CBC: Keeping Canadian Voters Confused by Paying Rex Murphy

[politicslvr]

I recently came across an article a friend of mine wrote on the CBC's Rex Murphy and his views on climate change. You can read it here. It's a short article and to the point, so a lot of the details of the story are missing but you can easily pick up on them with a simple Google search. What are you thoughts on the whole "climategate" speculations? Should Rex Murphy be allowed to "spout nonsense" or should he be held to higher standards of fact-checking? I'd be interested to get all of your opinions on this.

Edited December 8, 2009 by politicslvr

[M.Dancer]

What are you thoughts on the whole "climategate" speculations? Should Rex Murphy be allowed to "spout nonsense" or should he be held to higher standards of fact-checking? I'd be interested to get all of your opinions on this.

The article doesn't provide any reference to what Rex is saying.

[Riverwind]

I recently came across an article a friend of mine wrote on the CBC's Rex Murphy and his views on climate change.

The climate debate has been poisoned by people like your friend who dismiss people expressing dissenting opinions as 'oil company shills'. The only comment I have is: how would you feel if people tried to suppress your opinion because you refused to conform to their version of reality? Would be upset? Angry? Or would you quitely acknowledge the errors of your ways and conform?

[Riverwind]

The article doesn't provide any reference to what Rex is saying.

Here is the editorial. It is one of the best commentaries on the CRU emails. It addresses the seriousness of the revelations without lapsing into a 'its all a hoax' diatribe. Edited December 8, 2009 by Riverwind

[myata]

The folk, neighbourhood Joe wants to decide the matters of high science by a popular vote. No, they don't want to go to school, take time to figure it out for themselves, to have a clue what it means and what's at stake. They want to push the button here and now, between a bite of hamburger and a gulp of beer watching a favorite TV show.

He wants it, why not? Life always moves in circles and cycles, we've been to times when matters of life were decided by clueless but versed in scriptures and rituals chamans, priests, lords and so on, and this more recent and not so long yet age of reason, science and technology. I can understand the nostalgia. Godspeed.

[M.Dancer]

Here is the editorial. It is one of the best commentaries on the CRU emails. It addresses the seriousness of the revelations without lapsing into a 'its all a hoax' diatribe.

I ahve no problem with his commentary.

[Wilber]

I think your friend would fit right in with those idiots at the CRU who got caught doctoring and destroying data while actively trying to suppress and discredit anyone who might question their "findings". People who have done more damage to the cause of climate research and to the despair of those who want information they can trust so they can act accordingly. They are every bit as dangerous as those who claim these revelations "prove" that human involvement is a fraud.

[Pliny]

An interesting point might be that a large percentage of government revenues come from big oil and the use of fossil fuels. Scientists getting grants from governments are thus largely funded by big oil. Can it be that they miss this obvious point? We'll have to defer. However, governments I'm sure are well aware of it and are allowing oil companies the time to and opportunity to establish themselves in new technologies while new innovative sources of revenues for governments are developed.

Global warming is an opportunity that can and should be capitalized upon by everyone, and I think it is, especially by those with the most at stake.

Scientists should once again feel used by political opportunism. I think they have trouble admitting to the fact they could be duped but once again. In order to save themselves from these embarrassments they have to admit to human frailties such as greed, status, aggression, power, self-importance, etc., of which the rest of us suffer and let self-righteous sanctimony remain a disease of the lib-left politically correct.

[Michael Hardner]

The climate debate has been poisoned by people like your friend who dismiss people expressing dissenting opinions as 'oil company shills'. The only comment I have is: how would you feel if people tried to suppress your opinion because you refused to conform to their version of reality? Would be upset? Angry? Or would you quitely acknowledge the errors of your ways and conform?

Do you see how this gets to you when the other side impugns ulterior motives to your side ?

There are enough facts to go through without us having to go through the noise that accompanies it.

[Michael Hardner]

Scientists should once again feel used by political opportunism. I think they have trouble admitting to the fact they could be duped but once again. In order to save themselves from these embarrassments they have to admit to human frailties such as greed, status, aggression, power, self-importance, etc., of which the rest of us suffer and let self-righteous sanctimony remain a disease of the lib-left politically correct.

