Bishop Hill More sauce
Feb 27, 2015 Climate: Parliament FOI Greens Another few hours and another FOI request. This time it's the Competitive Enterprise Institute, who are targeting correspondence of the hard-left senators who have been at the forefront of harassing sceptic scientists:
To EPA’s National Freedom of Information Officer,
On behalf of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), please consider this request pursuant to the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA), 5 U.S.C. § 552 et seq.
Please provide us, within twenty working days,1 copies of all email and text message correspondence over the past two years between certain EPA Office of Congressional and Intergovernmental Relations employees and the offices of Senators Barbara Boxer, Ed Markey and/or Sheldon Whitehouse, which correspondence contains one or more keywords. as described herein.
Specifically, we seek email and text message correspondence on EPA-assigned or other accounts, and any attachments, that were
1) sent to or from...Laura Vaught, Joyce Frank, Nicole Distefano and/or Josh Lewis, and
2) sent to or from ...Sen. Boxer, Sen. Whitehouse, and/or Sen. Markey or anyone with a @EPW.senate.gov, @boxer.Senate.gov, @whitehouse.Senate.gov, and/or @markey.Senate.gov address or (e.g., in the case of text /SMS messages) otherwise to or from anyone who at the time worked in one of those offices, and
c) which communications are dated from January 1, 2013 through the date you process this request, and which
d) is to or from or cites or refers to Tom Steyer, his climate advocacy group NextGen (this also includes but is not limited to any email among these parties that anywhere includes a @nextgenclimate.org address), Fahr (including but limited to discussing Ted White or anywhere including twhite@fahrllc.com2), denier, denial or deniers, Climate Investigations Center, Greenpeace, Kert Davies, Energy Foundation, Center for American Progress, Sierra Club, and/or Natural Resources Defense Council or NRDC...
That should set the cat among the pigeons.
Reader Comments (23)
There's that old saying "he who lives in a glass house shouldn't throw stones".
Their problem is that most of the alarmist side are in the public sector. So, there are just so many targets to hit. Quite right since public money is paying for those fabricating this scam. But they really are either gullible, stupid and/or so politically blinded that they really do think if they find any dirt on sceptics, there's not a 1000x more dirt on alarmists.
I wonder if they will use legal challenges to get this stuck in the mud until after Paris?
The climate wars become a flud minging competition.
It makes sense politically and it shows that it is no longer possible for the so-called "left" to rule by intimidation.
But it is more bad news for science.
Under US and UK FOIA laws, what percentage of delegates at the recent climate party in Lima could be asked to disclose their funding, and correspondence?
Share values in electronic data shredder companies may rise faster than global temeratures.
Global temperatures may fall if adjusted temperature records are shredded.
In years to come Grijalva, will be hailed as a hero, for destroying the Hockey Stick, the Hockey Team, the Hockey Team supporters, and the game of Hockey. It may take a few years, and there will be casualties
I never liked hockey. But did enjoy "The Hockey Stick Illusion"
Of course, anti fossil fuel campaigners wouldn't use money and non-scientific arguments to achieve their goals, would they?
From Bloomberg, no less:
Sharon Stone Is Being Sued for Skipping an Anti-Chevron Protest
SPOCK: Lieutenant, I am half Vulcanian. Vulcanians do not speculate. I speak from pure logic.
SPOCK: "Climate Alarmists do not do logic. They speak from pure speculation. "
but then note the same self deception.
SPOCK : I speak from pure logic. If I let go of a hammer on a planet that has a positive gravity, I need not see it fall to know that it has in fact fallen.
ALARMIST : I speak from pure logic. If I let go of masses of CO2 on a planet that has Earth like atmosphere, I need not bother doing proper observations to know that the temperature is in fact rising worryingly.
- Hang on Spock yes anything that is denser than local atmosphere will fall.
However the self deception is that it is perfectly possible for a hammer to be an inflatable one filled with helium
- or be a plastic hammer where the atmosphere is a denser fluid like water.
.... The problem is too much assumption. One should consider the entire complex context.
Oops.
Mark
Michael hart;
I am astounded that the hollywood set is sometimes paid for the appearance of advocacy. Is nothing sacred?
Perhaps they are not the ninnies we always suspected.
It is, as they say, worse than we thought, jferguson.
Mark
FOI requests are only valid if they are about topics that support cliamte alarmism.
