So where the science is not settled, put in the assumptions that give you your desired result. Work from the story to the reality, not the reality to the story.

Some of you might be interested in the strange case of Joe Romm and Enron via Romm’s defunct Center for Center for Energy and Climate Solutions.” If anyone knows what happened to his nonprofit, let me know. http://www.masterresource.org/2009/06/market-conservation-vs-government-conservationism-understanding-the-limits-to-energy-efficiency-and-new-economy-escos/

Minor issue in the final collapse, maybe, but Ken Lay did bet his company on AGW. I went back to double check my memory. From a William L. Anderson piece posted at Mises.org: “Lay, a member of the Union of Concerned Scientists, a radical environmentalist and anti-free-market organization, supported the disastrous Kyoto Accords on “global warming.” Enron had banked on trading permits for carbon dioxide emissions, which would have been based upon the existing permit system for sulfur dioxide emissions from coal-burning electric power plants. When the Bush administration refused to sign the Kyoto treaty, however, Enron was left out in the cold.”

Also, there is this article from the Financial Post: http://network.nationalpost.com/np/blogs/fpcomment/archive/2009/05/29/lawrence-solomon-enron-s-other-secret.aspx and this blog post from masterresource.org: http://www.masterresource.org/2009/12/power-politics-enron-lives/#more-6063 from which there is much source material to peruse.

As I said, this was a root cause. Had Enron remaind a gas producer and pipeline operator, this would never have happened.

Yep. Extreme black ops stuff there.

Ausie Dan ..’What do scientists do in this situation?

Attempt to publish a peer-reviewed paper. Oh, yeah…

I used to write, and sign research grant proposals for single companies, multi-company consortiums and consortiums that included University researchers. I usually signed the final reports and decided what was public and what was not. L.T. hasn’t said that much, what he/she has said is correct to the best of my knowledge — and I do know some of the players in the national and international arena. I could fill in a lot of blanks but many people I know still take research dollars — and they don’t need to be harassed. Nobody would know most of the people — and most would not care who we were and what we were about.

What I can confirm on the AGW research side is that there are a few camps — ranging from those with religious fervor to people who take the money so they can fiddle their books and re-direct into what they consider to be “real” and commercial valuable research. I did not take the money for the AGW projects — but I believe people I know did. I never checked and did not want to know — because they considered the research to be of no value and intended to re-direct the money. I had the same opinion of the research but simply could not bring myself to take the money. They just wanted the money and their name on some papers with a prominent research institution funding them.