Bishop Hill Who leaked the Hintze correspondence?
There is some fascinating web-sleuthing going on in the comments on the Hintze email post, as readers try to work out who leaked the correspondence to the Guardian. Some clues have come from the correspondence itself, redacted versions of which have been published by the Guardian.
The original letter reveals that the requester was involved in the relationship between climate and health:
We assume that our previous letter to you, attached, somehow slipped your attention as we realise that you are really busy and may have been away. We do assure you that we will not be writing to you repeatedly.
However, because of the urgent need for action on climate change and health, illustrated by events in the last few months, we are taking the liberty of contacting you again to request support for the XXX.
And also that they had a representative at the Durban climate confrerence.
We would be happy to provide you with any other information you require, set up a conference call with you, or meet face-to-face. XXX is will be attending the Durban conference on Climate Change and Health in December and XXX will be in the UK again in February 2012.
Some googling suggested one plausible source of the letter as being the Climate and Health Council, an offshoot of the British Medical Journal.
Now, Barry Woods Maurizio Morabito has discovered this:
The Climate and Health Council supports Nasa scientist James Hansen as he joins the campaign to uncover secret funders bankrolling climate sceptic Nigel Lawson and his lobbying think-tank (Climate experts back unveiling of Lawson thinktank donor, 23 January). The public may finally discover who is secretly influencing UK climate policy – contrary to scientific consensus – today (27 January), when the Information Rights Tribunal hears this key freedom of information case. Some anti-climate lobbyists routinely misrepresent and cast doubt on the work of climate scientists. Although Lawson and his Global Warming Policy Foundation have been discredited and attacked by numerous scientists and senior politicians, his thinktank continues to receive significant coverage, wrongfully distorting the public and policy debate over climate change.
Well, well, well.
The signatories of the letter were:
Dr Fiona Godlee Editor-in-chief, British Medical Journal
Dr. Richard Horton Editor-in-Chief, The Lancet
Professor Ian Roberts Professor of Epidemiology and Public Health
Professor Hugh Montgomery Professor of Intensive Care Medicine
Professor Anthony Costello Professor of International Child Health
Rachel Stancliffe Director, Centre for Sustainable Healthcare
Dr. Robin Stott Co-chair, Climate and Health Council
Maya Tickell-Painter Director, Medsin Healthy Planet Campaign
I've written to Dr Godlee to ask for a comment on this post.
Bishop Hill
Maurizio Morabito has found an unredacted version of the letter to Hintze. See here.
Interestingly, the financial values, which are now visible, are denominated in $. There is much talk of Australian politics too:
The carbon price legislation before the Australian parliament still faces much political and public opposition even though Australia is one of the heaviest carbon emitters in the world. Meanwhile, the capricious climate and extreme weather events in Australia this year, including severe flooding, especially Queensland, and ferocious bushfires in WA, make it clear we cannot afford to delay preventive action further. Drought and famine in Sub-Saharan Africa and floods again in Pakistan illustrate the disadvantage of developing countries and the imperative of more help from the developed world.
Does this point perhaps to an approach from Australia's Climate and Health Alliance instead? They were at Durban too.
Bishop Hill
Leopard in the comments notes this from the CaHA website:
Demonstrating Better Practice: scoping paper on developing a set of criteria for voluntary accreditation of health care institutions in the area of environmental sustainability.
Which looks a bit like this from the begging letter (emphasis added).
Breakdown of this funding need is:
Website = XXXPolicy/position papers = XXX
Health effects of fossil fuels report = XXX
Scoping paper on voluntary accreditation for health care organisations = XXX
Administrative and operational costs, including office and phone = XXX
I'll try contacting CaHA to see what they have to say.
Bishop Hill
Fiona Godlee responds as follows:
There is no truth in your allegation that the letter in this case came from the Climate and Health Council. I am surprised that you would speculate publicly about this without first checking with a member of the council's executive. We are firmly committed to transparency but were in no way involved in this episode.
Reader Comments (135)
mdgnn
"fuel starvation"
Not to mention real starvation for the devotees of pasties and other thermally-enhanced take-aways.
geronimo:
I didn’t drift, I was pushed, when J Bowers and others outed my last sock puppet.He may have a good mind, but he’ll have Little Weed up by her roots before you can say roundup.
