Must-reads

A couple of posts that I simply must point out to readers. Firstly, Steve M is back in the saddle at Climate Audit, reviewing his recent visit to the AGU and making some disturbing revelations about the AGU's welcoming back of Peter Gleick into the fold.

Gleick’s welcome back to AGU prominence – without serving even the equivalent of a game’s suspension – was pretty startling, given his admitted identity fraud and distribution (and probable fabrication) of a forged document. Last year, then AGU President Mike McPhadren, a colleague of Eric Steig’s at the University of Washington, had stated on behalf of AGU that Gleick had “compromised AGU’s credibility as a scientific society” and that his “transgression cannot be condoned”. McPhadren stated that AGU‘s “guiding core value” was “excellence and integrity in everything we do” – values that would seem to be inconsistent with identity fraud and distribution and/or fabrication of forged documents, even by the relaxed standards of academic institutions.

Meanwhile, Tallbloke and his readers have uncovered a downwards revision in the Met Office's temperature projections. It's interesting to wonder why a statistically insignificant rainfall trend was worthy of a Met Office press release while a major reining back on the projections wasn't.

Parsing the Pacific Institute

Jim Lindgren, writing at law blog the Volokh Conspiracy, has been parsing the Pacific Institute's statement about reinstating Peter Gleick as president, and in particular the following phrase:

An independent review conducted by outside counsel on behalf of the Institute has supported what Dr. Gleick has stated publicly regarding his interaction with the Heartland Institute.

Lindgren notes that, being forged, the strategy document was not part of Gleick's interaction with the Heartland Institute. Gleick, you will remember, has said that he received it anonymously in the post. Lindgren concludes that there's a problem.

Click to read more ...

Quote of the day

However, [For the Pacific Insitute] I suspect the penny has dropped that their public credulity regarding an obviously fishy story, and the public excuses they made for Gleick's admitted dishonest tactics, let alone his unadmitted ones, sent the message to the public that they may also be credulous and tolerant of dishonesty when it comes to climate science.

Natalie Solent ponders the reinstatement of Peter Gleick. There is a lesson here for the IPCC when they consider how to respond to the Gergis affair.

Gleick "cleared"

From the Pacific Institute:

The Pacific Institute is pleased to welcome Dr. Peter Gleick back to his position as president of the Institute. An independent review conducted by outside counsel on behalf of the Institute has supported what Dr. Gleick has stated publicly regarding his interaction with the Heartland Institute. This independent investigation has further confirmed and the Pacific Institute is satisfied that none of its staff knew of or was involved in any way.

Dr. Gleick has apologized publicly for his actions, which are not condoned by the Pacific Institute and run counter to the Institute’s policies and standard of ethics over its 25-year history. The Board of Directors accepts Dr. Gleick’s apology for his lapse in judgment. We look forward to his continuing in the Pacific Institute’s ongoing and vital mission to advance environmental protection, economic development, and social equity.

“I am glad to be back and thank everyone for continuing their important work at the Pacific Institute during my absence,” said Dr. Gleick in a statement. “I am returning with a renewed focus and dedication to the science and research that remain at the core of the Pacific Institute’s mission.”

It appears that all details about the alleged inquiry, including who conducted it, are to be withheld. I think they had to clear him so as not to give any "fodder to the sceptics".

Gleick uncleared

Further to my article noting  that Peter Gleick has been cleared by an internal investigation into the Fakegate affair, the original source - the Guardian - has pulled the story.

How strange.

The original is still on Google's cache for anyone who wants it.

[Update: I've attached a copy for posterity]

Original Guardian article

Update on May 21, 2012 by Bishop Hill

Now he's cleared again!

Link

They have inserted a line saying "it is not entirely clear what the investigation entailed".

(H/T HK)

Gleick "cleared"

The Guardian is reporting that Peter Gleick has been cleared of forging the Heartland documents.

A review has cleared the scientist Peter Gleick of forging any documents in his exposé of the rightwing Heartland Institute's strategy and finances, the Guardian has learned.

Which is odd, because they then say this...

Gleick, founder of the Pacific Institute and a well-regarded water expert, admitted and apologised for using deception to obtain internal Heartland documents last February.

Forensic analysis of the Heartland memo

Watts Up With That? has just published an expert forensic analysis of the Heartland strategy memorandum and it's not looking good for Dr Gleick.

...the analytic method that correctly and reliably identified twelve of twelve authors in calibration testing also selected Gleick as the author of the disputed document. Having examined these documents and their results, I therefore consider it more likely than not that Gleick is in fact the author/compiler of the document entitled ”Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy,” and further that the document does not represent a genuine strategy memo from the Heartland Institute.

Read the whole thing.