Not always - here's one of the leaked emails, wherein an IPCC scientist admonishes an environmentalist for misrepresenting the situation and calling for control of emissions. This email flies in the face of those who think that the IPCC is committed to deception:

Dear Eleven,

I was very disturbed by your recent letter, and your attempt to get

others to endorse it. Not only do I disagree with the content of

this letter, but I also believe that you have severely distorted the

IPCC "view" when you say that "the latest IPCC assessment makes a

convincing economic case for immediate control of emissions." In contrast

to the one-sided opinion expressed in your letter, IPCC WGIII SAR and TP3

review the literature and the issues in a balanced way presenting

arguments in support of both "immediate control" and the spectrum of more

cost-effective options. It is not IPCC's role to make "convincing cases"

for any particular policy option; nor does it. However, most IPCC readers

would draw the conclusion that the balance of economic evidence favors the

emissions trajectories given in the WRE paper. This is contrary to your

statement.

This is a complex issue, and your misrepresentation of it does you a

dis-service. To someone like me, who knows the science, it is

apparent that you are presenting a personal view, not an informed,

balanced scientific assessment. What is unfortunate is that this will not

be apparent to the vast majority of scientists you have contacted. In

issues like this, scientists have an added responsibility to keep their

personal views separate from the science, and to make it clear to others

when they diverge from the objectivity they (hopefully) adhere to in their

scientific research. I think you have failed to do this.

Link

[Pliny]

Not always - here's one of the leaked emails, wherein an IPCC scientist admonishes an environmentalist for misrepresenting the situation and calling for control of emissions. This email flies in the face of those who think that the IPCC is committed to deception:

Link

The IPCC is not committed to deception. Who would claim or admit to such a thing?

We have to be a little less general and a little more precise in what we say. We all promote our own interests. Some individuals will, like a rotten apple, infect the whole bunch. What harm is done by one person claiming data shows we should be wary of our effects on the global environment and to move things along a little faster a sense of urgency is expressed or nothing will get done...oh and by the way.. this e-mail indicating we've fudged some of the numbers should be erased or nothing will ever get done.

My point is that scientists are human and in our human exuberance to please or do good things we may overstep the bounds of good sense. At a level as high as the IPCC in importance and influence it is essential personal interests or the moral sense of any ideology one may hold not taint our conclusions or decisions, and not dictate what is deemed imperative to our existence. It only takes one compulsively manipulative ideologue with power to infect any sphere of influence and thus wreak untold damage. He only needs to know how to delegate.

Edited December 8, 2009 by Pliny

[Riverwind]

Not always - here's one of the leaked emails, wherein an IPCC scientist

The email is from 1997. While reading through the emails I did notice a distinct change in tone as time when on. During the 1990s there seemed to more willingness to be scientists and to debate issues. But from about 2004 you see a closing of the ranks and an emphasis on putting a public common front to avoid giving skeptics grounds to question the IPCC.

[Shwa]

I recently came across an article a friend of mine wrote on the CBC's Rex Murphy and his views on climate change. You can read it here. It's a short article and to the point, so a lot of the details of the story are missing but you can easily pick up on them with a simple Google search. What are you thoughts on the whole "climategate" speculations? Should Rex Murphy be allowed to "spout nonsense" or should he be held to higher standards of fact-checking? I'd be interested to get all of your opinions on this.

To get back to your question... yes Rex Murphy should be allowed to present his views on climate change. His is commentary based on opinion and I do not see how it is represented by anything more. If he admits that his experts are not climate scientists, but investment bankers or oil lobbyists or whatever, only the very stupid would confuse his opinion with fact.

The CBC employs Don Cherry. Do they fact-check everything he tees off on? No. Rex Murphy is more entertainer than real news guy. Kind of like Rick Mercer, but much uglier and less funny.

[Michael Hardner]

The email is from 1997. While reading through the emails I did notice a distinct change in tone as time when on. During the 1990s there seemed to more willingness to be scientists and to debate issues. But from about 2004 you see a closing of the ranks and an emphasis on putting a public common front to avoid giving skeptics grounds to question the IPCC.

Maybe they grew tired of skeptics refusing to accept their findings. They're only human after all. I myself had to give up on the infuriating 9/11 conspiracy people to a degree, although I'll still wade in from time to time.

[Michael Hardner]

The IPCC is not committed to deception. Who would claim or admit to such a thing?

We have to be a little less general and a little more precise in what we say. We all promote our own interests. Some individuals will, like a rotten apple, infect the whole bunch. What harm is done by one person claiming data shows we should be wary of our effects on the global environment and to move things along a little faster a sense of urgency is expressed or nothing will get done...oh and by the way.. this e-mail indicating we've fudged some of the numbers should be erased or nothing will ever get done.

It's very easy to find claims of fraud, conspiracy, and so on - all of which imply planned deception. On these boards, people will imply that scientists are working for their own material gain, and that the GW movement is really a socialist movement disguised as an environmental movement.

