See Andy Revkin here and Gleick’s blog here.
Since the release in mid-February of a series of documents related to the internal strategy of the Heartland Institute to cast doubt on climate science, there has been extensive speculation about the origin of the documents and intense discussion about what they reveal. Given the need for reliance on facts in the public climate debate, I am issuing the following statement.
At the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy. It contained information about their funders and the Institute’s apparent efforts to muddy public understanding about climate science and policy. I do not know the source of that original document but assumed it was sent to me because of my past exchanges with Heartland and because I was named in it.
Given the potential impact however, I attempted to confirm the accuracy of the information in this document. In an effort to do so, and in a serious lapse of my own and professional judgment and ethics, I solicited and received additional materials directly from the Heartland Institute under someone else’s name. The materials the Heartland Institute sent to me confirmed many of the facts in the original document, including especially their 2012 fundraising strategy and budget. I forwarded, anonymously, the documents I had received to a set of journalists and experts working on climate issues. I can explicitly confirm, as can the Heartland Institute, that the documents they emailed to me are identical to the documents that have been made public. I made no changes or alterations of any kind to any of the Heartland Institute documents or to the original anonymous communication.
I will not comment on the substance or implications of the materials; others have and are doing so. I only note that the scientific understanding of the reality and risks of climate change is strong, compelling, and increasingly disturbing, and a rational public debate is desperately needed. My judgment was blinded by my frustration with the ongoing efforts — often anonymous, well-funded, and coordinated — to attack climate science and scientists and prevent this debate, and by the lack of transparency of the organizations involved. Nevertheless I deeply regret my own actions in this case. I offer my personal apologies to all those affected.
Peter Gleick
No one should feel any satisfaction in these events, which have been highly damaging to everyone touched by them, including both Heartland and Gleick.
Climate Audit 
521 Comments
Hmmm, Gleick now says that he got an “anonymous document in the mail” (i.e. the fake memo) “at the beginning of 2012” and afterwards dishonestly obtained documents from heartland:
Still doesn’t make sense, though the admissions to date are devastating to him.
“Hmmm, Gleick now says that he got an “anonymous document in the mail” (i.e. the fake memo) …”
No. Gleick did not specify that the “anonymous document in the mail” was what we know as the Fake Memo. He (or rather, his lawyers) may wish you to beleive he said that, but he did not say that.
This movie-dialogue comes to my mind.
– Those are his words?
– Do they sound like his words?
– He can’t be clear when clarity is exactly what he wants to avoid.
A dialogue between Robert Ritter (played by Henry Czerny) and James Cutter (played by Harris Yulin), from the 1994 movie “Clear And Present Danger”
If Dr. Gleick wishes to be forgiven then he must give a detailed and fully transparent account of what he has committed. I agree that this confession does not appear to do so. It is notable more for the details omitted than for his confessions.
There are some other steps he should take immediately. I hope that they occur to him before others demand it of him.
Excellent observation. The “anonymous document” could be the budget from his description. Not saying one way or the other, but yes he has not identified the anonymous document and he has not denied he authored the fake document. It’s not in his press release.
He says the 1st document he received in the mail named him.
There is only 1 document that names him.
“There is only 1 document that names him.”
There is only 1 document we have that names him. He does not claim that the “anonymous document” allegedly sent to him is the document we are calling the Fake Memo. Nor does he claim to have released the “anonymous document”.
It remains entirely consistent with his “confession” that the “anonymous document” and the Fake Memo are two different documents, one of which we have, and the other which we do not. One which was sent to Gleick, the other which was authored by Gleick.
And of course, it is only necessary for the explanation to remain consistent with Gleick’s “confession” if one assumes that he is being 100% truthful. That assumption is obviously not warranted.
Why do you assume Gleick still has documents in his possession which he did not release? That seems to be an entirely unwarranted assumption.
Hmmm – twitter silence for a few days – time for ‘semi plausible explanation’?
I wonder if these 2 documented events pushed him possibly into a rash action.
ie the style and forbes connection and other feature, make him a candidate for the ‘fake now’ I must accept.
Peter had accused me of being ‘incredibly offensiv’e on twitter (ie i thought my followers would mean like the vile abuse Katie Hayhoe had receieved.’
And it TOOK THREE climate scientists, Dr Tamsin Edwards, Prof Richard Betts (met Office, IPCC), AND Prof Katie Hayhoe herself to get him to back down..
in the email exchanges (published with permission) that followed Peter Gleicks thoughts about me, his worldview to ‘sceptics’ and his attitude to Dr Tamsin Edwards is very enlightening. ..
http://www.realclimategate.org/2012/02/clarifications-and-how-better-to-communicate-science/
What started this is Peter took issue with Dr Edwards blog name, where he pulled the senior scientist card (rather assertively, because some sceptics liked it (me) and it should be said UK climate scientists liked it as well!
http://allmodelsarewrong.com/all-blog-names-are-wrong/
This made me wonder, a bit, just after Heartland..
Barry you missed a peach from the ‘all blog names are wrong thread’
physicist Jonathan Jones:
@nmrqip: @richardabetts Yep. Lying “to avoid being misunderstood” never ends well @PeterGleick @flimsin (23 Jan 12)
Steve, I agree the current version of events “does not make sense”.
Dr. Gleick states:
– he received the “Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy” document anonymously in the mail,
– he then obtained additional Heartland Institute documents with the intent to verify the Confidential Memo,
– he verified the Confidential Memo, and then
– he included the verified document in a package of documents he sent to various organizations which could be expected to publish them.
However, the additional HI documents do not verify, and in some instances contradict, the anonymously received Confidential Memo. Examples include:
– there is no proof in the other documents that the HI uses the phrase “undermine the official United Nation’s IPCC reports”
– nor the phrase “keep opposing voices out”
– nor the phrase “dissuading teachers from teaching science”
– nor that HI “paid a team of writers $388,000 in 2011”
– nor that the Koch Foundation “returned as a Heartland donor in 2011 with a contribution of $200,000”
Most reasonable people would conclude the additional documents obtained by Dr. Gleick demonstrated the “Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy”. was a forgery. I consider it reasonable to expect even an advocate to question the validity of the anonymously received document, and to not include it in the package passed on.
Dr. Gleick’s claimed sequence of events and actions does not make sense.
You are assuming the memo was the anonymous document. If that assumption is wrong that Gleicks confession could be entirely true AND he could still be guilty of forging the memo.
He says the 1st document he received by mail named him. Only 1 document names him.
He does not say, however, that he included the original anonymous document into the released package. Gleick makes weasels envy him with his public non-apology.
So, Gleick claims he received the fake document early this year. How does that tally with the forensic evidence about it being scanned to hide identifiers, and the lack of letterhead, signature etc? Does he just believe any piece of paper that someone sends him if it tallies with his worldview? Or is there more to be revealed?
As for seeking evidence, he wasn’t looking very carefully as he swallowed the mistake about the Koch contribution hook, line and sinker.
You need to consider carefully what Gleick is claiming.
If the following (purely speculative) series of events happened, would it contradict anything Gleick wrote in his blog?:
1. Early 2012, Gleick is given an internal Heartland document that mentions him.
2. Gleick attempts to get more documents, but is unsuccessful.
3. Gleick impersonates a Heartland board member and asks to have the documents sent.
4. Gleick receives the documents, reads them, and authors the fake strategy memo.
5. Gleick forwards the real Heartland documents along with the fake strategy memo.
This is really damning for Gleick.
The fake doc has the date written as January 2012, but the scan of the document is February 13. The documents were leaked barely a full day later, on the 15th. Yet Gleick says:
At the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy….
Given the potential impact however, I attempted to confirm the accuracy of the information in this document. In an effort to do so, and in a serious lapse of my own and professional judgment and ethics, I solicited and received additional materials directly from the Heartland Institute under someone else’s name.
“the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy“That is the fake memo, yes? If so, is Gleick saying he scanned the doc or is he claiming he got the scanned doc from the source? If it’s the former, why did he scan it? If it’s the latter, that isn’t very much time to verify anything. If the scanned memo is what he claims to be his original anonymous document, me thinks he’s gotten himself into deep deep manure.
Seems clear enough. He got a piece of paper in the mail. And when it came time to send out his collection by email, he scanned it.
well, the paper is missing any evidence of a fold. Second, If he had the document in early january, then some of his comments after this make little sense.
your comment strikes me like one of those made by skeptics. There is an explanation for the warming. GHGs
Pointing out that it might be something else is trival and does not take account of the best evidence.
For example: any insider at Heartland would know that Revkin was reviled. I doubt that an insider would know about the animus between Gleick and Curry. And the insider would not know one of Gleicks cherished phrases
‘anti climate’ not anti climate science.. but anti climate. That term exists exclusively within the
walls of greendom. They would also have to know how to emulate gleicks extemporaneus writing style.
in short, the consilience of evidence points toward gleick. In the same way we argue that the consilience of evidence points toward GHGs being the cause of warming. Multiple lines of evidence.
SHHHUSSH Steven. Just look what a wonderfully mosaic pattern Nick’s web has, stop paying attention to its diaphanousness.
No folds means nothing… 9 x 12 envelopes are rather easily purchased for all manner of 8 1/2 x 11 pages – whether this is how it was sent or not is not currently known, and may never be. As to the rest, I concur.
Mark
No, I’m just pointing out that his story about the paper and scanning is simple and consistent. Doesn’t mean it’s right. But as others have pointed out, OCR scanning interprets and recreates the characters. It won’t tell you anything about the appearance of the doc.
I agree that the fact that you could finger Gleick based on style is persuasive.
Steven,
The post office, quit conspicuously, offers document mailers that handle letter and legal size documents without folding. Abusing (if that’s the right word) commas, and parentheses, is not particularly difficult, or unusual (while doing it purposely to imitate someone else is easy). You anti climate types, as usual, are clutching at straws (but we understand why).
Cheers,
James Cameron (no really, I’m him)
Dear James,
Some of us have been playing cat and mouse attempting to impersonate others on electronic message boards for decades. It’s like playing poker and looking for ‘tells’. Nothing mysterious or new about it. I had a particularly bad tell that I wasn’t aware for quite some time. I would put a space between the end of a sentence and either an exclamation or question mark ! Once someone told me I was doing it I quit it from thence forward. Of course that’s circumstantial evidence and inadmissible in court of law so take it for what it’s worth. The court of public opinion is, of course, a different story altogether. As we all know, if the meta data don’t fit you must acquit. What we must ask ourselves here is that if the meta data does fit must we convict?
Your friend,
Johnny Cochran
Nick…. I stand corrected on why he scanned it. That would of course make sense (sometimes I’m a little slow).
Interestingly enough, the veracity of his claims rests on whether or not he can produce e-mail that shows he communicated with someone else, anyone else, that he had the one damning doc and was working to get more info from Heartland or something. Of course, it would have helped had he scanned the doc right when he got it.
That said, the fact that the doc in question uses language that is not found in the other collection of documents, yet is shown to match that of Gleicks advocacy against skeptics. Here is part of the faked memo:
And here is Gleick, slamming Donna Laframboise’s book via a review on Amazon:
Granted, two words do not automatically show that he wrote the fake doc. That said, those of us who write a lot have our own linguistic quirks, our own personal style. Unless you are trained in the art of writing dialog, or something along those lines, these quirks and ticks typically go unnoticed by the writer. Again, the use of the words “influential” and “anti-climate” don’t prove that he wrote the fake, but the use of the same words and language does not help his cause.
Ooops, the Gleick quote on Dl should look like this:
“This book is a stunning compilation of lies, misrepresentations, and falsehoods about the fundamental science of climate change. It compiles the old arguments, long refuted, about the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which summarizes the state of science on climate change. The IPCC reports — the most comprehensive summary of climate science in the world — are so influential and important, that they must be challenged by climate change deniers, who have no other science to stand on. LaFramboise recycles these critiques in a form bound to find favor with those who hate science, fear science, or are afraid that if climate change is real and caused by humans then governments will have to act (and they hate government)….
None of the envelope conjecture or NS’s BS matter. If ,as he claims, he received the forged document first why did he bother to solicit crimally the rest. By his own words the most damaging document was already in his hands. Why on earth would someone be soooo stupid as to keep a defamatory document, commit a felony to add to it and then aggravate that felony by sending it all to the press??
Sheer stupidity as revealed in the CG1 and CG2 episodes.
Don –
After thinking about it for a while, I’m inclined to agree with your theory that this may be careful speaking. Gleick mentions that he received a document an “describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy.” He doesn’t identify it with the “Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy” document. He later says “I made no changes or alterations of any kind to any of the Heartland Institute documents or to the original anonymous communication.” He doesn’t say that the original anonymous document was included in his email along with the Heartland docs.
The impression given is that the document we’ve all seen with the title “Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy” is that anonymous document, unchanged. And Gleick was not its author. But there’s some wiggle room in his words.
On the other hand, this close textual analysis isn’t really to the point, is it? It’s not as though Gleick is speaking under oath. Aside from the revelation that it was Gleick who pretexted, if we just ignore the remainder of Gleick’s statement, we’re left with all of the evidence that the Climate Strategy document is fake, and the hints that it might have been Gleick who wrote it.
“I made no changes or alterations of any kind to any of the Heartland Institute documents or to the original anonymous communication.”
Of course, if he wrote it, then he could say that he didn’t change it after he was done creating it.
Gleick: “At the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy”
Question – is there anything in the strategy doc reference stuff that has happened since the beginning of 2012? Or any documents or donations that had not occurred at the time that Gleick was supposed to have received it.
Just wanting to check and verify of course – timeline becomes pretty important here.
Is he claiming he received the faked document, that summarized the stolen material, before the stolen material was created? Depends on what the “beginning of 2012” means I suppose. HI should be able to refine the required timeline.
The document that pointed to Gleick was the fake Strategy document. Without it, there would have been no reason to suspect Gleick. The fake memo has stylistic properties that pointed to Gleick, though they fell short of proof. Gleick is going to remain under suspicion as the author of the fake memo, with his present confession being a Nixon-style limited hang-out.
My point is that if there is anything in the strategy memo which references something that did not occur until late Jan, or better yet until Feb, it would blow the story about receiving it at the beginning of the year out of the water.
@Copner —
I don’t see any late events in the climate strategy memo. Possibly the latest event is the support for Watts, but that was in 2011 according to one of the other memos: “Heartland has agreed to help Anthony raise $88,000 for the project in 2011.”
It seems obvious that the faked document was authored using elements of the other documents to feign authenticity – specifically these documents, I’d suggest, and not including other unseen documents. I find it hard to believe that the author of the faked document did not have access to the very same, and only the same, cache of documents which Gleick obtained. On balance, when also considering the stylistic elements of the faked document, I find it impossible to reconcile Gleick’s account with the evidence at hand. I rather feel that Gleick has inadvertently confirmed that he authored the fake document.
I am not disputing your conclusion but for the record I think you made one misstatement. The strategy memo say, “[Charles G. Koch Foundation] returned as a Heartland donor in 2011 with a contribution of $200,000.” Koch denies that they contributed $200K and that point appears nowhere else in the documents.
That line was apparently fabricated as opposed to being lifted from another document. It would be interesting to learn where the author got that notion. Or perhaps the author was relying on the fact that the 990s for 2011 wouldn’t be publicly available for another year.
The figure of $200,000 comes from the projected donation for 2012 in the fundraising doc. In other words the amount HI were hoping to raise from the Koch Foundation this coming year. It’s likely that the forger either simply read the wrong column or assumed the money had already been promised.
Thank you. I see the figure.
“Nixon-style limited hang-out.”
Interesting you picked that. The first thing I thought of when I read his letter was something from the same era; Flip Wilson’s “The devil made me do it.”
Whilst there is no proof that Peter Gleick was the author of the fake strategy document, there is a flip-side to this. The real, unknown, author knew who to target, by appealing to Gleick’s vanity in inflating his ego and imitating his style very effectively. So effectively that it is very clear that it is not from Heartland, but pointed to Gleick as the most likely author. It suggests a super-mind who was willing to sacrifice a leading scientist’s career to damage a skeptic organisation, but not so intelligent as to be able to mimic the house-style of the Heartland Institute to convince the public it was from Heartland. This was so effective, that Gleick was still convinced of its truth after over 30 nights to sleep on it. Even if the tangible evidence could be explained, this story does not gel together awfully well.
Steve, is this what is meant by a “Nixon-style limited hang-out”?
Re: Copner (Feb 20 20:57),
Copner asked:
Question – is there anything in the strategy doc reference stuff that has happened since the beginning of 2012? Or any documents or donations that had not occurred at the time that Gleick was supposed to have received it.
The answer is, of course, that it depends, though not in this case on what the meaning of “is” is. It depends on what the meaning of “[a]t the beginning of 2012” is. If it’s a date before January 16th, none of the genuine documents (other than the Form 990) had been created. The Board Directory is dated January 25th, and the date of the minutes is January 29th. So “[a]t the beginning of 2012” would have to mean the beginning of February for all of the genuine documents to have been available to the fabricator, assuming it took no more than a couple of days for him to acquire copies after the originals were created.
But he also says the documents are identical to what her received. Implying that the single ‘fake’ originated with Heartland itself.
He does imply that the strategy document originated at Heartland, but he doesn’t go so far as to say that. If you read Gleick’s article with the presumption that he wrote the strategy document, you’ll see that every statement therein would be accurate, though some would be disingenuous.
No, I don’t agree. He doesn’t the original mailed doc is part of the Heartland emailed bunch. He could have said he didn’t get that doc out of Heartland but that would be too unambiguous, I guess.
I read it that the “early 2012” anonymous document, which started it all, is the (fake) climate strategy document. Gleick wrote, “At the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy.” He writes that he received the *fundraising* strategy document from Heartland.
But he does not say it was the strategy document. He simply encourages that assumption.
Bingo. As veteran CA readers know, always watch for the pea very carefully.
But he says the first document he received named him.
The only document that named him is the strategy doc.
I have had occasion to post documents to myself at home from a distant work address.
Ha. So it wasn’t necessarily the strategy document that he received in the post and it wasn’t necessarily someone else who posted it. That leaves a lot of options open.
“now says …”
What did he say prior to “now”? Your previous article, and other blogs, commented on his “curious silence”.
He was silent and now speaks?
A small matter, but given that this will surely be a long and drawn out discussion of who said what, when, and presumably, how the narrative changes over time, it would be nice if the language used was clear on exactly where the starting point is.
FWIW– I had to spend a bit of time rereading various web sites to make sure that these were in fact Dr. Gleick’s first words on the subject.
It was an elected Member of the United States National Academy of Sciences. Was he peer reviewed on this publication?
How ironic. What first caught Mosher’s eye was the style of language and the fact that Gleick himself is mentioned in the strategy document. Now he’s not admitting to any of that. Gleick is like the energizer bunny with a shovel. He keeps digging and digging…
Compare and contrast — Anthony Watts’ reactions and actions vs. Gleick’s reaction to receipt of the document and follow up actions. Even if one believes his story, he looks really bad.
A lot of lawyering went into Gleick’s statement.
I’m guessing the original document he received in the mail has already been destroyed.
That would be really dumb.
If the document exists, he is under obligation to keep it, because it would be discoverable in a lawsuit, and he should have been under reasonable apprehension of a suit for some days.
If he had the document & destroyed it, the court might interpret that as destruction of evidence, and for the purpose of the lawsuit refuse to allow him to make claims that the document existed.
(IANAL but I read John Grisham)
It would be a very big mistake for Gleick to have destroyed the original document. The Sarah Palin hacker was convicted of an obstruction of justice felony for destroying computer files that would be evidence in the hacking case (where the hack itself was only a misdemeanor.)
You may be right, Steve. On the other hand, if he was the person who created the document, he might be in more trouble for having done that than for having destroyed it in a fit of fear over having sent it out.
As for “big mistake(s)”, he’s proven he’s capable of that.
Pat Frank and I were the only ones naive enough to believe he couldn’t possibly have done what everyone suspected him of doing.
I can’t say you’re wrong, td. My judgment was based on the awkward and non-professional phraseology of the “Confidential Memo.” I still think it’s awkward and non-professional, and I’m still hard-pressed to think someone as well-educated as Peter Gleick could have written it.
But I note that PG phrased his revelation this way, “At the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy. (my bold)”
That’s an ambiguous description. He didn’t name the CM by its official title, Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy. That leaves open the possibility that he received a different anonymous document, with the “Confidential Memo” opportunistically created later. Clearly, this will have to be clarified.
And as to me being hard-pressed into belief, I’ve been nothing but totally blindsided by the AGW circus clowns who used to be sober-sided scientists. I’d never have thought that could have happened, without having seen it myself. A total surprise; now matured to mere amazement, more’s the pity.
“I’ve been nothing but totally blindsided by the AGW circus clowns who used to be sober-sided scientists. I’d never have thought that could have happened, without having seen it myself. A total surprise; now matured to mere amazement, more’s the pity.”
