Wednesday
Jun242015
by 
Bishop Hill
Bishop Hill What a difference a week makes
Jun 24, 2015 Deben Deniers continue to say science is disputed when it isn't and suggest the Pope has been misled when he hasn't been.
Lord Deben, 17 June 2015
When people know they've lost the argument they get desperate & rude.
Lord Deben, 24 June 2015
Reader Comments (63)
Sums up the Greenblob in one sentence. I unfortunately suffer this regularly by people telling "You're not a climate scientist & therefore can't comment!". I do try & point them to articles here, at WUWT, & The Resilient Earth, & elsewhere, but they refuse, but somehow I seem to be the one accused of "burying my head in the sand!", indeed one person the other day considered me to be a "patronising prick", for suggesting the webistes noted! Oh well, one can but try.
The 'science is settled' meme has hung like a lead weight round the necks of climate scientists. They now realise that such an ambitious claim is impossible to meet and easy for sceptics to deride. Good to see idiot Gummer adding a few more pounds to the load.
I have to say that the run up to Paris looks very much like desperation.
Alan the Brit
You do realise that WUWT is the devils own website for The Greenblob?
Lord Deben must be one of the most unpleasant people in public life.
"Mad Cow" Gummer, no less !
When people know they've lost the argument they spend their days publishing abuse on Twitter.
Whenever anyone mentions settled science I'm reminded of the MET Office's Vicky Pope in 2007 predicting confidently in 2007 a 0.3C rise in temps by last year. Preserved on youtube.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jZKD7k7BeBw
Vicky Pope? Has he had a sex change too?
Ted:
You've seen the latest from the Met Office?
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3136780/You-need-wrap-UK-set-plunge-mini-ice-age-Met-Office-warns-one-five-chance-temperatures-drop-leaves-seen-17th-century.html
When one's political career is facing ruin, risk your child.
Alan the Brit
You do realise that WUWT is the devils own website for The Greenblob?
A couple of acquaintences have accused my of pandering to the neo-fascist far right websites also. It was interesting to note the other day when one commenter went on a real rant on WUWT, how quickly & how many rounded on him to challenge his attitude!
@ Ted: Looks like they want it both ways, yet at one & the same time, they are predicting an impossibility, because they have stated & supported the claims that the Sun has no significant effect of Earth's climate, & it won't, according to them, offset global warming, so petitio principii, wtf are the worried about?
Alan the Brit
The mania fertilised by "received wisdom" is a difficult thing to dislodge.
1+1=2 from a "proscribed source" causes strain and main way the incurious release this - is to resort to idiotic name calling. Vehemence and volume are substituted for evidence and honesty.
One thing that runs through believers is conviction masquerading as fragile certainty which must be actively defended - one has to set aside a few grains of compassion (not too much) for their condition. Some things rarely found are unprejudiced doubt - and a willingness to admit "we don't know".......
But yeah .... it's pretty tiresome. I'd add that Gummer is an oxygen thief.
Bessings upon the good Lord Deben. When the Holy Father apears to be under attack the dear Lord put his noble head above the parapet and tries to take the flack with such wisdom.
Such a silly, silly man is Deben (I didnt know that the Pope had got desperate and Rude).
Just because Deben has lost the argument, doesn't mean that he should not be desperate and rude in trying to fuel his BSE-free gravy train.
There is an interesting contrast here. Gummer was correct to play down some of the hysteria which surrounded the BSE crisis (whatever you might think of the manner in which he did so). But he's been a vocal supporter of climate change hysteria for many years - indeed, he was the first politician I can recall pushing the 'settled science' meme, perhaps a decade ago, on a BBC2 science programme. Given the lack of credibility of the 'settled science' meme, one has to wonder what his motivation is. I'm not aware of any evidence or suggestion that he was in the pay of Big Beef...
@Ted: So, if there is a chance that the big shiney bally thingy in the sky might cause a known impossibility, i.e. that is has no significant affect on the Earth's climate, fact, then wtf are they bothering to tell us about this "prediction" & why are they worried. Smells ichthyoidal to me, like having ones cake & eating it, hedging ones bets, having it both ways,
@It doesn't add up...,
The story is also in the FT and the Guardian. It is based on a study published in Nature c.
Still they have to recite the classic mantras: it will be "a small fraction of projected anthropogenic warming", etc. But may be they are preparing the ground for a safe withdrawal.
This is truly a great time to be a sceptic!
What I'm finding online, is that I've stopped trying to convince alarmists and I don't care what they say because it no longer matters.
I know they have lost and whether or not some idiot like Deben agrees with me is no longer important because the evidence against alarmism is now dragging them along kicking and screaming.