None of this is helping in getting through the facts presented, and it sows distrust of either side, turning this into an US vs THEM debate.

My point is that scientists are human and in our human exuberance to please or do good things we may overstep the bounds of good sense. At a level as high as the IPCC in importance and influence it is essential personal interests or the moral sense of any ideology one may hold not taint our conclusions or decisions, and not dictate what is deemed imperative to our existence. It only takes one compulsively manipulative ideologue with power to infect any sphere of influence and thus wreak untold damage. He only needs to know how to delegate.

It's very easy to see why they would overstate their case when constantly engaging in dialogue with others who do so. This is another reason why having web skeptics and scientists dialogue together is a bad idea - they don't speak the same language.

The skeptics should nominate scientists to represent their views, and feed them suggestions on weak points in the IPCC papers.

[Riverwind]

Maybe they grew tired of skeptics refusing to accept their findings. They're only human after all. I myself had to give up on the infuriating 9/11 conspiracy people to a degree, although I'll still wade in from time to time.

A conclusion that one can only make if one ignores the perspective of SteveMc and RossMc. It is the reaction to the criticisms they raised about the hockey stick that has convinced me that these scientists are not honest brokers. We can leave aside the speculation on why they reacted the did but the reaction should be a concern to everyone who cares about the science and the CRU emails simply provide more evidence.

[Michael Hardner]

A conclusion that one can only make if one ignores the perspective of SteveMc and RossMc. It is the reaction to the criticisms they raised about the hockey stick that has convinced me that these scientists are not honest brokers. We can leave aside the speculation on why they reacted the did but the reaction should be a concern to everyone who cares about the science and the CRU emails simply provide more evidence.

Those are but two skeptics, though. There may as well be reasonable 9/11 truthers too - except I haven't met them.

Except for the "hide the decline" line, which may still be innocuous, there's nothing in the emails that show they're not honest.

[myata]

At which point in the discussion, the actual science, i.e. research, published and peer reviewed becomes truly irrelevant. It's out there, as it's been for decades, in the score of magasins and publications open for every "skeptic" to poke obvious holes in, and yet - surprise! nobody's interested?! It much more rewarding to discuss emails and conspiracies and "problems", editorials and media analyses, than the actual essense of the matter, what it all supposed to be about.

Any why does it have to be this way, how could one explain that puzzling phenomenon? Let me attempt. Could it be because there's lot more "skeptics" who know how to read and understand emails and media regorgitations of media analyses written in plain English, than those who could read, understand, and even, god helps, meaningfully respond to openly published and freely available scientific research?

[Riverwind]

Those are but two skeptics, though.

It only takes one person to be right.

There are other examples but the difference with these two I have the background that allows me to look at the technical details and make my own assessment of who has the valid scientific argument. And it is painfully clear that the climate science community is offside and that they have abused the peer review system in order to create a smoke screen designed to hide their malfeasance/incompentence. The CRU emails provide evidence supporting many of the complaints that SteveMc has been making and demonstrate that it was malfeasance rather than incompentence.

For example, SteveMc has long complained that the journal editor handling his paper on the hockey stick was mysteriously removed and replaced with an editor that was clearly biased and willing to break journal policies in order to get junk papers into the journals and the IPCC reports. These papers were then used to tell public/politicians that McIntyre's claims had been debunked when nothing of the sort was true. In the emails we find evidence that the removal of the editor was the direct result of pressure by 'the team' and that they backdated papers to get around IPCC requirements.

Except for the "hide the decline" line, which may still be innocuous, there's nothing in the emails that show they're not honest.

How many times to I have to tell you that the emails corroborate the claims of dishonest and unethical behavoir being made by others? If lower your ethical standards and insist on only looking at the emails themselves then you might be able convince yourself that there is nothing there but you would be fooling yourself. You have to look at all of evidence. Edited December 9, 2009 by Riverwind

[Shady]

Those are but two skeptics, though. There may as well be reasonable 9/11 truthers too - except I haven't met them.

I find it somewhat disgusting that you continue to equate global warming skeptics with 9/11 truthers.

Except for the "hide the decline" line, which may still be innocuous, there's nothing in the emails that show they're not honest.

How can you make an exception for that line? Anyways, what about these?

From: Michael Mann, Oct 27, 2009

"Perhaps we'll do a simple update to the Yamal post... As we all know, this isn't about truth at all, its about plausibly deniable accusations."