As hedge fund managers and ex-Chancellors of the Exchequer flock together, one wonders if Monckton flew to Australia on Hintze's dime at Lord Lawson's suggestion
If so, Hintze's due diligence people ought to look at this:
http://www.youtube.com/user/potholer54
Russell:
The whole point about hedge fund managers is that they hedge their bets (a bit for the ex-Chancellor, a bit for Little Weed’s toyboy..). Once they start backing one side only, like Jeremy Grantham, you know they’ve lost it.
No response to my email from Fiona Alexander. Barry W has tweeted her too.
Doesn't quite have the same ring as "Big Oil Directors" and "Ex-Energy Company Executives" that you had hoped for, does it? What does it matter whose dime Monkton flew on? Whose dime did all those attending Bali, Poznań, Copenhagen, Cancun and Durban fly on? It sure wasn't their own.
Richard Drake: Richard I believe CiF has reduced the number of articles that can be commented on dramatically, presumably because they were receiving a scientific drubbing from the "deniers". There are some alarmists on the threads, who like JB who seemed to enjoy the cut and thrust, but indulged in ad hominems, and had posts removed, but the tide was, scientifically at least, flowing with the "deniers". I guess the Guardian, which has descended from a great newspaper to just below the Sun in terms of editorial policy couldn't field enough scientific/technical knowledgeable people to refute the "deniers" so called it a day on comments except for token articles.
@DR - 'Maya Tickell-Painter seems to be the daughter of James Painter '
And I had his book on my desk, as I was wondering who daddy was. This is astonishing.
Here's what Oliver's sister was up to:
http://www.juliesbicycle.com/about-jb/who-we-are
They're all in on it!
geronimo:
Despite the treatment I’ve had from CiF, I still believe the moderating is independent from the journalists. (I once got a comment by Monbiot deleted. I also complained about one of my own comments and got it deleted).
The problem comes from the J Bowers-types who game the system by reporting anything factual as off-topic. If you look at the latest article on how to produce low-carbon theatre, (no, really) you’ll see that a simple remark - “Beyond parody” stays up and gets loads of recommends, while if the excellent Jack Savage had tried to back up his remark with evidence he’d be censored.
So we are allowed to yell “yah boo sucks!” but not to reason, which allows them to argue that we have no arguments.
PS Sorry. Wrong again. Jack Savage’s comment has been removed, together with the evidence that his remark was the most popular by a margin of 5:1.
Been busy Bowers?
If CAHA leaked the email correspondence then they may have broken Australian law on health professionals breaking client confidentiality, be they actual or potential.
Also the fundholder for CAHA is the Public Health Association of Australia. That makes that organisation liable under Australian law as a party in breaking confidentiality.
This could get messy.
Ben Pile:
What is it about music and green activism? The first link on the latest article by Vicky Pope of the Met Office at CiF leads you to a Climate Change FAQ site written by two graphic designers and a Green activist (author of the Rough Guide to Green Living) with a degree in music.And doesn’t Little Weed’s sugar daddy play the ‘cello?
geoffchambers: moderation on KMF was taken over by the Trots behind the new SWP/Red-Green Alliance, organised by an IT group with links to the moderators. During the build up to the elitist 10.10 movement based at the Guardian, they developed extreme paranoia, imagining that every person who posed expert science against the IPCC fraud was connected with Big Energy and/or the BNP.
It was a classic case of group madness and it has effectively destroyed objective reporting by the Left. I saw the same in the 1970s. They also have someone in the DT moderators who is censoring data showing the windmills above a critical penetration in steam grids like ours, cause more CO2/kWhr than without the windmills.
This shows the real aim is to use the windmills as a symbol of political domination, a bit like the Swastika. Politically, this is a re-run of the 1930s with Communism and Fascism the same beast itching for power.
We sceptics must be thankful, that due to the criminal activities of Peter Gleick and possibly CAHA, the alarmists have had their fingers badly bitten by their own flawed conspiracy theory about BIG OIL funding climate scepticism.
Dave K said:
I'm not sure.
Given the date of the approach (pre Durban) and Hintze having a charitable foundation it seems to me to be a legitimate begging letter that would have been forgotten about had Hintze not mentioned his support for Lawson.
So far all we can say is that Hintze supports Lawson's institute. We don't know the extent of that support. Nor do we really know who sent the letter or was CCCd into the conversation. We don't even know who leaked it either - the leak could have been one of the parties involved or someone who was sent the information.
"The lies have been repeated so often that they now believe them themselves. That is now their operational worldview and their understanding of us and it’s a false one. Essentially, they went to war against and are still fighting, a phantasm figure who is a patchwork product of their own spin machine’s memes."
http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2012/03/16/the-climate-wars-revisited-or-no-truce-with-kings/
They actually DO believe we all work for big oil.
