After The Friends of Science were discredited this summer, the Alberta Petroleum Industry whomped up another front group to pose as climatologists concerned with fighting the "alleged" consensus around Global Warming. They called it the Natural Resources Stewardship Project (NRSP).
The main PR guy for the NRSP is a fellow named Tom Harris, who I have written about on several occasions, and who has even been kind enough to leave a few comments on this blog and elsewhere.
Well, Tom has been a busy guy, leaving messages on the Free Dominion site begging for donations and exhorting "principled Conservatives" to grill Dion on climate change issues when he visits Calgary and Edmonton next week.
And Tom's behavior raises a couple of interesting issues. The first is that the FOS and NRSP have until now attempted to pass themselves off as apolitical organizations. This is the first instance I know of where their representatives have "let the mask slip", as it were, and placed themselves on the political landscape.
The second, and I think really interesting point, can be found in Mr. Harris's response to this comment left on the Free Dominion message board:
I want to see [Dion] try to answer the fact that under his watch, there was a 35% increase in GHG emissions above target set by the Kyoto Protocol signed by the Liberals.
That would be a good question, as I think we can all admit. However, it's not a question Mr. Harris wants asked. His response is fascinating:
While I admit that it may be attractive politically for those who oppose Dion to ask why he did so poorly on reducing CO2 when he had the chance, I suggest this question just digs us further into the hole of climate change dogma and so it is a question that will benefit only the NDP and those on the left of the political spectrum on this issue inside the CPC.
In other words, its a slippery slope. Frame the argument this way--why didn't Dion do more about GHG emissions when he had the chance?--and you admit GHG emissions are an issue. You admit Global Warming is REAL, and that something should be done about it.
Instead, Mr. Harris wants people to keep denying (there follows a reprinted article of his from 2002 that questions the science behind the "consensus").
But note also the phrase "those on the left...on this issue inside the CPC". Harris indentifies a split within Conservative Party ranks, and at the same time locates the NRSP in relation to that split; Harris and company serve those on the Right of the Right.
So, a couple of conclusions:
1) The recent admission by Harper, Baird et al that climate change is real is in itself a victory for progressive forces. It can't be taken back once made, and changes the terms of the argument. Now its about what to do, not whether anything should be done.
2) There are elements within the Conservative Party that take the issue seriously. Hopefully, they include the PM and the man in charge of his enviro portfolio.
3) The NRSP has chosen to marginalize itself, allying with a sliver of a sliver on the ideological spectrum.
Good news, for the most part.
(As usual, h/t to Desmogblog.)
While I admit that it may be attractive politically for those who oppose Dion to ask why he did so poorly on reducing CO2 when he had the chance, I suggest this question just digs us further into the hole of climate change dogma and so it is a question that will benefit only the NDP and those on the left of the political spectrum on this issue inside the CPC.
ReplyDeleteMan, what an amoral shill. Who's paying Mr. Harris again?
"In other words, its a slippery slope. Frame the argument this way--why didn't Dion do more about GHG emissions when he had the chance?--and you admit GHG emissions are an issue. You admit Global Warming is REAL, and that something should be done about it."
ReplyDeleteNot necessarily, asking Liberals why they didn't act on one of their main pledges while in power merely points up the truth that Kyoto is little more than a tool to be used by the left to fool the naive and gullible. They still need to be held accountable. McGuinty did the same with his lie about shutting coal-fired plants. Anyone with a moderate knowledge of energy economics and supply knew this wasn't going to happen.
Not necessarily, asking Liberals why they didn't act on one of their main pledges while in power merely points up the truth that Kyoto is little more than a tool to be used... blah, blah, blah...
ReplyDeleteWe're talking about Mr. Harris's motivations here, anonymous, which is to politicise the issue, as illustrated clearly by his remarks. I realise it's an entrenched habit for righties to invent the intentions of other people, but you really should stop doing that. It's what re-enforces the general delusional thinking so common among righties.
On this page at FD:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=73210&postdays=0&postorder=asc&start=15
concan says, in part:
"...Problem is as usual that mankind thinks they are way more important than God who is of course really in charge.
Our contributions to pollution and our use of resources is a drop in the bucket compared to seismic shifts, planets tectonic plates shifting, volcano eruptions, ocean rising / falling, El Nino, La Nina and so on... "
Yeah, sure.
and conscience responds:
"concan:
God isn't a rational argument. For, or in, anything.
