On August 27, 2010, Sean Hannity aired a special program called “The Green Swindle” that should be a “must see” for everyone concerned about global warming hysteria.  The 42-minute program explains the history of global warming and who stands to profit from all the hype.

From Fox News

A legal battle is heating up faster than the planet for embattled climatologist Michael Mann.

First word emerged that the inspector general for the National Science Foundation would look into the Penn State panel reviewing the climate scientist, who is currently director of the school’s Earth System Science Center. Now the attorney general for his old employer the University of Virginia is planning an investigation, too.

According to a report in Charlottesville weekly The Hook, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli has asked the University of Virginia to produce “a sweeping swath of documents relating to Mann’s receipt of nearly half a million dollars in state grant-funded climate research” conducted while Mann was at UVA between 1999 and 2005.

Should the AG uncover evidence of impropriety, the school could be commanded to return the funds, and pick up the cost of the AG’s investigation.

The paper, tipped off by anonymous sources, has posted a PDF of Cuccinelli’s formal request, a legal document called a civil investigative demand. In that letter, he demands production of information and documentary material relating to three papers Mann authored while at UVA, using a total of $484,875 of state grant money.

Read the Attorney General’s Letter

Read the Attorney General’s Note to UVA Rector John Wynne

“Since it’s public money, there’s enough controversy to look in to the possible manipulation of data,” Dr. Charles Battig, president of the nonprofit Piedmont Chapter Virginia Scientists and Engineers for Energy and Environment, told the Hook.

A spokesman for the attorney general told FoxNews that he was unable to comment on the case, explaining that “we can’t comment on whether there exists an ongoing investigation or anything like that.”

But the University confirmed that it had received the letter. According to spokeswoman Carol Wood, “the University has received the CID from the state’s attorney general regarding Michael Mann’s work. Because of the scope of the request for information it will take some time for us to review it and decide how best to proceed with gathering information.”

Read the rest of the story.

From the Climate Realists

By John O’Sullivan — The infamous Madoff Ponzi scheme cost $50 billion. Now put this into context with what the U.S. government has blown on policies related to climate change - over $79 billion since 1989. Madoff is in jail, Michael Mann isn’t-yet. So let’s look at the latest legal hullabaloo.

The Climategate scandal is a Ponzi scheme with far greater global ramifications for us all. But how are we dealing with the willfully corrupt acts of a few key individuals in the most senior posts?

The two lead scientists in this most grotesque scam, Michael Mann of Penn. State University and British Professor Phil Jones of the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research (CRU), discussed manipulation of data to ‘hide the decline’ in global temperatures. Both men and their employers benefited to the tune of tens of millions of dollars for their complicity in this scam.

Jones, rather than be convicted of fraud, stymied Freedom of Information requests then destroyed his data. He avoided criminal prosecution on a mere technicality- the British government conceded the statute of limitations had expired.
Jones is remorseful, broken and discredited; Mann stubbornly refuses to quit his shenanigans. His hubris remains intact. An expedient American government, just like the British, has stalled in implementing the most serious of fraud charges. Their likely embarrassment is just too great to even contemplate action.

The facts are well documented: according to Mann’s fudged graph, the hottest period in modern history was NOT the generally balmy era between 900 and 1300 but the late 20th century. The world’s skeptical community diligently sought access to Mann’s calculations to check how he came to his incongruous conclusions. His conclusions were swallowed whole by world leaders intent on pursuing an international cap and trade strategy. Almost overnight he had succeeded in re-writing a wealth of historical peer-reviewed studies.

Read the rest of the column at Climate Realists

At a Washington DC press conference yesterday, the No Cap and Trade Coalition announced a new video spoofing prominent ‘climategate’ scientist, Dr. Michael Mann and his infamous ‘hockey stick chart’ showing rapidly increasing global temperatures in recent decades. The video was posted on YouTube until Wednesday afternoon, when the Google-owned video site removed the video, citing non-existent copyright claims by Jib Jab.

The video was produced in response to a cease and desist demand from Michael Mann’s attorney over an older video produced by Minnesotans for Global Warming. The original Hide the Decline video they created used some Jib Jab-provided animation, under their general license and with their expressed written consent, but the new video, recently removed by YouTube contains no such content.

Spokesman for the No Cap and Trade Coalition, Jeff Davis said, “It looks like Dr. Mann has gone into overdrive trying to hide ‘Hide the Decline,’ since the new video was launched and began to spread like wildfire across the internet.” In the span of less than a day, the video had been linked on over 1,000 websites, including News Busters, Junk Science, and the American Spectator. It was going viral fast and the press was calling when YouTube pulled the plug.

According to the No Cap and Trade Coalition, Jib Jab has no rightful claims on the new video, titled ‘Hide the Decline II.’

“They have no basis for this copyright claim. It’s outrageous that they would claim ownership of content we produced, if that’s indeed what’s happened, as YouTube claims in the removal notice,” said Davis.

Although YouTube has decided to stifle the popular new satirical video, ‘Hide the Decline II’ is still available through other venues and can be viewed at NoCapAndTrade.com.