It's now very much a spectator sport of: how much can they embarrass themselves before they realise they've lost.
Couldn't Deben drink a glass of coke or champagne on TV to prove that carbon dioxide poses no threat to human life?
It is the sort of stunt he forced on his own young daughter, too young to make her own decision, so presumably he provided parental consent, to better his career.
TinyCO2: "I have to say that the run up to Paris looks very much like desperation."
It's going to be fascinating watching the Dead Parrot Talks - I'm even tempted to pop over to Paris - or is it just morbid fascination watching them squirm trying to explain how the dead parrot is "only resting".
The big question is this - the wheels are falling off the scam bit by bit. But will that rate accelerate? Will the first trickle of admissions turn into a torrent and then a flood - and if so when?
If it's going to slowly fade to nothing - then it'll be pretty boring for us sceptics. But if it falls apart in a spectacular way - perhaps at the Dead Parrot talks...
DaveS, I have a theory that the Deben condition is due to a compound of
a) Being called "dritsek" a long time ago by the Norwegian environment minister, and
b) His Catholic guilt.
Everyone knows that the Norwegians are nice[*]. So if they are rude to you, you must have been very bad. This guilt is amplified by Catholicism and he is therefore trying to atone for his sins by going full-on missionary for the greens. He thinks the Pope has just confirmed this, so we shouldn't be surprised if he turns totally tropo before Paris. I'm sure his own financial schemes are a distant second place.
[*He hasn't noticed yet that the nice Norwegians have, quite sensibly, no serious intention of giving up on fossil fuels or the accumulated wealth it has brought them.]
Couldn't failed Green Politicians be outsourced to polar bears?
Surplus fat, made possible by preying on the defenceless, could save the lives of seals. It might do down nicely with the polar bears aswell.
Michael Hart, you're probably right about the Norwegians and fossil fuels, since they have invested a great deal in natural gas (and make plenty out of it), as well as having a topography that lends itself to hydro-electric schemes. Even so, they have wind-turbines, too. I remember seeing quite a few near Hammerfest, on a very cold day, when there was no breeze at all and the supposed-to-be-moving parts were probably frozen solid, anyway. Hammerfest is expanding, too, so the town must already have a reliable source of electricity readily available for those very long and very cold winter nights.
Why on earth they put up bird-choppers defeats me, but I suppose political greenery gets everywhere, like nettles.
Alan the Brit: "Smells ichthyoidal to me" - must be the poisson-rouge.
Patagon: "But may be they are preparing the ground for a safe withdrawal."
I've come to believe that they are preparing the ground - but it'll run like this: 'The Sun is not such a great influence anyway, so the cooling won't be that much. OTOH, the AGW will continue unless we do something about it'
Then, when the cooling Sun has more of an effect, as it will - just as it has on warming - the Greens will then claim that the overall drop in warming was down to the mitigations, the carbon taxes and the disinvestments they have imposed.
golf charlie
"...drink a glass of coke or champagne on TV to prove that carbon dioxide poses no threat to human life?"
What an excellent idea! I shall reassure myself on a daily basis with a glass of something suitably bubbly.
MikeHaseler, since it will almost certainly be a record breaking hot year globally, albeit by a tiny amount, Paris is a difficult call at the moment. Personally I'm hoping for snow and record cold Dec in Europe. A modest improvement in Arctice ice would be nice but that too is hard to call. What happens in the financial world will matter as much if not more than the physical. We're not in the clear yet but warmists are nervous.
TinyCO2, if it is to be cold in Paris this winter, it would be really unfortunate if someone sneaked in to the hotels and conference centres and sabotaged the heating systems.
'I'm even tempted to pop over to Paris'
Mike Haseler
You do realise all the Hotels will be booked and all the limos and plane tickets too. ;)
And as anyone who knows anything about poetry knows, Putin already ruined the metre.
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@ Harry Passfield: I fully agree. They are indeed paving the way for the ball to go either way in their court. I can't wait for the "I was never in favour of that theory", or "We never fully accpeted the AGW thoery in its current form as propsed by the UNIPCC", sort of crud, they'll drivel they will trot out!
I recall reading a paper by Bob Tidsdale I think it was, on what Solar Cycles 24 & 25 would likely do to the global climate, with a reduction of around 2-3°C over 25-30 years. Curiously enough, I found it on the HMCR website, which I thought most peculiar at the time!
Jun 24, 2015 at 1:19 PM | golf charlie
It is the sort of stunt he forced on his own young daughter, too young to make her own decision, so presumably he provided parental consent, to better his career
It is a good idea to read earlier posts.