This could have been me writing! I wonder how many others?
I suppose I must always have had a much darker view of human nature, since the warmists have behaved exactly as I thought they would, at every step of the way.
And because of that, I now am certain that they are going to get even more vicious and frantic now. They aren’t going to ever give up, they will throw away their money, their reputation, their organizations just to – well, I was going to say “win” but that’s not an option anymore, so they are going to throw everything away just for an attempt at revenge at those they hate. Namely us. (That’s what Gleick just did)
It’s Ahab and The Whale all over again, and we’re the Great White Whale.
Gleick’s professional epitaph should be:
“From Hell’s Heart I stab at thee! For Hate’s Sake I spit my last breath at thee!!!”
(Moby Dick survived, btw. Ahab didn’t)
WWS said…
“From Hell’s Heart I stab at thee! For Hate’s Sake I spit my last breath at thee!!!”
(Moby Dick survived, btw. Ahab didn’t)
No reason to read the book now, thanks a lot WWS!
Well you can still watch Wrath of Khan.
And wws just spoiled climate science for me! I was so looking forward to see who’d win the climate science superbowl! The Alarmists? Or The Deniers? Ah, maybe I’ll see some more twists until science prevails…
What really make me misanthropic is how anti-scientific hacks have not only capture climate science, but other fields of science too. No names here, so I won’t spoiler anybodies expectations in other fields of science.
wws says:
YES, this is how I see it, too.
In the wake of Climategate 2.0 at WUWT, someone reminded readers that it would take actual criminal prosecution to see the AGW movement beyond the door as a respectable political movement.
EXACTLY, I thought.
But also the Gleick episode only signals the need for an intensification of the unhinged activist-AGWers, the True Believers. EVERYTHING is permitted for the cause. Already today, Daily Kos and DeSmog are heralding their hero Gleick!
I see this “useful idiot” defense of the indefensible among the Left in Australia in the blogs, too.
And here in North America, pre-confession, an LA Times editorial compared Heartland’s fakegate memo with Hitler’s own “Mein Kampf” for daring to suggest that AGW is controversial, ie, they claim that this a Big Lie. Rather than a reasonable statement of fact.
Unhinged and scorched earth is all they know.
Some have compared this to an own goal in soccer. No – it is like several because Gleick’s confession is incomplete, and others just as deranged are lined up to emulate him. There are more scandals to come.
I would only consider Gleick’s apology genuine if he were to say publicly that he wishes there to be no more postings eulogizing him and requesting such postings to be taken down.
Pat,
“… I’m still hard-pressed to think someone as well-educated as Peter Gleick could have written it.”
Keep in mind that if Gleick wrote it, Gleick wouldn’t write it as Gleick. Gleick would write it as Gleick’s internal concept of what a mouth breathing conservative scum sucking sceptic would write. That is clearly how he sees the people he was attempting to screw with. His opinion of them is very low. This is consistent with the tone of the document, which paints its alleged author and Gleick’s professional adversaries with derogatory verbage, but refers to Gleick himself with near honorific terms.
He would also have had problems faking a more professional looking document. Having been provided PDFs, he wouldn’t have Heartland letterhead. Perhaps cognizant of the legal danger inherent in further acts of identity theft, he wouldn’t make it an authored memo. And he would have wanted to do the print and scan routine, to scrub the doc of metadata of which he has perhaps an incomplete understanding.
Taken together, an obvious course of action is to make what appears to be a roughly written draft.
At this point the best confirmation that he wrote it is the fact that he hasn’t denied writing it, despite the fact that his greatest legal exposure lies with that act.
Whenever we think it can’t get worse, JJ, . . . .
Pure speculation, of course.
When Gleik successfully got Heartland to send him the board meeting documents, like Captain Ahab, he was sure he had the weapon and the means to finally, at long last destroy the big white whale, the bane of his existence, Heartland — and take the wind permanently out of the skeptic movement’s sails. When he reviewed the actual docs, however, much to his chagrin, he realized his weapon could not possibly deliver the lethal blow he envisioned. So he carefully, painstakingly sharpened the blade on the harpoon to a razor’s edge, devising the Strategy Memo, rendering the weapon now quite deadly. Heart beating savagely, Gleik came aside the terrible beast, and with seemingly the strength of the gods let fly the lethal missile, defiantly pressing the ‘send’ button. Smiling with celebratory satisfaction as the weight of so many years’ effort lifted, he failed to notice not only that the harpoon was on course to only wound and anger the great fish, but the harpoon’s tether had wrapped lightly, yet oh so securely, around his own ankle.
tentative working title:
MOBY GLEIK
excellent , only problem is a whale isn’t a fish. 😉
Technically true, though I recall in either Moby Dick or the biblical story of Jonah and the Whale reference to “the great fish”. That said, I took your advice along with other adjustments in a hopefully improved version found in the comments here:
http://motherjones.com/blue-marble/2012/02/climate-scientist-heartland-email-gleick
It can´t be pointed out enough that he does not deny writing the likely-to-be-fake-memo (unless I missed that part when reading his story).
After all, “I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy” does not (to a lawyerly mind) preclude him writing the “anonymous” (In the sense of there being no author) memo, nor does it preclude him receiving it in the mail (I email stuff to myself all the time).
I have a very strong suspicion that we’re shortly going to find out that some of the people involved were stupid enough to think that they’d get away with deleting emails since no-one worried too much about breaches of the FOIA. It’s worth noting that from the moment a law-suit was reasonably likely, Desmog and co had a legal obligation to preserve all evidence.
this is all consistent with the memo being either written by PG or received as he says. how on earth to know? this could go all the way through court and we still wouldn’t know.
Re: BillC (Feb 20 21:22),
[oops, self-snip. More on this thread about the paper document!]
If Gleick is telling the truth, he needs to quickly cooperate with authorities to nail the memo’s author. Otherwise, this all lands on his head.
Given Steve’s evidence for the memo being fake, this does not put any of the gleeful bloggers in a good light at all.
“Just remove the implausible and what remains is the truth”
-Sherlock Mosher
Mosher sure looks like a mindreader, doesn’t he, though his identification was based on the fake memo. He viewed its mention of Gleick in an anomalous place of importance as like an arsonist returning to the scene.
And the dog did not bark.
He caught my attention with his comments. Pretty fast that guy!
Actually, Peter’s memo has a serious logic flaw.
“I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy”
“an” — A single document released.
“I solicited and received additional materials directly from the Heartland Institute under someone else’s name.”
Multiple documents released.
Yet what are the dates?
Feb 13 for the single fake document originally hypothesized to be Gleickian.
Jan 16 for the rest
You have the right to remain silent.
Anything you say can and will be used ……
Innocent until proven guilty, but I sure would like to see this guy’s harddrive.
Jeff –
I don’t see the date of the fake document, per se, as a flaw. He claims he received a hardcopy; perhaps he didn’t scan/OCR it until the day he was ready to send the email package to his friends.
It is a fair comment, the document was handled separately. However, the header file was also cleaned.
Hard to do both on accident.
Not impossible though.
It is a fair comment, the document was handled separately. However, the header file was also cleaned.
Hard to do both on accident.
That he scrubbed the PDF’s header would be consistent both with him receiving the forged memo as well as with him manufacturing the memo – in both cases he would be interested not to be associated with the dissemination of the documents. So I consider it non-evidence.
That is not pea to watch.
Speaking of hard drives, I wonder what Tall Bloke thinks about this.
Why clean the header of an anonymous file?
You will have to explain “clean”? From what I can tell Dr. Gleick removed his name from the author input well in the standard Print to PDF dialog. The populated properties in this document seem to be the same as when I print to pdf.
conard,
None of what we have is proof, however, if the document was received beforehand by an anonymous source, it seems odd that it was reformatted, don’t you think?
Imagine the risk you take by reformatting/re-saving something obtained illicitly. My first reaction to Climategate 1.0 was to delete the link!
I’m skeptical of the story. Mosher, and others I might add, picked Gleick as the source before he admitted it. Now we see the fake document doesn’t fit the timeline of his story.
Why???
Receive a document in the morning post. Later scan it, print/save as PDF. Is that what you mean by reformatting?
(See my comment above)
In case he received the memo as PDF from a “leaker” (say, a good friend), he would be interested to protect both the leaker’s identity and his anonymity. Printing the memo and then scanning the print-out with his Epson scanner (direct to PDF scan) would be helpful.
I don’t think this is what transpired, but at least it would not be inconsistent with PG not faking the memo.
Strike that, that is BS what I have written. The PDF would have meta-data pointing to the Heartland Institute – why scrub that?
It would be consistent with PG receiving the memo by snail-mail, and not by email. So when PG writes mail, he means mail and not email (see my comment about clearity above).
And then we have the dog that didn’t bark and the fold, that wasn’t there. Surely, if PG will present both the memo and the envelope he received it in, we will know for sure.
Jeff, the document was scanned on Feb 13th. There are two reasons it was scanned – it was the only way to transmit the paper document or .. he wanted to remove all the property information of a created document.
Personally, I’m puzzled why an anonymous person would send a fake document to an obscure person.
“Mosher sure looks like a mindreader, doesn’t he, though his identification was based on the fake memo.”
Well, if we’re being properly skeptical wouldn’t that make Mosh the prime suspect for the forger, if it was a deliberate trap? If he sent it to Gleick, he’d have known exactly where it came from, and if he knows Gleick’s style well enough to identify it, then he knows Gleick’s style well enough to forge it.
Not that I really think it was Mosher, mind you, but it’s worth noting.
Interesting. . . . consider Gleick’s statement:
“I can explicitly confirm, as can the Heartland Institute, that the documents they emailed to me are identical to the documents that have been made public. I made no changes or alterations of any kind to any of the Heartland Institute documents or to the original anonymous communication.”
1. “. . . .the documents they emailed to me are identical to the documents that have been made public. . . . ” In other words, he did not alter any of the documents that he obtained under false pretenses from Heartland; this obviously does not include the fraudulent document, which was not sent from Heartland.
2. “I made no changes or alterations of any kind to any of the Heartland Institute documents or to the original anonymous communication. . . ” Both of these states are true . . . . if Gleick was the one who authored the fraudulent document.
3. If the time stamp on the fraudulent document is correct — than Gleick would have to be author, and would have produced it on February 13.
“…My judgment was blinded by my frustration with the ongoing efforts — often anonymous, well-funded, and coordinated — to attack climate science and scientists and prevent this debate…”
Prevent this debate? Delusional much?
Assuming that one takes Gleick’s statement at its face value, the question is, was Gleick set up? That is, was the fake document mailed to him, with the intent of encouraging him to release it, thereby discrediting him when it was shown to be fake? The clues to which Mosher points, all would tend to feed his prejudices…
Just a thought.
Are you suggesting some vast right wing conspiracy to discredit him?
Nothing he says now can be taken at face value. It’s far more likely that he was set up by himself.
But he didn’t just release it. That could have been the act of an innocent man being set up.
Instead, even according to his own account, he went off and did a bit of identity fraud, completely off his own free will with no prompting, and then released the strategy doc, and a whole bunch of nefariously acquired private documents.
You really can’t accept at face value. It is discordant with the documents themselves. Look at the creation dates. The fake memo post-dates the others by about two or three weeks – I forget. The fake was apparently scanned just before it was sent to DeSmog Blog. Gleick woulod be well advised to hang on to ANY evidence that supports his story, otherwise he may be on the next list of Heartland Institue donors. He may be anyway.
Duster —
You’re correct that the date-stamp indicates that the “anonymous document” was scanned shortly before mailing, but that doesn’t contradict his published statement that he received the hardcopy earlier.
Personally, I don’t actually accept Gleick’s statement at face value. He’s suggesting that he was sent a real Heartland document, or possibly he’s trying to suggest that he was entrapped if it’s a fake. The document has factual errors which makes it unlikely to be an authentic Heartland document leaked by a whistleblower. And Mosher’s comments about the correspondences in writing style are still valid. Not conclusive by any means, but I find it much more plausible that PG created the fake from the authentic details of Heartland’s documents, plus his own cartoonish view of the workings of the nefarious anti-science flat-earthers.
The disclosure email that Gleick sent to the blogs read:-
——————————–
Dear Friends (15 of you):
In the interest of transparency, I think you should see these files from the Heartland Institute. Look especially at the 2012 fundraising and budget documents, the information about donors, and compare to the 2010 990 tax form. But other things might also interest or intrigue you. This is all I have. And this email account will be removed after I send.
——————————–
Why did he not mention in that email that the strategy document had been obtained separately from the other documents? And was unverified from an anonymous source?
Why also does he state unequivocally in that email that “these files [are] from the Heartland Institute.” When he supposedly had doubts about 1 of the files?
“No one should feel any satisfaction in these events…”
Perhaps, but Glieck apparent narcissistic self-delusions do fit the pattern presented by the facts here.
“Satisfaction”-not exactly. But his behavior reminds me of eco-terroists who whose sense of ‘necessity’ leads them torch ski area chalets – like the one on top of Vail Mountain in the 1998, costing $12 million and contained irreproducable art treasures. (http://www.thedenverchannel.com/news/5532156/detail.html)
Such self-delusions can be damaging and dangerous to others.
ideology. You can’t get away from it.
The red flags remain — the fake document was written in the first person, was unsigned, was not day-dated, and was not written on paper with a HI heading — there is nothing on the fake memo to indicate origin or a specific date.
There are three aspects of deception involved: 1) The deception to cast Heartland in an unfavorable light (the contents of the memo); 2) The deception to hide the authenticity of the fake memo; and 3) The deception to obtain authentic Heartland documents.
Now we are to believe that the confession is free of deception? Once a person has been found to be untrustworthy, can he/she ever be trusted again? (Please do not confuse this with forgiveness.)
Falsus in uno, falsus in omnibus. Once a witness has shown to be untruthful about one thing, none of his testimony should be believed.
Don B,
If a witness has been shown to be untruthful about one thing, still other parts of that witness’ statements under oath can and should be accepted if those parts can be corroborated by other witnesses and/or evidence.
John
John
If, and only if. Without corroboration, the testimony can and should be discarded.
re: “No one should feel any satisfaction in these events, which have been highly damaging to everyone touched by them, including both Heartland and Gleick.”
Satisfaction? Heartland got wronged here. Even if his story about ‘anonymous person sent me the fake memo [or something like that]’ is somehow true, it is still 99.8% Gleick’s fault. I am ready to see some justice get served.
Definitely respect to Mosher. His spot was brilliant.
Remember,
Gleick is not rational right now. He knows he is in deep——–.
His mea culpa is to change the timeline and absolve him of the most damning document….that pointed right to him.
He knows that is the document that puts him in the most precarious situation. He needs an out and this is his hail mary pass.
I wonder if the Guardian and/or the BBC will report Gleick’s confession as prominently as they reported the “leak”.
Not sure how someone is going to cry “out of context” on this serious lapse of judgement and ethics. But I am sure that is coming.
He nevertheless tries to provide some “context” (or spin as I would call it).
I only note that the scientific understanding of the reality and risks of climate change is strong, compelling, and increasingly disturbing, and a rational public debate is desperately needed. My judgment was blinded by my frustration with the ongoing efforts — often anonymous, well-funded, and coordinated — to attack climate science and scientists and prevent this debate, and by the lack of transparency of the organizations involved.
“I wonder if the Guardian and/or the BBC will report Gleick’s confession as prominently as they reported the “leak”.”
Yep. He’s a hero don’t ya know?
“A leading defender of climate change admitted tricking the libertarian Heartland Institute into turning over confidential documents detailing its plans to discredit the teaching of science to school children in last week’s sensational expose.”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2012/feb/21/peter-gleick-admits-leaked-heartland-institute-documents?newsfeed=true
Thanks for the link Menth.
I found this info from the Guardian article especially interesting: “In a sign of combat to come, Gleick has taken on a top Democratic operative and crisis manager, Chris Lehane. Lehane, who worked in the Clinton White House is credited for exposing the rightwing forces arrayed against the Democratic president. He was Al Gore’s press secretary during his 2000 run for the White House.”
Operatives of a feather…
It’s worth recalling that The Guardian was also responsible for “Operation Clark County” during the 2004 US elections They tried to get their readers to write to voters in Clark County Ohio, urging them not to vote for Bush.
Needless to say, that pretty dumb plot backfired on them. I fear they may not have learned much from the event.
It is also worth recalling who controls the Guardian. It is owned by the Scott Trust Ltd., which is chaired by Liz Forgan, a former Director of Programmes at BBC Channel 4 and Managing Director of BBC Radio. Conformity by the Guardian with the UK Government line on climate-related policy and propaganda, can therefore be assumed.
Good line of thinking, I’ve often thought about checkout the ownership of the Guardian.
However, you should check your facts. Channel 4 is an independent channel that is nothing to do with state run BBC. Your “BBC Channel 4 ” seems confused.
I thought the paper had been bought by a Russian millionaire but I could be out of date.
The Independent was bought by a Russian.
Thanks for the correction on Channel 4. It’s a long time since I’ve been in England. I assumed Channel 4 must be a New BBC venture even more boring than the Third Programme, with a focus on such things as the “folk history of the potato”, the performance of music for wind turbine and aeolian harp, etc.
Nowadays we long for something as gripping as the “folk history of the potato”. The Third Programme dates you just a little too. That was when you could divide a pound sterling by 240 pence wasn’t it? But not all progress is bad, I say on my MacBook on the way back from another excellent London Node User Group. Hold fast to that which is good is from an old book but it works for me.
As of 23:10 GMT 21/2/12 there is still no mention of Gleick’s confession on the Beeb’s website.
But the Beeb is still displaying Richard Black’s 15/2/12 posting, the ironically titled “Openness: A Heartland-warming tale”
Glieck writes:
Gleick pleads for debate now? Against forces that “prevent this debate….” Yet the original climategate emails reveal systematic effort by climate scientists to prevent genuine scientific debate about climate change….
organizations like HI, he implicitly alleges, “prevent this debate, and by the lack of transparency of the organizations involved.” Yet the climategate emails indicate a conspiracy to defeat FOIA laws exercised to expand transparency needed to conduct science, hugely important to taxpayers and the public.
Clearly, Gleick is internally struggling with the enormous hypocrisies involved since climategate – and failing to cope well.
Yes, the alleged efforts to “prevent this debate” comment is perhaps the most insanely fake part of it all.
In their signed editorials of recent weeks, The Team including Mann and Trenberth have shed crocodile tears over the lack of “debate” concerning climate. It’s more of the same lawyered-up talking points that we’ve come to expect from their version of “scientific debate.”
is internally struggling with the enormous hypocrisies involved since climategate – and failing to cope well.
Yeah, cognitive dissonance is a real bear isn’t it?
“I wonder if the Guardian and/or the BBC will report Gleick’s confession as prominently as they reported the “leak”.”
I think they will wait to see when the dam breaks. When the Fake document is finalized they may jump in.
Heh just thought of this.
Gonna be alot the “denying” going on tonight in the warmer camp.
I think it is human nature to want to believe that at some point we all have a come to Jesus moment and honesty finally prevails.Unfortunately I think there are serial prevaricators.
Gleick, while appearing to fall on his sword, seems to be making a late play to shore up the authenticity of the fake. If Gleick got the fake before the other documents, the only source of the fake would have to be within Heartland.
He had better have the document and the envelope it came in.
I told Mosher that Gleick had too much to lose to be the guy. But then, I never win at Clue, either.
that’s like saying Nixon had too much to lose to have possibly been involved in Watergate.
oh how the mighty have fallen…
But in getting back to the authenticated documents, we can all agree that theft of internal information, via deception or hacking, is wrong. Right everyone?
Like the Pentagon Papers, the Watergate before Watergate.
Mr Gleick:
Nice cop-out. Having spread false and inflammatory material, it is the coward’s way out now to retreat into silence. You should be out there trying to repair the damage you have done by pointing out that the documents you obtained offer no support for the claims that Heartland is being paid by the fossil fuel industry to undermine the IPCC or dissuade teachers from teaching science, and that the only disinformation campaign going on here is the one you launched.
To which end you distributed fraudulent and stolen material in order to provoke derision and hostility against people you disagree with. Spare us the high-minded lectures about the need for rational debate.
Stop trying to mitigate your own guilt by making scattergun accusations of actions you imagine, without evidence, others to be engaged in, when the reality is, you are the one doing these things. You were the one who engaged in an anonymous and coordinated campaign to attack other scientists and destroy the atmosphere of debate, and yours were the actions lacking transparency. You only deepen your disgrace by trying to hide behind even more innuendo and slander.
At last, the beginnings of an apology. It might be more persuasive were it not preceded by so many self-serving excuses, and if it were accompanied by efforts to rectify the distortions you have spread. But, no doubt, in due course you will have the opportunity to make more tangible amends.
Also, it’s always bad to steal documents, right?
