The Observatory

03:35 PM - April 3, 2009

Making Space for Skeptics

Post, Times draw criticism for coverage questioning global warming

All arguments considered, Dawidoff’s profile strikes me as legitimate in conception, but flawed in execution. Petit is right—to “squelch” this article would have been a shame. While exploring the importance of honest and transparent skepticism (as opposed to the more duplicitous kind proffered by people like Will) to science overall, however, Dawidoff could have done more to challenge the idea that, in this particular instance, Dyson is doing more good than harm.

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Curtis Brainard collaborated on this article. Eliott and Griffin are the directors of the Science Media Centres in Australia and New Zealand, respectively. Kelland is Reuters health and science correspondent for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.

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The proponents of the man made global warming ruse are not altruistic. Their total involvement is for self aggrandizement and personal enrichment. Follow the money and you will see all of the conmen, scoundrels, cheats, flim-flammers, lawyered up promoters and Nobel laureat sellouts. If you repeat a lie often enough it becomes a movement and then the movement becomes a tool for the unscrupulous to use for their religious experience. Now congress and government has taken up the drumbeat with aid of the purposely misinformed media. Many people sense that this is bovine excrement and the shills for the movement are skirming because they are being exposed. With righteous indignation they are trying to use models, figures and junk science to support a feeling. Well, figures don't lie but liars do figure. One statistic is very telling though $50,000,000.000.00 have been spent by the fed to study global warming (conveniently called climate change now) and Obama and the boys are ready for cap and trade, but the CO2 freaks are looking for more. They wouldn't get very much more if they all concurred that this is the way the planet works naturally (would they?) and now that Washington and Al have declared it a "crisis", well, the pump is primed. Unfortunatly these folks have no shame. They are going to tax us for breathing soon. We'll have to figure out how to not exhale or have cattle flatuate. PT Barnum was right.

#1 Posted by paul, CJR on Sun 5 Apr 2009 at 08:04 PM

The problem is not that the Dawidoff article didn't explore Dyson's alleged skepicism (which is really naysaying, since Dyson isn't qualified to express skepticism and the article didn't offer any technical discussion at all). The problem is that the media is treating climate change like an intellectual debate, instead of a massive threat to the carrying capacity of the Earth.

Serious examination reveals that climate responses which are cheaper than the status quo are abundant. U.S. utility efficiency programs cost $3 billion in 2008, and saved about $9 billion in electricity. The 1974 fuel efficiency standards saved hundreds of billions last year, and while the price of gasoline has dropped, we can still save hundreds of billions more without changing the size and safety of the fleet. New renewables are now cheaper than new coal powered generation and the trend is such that within a decade we may have photovoltaics which will be cheaper than coal.

This isn't the place for a deep examination of the potential for a massive investment in money-saving technology, but there should be one, and there isn't. The subject is vast. We have appliance standards and building codes and simple things like controls on parasitic power. All of this is available. If we invest the stimulus package energy dollars in efficiency ($30 billion), the savings are large enough to pay for a massive, multi-decade efficiency and renewables strategy which completely eliminates U.S. electric sector CO2, and just about completely eliminates U.S. natural gas CO2, and cuts a big bite out of U.S. petroleum.

And we don't even have a place to discuss the implications of a strategy to eliminate petroleum dependence in the context of global warming. Because the media is enthalled with the superficial existence of a difference of opinions, it doesn't seem to have the capacity to investigate whether one side or the other is dealing with a full deck. But that's not the deep shame. The deep shame is that everyone agrees that economically justified, money-saving responses ought to be pursued, but no one is looking at how much, how soon, and how much good it will do for us.

If one looks at the technology seriously, it is feasible to talk about a global elimination of CO2 within 20 years while steadily and strongly improving the economy. But the human politics are not able to embrace this knowledge. We have very little time left before the annual increase in atmospheric levels change ocean chemistry and climate patterns in ways that will make it extremely unlikely that we can continue to feed 7 billion people.

#2 Posted by Ned Ford, CJR on Sun 5 Apr 2009 at 10:07 PM

I'm an admirer of Dyson's. (Everyone should read his Disturbing the Universe) I found the NYTMag piece troubling. The evidence is unassailable, appearing in many different forms, from plant growing cycles, to butterfly habitation patterns to shrinking glaciers, that anthropogenic warming is happening. Dyson's position that while this is so (in contrast to Will's), it will either be inconsequential or within our technical grasp to compensate for is unpersuasive.