From: Edward Cook, June 4, 2003

"I got a paper to review (submitted to the Journal of Agricultural, Biological, and Environmental Sciences), written by a Korean guy and someone from Berkeley, that claims that the method of reconstruction that we use in dendroclimatology (reverse regression) is wrong, biased, lousy, horrible, etc. ... If published as is, this paper could really do some damage ... It won't be easy to dismiss out of hand as the math appears to be correct theoretically (...) I am really sorry but I have to nag about that review -- Confidentially I now need a hard and if required extensive case for rejecting."

From: Phil Jones, Feb 2, 2005

"The two MMs [Canadian skeptics Steve McIntyre and Ross McKitrick] have been after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I'll delete the file rather than send to anyone."

From: Tom Wigley, Apr24, 2003

"Mike's idea to get editorial board members to resign will probably not work -- must get rid of von Storch too, otherwise holes will eventually fill up with people like Legates, Balling, Lindzen, Michaels, Singer, etc."

From: Phil Jones, July 5, 2005

"If anything, I would like to see the climate change happen, so the science could be proved right, regardless of the consequences. This isn't being political, it is being selfish."

Yes Michael H, they're all bastions of honesty.

[Keepitsimple]

I recently came across an article a friend of mine wrote on the CBC's Rex Murphy and his views on climate change. You can read it here. It's a short article and to the point, so a lot of the details of the story are missing but you can easily pick up on them with a simple Google search. What are you thoughts on the whole "climategate" speculations? Should Rex Murphy be allowed to "spout nonsense" or should he be held to higher standards of fact-checking? I'd be interested to get all of your opinions on this.

Your article contains this telling statement......which in many ways parallels the attitude contained in the CRU emails. Do you not see what kind of world you envision? As Riverwind has already asked - how would you like it if your opinions, regardless of their merit - were conspired against to be "shut down"? Is that the world that you want to live in?

I have written in more detail about this here, along with some suggestions for shutting Rex Murphy down.

Edited December 9, 2009 by Keepitsimple

[Michael Hardner]

I find it somewhat disgusting that you continue to equate global warming skeptics with 9/11 truthers.

How can you make an exception for that line? Anyways, what about these?

From: Michael Mann, Oct 27, 2009

"Perhaps we'll do a simple update to the Yamal post... As we all know, this isn't about truth at all, its about plausibly deniable accusations."

From: Edward Cook, June 4, 2003

"I got a paper to review (submitted to the Journal of Agricultural, Biological, and Environmental Sciences), written by a Korean guy and someone from Berkeley, that claims that the method of reconstruction that we use in dendroclimatology (reverse regression) is wrong, biased, lousy, horrible, etc. ... If published as is, this paper could really do some damage ... It won't be easy to dismiss out of hand as the math appears to be correct theoretically (...) I am really sorry but I have to nag about that review -- Confidentially I now need a hard and if required extensive case for rejecting."

From: Phil Jones, Feb 2, 2005

"The two MMs [Canadian skeptics Steve McIntyre and Ross McKitrick] have been after the CRU station data for years. If they ever hear there is a Freedom of Information Act now in the UK, I think I'll delete the file rather than send to anyone."

From: Tom Wigley, Apr24, 2003

"Mike's idea to get editorial board members to resign will probably not work -- must get rid of von Storch too, otherwise holes will eventually fill up with people like Legates, Balling, Lindzen, Michaels, Singer, etc."

From: Phil Jones, July 5, 2005

"If anything, I would like to see the climate change happen, so the science could be proved right, regardless of the consequences. This isn't being political, it is being selfish."

Yes Michael H, they're all bastions of honesty.

Uh.... right. Ok. I didn't see these. Give me a link, but in the meantime I recant.

[wyly]

long before I heard that rant I thought Rex Murphy was an idiot but if he was a journalist on a news program fair enough I'll live with it an ignore him...but now I hear that he's a economist with the Fraser Institue FIRE his ass off our Public News...let him spew that biased shitte at Global...since when do we allow politcal shills a regular spot on public tv?, if he gets a regular spot to spew his politcal biases then CBC has to give equal regular time to guys like David Suzuki on the national news....

[Smallc]

So, people whose job it is to have an opinion aren't allowed to have opinions now? Interesting. And for the record, Rex Murphy falls on many different sides depending on the issue.

[Riverwind]

biases then CBC has to give equal regular time to guys like David Suzuki on the national news.

CBC is non-stop political shilling for lefty causes. Did you realize that David Suzuki has been allowed to host the CBC radio national morning show at least twice? Did you know that in addition to that he and al gore were granted hour long segment on Q? Rex is the exception rather than the rule.