“JohnG
Also, it’s always bad to steal documents, right?”
Steal yes. Publish what you are entitled to have access to. . . Maybe. Forge defamatory libel. No.
JE
I wrote in response to:
“JohnG
Also, it’s always bad to steal documents, right?”
“Steal yes. Publish what you are entitled to have access to. . . Maybe. Forge defamatory libel. No.”
JE
Should have written “‘Absolutely” for the last word. Too late to be answering trolls.
JE
Your money is used to acquire something under the agreement that it will used lawfully, with good intentions, and will be available to you upon proper notice. It is found out to be being using unlawfully and they have refused to allow you access to it. To then have someone who knows what is going on copy it and give you a copy, is this what you would call stealing?
As a UK taxpayer I paid for the Climategate emails but was not allowed to see them by an organisation that broke UK FOIA legislation. I have never contributed to Heartland so cannot expect to be able to see private documents.
A question that hasn’t been asked yet: why did Gleick confess? and why now?
Because he not only perpetrated a hoax against the HI, but also against the websites that initially published the material? Maybe the proprietors of those websites encouraged him to come clean?
Most likely:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Limited_hangout
Steve McIntyre asked: “why did Gleick confess? and why now?”
John Silver’s “limited hangout” is a very good general answer. More specifically, I think it is quite easy to analyze what happened. First, Gleick’s confession has clearly been heavily influenced and edited by legal counsel. When someone uses an email address to obtain documents, it’s actually fairly easy for someone with serious IT skills to track it down, especially when there are serious legal implications. Gleick apparently knows nothing about IT, and it seems a fair guess to say his electronic fingerprints were all over this, Heartland had already found out, and along with their legal demand notice to those who printed the faked documents today they must have let Gleick know that they were beginning legal action specifically aimed at him.
Gleick was worried enough to confer with legal counsel, and said counsel said “Boy, you inna heap’ a trouble!” So this is an attempt to defer civil and/or criminal liability for his actions, AFTER he realized that they had the goods on him.
Of course there’s a problem with his claim that he was sent the fake memo BEFORE he lied to get the other documents, and this mistake may leave him in even bigger legal trouble than before.
IF he got the fake memo BEFORE he got any of the other documents, how come all the internal metadata shows that the fake memo is dated well AFTER all of the other documents, and in fact appears to have been created on the same day that it was released? I think a court (whether it’s civil or criminal) is going to want to see the provenance of the document that Gleick claims he got before all the rest.
Because a cynical man might just suspect that Gleick is still lying, even in his “confession”, and that he wrote that fake document himself AFTER he got all of the other documents and found they wouldn’t suit his purpose. You, know that would explain how some of those other documents are quoted word for word in the fake document that Gleick now claims was written BEFORE any of the others were written.
I suspect that the hole Gleick is in is going to continue to get deeper and deeper.
But I can’t imagine any lawyer greenlighting Gleick’s statement with its claim that he received the summary from someone else. (Not a lawyer myself.)
Perhaps the HI tracked Peter down via email addresses and ISPs and somehow alerted him to their suspicion. Then perhaps a quick confession was thought to be a way of obscuring at least the source of the faked document, which now appears to be another shoe waiting to drop.
On a related topic – I wonder if Gavin and co (x7) will issue another letter of empathetic understanding (or will fewer people be willing to write an ‘open’ letter this time?)
It seems Gleick, or someone on his behalf, has already retained the services of criminal attorney John Keker. Could it be that he has already been contacted by one or more of the law enforcement agencies? And it was that contact that stimulated the act of confession?
Yes, or Heartland contacted him directly and made it clear that the game was up.
Maybe to limit the wrap, going for something smaller than he actually did. The real trouble for Gleick is the forgery. Yes he obtained the documents but feels vindicated saying to his fans, those documents are genuine. But the crime that comes with he most time and loss of face is the forgery. If he wrote the fake memo no lawyer would ever allow him to confess to that. A first move defensive strategy IMO, but one ill judged by his counsel, as the combined effort of great minds on the internet are much smarter at getting to the truth than any legal mind.
My guess is that some random person on the internet obtained the Heartland docs and sent them to Gleick, and Gleick wrote the fake document in order to spice up the docs. The problem is that he didn’t do a good job, specifically getting the Koch section incorrect, and it was determined to be fake before Heartland even had to say anything.
As a scientist, if you’re going to admit to wrongdoing, what would you rather admit to: going too far in search of the truth, or writing a fake document to make the documents look worse than they are. The latter calls into question the objectivity that scientists are supposed to have, and could be used to undermine his previous and current work. Also, if the fake document is discovered to have been written by Gleick, this episode is forever known as FakeGate, not DenierGate.
“My guess is that some random person on the internet obtained the Heartland docs and sent them to Gleick”
Gleick has already confessed that he did that part all by himself!
Unless he’s insane [which is not impossible] he would only admit obtaining the emails by pretexting at this point if it were advantageous to him to make such an admission.
I am guessing that it was made clear to him that he could either announce immediately that he did it, or run the risk being carted off in handcuffs with a virtual certainly of being convicted anyway.
He suffers from a new mental illness: Climate Activist Derangement Syndrome (CADS).
I also wonder, if there *is* an anonymous author for the faked memo, why doesn’t that author step forward?
IANAL, but as far as I know, it’s not a crime to make Peter Gleick look like an idiot; that seems to be the limit of the anonymous authors culpability.
“A question that hasn’t been asked yet: why did Gleick confess? and why now?”
Pure speculation, but assume Gleick at first thinks he’s got away with it. Then he sees that a bit of a storm’s brewing, and keeps his head down. The storm doesn’t go away, and he starts to worry that what he did was actually more serious than he first thought. He contacts a lawyer over the weekend, still not taking things seriously enough, and makes an appointment for Monday. He’s then told he’s in a whole heap of fertiliser, and almost immediately issues a mea culpa and, significantly, an apology.
My suspicion is that the main purpose of Gleick’s post was to get a public apology out as soon as possible, and the ‘confession’ is distraction. Note that he does not specify what he’s apologising for, and in fact apologises for all his actions in this case, rather than specifying those mentioned.
The American Geophysical Union has issued a press release saying that Gleick resigned as Chair of the Ethics Committee on February 16, for unspecified personal reasons. So it seems that he knew that the game is probably up for some days before going public, and has likely been seeking legal and spin doctor advice well before his admission.
> why did Gleick confess? and why now?
He did to encourage an open and factual debate about climate change don’t you know?
“Given the need for reliance on facts in the public climate debate, I am issuing the following statement.”
See, another selfless action.
Maybe he knows that you and Mosher have him dead to rights, and he wants to start damage control now. Maybe he realized it, or maybe someone else told him.
Agreed . . . lots of weasel words and side-speak.
Obviously he has lawyered up and is having his new truth produced by specialists.
Such an ethical man. Maybe they can create a special award for ethical behavior and give it to him at the next AGU meeting.
Hear, here!!
well said Ross at Posted Feb 20, 2012 at 10:14 PM
Being an expert at apologizing, Gleick indeed may have received a phony letter by some paranoid internet fan. Or he concocted it. These are the only two possibilities. Given that he was named parenthetically in the fake document and placed in an exalted status in that letter, I would guess he had a hand in the authoring.
It would have to be a crazy internet fan who had access to Heartland’s private documents, since some content seems copied and pasted.
For the people commenting on the time stamps of the files, remember, the faked memo is a scanned document. If Gleick scanned it himself, it would have the timestamp of when he scanned it, not when it was made. That means there is no contradiction shown by the timestamps.
Agreed, of course, but there may be contradiction in the relationship between the fake document and the other documents released. It seems, to me at least, that the faked document’s content is in significant part derived from the documents Gleick himself obtained through deception. Unless a faker, other than Gleick, obtained the very same set of documents from Heartland in yet another instance of deception, all roads still seem to lead to Gleick.
That’s an astute observation.
One thing, though. The PDF metadata shows two drives (C: and P:) with directory paths through /jbast and /ZMcElrath. There is likely a timeline that can be constructed through the .WPD file revision/autosave history. Glieck needs to be very careful with the story he weaves.
The anonymous document that triggered this event needs not be the strategy document that was ultiumately released with the genuine Heartland documents.
It was the only document he was named in, this is one of two things, an attack of conscience, or establishing a line of defense(he now has a legitimate reasons to have unwittingly copied and distributed the alleged fake document.)
Shocking. When Steve said “No one should feel any satisfaction in these events,” my knee jerk reaction was why the heck not, but now I just feel stunned. I hope Peter has people to help him through this.
Or he could resort to the solution unsuccessfully attempted by the prosecutor in the movie “The Count of Monte Christo”
Bernie:
The problem in your scenario is that it still places Gleick as the source of the strategy document.
Yep – but he never said that he didn’t write it. Steve Mosher’s original assessment is still in play. Lawyers wrote this statement so it needs to be parsed very carefully.
This is a very important point. With lawyers involved, it is going to be even more slippery than the usual realclimatescientest communiqué. It is worth remembering that until we hear directly that the early document was in fact the strategy memo in something binding, it should not be treated as a given.
Jeff Norman
My thoughts exactly. We should hope for his saftey and well being. I disagree with the man but that does not mean we don’t wish him well.
It’s very difficult for middle-aged men who’ve been successful to deal with failure. He has to remind himself that you’re never as smart as you think you are when you’re doing well or as dumb as you think you are when you’re doing poorly.
Well said.
Aye, this presents a valuable opportunity to take the discussion about climate back to where it belongs, I.e. less in the realm of PR and more in the realm of open and relaxed discussion.
Yes, well put.
If Gleick had any class he would have destroyed the “anonymous” document and promptly forgotten about it. If it truly was anonymous, he foolishly sensed an opportunity to attack Heartland. So it is difficult to accept that it was truly “anonymous”.
Steve, I fear that despite trying I find I can’t be as Canadian as you are when you say:
I am not happy about the allegations made against Heartland. But I am extremely satisfied, let me say overjoyed, that it turns out that it was Peter Gleick who tried to defraud people. Not only that, but in the process he ensnared people like the DeSmogBloggers, and the RC guys, and Michael Tobis, who wrote:
Believe it now, Michael?
Yeah, I know it’s schadenfreude, but I’m not Canadian … call me an arch-criminal, but in my heart of hearts I’m happy to see dissension in the AGW ranks, with the local denizens setting bear-traps for honest men and in the event entrapping no one but themselves and their friends, and watching their reputations go up in smoke … priceless. Pass the popcorn.
w.
I prefer the earlier suggestion.
“No one should feel any satisfaction in these events.”
There is some satisfaction in justice.
Willis, you are as good as mosher, you read my mind.
Peter Gleick has earned his Phil Jones medal for team integrity
Dude
Posted Feb 20, 2012 at 10:42 PM
Man, is everyone Canadian here?
I hope for his safety and well-being, but I certainly don’t wish him well. He is a sneak, a phisher, and a liar. Why should I wish him well? I wish for him what I wish for everyone, which is that he get exactly what he deserves. In this case, that means that he pay the full and complete price for his underhanded actions.
w.
…which were to obtain documents through nefarious means, which is always bad. Right?
Depends on what you define as nefarious. Your implied analogy is flawed, as are most analogies.
So sometimes it’s ok to steal documents, and sometimes not?
John, why don’t you skip the faux-Socratic questions and tell us what you think? Trying to entrap people into answering some trick question is just more gleicking …
w.
I think it’s always wrong to steal documents (intelligence agencies excluded….).
JohnG Posted Feb 20, 2012 at 11:55 PM
In other words, you are saying it is sometimes wrong to steal documents … that’s the trouble with this danged planet, it’s so rarely black and white.
w.
Life would not be interesting if everything were black and white.
Theft is wrong, but theft to mitigate a greater evil may be morally justified, even though it is still, legally, wrong.
Gleick claims moral justification for his “theft” of documents by the imperative to verify the evidence provided by the fake memo of evil intent by the HI. So Gleick’s position is morally defensible if, and only if, his claim to have been duped by the fake memo stands up.
While Gleick’s position looks highly vulnerable, it is not, as yet, indefensible.
I almost never reply and here I’m making the same point as Willis.Like he needs my help.
“here I’m making the same point”
Which is?
“JohnG
I think it’s always wrong to steal documents (intelligence agencies excluded….).”
That may indeed be the case. I’m guessing you would vote for a firing squad for the Pentagon Papers? Of course in that case there was clear evidence that the recipient had no legal right to have the documents, as opposed to climategate. Also, none of the Pentagon Papers were forgeries.
Can we ask you. What is worse. Leaking evidence of malfeasance or forging documents to support your cause? Because the real issue here, that you are too blind to see or willfully disingenous about, is the forgery, not the “leak”.
So JohnG you absolutely, 100% sure, know that a villainous “climate D@#(^#$” impersonated member of the CRU and had them download the emails to them?
If you answer no to that question then your snide attempt at analogy fails.
Also show the evidence that the emails were even stolen which is something that the Norwich Constabulary and the Information Commissioner would be interested in since they have no evidence that someone broke in and stole them. As Steve posted in the prior thread the ICO has suspicions that a “whistle-blower” from inside CRU did it. I’m sure you do know that Whistle-blowers are protected under the law?
Easy bud!
Easy???
You post blatantly trick questions and when called on it you go “Easy Bud!”
Ah, I see….
The original Watergate scandal involved the theft of documents from the Democratic National Committee by agents of the Republican Party.
The burglers undoubtedly viewed themselves as justified by the need to “save the world” from George McGovern, but it was burglary nonetheless. Likewise, electronic impersonation to obtain entry is in itself a crime in California.
If a DNC employee chose to leak the documents, the situation would have been very different. Even so, DNC and HI documents are private property not subject to FOI (if it had existed at the time), so any analogy to Climategate is rather weak.
One little tangent in all of this is we see the danger of making criminal allegations with no evidence. CRU to the day has no evidence that the illegitimate e-mails were stolen but they have make a criminal allegation. This allegation taken as fact by zealots has given said zealots moral license to now clearly break the law.
“JohnG:
…which were to obtain documents through nefarious means, which is always bad. Right?”
Can you provide evidence that the climategate documents were not the legal possession of the leaker?
Not that that matters, as the issue here is not the release of information that is flattering to the Heartland institute (which all but the forged document are), but rather that a forged document was used to defame the Heartland institute. None of the climategate e-mails are alleged to be forged. As Steve always says, watch the pea.
To paraphrase Dory: “Keep On Digging, Keep On Digging”.
JE
“I hope for his safety and well-being, but I certainly don’t wish him well. He is a sneak, a phisher, and a liar.”
I’m with Willis on this. I am Canadian.
When I first read the Strategy document I had a profound feeling that something was very odd about it. This was very early on before people started to comment on it being a fake.
I have the same feeling about this confession. The needle on my BS meter is hard right on the pin of the red zone. Time will tell if my suspicious are correct.
I felt empathy for Nixon back in the early ’70s. Didn’t change what he did in the least. That was a life lesson learned, Your emotions can never change the facts.
I second you Willis. He had a choice, to proceed with his fraud, or not to. He chose to proceed, severely, overestimating his intelligence and “cleverness” in the process. I do feel bad for his family but again, maybe Gleick should have thought about them before embarking on his course of action. I hope he gets prosecuted to the full extent of the law.
Still waiting for the other shoe to fall with the forged document.
W. Eschenbach: “…what I wish for everyone, which is that he get exactly what he deserves.” Mr. Eschenbach, you are someone I highly esteem. Be that as it may, here is W. Shakespeare (Hamlet) on the subject: “Use every man after his desert, and who shall ‘scape whipping?”
I do love the quotation, most apt, “Use every man after his desert, and who shall ‘scape whipping?”
And I do understand it, because as a person who writes on climate for WUWT, I get whipped a couple of times a week, I’m kinda used to it.
So I’m up for it if Peter Gleick is …
w.
Look, if we wish these people too much well, then it’s more likely that they’ll continue to be able to do the underhanded things they’ve been doing. No. They need to be broken down for the good of everyone they keep lying to.
so pass the popcorn already, and the candy too. This is just amazing.
There’s a blatant contradiction in the statement. In the confessional paragraph, he tries to excuse his actions and claim a measure of victory by saying the documents he fraudulently obtained backed up much of what was written in the fake document: “The materials the Heartland Institute sent to me confirmed many of the facts in the original document, including especially their 2012 fundraising strategy and budget.”
Then, in the final paragraph he says: “I will not comment on the substance or implications of the materials . . .” Of course, he did exactly that in the preceding paragraph.
Steve alluded in his preceding post to the self designated climate response team. There appears to be a concerted and highly coordinated effort going on to promoted CAGWers and denigrate skeptics. I have been tracking reviews of Mann’s new book on Amazon and the number of positive votes very, very poor reviews have received is astonishing. Many of the reviews,both positive and negative, are very weak including Peter Gleick’s.
It does seem that the paranoia od certain folks has caused them to do that which they fear skeptics are doing.
Suzanne Goldenberg has a breaking article in the Guardian here. Glieck’s Rapid Response team-mate Scott Mandia is quoted:
Goldenberg also reported that Gleick has retained Chris Lehane as crisis manager:
As a rebuttal to Scott Mandia of the Climate Rapid Response team, Time magazine commented:
Read more: http://ecocentric.blogs.time.com/2012/02/20/climate-expert-peter-gleick-admits-deception-in-obtaining-heartland-institute-papers/#ixzz1mzRvpJvE
The Guardian headlines is: “Climate scientist Peter Gleick admits he leaked Heartland Institute documents”.
Gleick didn’t “leak” the documents.
“Glieck’s Rapid Response team-mate Scott Mandia is quoted:
Peter Gleick, a scientist who is also a journalist just used the same tricks that any investigative reporter uses to uncover the truth.”
———————————————————
Scott Mandia must hang out with some pretty sleazy investigative reporters – it is certainly not true that ‘any investigative reporter’ would do what Gleick did. In fact, it is against every mainstream journalistic code of ethics, and is a firing offence at any reputable journal. True, it is the kind of practice that Murdoch’s reporters and their associates are being arrested for – could that be what Mandia is referring to as normal practice in his universe?
Wait a minute, did you just see the pea move… WHEN did Dr Peter Gleick become a journalist?? He has written articles as a ‘high-profile’ scientist but a Journalist?? Is he/Scott setting up a defense that Peter may not be able to divulge information under that profession….
In this wretched economy, what do you have against people moon-lighting? /sarc
Journalists aren’t supposed to be as honest as scientists, and they’ll do crazy things for a story, right? Bottom line, the standard is lower for a journalist.
“what Gleick did. In fact, it is against every mainstream journalistic code of ethics, and is a firing offence at any reputable journal.”
What you say is, I assume correct. Nevertheless, there can be a moral justification for breaching a professional code of ethics if it is in the name of a greater good.
Gleick claims to have believed an anonymous document alleging a concerted and well-funded assault on science by the HI. I personally don’t believe his claim to be reasonably, although depending on his state of mind, it may be consistent with his belief at the time.
However, if Gleick knew the fake memo was fake, as the circumstances seem to suggest must have been the case, then he is guilty not only of document theft by the use of a false identity, but of fabricating evidence.
Posted Feb 21, 2012 at 1:49 PM
Certainly there is moral justification in the name of a “greater good”, happens all the time, and it’s a real problem.
It’s called “Noble Cause Corruption” and it is rampant in climate science. That “ends justifying the means” BS has done huge, huge damage to the field.
w.
“Certainly there is moral justification in the name of a “greater good”, happens all the time, and it’s a real problem.”
It is a problem if the “greater good” is misconceived, as you believe, and as it I happens I also believe, to be the case with some actions of some climate scientists. That does not detract from the point I made, which was that a greater good may provide moral justification for a breach of law.
Whether you accept Gleick’s claim that his action in stealing documents was justified by a greater good, a claim I reject, is beside the point.
All of Suzanne Goldenberg’s columns on Heartland have been strongly slanted. For example, in this column she described Heartland as “a thinktank that has a core mission of discrediting climate science.” And gave a lot of space to Mashey’s claim that Heartland violated rules for tax-exempt entities.
It seems some people are up to their usual ‘tricks’.
I guess last year’s scandal about Murdoch reporters hacking cell phones has retroactively been blessed as just something “any investigative reporter uses to uncover the truth.”
You have to read the Guardian every day be able to tell scandal from heroism, it changes.
Let’s not forget that the Guardian’s very own David Leigh has admitted using phone hacking himself, yet seems to have incredibly escaped censure.
A bit surprising, perhaps, is that Peter Gleick is the just announced AGU expert to lead the AGU task force on scientific ethics and integrity.
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2011EO470009.shtml
I guess they define their own rules and concepts of ethics and integrity.
Gleick may have to redefine what peer review, rather, ethics means.
Gleick had to destroy the ethics in order to save them.
–Bad News
You couldn’t make it up, some might say. In fact you could easily make it up, but nobody would believe you.