Penn State University’s Michael Mann, one of the central figures in the Climategate scandal, has threatened legal action against Minnesotans for Global Warming (M4GW) over the group’s popular satirical YouTube video “Hide the Decline.” The No Cap-and-Trade Coalition, a group that includes M4GW, responded today at an event at the National Press Club, releasing Mann’s threatening letter and an updated version of the “Hide the Decline” video.

“We understand why Michael Mann is eager to silence public discussion of the hockey stick scandal,” said Jeff Davis of No Cap-and-Trade, “but truth is an absolute defense.”

The original “Hide the Decline” video, which had more than 500,000 viewers, was removed today from YouTube by M4GW’s Elmer Beauregard. It received national attention when Rush Limbaugh played it on his radio show and was later featured on CBS Evening News in the wake of the Climategate email scandal. “Hide the Decline” parodied Mann, the Penn State professor who is largely responsible for the creation of the now debunked “hockey stick” graph, which purported to show a dramatic spike in average global temperature during the 20^th century after 900 years of relatively constant temperature.

The video spotlighted a phrase from one of the central “Climategate” e-mails in which the University of East Anglia’s Phil Jones explains how he used Mann’s “Nature trick” to “hide the decline” of key temperature data. The hockey stick graph relied on “hiding this decline.”

When asked why he removed the video, Beauregard said “Right now, the last thing I need is a lawsuit. I can barely afford my electric bill.” Beauregard recently converted M4GW’s world headquarters (a recreational vehicle parked in Northern Minnesota) from propane to wood heat. “Mann should be glad to know that we don’t burn fossil fuels anymore - just trees,” said Beauregard.

“M4GW was started to poke fun at Global Warming because I knew it was a joke, it’s hard to believe in Global Warming when you live in a place like Minnesota. During last winter we all wished we had some global warming, hence the name of our group,” said Beauregard. As global warming developed into a political issue, M4GW has tried to educate the public that CO2 is not harmful but part of the natural carbon cycle.

Minnesotans for Global Warming did comply with Mann’s cease and desist demand, taking the “Hide the Decline” video down from their YouTube account and webpage. The No Cap and Trade Coalition unveiled a new video they’re calling “Hide the Decline II,” however. It was screened at a press conference on April 20^th and is available on YouTube and NoCapAndTrade.com.

“If Doctor Mann decides to sue,” said Davis, “we would welcome the opportunity to do legal discovery. I believe he’s hiding more than just ‘the decline.’”

Speaking at the No Cap-and-Trade Coalition press conference was M4GW spokesman “Chicken Little,” a man in a chicken suit who goes to rallies crying “The globe is warming, the globe is warming!”

When asked about the situation, Chicken Little said, “I used to believe in global warming - of course, I used to believe the sky was falling too, but Elmer set me straight.” Chicken Little went on to say, “I think it’s horrible that Elmer had to take down the video. Can’t a person have a little fun on YouTube anymore? Those Global warming guys sure don’t have any sense of humor.”

At the press conference, the No Cap-and-Trade Coalition handed out a historical review of the hide-the-decline controversy entitled, “Michael Mann: Defamed or Defined by Hide-the-Decline?” as well as mini-hockey sticks that read “Mann-Made Global Warming: Why We Should Be Worried About the Intellectual Climate.”

Scott Brown’s historic victory on Tuesday in Massachusetts has a lot of people asking the question whether there’s a new day dawning in American politics.  This video does a pretty good job of framing the issue.

A special election will be held this week in Massachusetts that could determine the outcome of much of President Obama’s agenda.  Republican candidate Scott Brown has stated he is opposed to the President’s cap-and-trade bill, which would cost the American taxpayer trillions of dollars.  Democrats have controlled this senate seat for nearly 60 years, so a win for Brown would appear to be truly a miracle.  Polls have the Brown and his Democratic opponent in nearly a statistical tie going into the election.

This 53-minute documentary offers an alternative explanation for climate change that is based upon a relationship between cosmic rays, the sun and the earth’s clouds.

Because the findings contridicted the so-called “scientific consensus” that CO2 was responsible for climate change, the author of this study was unable to get his work published in a scientific journal.  This is the same corrupt peer review process exposed in ClimateGate that  is leading to censorship of studies that contradict the C02 theory.

From Slate Magazine

COPENHAGEN, Denmark-I’m not sure whether it was the chicken-suited followers of Supreme Master Ching Hai wandering about or the experience of freezing slowly for seven hours as I waited to get into the Bella Center, but something happened in the last 10 days to convince me, once and for all, that the United Nations climate negotiations will never quite work. As the dust settles on this year’s talks and observers try to understand exactly what happened here, one thing is for certain: The U.N. process can no longer be the central focus of global efforts to confront climate change.