Yes, Hansen's language is over the top. But ftmp, the climatologists have erred on the conservative side. Warming is happening faster than the models predicted, and there are definite feedback loops involved that were not in the models.

But I don't think it's fair to dismiss Dyson as an amateur. He's making a "not proven" claim. The response should be to gather more proof.

This is completely different from Will's feckless position that it's all a buncha malarkey. It is completely irresponsible of the Post to continue to employ Will, never mind repeatedly run his nonsense.

#3 Posted by jayackroyd, CJR on Mon 6 Apr 2009 at 10:08 AM

OH MY GOD WE'RE ALL GONNA DIE! The proponents of anthropogenic GW are so incredibly arrogant. Man is really not that big a deal on a global scale. You have more to fear, sooner, from your own government.

#4 Posted by Jude, CJR on Mon 6 Apr 2009 at 03:31 PM

By all means, let's not give the skeptics any voice whatsoever in this "scientific" conversation. Science, as we all know, is not about disagreement, rethinking assumptions or reviewing the evidence. It's about believing what we're told, refusing to critically examine it and attacking anyone else who does.

In fact, let's go one step further and advocate removing the livelihood of any who dare to question the idea of global warming, as Romm is doing with Hiatt. Hey, it worked with University of Washington climate scientist Mark Albright and award-winning Princeton University physicist Dr. Will Happer.

As Richard Lindzen, professor of Atmospheric Science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology, notes: "Scientists who dissent from the (ecological) alarmism have seen their funds disappear, their work derided, and themselves labeled as industry stooges. Consequently, lies about climate change gain credence even when they fly in the face of the science."

Let's just shut them all up. And in their place, CJR can just cite more liberal bloggers. (BTW, where are the quotes from the conservative bloggers on the science of global warming?)

No liberal bias in the media though... nope.

#5 Posted by Stan, CJR on Mon 6 Apr 2009 at 04:12 PM

Come on, Stan. You lose credibility when you start with the "liberal bias" thing. Science doesn't have a "liberal bias" except in that normal people including liberals usually start with the facts, and in global warming I am talking about measurable facts. Trends in average earth temperature and measurements of Arctic ice are not "liberal bias," they are measurements. If you want to debate the conclusions that scientists draw from that fine, but the facts themselves are not debatable. The crackpots you cite are very selective about what facts they want to talk about, and the ones that are relevant to the issue aren't the facts they want to talk about. It is just silly to talk about this in terms of liberals and conservatives, except for the fact that conservatives either don't understand, or don't want to talk about, the facts. but you have to start there if you want to have a debate.

I'm a scientist myself, and I can tell you if I was as sloppy in my work and selective in my facts as the people you cite, my work would be roundly derided and I would be ostracized from my field. People in the science fields who play fast and loose with the facts are held accountable in public. And that is as it should be. That is what has happened to the crackpots you cite.

You want to review the evidence and challenge assumptions? Fine, that's what we do every single day. Let's review ALL of the relevant evidence, and then you spell out the assumptions you want to challenge, with a rational basis, and float another hypothesis. We'll see if we can test the hypothesis based on availaable evidence and maybe we'll all learn something.

#6 Posted by Tom, CJR on Mon 6 Apr 2009 at 05:39 PM

Ahhh... Richard Lindzen... Mr. "Pretty Much a Salaried Employee of Exxon-Mobile" himself.... of course he's not trying to sell us a bill of goods.

Look Stan, Richard Lindzen HAS HIS BREAD BUTTERED by the oil and coal interests who fund think tanks like the George C Marshall Institute of which he is a member.

I don't know why it's so hard for these pollution cheerleaders to do a little background research on these "scientists" they tout. If Stan actually cared about honesty and factual accuracy, he wouldn't be citing an energy industry hack like Richard Lindzen.

#7 Posted by Hardrada, CJR on Mon 6 Apr 2009 at 08:55 PM

Tom, don't mistake Stan Dup for all the other Stans at CJR. Anybody who tries to nail me to a dogma always but always misses. I've lent aid and comfort to the left more so than the to right, but when time comes to lock and load, I'll be standing with the farmers and those who consider the right to grow food to be a human right. Anybody who doesn't stand with us is on the other side.

