Posted by Tim Lambert on February 16, 2010 Andrew Bolt, Media Watch is overheating in its climate jihad:
‘Shorter’ concept created by Daniel Davies and perfected by Elton Beard. We are aware of all Internet traditions.â„¢ Acknowledgement copied from Sadly, No!.
Update: The Australian runs with the Bolt line. Just how stupid does the Australian think its readers are?
Sandly I think John Houghton’s prediction is turning out to be correct:
>*If we want a good environmental policy in the future we’ll have to have a disaster*
[If that is an accurate report of what he said].
It doen’t look like we’ll get meaningfl mitigation action unless we get more shocks like Katrina to wake people to the reality of GW.
We didn’t get decent SO2 control until mass die off of forest. We didn’t ban asbestos until it was too late for many thousands. Most environmental regualtion seem totally inadequate until there is a complete disarter.
The problem in the case is that once the distarters start to bite, it may be too late to stop more bigger ones in the pipeline. Let us hope that what ever disarter results will be recoverable for us.
I expect people of renound will be reluctant to express any similar observation for fear of getting Bolted, Rosed, Piersed or Leaked on.
Bolt puffs his chest and announces:
>*Declaration: I have never cited the suspect quote attributed to Houghton*
Then Bolt goes on to try and miscontextualise a quote to try and give the meaning of the fabricated one:
>If we want a good environmental policy in the future, we’ll have to have a disaster.
I have a [take on this quote](http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2010/02/shorter_andrew_bolt.php#c2280205), my take is quote opposed to Bolt’s. My take is supported by the [part of the quote](http://john-adams.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2010/02/houghton-and-god.pdf) that Bolt chooses to leave out.
>*If we want a good environmental policy in the future, we’ll have to have a disaster. ***It’s like safety on public transport. The only way humans will act is if there’s been an accident**.*
Having trancated the quote, Bolt blows into his trusty dog whistle:
>*I rather feel that the critical issue here is not Houghton’s form of words but his attitude.*
Mmm, guilt by attitude? That way bolt doesn’t need quotes, he can tell whats what from what he judges to be attitude.
Funny, an uber neocon reporter in Canada also made reference to jihadist recently when referring to we “warmers”. Could someone please tell them that the analogy is not even remotely correct. Jeez, first Munchkin and Hitler youth and now this. Isn’t this a tactic that was employed by Bush/Rove/Cheney? You know, the “axis of evil”, or “you are with us or against us”
Someone could take Bolt to task for libel on this. In fact, anyone who knows AGW to be a threat.
Time to start a black list of failed reporters (and I use that term incredibly generously), who specialize in distorting, misrepresenting and even lying about science and AGW. I’ll start from a Canadian perspective:
Terence Corcoran
Lorne Gunter
Gary Lamphier (Mr. ‘Climate Jihadist)
Andrew Coyne
Rex Murphy
Lawrence Solomon
Richard Foot
Über-Hypocrite Andrew Bolt writes:
>*Last week Holmes tried (unsuccessfully) to discredit climate sceptic Lord Monckton, without even pretending that Monckton’s alleged sins were those of a journalist or media outlet – which is actually Media Watch’s true brief.*
Regarding Bolt’s accusation: Read the [slide used by Moncktion](http://www.flickr.com/photos/8057274@N05/4326525337/in/set-72157623339675684/).
Bolt in one slide?
MapleLeaf, you forgot Margaret Wente; and practically everyone who writes for the Calgary Herald.
OT in the absence of an open thread. BP America, Conoco Phillips and Caterpillar are pulling out of the Climate Action Partnership.
http://www.globalwarming.org/2010/02/16/bp-conoco-and-cat-abandon-ship/
I’ve just posted the following at Andrew Bolt’s blog. It will be interesting to see if
a) he publishes it
b) anyone responds with a whit on intelligence
I won’t be betting on both being true, but let’s see, as an exercise in anthropology …
Just how fearful/stupid are the Bolt crowd?
___________________
Let’s put aside all the argy bargy and see if people here can marshall the perspicacity to distinguish the meaning of :
If we want a good environmental policy in the future we’ll have to have a disaster.
(Houghton’s actual words)
from …
Unless we announce disasters, no one will listen.
(the words attributed to Houghton by Mr Akerman)
The difference seems very clear to me, but I’m going to revisit this blog later and see if anyone succeeds in evaluating the extent of the similarity Mr Bolt claims for the two texts.
It is often claimed that ideologically-driven people can’t step outside their own world view. The posters here have a very definite ideological world view, so this will be an interesting exercise in your powers of analysis.
“I rather feel that the critical issue here is not Houghton’s form of words but his attitude.”
The real critical issue here is people who think that they can read someone’s attitude by a truncated 15 year-old quote, rather than by the thousands of words they’ve publicly written and said.