Please read
Jun 24, 2015 at 12:30 PM | DaveS
There is no paradox.
Gummer is in the pay of Big Green and Big Beef. He is MP in a farming area
"When people know they've lost the argument they get desperate & rude."
I didn't realise he'd been losing the argument for so long...
Roger
Don't be too hard on GC - it's always good to be reminded of Gummer's appalling parenting.
TinyCO2 - Politicians have been going along to talks like the Dead Parrot ones, making "green" noises to keep the greens backing them. But in reality they've been cutting back targets, putting up coal fired stations and basically whilst the rhetoric was still green, the reality was sceptic.
However, that now all looks set to change with the Scottish government taking on the UK government in the courts and the Greens "winning" against the Dutch government.
Now they are being hoisted by their own petard - their own rhetoric is coming back to bite them and these court cases mean they can no longer keep on saying one thing in public and doing quite the opposite in private.
They now face the stark choice of upsetting most of the electorate by pandering to the greens - or upsetting a few greens by ditching the global warming scam.
And that is a very easy choice for any politician!
Breath of Fresh Air: re popping over to Dead parrot talks: "You do realise all the Hotels will be booked and all the limos and plane tickets too. ;)"
I'm a sceptic - I couldn't afford the hotels these greens go to.
The official Norwegian position on CAGW is as nauseatingly bad as anyone - hence the bird-mincers. However, they do have some sensible scientists and some very pragmatic politicians. The former (left of centre) energy minister Ola Borten Moe has just started a new oil exploration company after recent finds have almost doubled Norway's proven oil reserves. There has been a lot of doom and gloom in the media about the lower oil price, but lay-offs have been small so far.
At the time, Norway's environment Minister (Thorbjorn Berntsen) calling Lord Deben (then plain old John Selwyn Gummer) a drittsek was to do with Sellafield, but it was actually quite prescient seeing how this man has behaved since then. Berntsen was a bit outspoken and I don't think he won may friends in politics, but he was entertaining for the rest of us.
"quite prescient seeing how this man has behaved since then"
I get the impression that almost everyone who has met Gummer/Deben has come away feeling much the same. I was much amused by the tweets that followed Lord D's arrival on that scene, and the general disbelief that he was their real author. This was summarised nicely in a comment to the effect that those who hadn't met him thought they must be made up, but those who had met him believed that they were genuine!
Roger Clague, I did read and appreciate DaveS's comment. Didn't you read mine from 4 years ago?
I was just making the point that Mr Double-Standards Gummer plays down the risk of one genuine crisis, but plays up the risk of an imagined one.
Now he is elevated to the House of Has-Beans, he doesn't give a flying bus pass for his former farming constituents, as they no longer put beans in his pocket.
In political pension plans, exuding hot air means loads of beans. Amazing how cause and effect change with time.
MikeHaseler, I think those bloody oil companies should stump up for hotels and flights. I'll bring my own plackard and pretest literature. It's about time they paid up.
Lord Deben must be one of the most unpleasant people in public life.
Jun 24, 2015 mitcheltj
He is. I can vouch for that
"Cameron pledges tough measures on climate change", By George Jones, Political Editor Telegraph.co.uk (Filed: 10/12/2005)
"David Cameron promised yesterday that under his leadership the Conservative Party would be ready to take the "tough decisions" needed to cut Britain's greenhouse gas emissions to combat global warming.
He appointed Zac Goldsmith, an environmental and anti-globalisation campaigner, and John Gummer, a former Conservative environment secretary, to take charge of a new policy group looking at quality of life issues. Mr Cameron has highlighted the environment, and in particular climate change, as key concerns that he feels the Conservatives have previously neglected. He launched the policy review group at the London Wetland Centre bird reserve where he met members of Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace."
It was Cameron who specifically appointed Gummer as CCC chair in 2012.
GLOBE INTERNATIONAL
Although Chairman of the Climate Change Committee, Gummer is still involved with GLOBE International: http://globelegislators.org/about-globe/73-biographies/203-john-gummer-lord-deben
"After serving for over 3 years as the President of GLOBE International (2010-2014), Lord Deben was elected as the first Honorary President of the organisation in the Annual General Meeting held in Washington DC on 28 February 2014."
This is a quasi world government: http://globelegislators.org/about-globe/24-history
The GLOBE Climate Legislation Initiative was formally launched in January 2013 at a summit held at the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office. A strand on Adaptation was launched in July 2013 at the 1st International Conference on Climate Change Adaptation hosted by the Chinese National Development & Reform Commission in Beijing from in July 2013.
