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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/gr...-proof-of-the-warmists-endless-credulity.html
All this has left the debate over climate change in a depressingly fetid state, as supporters of the orthodoxy lash out with increasing desperation, forlornly trying to defend their crumbling faith. A further example of this was the strange little scandal that erupted last week, with the release on the internet of various documents from the Heartland Institute, a Chicago-based think-tank long vilified by the warmists for organising conferences attended by hundreds of distinguished scientists from across the world who dare to be sceptical of the orthodoxy.
The documents were entirely innocuous except for one, which stood out from the rest because it purported to be a secret “strategy paper” that outlined Heartland’s plans to get the teaching of the science of climate change outlawed in America’s schools. This seemingly damning revelation aroused much excitement among warmists on both sides of the Atlantic. The Guardian published no less than nine separate items about it.
But the document’s peculiar phrasing, punctuation and other details soon led some observers to suggest that it looked suspiciously like the work of one Dr Peter Gleick, a prominent warmist and the head of a California-based institute which campaigns on climate change and on the need for “integrity in science”.
Within hours, the story was unravelling. Gleick confessed that he had obtained genuine Heartland documents under false pretences, in an attempt, he said, to verify that the “anonymous” strategy paper had come from the institute – the document that he himself was already suspected of faking. Though his statement made no admission in that regard, it unleashed mayhem. Gleick was reprimanded by his own Pacific Institute, and then requested a leave of absence. Heartland is threatening legal action in all directions – not least against all those journalists who were so eager to believe his hoax that they hadn’t bothered to check their facts.
When the history of the decline and fall of the world’s most damaging scare comes to be written, l’affaire Gleick will only be a brief footnote. But it does suggest how desperate those who wish to keep the scare alive have become.
More importantly, however, it should focus our attention once again on the fact that we are still being presented with by far the biggest bill in history, to counter a threat that never actually existed.
All this has left the debate over climate change in a depressingly fetid state, as supporters of the orthodoxy lash out with increasing desperation, forlornly trying to defend their crumbling faith. A further example of this was the strange little scandal that erupted last week, with the release on the internet of various documents from the Heartland Institute, a Chicago-based think-tank long vilified by the warmists for organising conferences attended by hundreds of distinguished scientists from across the world who dare to be sceptical of the orthodoxy.
The documents were entirely innocuous except for one, which stood out from the rest because it purported to be a secret “strategy paper” that outlined Heartland’s plans to get the teaching of the science of climate change outlawed in America’s schools. This seemingly damning revelation aroused much excitement among warmists on both sides of the Atlantic. The Guardian published no less than nine separate items about it.
But the document’s peculiar phrasing, punctuation and other details soon led some observers to suggest that it looked suspiciously like the work of one Dr Peter Gleick, a prominent warmist and the head of a California-based institute which campaigns on climate change and on the need for “integrity in science”.
Within hours, the story was unravelling. Gleick confessed that he had obtained genuine Heartland documents under false pretences, in an attempt, he said, to verify that the “anonymous” strategy paper had come from the institute – the document that he himself was already suspected of faking. Though his statement made no admission in that regard, it unleashed mayhem. Gleick was reprimanded by his own Pacific Institute, and then requested a leave of absence. Heartland is threatening legal action in all directions – not least against all those journalists who were so eager to believe his hoax that they hadn’t bothered to check their facts.
When the history of the decline and fall of the world’s most damaging scare comes to be written, l’affaire Gleick will only be a brief footnote. But it does suggest how desperate those who wish to keep the scare alive have become.
More importantly, however, it should focus our attention once again on the fact that we are still being presented with by far the biggest bill in history, to counter a threat that never actually existed.
