Category Archives: "Political" Science

Enviro and Media Agenda on Extreme Weather – State Climatologist Invited, then Uninvited to Rally

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“Enviro and Media Agenda on Extreme Weather – State Climatologist Invited, then Uninvited to Rally“. Anthony Watts wants us to know that the State Climatologist for Delaware, “David R. Legates, Ph.D., C.C.M” was invited by Environment America to speak at a press conference about “Extreme Weather in Delaware.” He was cruelly uninvited when they learned that he was loose cannon looking for opportunities to misrepresent climate science in support of the posturing of the politicians who appointed him.

How dare Environment America state that “we do not suggest that these [particular] extreme weather events were caused by global warming” and then say that “the point of examining the recent extreme weather events – and the economic losses and other negative impacts they caused – is to document why we need to take action to protect against them, including by reducing emissions of pollutants that are changing our climate.” That’s a total contradiction, unless you can comprehend the English language!

It’s ironic to see Anthony decrying censorship when his blog comment policy personifies it (and the mob justice he encourages).

Quote of the Week

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“Quote of the Week“. Anthony Watts brings to our attention a quote from Dr. Roger Pielke Jr. about the hated Joe Romm that is “long overdue”, prompted by Joe’s coverage of Clive Crook at the Atlantic repeatedly smearing climatologist Dr. Michael Mann:

“More than any individual — James Inhofe and Marc Morano included — Joe Romm is responsible for creating a poisonous, negative atmosphere in the climate debate. Responsible voices should say so, this nonsense has gone on long enough.”

This is code for “Joe Romm is kicking my ass all over town.” You see, Joe Romm has a Physics Ph.D. but Roger Pielke Jr.’s Ph.D is in… political science. They’ve crossed paths many times, but it’s like bringing a knife to a gun fight, and Romm doesn’t sugar-coat it.

Interesting to see the implication that denialists Senator James Inhofe and political operative Marc Morano are also “poisonous.” I’m not sure how Anthony avoided that short-list, but perhaps it’s because he’s one of Roger’s buddies. Roger Pielke Jr.’s claim of being (the only?) “honest broker” in the climate change debate is currently being laughed out-of-town. Here are two links (Roger at Face Value and The Honestly Broken) about Roger’s self-serving concept.

Expert Embarrassment in Climate Change

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“Expert Embarrassment in Climate Change“. Thomas Fuller, first to publish rash “Climategate” accusations, lets us know that the recent PNAS paper, ‘Expert Credibility in Climate Change’, is somehow a nasty and unethical blacklist.

Sorry Tom, the determination of denier/agree-er was based on freely given public statements and the assessment of expertise was the same for all subjects. Claiming sneakiness, privacy infringement, or violation of confidentiality is bull. Read the author’s defense, several days before Fuller’s repetition, over at Real Climate.

Your denialist victims have been “outing” themselves without any help, and your post is merely an exercise in victim bullying. However your howls do remind me of the frequent calls by denialists for the dismissal of “warmist” scientists or public officials, cuts to their funding, calls for boycotts, etc, etc. What’s that smell? Oh yes, hypocrisy.

We enter the age of “…or else”

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We enter the age of “…or else”. Nothing makes a libertarian madder than governments acting on something. Anthony Watts  copies-and-pastes excerpts from a Washington Post report that the death of a Senate Climate bill means that the White House will use its power to act on Global Warming via the EPA’s clean-air regulations.

Obama is such a bully! And a Nigerian communist.

New carbon dioxide emissions model: “carbon dioxide emissions must be reduced to around zero by the end of the century”

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New carbon dioxide emissions model: “carbon dioxide emissions must be reduced to around zero by the end of the century”. How dare those Europeans tell Anthony Watts what to do! Wait, the copied-and-pasted  Max Planck Society for the Advancement of Science press release is simply saying this:

Meteorologists have determined exactly how much carbon dioxide humans can emit into the atmosphere while ensuring that the earth does not heat up by more than two degrees.

CO2 emissions calculated by the model (left, in gigatons carbon/year) and the temporal development of the global mean annual temperature (right). For long-term stabilisation of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration, fossil carbon dioxide emissions must be reduced to around zero by the end of the century. Black lines represent the observed values. Source: Max Planck Institute for Meteorology.

The practical truth is that if we want to limit the global temperature increase to the 2°C rise that has been agreed is a wise target, we’re going to have to start acting now. There is a significant “inertia” to our climate’s response to inputs such as CO2 emissions, it’s not as if we can just “turn off the tap” when it suits us.

Anthony leaves the wise observations that we’d “better stop breathing” and howls about taxation, socialist vegetarian conspiracies and population control to flourish uncorrected in the comments.