Quote-mining serves no purpose other than to misrepresent a person’s views. If you want to know whether Houghton thinks we should hype disasters to get people to pay attention to global warming, you can just ask him. This has been done, and the answer is an emphatic “no”. Taking the minimal standard that a person should have the final say on what he actually believes, this is how you understand a person’s attitude. Not by a fabricated quote, and not by a very old real quote that has to be read like a Rorschach test to get something nefarious out of it.
Thanks HollyStick, yes, that Wente is another one. It is quite the list and that is just CanWest and its affiliates!
In fairness to Piers, in response to my OT request on his blog to respond to his allegations, he does indeed say he will devote a post to it.
Dear Piers,
Sorry to be off-thread but this is serious – can we have an post about how you were busted by both the Independent and Media Watch for inventing a quote about Sir John Houghton and the IPCC, to make him look ‘alarmist’ on climate change?
Did you invent? If so – why do you need to invent? If not, why did you pass up the opportunity both media organisations gave you to clear-up your name?
Thanks,
Trevor
Trevor Woodward of South Turramurra (Reply)
Piers says…
Trevor, watch this space tomorrow. Thank you.
Piers Akerman
Wed 17 Feb 10 (09:31am)
It’s probably wisest to withhold judgement until then.
Andrew Bolt writes “(Declaration: I have never cited the suspect quote attributed to Houghton.)”
But he has given space to someone who does cite it:
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/back_to_our_hovels/
I note that the Andrew Bolt site has my post pending …
Davis I can still see it and it has a number of replies.
I rather feel that the critical issue here is not Houghton’s form of words but his attitude.
Shorter Bolt:
I am right because he really said what I thought he did.
Shorter shorter Bolt:
He really meant what I say he did.
> If we want a good environmental policy in the future we’ll have to have a disaster
By dwelling on quotes like that, these clowns are increasingly sounding like the 9/11 truthers and their continual trumpeting of the “New Pearl Harbour” quote.
A sceptic is somebody who is sceptical of all data sources and conclusion – and a really good sceptic knows that worst of all, we can be our own worst enemies. We have inbuilt a system of cognitive bias that not only seeks out information to confirm an existing prejudice, but also edits what we remember we have been to remove information that counters our prejudices. We call this process (broadly) cognitive bias (there is a great article on this in the UK Wired feb issue).
Put simply, the key to accounting for cognitive bias is to have a rigorous and accountable system. Science has it; it’s not perfect, but no human-run system will be. But it is there and is accountable. Global warming denial does not. It has zero accountability, is tainted thought and though with corporate cash and riddled with chancers, lies and errors.
Bolt’s quote (“Don’t ask me to adjudicate on the Lambert-Monckton stoush. Many of these issues are over my head…”) is a tacit admission that he does not understand the workings of the science means that it is impossible for him to make his mind up on the basis of logic and facts; because he is ill equipped to understand them. No shame there, I’m not much better. That means he is making his mind up only on the basis of ‘truthiness’ – what he’d like to be true rather than what is true. However I don’t then call out people as frauds who’s work I don’t understand simply because it does not accord with my bias. I do critique the work of denailists because it is written by fellow amateurs using simple tricks that even a basic bullshit detector will spot.
Again to put this simply; people like Andrew Bolt are simply blowing the trumpets of people who confirm their existing prejudice – that that in no guarantee of truth – indeed it is a logical gap that means you wont see the wood for the trees.
http://anarchist606.blogspot.com/2010/02/how-cognative-bias-works-in-global.html
I’m still amazed that Bolt can accuse mediawatch of ‘overheating’ in the same title as he characterises their analysis as “climate jihad”. Its difficult to believe he could be that big a hypocrite, surely he must be a Colbert-esque parody?
>*I’m still amazed that Bolt can…*
Give your self time, I’m way past that stage.
The Australian thinks its readers are incredibly stupid. Especially those who read the Weekend Australian (the article in the Magazine a few weeks ago blaming Charles Darwin for the Columbine massacre thankfully got the slap-down it deserved from the readers).
I don’t believe there’s a single reporter on there who has the slightest idea how science works. Not climate science. Science in general. It is a vast mystery to them and one that they have no intention of fathoming.
I will keep subscribing, however, as I like to read a paper with articles with which I fundamentally disagree at least more than half the time. I like to have my world view challenged and attempt to see the other side. I may think their opinions are kind of crazy and insanely anti-environment/environmentalist on many occasions but at least I can comfort myself with the thought that I am not making the mistake of only seeking out opinions that agree with me. That way, I believe, smug madness lies.
Though I miss Matt Price so very, very, very much.
A
Yes, journalists in general display an abysmal lack of understanding of basic science.
Who’s seen the frequent use by journalists of the metric “light years” as a measurement of time?
Or the memorable article in the Canberra Times 14 months ago carrying a picture of a very full Scrivener Dam captioned “releasing water into the lake”.
That one killed me – took dumb to a whole new level.
Or the Melbourne journalist years ago who asked me “Is Vietnam an island?”.
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