“LOG12 was fundemenatlly [sic] flawed from the start, and throughout. It offered no valuable insight or understanding as a result. It is clear to any rational outside observer it had one purpose – to be used to promote the authors advocacy of catastrophic anthropogenic global warming – and to demean and denigrate those who do not believe as he does. The fact this paper has never been published, as Lewandowsky’s repeatedly claims, confirms this finding.”
Cook laughs at this commenter as a ‘conspiracist’ for thinking non-publication confirmed how bad the paper really was.
It will be interesting to see whether this commenter resists the “Something Must Be Wrong” urge when LOG12 is published or continue to assert that the research is “a fraud”.
No, Cook. That’s not the ‘something must be wrong’ urge, that’s the ‘any serious academic would see right through this’ type of wishful thinking.
Thinking your colleague’s paper didn’t get published, because of how bad it is, is placing faith in the academic peer-review process, yet. Where one hopes reviewers and editors would see questions and criticism raised about the paper. Your commenters and critics come from a place where higher standards reside.
One of the tropes of environmentalism is that the (evil) Republican party used mind-altering framing techniques gleaned from Frank Luntz, a political strategist, to delay, disrupt or negatively affect in some form climate-related policy action in the United States.
This idea is has been so politically convenient, and useful, for environmental groups (who like to moan about their ‘failures’ and blame someone even as they mark off notch after notch on their policy totem-pole), Democratic Party supporters (for obvious reasons) and others , that Luntz’s name is invoked simply as an self-evident example of a black-ops framing hit carried out on the climate movement. Known simply as the Luntz memo, it was a 16-page pamphlet with which he’s supposed to have done this.
I offer two examples. First, you can catch from this clip, of the ho ho BBC’s Earth: The Climate Wars, what’s is pinned on Luntz (starting ~2 min in):
The essential bit transcribed (emphasis mine):
“But what was a secret was the strategy the Republicans used to get the American public on their side. That is, until a revealing document came to light in 2003. […] Frank Luntz was a pollster and political advisor with an impressive reputation. When an internal campaign memo he wrote in 2003 was leaked, it was revealed that it was the issue of the environment on which Republicans felt most vulnerable.”
[...][investigative gestures by narrator]
“Its pretty obvious that the aim of all this is to avoid taking action on climate change.”
Another one here, by the CBC:
Again, the point in question transcribed:
Underlying it all was a simple concept. The public can’t understand the complex science of climate change, [Luntz] argued, so convince them that scientists don’t fully comprehend it either. Then persuade them that without sound science it makes no sense to take preventive action at a huge economic cost. […] From Luntz’s lips to the President’s ears, that advice became George W Bush’s mantra …
The real question
Conspiratorial fear-mongering aside, what did Luntz really do? What tricks did he teach the Republicans? And why did he do it?
To answer these questions the first thing of course, is to find the Luntz memo and read it. This is important because you might notice is that it is not easy to get a hold of. You’ll also realise, there are any number of excerpted exegeses of the memo which push their inverted view by quoting selective passages from it. So, the next thing is to read it fully. Here it is.
What you’ll see, contrary to widespread rumour, is a document that is primarily concerned with strategies to connect to a majority whose views, as discovered by Luntz, were already favourably disposed toward the climate cause and the environment.
That’s right. Its about what Luntz found existing in the public, and his ideas for appealing to such an audience. The same thing has been turned on its head and blamed on him for having caused to come into existence, and nurtured to full growth.
For instance, Luntz found via his focus group methods that members of the American public believed “there [was] no consensus about global warming in the scientific community”. His recommendation, arising from what he found, was to make this lack of consensus an issue and defer to science, in order to win over such individuals.
The second famous item, the rebranding of ‘global warming’ into ‘climate change’, is even better. In the memo, Luntz is seen providing the insight that ‘environmentalism’ and ‘global warming’ invoke images of extremism and alarmist dogma, both of which turn off neutral voters who found ‘climate change’ more palatable.
How have the above been turned on their heads? Luntz is directly blamed for (i) trying to induce the American public to think there was no consensus about global warming. and (ii) attempts to rebrand ‘global warming’ to detract from its urgency. Quite the opposite of what he set out to do.
Consider how the environmental movement has used the Luntz memo. Firstly, it paints a picture of a nefarious conspiracy hatched by ‘industry’ to lull the population into sleep using clever slogans. Such characterization neuters Republican party attempts to gain a foothold in the climate debate arena. Secondly, it fixes blame for creating something he just found already existed. Lastly, even as it slams Luntz, it has borrowed and implemented ideas present in his report to advance its own cause.
Consider what has happened since the memo was written. Per Luntz’s focus group findings, a majority of the American public ‘believed in global warming, believed that humans were likely causing it, were not interesting in the science, but interested in positive solutions to the problem, wanted jobs, end to dependence on foreign oil, and a shutdown of outsourcing’. Correspondingly he came up with a number of words and phrases to be used by any political party to advance its case.
Last heard, he had just finished work for the pressure group Environmental Defense Fund (EDF).