Chairman of GLOBE International is Tory MP Graham Stuart. http://globelegislators.org/about-globe/73-biographies/204-graham-stuart-mp
"Mr Stuart is President of GLOBE UK since 2010 and he chairs the All Party Parliamentary Group "GLOBE UK". In the House of Commons he has served on the Environmental Select Committee and the Draft Climate Change Bill Committee.
Graham Stuart MP was elected to the post of Chairman of the GLOBE International Board in January 2013."
The list of partners is illuminating and explains so much of what is happening behind the scenes, a "must check" page. http://globelegislators.org/partnerships
Sam Fankhauser of the Grantham Institute at LSE, (Stern), is Chief Economist at GLOBE and also on the CCC with Gummer. The author of the Pope's Encyclical, John Schellnhuber, is on the Grantham Institutes Advisory Board
http://globelegislators.org/publications/legislation/climate-2015
"The 2015 Global Climate Legislation Study study, led by Michal Nachmany and Sam Fankhauser, is the latest in the annual series initiated by GLOBE International and the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment of LSE in 2010."
"There were 804 climate laws and policies at the end of 2014, compared with 426 in 2009 at the time of the Copenhagen climate conference. In 1997, when the Kyoto Protocol was agreed, there were just 54 climate laws and policies - a doubling every five years.
Forty-seven countries, including the 28 Member States of the EU, have introduced carbon pricing through either a carbon tax or a cap-and-trade system.
Seventy-five countries plus the EU now have frameworks for limiting greenhouse gas emissions and 64 countries have frameworks for adapting to the impacts of climate change. However, only 37 countries have completed a fully comprehensive national climate change risk assessment.
In order for a successful outcome in Paris in 2015 there is now extreme urgency to strengthen commitments, and for countries that have not yet passed climate change laws and/or regulations to do so."
In 2012, Ban Ki Moon addressed the “KPMG Summit: Business Perspective for Sustainable Growth” at which he said, "I have been urging leaders of the world not to be prisoners of their constituencies. When they have a vision and commitment they have to carry them out."
http://www.un.org/sg/statements/?nid=5861
GLOBE International, compromising politicians from all political spectrums, is taking him at his word and following the UN Global Governance route.
It is worth re-visiting Matt Ridley's piece on John Gummer here: http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2014/3/12/the-works-of-lord-deben.html
Just take a gander at Lord Dipin's register of interests.
http://www.parliament.uk/biographies/lords/lord-deben/4154
Now you know why this trougher is so keen on spreading climate alarm.
+1 dennisa
TinyCO2 - it's pronounced 'pleckard' in my social circles.
"The biggest pro warming lobbying group (486) at the 2009 Copenhagen global climate conference was the International Emissions Trading Association created to promote cap and trade in 1999.
IETA has about 170 member companies.... It was the largest non-government delegation at the COP15 conference in Copenhagen in December 2009.
http://www.marketswiki.com/mwiki/International_Emissions_Trading_Association#Membership
Its members include :-
BP, Conoco Philips, Shell, E.ON , EDF, Gazprom , Goldman Sachs, Barclays, JP Morgan Chase, Morgan Stanley..
http://www.ieta.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&catid=19%3Adefault&id=168%3Aour-members&Itemid=82
E.ON , EDF are major coal players in the coal market. Gazprom is the largest Russian oil and gas corporation
Just be thankful that the awful Gummer doesn't live in your county. What we in Suffolk did to deserve him I'll never know. His son, Ben, is the MP for Ipswich. I have no personal knowledge of young Ben so don't know if the future is bright or blight.
Not just the first time Lord Deben has blustered
"were this morning ordered to come clean about what they know or ‘shut up’.
Former Cabinet colleague John Gummer, now Lord Deben, said MPs were ‘making innuendos and insinuations in order to make themselves look as if they know something when they don’t’. He said it was ‘wicked’ to make allegations without any evidence.
The Tory peer’s outburst comes after campaigning MP Simon Danczuk said Lord Brittan’s death was a ‘sad day’ for the victims of child abuse who wanted to question the former home secretary about the missing ‘Dickens dossier’ of paedophile allegations handed to him in the 1980s"
Alan the Brit,
I've given up talking to the climate change religious maniacs, there's no future in it.
If the topic comes up and they start to preach I apply my acting experience and training. I give them my best pitying smile, combined with a well practiced and dismissive, "little do you know what I know" and "you'll be sorry" over the shoulder chuckle as I turn and casually saunter away from their presence.
Plays hell with their psychological well being.
The resident warmists in NZ are a little dismayed by the record-breaking low temps set a couple of days ago in rural parts of the South Island, but they are continuing to talk up the nonsense of man-made 'climate change', ignoring the fact that the climate changes on a reasonably constant basis.