr. Watts said we won’t know until the analysis is complete.”

    Well the analysis is complete, and the ‘poor’ stations show the same trend in mean temp as the ‘good’. A paper coauthored by Watts says so. By some oversight he doesn’t mention this.

    I say oversight, one can still download a ‘paper’ by Watts accusing scientists of malfeasance, since falsified by his own results. What’s Up With That?

    [Don’t worry, Anthony thrives on cognitive dissonance and the analysis will never be quite complete enough. – Ben]

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  8. ClimateGate 2.0: The Wattbots are getting a bit nervous

    “OK, my skeptic instincts are on high alert. So far, there is no smoking gun in the emails. There are only some uncomfortable exchanges, expressions of doubt, etc., etc. How do we know that this isn’t Mann or another member of the team putting these emails out to try to sway public opinion. . The idea would be to put out a bunch of legitimate emails that put people in a mildly bad light (so as to establish their genuineness), but don’t contain any really damning stuff. There will be a big flurry of press coverage and blogger buzz, but in the end, its all about nothing. The public will then conclude that its all been overblown and that the skeptics are wrong about the degree of dishonesty within the team. Public interest (and the concomitant public pressure) in the UVA emails would subside. This would be a fairly sophisticated strategy (sort of a ‘false flag’ operation), but I’m worried because these emails are not nearly as damning as Climategate I. It all looks very suspicious to me.”

    I am amazed these guys can get out of bed with those levels of paranoia …..

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  9. Nice stalking! You really do have an obsession with Mr Watts. Do you try and dress like him as well?

    [Nice try but work on the grammar, OK? In fact, I simply won’t allow his bold-faced lies to go unchallenged. I’m ‘obsessed’ with Anthony the same way a schoolboy is when discovering a skittering bug beneath a rock. – Ben]

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