Pielke Jnr has emailed James Saiers one of the journal editors who was the target of a Hockey Team plot to oust him from his position. This is what Saiers had to say
I haven’t looked for, and don’t intend to look for, my name in the CRU emails, but one of my colleagues did alert me to an email written by Wigley in which he suggested that, if I were a climate skeptic, then steps should be taken to get me “ousted.” Wigley’s suggestion stems, I believe, from the publication of a GRL paper (by McIntyre and McKitrick) that criticized certain elements of Michael Mann’s Hockey Stick paper. This paper caused a bit of a stir and because I oversaw the peer review of this paper, I assume that Wigley inferred (incorrectly) that I was a climate-change skeptic. I stepped down as GRL editor at the end of my three-year term, long after the excitement over the McIntyre and McKitrick paper had passed. My departure had nothing to do with attempts by Wigley or anyone else to have me sacked.
Now this is very odd. Saiers' position as editor in charge of the McIntyre and McKitrick paper in Geophysical Review Letters was taken over by the journal's editor in chief, Jay Famiglietti, who then refused to discuss the circumstances surrounding his taking over unless it was off the record.
Why would he do that if it was merely because Saiers was stepping down at the end of his term? And wouldn't Saiers be expected to finish off his existing papers before leaving? And why would the editor-in-chief take over himself?
It doesn't quite stack up in my book.