Just thought I should mention this page at the AGU…
http://www.agu.org/about/governance/committees_boards/scientific_ethics.shtml
Task Force on Scientific Ethics
Chair
Peter Gleick, Pacific Institute, Oakland, California
Copner, sounds like Gleik is the perfect man to head the ethics commmission for climate scientists.
There’s nobody better than a poacher turned gamekeeper!
@Copner & Ed —
That is just stunning! Truly, inmates running the asylum.
It says at the bottom of the page:
“If you would like to offer comments, suggestions or feedback for the task force, please contact us at Ethics@agu.org.”
Any AGU members around here?
Seems like the chair has now been pulled from under him.
“Heartland Insider”
Yeah! Pretty much says it all!
If he had set up the email account as “Concerned Citizen” he might still have a prayer of getting anybody to believe the fake memo came from anybody other than himself. But it appears he even signed the memo.
“the ongoing efforts — often anonymous, well-funded, and coordinated — to attack climate science and scientists and prevent this debate”
i.e. As I apologize for my fraud and dishonesty, I choose to take this opportunity to make another slanderous attack on those who disagree with me.
Anthony has posted Heartland’s response to Gleik’s confession:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/20/statement-by-the-heartland-institute-on-gleick-confession/#more-57134
Willis,
I am Canadian but my feelings about Gleick are more in line with yours. The man has previously shown himself to be a nasty piece of work in his review of the book, “The Delinquent Teenager…”. Notice how the “apology” states “I attempted to confirm the accuracy of the information in this document”. The man demonstrates no inclination or feeling of duty to determine the authenticity of the alleged anonymously received document. I wish no physical harm to the man but a good dose of humiliation would be in order.
I find that I myself am much more aligned with the great crusader Clarence Darrow, (NOT a Canadian!) who once said “I have never killed a man, but I have read many an obituary with a great deal of satisfaction!”
Yes Steve… If it were me who had a “dishonorable mention” in Gleick’s Forbes post “The 2011 Climate B.S.* of the Year Awards”, I know I would feel at least a modicum of satisfaction.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/petergleick/2012/01/05/the-2011-climate-b-s-of-the-year-awards/
But just below the slime we have the more encouraging:
Next year, in Forbes magazine? Somehow I don’t think so.
They might as well award the 2012 Climate BS of the Year trophy now. In spite of Michael Mann’s efforts, there can only be one winner.
‘Independent group of scientists’, hmmm. Like ‘independent’ proxy studies (TM Climate Science) h/t Steve McI
At present I suspect his received by snail mail claim is being made to cover for a lack of electronic traceability which would be present if emailed to him by another person.
His claim to have received the strategy document by snail mail lacks credibility unless he can provided the envelope in which it was mailed. There is no reason not to retain and file the envelope with the document as the document is both undated and unsigned and therefore totally lacking in provenance.
The lack of any visible fold lines on the scanned document (supposedly received in the mail) is also not helpful to Gleick’s story
If I was mailing an important document I would use a 9 X 12 envelope so that the document would not have fold lines. I don’t think the lack of fold lines is in any way relevant.
if it was snail mailed to him, Gleick should still have the original document.
Or maybe he will fall back on the “Lucy Ramirez sent it to me and I burned the original” defense. But I think his lawyer will tell him that it won’t help him to claim that he intentionally destroyed the only hard proof of his claim.
He’s going to be desperate to come up with something, since it’s a pretty fair bet that no such “original document” exists, or ever existed. Except for the one Gleick wrote, printed, and scanned himself.
Elements within the Strategy Memo would indicate that the writer opened a new doc in “Word” with the generic default settings for margins and type font (Times New Roman 12 point)
If you look in the upper left hand corner of both pages, you can see a very slight remnant of a border/masthead that looks like a box that would contain fax transmission information. Just speculation on my part. But it would be interesting to see if those artifacts line up with some of the more common fax transmission templates.
There’s a blatant contradiction in Gleick’s statement. In the confessional paragraph, he tries to excuse his actions and claim a measure of victory by saying the documents he fraudulently obtained backed up much of what was written in the fake document: “The materials the Heartland Institute sent to me confirmed many of the facts in the original document, including especially their 2012 fundraising strategy and budget.”
Then, in the final paragraph he says: “I will not comment on the substance or implications of the materials . . .” Of course, he did exactly that in the preceding paragraph.
I think it would be very easy to “bait” a guy like Glieck with a fake document he wanted to believe.
I’m not saying he is innocent of being the author of the faked document. But I find the story credible. That he is now confessing is evidence of remorse at having belatedly realized he was scammed.
Show me that he was about to be unmasked anyway, and I might change my mind –otherwise, I’m not willing to throw him under the bus just yet for the *additional* crime of forgery.
Roger Pielke Jr. commented on Friday that he had specifically asked Gleick whether he was “responsible.” Gleick responded today. It is not too far-fetched to assume that Gleick must have spent the weekend trying to figure out how to respond to the direct question. Silence would be damning.
Why do you find it credible? It contained much material cut-and-pasted from the docs that Gleick illegally obtained. In order for that to be the case, the original faker would have to have had access to the original docs. In which case, why not send out all the original docs?
Doesn’t that stretch things out a bit too far?
Plus there are the stylistic similarities, especially the use of the nonsense term “anti-climate”…
Until now, I had not considered ever joining in with any of the think tanks as a subscriber.
After this assault by Gleick and who knows who else on Heartland Institute, I am going to join as a matter of principal.
What Gleick did, who was apparently at the least encouraged in this by others if not actively helped, was an assault on freedom of speech. he sought to lie, cheat and forge a way to damage Heartland because they disagree with him on climate science.
All of us who are skeptics are potential targets of this sort of anti-freedom action. Our jobs, our privacy, and possibly other areas of our lives could be assaulted by some unethical fanatic if we do not stand up against this sort of assault.
Even if we disagree with Heartland’s political ideas (which I largely do), we should find ways to stand with Heartland’s rights to be in the public square and to disseminate their ideas freely.
Gleick and his sort must be stood up to now, or we will find no one to stand with us when they get around to us later.
Here is a link to Heartland Institute if anyone cares to look:
http://heartland.org/about
I never knew much about Heartland before, never paid them much attention, only the name and that they were hated by warmists. I assumed the claims about them being funded by oil and Koch were more or less true (even though I learn towards slightly towards skepticism). I also assumed there probably religiously motivated, i.e. young earth creation, anti-abortion, all that stuff, since that kind of stuff usually gets mentioned in the same breath.
Turns out that I misled by the background chattering of the BBC et al.
Heartland are not the organization I was led to believe.
While I don’t agree with all they do, they do seem to do some good work (the Anthony Watts project seems like a nice idea). I’d certainly consider making a substantial donation, albeit ear-marked for specific types of activites.
Yep. Anthony Watts’ project should make some climate data comprehensible to people like Phil Jones. 😉
Long popcorn.
On the off chance that the scanned document was originally printed on a color printer, the printer may be traceable:
http://seeingyellow.com/
I’ll try and check that tonight, don’t even have the documents yet at this point.
Personally I think the ‘sides’ have been framed wrong, it really should be ‘people willing to bend scientific data to prove what they know to be true’, and people not willing to do so. The scientific method is the probably the most important invention ever, because it allows people to remove their own bias from observation. Clearly many in support of agw do not follow this, but we should remember it is much easier to follow the data if you agree with the results.
Over the years reading this blog I do think Steve is one of those rare people that are able to do look at the data with the self removed. Total respect. It will be a few very hard days for Peter Gleick, I too feel sorry for him (hey, I’m also Canadian ;). He made a giant mistake – he is clearly not a person that can separate beliefs from data, and he will pay for that. I feel sorry for him though, because I probably couldn’t either if I felt as strongly about something as he does, and the data wasn’t there. I’m not superman either.
I think ultimately the AGW movement is an easy sell because people are uncomfortable with the extent we are able to manipulate the world around us seemingly without consequence. It makes people feel ‘we are going to pa’y for all this at some point. From that state of mind, it is easy to be manipulated, by others or more likely by yourself. In that sense, this whole document forgery is a metaphor for the AGW movement itself – strong beliefs, weak science.
My takeaway is I have to keep perspective on the long term, science can take a roundabout way, but arrives at the truth over time. Whatever that may be.
Much respect Steve, for the rational observations and for the human empathy. Thank you.
Maybe Mosher set Gleick up. sarc/
To be honest, I think that entrapping these people into openly lying and deceiving to support their ideologies is A-OK with me.
It should happen over aqnd over. Let the truth come out.
While I agree that Gleick would easily be baited by the forged document, why would anyone expect his response to be anything more than just passing it on?
The overview has more lessons than the detail.
The overview shows again that ‘climate science’ has a disproportionately high content of people who have harmed the fine reputation that normal, good science has painstakinly earned over many, many decades.
In most branches of science and science-realted activity, there is a profound willingness of professionals to ‘do the right thing’. Altruism is not a lip service word.
This upstart ‘climate science’ has failed, again and again, to display the professional credentials that cause people to trust it.
It is readily conceded that most areas of science have had their disreputable incidents. They will continue, human nature being what it is. However, as the climate science count of inexcusible acts continues to increase, we see little attempt to reverse the decline. Instead, we have to face the gall of ‘professional institutions’ and ‘learned societies’ siding with those who are blatantly and without unreserved apology destroying the good name of science with shameful ignorance.
The bit players are shameful, but the heavy blame rests with those who fail to police standards.
Cross posted from Bishop hill. Theories about a whistleblower make no sense to me.
A whistleblower inside heartland would presumably know Wojick well enough NOT to resort to plagairism in writing the description of Wojick.
That ONE sentence jumped out at me immediately as one not written by the person who wrote the rest of the paragraph
“Dr. Wojick is a consultant with the Office of Scientific and Technical Information at the
U.S. Department of Energy in the area of information and communication science”
Let me tell you exactly how this happened.
Steve mcintyre called me. I was busy working on BEST. I had already posted my theory on Lucias.
He asked me if I had done what I normally do, which is look for high entropy words/phrases.
I said no. Honestly I had only skimmed the document and thought it was fake and figure it was Gleick. I had already posted my theory. Steve sent along one of Gliecks tweets. And he asked me to read the document a second time.
On the phone I read it to him giving my thoughts as I read. I noted the odd use of parenthesis and the lousy use of commas. Then I read the sentence above and told steve ” this sentence was not written by the person who wrote the rest”. With steve listening, I tried to explain why the style was different..and then I just googled the shit.
Basically, whoever wrote this didnt know Gleick well enough to write a bio in his own words, so he cribbed it from heartland’s web page. For me, that points away from an insider and not toward one. After all, according to this memo Wojick is at the center of the strategy with Gleick. Hard to imagine an insider who knows so little that they have to copy a bio.
They look for a vast conspiracy (it’s all they know) but it always comes back to one man 🙂
Awesome work. Chances are Mosh has got the rest right too. That’s all I feel I need to know. As for what happens to Gleick, that’s for the laws and courts of another land. As Steve said, the bad news is that you aren’t as smart as you thought, the good news that you become a lot smarter now. As Ross implies, an apology without excuses is the first step up.
Possible typo here:
“didnt know Gleick well enough…” shouldn’t this be: “didn’t know Wojick well enough…” ?
Steve, a person at HI was conned into releasing confidential information.
This is grounds for dismissal, that someone could lose their job for helping an impersonator recover their documents.
Yeah, I’ve thought about the fate of the poor individual who emailed out the doc’s. I doubt Heartland will sack them, however, over this incident. By all accounts the released documents are not that inflammatory in substance, and if Heartland plays this right, they will get some excellent mileage out of Gleick’s nefarious deed. The Heartland employee will probably get a stern talking to, but (I hope) not fired.
“. . . highly damaging to everyone touched by them, including both Heartland and Gleick.”
Regarding H.I., “highly damaging” seems a bit hyperbolic. True, information which should have remained confidential, such as salaries, is now public and will undoubtedly cause some internal tensions; board members’ business contact info was outed (if it wasn’t already common knowledge); and some of H.I.’s strategies for the coming year are now in the hands of their opponents. None of this seems to rise to the level of highly damaging.
OTOH, H.I. gets 100% untainted victim status out of this. The stolen docs are utterly mundane, not a hint of malfeasance or nefariousness except the fake memo, which is just more egg on PG’s face.
But we can’t get no satisfaction? One of the most visible & vocal (and opportunistic, as Steve once pointed out) AGW propagandists has been silenced, hoisted on his own stinky petard. If that’s not satisfying, what is?
PS: There is one glaring revelation in the purloined docs, but you won’t read of it anywhere in warmsta’-land: H.I. spent only $700,000.00 on climate issues last year. That’s right, H.I. opened a can of whup-ass for about 1/1000 of what the big dogs spent. Ouch, warmers, that’s gotta hurt.
I submit that, from a scientific point of view, it is ill-advised to find pleasure in this episode. Some sobering up might be in order by all. As we skeptics often state “nature is oblivious to how we feel about it.”
Is it not time for the science community in general to refresh the basic tenets of science? Such as:
1 – form a hypothesis;
2 – gather pertinent data;
3 – analyze the data to see if it supports the hypothesis or not;
4 – if new knowledge is thought to have been discovered, submit same for publication with wide spectrum professional peer review and all data and methodology fully open for inspection;
5 – repeat.
The only winner should always be truth. The only loser should always be ignorance.
Just one minor correction:
1 – form a *falsifiable* hypothesis
How many days Peter Gleick will still remain the Chair of the AGU ethics committee is anyone’s guess.
The longer it takes before he steps down or is fired, the less credible the AGU becomes.
Max
His name is gone from the AGU website as of 10:15AM (Eastern)
His name was gone this morning and replaced as of this afternoon by Linda Gunderson (although, interestingly, Gleick’s name still shows up in the comments in the code).
I’m deeply Canadian and I am doing the Snoopy Happy Dance.
Gleick has disgraced himself and underscored MSM’s credulousness on all matters CAGW. Gleick beclowned himself and bemerded his colleagues.
Good.
Mosher is a God!
Revkin is being schooled. As is the Guardian and the odious Black of the BBC.
It has been a long time coming and it is not over by a long shot.
Satisfaction? You bet Steve. Your work and the work of countless other unfunded skeptics has borne fruit.
Rejoice!
(And, good news eh: twice a year, Canadians get to have fun…no, really.)
Small time academic hires “top Democrat operative Chris Lehane” whose services, I presume, do not come cheap. So who’s funding Gleicke? Shouldn’t we be told?
If someone pays for your lawyer, isn’t that “income”?
geo writes:
“I’m not willing to throw him [Gleick] under the bus just yet for the *additional* crime of forgery.”
You don’t have to.
He just jumped under the bus all by himself.
Max
“Mr. Lehane has always relished his reputation as someone who enjoys the aspects of politics that make others squirm. He is not surprised at the flaws he finds in the candidates, and he views his role as helping overcome them, even if that means (or perhaps, especially if that means) destroying the opponent.
“I’m a guy who would not be at all surprised to find worms under the rock — but I’d make sure to put bigger, slimier, nastier worms under the other guy’s rock,” Mr. Lehane said at a dinner in San Francisco, sounding very much like his character. “Jay’s a guy who really hopes that the worms are not going to be there. If he finds them, he deals with it.”
“Jay is earnest and great,” he said. “I like sticking the knife in people.”
see
http://www.nytimes.com/2011/12/08/us/politics/a-washington-rivalry-turns-cinematic.html?pagewanted=all
And the movie coming soon!
Has anyone done a statistical text analysis of the “strategy document”, comparing it with, say, Gleick’s blog posts? Would be interesting to see the results.
I checked other Gleick documents for use of the word “subset.” The strategy document contained that rare word one time. Sure enough, Gleick favors that word, as I found it in nearly every document he authored. Oddly, it appears he uses the word only once in each older document in some sort of strange self-imposed quota system.
SteveMc,
You make the (reasonable-sounding) claim that despite all the data hiding, malfeasance etc etc, there are nevertheless some very competent and sincere climate scientists with genuine, science-based concerns that the CAGW thesis is true.
What though do you make of their deafening silence regarding the insincere ones ? Are they cowed perhaps, by the fear of losing their jobs and/or grants if they speak out or criticise do you think ?
Steve: IMO, more they don’t want to get involved. They’re more interested in their own work.
Indeed they don’t want to get involved … and therein lies the problem.
w.
lets see.
According the Gleick he is sent a document. That document gets most the facts largely correct. Down to the dollars that Singer earned.
So that person has access to the documents. The real numbers. That is how
they can write the document.
And That person decides the best evidence to send Gleick is a memo?
undated, unsigned.. and leaves Gleick to find the supporting documentation?
MAKES NO SENSE, unless that person were trying to trick Gleick, BUT if they were trying to trick him they would have sent him a MORE FAKE document.
A: you have to believe an insider with access to the real docs, sends Gleick the worst evidence.
B: you have to beleieve in a really stupid trickster
C: gleick wrote it.
Steve:
First, you did a great job sussing out Gleick. Do you read Gleick’s confession as saying that the document he received in early January as the same document as the fake strategy document? Given that lawyers wrote it, I think it has to be parsed very carefully. I think your initial read remains correct: Gleick wrote the strategy memo, which is different from whatever anonymous document that triggered his subsequent unethical behavior.
the document gives him wiggle room. I havent parsed out all the logical possibilities, but its vague enough to let the story morph. its a STUDY IN AMBIGUITY. that implies a knowningness in and of itself.
Most likely he did his pretexting from a location that is traceable
Assume for a moment that Gleick received the strategy document from an anonymous source, as he claims.
Now that strategy document actually contains text along the lines “here’s some super stuff we’ll keep secret even from our own board”.
If Gleick wanted to verify the strategy doc, the last thing he would want to look at would be he board papers, because the strategy doc supposedly contains info that even the Heartland board don’t know.
So why would he then go do ID theft, or whatever you want to call it, to get the board papers?
It doesn’t make sense… he stole completely the wrong papers to test the authenticity of the strategy document.
Mosh
Add to your discussion –
1 The memo includes facts to an accuracy (bar the mis-statement of the Koch donation) that can only have come from someone in possession of the Heartland documents
and
2 The memo only includes as facts those things that can be verified from the Heartland documents that Gleick subsequently leaked, and in no instance is other documentary proof required.
As such, the two scenarios are:
1 – As Gleick claims, the memo was prepared by some third party, who by some coincidence had access to an identical bundle of documents to those then obtained by Gleick in his phishing expedition
or
2 – Gleick’s carefully worded mea culpa (which as pointed out does not explicitly state that he did not author or at least modify the strategy memo) is intentionally misleading, and he was the author of the fake memo following receipt of the Heartland docs, and that the previous document was actually either the publically available tax form or something derived only from this.
I know where I would put my quatloos.
“As Gleick claims, the memo was prepared by some third party, who by some coincidence had access to an identical bundle of documents to those then obtained by Gleick in his phishing expedition
or”
Yes according to gleicks story, this person choose not to send gleick supporting information. So the writer of the memo has all the documents.
and chooses to send gleick ONLY the memo.
right
Mosh
Does seem to need a rather non-credible series of events doesn’t it?
Whoever wrote the memo (or part of it) knew the language of communications. I googled this part sentence from it (sans quotes):-
Efforts might also include cultivating more neutral voices with big audiences
After the first quotes from the memo, at about page 5 the search turned up ‘Communication Foundations and Analysis’ Part 1 Chapter 4:-
Planning Written and Spoken Messages
Click to access 0324587902_143597.pdf
The words: cultivating; neutral; voices; audiences; and, audience’s occur frequently.
Wouldn’t this point to someone like Richard Littlemore rather than Gleick?
Compare this:-
“Efforts might also include cultivating more neutral voices with big audiences” – fake memo.
With this:-
“You need to be even more active in recruiting experts who are sympathetic to your view, and much more active in making them part of your message” – a real memo.
The first is the PR language of ‘Planning Written and Spoken Messages’ (previous comment above) of which James Hoggan and Richard Littlemore of DeSmogBlog are exponents.
The second is a memo by Frank Luntz. Republican public opinion researcher Frank Luntz. Luntz was an expert on the use of language – he wrote the book “Words That Work”. Luntz’s memo outlined a strategy on the environment for the Republican party. This is part of his advice on global warming (pages 137–138 of the memo):-
http://lightbucket.wordpress.com/2008/04/09/pr-versus-science-the-luntz-memo/
http://www.politicalstrategy.org/archives/001330.php
Hoggan cites the memo here:-
http://desmogblog.com/slamming-the-climate-skeptic-scam
Littlemore cites the memo here:-
http://www.prairiedogmag.com/archive/?id=76
Deduce what you will, but I suppose that could be nothing.
