Monthly Archives: April 2010

The BBC is very keen to tell us in detail why Lord Oxburgh and his panel of cronies have exonerated in a rushed report the University of East Anglia climate change fabricators. Their reasons for the whitewash – which can be paraphrased as the need to perpetuate the lies – are trumpeted loudly, while the sceptic community gets, as usual, only a nodding mention, 74 words out of 760. Here, for the record and for starters, are some of the concerns of “sceptics” that the BBC has chosen not to tell us. They are from Steve McIntyre, of Climate Audit, the man who for almost a decade has been painstakingly revealing the tricks and lies of those who have been so rapidly absolved:

The Oxburgh report ” is a flimsy and embarrassing 5-pages.

They did not interview me (nor, to my knowledge, any other CRU critics or targets). The committee was announced on March 22 and their “report” is dated April 12 – three weeks end to end – less time than even the Parliamentary Committee. They took no evidence. Their list of references is 11 CRU papers, five on tree rings, six on CRUTEM. Notably missing from the “sample” are their 1000-year reconstructions: Jones et al 1998, Mann and Jones 2003, Jones and Mann 2004, etc.)

They did not discuss specifically discuss or report on any of the incidents of arbitrary adjustment (“bodging”), cherry picking and deletion of adverse data, mentioned in my submissions to the Science and Technology Committee and the Muir Russell Committee.

Update: Richard North, as perceptive as usual, has very useful commentary on the Oxburgh findings; he skillfully underlines what the BBC should have said if it had been serious about properly analysing the findings, rather than rushing to a whitewash defence of climate change science. Particularly damning is Oxburgh’s observation about the failure of the CRU cronies to use statisticians, which suggests that in the most fundamental sense, Phil Jones et al were out of their depth. And let’s spell out what that means: the temperatures that the UN replied upon for the AR4 report were arrived at without adequate statistical analysis, even though what was involved was a series of stastical projections. It beggars belief. Steve McIntyre, of course, has been saying this all along – but now Oxburgh has concurred, albeit with qualifications. The house of cards looks more and more precarious, especially if you also read this.

The election continues, with all three main parties steadfastly refusing to discuss properly their insane, bigoted advocacy of massive new taxes on energy. Meanwhile, the BBC continues to report the agenda of greenies with relentless bias. Take this story about greenie fanatics stopping the import to Kenya of GM maize on the ground that it might contaminate the soil. Such supersititious rot would put Matthew Hopkins (the Witchfinder-General) to shame, but the reporter doesn’t waste an ounce of effort looking for alternative views. Tens of thousands are at risk of starvation in Kenya because of cyclical drought, but the BBC has green issues to pursue and that is all that matters.

Anyone who has visited Africa knows that one of the main problems of the continent is inadequate power supplies. As well as endless power cuts, tens of thousands of Africans die every year through house fires that are caused because they don’t have access to electricity and use crude torches instead. So when the World Bank decides to help (and act sensibly for once) with the building of a major new power plant, it should be unqualified good news. Not for the BBC; its main concern in its reporting of the topic is what “environmentalists” think.

As requested, have a nice weekend!