They need to also look for emails between Gavin Schmidt, Phil Jones and sundry parties, and also payments received apart from their base salary.
Hi from Oz. jferguson - au contraire, I am NOT surprised that advocacy (aka AGW activist) groups PAY entertainers to "perform" advocacy - as do many companies who advertise anything pay those same performers (and sports stars, etc.) to promote their products. Its just that the gullible public is made to think that these entertainers, etc. are NOT paid to promote AGW (which is just another product like toothpaste or pimple cream, but far less useful). I ask: should the ads / articles / presentations in which they appear be required to show a disclaimer like "The entertainer / sports person used (!) in this ad / article / presentation was paid for their appearance." Maybe a legally qualified reader would like to comment.
I guess snail mail will be back in favour soon then.
Seems like FOIA requests are almost always a waste of time. The agencies have no problem exempting anything interesting and dumping a huge amount of mostly useless data for the requester to sort through.
"the hard-left senators"
LOL, This is the USA right?
@Michael Hart
If you have money in Scottish Widows plc, you are in bed with Sharon Stone.....errr, let me rephrase that. You were/are in line to benefit from Steven Donziger's $19 billion racketeering project via their investment in the "litigation financing" industry.
http://hotair.com/archives/2011/06/29/are-you-funding-ecuadors-corrupt-litigation-against-chevron/
Part of the Donziger legal plot was producing the Hollywood movie "Crude". Ironically, outtakes in which Donziger openly discusses his own corruption, were a significant part in sinking him.
http://www.pointoflaw.com/archives/2010/08/crude-outtakes.php
Curiously, this story has had little traction in the US press, even though it took down Patton Boggs, a premier Washington law firm. Forbes magazine has had the most interest.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/danielfisher/2013/11/22/chevron-uses-thermonuclear-device-of-rico-against-donziger/
Golf Charlie @ Feb 27, 2015 at 10:32 PM "I wonder if they will use legal challenges to get this stuck in the mud until after Paris?"
They'll first simply refuse. The next step would be a court action. It will be a long, long process For comparison, review the IRS emails and the Judicial Watch suit to obtain FOI information. Oh, and note the US Federal Courts have been stuffed with Left folks for some time. All the senators named will either be retired or dead by the time the issue is resolved.
Jeff Norman - "the hard-left senators" LOL, This is the USA right?
Surprisingly, there is a significant number of "hard left" politicians in the US, not least of which is Rep. Grijalva, http://keywiki.org/Ra%C3%BAl_Grijalva
"He is a co-chair on the Congressional Progressive Caucus, (CPC), http://keywiki.org/Congressional_Progressive_Caucus, which was founded in 1991 by Bernie Sanders-the openly socialist then Congressman from Vermont, Democratic Socialists of America (DSA) and the radical Washington DC based "think tank" Institute for Policy Studies (IPS).
Many members were and continue to be linked to DSA and/or the Communist Party USA, IPS or other radical organizations.
From small beginnings the CPC has grown to embrace more than 80 members of Congress and three in the Senate - Roland Burris, Bernie Sanders and Tom Udall."
"Carol Browner, former Environmental Protection Agency head under Bill Clinton, was a Vice-President of Socialist International and a member of the Socialist International “Commission for a Sustainable World Society”.
In a video address to the Party of European Socialists, (PES) on Dec 8th 2009, as Copenhagen was about to get under way, Howard Dean, chairman of the Democratic National Committee at the time, had this to say, to his “Dear Colleagues”:
He called for a strong center left and noted the regular contact between democrats and PES over the previous three and a half years, at congress, senate and party level. He recalled his visit with Bill Clinton to the Global Progressive Forum in Brussels earlier in 2009 and US and EU progressives sharing a long-term global vision and seeking a global new deal.
He spoke of the need for a Low Carbon economy, large investment in “green” technology, social justice and “differentiated responsibilities “for developing and developed nations. The PES member parties are themselves members of the Socialist International."
More here: http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/originals/un_progress_governance_via_climate_change.html
Dennisa, you must be an American (of the U.S. variety).
They did notice Exemption 5: Internal Government Communications?
"The purpose of the fifth exemption is to safeguard the deliberative policymaking process of government. The exemption encourages frank discussion of policy matters between agency officials by allowing supporting documents to be withheld from public disclosure. The exemption also protects against premature disclosure of policies before final adoption."
FWIW the Congress and Congressional deliberations are also exempt from FOI