Luntz memo:-
“Voters believe that there is no consensus about global warming within the scientific community……..Therefore, you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debate (page 137)
“It’s time for us to start talking about ‘climate change’ instead of global warming” (page 142)
Fake memo:-
“….the topic of climate change is controversial and uncertain” (page 1)
Cross-posted to http://joannenova.com.au/2012/02/gleik-admits-his-guilt-deception-used-to-get-documents-in-fakegate-apologizes/#comment-980682
And http://www.climateconversation.wordshine.co.nz/2012/02/heartland-fakegate-scandal/#comment-81396
The idea that the strategy memo was forged by someone with access to the internal documents, then supplied to Gleick without the internal documents, would be consistent with Gleick being targeted for exposure as a forger if he tried to make use of the strategy memo. That is, it is consistent with the idea of the whole thing having been designed from the get-go as a scam targeting Gleick by someone who had access to the internal documents.
I’ll grant you that knowing what we know today, it seems simpler to simply believe that Gleick forged the memo and is lying about having received it before his phishing attempt. But so far at least, I haven’t seen evidence that rules out the Gleick-as-victim scenario. Both explanations seem to account for the known facts pretty well.
I guess the main thing that makes me resist letting go of the Gleick-as-victim theory (besides the fact that I’m one of those liberal warmists, which I’ll grant you is probably more than enough to disqualify me right there, based on some of the stuff that is flying around from my side lately), is this: to believe the Gleick-as-forger theory, I have to believe that Gleick not only exhibited (limited) dishonesty and (abundant) bad judgement, but also that he acted downright stupid, in that he had the original documents, but chose to sex them up by forging and including the fake strategy memo, which he must have known would be instantly denounced as fake by Heartland, thereby handing Heartland a made-to-order defense that immediately shifted things toward a discussion that favored them. Whereas the Gleick-as-victim theory only requires that Gleick be naive and out of his depth, driven to making dumb decisions by his having been successfully played by the forger. Granted, there’s plenty of stupidity evident in that chain of events, too, since (as McArdle has pointed out) it requires us to believe that Gleick didn’t notice, or at least didn’t pause to consider and be guided by, the signs of fakery in the strategy memo that you (in particular) were so astute at spotting. But a naive Gleick who includes the fake strategy memo because he honestly assumes it is real seems more consistent with what I’ve read about him than the stupidity of his thinking the inclusion of an easily denounced fake document would make the leak more effective.
Ultimately, too, I’m influenced by the actual outcome. Who has benefited from the chain of events? Who has been harmed? There clearly was a motive for a Gleick-as-victim scam, because look at how well it (hypothetically) has worked. Even with the (presumably unplanned) obtaining and release by Gleick of the legitimate documents, Heartland has still been able to focus the ensuing discussion on the forged memo, effectively neutralizing Gleick and (by my estimation, at least) dramatically winning the exchange in terms of the likely effect on public opinion.
If he didn’t author the fake document, why wouldn’t he have highlighted this in his “admission”?
If it were me, I’d distance myself from that fake document as clearly and loudly as I could. Admitting to phishing while not denying the bigger issue (faking a document to taint the reputation of individuals and an organization)? Seems like a lost opportunity. The words seem carefully parsed for a reason. The statement appears to be wreitten to avoid any (provable) lies – hence a denial of writing the fake document would be out, if that’s indeed what he did.
Why no clear denial of the fake?
We also have discussed motive for a while. Go back to the memo text again:
1. It builds up Gleick as a good climate scientist and an important Forbes commentator to be reckoned with.
2. It’s claim that Heartland want to discourage teaching of science [i.e. AGW] in schools, is in stark contrast to Gleick’s new position with NCSE encouraging teaching science [i.e. AGW] in schools.
Furthermore, if point 2 were to become widely accepted, then it might even generate extra funding for NCSE.
I’m not saying that Gleick wrote the fake memo, but that’s 2 personal motives (as well as more nebulous political motives) that Gleick would have had to fake it.
Gleick received the apparently fake 2012 strategy memo in early 2012 but the meta data of the pdf indicates that it was scanned in mid-february… !
“No one should feel any satisfaction in these events, which have been highly damaging to everyone touched by them, including both Heartland and Gleick. ”
I guess I’m a bad person, because I feel great satisfaction right now.
Obvious point that seems (?) to have been missed so far: if Gleick received the fake strategy document before he obtained the board papers, why did it not occur to him as strange that the strategy paper was not among the board papers? Why did he proceed to publish it online claiming that it was part of the board pack when he knew it was not?
No matter what happens… Gleick most likely will have to lay low for a while, until he can triumphantly re-emerge with some newly manufactured high ground with a ‘get out of jail free’ card…
…Otherwise known as an anonymous “death threat” email.
It’s done the trick many times.
Hopkinson above may be right. He may not have created it but someone close to him with his help and agreement did from the information derived from the other documents? That does not leave him off the hook in my view. Anyway the whole thing is a bit overblown. Hopefully a lot of the fanatics will now back down and get a life….
1. Why was the fake memo sent to Gleick?
2. Why was the fake memo sent only to Gleick?
3. Was the fake memo sent only to Gleick?
4. If the fake memo was sent to people other than Gleick, why haven’t they published it?
5. After receiving the fake memo and before publishing it, did Gleick discuss it with anyone else?
6. If Gleick discussed the fake memo with anyone else before publishing it, what was their response?
7. Is it logical that upon receiving the fake memo, Gleick didn’t discuss it with anyone else?
phone records, email records.
Let’s see it all Poor Peter.
And let’s have a tap on your phone too, just to record any death threats you receive. After all, it’s the only safe thing to do.
And to prove you don’t get any.
It’s intriguing, what Gleick’s note would show:
That he got this, and opted to go
For identity fraud
That seems rather odd
To “confirm” what the doc seemed to show
Now this “they made me do it” distress
Which has led Gleick to partly confess
(Though it may be a punt)
Is because of the stunt
He then pulled having been a success
And presumably, only PG
Had received it anonymously
Whereas he thought it keen
To send to sixteen
With perhaps some self-satisfied glee
So what are the chances that one
Sent to Gleick this so-called “smoking gun”
And then waited for weeks
For results that he seeks
Sending just one piece out, and was done?
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
No one should feel any satisfaction in these events…
—
Indeed. Work on investigating HI’s lobbying activity, and convincing their corporate donors to withdraw funding, must now be redoubled. Otherwise Gleick’s work will have been for nothing.
Absolutely. How’s it going so far?
A formal complaint to the IRS has already been made, apparently.
Give us a wry smile at least, bcl. We know you can.
Yes, the IRS has received a communication that apparently contains a complaint, they’re just not sure at this stage what exactly the complaint is and where in the document of some 2,124 pages the complaint resides. Ex-CIA codebreakers are being enlisted as we speak.
/sarc off
Aaaahhhh… let’s get the IRS to shutdown one side of the fair debate. That’s all Gleick wanted. A fair debate…
google: a shagged sheep, bcl
Good times… good times…
Interesting that the ‘Secret Memo’ has material lending support to the IRS dossier written by climate warrior Mashey. A quote from the link:
But the fake-memo does paint picture by communicating the derogatory idea that Heartland knowingly lies to their board, their staff the public and the IRS presenting this idea interlaced with what appears to be mostly correct, but otherwise bland material.
http://rankexploits.com/musings/2012/how-might-the-fake-memo-presented-as-real-defame-heartland/
Oh the irony.
This post at Real Climate Free speech and academic freedom has this update at the top:
Update: Some related concerns from deepclimate.org, if these claims can be verified.
which points to Heartland Institute budget and strategy revealed.
A Physical Realization of an Oxymoron: Real Climate pointing to a post about a fake document.
Indeed. Work on investigating HI’s lobbying activity, and convincing their corporate donors to withdraw funding, must now be redoubled. Otherwise Gleick’s lies will have been for nothing.
There fixed it for you.
Work?? Making stuff up is work?
Making stuff that’s plainly unethical, unprofessional, illegal, and contrary to human behavior up is Climate Science work??
Well of course it is, dummy. While you’ve been sleeping under some flat rock, Peter Glieck has taken up the challenge and redefined everything.
Here is etxt from the link Ed above supplied
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2011EO470009.shtml
—
AGU’s new task force on scientific ethics and integrity begins work
Peter Gleick
Pacific Institute, Oakland, Calif., USA
…
American Geophysical Union, Washington, D. C., USA
… AGU has established a new task force to review, evaluate, and update the Union’s policies on scientific misconduct and …responding to allegations of possible misconduct by AGU members….. trust is earned by maintaining the highest standards of scientific integrity in all that we do …. unwavering commitment to excellence in Earth and space science.
keeping track of a series of lies and covering up crimes can be very hard work
Has anyone asked Dan Rather to comment?
… internal strategy of the Heartland Institute to cast doubt on climate science ..
ie exposing its failures.
So is it now wrong to expose failures ? Is the idea to defer to political correctness and cover them up, ignore them, deny them, etc etc?
Hey, guys, here’s a “dot” that just might be significant. A few months ago, in the Climategate 2 e-mails, Mann said that an investigative journalist ought to try to discover if McIntyre (and someone else, I forget who) was being secretly funded by a think tank.
Could this suggestion have “inspired” Gleick? I think it could have played a role.
Wow, I remember reading this! You might be on to something here, but only Gleick knows for sure; doubt he’ll be sharing. I see Gleick’s actions as being provoked ultimately by the damage done to the cause by Climategate 2.0 in any case. The gift that keeps on giving.
There was a telling phrase two days ago in the New York Times comments on the original Revkin piece breaking Gleick’s confession:
That’s from PaulV of Richmond on the James. Climategate Envy was an underlying reason for this caper, without question, in my mind. But something caused Gleick in particular to lose his marbles and think this would fill the gap. I have a theory on that – all I need is evidence 🙂
I see Gleick’s actions as being provoked ultimately by the damage done to the cause by Climategate 2.0
Yes, “frustrated” by evidence of widespread foul play emerging, he thought he could offset it with some of his own.
The way the letter of ‘condolence’ from Mann & gang is written, I will bet they had been in contact with Gleick about this for quite some time.
As predicted, Greg Laden accepts Gleick’s statement as true, and uses that to claim the strategy memo must be real
Like I said if Gleick does know anything more about the strategy memo that he hasn’t disclosed (including if knows it’s fake), he just threw one of his supporters under a bus.
http://scienceblogs.com/gregladen/2012/02/the_heartland_science_denial_d.php
Gleick are you reading? Does this aspect at all pick your conscience?
Seems to me that Laden of his own volition just willfully placed his body under the wheels of the bus.
Because of this incident, Gleick has proven he has no credibility. Laden accepting the confession at face value proves he has no credibility either.
Laden’s trust in Gleick’s veracity is touching for those who want to–or rather NEED– to believe. It’s pablum for warmist consumption only.
It’s also an attempt to circle the wagons. “That’s our story and we are sticking to it.”
something caused Gleick in particular to lose his marbles … I have a theory on that – all I need is evidence
Can’t you just model it ?
That’s old hat. I was thinking a bit of identity theft, obtaining private documents by deception followed by a faked summary that better supports my thesis, all emailed to my best friends. Now that’s what I call evidence. (The tranquilliser dart for Mosher is now also considered essential.)
Serious censorship over at Revkin’s.
I posted this comment 12 hours ago and it disappeared into the ether.
I think as time goes on and we see Gleick’s defense, we will also see an evaporation of pity or sympathy for the man. Just a guess…
Gleick says he got the document in the mail. He supposes that someone anonymously mailed it to him because he was named in the document.
Unless there is yet *another* document out there, which Gleick chose to keep back from his document release, then he can only be talking about one and the same document, the faked 2012 Confidential Strategy document.
But if he had this document first, as he claims, it is damning enough as written. As anyone can see by reading the alarmist blogs the phraseology was seized upon immediately as “confirming our worst suspicions.”
So why would he not just release the document to his buddies or write about it himself? No crime had been committed at that point.
None of what he says makes sense. The reasons that Mosher and others picked up on Peter Gleick as the author were the style it was written in, the fact that it mentioned Gleick by name, Forbes and how it plays up Heartland, Forbes, Gleick, his competing blogger at Forbes – who are all bit players.
I suspect we will soon have solid evidence that Gleick did indeed write the memo. The man is a fool when it comes to his global warming science and he is a fool when it comes to IT. Printed documents can be traced forensically to individual printers in half a dozen ways. He might have gotten some legal advice to plot a strategy but no one around him is very technical.
Assuming it wasn’t generated by him, it is written in a way that would really stroke someone with a large ego and it might have been done as bait to ensure that he would release it.
But he didn’t just release it. He decided to go and do a bit of pretexting as well.
Would the document’s author have expected that?
When asked to comment on Dr. Gleick’s denial that he had any connection to the forged document, Anthony Weiner said “Nobody on the internet is stupid enough to believe that”*
*Ok so I might have made that up.
To its credit, today’s NYT has an article on Gleik’s confession:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/21/science/earth/activist-says-heartland-climate-papers-obtained-by-deceit.html
The article notes that he won a MacArthur “genius” grant in 2003. However, it does not mention that he is chair of the AGU Task Force on Scientific Ethics:
https://climateaudit.org/2012/02/20/peter-gleick-confesses/#comment-324849
One possibile plot twist we should keep in mind (not very likely, IMHO, but still a possibility) is that the faked document was a set-up sent to Gleik by a misguided skeptic, in anticipation that Gleik would be gullible enough to think it was real, thereby discrediting himself and the AGW movement after the memo was proven fake.
That reminds me — I’m low on popcorn!
As Gleick reminded Congress in his lecture to them on scientific ethics, he is also a member of the National Academy of Science: http://www.pacinst.org/publications/testimony/Gleick_Senate_Commerce_2-7-07.pdf
Will this affect his NAS membership?
(I see I misspelled his name in my previous comment.)
Unbelievably prescient document…
“Threats to the Integrity of Science”
and right there, listed first is Peter Glieck. 🙂
Well, to the NYT’s discredit, there is no retraction today of the 2/15 article promoting the fake memo:
http://www.nytimes.com/2012/02/16/science/earth/in-heartland-institute-leak-a-plan-to-discredit-climate-teaching.html?_r=1&ref=globalwarming
> One possibile plot twist we should keep in mind (not very likely, IMHO, but still a possibility) is that the faked document was a set-up sent to Gleik by a misguided skeptic, in anticipation that Gleik would be gullible enough to think it was real, thereby discrediting himself
But Gleik didn’t just think it was real, he decided to go and do some pretexting to nefarious obtain more documents.
Nobody made Gleik do that – expert on ethics and integrity that he is, he did that entirely of his own volition, apparently without prompting of any kind.
There is no evidence that the anonymous document is the fake document. The anonymous document could have been the budget.
Re: JamesD (Feb 21 14:53),
Glieck says the anonymous document mentioned him (Glieck). So it couldn’t have been, say, the budget.
Either the anonymous document is the fake memo, or there are two documents around that “mention” Glieck.
I don’t think there can be much doubt that in Gliek’s version, the “anonymous document” is the fake memo and that is what he appended to the genuine documents he sent to the “15 friends”.
That said, I don’t believe Gleick’s version. Whoever wrote the fake memo (which Glieck says he received at the beginning of 2012) must have had access to the genuine documents (which weren’t authored until the middle of January). Further, Mosher fingered Glieck as the author based on the style and content of the memo. That’s a hell of a coincidence.
There is little doubt in my mind that Glieck wrote the fake memo.
I’m still struggling to see how he thought this was going to play out:
– Go on a phishing expedition to illegally obtain internal HI documents
– Send the documents (including a faked one) to various blogs
– Sit back and enjoy the spectacle as the internet and MSM publish the documents and crucify HI
– Assume the role of anonymous climate ‘deepthroat’, sitting in the shadows never to be identified (but maybe become an unsung hero)
The naivete here is astounding.
At no point does he appear to have sought advice on the technical or legal implications, or even brainstormed with some of his colleagues on how to proceed, as surely someone would have quickly pointed out the massive issues with the approach he took.
At this writing, the AGU’s webpage on their Task Force on Scientific Ethics does not list a chair, and does not even list Gleick as a member.
http://www.agu.org/about/governance/committees_boards/scientific_ethics.shtml
Has he already been removed? Or was the report that he was its chair in error?
Hu, check the google cached version. The AGU moved fast.
http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:jSz6nZR3QVwJ:www.agu.org/about/governance/committees_boards/scientific_ethics.shtml
Thanks, Paul! So Gleick is now the Newly Defrocked Chair of the AGU’s Task Force on Scientific Ethics.
Does the NAS still count him as one of their distinguished members? 😉
As noted in the comments at WUWT Gleick is still listed as chair in the HTML code, but it’s been commented out.
Obviously some webmaster got a 3AM call to Get Him The Hell Out Of There – presumably he’ll be excised permanently once the marketing folks with the content editor password get in to the office in the morning.
Either that, or he’ll be quietly reinstated after a decent interval, which would represent perhaps the final triumph of ideology over honesty at the AGU.
The Commissar Vanishes.
This is the list of AGU Fellows as of 22 Feb 2012.
James N Galloway, Giuseppe Gambolati, Rolando R Garcia, Ed J Garnero, Christopher J R Garrett, Glendon W Gee, Johannes Geiss, John W Geissman, Lynn W Gelhar, Marvin A Geller, Michael Ghil, Mark S Ghiorso, Gerald V Gibbs, J Freeman Gilbert, John C Gille, Gary Glatzmaier, Andrew J W Gleadow, George Gloeckler, Clyde C Goad, Melvyn L Goldstein, Jerry Goldstein, Steven L Goldstein, Allen H Goldstein, Tamas I Gombosi, Richard M Goody, Richard G Gordon, Arnold L Gordon, William E Gordon, Steven Gorelick, John T Gosling, Anthony J Gow, Thomas E Graedel, Donald L Graf, Stephen P Grand, William G Gray, Harry W Green, David H Green, Raymond A Greenwald, Michael C Gregg, Ross W Griffiths, Pavel Ya Groisman, Lawrence Grossman, Timothy L Grove, Nicolas Gruber, Eberhard Gruen, David Gubbins, Vijay K Gupta, Hoshin Vijai Gupta, Harsh K Gupta, Don A Gurnett, Michael Gurnis, Robert T Guza
Now the AGU page has changed again and Linda Gundersen, a geologist, is the new chair.
But Gleick is still there, commented out, in the html page source.
Perhaps he will be reinstated after an Independent Inquiry concludes he has done nothing wrong.
Willis’s Open Letter to Dr. Linda Gundersen at WUWT is worth a read. The difficulty the consensusites have with Gleick is that he seems to have admitted a criminal offence. I’m not saying they won’t consider subverting the whole of the US justice system but they may feel it’s easier to throw their respected ethical friend under a bus and repair the damage the best the can. HTML evidence notwithstanding 🙂
Looks like they are not to sure what to do. If you click to view the source html code and go just up from the bottom they still have all the Gleick info, it is just commented out.
In the “You can’t make this stuff up category,” look at who is heading the American Geophysical Union’s “science ethics effort.” http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2011/2011EO470009.shtml
Apologies if this has already been pointed out ad nauseum-
Gleick receives an “anonymous document” (apparently the fake, which is clearly made from the real documents). Gleick then supposedly uses social engineering to get corroboration, receiving a trove of documents that happens to do exactly that. A remarkable coincidence.
And why wouldn’t the anonymous sender also include those supporting documents in his packet to Gleick? Surely he would have calculated that a single document might be seen as a forgery and that it would take more to spur Gleick to act.
Geick’s story doesn’t hold water.
First concrete fallout?
http://ncse.com/news/2012/02/source-heartland-leak-steps-forward-007220
“As part of NCSE’s expansion to defend the teaching of climate science, Gleick had agreed to join NCSE’s board of directors. On the same day as he posted his statement, however, he apologized to NCSE for his behavior with regard to the Heartland Institute documents and offered to withdraw from the board, on which he was scheduled to begin serving as of February 25, 2012. His offer was accepted.”
But the NCSE appears to still take the fake memo at face value:
http://ncse.com/news/2012/02/source-heartland-leak-steps-forward-007220
“I solicited and received additional materials directly from the Heartland Institute under someone else’s name.”
Is it agreed that Peter Gleick here is confessing to being the one who imitated an HI director in order to obtain the non faked documents from HI? That part of the puzzle appears to be clear to me, but the discussion here seems to be more on the supposedly faked document. The confession certainly has legal implications that perhaps Gleick is now attempting to get out in front of with his admission.
What makes the partisan political case for the entire exercise is the associated document that is thought to be a fake. The non fake documents that, while causing a legal problem for Gleick, are rather ho hum material that might even be considered to shed a favorable or neutral light on HI. Any strategist intent on getting the spin on the non faked documents needs the supposedly faked document. Gleick in his confession is evidently saying that he received the supposedly faked document but is certainly not indicating or admitting it was a fake. Looking at it from Gleick’s perspective we have someone in possession of a document of very uncertain origins and validity. In order to verify that seemingly damning information about HI in this document he went about stealing verifiable documents from HI.
