Collin Maessen vs. Lord Monckton 2013

One of the most astounding and frightening aspects of the "Republican" attitude towards learning about and understanding climate science is the GOP's willingness to embrace serial lies in order to support their political agenda.  

As though having wealth and power makes them superior to our planet's natural forces.  Yet, even though human history is filled with stories of the hubris of greed and power destroying its own civilizations, they remain hostile to rational information.  Why does it seem like the GOP hasn't learned anything in these information rich and supposedly enlighten times?

I've been thinking about it because of the recent farce where one serial liar Lord Monckton has come to the rescue of another deception artist Dr. Richard Lindzen the scientist who loves misrepresenting his colleagues. (also see: “A disservice to the scientific method”: climate scientists take on Richard Lindzen )

Who Is Lord Christopher Monckton?

Dear Durango Telegraph Editor,
There’s an exciting brouhaha going on within the Global Warming blogosphere these days. Every bit as heated and implication laden as ClimateGate was a half year ago. Not surprisingly, big media isn’t covering this story. Just as they seem to be ignoring the exposure of the fabricated charges and nonexistent sins scientists supposedly perpetrated in “ClimateGate.”

This saga concerns the lowly academician who dared question the darling of the “Man Made Global Warming Is A Hoax” community.

Viscount Lord Monckton update ~

The information regarding Lord Monckton's political theater and mutilation of scientific data keep growing in leaps and bounds.

At Skeptical Science.com John Cook has gathered a treasure trove
and organized it under various headings:

“A Scientist Replies to Christopher Monckton: Abraham v. Monckton.”

Professor Abraham's presentation can be found at:
http://www.stthomas.edu/engineering/jpabraham/

Over the past couple years I have been carrying on a virtual conversation with various scientifically informed folks who are vocal “skeptics” regarding man-made global warming (AGW). This past winter that conversation flared with a spat of emails offering up ClimateGate tidbits along with a lot of overblown, even slanderous, charges toward the scientists whose personal emails had been stolen from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit. Having read the full texts of the emails being singled out, I was able to carry on a spirited defense of the scientists integrity.

More reviews on Lord Monckton's "science"

Anti-Climate Change Extremism in Utah
A Local Front in a Global Battle

The Monckton Files: Solar Variation
Recently, Prof. John Abraham criticized Lord Christopher Monckton for citing scads of scientific papers to back up his opinions about climate change, but when Abraham actually looked into those papers, it often turned out they didn’t support Monckton’s conclusions, or they even contradicted those conclusions.  

Given his rap sheet (including numerous infractions mentioned on this blog), I thought it would be fun to start examining Lord Monckton’s recent testimony before a committee of the U.S. Congress.  What if I were to scan through the document, randomly pick one of Monckton’s claims that I don’t know much about, and start investigating the literature he cites?  Would I find that he makes reasonable points, or that he has continued his nearly unblemished record of propagating scientific-sounding nonsense?  

Tim Lambert has already shown that Monckton’s testimony was flamboyantly incompetent about three issues (solar brightening, ocean acidification, and Snowball Earth), so I picked another topic that has to do with variations in the radiation output of the Sun.

read on at http://bbickmore.wordpress.com/2010/06/25/the-monckton-files-solar-variation/

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Monckton's testimony to Congress
May 9, 2010 by Tim Lambert

The most damning thing about Christopher Monckton's testimony to the House Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming on global warming science (video here), is the fact that the Republicans could not or would not get a single scientist to testify.

His main argument is based on the same confusion that I dealt with in my debate with him -- the idea that Pinker (2005) which found an increase in short wave radiation at the surface, actually found an increase in radiative forcing. Rachel Pinker herself explained the difference:

The CO2 "radiative forcing" value that Mr. Christopher Monckton is quoting refers to the impact on the Earth's Radiative balance as described above. The numbers that we quote in our paper represent the change in surface SW due to changes in the atmosphere (clouds, water vapor, aerosols). These two numbers cannot be compared at their face value.

