Climategate: The Whitewash Begins

James Delingpole
London Telegraph
Friday, November 27, 2009

Breaking news from the splendid Bishop Hill. It seems the AGW establishment has launched an urgent damage limitation exercise in order to whitewash the Climategate scandal in time for Copenhagen.

Here’s the (so far unconfirmed) story:

1) Lord Rees (Royal Society) to be asked by UEA to investigate CRU leak.

2) Foreign Office and government leaning heavily on UEA to keep a lid on everything lest it destabilises Copenhagen.

3) CRU asked to prepare data for a pre-emptive release in past couple of days but trouble reconciling issues between data bases has stopped this.

The appointment of Lord Rees, if confirmed, is especially worrying. It’s the rough equivalent of appointing King Herod’s grand vizier to investigate a mysterious outbreak of mass baby killing in Judaea.

First, Lord Rees – formerly Sir Martin Rees, the Astronomer Royal – is very much of the catastrophist mindset which helped launch the whole AGW scare in the first place. Five years ago, he declared:

“I think the odds are no better than 50/50 that our present civilisation will survive to the end of the present century.”

Second, he has previously suggested that there might be certain areas where frank and open scientific enquiry is not a good idea.

“He asks whether scientists should withhold findings which could potentially be used for destructive purposes, or if there should be a moratorium, voluntary or otherwise, on certain types of scientific research, most notably genetics and biotechnology.”

(ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW)

Third, he is president of an institution – The Royal Society – which has persistently used its distinguished name (founded 1660); and supposed unimpeachable scientific authority to push AGW theory.
Here is the Royal Society’s most recent statement on the subject, brought out in the aftermath of the Climategate scandal.

The UK is at the forefront of tackling dangerous climate change, underpinned by world class scientific expertise and advice. Crucial decisions will be taken soon in Copenhagen about limiting and reducing the impacts of climate change now and in the future. Climate scientists from the UK and across the world are in overwhelming agreement about the evidence of climate change, driven by the human input of greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.

As three of the UK’s leading scientific organisations involving most of the UK scientists working on climate change, we cannot emphasise enough the body of scientific evidence that underpins the call for action now, and we reinforce our commitment to ensuring that world leaders continue to have access to the best possible science. We believe this will be essential to inform sound decision-making on policies to mitigate and adapt to climate change up to Copenhagen and beyond.

I’m sure that Lord Rees will strive to be as scrupulously unbiased as he is possibly capable. But with a history like this behind him, I can’t say I am terribly reassured.

Full story here.

Print this page.

Comment Rules

Comments are closed.