After mulling over his anonymously obtained document for a goodly length of time, once he had possession of the stolen HI documents he almost immediately without further mulling over or attempts to reconcile the anonymous document with the stolen ones sent all the documents to 15 bloggers.
Obviously Gleick knew the importance of the anonymous document to be used to spin the stolen ones whether he received it anonymously or wrote it himself. In his confession he has rather carefully left open the issue of the document as being founded in an HI source and thus to allow the spin of the combined documents to continue at some blogs. If Gleick turns out to have authored the supposedly faked document (or if it is proved to be definitely a fake by someone else) the entire spin being applied at some blogs goes down the drain. It would take, what I think would be considered by other than true believers, a major spin on spin effort to keep alive the current spin on the HI documents.
There is no indication that the “anonymous document” is the fake document. It could have been the budget for all we know.
Glieck says the anonymous document mentioned him (Glieck). So it couldn’t have been, say, the budget.
Actually, there is. In Gleick’s confession, he suggests that he might have been sent the doc because he was mentioned.
But AFAIK, the fake document is the only one that mentions Gleick.
The strategy among the members of the consensus has been to defend their theories by saying (paraphrasing) “there is consensus among experts, you must agree with us in order for us to classify you as an expert, non-experts should trust us because we are the experts, and therefore no debate is needed nor will it be tolerated.”
What they don’t seem to understand is that this strategy is substantially undermined every time a member of the consensus reveals themselves to be untrustworthy. Mann’s “censored directory’, Jones’ little fibs about FOIA, Mike’s Nature trick, Hansen’s lack of disclosure about awards from political advocacy organization and now Gleick’s misadventure: to the average person, all of these things are red flags that indicate that trust is not warranted.
Timeline of the confession — Speculation
It occurs to me that maybe the trigger to Gleick’s confession was the American Spectator article by Ross Kaminsky
http://spectator.org/blog/2012/02/17/theft-and-apparent-forgery-of
That article fingered him for document theft “One obvious suspect in the Heartland document theft — and this is just my speculation — is Peter Gleick,” – and while it says the strategy memo is fake, never actually accuses Gleick of being the faker (it simply says his office is in the same timezone as the faker).
And maybe Gleick was not aware of Mosher’s speculation and all the speculation about the content of the faked document that was going on at Lucia’s.
Then Roger Jr. tweets him asking if he is the document faker.
At which point maybe he decides the game is up regarding the theft, but thinks he need not confess to any knowledge of the fakery (if he any such knowledge), because all the evidence against him is the fake was made in his office’s time zone.
So then he talks to his close associates, and starts preparing his confession (the confessions looks like he’s had some advice preparing it, and is very carefully written).
But he’s now stuck in a trap, since if he does have any knowledge of the fakery, he can’t disclose it even to his close associates, because he’d then have to admit that he had lied to them even while confessing to the document theft…
“some advice preparing [the confession]”
From Politico via WUWT:
“Lehane, Al Gore’s 2000 presidential campaign press secretary, is helping Gleick pro bono with communications issues. Gleick is represented by John Keker, a prominent San Francisco-based white collar criminal defense attorney.”
Chris Lehane is one of the hardest of hard-core Democrat flacks in this state.
As I posted way, way above, according to the AGU, Gleick resigned as Chair of the Ethics Committee for unspecified reasons on 16 February. So it seems likely that he knew he was in trouble pretty much as soon as his name started being bandied around as a suspect.
cross-post
Gleick may very well be looking at a perjury charge. He was “mailed” that document right?
1. There were no fold marks on the “scanned” copy. While it is possible that someone used an 8 1/2 x 11 enevlope, who would do that for a 2 page document?
2. Whoever faked the document, had to have acces to the Board meeting papers, as some of the exact wording was on both.
Suppose the original document was the budget? Then he phishes Heartland and gets all the documents including the budget. Then he fakes the “Strategy Document” because there is no smoking gun. He has not identified the anonymous document. How he describes it could also describe the budget.
“Suppose the original document was the budget?”
Was this in the form of an xls (Excel) spreadsheet?
If not, I’m not buying that this was ‘the budget’; a high-level summary maybe …
I don’t really care as to the author of the “fake” memo.
Gleick VIOLATED THE LAW in doing what he did.
Having Gleick and his sycophants trying to support his “by any means in support of THE CAUSE” is absolutely distasteful.
Gleick does not justify his action as “support of THE CAUSE,” he justifies it as a means to verify evidence of a conspiracy by the Heartland Institute to corrupt the scientific process. He offers a moral justification for a technical breach of the law, if that is what his access to HI documents amounts to. You cannot dismiss the moral justification by bleating that his action was against the law. He’s acknowledged that already.
Gleick does not justify his action as “support of THE CAUSE,” he justifies it as a means to verify evidence of a conspiracy by the Heartland Institute to corrupt the scientific process. He offers a moral justification for a technical breach of the law, if that is what his access to HI documents amounts to. You cannot dismiss the moral justification by the fact that his action was against the law. He’s acknowledged that already.
Yesterday, Peter Glieck was the Chair of the task force on scientific ethics and integrity at the American Geophysical Union.
http://www.agu.org/about/governance/committees_boards/scientific_ethics.shtml
Task Force on Scientific Ethics
Chair
Peter Gleick, Pacific Institute, Oakland, California
Members
…
How do you conclude that it is a crime for Gleick to destroy the original memo? How was he to know it was evidence? He can claim he destroyed it as soon as he scanned it.
The actual timeline of what happened:
A certain Heartland worker was reading Forbes and stumbled upon a article by Gleick. This person realized the error of his skepticism, and started realizing that he was a tool of big oil. He started reading more of PG’s work, and became a big fan. He eventually wrote a fake memo and sent it to Gleick. Being a big fan, he wrote it in the style of Gleick.
Gleick has not identified what the document was that he received. We don’t know that it was the fake document. It could have been the budget. As far as I know, Gleick has not denied that he is the author of the fake document.
Gleick’s mea culpa was written in logical legaleze. It can be interpreted multiple different ways depending on how the future plays out.
The National Center for Science Education (NCSE) has accepted Peter Gleick’s generous offer to resign from their board.
Peter was appointed to the NCSE board only on 13 January 2012, making his tenure all of 5 weeks.
Below are the last two paragraphs of the NCSE’s press release in response to Peter’s lie. Dr. Eugenie Scott, the director of NCSE, is clearly taking a ‘fake but accurate’ approach to the “Confidential Memo.” Note especially the bolded last line.
End of the NCSE press statement: “As part of NCSE’s expansion to defend the teaching of climate science, Gleick had agreed to join NCSE’s board of directors. On the same day as he posted his statement, however, he apologized to NCSE for his behavior with regard to the Heartland Institute documents and offered to withdraw from the board, on which he was scheduled to begin serving as of February 25, 2012. His offer was accepted.
“”Gleick obtained and disseminated these documents without the knowledge of anyone here,” NCSE’s executive director Eugenie C. Scott commented, “and we do not condone his doing so.” But, she added, “they show that NCSE was right to broaden its scope to include the teaching of climate science. There really are coordinated attempts to undermine the teaching of climate science, and NCSE is needed to help to thwart them.” (my bold)”
“As part of NCSE’s expansion to defend the teaching of climate science”
Wow that was lucky, because those evil Heartland folks want to discourage teaching of science – and even wrote it down in a memo – well according to the faked memo they did.
Am I the only one who finds tat bit of mirrored language an amazing coincidence? Maybe even a bit too amazing?
“. . . making his tenure all of 5 weeks.”
Actually, according to the NCSE, Gleick hadn’t even started serving yet, which is just as well for the NCSE. They can probably come away from this with Gleick never showing up in any of their documents or corporate history as ever having served on the board, and we can be confident they are reviewing how to best document this issue as we speak. If this had all hit the fan after February 25, he would show up in the corporate record forever as a one-time board member with an embarrassingly short tenure. Assuming the February 25 date is accurate (I have my doubts, but am willing to let them lie for now), there is nothing nefarious on the part of the NCSE here — just lucky timing on their part.
So the NCSE could come off pretty cleanly. But then, driven by her usual MO and unable to help herself, Scott had to go open her mouth and insert her foot about all those nasty folks out there working to “undermine” science . . .
Pat, when we last spoke I was sincere in wishing you the very best with your fightback over the NCSE extending its efforts into climate science. But this is ridiculous mate!
It sounds like they are going to need a bit more help to see the light, however, so may I officially wish you the best with the next phase too.
http://stevemosher.wordpress.com/2012/02/21/berkeley-earth-surface-temperature-v1-5/
Interesting and strange: “I solicited and received additional materials directly from the Heartland Institute under someone else’s name.” Apparently this was done without that someone else’s permission to steal information he was otherwise not entitled to? Hum, meets all the elements of identity theft. So, identity theft is indulged in to tarnish a private think tank’s efforts to debate in public a public funded science and its vicissitudes, but in the name of heroically preventing the think tank from muddying the waters of scientific certitude secretly arrived at on the public dole. The seemingly assumed moral equivalence to justify the identity theft is astounding–if public funded facts of science held by public institutions can’t be kept secret an are fair game to be stolen or whistle blown, than neither can the facts of a private going concern be kept secret an are fair game to be stolen. Apparently the tacit assumption is that private think tanks should be subject to a freedom of information act, which is rather ironic.
JJ has a critical comment. Gleick does not identify the document he received in the mail. So he has never denied faking the Strategy Memo. Let him deny that he is the author of the fake memo. He hasn’t done that yet. The document he received in the mail could have been the IRS document. He hasn’t said.
Again, in his confession, he stated that maybe he was sent the Fake doc because he was mentioned in it.
AFAIK, the fake doc is the only one that mentions Gleick. He certainly isn’t in the IRS Doc. 🙂
Or the anonymous document wasn’t published.
“Glieck says the anonymous document mentioned him (Glieck). So it couldn’t have been, say, the budget.”
Didn’t Joe Bast say that Gleick was recently invited to a debate at a “Heartland event” only recently? Could that invitation have mentioned the board meeting? It might have given him the idea (to go after documents circulating before/after) and it would have been something with his name on it. Maybe the “anonymous” part is the lie.
Just a thought.
What I see as the sad part about this are the reactions that I am seeing about this. This isn’t a debate. it is just people screaming “Our side is right” at the other. Nobody listens they just spin and scream. In this I agree with Andrew Revkin in that this is a sad day because it it yet more evidence that we have lost the chance fro a rational debate about this. For this, the consensus and skeptical sides each have blame enough. This is a very sad day.
I don’t know or care to know about the Heartland issue. About who did what or what they did on both sides. I just know hat this screaming is not getting us anywhere. Nobody changes their minds. We never move ahead. Both sides should hang their heads in shame.
Oh, I see. Peter Glieck commits identity theft, fraud, and outright deception, and I should hang my head in shame … dude, that is one screwed up sense of right and wrong you’ve got there. You boast that you “don’t know or care about the Heartland issue”.
I love people who say things like ‘I know absolutely nothing about any of this, but you should all be ashamed’ …
No, I shouldn’t be ashamed, Tom. You should be ashamed for being proud of your ignorance of the issues, and for your willingness to condemn the actions of others when even you admit that you don’t understand the issues.
Do your homework before uncapping your electronic pen, there’s a good fellow.
w.
Well said that man.
It’s been said before but has to be repeated. Gleick (et al) has spent years doing everything he could to refuse debate and shut it down. This whole affair may have begun a few days before the fraud with an invitation Heartland sent to Gleick to participate in an actual debate. He ignored it as always, but may have used the contact details in the invitation to perpetrate his fraud.
Yes, people should hang their heads in shame because of the current reactions. This is not a game in which one side will win. it is the consideration of a serious issue. The entire AGW issue has not be well served. The Heartland Institute issue was just a distraction. it continues to be a reaction with what is going on now
Tell me, will any of this matter in two weeks? It shouldn’t be but it will. I can see lengthy discussions going on about the ethical issues. This will all accomplish nothing while at the same time the issue still waits
A debate full of sound and fury. Signifying nothing. This is not good news fro any of us and we all have much reason to hang our heads in shame
Man, I do have to laugh at people who think just because they are ashamed, everyone should be.
Tom, if you are ashamed, that’s your business. Saying that everyone should emulate you? Sorry, my friend. Your guilt and shame are yours, not ours, and certainly not mine. Your attempt to justify your own personal shame by trying to spread it around?
Priceless …
w.
The main reason that I read Steve McIntyre’s blog is that I see an attempt at dispassionate analysis. I do not see partisan rationalizations of the evidence. I see objective audits of the papers with the extremes of partisan rhetoric not allowed. I don’t see this elsewhere even in lobs from real scientists.
The main reason that I see how Steve McIntyre succeeded is the dispassion that he uses here. It is a winning tactic. While others rant at each other, he examine the facts. He has the advantage of being right. His analysis can stand up to close scrutiny. His opponents have ceded this ground to him.
Being dispassionate is a wining tactic.
If one side wins the Heartland debate will the other side admit it. What will really change?
This is just another version of
“Ok you two, I don’t care who started it – just shake hands and say you’re sorry.”
That kind of false equivalence doesn’t solve conflicts, it only exacerbates them.
Isn’t it serendipitous that Gleick was invited by Heartland to debate / discuss climate issues shortly before the “fakegate” thing hit the fan. Heartland has always extended conference invitations to prominent climate scientists of both persuasions and we know of only one, Peter Demming I believe who accepted an invitation (and was cordially and well received). Heartland has no reason to “hang their heads in shame”.
Tom Gray: Apart from the fact that you seem to be “screaming” the loudest on this thread, you are ignoring a basic fact regarding the controversy over climate change: One side, Manned by people like Gleick has declared “the debate” over. They have moved beyond “debate” to tactics that seek to injure the other side and/or squelch debate.
You also seem oblivious to the fact that climate research continues and from all appearances seems to be expanding. Climate research on the subject of global warming is no longer the exclusive domain of a small clique of scientists with self-reinforcing views. This is where all the sound and fury of the political/social/economic debates will be resolved once conclusive evidence one way or the other is discovered in research.
Jeff Norman Posted Feb 20, 2012 at 10:37
“…but now I just feel stunned. I hope Peter has people to help him through this.”
I believe his lawyer is close at hand.
For those who wonder about trick (TM- climate science):
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/bbada27c-5cb5-11e1-ac80-00144feabdc0.html#ixzz1n3RWWHT7
Steve, Steve, Steve. We all know that by “trick” they don’t mean anything nefarious. It just means a cool approach, a neat technical way to do something — you know, like one programmer looking at another’s code and saying “that’s a nice trick” or a skateboarder saying to another “Dude, that’s a sick trick.”
So this just means the Team now has one more useful tool in their bag of tricks. Mike’s Nature Trick. Now Peter’s Heartland Trick.
/sarc
Yup, just like Mandia’s claim in the Guardian article cited above that what Gleick did was just part of the bag of tricks of ‘any’ (according to him) investigative journalist. Misrepresenting your identity to get private information is all part of the day’s work, in his world. Now that News of the World has been closed down, and numerous reporters and their associates have been arrested, I guess his investigative reporter mates who apparently do this stuff all the time are banging on his door looking for jobs.
I think they called Richard Millhouse Nixon “Tricky Dick” for a reason.
A commenter on Pointman’s quoted this pertinent bit of American law:
Yoiks.
Judging by this commentary at the Justice department website, the defence may argue that the intent was not to defraud Heartland of money. On the other hand, it was intended to obtain property, namely the Board meeting documents. The test of de minimis here is easily met by pointing to the avalanche of international publicity: it was obviously a “material” scheme judging by the reporting that took place. Heartland will want to be archiving copies of all the media and blog coverage that was/is out there, especially the stuff that is injurious and harmful to them.
Even if Gleick’s legal team argue that the artifice was not intended to obtain money out of Heartland, the wider net is S1346, the notoriously ambiguous Honest Services statute, which says: “For the purposes of this chapter, the term “scheme or artifice to defraud” includes a scheme or artifice to trick Heartland into sending Board documents to nutjobs in California” or words to that effect.
The faked memo suggests that Heartland wanted to discourage teaching of science [where science = CAGW]
Meanwhile warmist group(s) were initiating new programs to encourage teaching of science [where science = CAGW].
A consequence of the faked memo being published – providing it were to become accepted as genuine – would be to make it easier for the warmist group(s) to raise funds. It remains to be seen whether than was a motive of the faker, or just a coincidence.
The best course for Heartland may be to inform Gleick that a full and heartfelt apology for his actions combined with a promise to never again repeat, speak, correspond or write about the incident, other than when required by court order or by a government committee, will be sufficient to avoid any court action by them against him. An outline of what HI expects in the apology to be provided by HI. And upon agreement, Gleick to make a donation to a charity chosen by HI.
Take the high road.
JCM, if someone published your and your family’s personal contact details, financial details (including birthday cheques from Aunt Suzy, with her address), plans for the next 12 months, and a fake document that makes you look like a sinister tosser, all over the internet – and that is then repeated and commented on in newspapers and on blogs all over the world – come back and tell us that a heartfelt apology would be enough for you.
This is not trivial. One takes the high road on things that are trivial, not on direct attacks on one’s finances, reputation and privacy worldwide.
JCM, What you propose is not a remedy. If you have to dictate how “full and heartfelt” an apology has to be, it isn’t full and heartfelt. And if they write a contract enjoining him from ever speaking about the matter (which would serve him better than them, as he’s the one who would prefer people forgot all about it), then they have to monitor him forever at their expense, and seek compensation should he breach the contract… a big nuisance. No, there is a simpler and more effective way of pursuing remedy here, through tort and libel actions.
Also, don’t suggest that the “high road” somehow involves not defending yourself. Heartland owes a duty to its members and donors and employees to defend its reputation and operations. Taking the “high road” in this case involves pursuing every remedy available under the law, both to make their organization whole again and to provide a deterrent to future would-be Gleicks, for the benefit of their potential victims.
Ross wrote:
“Heartland owes a duty to its members and donors and employees to defend its reputation and operations.”
That puts Trevor Davies in a better light than I previously perceived. As a general and rhetorical question to the commenters here (and aside from public/private arguments which are conceptually tangential), why would sunshine be the best disinfectant at UEA but not at Heartland?
Davies owes a duty to defend UEA as well. That, however, doesn’t imply a duty to derail inquiries or shield his staff. My complaint about his conduct is that he didn’t convene independent inquiries capable of resolving the accusations. He empanelled Oxburgh, then steered him off the science issues and claimed the list of papers was selected by the Royal Society, when it came from his office and omitted many of the controversial studies. He empanelled Muir Russell then allowed them to drop the ball on the key lines of questioning, including deletion of emails and manipulation of evidence. So it ended up looking more like whitewashes.
The attempt to draw a parallel between Heartland and CRU falls down in 3 ways. First, Heartland is a private organization, not a taxpayer-funded university. Second, Heartland is an outsider to the IPCC. CRU staff are long-time Lead Authors of IPCC and CRU supplies key data used by the IPCC. Third, the CRU emails were validated and revealed serious cases of evidence manipulation. The Heartland document that everyone seized upon as evidence of dishonest conduct turned out to be a fake.
Yeah, apart from that they’re the same.
If you are funded by the public, to do research, which effects public policy, you ought to be prepared to provide details of your work. Private individuals and organizations – are entitled to privacy.
The strange thing is that Trevor Davies has never taken anyone to court. I wonder why.
Matt Skaggs –
“As a general and rhetorical question to the commenters here (and aside from public/private arguments which are conceptually tangential), why would sunshine be the best disinfectant at UEA but not at Heartland?”
I don’t think you can honestly set aside the public/private argument – while I can legitimately demand to see my MP’s expense account (because he works for me), I have no right to demand to see my neighbor’s tax deductions no matter how much I might feel he is abusing his agricultural status.
Public organizations need to be exposed to sunlight if they are believed to be abusing our trust. Private individuals and organizations should be exposed to sunlight only when they are believed to be abusing the law (and even then, only fully so when convicted of such).
Thanks to those who responded to my post, but everybody sidestepped the question. Not surprising, since if you believe in fairness, there is no good reason why one side of a debate should be required to be transparent while the other side can be opaque. Perhaps nonprofit status should invoke FOIA.
Matt Skaggs
The FOI Act does not apply to non-Govt organisations, such as HI
This is not a tangential factor, despite what you may hope. Your question is simply ill-posed
Whether HI should voluntarily publish its’ donor list is another argument, and has been much discussed in relation to NGO’s such as Greenpeace
Matt Skaggs: On the contrary, there are many good reasons. Here’s the primary one:
What you are advocating, whether unwittingly or not, is the abolition of private, intimate conversation or communication on matters that might conceivably have something to do with public policy. That is a very dangerous road to travel down. FOIA protects the people against government secrecy in matters that directly effect them. What you are advocating is government use of FOIA to destroy the people’s right to privacy in “houses, papers and effects.”