#8 Posted by Stan Dup, CJR on Mon 6 Apr 2009 at 09:22 PM

So the brilliant scientist Freeman Dyson is discounted by the left because he's "not an expert on climate science." What was Al Gore's training? Oh yeah -- Divinity School, which he dropped after a year.

#9 Posted by Sam Tyler, CJR on Mon 6 Apr 2009 at 09:48 PM

Tom, et al, btw I wouldn't weigh in on global warming, but since I made such a big scene on the tax-for-obsolete-newspapers discussion, I will do well to declare in this, to avoid confusion.

I'm convinced , by all available evidence, that global climate change is a result of anthropogenic activities. Global carbon-dioxide levels and computer modeling that consistently produces results matching current events provide compelling evidence.

But, daring to lose whatever credibility I gained or salvaged in that other discussion, I'm split on my views of the climate-change-is-a-myth critics.

This is where the news-vs-propaganda game turns close-quarters and ugly. I have long suspected that the populist right - and for that matter the radical left - are largely fed rhetoric intended to shape public dialogue. How they do it is another discussion, but don't go deaf just because I say "They" and don't name them. I'm talking social narrative - the collective voices of diffuse interests. Powers and principalities. Spiritual corruption in high places.

This feeding of wrong-headed ideas to select groups serves two primary purposes:

first it shapes the scope of dialogue in one direction or the other so that the center falls conveniently in the spot where manipulators want it to fall and,

secondly, it can marginalize viewpoints that are inconvenient for whomever claims the middle ground. What better way to confuse a jury about culpability in a crime than to introduce a dozen competing theories of the crime.

In the case of climate change, the argument that is discredited by association with the zany right (sorry friends on the right, bear with me) is the argument that promotion of climate change is being used to consolidate world economic and political power. That part of the climate-change-is-a-myth argument I buy. Global financiers will benefit hugely from global-scale climate-change remediation programs. They will benefit by way of consolidated political power in a global scale.

See, if we would all just reduce our carbon-burning activities -- like long jet trips called "Vacations" and pointless business trips not called "vacations" and instead spend our spare time planting nice things like roses and apple trees and daisies (I like daisies), we would be well on our way to solving the greenhouse gas problem.

But GreenPeace doesn't want that. Of course that's what rank-and-file greenies want, but what GreenPeace's funders want is a strong central government. So they tell their followers, via publications like Mother Jones, that "it's not the 100 things you can do to save the planet, it's only the one thing big oil must do that can save the planet."

And Mother Jones has the paucity of human interest to claim at least once in the past 15 years that those who advocate cultural reforms aren't just ignorant- they are in the way of a political solution. So all those Woodstockers who fell for the "get back to the land and set our souls free" bs didn't realize that "the land" neil young was going back to was his beach-front Malibu real estate, and that there was no political support on the left or the right for a "back-to-the-land" or a "Save-the-farms" movement. During the subsequent 40 years, rural USA was gutted. Subsistence farming came to be considered in some cases a form of child abuse. '

Our moral authority to inspire the rest of the world to a rural, sustainable way of life was ruined. The rest of the world wanted what we had -- a nice buzz, fueled by petroleum and the amazing sense of light, sound and motion it creates. We became addicted to the dopamine-rush of a nice car, a nice tv show, a nice new mansion, a nice speed-boat, a nice airplane ride -- we became pathetic junkies with no way to stop robbing the earth to pay for our habit.

Unfortunately, those Hamiltonian bankers couldn't have been more pleased. And now that we need a nurse

#10 Posted by Stan Dup, CJR on Mon 6 Apr 2009 at 09:54 PM

"At The Intersection, blog, Chris Mooney summed up the feeling of many critics by retorting that 'Dyson’s fame and authority don’t buy him any special deference in this area; science does not work that way. Does Dyson publish top work in this field? That is a far more relevant question.' Mooney also argued that Dawidoff, with little science writing experience, was 'out of his depth' too."

What about the folks on the IPCC panel? Only one is a climatologist.

- The current chair of the IPCC is an environmentalist with a background in electrical engineering.

- The first vice chair has a background in mechanical engineering, with specialties in thermo fluids and heat transfer.

- The second vice chair is a physicist specializing in climate modeling.

