With such ill-informed (on the climate change front) but dedicated climate-propagandists like Goldberg, who needs enemies, eh?!

I'm inclined to think that there's a very good reason that after - 20+ years of failure on the part of the UNEP - a UN creation that was never (and has never acquired the status of) an actual chartered UN body - there is absolutely no agreement on the purported "dangers" to the future of our planet.

Least of all those that hinge on a mere purported "average" increase of 2 degrees celcius - a figure that was dreamed up by a dedicated UN-ocrat whose utterings are guided by his income redistribution fantasies and imperatives (that would not solve the "problem" even if it were actually shown to exist).

That any intelligent commentator (such as Goldberg presumably thinks he is) would choose to focus on purported evils such as climate change claptrap - as he has mindlesslly chosen to do - rather than the real dangers to the future of our planet (i.e. the aspirations of the government of Iran and its terror-riddled offspring) is far from original.

Nonetheless, it is nothing short of amazing. Simply amazing.

Alannah, thanks for a very enlightening exchange and commentary (in this and your previous post)

To my mind, Revkin has spectacularly avoided asking some very basic questions regarding the Climategate "narrative" as relayed to him by one of his long-time "primary" sources, NASA's Gavin Schmidt. - whose word he always seems to accept at face value, and in this instance appeared to bend over backwards in order avoid asking the questions so as to hide the obvious from himself, not to mention his readers. Revkin's errors of journalistic omission in this matter have almost earned him the rather dubious title of the Albert Speer of Big Green.

One of the key parts of Schmidt's ever-changing story (and I'm sure you'll agree that when an individual's story keeps changing over a relatively short period of time, this is - or should be - a very bright red flag; but perhaps Revkin is selectively colour-blind) is that FOIA allegedly "hacked" into Schmidt's "RealClimate" server for the purpose of "uploading" the zip archive of the CRU files s/he had allegedly obtained from UEA in November 2009.

This made absolutely no sense to me at the time (and still doesn't). Considering her/his "mission", does it make any sense to you?! And what's the first question you would ask if told such a bobba-meiser?! You'd ask to see the log files, right?!

Actually, considering the stakes, it is almost beyond belief that Schmidt didn't contact Revkin on Nov. 17/09 to INSIST that Revkin (along with a knowledgeable NYT IT person) take a look at his log file, isn't it?! Imagine the blow Schmidt could have single-handedly dealt to the "evil big oil funded skeptics" by contacting Revkin on Nov. 17 and sharing with him the "evidence" of this alleged "hack". But I digress ...

Not only did Revkin provide no indication that he attempted to verify Schmidt's story (nor did he challenge him on the inconsistencies between what Schmidt evidently told him on Nov. 20/09 and what he apparently told him on Nov. 22/09), but also ...

Even when Revkin finally got around to asking Schmidt (circa July 6/2010) "whether a criminal investigation was ever conducted into the Real Climate hack", he was quite happy to accept Schmidt's reply that "It would have been up to us to report it, and I didn’t think it was worth it – If you recall, we were kind of busy. ;)" Schmidt was certainly quite busy from Nov. 20 onwards, but what was keeping him so "busy" from the 17th to the 19th that he couldn't have reported this alleged "hack" to the appropriate authorities?!

Details and links to sources for the above at
http://hro001.wordpress.com/2011/08/23/of-climate...

and
http://hro001.wordpress.com/2011/11/29/climategat...

So I'm not sure her case is quite as compelling as it might seem to the outsider.

I"m sure, then, that it will surprise you to learn that those who've actually read the book - and followed the links to her source material (much of which comes from the views of IPCC insiders themselves) find her case to be very compelling.

Global warming ... the one size fits all scare for all seasons!

Oh, but you're quite mistaken, Geoffrey. It's the people who HAVE read the IPCC's climate bible who realize that CO2 as primary "culprit" of whatever AG warming may - or may not - be occurring is far from proven. And (contra Andrew Weaver) climate change is far from being a "barrage of intergalactice ballistic missiles".

Furthermore, as the UNEP's chief scientist noted in his address to the October 2009 Bali meeting of the IPCC:

“[A]s policymakers and the public begin to grasp the multi-billion dollar price tag for mitigating and adapting to climate change, we should expect a sharper questioning of the science behind climate policy.”
http://hro001.wordpress.com/2010/11/19/andrew-wea...

Oh, please, Macleans ... do spare us these computer generated silly scary poor bear stories.

Until one of these brilliant "scientists" is able to empirically demonstrate that whatever might - or might not - be occurring is a function of "nurture" (in this case human generated C02) rather than "nature" (doing what nature has done since time immemorial), then these adapted press releases are a waste of bandwidth.

If you're concerned about the environment (and really, who isn't?!) why not tell the story of someone who is actually making a difference by doing something that matters .... try:
http://hro001.wordpress.com/2010/11/21/support-el...

PIQ [continued]

Here's how I think it might work ...

1. All campaign promises are duly recorded in a database [PIQ_Master] for each elected person.

2. When a campaign promise is broken (documentation always required of course), it is recorded in PIQ_Master.

3. Three broken promises automatically results in the riding getting a PIQ-Fix (i.e. parliamentarian is fired, and by-election called)

Any changes could be widely broadcast (e.g. running PIQ tally on Weather Channel ... regional tallies etc)

No, it won't stop "promise breaking", but eventually it might lead to more realistic "promise making".

Such a concept - if implemented - would have the additional benefit of turning the tables on legislators attempting to change *our* behaviour via wasteful PR campaigns and other disincentives:-)

I know, I know ... the whole thing needs considerably more thought, but perhaps it's an idea worth considering!

"But what if the problem isn’t promise-breaking but promise-making itself?

Aye, there's the rub - and probably the nub of the problem! I don't know what they're teaching in "Political Science 100" these days, but the one axiom I remember from the very first PolySci lecture I attended (many more years ago than I care to disclose!) was along the following lines:

"The primary goal of a political party that is not in power is to get into power; the primary goal of a political party that is in power is to stay there".

A truism to be sure - and far from profound! Some years ago (I think it was around Canada Day during the Meech "debates"), I was giving this some thought, and it occurred to me that perhaps what we need is a Parliamentary Integrity Quotient. (PIQ [pronounced "pick"] for short) for MPs (and MPPs) on all sides of all aisles.

Perhaps the time has come for Macleans to take this on as a pilot project (similar to the University Rankings, or Top 50 Employers etc). - or it could give the Chief Electoral Officer something to do between elections. [continued in next post]

"Thousands of climate scientists", you say?! Hmmm ... try a few dozen, maybe:
http://hro001.wordpress.com/2010/06/18/honey-i-sh...

It wasn't *my* point, but rather that of Dr. Laughlin: in essence he was saying that it is beyond our power to "change" the earth's climate. So the alarmists and doomsayers (such as Heidi Cullen, whose utterances Gulli and Henheffer fail to examine with any measure of critical thinking) would be better off giving consideration to that which we do have the power to change.

But if you've decided to make the leap of faith required by the tenets of CAGW, i.e. that the only path to salvation of the planet and our species lies in drastic reductions of our C02 (because the computer models say so), far be it from me to interfere with your delusions.