Democratic activists and lawmakers have launched a massive campaign to discredit academics and politicians who are skeptical of man-made global warming.
On the heels of a New York Times report critical of Harvard-Smithsonian climate scientist Wei-Hock Soon for getting funding from utilities and energy companies, Democratic lawmakers were quick to launch a campaign to uncover which fossil fuel companies were funding climate science.
First, Massachusetts Sen. Ed Markey called coal and oil companies to disclose how much they had spent funding climate science. Markey promised to send letters demanding information from companies, trade associations and other groups to find out if they are trying to fund science critical of man-made global warming.
In a statement, Markey said:
The American public deserve an honest debate that isn’t polluted by the best junk science fossil fuel interests can buy. That’s why I will be launching this investigation to see how widespread this denial-for-hire scheme stretches within the anti-climate action cabal.
Now, Arizona Democratic Rep. Raul Grijalva, the ranking member of the House Committee on Natural : SkeResources, is demanding that seven universities reveal the funding sources of affiliated scientists who are skeptical of man-made global warming. In a letter sent jointly to the presidents of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Georgia Institute of Technology, Pepperdine University, Arizona State University, the University of Alabama, University of Colorado and University of Delaware, Grijalva wrote
Companies with a direct financial interest in climate and air-quality standards are funding environmental research that influences state and federal regulation and shapes public understanding of climate scientists.
The universities Grijalva’s letter targets are home to noted skeptical scientists, including MIT’s Dr. Richard Lindzen, Georgia Tech’s Dr. Judith Curry, Colorado’s Dr. Roger Pielke, Jr. and the University of Alabama’s John Christy and Roy Spencer.
Pielke has presented research showing that global warming is not making weather more extreme and testified before Congress. It should be noted that Pielke does believe that mankind is driving global warming simply challenges claims that it’s also making the weather worse.
It is misleading and just plain incorrect to claim that disasters associated with hurricanes, tornadoes, floods or droughts have increased on climate timescales either in the United States or globally. It is further incorrect to associate the increasing costs of disasters with the emission of greenhouse gases.
Christy and Spencer, on the other hand, operate the University of Alabama, Huntsville satellite temperature dataset. UAH satellite data has shown no significant global warming trend in more than 15 years — the Remote Sensing Systems satellite dataset shows no warming for more than 18 years.
“My colleagues and I cannot perform our duties if research or testimony provided to us is influenced by undisclosed financial relationships,” Grijalva wrote in his letters, which ask for financial disclosures and information on research grants.
Democratic lawmakers’ efforts are being bolstered by the former Obama campaign group, Organizing for Action, which is now on the offensive against lawmakers skeptical of global warming.
“It’s tough out there for climate change deniers,” reads an OFA email sent out on Friday encouraging followers to join in on “calling out climate change deniers,” adding:
One by one, literally every argument and excuse they’ve been using for years is being proven false. They’re still grasping at myths and conspiracy theories, but deniers are on the run.
This report, by Michael Bastasch, was cross-posted by arrangement with the Daily Caller News Foundation.