- The third vice chair is a bit of a mystery man whose background is rather difficult to locate on the IPCC.

Previous IPCC reports have at times been chaired and co-chaired by economists rather than climatologists. In fact, when Yuri Izrael served as vice chair of the IPCC, he was the only climatologist among the chair and vice-chairs, and he was the only one to dissent from the idea of man-made global warming.

I'm not saying they are unqualified because of their backgrounds. However, criteria for judging qualifications must be applied universally. In short, be very careful to be precise in saying why someone is "out of his depth."

This is rarely given fair treatment by the media, whic focus on the "consensus" of "scientists" when discussing reports that are sometimes authored by people without any special training in climatology.

Reports in the mainstream media refer to "global warming deniers" and "flat earthers" and "crackpots" and "oil industry" flunkies. But those those who support the concept of anthropogenic global warming are rarely if ever treated with anything near the same level of skepticism.

When people see that, they begin to use words like "cover-up" and "liberal bias."

What's needed is a much more transparent discussion of global warming, not stepped up efforts to silence, discredit or fire those who challenge it (even if they are wrong).

That's especially true of the media, who should be promoting free speech and scientific inquiry rather than discouraging it.

When you consistently belittle arguments against global warming, while launching ad hominem attacks against those presenting such arguments, you run the risk of alienating a populace already largely convinced of media bias. And when Google "global warming" and see things like the Senate Minority Report, they wonder why global warming dissent gets so little coverage in the media.

That's bad news for journalism.

#11 Posted by Mike, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 10:44 AM

How about someone who has a degree in common sense? A masters in politically incorrect speach and a doctorate in keep it real. Maybe we can hear from them. Man made global warming is a business. Let's get some righteous indignation going about the fool's that perpetuate this bilge, just like our indignation with the money and industry ceo's.

#12 Posted by paul, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 11:20 AM

Causing problems then forcing a solution is the oldest despots trick in the book.

If critics can be made to look as if they are denying a real problem - which can be done by making sure the problem is real -- the forced solution seems all that much plausible.

#13 Posted by Stan Dup, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 11:43 AM

First of all, there is no amount of transparent discussion that will convince the "liberal bias" freaks that it doesn't exist in today's media. The shrieks of "liberal bias" has paid the right too many dividends in intimidating the legacy media and forcing them to hire any number of wingnut welfare cases without regard to talent. No evidence of "liberal bias" is ever demonstrated, save a poll taken back in 1980 that the majority of reporters were registered Democrats. Of course, political party registration doesn't prove a thing; these fanatics can never actually show bias in the news product. But that doesn't stop the shrieking, and it doesn't stop the legacy press from cowering under the desk in the newsroom.

Secondly, if these global warming crackpots had any evidence, as in measurable data, that global warming wasn't occurring, they haven't produced it. And if they had a rational alternative theory about why the globe was warming, they haven't articulated it. Thus they are rightfully called flat-earthers and crackpots. Instead the best they can com up with is, ...wait for it! -- a masters in "politically incorrect speach"[sic] and doctorate in "keep it real." Uh huh.

Of course, these crackpots can always get a full hearing over at Washington Post.

#14 Posted by James, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 12:06 PM

"No evidence of "liberal bias" is ever demonstrated, save a poll taken back in 1980 that the majority of reporters were registered Democrats. Of course, political party registration doesn't prove a thing; these fanatics can never actually show bias in the news product. But that doesn't stop the shrieking, and it doesn't stop the legacy press from cowering under the desk in the newsroom."

That's not true.

You need look no further than the most recent issue of Journalism and Mass Communication Quarterly (a premiere academic journal that's hardly a bastion of conservatism) to find two studies supporting the idea of liberal bias in segments of the media.

Of course, those journalism professors are probably just "crackpots."

#15 Posted by Mike, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 12:24 PM

"Secondly, if these global warming crackpots had any evidence, as in measurable data, that global warming wasn't occurring, they haven't produced it. And if they had a rational alternative theory about why the globe was warming, they haven't articulated it. Thus they are rightfully called flat-earthers and crackpots."

I should add that this ignores the fact that alternative theories related to global warming have indeed been put forth. For those "deniers" who admit the existence of global warming (as opposed to arguing that it's a variation with historical precedent), sun activity appears to be the primary alternative theory. All you have to do is look at something as simple as Wikipedia to see mention "Solar Variation" as an alternative theory under the topic of "Global Warming."