But Monckton ignored this correction from Pinker in his testimony:

read on at http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/05/moncktons_testimony_to_congres.php

HELP alert the media to denialist activity

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Turn the Tables on Monckton
Written by Professor Scott Mandia

Christopher Monckton and other deniers get far more press coverage than they deserve. Journalistic false balance has caused the public to be confused on climate change – the greatest threat to humanity this century. Worse, these deniers have used mainstream media to attack climate science and the scientists who pursue the truth. Let us now turn the tables.

Monckton has been exposed by Dr. John Abraham and instead of hiding his tail and whimpering away, Monckton has gone on the offensive by attacking Dr. Abraham and asking his followers to essentially “email bomb” Dr. Abraham’s university president. We need to alert the media to this story.

I have assembled a list of media contacts in the hopes that my readers will follow my lead and send letters asking for an investigation of Monckton and his attack on Abraham.

Has Monckton finally arrived at his Waterloo?

A group of scientists has put together a detailed study of Mr. Lord Monckton’s Congressional testimony, unlike LM’s many lectures and blogs, LM was under oath while giving false testimony to the Select Committee on Energy Independence and Global Warming.

Hopefully, we can finally see the court trial that the good Lord keeps threatening.

With him as defendant !
{hope springs eternal}

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Visit - Professor Scott Mandia website: Global Warming: Man or Myth?

Monckton Testimony at US Congress: Ignorance or Perjury?

{#3} Citizenschallenge v Monckton

========================================
my 2nd email to Lord Monckton 8/16/10
Lord Monckton’s 2nd reply to me 8/17/10
my response (3rd email) to Lord Monckton 8/20/10
========================================
#1
Dear Mr. Miesler, - Answers are in the body of your email below. Since you have chosen to be impolite, these are the last answers you will receive. All further emails from this address will be auto-deleted before I see them. - Monckton of Brenchley

Lord Monckton, please don’t run and hide. You claim yourself ready to debate.
Therefore, please allow us to take part in a frank discussion.
Sincerely, Peter Miesler August 20, 2010
(ps. I sent my email by way of a new email address, so Lord Monckton did see it, whether he's willing to reply remains to be seen.)

AN UNAUTHORIZED SORTING OF LORD CHRIS MONCKTON’S (9/14/2009) POWER POINT PRESENTATION

This is a first step to a larger project exploring Lord Monckton's presentation to the Minnesota Free Market Institute, given September 14, 2009. The PowerPoint is available at: http://www.docstoc.com/docs/13460116/Lord-Christopher-Moncktons-Power-Point-Bethel-University--Global-Climate-Change-Conference-Oct-14-2009
This is intended as a guide for viewing along with Lord Monckton's illuminating PowerPoint slides.

The presentation can be viewed on YouTube:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=stij8sUybx0

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Categories :

32..... Gratuitous Political Theater
41..... Gratuitous Misdirection
20..... Mudslinging: malicious, abusive, insulting, and untruths
36..... Scientific Shenanigans
19..... Big Issue Claims
17..... Graphs worth Closer Examination
05..... Looking at the Math
02..... Philosophical Considerations presented with a cynical twist
02..... Informative Slides
______________
174 slides

please read on...

Lord Chris Monckton Update, April 2012, courtesy of SkepticalScience.com

Lord Monckton just can’t seem to stay away from the lime light while the right wing can’t seem to get enough of his fairy-tale version of reality and science.  

Having watched... even studied a few of his presentations,  

most particularly his September 14th, 2009 performance to the Minnesota “Free” Market Institute 

{See, http://citizenschallenge.blogspot.com/2010/08/unauthorized-sorting-of-lord-chris.html} 

I do appreciate why he is so loved by folks of a denialist “free market” persuasion.  

The man is a great speaker, a mesmerizer, a political entertainer of the highest caliber.

On the other hand, his utter arrogant contempt for science's understanding of Earth processes, society’s impact and its consequences is downright criminal.
But enough of that.  

Here's another example of the type of posts I dream of putting together, if only...