Pointman
Storm, meet teacup.
If there is something superduper exciting and earthshattering here I missed it.
Somebody sent a rich man a polite begging letter outlining what they planned to do with the money. He equally politely said 'no' and mentioned that he was doing something else.
End of.
I cannot for the life of me see anything above the mundane in this rather ordinary exchange.
What have I missed? Why should I dampen my underclothing about it?
Latimer Alder
Yeah that story keeps my pants dry too. Shouldn't you tell Leo HIckman that? Why mention it here?
The bit that this page relates to is the sequel where the "doing something else" was giving money to a rival of that "somebody" and somehow that "somebody" let that information out. That letting out of information was designed to hurt the rival body in a way that is consistent with previous campaigns organised by "climate and health" somebodys.
Not rubber pants I know, but could be illegal in that "somebodys" jurisdiction. Interesting no ;)
TLITB
'Shouldn't you tell Leo Hickman that?'
How? No comments allowed and I'm banned from CiF anyway
Latimer Alder
Ah fair enough, I think he reads here anyway :)
@TLITB
'Ah fair enough, I think he reads here anyway :)'
Oh dear. Tsk, tsk. Oops. Perhaps he'll read my less than fulsome remarks about the 'moderation' process at Komment Macht Frei.
And he'll say - as all grauiad 'journos' - do that moderation is nothing to do with them, that anyway its a hard job, they only get a second to decide whether to ban somebody for ever and that what do we expect when all they can afford is couple of redundant admin clerks from Car Trade Advertiser with greenpeace badges and atomkraft nein danke of the back of their 2CV. And you are all deniers anyway so you deserve to be ostracised ...or something like that.
And when he's finished with that he really really should read Pointman's excellent and insightful piece at
http://thepointman.wordpress.com/2012/03/16/the-climate-wars-revisited-or-no-truce-with-kings/
which ought to give him great pause for thought. Banning people for expressing opposing views has *never* been a way to long-term success.
"all they can afford is couple of redundant admin clerks from Car Trade Advertiser with greenpeace badges and atomkraft nein danke of the back of their 2CV"
:-)
It's long amused me that the Graun is kept afloat by the proceeds from Bangers R Us...
No this is important. This goes to the heart of the debate in which our enemy wishes to describe us - thru the BIG OIL FUNDED conspiracy theory - and the lengths they go to keep that in the front of people's minds. The revealing thing is that some alarmists actually believed their own falsely generated headlines - the Gleicks and the Gleick-minded.
It would appear that people at CAHA deliberately breached client confidentiality about potential sponsors by releasing email correspondence because they they thought it suited their cause. That act highlights many aspects;
1. No scruples, none what-so-ever in fighting for the cause. Unfortunately this will put off potential sponsors in the future. It erodes trust.
2. CAHA says it represents health professionals, and has many health professional bodies as members; but under Australian law such a breach of client confidentiality by any health professional is a criminal offence.
3. Desperation, even though BIG OIL was not involved the need to discredit eventually overcame the conspiracy theory mentality.
4. Further damage to the cause. This was another self-inflicted chest wound this time by health professionals. Physician heal thy self!
I agree Mac. The vast oil-funded conspiracy theory has now had a good run in the park. Result: no match with reality. Important result that, because as Pointman says many have come to believe it.
Latimer Alder (Mar 29, 2012 at 2:54 PM)
mydogsgotnonose (Mar 29, 2012 at 10:55 AM) suggests that the moderation has been taken over by Trots. If he’s got evidence, let’s have it. That would be a real scoop. Not everyone at the Graun is a Trot. Important people still read it, and self-important people still write for it. A scandal there would at least get to the ears of other media folk. No-one outside our tiny world is ever going to get excited about dodgy doings at an Australian green health blog, or at Skeptical Science.
geoff is right...whenever I get linked from the Bish the visitors' counter skyrockets. My 5-min fame at SkS brought very little instead.
As for the Guardian, like in most of the British Media they're living the Lie, and they all know they can keep doing it as long as everybody else does.
Some of the scientists at SkS could teach CaHA how to write better begging letters, or "research funding proposals" as I believe they're called in the trade. It's a skill that people who don't usually have everything handed to them on a plate need. If this letter is genuine, it's a good example of what not to do.