Looking at the minority report from the senate, one sees a number of seemingly well-credentialed scientists who support such alternative theories of climate change. Are they all "crackpots"? Does the act of exploring alternative theories of global warming, by definition, make one a "crackpot"?

Reading discussions of global warming in the media, it would seem so.

#16 Posted by Mike, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 12:49 PM

As long as readers believe life's important questions are a matter of liberalism and conservatism, and that humanity's collective discussion is represented primarily in political terms, there will be both liberal bias and conservative bias in the media.

That's all these frat boys and sorority sisters know, except hatred, which we can see in the way they call their critics "crackpots."

#17 Posted by Stan Dup, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 01:04 PM

That study you cite has been thoroughly discredited by all but the most ideological rightwing fanatics. Here's what that preposterous study was measuring:

"If a member of Congress cites a think tank approvingly, and if that think tank is also cited by a news organization, then the news organization has a "bias" making it an ideological mirror of the member of Congress who cited the think tank. This, as Groseclose and Milyo define it, is what constitutes "media bias.""

I mean, can't you do better than that kind of silliness? As I said, there is absolutely no evidence that anyone can produce that there exists, today, "liberal bias" in the legacy media.

Next, exactly what evidence is there that "solar variation" be a plausible explanation for the warming of the globe that has been measured. Does the explanation have any data whatsoever to support it, or did someone just pull that out of his hat? I mean, we all could think of a favorite theory why that is happening but is there any data to support the theory? If so, please cite a peer-reviewed article. Otherwise, you are just blowing smoke.

If you actually read the Wikipedia entry, it claims that the actual data show that solar variation isn't sufficient to explain the trends in increasing average temperature. But that would be inconvenient for you, wouldn't it?

That's right, I call them "crackpots" until they come forth with some facts and reproducible data that supports their nutzoid claims. The "minority report" in the Senate? What so-called well-credentialed scientists do they cite? Mark Morano, funded by Richard Mellon Scaife Foundation. Give me a break.

#18 Posted by James, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 03:16 PM

Predictably snarky, James. And just as predictably short-sighted.

The articles (I note you reduced it to one for some reason) that I referenced come from the Autumn 2008 issue of JMCQ and are not a reference to Groseclose and Milyo (2003). Perhaps you read criticism of the Groseclose and Milyo piece long ago, found it supported your own beliefs and left it at that?

At any rate, the two most recent studies found "partisan (i.e., pro-Democratic) bias" in network TV coverage of the economy (Lowry) and "most stories favoring Democratic and other liberal candidates" during the 2006 elections (Fico and Freedman). These researchers are widely published and well-respected in the field, though I suppose the fact that they conducted a study that found liberal bias in the media makes them "crackpots" in your book and prompt a trashing of their reputations (no doubt intended to promote a free and open dialogue of the subject.)

Note that I'm not saying these studies, in and of themselves "prove" liberal bias or anything else. What I *am* saying is that we cannot continue to stick our heads in the sand and brush off claims that the media have a liberal bias. It is obvious in their treatment of a wide variety of social issues. And it's just as obvious if you, for example, attend a journalism conference where Bush, Reagan, Clinton or Obama come up. (Guess which ones get booed/sneered at and which ones get cheered appreciatively... every single time.)

For my own part, I'm a middle-of-the-roader. I would argue that neither conservative nor liberal viewpoints should dominate the "legacy" media. But both deserve to be given fair and full treatment. That's hard enough to pull off when conservatives, moderates, liberals and others are equally represented in a newsroom. It's virtually impossible when they are not.

#19 Posted by Mike, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 04:50 PM

Oh yeah, well if you go to an Associated Press conference you'll see Ron Fournier and Liz Sidoti sucking up to John McCain YouTube - John McCain's Media: AP Reporters give him some nice donuts. Sprinkles! My favorite! That proves that AP is biased in favor of the right.

Get off that tired old "liberal bias" crap. It's old. It doesn't exist. I realize that it has served you rightwingers well to lard the legacy media with rightwing ideologues with all your wingnut welfare. CNN and MSNBC are crawling with ex-bushies, and so is Washington Post. To say nothing of the outright rightwing rags like Politico, Wa Times, NY Post, Fox News. Okay? That you rightwing ideologues are not "equally represented" in newsrooms is a big crock. You are nothing but crybabies and it wears thin.