Fortunately, there is a team of folks over at SkepticalScience.com who do some first class work in gathering and presenting the facts.  Here is an excellent collection of the unflappable Lord’s latest misrepresentation.

Courtesy of Dana1981 at John Cook’s SkepticalScience.com, posted April 5th.
“Monckton Misleads California Lawmakers - Now It's Personal (Part 2)”

YouTube - Peter Hadfield's educational "Climate Change" video series

"Skeptical" websites such as Curry's blog, or WUWT, or ClimateAudit, et al. spend endless hours side tracking the real issues.  And since I have some free time, I figured why not put together an index of Peter Hadfield's video series ~ it does an excellent job of reviewing what the scientific "consensus" on Climate Change is all about.

Grab the popcorn and sit down for some easy learning.   ;-)

Potholer Climate videos

http://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLTBY5Vb0tbtsdrOC2XE0hVA36xfR2GdN6

Uploaded by potholer54 
Peter Hadfield 

1. Climate Change -- the scientific debate
by potholer54 ~ 10:19

2. Climate Change -- the objections
by potholer54 ~ 7:25

3 - Climate Change -- Anatomy of a myth
by potholer54 ~ 9:52

4 - Climate Change -- Gore vs. Durkin
by potholer54 ~ 11:00 

5. Climate Change -- isn't it natural?
by potholer54 ~ 9:55 

6. Climate Change -- Those hacked e-mails
by potholer54 ~ 9:23

7. Climate Change - "Those" e-mails and science censorship
by potholer54 ~ 9:15 

8. Climate Change -- Has the Earth been cooling?
by potholer54 ~ 8:53

8a. Climate Change - Phil Jones and the 'no warming for 15 years'
by potholer54 ~ 10:21

9. Climate Change - Meet the Scientists
by potholer54 ~ 10:17

10. Climate Change - An imminent ice age debunked
by potholer54 ~ 12:48
12:48
11. Climate Change -- Hurricanes, atolls and coral
by potholer54 ~ 12:48

11a. Sources for my last video
by potholer54 ~ 9:25

12 - 'Doubled CO2 means just 1.64 degrees of warming...' or maybe not.
by potholer54 ~ 9:25

13 - Misleading media reports on sea level rise - a case study
by potholer54 ~ 5:04  

14 - BP oil spills and an end to snow
by potholer54 ~ 14:34

Monckton Bunkum Part 1 - Global cooling and melting ice
by potholer54 ~ 14:56

Monckton Bunkum Part 2 - Sensitivity
by potholer54 ~ 15:24

Monckton Bunkum Part 3 - Correlations and Himalayan glaciers
by potholer54 ~ 15:29

Monckton Bunkum Part 4 -- Quotes and misquotes
by potholer54 ~ 12:13

Monckton bunkum Part 5 -- What, MORE errors, my lord?
by potholer54 ~ 12:13


20 - Are cosmic rays causing global warming?
by potholer54 ~ 7:16

21 - "Earth facing mini-ice age!!" say the media. Now for the science....
by potholer54 ~ 6:29

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This has been all about Peter Hadfield but I shouldn't ignore Peter Sinclair, aka Greenman3610, and his top notch coverage of the AGW "debate"... story...

Greenman3610 ~ Climate Denial Crock of the Week 

http://www.youtube.com/user/greenman3610

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 

Peter Sinclair interviews Peter Hadfield

Potholer54/Greenman3610 - The Search for Lord Monckton

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WZKzJwMOWAI

{#1} Lord Monckton, are you a Creationist? ... an open letter

Lord Monckton,
I’ve been reviewing your Minnesota Free Market Institute presentation. One of many disturbing aspects of your performance are the following statements. But, first to borrow from your 466 questions to Professor Abraham: Could you, Christopher Monckton, confirm that the following quotes accurately encapsulate your recorded comments?