President Barack Obama in Copenhagen The structural problem with these talks has long been clear: It’s hard to find anything that 193 countries agree on, and it’s downright impossible to negotiate when all those parties must have their say. But activists, diplomats, and many analysts have long insisted on the participation of every last U.N. member nation. Climate change is a global problem, they argued, and hence one that requires a global solution. Indeed, the logo for the Copenhagen conference shows circle of 192 crisscrossing lines. (It was designed before Somalia joined the U.N. process on Dec. 10.) This pattern is meant to symbolize how interconnected we are. Instead, it looks like a ball of tangled string.

Read the rest of the column.

It is now widely recognised that the misguided Copenhagen Conference was a complete failure. Those political leaders and policy makers who refuse to accept this reality are merely burying their heads in the sand and are forfeiting the trust of the public.

–The Global Warming Policy Foundation, 20 December 2009

The world’s political leaders, not least President Barack Obama and Prime Minister Gordon Brown, are in a state of severe, almost clinical, denial. They insist that what has been achieved in Copenhagen is a breakthrough and a decisive step forward. Just one more heave, just one more venue for the great climate-change traveling circus - Mexico City next year - and the job will be done. Or so we are told. It is, of course, the purest nonsense. The time has come to abandon the Kyoto-style folly that reached its apotheosis in Copenhagen last week, and move to plan B.

–Nigel Lawson, The Wall Street Journal, 22 December 2009

The biggest losers of the Copenhagen fiasco appear to be climate science and the scientific establishment who, with a very few distinguished exceptions, have promoted unmitigated climate alarm and hysteria. It confirms beyond doubt that most governments have lost trust in the advice given by climate alarmists and the IPCC. The Copenhagen accord symbolises the loss of political power by Europe whose climate policies have been rendered obsolete.

–Benny Peiser, The Observer, 20 December 2009

India hailed Tuesday the lack of targets and legally binding measures in the Copenhagen climate accord and vaunted the united front presented by major emerging countries at the chaotic talks. Facing parliament for the first time since the UN talks last weekend in the Danish capital, Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh said India had “come out quite well in Copenhagen”. The Copenhagen accord “bears in mind that the social and economic development and poverty eradication are the first and overriding priorities of developing countries,” Ramesh said.

–AFP, 22 December 2009

From the Weekly Standard

The climate campaigners play their trump card, but it may turn out to be a joker.

By Steven F. Hayward — The climate campaign, built step-by-step over the last 20 years, has reached its Waterloo. The Copenhagen conference that ended Friday was an exercise in political theater. It not only failed to produce a binding agreement, but the potential emissions curbs it endorsed fall far below what climate orthodoxy demands, while the proposed wealth transfer from rich nations to poor nations is a political nonstarter. Back home, cap and trade legislation remains on life support, even though it has been significantly watered down so as to postpone real costs to consumers for a decade or more. In the midst of this gloom, the climate campaign has played its trump card in the United States: The Environmental Protection Agency formally announced on December 7 its intention to regulate greenhouse gases through the Clean Air Act.

That trump card, however, may turn out to be a joker.

The Clean Air Act (CAA), enacted in 1970 and last updated in 1990, is an abysmal policy mechanism for controlling greenhouse gases, and was never intended for this kind of problem. But the EPA’s gambit is not about policy–it is all about politics. The EPA’s grasp for dominion over greenhouse gases has been a long time in coming, starting as an effort to bring pressure on the Bush administration to relent in its opposition to a U.N.-led international climate treaty, and continuing under Obama as a means of pressuring Congress and the business community to support cap and trade.

The key antecedent to this gambit was a botched Supreme Court decision in 2007, Massachusetts v. EPA, in which a 5-4 majority (Justice Anthony Kennedy sided with the Court’s four liberals) ruled that greenhouse gases like carbon dioxide were indeed “pollutants” under the capacious definitions of the Clean Air Act, thereby giving the EPA jurisdiction to regulate them without any legislative mandate from Congress.

Environmental groups had petitioned the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act and had encouraged several states to ask for federal authority to impose their own regulations on automobile emissions. The Bush EPA took the position that it did not have the authority to regulate greenhouse gases, and would decline to regulate them even if it did have the legal authority. Once the Supreme Court ruled, however, the slippery slope logic of environmental law took over, making it inevitable that the EPA would eventually move to regulate greenhouse gases. In a nutshell, environmental statutes and case law have evolved so as to make federal judges into the sock puppets of environmentalists, and greens have become highly skilled in bringing lawsuits to compel federal agencies to do their bidding. (This explains, for example, the Bush administration’s decision to list the polar bear as an endangered species.)

The EPA gambit has business groups in an uproar, but is this a case of crying wolf, in a mirror image of environmental alarms? Industry protested every version of the Clean Air Act (a Ford executive named Lee Iacocca predicted in 1970 that the CAA would shut down the entire American auto industry), and although the cost of reducing air pollution was not trivial (over $500 billion according to the EPA’s likely underestimate), it has not decimated the American economy. In fact, on the surface the Clean Air Act appears to be the largest public policy success story of the last generation: The dramatic reduction in air pollution is greater in magnitude than the reduction in the crime rate in the 1990s or the fall in welfare rolls since welfare reform. You’d never know this from the media or the greens, who hate good environmental news as much as vampires hate garlic.

Read the rest of the column.