I note that you "referenced" studies without links. Yeah, that really proves ...something. Not what you think it does though.

#20 Posted by James, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 05:16 PM

If we had more reporters like James, we could just shut down media and have a good old-fashioned genocide.

There is liberal bias in the media. I was a reporter and I reported with a liberal bias. Had I been more conservatively oriented, I would have reported with a conservative bias. I took my liberal bias to mostly liberal companies, and to a CPB-funded project. Were I more conservatively oriented, I would've gone toward Fox news.

Then, having told us hatred and namecalling is okay, we get more of the tired old rehash-- let's reduce the climate change discussion to a matter of is it or isn't it, and leave the policy debate unreported. Of course, if global warming is human caused, there is no policy to debate. We just do whatever our Democrat leaders tell us. And if we decide it's not, then our thinking is equally well complete, requiring no further need to think.

#21 Posted by Stan Dup, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 06:10 PM

Somewhere it was written"
"I note that you "referenced" studies without links. Yeah, that really proves ...something. Not what you think it does though"

It proves:
A. that the writer is willing to hold someone else responsible for the writer's own frustration
B. that the writer would rather blame someone else for not opening a door on his behalf than to simply open the door.
B. that the writer's standard of proof is not consistent with the p95 standard familiar to most scientists.

#22 Posted by Abacan, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 06:16 PM

Actually it means that you don't have peer-reviewed articles from reputable journals to back up your nutty claims.

You have no evidence of any kind of 'liberal bias'in the legacy media, and you have no evidence of your flat-earth solar-variation-causes-global-warming either.

And here I provided you with video proof of rightwing bias at the Associated Press. There is no liberal bias in the legacy media. Indeed the national press is very, very conservative.

Yeah, that's pretty clever, ummm, "shutting down media" and having genocide. Oh wait. No it isn't. Actually it goes to my "nutty claims by rightwingers" evidence.

#23 Posted by James, CJR on Tue 7 Apr 2009 at 06:57 PM

James,James,James.....If you didn't notice the pro-Obama bias during the campaign you were either dead or in an ICU unconcious.You couldn't turn on the TV without some reporter(et)saying that Obama was a rock star and McCain, well he's the old tired white guy from the dark ages.
1)Just days after Obama won the Iowa Caucus, NBC News correspondent lee Cowan, unashamedly, said that" it's almost hard to remain objective" when covering Obama because "it's infectious, the energy,"when Obama speaks to big crowds.2)Atlantic magazine hired a photographer who intentionally shot John McCain looking like a monster with his facial incisions up close, and this was for their OCTOBER cover. Turns out she was a self described "hardcore democrat" who later commented that "it was probably irresponsible for Atlantic to hire me."3)Then Harry Smith at CBS when Obama delivered his acceptance speech at Invesco Field, emotionally said " I'm just not so sure I've ever witnessed anything like this in all of the politics I've covered, which goes back quite a few years." OR David Gergen commenting on the same speach "In many ways," Gergen full of verve, "it was less a speech than a symphony. It moved quickly, it had high tempo, at times inspiring, then it became intimate, slower-It was a masterpiece." You could almost become hyper-glycemic listening to this *objectivity*
Project for excellence in Journalism looked at more than 2400 stories from (48) news outlets during the critical six week period from September through the end of the Presidential debates in mid-October and their central findingBarack Obama = good, and John McCain = bad.George Mason University study on 585 TV news stories in August and September and guess what Obama 65% positive to John McCain 36% positive.by network CBS NBC ABCObama 73% 56% 57%McCain 31% 16% 42%4)Chris Mathews on Leno (Barack and Michelle) "cool people. They are really cool. They're Jack and Jackie Kennedy when you see them together. They are cool. And they're great looking and they're cool....Everything seems to be great.I know I'm selling him now. I'm not supposed to sell."Yeah, James, the network and mainstream print media are liberal, but they are supposed to be objective. As for FOX they have many liberal guests on, but you agree with them and think they are reasonalbe and really regular folks. The problem is with the conservatives, to you they are not just wrong....they make you upset so they are more easily remembered. I get the same feeling (waves of nausea) about incompetence in journalism. Man made global warming is a game to some, a serious issue to some but to many it is all about the money. Gobs and gobs of cash and as we have stated before. The sold out pseudo- scientists waiting for another infusion of cash from Uncle Sam have sold their souls to the devil for 30 pieces of silver.

