ICECAP NOTE: Before reading this Washington Times post on how the enviros try to save their agenda through court action in court friendly states, read this Andrew Thomas piece in the American Thinker about the warmist cult and their real agenda.
Washington Times
Leftists are rushing to the judiciary as a refuge against efforts to undermine their global-warming tax schemes. In the current economic environment, the idea of massive hikes in the price of gasoline and other sources of energy has become radioactive. In response, the attorneys general of California, Connecticut, Iowa, New York, Rhode Island and Vermont are hoping activist judges will enact policies that elected, accountable representatives are increasingly afraid to touch.
Congress moved this week to overturn an Environmental Protection Agency ruling meant to bring about carbon-dioxide rationing. At the same time, the seven left-leaning states argued in a brief to the Supreme Court that they have the right to sue out-of-state corporations as “public nuisances” for their crime of emitting a harmless, colorless gas that’s essential for life on this planet.
According to the complaint, carbon-dioxide emissions from various power plants around the country “increase smog and heat-related mortality”; “raise sea levels, thereby inundating low-lying property such as much of New York City’s infrastructure”; “lower water levels in the Great Lakes, harming commercial shipping and hydropower production in New York”; and “make it impossible for several species of hardwood trees to survive in Vermont, Connecticut, New York and Rhode Island.” It goes on to claim “even one degree of global warming will double the number of heat-related deaths in New York City, to 700 per year.”
Never mind that none of these calamities have actually happened, or that if they did, there would be no link to the companies under legal assault. Never mind that if the power companies were to cease operations, it’s likely heat-related deaths from the lack of air conditioning would be far more real than the casualties from these imaginary catastrophes. Still, it’s enough for the ‘60s-era radicals who traded their tie-dyed T-shirts for judicial robes that someone claiming to be a scientist says it’s true. That includes people like Pennsylvania State University Prof. Michael E. Mann, who created the famous hockey-stick graph that served as the centerpiece of Al Gore’s Oscar-winning global-warming infomercial, “An Inconvenient Truth.”
Ever since the Climategate e-mail scandal exposed how Mr. Mann’s graph used “a trick” to “hide the decline” in global temperatures, public support also has declined for the fable that cosmic irritation at mankind’s exhalations has made things hotter by an imperceptible one-third of one degree over the course of a decade. In 2000, media-driven climate hysteria peaked with 72 percent of those surveyed by Gallup indicating they were worried about global warming. That number fell to 51 percent in a Gallup poll released Monday, with four in 10 Americans saying the seriousness of global warming was being exaggerated.
Lawmakers sense this skepticism in their constituents and can no longer get away with pursuing policies that sacrifice jobs and economic prosperity on the pagan altar of warmism. The House Energy and Commerce Committee voted 34-19 on Tuesday to adopt the “Energy Tax Prevention Act” which denies the EPA any authority to regulate water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane and other naturally occurring gases as if they were actual pollutants. On Tuesday, Majority Leader Harry Reid, Nevada Democrat, promised a vote on the Senate version of the bill introduced by Sen. James M. Inhofe, Oklahoma Republican, and his 43 co-sponsors, only to retreat the next day when it became apparent Mr. Inhofe had more support than expected.
It’s time for the Supreme Court to put the states’ bogus argument on ice.
Read more and comments.
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, March 16, 2011
Contact: Christopher Horner, chris.horner@atinstitute.org
Today, American Tradition Institute’s Environmental Law Center announced it would appeal a NASA decision to withhold from the public documents for its high-profile global warming activist, astronomer Dr. James Hansen.
Two months ago ATI sought records detailing whether and how Dr. Hansen and his office, NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), has complied with federal ethics and financial disclosure laws and regulations, and NASA Rules of Behavior. Specifically ATI is curious whether Dr. Hansen has filed applications for outside employment, like speeches, books (emails obtained already indicate NASA staffed worked on this), cash awards and other gifts, and other support.
“NASA’s denial of our request represents the height of arbitrary and capricious application of the law,” said Christopher Horner, senior director of litigation for the ATI Environmental Law Center. “We look forward to seeing, through these requested records, just how NASA is complying with ethics laws, and why they went to such extraordinary rhetorical lengths to hide the files.”
From earlier records obtained via the Freedom of Information Act, Horner learned that Dr. Hansen’s protege, Gavin Schmidt, was for years not held to ethics requirements that employees seek and obtain waivers for such outside employment - such as Schmidt’s extensive work on the global warming activist Web site RealClimate.org during business hours. Logic follows that since Dr. Hansen allowed Schmidt to ignore disclosure rules, that Dr. Hansen himself may well also be ignoring them.
NASA denied ATI’s request for Dr. Hansen’s records in part because of a FOIA exemption that “permits the Government to withhold all information about individuals in ‘personnel and medical files’ when the disclosure of such information ‘would constitute a clearly unwarranted invasion of personal privacy.’” Also in NASA’s denial was the claim that ATI “failed to make the requisite showing with respect to Dr. Hansen’s outside activity, namely, how these specific documents would contribute to the public’s understanding of the operations or activities of the Government, or how it would shed light on NASA’s performance of its statutory duties, such that the public’s disclosure outweighs Dr. Hansen’s privacy interest.”