A crucial point well made. One senses in the UK at the moment the ire of the bureaucrats over FOI legislation and its burdens. How quickly “we’ll make them pay for this” can become a demand for equal treatment of the private citizen and their voluntary association into Burke’s “little platoons” – which as you say would destroy all semblance of freedom. Happily, though, the current administration has indicated it isn’t going to play ball with public-funded universities in lightening the load of FOI and I hope that extends the other way too. Eternal vigilence as ever.
Matt Skaggs –
Your question was not possible to answer as phrased, as it is not possible to remove the public/private consideration without completely changing the nature of the organizations. I don’t know about the other respondents, but I didn’t side step the question, I tried to show (poorly, no doubt) that public/private is at the core of any question on the differences between UEA and HI.
Your reply shows what you think is important here – ‘fairness’. theDuke gives a far better answer to that than I would have.
@Matt Skaggs, FOIA laws came about as reforms directed at PUBLIC institutions conduct themselves in our names and our (taxpayer) expense. Of course one can argue about the details and applications within public institutions, or even whether FOIA is a good idea at all etc, but the idea that all private persons and institutions should be subject to some kind of complete disclosure is a radical assault on the very concept of privacy.
The donor list is a thing of value. Gleick definitely devised a scheme to obtain this property and did use wires to transmit it. His intent is meaningless. He most definitely used fraud to obtain property, in this case the donor list. If he had scrubbed the contact info of the donors, he would have a little defense, but still the names of the donors is a thing of value that Heartland could have sold.
See Carpenter v. United States for a Supreme Court case holding that confidential information is covered by the federal mail fraud statue.
In the previous comment, I should have said “wire fraud” instead of “mail fraud.” The statute is 18 U.S.C. 1343.
just out of interest, what would it mean if gleick had done some of this stuff on his computer from work ? Would his employer become in any way liable for any damage done or any (alleged) criminal act ?
On getting satisfaction…
We have all read people writing in to comment on an article on AGW, people on both sides of the debate, people who are not rational. Some of these people are consistently delusional and generally get moderated out of the discussion. Some wander in and out of rationality depending on which meme they are currently flogging. I get no satisfaction in seeing these people harassed, embarassed or demeaned.
Now, I am not a medical doctor, nor do I play one on TV or the Internet, so with that in mind consider the following. I read many different blogs and threads, articles and commentaries. Some of these were written by Peter Gleick.
It seems to me that over time these contributions have changed. I found his writing in January to be kind of disturbing. If this were symptomatic of some underlying condition then how could I feel anything but sorry for him and the situation he has gotten himself into. I sincerely hope he has a good support system.
I would feel nothing but satisfaction if those who received and promoted Peter’s latest work were to show some sort of contrition for being so stupid. But I don’t see it happening. I see that Naomi Klein has waded in, expressing her admiration for Peter’s honesty and integrity. There are none so blind as those who will not see and unfortunately our society frowns upon attempts to beat common sense into those who are so blinkered.
It doesn’t seem likely to me that Gleik woke up one sunny morning and suddenly decided to commit a crime and pull identity fraud on Heartland, whatever his preconceptions. So what was the trigger?
I’m inclined to think he did receive at least some information [spoken, electronic, or printed] about Anthony Watts incipient funding for his project.
Even if incomplete, this tip-off would have seemed like Christmas and all his Birthdays coming at once and he couldn’t wait long before acting upon it. The fake memo just seems like the icing put on the cake because the Heartland documents were essentially pretty dull. The calculation that the defamatory exaggerations in the fabricated document would be accepted at face value must have appeared worth the risk.
As pointed out by others, a mole at Heartland might be expected to have access to real incriminating documents, if they existed. If Heartland is a middle link in the chain from donor to acceptor, then one may speculate that Gleik’s trigger source might be a third party with inside knowledge of Anthony Watts or the Koch Foundation.
It seems likely that Glieck authored the fake memo for reasons many have mentioned, and he already admitted to fraud and theft, so why wouldn’t he admit to that as well? I have to wonder if he (or his lawyer) believes that contesting the contents of that memo would be the leverage required to get broad “discovery” on Heartland, and that in turn could pressure Heartland to drop the charges and accept an “apology”…
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/02/peter-gleick-confesses-to-obtaining-heartland-documents-under-false-pretenses/253395/
Great article, Steve! It very nicely summarizes many of the points made in the conversation here and at other blogs.
My favorite line in the article, however, was
It reminded me of the fact that the activists thinking that the solution for convincing everyone was figuring out how to communicate their ideas better. I would suggest that the team and their supporters could learn something by paying heed to Ms. McArdle’s excellent observation.
“After you have convinced people that you fervently believe your cause to be more important than telling the truth, you’ve lost the power to convince them”
Convincing people that he considered his cause more important that telling the truth was obviously not Gleick’s intention. What he wished to convince people of whas that the Heartland Institute was not telling the truth.
It still remains an open question, slightly open, anyhow, whether Gleick believed that the HI was engaged in a campaign of misrepresentation to discredit climate science or whether on the contrary, he sought by deceit to convince people that valid questioning of some climate science by the HI was an exercise in deceit.
See it’s not clear, not absolutely clear, anyhow, what did motivate Gleick. His contention is that he believed the lies contained in the fake memorandum that he claims to have received from an anonymous source. Until the truth of that contention is determined, Gleick’s moral standing is open to debate.
Of course, it wasn’t his immediate intention. However, given his whole-hearted involvement in the AGW movement and, for example, the vehemence with which he attacked those who did not share his beliefs, I would suggest that he was a fervent dyed-in-the-wool believer in and activist for the Cause.
What he actually thought about HI and their activities is really not relevant. It appeared to him that this was an opportunity to seriously damage HI and its credibility and he took steps to achieve that end – steps which can very likely be described as criminal as a Nigerian scam. This was not an intellectual exercise and “Gleick’s moral standing” does not in any way depend on the “truth of the contention”. HI was not committing any obvious crimes, even if what the faked document claimed happened to be true. His investigation cannot be justified on those grounds.
Your entire argument is a red herring of major proportions.
“What he actually thought about HI and their activities is really not relevant. It appeared to him that this was an opportunity to seriously damage HI.”
What you assert was Gleick’s intention is not what Gleick has asserted was his intention. Unless you have evidence to prove your contention, your categorical conclusion is, therefore, unjustified.
@CanSpeccy your comments are based on the misapprehension that anything in the Megan McCardle sentence requires an assessment of Gleick’s “intention” when that is not the case. One’s words or actions may “convince” someone of something that lies outside the scope of one’s intention. Someone who says something that another regards as stupid or dishonest may unwittingly “convince” that person of certain beliefs (“so-and-so is such a fool” etc.. In the present case Peter Gleick can “convince” people (including me, certainly) that he prizes his ideology above honesty, even though that was never part of his intention.
CanSpeccy – if Gleick’s intention was to demonstrate that Heartland is untruthful, how does acting deceitfully help his case? At the very leaswt, he pretended to be soemone connected with Heartland. Most people still believe that he faked the memo. How does that help his case that Heartland is not telling the truth? I am a deceitful man, therefore heartland must be too? Strange logic.
“if Gleick’s intention was to demonstrate that Heartland is untruthful, how does acting deceitfully help his case?”
If, as Gleick apparently believed, the documents he obtained by false pretenses confirmed the gist of the fake memo that reflected discredit on the HI, then his theft and distribution of those documents helped his case, provided his role in the theft was unexposed.
But since his role in the theft is now known, his deceitful action has destroyed his case.
All I have tried to point out is that Gleick’s self-justification; namely, that he engaged in deceit to expose what he viewed a much more serious deception, has some force, though not enough to convince too many people here, it would seem.
However, if he is shown to have faked the memo, as Mosher has given good reason to suspect, or if he did not fake the memo but had reason to suppose that it was a fake, then he will be totally discredited.
You don’t seem to understand what I wrote.
My point was that Gleick’s “intention” did NOT justify his his actions in ANY way, shape or form, so his assertion was therefore irrelevant. There is no legally justifiable reason that entitled him to make the intervention that he did.
However, your defense of his actions that somehow the possibility that HI might be “engaged in a campaign of misrepresentation to discredit climate science” (which I do not think would not be a culpable act were it to even be true) justifies a genuinely criminal act on the part of a private individual is somewhat ridiculous. I might add that the Gleick’s view of the “misrepresentation” portion of such a campaign is very much a natural consequence of the mindset of one who displays an overwhelming acceptance of the tenets of AGW.
“You don’t seem to understand what I wrote.
My point was that Gleick’s “intention” did NOT justify his his actions in ANY way, shape or form”
But I do understand your point entirely. But you seem not to understand my point, which is that a lie may be justified in the name of a great good. Some people, I know, would not agree. But in real life, my contention is consistent with the conduct of most people, whether it be in telling a white lie to save hurting someone’s feelings or in creating a “bodyguard of lies,” to use Winston Churchill’s phrase, to guard vital military secrets.
Unfortunately, that idea opens the door to every loose cannon or crackpot who imagines that they are saving the universe.
The situation was not an emergency that required an immediate remedy by a lone individual. Gleick’s action is simply unjustified in the current circumstances and indicates a serious lack of judgment on his part.
“Unfortunately, that idea opens the door to every loose cannon or crackpot ”
I was not advancing an “idea”, I was stating what I believe to be a fact. How this fact affects human action depends on the individual. Some people act with wisdom and responsibility, others not.
Great, “the end justifies the means” defense. As Willis pointed out to you earlier, it leads to Noble Cause Corruption as already observed in the climate community through their non-fake e-mails
It might be justifiable in very rare cases when no reasonable alternatives for proper action exist, but the Gleick situation is definitely NOT even close to being one of those rare cases.
It’s late. Enough on the topic for me.
CanSpeccy
That’s why we have this quaint thing we call “laws”, CanSpeccy. See, the idea of a law is, it doesn’t matter if you think it’s really really important, even world-altering, that you have to kill someone. Absent certain very well defined exceptions (acting in response to an immediate threat on your life), it doesn’t matter what your lame excuse might be—you kill someone, you go to jail just the same, even if you think that you are saving the planet in the process.
Next, pretending that the Gleick case contains anything of that importance is a sick joke. He just wanted the information in order to hurt someone he saw as an enemy … hardly the noble motives you are claiming.
Next, your idea that a “white lie” somehow explains mail fraud committed to hurt your enemies is pathetic. Truly pathetic.
Finally, you say that “… a lie may be justified in the name of a great good.” The problem with that is obvious, and best expressed by Megan McCardle:
So in addition to it being against the law to commit wire fraud in order to steal the financial records of a business, it’s also really bad strategy to do that kind of lying—as Peter just found out.
Now, you can sit there and come up with all kinds of ways to justify Peter committing wire fraud in order to steal business secrets, CanSpeccy … but is that really what you want to be famous for? “Yeah, that dang CanSpeccy, he was so good, the man could justify absolutely anything. I’m not kidding, anything. You name the crime, he’ll justify it somehow. He’s the man, he even justified the Gleick mail fraud, he’s awesome”
I’ll leave that bit of notoriety to you …
w.
CanSpeccy said:
See it’s not clear, not absolutely clear, anyhow, what did motivate Gleick. His contention is that he believed the lies contained in the fake memorandum that he claims to have received from an anonymous source. Until the truth of that contention is determined, Gleick’s moral standing is open to debate.
————————————————————
You really don’t get it. It doesn’t matter what his motivation was, assuming (and that is a big leap) that we can get inside someone’s head to that extent. His moral standing is not ‘open to debate’ at all.
What matters is what he did. What matters is that he set himself up publicly as an exemplar of scientific ethics. These are provable, unlike speculation about what was happening while the electric pulses zoomed around in his brain at one moment or another. So, if you kill someone who is about to kill you, that is provable, and mitigating. If you kill someone because you claim that you thought they were going to kill you, absent any evidence, that is no excuse unless you are certifiably nuts.
Willis said:
“Absent certain very well defined exceptions…”
Exactly. And the rest of your argument is merely an attempt to refute what you have already acknowledged.
But let us have a clear statement from you, Willis, for future reference concerning the Climategate emails, that you condemn absolutely and without reserve the release of those documents should it ever be shown that their release depended on an act of deception or a breach of law, however minor or technical.
Johanna said: :You really don’t get it. It doesn’t matter what his motivation was …”
This is an odd doctrine at odds with all moral and legal systems.
And you refute it by saying “If you kill someone because you claim that you thought they were going to kill you, absent any evidence …”
Which is to say, that if there is evidence that you had reasonable grounds to believe, etc. then that is a vital point of evidence.
Gleick has claimed that he had reasonable grounds to believe, i.e., the fake memo which he claims to believe was genuine.
That may not be judged by you or willis Eschenbach to justify Gleick’s theft of documents providing what Gleick believed to be corroboration of an HI plan to corrupt the teaching of science in American schools, but it is an extenuating circumstance that any jury would have to consider.
you condemn absolutely and without reserve the release of those documents
You’ll be waiting a long time. Willis “thanks the fates” that the emails “were released,” in an action apparently without an actor.
Never mind that a criminal investigation is still ongoing, Willis is on a Noble Cause. Don’t bother him with mere <blaw.
A couple of the commenters at the Atlantic have speculated that Gleick may have been drinking when he did these things. The same thought had occurred to me.
He would have to have been drinking for several days.
He scanned the memo in the middle of the 13th. Sent it on the morning of the 14th.
And the pretexting apparently began a couple of weeks earlier than that.
Perhaps the saintly Mr. McIntyre can explain to me how this episode will be harmful to the Heartland Institute.
1. The obvious smears: convincing teachers not to teach science. That Heartland wants to “undermine” the IPCC.
2. By publishing the donors list, Heartland can no longer sell this property.
Seriously?
Ok: Firstly, one of the folks at Heartland says that they used to make their donors public. They stopped doing this when their donors were targeted with attacks and boycotts, which resulted in reduced funding for Heartland.
Also, if you look around, there are attempts being made based on the docs to have Heartland’s charity tax status revoked.
Additionally, Heartland will have to hire lawyers to take action on various fronts.
And finally, the fake document makes actual slurs which falsely portray attitudes at Heartland that defame Heartland’s reputation. If you don’t know the value of a reputation, I would have to ask…why don’t you?
In his “confession” he still talks about a well-funded conspiracy–he can look at a program that is 1/10 (since climate is only one of HI programs) of $6.5Million and say well-funded? How delusional (or innumerate) can you get? That is chicken feed.
That is nearly 3x the amount declared in PI’s 2010 990 IRS filing.
Click to access Pacific_Institute_990_tax_10.pdf
Click to access 2010-IRS-Form-990.pdf
1. He claims to have received the faked memo in the mail early this year, yet there are no folds on the scan. He lies.
2. He uses fraud to obtain confidential documents. He’s a fraud.
3. He was “trying to verify the documents.” If he lies once, he’ll probably lie twice.
4. Then he released everything on the internet anonymously. This doesn’t sound like a man trying to look out for the public good.
How about this for a clearer reason: He’s embarrassed because the Climategate e-mails exposed him and his cadre as frauds, and he’s seeking revenge by fraudulently acquiring Heartland documents and clumsily faking a memo.
Case closed.
Just a note that when Gleick talks about people stopping the debate, he does not mean the debate about the science, he means the debate about how to save the world (ie, the debate you have after the science is settled about how to rearrange the economy and who gets elecricity, etc). Likewise when Trenberth and others use that word. Otherwise it makes no sense at all–the same people who will not debate in person and who try to silence critics asking for more debate? No a chance. Different “debate” entirely.
This is an excellent point.
So often in politics, the assumption is that the debate is about what policies to pursue. But the reality is that it is the “facts” that are the major area of dispute. Unfortunately, most people don’t even want to acknowledge that their facts may be questionable. Gleick has no interest in debating that which he already KNOWS is true. He is willing to debate the proper policy response.
[btw–this unwillingness to concede a factual dispute exists can lead to the notion that opponents must be evil]
The chickens of post-modernism coming home to roost–the truth of a proposition is determined by who says it and the end effect it has. So a man can’t say anthing about women’s issues, and a conservative think tank has no right to speak about climate change. Certain groups are inherently evil and must be prevented from speaking. This is the world view that Gleick reflects, and it is a very dangerous world view.
WSJ video interview with Joe Bast.
http://online.wsj.com/video/opinion-the-purloined-climate-papers/F3DAA9D5-4213-4DC0-AE0D-5A3D171EB260.html
I hope the link works. Some of their stuff is subscriber only.
Question to readers. Gleick turned up in May 2010 as lead signer of the NAS letter published in Science. I somewhat recollect blog postings around March 2010 in which climate scientists decided that their best course of action was not to apologize, but to strike back at critics. I sort of recollect Gleick being involved in the start of the Empire Strikes Back phase, but am having trouble locating relevant references prior to May 2010. Help appreciated/
Here’s reference to the campaign but no Gleick
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/05/scientists-plot-to-hit-back-at-critics/
I found a google feature I’ve always wanted: “daterange:2455228-2455317” will filter based on Julian date range. Those dates are the 3 months feb-april 2010.
‘climate skeptics “strike back”‘ will give results but the addition of Gleick is empty.
Steve, have you seen these? The first is a blog post he did in March 2010:
http://blog.sfgate.com/gleick/2010/03/11/the-best-argument-against-global-warming/
June 2009:
http://www.pacinst.org/press_center/press_releases/climate_action_letter_6_22_09.html
May 2010:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/peter-h-gleick/climate-change-and-the-in_b_564362.html
http://blog.sfgate.com/gleick/2010/05/06/more-on-climate-deniers-and-their-abuse-of-science/
Here’s a list of his blog posts in the SF Chronicle in and around 2010:
http://www.pacinst.org/publications/essays_and_opinion/gleickblog/index.htm
I served on a WMO Commission for Hydrology working group in the early 1990s with Peter. I think it was to frame a hydrological input to GCOS, the proposed Global Climate Observing System. He has contributed to studies of the impact of climate change on the hydrological cycle and water resources. He had a geography background as I recall. The period was on the cusp of when it became off-limits to speak against the theory.
Gleick said in his confession-cum-apology,
Apparently referring to this email body,
The complete email with addresses and time and transmittal info/metadata would help verify the level of Gleick’s honesty in the whole matter. Has anyone seen the complete email with all that info included?
John
Steve, as a fellow Canadian I have some sympathy for your generosity – it’s a trait we bear proudly!
“No one should feel any satisfaction in these events, which have been highly damaging to everyone touched by them, including both Heartland and Gleick”
However, it’s extremely difficult to extend this generosity towards Gleick. His record shows that he’s a really nasty piece of work and that he would be popping champagne corks, high fivin’ and doing cartwheels down the hall if the roles were reversed.
It was the toxoplasmosis parasites in his brain that made him do it http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2012/03/how-your-cat-is-making-you-crazy/8873/
Gleick at Joe Romm in March 2010. (Subsequently he is regularly quoted at Romm.)
Implicitly, this is Gleick’s justification for stealing the HI documents. Explicitly, he claims that, in their participation in the climate debate, the HI had dispensed with the “rules and tools of science” and were engaged in the corruption of science. While under any circumstances, Gleick’s action in stealing documents will earn censure and possibly much more, he is still claiming moral justification, based on his supposed belief in the validity of the fake memo. Thus Gleick’s actions must presently be judged with reference to two possibilities, i.e.,
(1) that he believed the fake memo was genuine and that he was therefore simply taking a knife to a knife fight;
(2) that he aimed to discredit the HI on the basis of what he knew to be a fraudulent document.
In the first case, he is guilty of incompetent execution of a high risk strategy that has damaged the warmist political camp, although in the long run it should be of benefit to the genuine climate science community by serving as a grim warning to any who might be tempted to rely on other than sound scientific evidence to advance whatever may be their argument.
In the second case, he might as well start preparing for a career change: selling refrigerators to eskimos, perhaps.
“Rules in a knife fight? No rules.”
From Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. Steve, he is our age and probably saw the same movies. No rules.
Jim Lakely tweet:
previous tweet from JL:
“I emailed invite to @PeterGleick to Heartland climate debate. He indignantly refused. Why? Disclose ur donors, he said. Hmm.”
Well. Gleick was clearly obsessing over the donor list. This would point towards a strategy to target donors on the list ala Glen Beck his advertisers. Easier to prove damages if those who now have the list move forward with that strategy.
One year later and Gleick has skated merrily away from his malfeasance with hardly a ‘tsk tsk’ from his allies and enablers. This would be a good month for blogs to press journalists and the US Dept of Justice to revisit these matters.
Now that Gleick is being described as a “water scientist” rather than a “climate scientist”, a WUWT suggests that this affair be called “watergate”.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/21/fakegate-its-what-they-do/#comment-899930
If he is a water scientist, can we be assured that he and his publications are counted as part of the 97%?