#24 Posted by paul, CJR on Wed 8 Apr 2009 at 10:23 PM

That's just silly. I reject your examples. Bias isn't the same thing as "stuff I don't like." What about when 24 journalists went to a big drunken barbecue and lavish resort with McCain. How about reporters from Time and Washington Post fabricating anti-Obama stories and quotes, how about all those drunken Karokes with Time Mag and Newsweek staff with McCain campaign lobbyists? Associated press reporters giving McCain a standing ovation on television. Time magazine giving Guiliani a cover story naming him America's Mayor. Ron Fournier's emails sucking up to Karl Rove. I could come up with a million examples of conservative bias in the mainstream media. Your examples don't prove a thing. Oooooh someone took a picture of McCain you didn't like! Liberal bias! (eyeroll) Quit whining, victim.

Your citing that silly survey doesn't prove a thing. A story was scored "positive" if the reporter said the polls show the candidate is ahead, and "negative" if the reporter said the candidate was behind in the polls. What does that prove? Maybe lack of innumeracy but it doesn't prove bias. What? They are not supposed to report actual poll results during a campaign for fear of offending tender rightwing sensitivities?

Oh yeah? You prove that climate scientists are receiving "gobs and gobs of cash" from the government.

On the other hand, it is undeniable that Exxon, Dow Chemical, and Richard Mellon Scaife Foundation are the major funders of anti-climate change groups.

Why are you a such a shill for Exxon? I'll bet you are dong it for free too. Fool.

#25 Posted by James, CJR on Thu 9 Apr 2009 at 01:33 AM

@James
Some hated examples are not a trend. What kind of argument is that? There are probably thousands of examples on both sides, the point is consistant arrogance and bias in the media is undeniable and has a liberal bent. Number 1) Conservative not right wing. Number 2) This country was founded on principles that seem to escape you. Number 3) Liberty and Free enterprise allows anyone to aspire to be what they want to be ie rich, poor, engaged, non-contributing, ruthless idealog, religious, or just plain. Number 4) Debate is good, but trying to stifle debate is not good. Number 5) Free speach is for all not just "the enlightened elite". Number 6) Name calling is childish. When President Obama won the election he didn't realize how bad the economy was and he had to lay off 17 journalists. A little conservative humor. Have a great holiday weekend.

#26 Posted by James, CJR on Thu 9 Apr 2009 at 10:09 AM

Nisbet says: "On the other hand, the strategist in me worries that the sophisticated article and Dyson’s lone wolf views will be used as more fodder by conservatives committed to blocking climate action at any cost."

True, but this is not the most troubling aspect of the whole affair.

There is a nagging feeling that the massive media exposure of Dyson's contrarian views (NYT and Newsweek in the same week) is just one link in a sophisticated PR campaign designed to get those views into the mainstream. It would be interesting to know the "chain of awareness" that led to the Dawidoff interview.

Even more troubling is Dyson's past willing complicity in PR campaigns against the AGW scientific consensus. He signed the infamous Oregon petition, the Bali open letter to the U.N. (late 2007) and the Manhattan Declaration (March, 2008). The latter two were co-ordinated by Tom Harris, a longtime PR climate disinformation specialist, formerly of APCO Worldwide.

While there is no evidence that Dyson is corrupt or insincere, the hard questions that he needs to be asked include:

a) How does Dyson reconcile the specific contradictions between the above joint statements and some of his other statements on climate change?

b) What were the circumstances leading to his signature? By whom and how was he contacted? What due diligence was performed?

c) Does Dyson know or care that these campaigns were funded directly or indirectly by fossil fuel interests?

(Search SourceWatch.org for info on Tom Harris and related orgnizations like Friends of Science, Natural Resources Stewardship Project and International Climate Science Coalition.)

And the other obvious question: Why is no one in the media asking these questions, or even aware of these issues? My guess is it's a combination gullibility and lack of time or resources.

#27 Posted by DeepClimate.org, CJR on Fri 10 Apr 2009 at 04:27 PM