Postscript: Luntz is just another pollster who has consistently worked toward ending real debate over climate issues. His advice on environmental issues in the Luntz memo is virtually indistinguishable from what is in the current US administration playbook.
The Skepticalscience Team, usually prompt in jumping on to any study or a sneeze that confirms their biases, is very quiet about Marcott et al with the 11,000 year hockey stick. Why? Are they worried the study would tank after they stick their necks out for it?
So things sit, dumb. But as a resident hack attempted to work up froth about ‘denier’ Anthony Watts, the itch had to be scratched and discussion of the Marcott paper broke out.
Now, these comments, coming almost entirely from Skepticalscience contributors’ are ‘off-topic’, violate ‘comment policy’ and ought to be deleted right? Nah. That’s not how it works. It is one rule for the in-house boys and another for the rest. So the comments stayed up.
Along comes A.Scott, asking pesky questions about Marcott’s paper trying to join the discussion that was already on. Can you guess the response?
Moderator Response: [DB] This thread is about Watts Interview – Denial and Reality Mix like Oil and Water. Much of your challenge is beyond the scope of this thread – and thus off-topic. FYI.
So this Team can talk about a dangerously wobbly piece of work like Marcott et al but only with each other. The moment someone from outside asks tough questions, they shut everything down.
If you look at the thread, A.Scott began just as instructed by the moderator ‘DB’, with a lengthy comment about [Anthony] Watts’ denial business. The result? Comment butchery by the same moderator: snip, and further snip, snip.
So, not only can there be no lateral movement whatsoever, these guys won’t stand their ground and defend their own threads from questions that are on-topic.
Can you guess what might happen if you ask a climate scientist a tough question?
He will set his pals on you, that’s what.
Post-Climategate 3.0, emails between a journalist and a climate scientist came to attention (again). In the exchange, you can see Anne Jolis of the Wall Street Journal asking a handful of questions to Michael Mann, a climate scientist of very high repute. Who wouldn’t? Too many questions keep coming up about the same person’s work, people get curious.
This is what Michael Mann did. First, he informed the journalist that all her questions were wrong, and she was committing an ‘offense’.
…premise of essentially everyone of your questions is wrong, …
Misrepresenting the work of scientists is a serious offense, …
Second, he threw a whole bunch of material – links to reports, newspaper clippings, Congressional hearing gossip, and Realclimate blog posts – at Jolis. Funnily, most of the material was dated and irrelevant to her questions.
Stuff flung at journalist by a climate scientist. Note the kitchen sink in the middle.
Third, Mann copied the following people into the conversation:
Joe Romm
Media Matters’ Erikka Knuti
Dan Vergano
Bud Ward
George Monbiot
AJ Walzer
Paul D. Thacker
Chris Mooney Stephen Schneider
Gavin Schmidt
Stefan Rahmstorf
Phil Jones
Tim Osborn
Andy Revkin
Henry Pollack
Gabi Hegerl
Benjamin Santer
Richard Littlemore
Someone called ‘DarkSydoftheMoon’
Littlemore’s answers are funnier. In response to Jolis’ queries, Littlemore asserts the ‘unprofessional, haphazard or amateurish manipulation of data’, ‘machinations’, ‘motivations’, and ‘professionalism’ of Steve McIntyre, tries to sell his book, and offers to set up an interview with … himself or Jim Hoggan.
Anyone left with doubts about the intellectual bankruptcy of the climate movement at its highest levels?
Incidentally, Anne Jolis won the Bastiat Prize for journalism for 2012. Surely someone who knows to ask good questions.
I think our friend the saint gets almost everything right. It is heartening to know that there are those in the West who are kind enough to keep in mind folks who are trying to climb out of their holes.
There are two simple, yet serious questions about his paper. Question number one: where is the ethics approval section of the paper?
Now, I might be mistaken. The section could be in the paper. After all, the paper is 57 pages long and ethics review section could be hidden someplace. On top of it, I am a ‘denier’. So I might be not seeing what’s there.
On to question number two. Why are there what appear to be fabrications and falsifications in the paper?
Again, this has to be clearly understood. People make all sorts of mistakes in research. The kind of errors that are considered serious enough to constitute scientific misconduct are hard to pin down. As a shortcut, the US NSF for instance makes the determination that any act that constitutes fabrication, falsification or plagiarism, would qualify.
The kind of usage of comment material Stephen Lewandowsky, Cook and others appear to have employed in their paper seems to fall squarely in the falsification and fabrication territory. Brandon Shollenberger’s post is published at a prominent outlet WUWT.
Shollenberger’s evidence doesn’t rely on interpretive grounds to support this conclusion: the excerpted quotes and the full quotes with their context are provided in the open.
Cook usually does not answer to criticism. But this is about a scientific publication in the public domain. Of the questions above, the second one, is serious. It requires a response.
The disinformation machine finally appears to be going into full gear now to discredit latest study striking a critical blow against the industry-funded climate change denial campaign.
[...]
I mean, the guy even carries a picture of a little pyramid, courtesy his favorite Sourcewatch. Only the all-seeing eye is missing from the top.