US Government Climate Change spend 2011 vs Heartland - Josh 153

Fakegate showed how small the Heartland Institute budget is compared to spending on Climate Change science. Here is just one example using US Government figures. I thought a simple graphic would be more helpful than a cartoon here.

Click the image for a bigger version.

Cartoons by Josh

Koch fights back

The Charles Koch Foundation has issued a strongly worded denunciation of the New York Times' reporting of the Fakegate affair.

One might expect the Times to have some chagrin about its reporting that was based on material obtained by fraud, motivated by an ulterior ideological agenda, and suspect in its authenticity.  Yet even though that source lied, cheated, and stole – and refuses to answer any further question from the Times or anyone – reporter Andrew Revkin nonetheless found room to praise him, writing, “It’s enormously creditable that Peter Gleick has owned up to his terrible error in judgment.”  Readers would be right to wonder if the Times itself is able to own up to mistakes on this story.

Indeed.

Update on Feb 29, 2012 by Bishop Hill

In related news, Heartland has issued an open letter to the Pacific Institute.

Update on Feb 29, 2012 by Bishop Hill

And Revkin has replied.

Mann in Time

Time magazine has a rather toe-curling profile of Michael Mann, although there is considerable discussion of the Gleick affair too, including this:

Scientists are held — and hold themselves to — a higher standard than political groups like the Heartland Institute. That's one of the reasons scientists are trusted by a larger share of the public than most other authority figures — especially politicians. But that trust is fragile, and if scientists stoop to some of the same tactics the other side employs — as Gleick did against Heartland — they risk winning a battle at the cost of losing the climate war. As the British climatologist Richard Betts tweeted yesterday: "If people don't trust climate scientists then all the activism counts for nothing."

More Fakegate bits and pieces

Mark Fischetti, writing at Scientific American, interviews Gavin Schmidt, "a climate scientist who has been a consistently moderate voice at the center of the climate and ethics debate" about Gleick's activities. Fischetti seems to think that "Deniers are well funded and politically motivated." I guess he didn't actually read the Heartland documents then.

Meanwhile, Anthony Watts has a copy of Gleick's blagging email here.

Politicians notice Fakegate

Rep Edward Markey of Massachusetts has written to Heartland asking for them to document the inaccuracies in the Fakegate documents and asking for originals.

In a letter to Heartland Institute President Joseph Bast, Markey asked the group for an explanation of any inaccuracies in the leaked documents as well as accurate versions of those documents.

“These documents appear to indicate that the Heartland Institute is receiving large donations from corporations for the direct purpose of discrediting the mainstream science of climate change and has planned to engage in a campaign to undermine the teaching of well-established science at our public schools,” Markey, the top Democrat on the House Natural Resources Committee, said in the letter.

If I recall correctly, Heartland's climate change activities were not actually corporate funded at all. What an extraordinary error to make.

I think it is probably worth Heartland documenting what is wrong in the fake document, since this is in the public realm. As to the real one, I suggest they tell him to mind his own business. Private matters should remain private.

BBC World Service on Fakegate

The BBC World Service covered Fakegate this morning, interviewing Bob Ward and Mike McPhadden, the president of the AGU.

Considering the post-Jones-report choice of guests, the coverage was not too bad. We could have done with some challenge of the dark mutterings about "disturbing revelations" from the documents though. I was interested in McPhadden's description of the tumult at the AGU and their desire for public trust. It seems to me that while they allow Chris Mooney to use their organisation in the way they do, they are going to be seen as a political organisation rather than a scientific one. Mooney to me looks like another AGU accident waiting to happen. That being the case, it will interesting to see how the AGU responds to the Gleick affair.

The audio is attached below.

Science in Action on Fakegate

Update on Feb 24, 2012 by Bishop Hill

In the comments I am advised that Mooney resigned from the AGU some time ago, although  his replacement, Susan Joy Hassol, doesn't look much better.

Gloves off

The gloves appear to have come off in the Fakegate affair, with Heartland calling in the FBI.

The Chicago-based free market Heartland Institute has called in the FBI and threatened other legal action against a global warming proponent who has admitted stealing emails from the institute in a bid to embarrass and discredit the group’s questioning of climate change.

Heartland officials tell Washington Secrets that they have been in talks with the FBI over the case against prominent global warming proponent Peter Gleick, co-founder of the respected Pacific Institute. Heartland is getting ready to reveal their probe of the affair, which they hope the FBI will act on.

The comedy of fakers

Hilariously, DeSmog appears to have decided to try to uphold the line that the fake Heartland strategy document is real. I'm struggling to keep my jaw off the floor.

In response, Anthony Watts has launched a crowdsourced textual analysis project to see if science will provide backup to Mosher's observations about the similarities between the literary styles of the counterfeiter and Peter Gleick. You can find out how to take part here.

It's a good idea, but I'm worried that nobody is going to be able to stop laughing at DeSmog for long enough to take part.