Or there was nothing in it to grab his attention and it ended up in the bit bucket, along with no doubt many more similar begging letters. So after a brief tug at the heart strings, they go straight for the purse strings:
This could be interesting. It sounds like a potential investment opportunity, either to sell or licence mitigation and adaptation technology, or just do it as a public good as the Welcome Trust did with the HGP. So what strong mitigation and adaptation techniques are they proposing?
Ok, so Aussie Cash CDs aren't doing great but $30k on a website to do what exactly? Would this cover renting webspace, bandwidth, SEO work and over what timeframe? CaHA already has a website, sites like SkS manage to run theirs pro-bono or in kind. Where will this $30K go? Some mate who knows a bit of HTML and needs the cash?
I know page rates in premium journals are pricey, but again what (or who) does this $50K pay for? What policies or positions are they proposing? If those are aligned with a prospective investor, they may be willing to contribute. Where is the synopsis.
Same question. What effects are they considering? Google gives about 3.8m results for that phrase. Are they proposing any new or novel research angle that may have some journal impact? Where's the synopsis?
Again no synopsis and no detail about where the money goes. Maybe it's for a logo. Something like a patient being tipped off a trolley into a recycling bin or compost heap? That might work to demonstrate sustainability.
At last, something vaguely tangible, but still very undefined. Work from home and use Skype. Save $20K, save the planet.
Replace "by the executive" with "by the sponsor" and it might have a better chance to fly. Sorry to disappoint any friends or family who were hoping someone else may pick up their bar tab.
So many conferences in so many exotic locations. We have the time, we don't have the money. Please give generously.
I'm not suprised Mr Hintze declined such a well considered proposal.
Well I appreciate the Bish raising the profile of this story by at least asking some questions that seemed to elude being thought of by other parts of the media, but it is looking that this story has moved on and the little blip of interest that allowed some Tory guy to get called a denier for a bit has run its course. Job done. All in a days work being in environmental reporting - just manufacture some news and thats it.
Judging by the redacting of the emails it seems clear that an attempt at hiding the identity of the mystery organisation, not just a person makes it look more likely that this organisation itself gave out the information only after it was rebuffed after asking for money. I think that should be enough to know next time certain parties start puffing their chests out declaring their self awarded moral superiority.
I wonder what would happen at the Graun if Hintze turned out to be the wrong guy? It's still supposition, I think.
I just checked Hengist's site...he thinks that a hedge fund = big oil. the meme dies hard. especially if you are a clueless idiot. A hedge fund speculating on oil stocks or an organisation such as NASA or CRU or Hadley which is directly funded by contributions from oil companies....where is the independence?
hint to J Bowers if he shows up....the hedge fund is independent. Cue Bower's nappy getting filled.
Delighted that I am not the only person here who has been totally annoyed by the tactics of J Bowers and his silly cronies at CiF in my attempts to sensibly discuss stuff there. I can no longer be bothered with CiF and all the Moonbat and Hickman sycophants who cannot think for themselves but ferociously protect their idols. I sincerely believe their continual shouting of the D word plus their continued accusations of anyone in the possession of a rational, sceptical mind as being a product of 'being in the pay of big oil' is playground stuff. Hickman's fixation with GWPF's funders is indicative of either his retarded intellectual development or a mild form of mental illness.
AH,
"Some of the scientists at SkS..." Scientists??? Are there actually real ones there then?
LC,
Yes, The Marsupial is a real, live, published scientist. Works at UEA though, so may not have had to worry too much about funding, at least not in the past. With taxpayers and oil companies to tap, there may have been no need to refine their begging letters. If the troughs dried up now, they could always try for a staff discount on a creative writing course.
I'll stick some notes on that BBC play people mentioned
- PLOT SPOILER
... it was supposed to be about terrorists planting a virus which killed 1/3 of the world population. Now it just twisted : eco warriors were angry a top climate skeptic was making progress so one of the girls fitted him for rape. But the fit up didn't work, so when they got out of jail they engineered the virus which eventually wiped out the 1/3 of the world's population "to save gaia".
- The first part already got wiped fro the BBCiplayer but the other 2 parts are on BBC website here (the full version can be bought at audiogo.co.uk for £7.49 )
BBC Play : Pandemic : A three-part thriller by John Dryden.
I was following some old twitter threads and notice that Bob Ward seemed upset about the speculation about the Climate and Health council being the organisation who sent the email at the time. However after the extra information that came to light, indicating an Australian organisation was the source, he doesn't seem too bothered that the CaHA was mentioned as a possible source. Interesting.