Reprinted below is a response to a “climategate” editorial published in the Wall Street Journal by Kimberly A. Strassel.
In the article Strassel quotes Rep. Jim Inhofe’s claims that “Cap and Trade is dead”.
With the CRU leak, many are holding Scientists to a ridiculous standard of behaviour that we wouldn’t even expect from Priests, Politicians or anyone else. Wow, you mean Scientists can be back-stabbing arseholes? Big surprise there! You mean they have pride, and occasionally massage results? Holy Obvious-Burgers Batman!
Reader thoughts welcome, though I do recommend you read the original article for some context.
Response continues…
It’s a real shame to see legislation on a globally important issue such as climate change treated with the same kind of partisan rhetoric as anything else.
Despite your accusations that the leaked emails are “damaging”, not one scrap of evidence has been unveiled that indicates that the published data is wrong, that the models are incorrect, or indeed that the planet isn’t warming and that this warming is caused by humans.
Human-caused climate change is real, and it is a genuine threat to continued prosperity and stability in the world. A few scientists blowing off steam or even hiding some results that they think don’t support their theories is nothing new. It does nothing to damage the credibility of the climate science field as a whole, unless journalists allow it to.cloud the issue.
In over 900 papers published on the issue of climate change between 1993 and 2003, precisely none disagreed with the hypothesis that climate change is real and man made (cf. Oreskes, 2004). Such a consensus is practically unheard of in the history of scientific endeavour.
Yet in the mainstream media, over the last 5 years, we have seen 53% of articles published raising some doubt over the existence and causes of this phenomenon.
And while these scientific papers may disagree on the details, and individual scientists may let their egos and pride occasionally get in the way of professionalism, the same can be said for any industry. The overall trend is clear and unequivocal.
Even as the arctic disappears before our eyes (it will be GONE in summer some time between 2012 and 2015 - the entire arctic ice shelf!), and we witness the greatest extinction the world has ever seen, and sea levels are rising faster than even the worst-case scenarios published a few years ago, these articles continue to appear and set back the movement to really do something about this problem.
It is a shame that we may have to wait until it is too late before some people see fit to acknowledge the problem. Life is probably going to get quite uncomfortable, and your “economy” will not be able to save you when the planet no longer supports life the way it once did.