Winning the hearts and minds of people who don't believe in God isn't going to go well if you start with "But in the Bible..".
In the future, and this goes for anyone who tries to bring anything as ethereal as God into the already-ethereal global warming debate, try to use the word "nature"--you believe God created that, so just leave it at being dwarfed by it and you'll get better results. "
Is this a PR guy?
So watch for anyone saying "Nature is too big for humans to affect it" because it is apt to be code for God. I'm sick of these fundamentalists who give religion a bad name.
Tom,
ReplyDeleteIt sounds to me like what you are saying is not only boosting one party over another, but boosting one wing within one party over the other wings of that party (CPC).
Why does Mr. Harris even bother commenting here? He's won't address the real issue. What is "good science" in the following?...
ReplyDeleteWhile I admit that it may be attractive politically for those who oppose Dion to ask why he did so poorly on reducing CO2 when he had the chance, I suggest this question just digs us further into the hole of climate change dogma and so it is a question that will benefit only the NDP and those on the left of the political spectrum on this issue inside the CPC.
This is patently "bad science." Questions posed to Dion with regard to his record are entirely legitimate and would responded to with a set of possible answers. This is inquiry, plain and simple, and it's frankly bizarre that a scientist would advise against it.
Leave the GW-denial PR to the Exxon-funded PR people and the science to the scientists. It's not that difficult.
Evasive as usual.
ReplyDeleteYou can tell a bullshit artist when he provides the answers to the questions he prefers you'd have asked, rather than the ones you actually did ask.
So, non-political? Yet happy to give advice to Conservatives here at Free Dominion:
ReplyDeletehttp://www.freedominion.ca/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=73474&start=15
"Tom Harris
Member
Joined: 12 Oct 2006
Total posts: 37
Gender: Unknown
Posted: 01/ 10/ 07 2:20 pm Post subject: If the science is wrong, then nothing else matters
I completely agree with fourhorses that the ultimate aim is to create a situation where the CPC can say assertively, "The science no longer supports the assumptions of the Kyoto Accord."
However, politically this cannot be done overnight without the Conservatives taking what they consider to be an unacceptable hit (do people think they would really lose votes with this statement (from Canadians who would otherwise vote for them, that is?).
So, the solution put on this site a little while ago by Tina is one I would support as well - namely, they don't take sides at all and admit they don't know and so are holding unbiased, public hearings in which scientists from both sides are invited to testify. The resulting chaos, with claims all over the map, will do enough to thoroughly confuse everyone (which is appropriate, actually, since the science is so immature and, frankly, confusing) and take the wind out of the sails of the "we are causing a climate disaster and must stop it" camp entirely, and the CPC can quietly turn to important issues without really having had to say much at all.
What's wrong with this approach?
Sincerely,
Tom Harris, Executive Director, Natural Resources Stewardship Project
Web: www.nrsp.com"
He does not post his engineering degrees; not that FD'rs would know the difference between an engineer and a scientist.
I see that the Calgary Herald has more information on the Friends of Science, in the PDF linked here--
ReplyDeletehttp://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2007/01/tim_ball_update.php
After The Friends of Science were discredited this summer,
ReplyDeleteDo you have a reference for this? ie by whom? link etc.Thanks.
After The Friends of Science were discredited this summer,
ReplyDeleteDo you have a reference for this? ie by whom? link etc.Thanks.
Joanne,the article was in the Globe:
ReplyDeleteNurturing doubt about climate change is big business
CHARLES MONTGOMERY
Seems you can't get behind their firewall anymore, but there it is.
Actually I found it. Thanks.
ReplyDeleteSorry about the double post.
Climate change is a fact of life. It has always happened and always will. Nothing we can do will change that. The best approach is to help our most vulnerable citizens adapt to climate change, cooling and warming. To try to "stop climate change" is clearly a mistake since progressively more scientists (and common sense) tell us we humans cause very little global climate change. Yet, to this point, almost all the money is going into the idea that we can stop it, leaving many vulnerable people with little or no support in coping with it. A sad situation indeed.
ReplyDeleteSincerely,
Tom Harris, B. Eng., M. Eng. (thermofluids)
Executive Director
Natural Resources Stewardship Project
P.O. Box 23013
Ottawa, Ontario K2A 4E2
Web: www.nrsp.com