Climate proposals threaten pursuit of happiness and justice

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“Climate proposals threaten pursuit of happiness and justice“. Paul Driessen of the right-wing “Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow” sarcastically tells us this:

Environmental justice demands that the United States address global warming, the gravest threat facing minority Americans, insist the EPA, Congressional Black Caucus and White House. Are they serious?

After the usual collection of denialist talking points, we get to Paul’s real concern:

Whether they take the form of cap-and-trade, carbon taxes, restrictions on drilling and coal mining, or EPA rules under its claim that carbon dioxide “endangers” human health and welfare, anti-energy policies frustrate the natural desire of poor and minority Americans to improve their lives.

Ah yes, the Republicans just want to help the downtrodden. Downtrodden corporations that is.

Thanks for the science, Anthony.

Gore cleared in masseuse case

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“Gore cleared in masseuse case“. Is Anthony Watts clearing the air on yet another attempt to besmirch politician and environmentalist Al Gore, or is he taking the opportunity to remind his readers that ‘the alGore’ is evil, evil, EVIL?

This kind of post is just another sign that Anthony Watts’ blog is propelled by partisan right-wing anger and not by objective scientific interest.

I’m honored…I think

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“I’m honored…I think“. Here’s another funny one from Anthony Watts. Virginia Heffernan has naïvely written in the New York Times about a controversy over disguised advertising on ScienceBlogs, which she claims “has become Fox News for the religion-baiting, peak-oil crowd”. Sounds like a someone’s got a nice fact-free agenda… She also makes a rather loose suggestion about some ‘sensible’ science websites:

For science that’s accessible but credible, steer clear of polarizing hatefests like atheist or eco-apocalypse blogs. Instead, check out scientificamerican.com, discovermagazine.com and Anthony Watts’s blog, Watts Up With That?

Anthony loves the credibility bump, even though Scientific America is ‘dead to him’ for it’s awful, corrupt, lying support of the Global Warming orthodoxy (so are most natural history museums). Too bad Heffernan makes a very explicit retraction of her endorsement of Watts Up With That?:

One regret: the Watts blog. Virtually everyone who emailed me pointed out that it’s as axe-grinding as anything out there. I linked to it because has a lively voice; it’s detail-oriented and seemingly not snide; and, above all, it has some beautiful images I’d never seen before. I’m a stranger to the debates on science blogs, so I frankly didn’t recognize the weatherspeak on the blog as “denialist”; I didn’t even know about denialism. I’m don’t endorse the views on the Watts blog, and I’m extremely sorry the recommendation seemed ideological.

Anthony of course considers this proof that Heffernan succumbed to intellectual bullying from those nasty, hateful, lying scientists. Or is he just disappointed that a gullible newcomer with the correct political perspective has slipped through his fingers?

Tim Lambert over at Deltoid has a good overview: Post-modernism rides again at the New York Times.

Step Changes in Science Blog Climate

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“Step Changes in Science Blog Climate“. This is an amusing exercise in boasting and wish-fulfillment from Watts Up With That “moderator” Mike Lorrey. Apparently the dubious web statistics generated by Alexa prove that WUWT is the best place on the internet for “science”. Why? Because obsessive denialists click madly on Anthony’s posts, shouting over each other and at people who don’t share their views. Also WUWT’s website is designed to amplify “clicks”.

WUWT attracts clicks like flies are attracted to... honey.

Mike compares WUWT’s “traffic” to RealClimate.org (boo! hiss! “always the least popular, indicating the general public got that this was an astroturfing site by climate alarmists who tolerated no dissent”), Climate Progress (boo! hiss! “talk[s] down to the average bloke”) and Climateaudit.org (yea!). According to Mike, WUWT was the place where “Commentary from all directions was encouraged, with postings by non-skeptic scientists to provide a balanced view”.

He first notes a jump in WUWT’s traffic with the election of Nigerian crypto-communist Barack Obama and ascribes this to an instantaneous public hunger for information about climate policy and not libertarian conspiracy theorists needing a place to vent. Yeah, right.

Next he points out the jump when ClimateGate broke, which in his mind shows that WUWT “won the narrative with the public”. Funny, to me it looked like a frenzied attempt by the usual small group of denialists to talk themselves into believing that the molehill was a MOUNTAIN!!!!!!! They’re still at it, but with less enthusiasm now that every single outrage has been disproved.

A recent modest blip in traffic is apparently “due in part to Anthony’s speaking tour, where he has spoken to packed and enthusiastic crowds”. Nothing to do with a wash of half-hearted denialist mutterings in response to the final dismissal of the false Climategate allegations, right? By the way, my understanding is that the Grand Tour was more like this.

Mike, WUWT is the talk-radio version of science. A fire-hose of bullshit, lapped up by people seeking confirmation of their prejudices. You’ve got an audience alright, but I wouldn’t want to sit beside them on a long flight.