In ATI’s appeal Horner argues “whether NASA holds its employees to compliance its employees to comply with ethics laws sheds light on NASA’s performance of its operations and performance of statutory duties.” Further, in records previously obtained that pertained to Schmidt, NASA has already shown that it has been operating out of compliance with regard to ethics disclosure obligations. In fact, NASA revealed this by releasing the very files (NASA Form GSFC 17-60) of which it now, selectively, insists would constitute a ‘clearly unwarranted violation’of an employee’s personal privacy—so long as that employee is James Hansen.
NASA’s budget for Fiscal Year 2010 was $18.7 billion. Its budget for earth science research, which includes climate studies, was $1.4 billion.
See ATI’s Appeal of NASA’s denial for Dr. James Hansen’s records relating to compliance with ethics and financial disclosure laws.
To view Exhibits related to ATI’s Appeal to NASA, visit.
For an interview with Christopher Horner, senior director of litigation for the American Tradition Institute Environmental Law Center, contact him at chris.horner@atinstitute.org or call (202)670-2680.
See more on this Pajamas Media story and this Spectator blogpost.
ICECAP UPDATE
The results of this poll were released in the congressional Energy and Commerce committee which I am told shocked Waxman into a rare silence (at least temporary). They scurried around and accessed and introduced a letter from an editor at Scientific American that said the poll results were biased by blogger influence (allegedly a mention on WUWT). Anthony did refer to it on his blog without pleaing for readers to take any position. On the other hand, Climate Progress’s Joe Romm in a scathing post attacked Scientific American for doing the poll and begged his readers to freep the magazine until they took it down (which they did). Romm questioned the new direction at Scientific American and threatened to drop his subscription. Scientfiic American is a magazine I once subscribed to and enjoyed but long ago dropped because of its staunchly biased stance favoring the alarmist side of the global warming debate - likewise their cable programming. Hopefully the new majority introduced that Romm post to counter Waxman.
Last year, in the senate EPW, Anthony and my paper for SPPI was introduced and took Boxer by surprise, who after retreating behind locked doors came out and announced our paper questioning the data appeared in an organization blog sponsored by big oil - Exxon Mobil and therefore could be ignored. SPPI responded back in a letter that they NEVER received a penny from Exxon, but Boxer etal had moved on. Never let facts muddy up a good story or endanger a chosen direction on public policy.
Hockey Schtick
‘Scientific’ American may regret taking their recent opinion poll on the state of climate science given the eye-opening results cast by their “scientifically literate” readership. With a total of 5190 respondents, a consensus of 81.3% think the IPCC is “a corrupt organization, prone to group-think, with a political agenda” and 75% think climate change is caused by solar variation or natural processes vs. 21% who think it is due to greenhouse gases from human activity. 65% think we should do nothing about climate change since “we are powerless to stop it,” and the same percentage think science should stay out of politics. When asked, “How much would you be willing to pay to forestall the risk of catastrophic climate change?,” 76.7% said “nothing.”
Poll results hidden here
Climate of Change?
1. Should climate scientists discuss scientific uncertainty in mainstream forums?
No, that would play into the hands of the fossil-fuel lobby. 3.0% 157
Yes, it would help engage the citizenry. 90.1% 4,673
Maybe - but only via serious venues like PBS’s the NewsHour and The New York Times. 6.9% 358
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2
2. Judith Curry is:
a peacemaker. 69.1% 3,585
a dupe. 7.6% 392
both. 4.3% 224
I’ve never heard of her. 19.0% 987
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2
3. What is causing climate change?
greenhouse gases from human activity 30.9% 1,602
solar variation 33.1% 1,718
natural processes 75.8% 3,934
There is no climate change. 6.2% 320
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2
4. The IPCC, or Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is:
an effective group of government representatives, scientists and other experts. 18.0% 932
a corrupt organization, prone to groupthink, with a political agenda. 81.3% 4,220
something to do with Internet protocols. 0.7% 36
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2
5. What should we do about climate change?
Nothing, we are powerless to stop it. 65.4% 3,394
Use more technology (geoengineering, carbon capture and storage). 16.7% 865
Use less technology (cars, intensive agriculture). 5.8% 303
Switch to carbon-free energy sources as much as possible and adapt to changes already underway. 29.5% 1,528
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2
6. What is “climate sensitivity”?
the degree to which global temperature responds to concentrations of greenhouse gases 32.6% 1,692
an unknown variable that climate scientists still do not understand 52.2% 2,708
the phrase on which the fate of human civilization hangs 0.6% 30
all of the above 14.6% 758
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2
7. Which policy options do you support?
a carbon tax 15.1% 781
cap and trade (a price on carbon via an overall limit on emissions paired with some form of market for such pollution permits) 8.5% 441
increased government funding of energy-related technology research and development 38.8% 2,015
cap and dividend, in which the proceeds of auctioning pollution permits are rebated to taxpayers 6.6% 343
keeping science out of the political process 65.1% 3,375
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2
8. How much would you be willing to pay to forestall the risk of catastrophic climate change?
a 50 percent increase in electricity bills 3.8% 195
a doubling of gasoline prices 5.5% 286
nothing 76.7% 3,981
whatever it takes 14.0% 726
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2
Check out the comments as well.