5:20: “... we all love the planet that the good Lord has given us. And he’s given us the stewardship of it, Genesis 1:22, very clear what our obligations are as stewards of the planet. We are to look after all that is in it, and over it and under it and swimming in the sea. We are not therefore to exercise that stewardship given to us by our creator in an irresponsible fashion. Therefore it is important that we do not waste money, effort, time, or resources on non-problems such as global warming. As I shall show you that it is.”

{#6} Examining Lord Monckton's Rhetoric

This is the sixth email in my series examining Lord Monckton's 10/14/9 presentation to the MFMI in Minnesota. The talk can be found here.


Lord Christopher Monckton,
Early in your 10/14/9 Minnesota Free Market Institute presentation you make the following promises to your audience:

7:10
“But, one point I do want to make, is that you must not believe a word I say.
... I am not gonna to tell you what the truth about the climate is.
I am simply going to tell you a series of facts from the science and the data and the peer reviewed literature...
9:05
“And that is what we are going to do tonight, there won’t be rhetoric, there will just be boring fact after fascinating fact.”

~ ~ ~
In this sixth segment of our correspondence and my examination of your 10/14/9 MFMI presentation, allow us to examine how well your actual words live up to your promise. Early in your presentation you did give us your word that you would present the latest science facts sans “rhetoric.”

{#11b} Lord Monckton, Mr. Ferguson, SPPI, v. Dr. Ben Santer - anatomy of a character assassination

Lord Monckton, and SPPI's Mr. Ferguson,

In this email I want to look at how some lies never die. In particular, today's reincarnation of the Wall Street Journal's travesty, with it's relentless, substance lacking, attacks on Dr. Benjamin Santer.

From SPPI’s Blogwatch: “Science ad rem, not politics ad hominem”
“However, a single scientist – Ben Santer – was asked by the IPCC substantially to alter the scientists’ final draft. He did so, crossing out five references to the absence of any evidence of a human influence on climate, and substituting the directly opposite conclusion.... the contrarian opinion of a single scientist who was willing to write what the IPCC’s bureaucrats wanted.”

10/14/9 MFMI 43:00
“Now we come on to a lie we find in the 1995 report. And this is one of the most extraordinary lies of the lot. Time and again, the scientists in that report said “We can not find any anthropogenic, or human signal, in the climate record. We are having no effect on temperature so far as we can see.” They said it five times very clearly, here’s one sample of it, here’s another. And now watch this, here is what the bureaucrats did. They rewrote the final draft, yet again, after it had been cleared and signed off by the scientists, to say the exact opposite: The body of evidence now points to a discernible human influence upon climate. And, that has been the official line ever since.”

Lord Monckton you often repeat this meme. To do so you ignore reams of contrary evidence. Why should we take your word for it?

Beyond that, why must you paint climate scientists like foreign enemies? In my last email I documented how these charges against Professor Ben Santer were shown to be gross falsehoods. Yet, here we are nearly fifteen years later and the same knowingly false charges are still being advertised. What a stellar example of the Monckton brand of “fidelity to the truth.”

Highlights Index

The Denial Machine Keeps Cranking... an essay
January 20, 2011

“The Great Global Warming Swindle” is itself a Fraud and a Swindle ~ by Bill Butler ~
December 30, 2010

Open Letters to Lord Monckton and SPPI
{#11a} SPPI, Monckton, Seitz, WSJ - anatomy of a character assassination
{#11b} Monckton, Ferguson, SPPI, v. Dr. Ben Santer - anatomy of a character assassination
{#11c} Monckton, Ferguson, SPPI, v. Dr. Rajendra Pachauri (IPCC) - anatomy of a character assassination

AN UNAUTHORIZED SORTING OF LORD CHRIS MONCKTON’S (9/14/2009) POWER POINT PRESENTATION
August 10, 2010

Climate Change & Contrarians
March 7, 2010
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Regarding the speculative Village at Wolf Creek development please visit:
http://no-villageatwolfcreek.blogspot.com/
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Olden Goldies:
Reflections On Justice Sotomayor’s Confirmation Process
August 14, 2009
An Essay Concerning Our Weather
Nov/Dec 1995 and Nov/Dec 2005
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

August, 2008:
Why start this blog?