I’m thinking it should be called the Gleickenspiel Affair.
A name should be brief
To help people relate…
To connect to the thief
How about “Petergate”?
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
Can you come up with some neat doggerel to help us remember whether the ‘i’ or the ‘e’ comes first in Peter G’s name? Many here use both variations in a single comment! I’m enjoying your rhymes.
First comes the “e”
For expressions of glee
On the face of the guy
With the gleam in his “i”
Since the name is pronounced
With the long “e” in Gleick
Just remember it sounds
Like his future: Quite bleak
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
LOL – brilliant (and thanks, I’ll be able to keep it straight now!)
ISTM that it’d be all too easy to engage somebody as a useful idiot by sending them a document, in their language, which reflected what they wrote in the past.
The fake memo appears to be in Gleick’s language. It obviously appeals to his prejudices. It reflects his view of the world as one can see from his writings.
So which is Gleick? A useful idiot or a forger of documents?
I take great satisfaction in nailing the crook and making it stick.
I truly hope that Dr. Tim Ball and his family are getting as much satisfaction as I am- or more, because they are still going through hell thanks to these criminals.
If Heartland succeeds in a civil or criminal proceeding against the gleick, it will be a major milestone – the first time a single one of them has received consequences for his fraud instead of a coverup or whitewash by his cronies.
I also want them to refund everything they stole by their deceptions – every nickel they were ever paid.
I’m not satisfied as much as I need to be and truly hope for more.
Restitution first, retribution after.
They don’t need to eat, sleep or breath air until they are held responsible for the incredible harm they have caused by their connivances and frauds.
Or did you think a hug would show them the light while we suffer their predations?
Anyone read through the commentary on the NYT article?
Most of the contributors are taking Gleick’s explanation at face value, and are hailing him as a hero for exposing Heartland (I have to admit I’m still not sure what has been ‘exposed’ that was not public knowledge or fairly normal behaviour for a right wing lobby group, but then I’m not American).
One comment did jump out as a big ‘wow’ moment though, and that was the comment from Dr Tom Crowley:
“standing up for the nobility of science? I think not…..
by sinking to tactics as low as the people he accuses, Gleick has damaged the cause of science credibility. He has actually made it harder for climate scientists to make their case, because this will be thrown in their face.
shame on you, Mr. Gleick
Thomas Crowley
climate scientist (retired)
Univ. of Edinburgh”
So can Thomas Crowley, whoever he might be, give examples of where those whom Gleick ‘accuses’ have used such low tactics?
Dave S
Crowley is at least a peripheral member of ‘The Team’. Some further information can be found on the topic search function at the top left of the page.
I seem to recall some comments he made disparaging Steve Mc, which he has subsequently retracted and apologised for. Not sure what thread this was discussed in though.
My assumption with regard to ‘low tactics’ is a veiled referece to Climategate.
Maybe what Tom meant to say was, “by sinking to tactics as low as those of which he accused others…”, in other words, he’s not assuming Gleick’s targets actually were doing the kind of things that Gleick was doing, instead he’s merely saying that Gleick was accusing them of it, while actually doing it himself.
– a charitable assessment that does not detract from the impact of Mr. Crowley’s comment.
For those who would offer ‘fake but true’ as a defence.
Take the forged memo. Remove from it all the text that appears anywhere else in the Heartland documentation as supplied.
Read only what is left.
That is what you are defending!
One of the odd things about this affair is why would the supposed original source send a document to Gleick. Why not send it direct to one of the whistle blowing blogs. Why deal with an amateur when you could send the document to the pros.
No one should feel any satisfaction in these events, which have been highly damaging to everyone touched by them, including both Heartland and Gleick.
===============================
Steve, I did not understand the import if this statement, when I read it yesterday. I thought you were unecessarily including Heartland in your desire to be sane balanced.
Seeing the “silliness” with which the “Gleickian” .forces are defending and the “Wattsian” forces are rejoicing, makes me realize that you did not cast your net wide enough.
Steve: Among other things, Heartland was damaged by the statements in the fake memo and the repetition around the world and by the breach of confidentiality of their donors, points that they themselves will undoubtedly make in any litigation.
“In his “confession” he still talks about a well-funded conspiracy–he can look at a program that is 1/10 (since climate is only one of HI programs) of $6.5Million and say well-funded? How delusional (or innumerate) can you get? That is chicken feed.”
Gleick’s recent actions/confession might lend credence to his being delusional about the cause, but what about those who would second what he says about HI and that it now confirms what they (wanted to) believe about the (evil) forces out there attempting to alter the evidence for immediate and comprehensive mitigation of AGW. I think all sides of most issues have those who would advocate unreasonably and at time unethically for a cause they believe in. What is more important to those sides and their arguments is how they handle or react to the unreasonable true believers.
I would agree that Gleick’s confession was very much in line with his extreme advocacy in that he was continuing in that confession to get his point across about a seemingly conspiratorial funding out there to muddied the truth about AGW.
Yes, each side has the odd individual
Who could act like a criminal at large
But the last of their ethics residual
Went when they put that person in charge
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
Well they were well-funded (~$6.5m) compared to his own Pacific Institute (~$2.5m)!
Re: Copner (Feb 22 20:00), Maybe you should read the budget documents…
The budget was closer to $5M last year — there was a shortfall as I recall. They would like to raise more this year — as would we all.
Second, as pointed out above the Climate Science work was a small part of the budget.
Third so called mainstream science in the USA has a budget in the hundreds of millions and worldwide is in the (many) Billions.
So, how exactly could a few hundred thousand dollars distributed by Heartland change the world? — Unless the science was already so shaky and ill-conceived that a figurative grain of sand thrown at the mountain of climate science could destroy the mountain — I don’t see it.
Just askin’…
$6.5m was the year before I think. Sorry.
Yes I am aware that Heartland is a miniscule organization with tiny funding.
I was just point out the Gleick’s institute is smaller still (albeit part of a huge well-funded coalition of similarly politically-aligned organizations).
When considering politically-aligned organizations, one needs to include poltically-funded ones, as these will obviously tend to have a pro-political bias (as the existence of the ‘consensus’ shows).
This means all/most universities – whose combined funding must surely be in the $billions rather than the mere $millions of Pacific and Heartland.
Gleick wrote the following in September of 09, a cpuple of months before Climategate and Copenhagen. In hindsight, the rhetoric tells you it was only a matter of time before he did something stupid:
http://blog.sfgate.com/gleick/2009/09/07/new-mccarthyism-fear-of-science-and-the-war-on-rationality/
He reminds me of the SDS/Weathermen types in the 60s who started playing with explosives and blew themselves up.
If Gleick is touted as a whistleblower and hero, that takes accusations against the CRU email leaker (hacker, thief, etc.) completely off the table for those who are trying to salvage Gleick’s reputation. Ethics and logic are not like climate (and post-normal) science where you can have it both ways.
“At the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail ”
Reminds me of Mr Beans christmas cards (after 55 seconds)
http://www.physorg.com/news/2012-02-fresh-scandal-embroils-climate-science.html
“The Heartland Institute has said that one of the leaked strategy memos, a two-page document, was fabricated, but has not commented on the others and did not respond to AFP requests for an interview.”
Sometimes I have trouble getting the gist from the articles that Steve authors. I don’t know why. It’s probably my fault. I didn’t get what exactly it was that Gleick Did, but now I get it. They made up stuff and included it with documents that were supposed to come from Heartland Institute.
Saving Climate Science? Not likely!
What astounds me is the scale of the pettiness involved. Since nobody else has commented on this I will. Keep in mind that If I posted my real name people would say the equivalent of “Joe Who?” My name is not a household word anywhere… least of all in climate science, such as it is.
My understanding is that Heartland Institute had a budget around the $5 million dollar mark last year. The last time I did any serious projects in “Green Energy” and the “Smart Grid” and “Energy Saving and Efficiencies” I had three projects on the go with a total budget of about the same amount of money. I think it was around $4M – $5M per year but, maybe it was more with all the side issues and projects as that did not include our contribution. Maybe it was somewhat less.
The only difference was that most, perhaps all, as I recall, of the university based scientists wanted to fake the reports and pocket as much cash for their private companies as they could. They wanted to do “Real Science” with the money — or so they said. At least one NRC person was aware and an eager participant – perhaps it was part of the “Freedom 55” Plan for that person. My inclination was to decline as I wanted no part of the illegal activities. So I “disassociated” myself from the projects – and as we were the lead company, things dissolved. I was grateful. However, never again did we see an NRC booty – er bounty I mean.
What’s the point? We were a drop in the bucket of Climate Science projects – barely noticeable in the scheme of things and the river of cash that flowed.
To suggest that Heartland with it’s budget could overwhelm even the research of one university with its funding of projects is nothing short of laughable. It is beyond funny and worthy of no more than a snort of derision… Unless, perhaps, it took so little cash, effort, scientific acumen and time to overturn the work of major university researchers that there was indeed an issue. Hmmm, now there is food for thought.
To allow him excuses such as have been suggested here… not worth the time folks.
CanSpeccy
Posted Feb 23, 2012 at 11:20 AM | Permalink | Edit
Willis said:
Say what? That makes no sense at all. It appears you think I said something very different from what I actually said. If you think an exception of that type applies to Gleick, you’ll have to spell out the well-defined legal exception that applies. Note that the exception I listed is SPELLED OUT IN THE LAW ITSELF. It is not some bogus street excuse like you have made to date for Gleick.
I await your reference to the section of the law where it says Gleick didn’t commit a crime because he was a true believer in AGW and really, really though Heartland was the bad guys …
Sorry, I don’t deal with theoretical claims and fantasy worlds like that, CanSpeccy. There’s an old Sufi story that explains why.
Mulla Nasruddin was walking down a street one day, when a man fell off a roof and landed on the Mulla’s head. The man was unhurt but the Mulla was rushed to a hospital with a broken neck. His followers visited him there and asked “Oh great teacher, what can we learn from this event?}”
The Mulla looked at them and said “Shun reliance on theoretical questions like “If a man falls off a roof, will he break his neck?”.
So I leave all such speculations to you and others that seem to get off on them.
I will say that all that was revealed by the Climategate emails were taxpayer-paid documents in the public domain … documents that the CRU guys were illegally keeping under lock and key. So here’s a question for you.
You’ll have to answer that one, though, because as I said, I shun reliance on theoretical questions.
w.
“I await your reference to the section of the law where it says Gleick didn’t commit a crime”
Don’t impute rubbish to me. I said, as you can see in my response to Johanna that Gleick’s claimed belief concerning the HI constitutes an extenuating circumstance that a jury would have to consider.
“…I shun reliance on theoretical questions.”
I think perhaps you mean that you shun hypothetical questions. Me too.
Oops, I seem to have a multitude of IDs acquired by accident and coming in and out of existence in a mysterious way. The above was in response to Willis responding to me as CanSpeccy.
Alfred Burdett Posted Feb 23, 2012 at 3:33 PM | Permalink | Reply | Edit
Ooops, sorry, I thought you were a real person. I don’t interact with sock puppets, it’s never worth my time. It does explain why you think Gleick impersonating a Heartland Board Member is no big deal …
Bye-bye,
w.
“I don’t interact with sock puppets”
If I were a sock puppet I would not have apologized for using different IDs on the same thread, or pointed out the identity between the two I had used.
But I am happy to see you have decided to stop digging a hole for yourself with the absurd contention that motives have no bearing on moral or legal judgement about human action.
Hey Steve,
Why are you blocking this post?
Steve- I sometimes use editorial discretion to stop off-topic discussions that I do not believe to be of general interest to readers, particularly if they seem sterile to me. Sorry.
What Roman and Willis have said:
What Gleick thought at the time hardly matters
We can’t ever know what’s in his head
Leaving legal enforcement in tatters.
Some evidence might be presented
Based on what attorneys construct
Which will largely, of course, be invented
As a science, the process is … messed up.
Roman, Willis note legal exceptions
That apply in, e.g, self defense
But you seem to have some misconceptions
That this thus works for every offense
Gleck’s admitted both crime here and tort
(For which “sentencing” isn’t applied)
“Justified” here? Nothing of the sort
Such exceptions to fraud are denied.
You have drawn parallels to defend
By comparing to Climategate. Clever.
But that doesn’t work. You might spend
Time on some more fruitful endeavor.
In the Climategate case it’s not known
If the source was internal or not
Is it just that a whistle got blown?
So far that’s the best choice that we’ve got
In which case there’s no lawbreak at all
And for sure no “intention” is needed
But protecting the Team takes some gall
And there’s risk that this ground you have ceded.
You’ve said “Look at my comments! I’m good!”
You’ve objected to Gleick’s fraud and lie
That was easy — for anyone should
Then you say “Condemn Climategate!”
Sly.
===|==============/ Keith DeHavelle
The mystery part to me is this: if the story is as Peter recounts it, then why did he end up thinking the fake document was not fake?
I mean, there are several pretty clear indications in the document that it is fake. And Peter Gleick is an intelligent man, one assumes. Whyever would you not submit the document to every imaginable test? Would you not be suspicious that you were being played, or that the sender of the document was being played?
Interesting analysis here says Joe Bast is the faker … I’m buying popcorn futures. I greatly doubt that such “count the styles” kind of analysis could deal with a document which was clearly written to be “in the style of” so it would be interpreted as being authored by Heartland …
w.
Intelligent people invest in ponzi schemes, intelligent Dutch people bought a lot of tullips. You believe in what you want yo believe.
Sadly, Jeff, you are likely right. I always underestimate the power of wanting to believe. Wanting to believe the ponzi scheme, wanting to believe you’ve found the secret document … but wouldn’t he have asked someone? Scott Mandia, or someone?
I dunno, none so gullible as those that want to be fooled, I guess. I suppose I’m the same way, just haven’t hit that magic situation yet. None of us are free from confirmation bias.
Thanks,
w.
Willis:
There is no way any sane person would look to Scott Mandia for an objective assesment of anything. He wouldn’t even make it as an extra on Big Bang Theory.
Bernie Posted Feb 23, 2012 at 5:29 PM
Objection, your honor, in the case of Peter Gleick this assumes facts not in evidence …
w.
Anthony sends this explanation:
Well, it shows the limitations of a computer-based similarity analysis of a short sample.
Of course, if this were an Agatha Christie mystery, we’d find out that the fake document was written by Megan McArdle, part of a deep scheme to increase her readership. Her plan was to write the document in Gleick’s style and send it to him. She expected him to release it to the media, at which point she’d make all these clever points about the documents which indicated Gleick as the writer. Her astute deductions would win her fame and riches. But Gleick didn’t follow the script. 😉
By your own argument motive is irrelevant to judgement of actions, so why start now to worry about what Gleick thought.
Non-Profit Strategic Planning For Dummies.
Click to access Non-Profit%20Strategic%20Plan%201-2005.pdf
This (Dummies example) is an overall Strategic Plan document including:-
Individual Member Strategic Goals
Agencies and Organizations Strategic Goals
The equivalent HI Plan would be:-
Tobacco Strategic Goals
Health Care Strategic Goals
Climate Strategic Goals
Whatever Strategic Goals
Did the “Board Member” request HI Admin to resend JUST the Climate Strategy memo? It’s odd that it’s in memo form to begin with (where’s reference to overall strategy? should be cohesive) and surely HI Admin would have forwarded the entire Plan especially given climate is the lessor part of the operation.
That would mean the “Board Member” then had HI’s Tobacco and Health Care strategies as well. Why weren’t they disseminated?
The Board meeting minutes would record whether what was discussed was the Climate Strategy memo specifically or the overall HI strategy.
I’m sure the FBI will sort that out.
[Cross-posted to Hot Topic ‘Twist’ and Climate Conversation Group ‘Fakegate’]
The HI operations are:-
* Education
* Health Care
* Telecom
* Energy & Environment
* FIRE
* Budget & Tax
* Legal
The ‘Center on Climate and Environmental Policy’ is within the ‘Energy & Environment’ operation.
It is not apparent that there is a further “Climate” sub-operation worthy of a strategy of its own that for some reason is distinct from ‘Climate and Environmental Policy” or even ‘Climate Policy’
http://heartland.org/issues/environment
Then there’s: ‘Environment & Climate News’
“Environment & Climate News is The Heartland Institute’s monthly print publication sent both to paying subscribers and each and every elected official.”
There’s not even separation of News into “Environment” and “Climate”.
Whoever wrote the fake didn’t understand the HI structure (from a mgt perspective) that they could discern just by going to the HI website.
But they DID understand PR.
Having gone back and forth between genuine HI docs and the climate strategy memo it is beyond me how anyone can think the climate strategy is genuine given the complete absence of logo, format, numbered strategies and bullet pointed tactical actions etc. The fake stands out like dogs balls but I digress,
Continuing the HI organizational analysis starting at the website (previous comment) and now introducing the ‘Proposed Budget’ and ‘Fundraising Plan’.with 2012 figures.
The structural divisions are DEPARTMENTS – not operational foci. The ONLY operational area from the website allocated a department and budget is 7. Center on FIRE/ Wash DC $715,263.
Outside the departments are 10 MAJOR PROJECTS. ‘Climate and Environmental Policy’ related major projects (sponsored and outsourced from proposals) are:-
B. Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC)
H. Global Warming Curriculum for K-12 Schools
J. Weather Stations Project.
B funded by 2 donors approx $300,000 to outsource $88,000 to in-house..
H funded by 8. Editorial Department budget $88,000.
J funded by 8. Editorial Department.budget $75,000.
Both STRATEGY and TACTICS for B, H and J are detailed in the ‘Fundraising Plan’.along with A, C, D, E, F, G and I.
B, H and J is the ENTIRE “Climate Strategy” (from fake) already detailed
There is NOTHING in either ‘Proposed Budget’ or ‘Fundraising Plan’ about “We will also pursue additional support from the Charles G. Koch Foundation” (from fake) for ANYTHING ‘Climate and Environmental Policy’ related..
All of HI’s strategies and tactics are mission-specific (or should be). The mission of The Heartland Institute is to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems. Such solutions include parental choice in education, choice and personal responsibility in health care, market-based approaches to environmental protection, privatization of public services, and deregulation in areas where property rights and markets do a better job than government bureaucracies.
http://heartland.org/mission
Mission-specific for all HI foci is:-
“….to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems”.
Including with respect to ‘Climate and Environmental Policy’,
“market-based approaches to environmental protection
How is it possible to reconcile that mission with a major-project-only derived mission (from fake) “….leading the fight to prevent the implementation of dangerous policy actions to address the supposed risks of global warming”? They are irreconcilable because the projects although termed “major” are actually relatively minor and peripheral in overall HI context and not necessarily from HI expenses (and the language is disparate).
‘Climate and Environmental Policy’ related ‘Major Projects’ expenses as a percentage of projected total HI expenses (Table 1, $7,746,529): B 0% + H 1% + J 1% = 2%.
Fake and bogus to boot.
‘HI Policies Regarding Donors’ page
http://giving.heartland.org/donor-programs/policies-regarding-donors
“Heartland exists to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems. All of our research is directed toward advancing that mission.”
This corroborates what I said previous comment in regard to the HI mission ”All of HI’s strategies and tactics are mission-specific (or should be)”. It also highlights the disconnect between the fake climate strategy memo and the HI mission with its resultant actual strategies and tactics.
HI Press Release:-
” Gleick originally portrayed all of the documents he circulated, including the fake climate change strategy memo, as originating from Heartland. Now he claims he received that memo from an “anonymous source” before his theft. But the emails Heartland released today reveal Gleick never asked for either of the two documents that are specifically cited and summarized in the memo, suggesting the memo was written after, not before, he received the phished documents.”
http://junkscience.com/2012/02/24/heartland-releases-gleick-emails-detailing-fraud-identity-theft/
The “two documents” cited in the memo are (as per fake memo) ’2012 Proposed Budget’ document and ’2012 Fundraising Strategy’ memo.
But the correct titles are ’2012 PROPOSED BUDGET’ (fake correct) and ’2012 FUNDRAISING PLAN’ (fake incorrect). And the ‘Plan’ is NOT a memo.
It remains to be seen from the Board minutes of the meeting that ensued whether “Climate Strategy” was even discussed.
Anyway, enough of this I’m off. I hear the phishing’s good right now.
Seth Borenstein is, once again, right on top of things.
http://www.usatoday.com/money/economy/story/2012-02-25/think-tank-leaks/53235836/1
One of the weirdest articles I’ve read on any climate controversy. First obvious question: when was it written. One finds near the bottom left:
So it was updated before it was posted. Either way, it’s quite recent. And there is no mention of Peter Gleick. I won’t try and say why that’s so strange, given everything else Borenstein writes. Read it for yourself and be amazed.
And, conard, your sense of humour is much appreciated, on this of all threads.
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