A historic snafu in need of revisiting

There They Go Again........

What is Science's Sin?

God flowing into the Word

{#10} SPPI and Lord Monckton, The Data Creates the AGW Consensus

I got a little ahead of myself in sending out this email in that I didn't do my usual detailed double check of Monckton's MFMI presentation quotes. None of my errors altered Monckton's substance, but in the interest of accuracy I have gone through this post and corrected my few errors in my Monckton quotes. . . my apologies Peter M.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

In my last email {#9} I claimed that increased snow fall in Greenland is tied to AGW and does nothing to support Lord Monckton’s thesis that manmade global warming is a hoax. So, I thought this tenth email should review some of the evidence leading to the AGW consensus.

After spending sometime researching I realized there is no way I can improve upon the work done by John Cook over at SkepticalScience.com. They clearly lay out the arguments and point the way to verifying studies and data. In this email I will shamelessly reproduce SkepticalScience.com search results including links.

Here is John Cook’s introduction to his site:

Scientific skepticism is healthy. Scientists should always challenge themselves to expand their knowledge and improve their understanding.

Yet this isn't what happens in global warming skepticism. Skeptics vigorously criticize any evidence that supports man-made global warming and yet uncritically embrace any argument, op-ed piece, blog or study that refutes global warming.

So this website gets skeptical about global warming skepticism. Do their arguments have any scientific basis? What does the peer reviewed scientific literature say?

Also, Lord Monckton, despite your shrill and colorful objections to the contrary Professor John Abraham's presentation "Abraham v. Monckton" does do an excellent job of exposing many misleading scientific claims in your 10/14/9 MFMI talk.

{#4} Questioning the veracity of Lord Monckton’s attributions

{This is the fourth email to Lord Monckton examining his 10/14/9 MFMI presentation}
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Considering that Lord Monckton’s PowerPoint presentation offered the best venue for clear citations or reference to the many quotes the Lord tosses out. I thought it would be interesting to look at the side notes with his slides and see if LM offered any information that would help in tracking down the veracity of his various quotations.

From his 10/14/9 PowerPoint presentation: http://www.docstoc.com/docs/13460116/
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

{#5} Lord Monckton about your claims regarding AIT and the UK Trial

{This is the fifth in my emails to Lord Monckton, examining his 10/14/9 MFMI presentation}


Lord Monckton,
You seem to be avoiding me, but my examination into your claims will continue - as will my attempt to engage you in a frank discussion on the matter of the voracity of your many claims regarding your promulgation of the notion that AGW is a hoax. Today, I ask about your often repeated implications that a UK Judge found AGW to be a hoax.

{#8} SPPI & Monckton’s claims regarding David’s: “The Down To Earth Guide to Global Warming” - Examined

MFMI 54:15
(#79) “And they are lying to children as well. They lie even to children....”
MFMI 54:25
“What she (Laurie David) did was to switch the captions on the graphs for temperature and CO2 going back 650,000 years so that she could show that it was CO2 that had changed first and temperature that had followed.”

{#7} SPPI - Lord Monckton's "Nils Axel Mörner" claims examined

Dear Mr. Ferguson, and Lord Monckton,
It would be nice to keep this civil. Simply, because you may not like me, or what I’m writing, doesn’t mean I can’t ask you, Robert Ferguson... Science Public Policy Institute, and SPPI’s brain trust: Lord Monckton, some pointed, and public, questions.

I shall continue my little examination of the way you folks present science to a public in need of real and complete information, learning, understanding and appreciation for the global situation humanity is in. In this email {#7} I shall review statements made on SPPI’s website and in the MFMI talk by Lord Chris Monckton regarding Nils Axel Mörner PhD and his claims.


Quoting the 10/14/9 MFMI talk -
MFMI 27:35
LM: “Nickolas who has written 520 papers on the subject.” Then, there is Monckton’s often repeated sentiment: “Professor Niklas Mörner, the world’s foremost expert on sea level.”