A FEW weeks ago I wrote a story for DeSmogBlog looking at how Lord Christopher Monckton - a poster child of the climate science denialist movement - had agreed to launch a new Australian political party fronted by an anti-Islamist Creationist preacher.
The talented team at Skeptical Science produced the video below to debunk the well-worn denialist argument that there's been "no warming for 16 years" - a favorite lie of Lord Christopher Monckton and many other anti-science crusaders. It's fantastic, and deserves to be spread far and wide to anyone who is confused about this.
Whether you're skydiving onto the beaches of Durban, galavanting across the U.S. on the Tea Party's invitation to spread Birther lies about President Obama's birth certificate, pitching 'Fox News Australia' to a wealthy mining magnate, or referring to young climate activists as "Hitler Youth" without apology, the discerning climate science (and reality) denier must make a fashion statement.
IT'S not been a great few weeks for Alan Jones, arguably Australia's most influential radio personality who believes global warming is a hoax and that climate change science is "witchcraft".
In a humiliating episode, Jones and his Sydney radio station 2GB have agreed with the country's radio broadcasting watchdog to undergo training in fact-checking after complaints about a statement Jones had made about climate change.
Jones' most recent episode of self-inflicted misery began a few weeks ago, when the veteran broadcaster issued a half-hearted apology to the Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard after telling a meeting of young Liberals that Ms Gillard's father had "died of shame" over what Jones described as her "lies".
"We are honored to have someone of his stature speaking," he told an online university community newspaper. In another story, Dr McKenzie added: "It’s not every day you have the opportunity to have a world renowned speaker to come to Southeastern".
So who is this global powerhouse on climate change and economics? Sir Nicholas Stern, perhaps, author of the UK government's "Stern Review"? Could it be James Hansen, head of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies and famed climate scientist?
No. The "world renowned speaker" appearing at Southeastern Louisiana University on 2 October is none other than Lord Christopher Monckton, the British hereditary peer who believes climate scientists are part of a plot to introduce a socialist world government.
As has become the norm at such international gatherings in recent years, the eccentric climate sceptic Lord Monckton has flown in to Rio to perform his party piece about how environmentalists are trying to establish a "world socialist government", and such like. What is less clear these days is whether his colleagues at the UK Independence Party (Ukip) approve of such interventions.
Under Lord Pearson, the previous Ukip leader, Monckton was the party's deputy leader and was also variously the head of the party's policy unit, as well as its spokesman on energy and the environment. But ever since fellow eccentric climate sceptic Roger Helmer defected from the Conservatives to Ukip earlier this year, he has assumed the latter role. So what, if any, role does Monckton now have at Ukip?
Gawain Towler, Ukip's press spokesman, has confirmed to me this morning that Monckton "no longer has any formal role" with Ukip. Towler described Monckton as an "outlier" who is now "semi-detached" from the party, partly because he's "barely in the country these days". (Before arriving in Rio, Monckton had been touring the US Tea Party circuit casting doubt on the origins of Barack Obama's birth certificate.) [See DeSmog's coverage of Monckton's birther tour]
I asked if there had been a falling out between Monckton and the current Ukip leader, Nigel Farage. Towler said not, but said that Monckton - whom he described as a "17th century pamphleteer" - was sometimes the source of "frustration" and was "very much Lord Pearson's man - they own contiguous shooting estates in Scotland". Towler added that Monckton had been active in the party at a time when it was "not drowning in talent", but the recent surge in popularity for the party had seen a fresh influx of personnel. Monckton was a "loose cannon", said Towler, but Helmer is a "tied-down cannon, pointed in the same direction".
This is a guest post by Greenpeace USA's Kevin Grandia, former DeSmog Managing Editor.
Christopher Monckton, well known for his wacky behavior attempting to deny the scientific realities of climate change, has now moved on to look into the conspiracy theory around whether US president Barack Obama was actually born in the United States!
Monckton, decked out in an American flag shirt, fire arm on his hip and a cowboy hat, tells the interviewer that:
My purpose in being here [in Arizona] is to have a further look into whether the president of the United States is the president of the United States. Now you might say, what has this got to do with someone from Britain... I am here because I am curious. As a peer of the realm I am allowed to stick my long aristocratic nose into anything I want to stick it in.
Seriously, you can't make this stuff up. Here is the video:
A recent posting on The Yale Forum on Climate Change & the Media website linked to a very long piece regarding climate change by Christopher Monckton.
As a practicing scientist, I recognize and value the role that The Yale Forum plays in furthering civil discussion on this topic. As a society, we have too few venues of this type where ideas can be discussed, solutions proposed, and our preconceptions challenged.
Commentary
It is not difficult to appreciate the dilemma faced by editors of sites like The Yale Forum when submissions such as that cited are offered, particularly when, as here, the respondent is addressing an earlier posting in which he or she was specifically named.
On the one hand, sites such as this want to encourage vigorous and candid debate. On the other, they must be mindful of the very extreme views taken by some participants in this discussion. Inclusion of the most extreme views may not advance the purpose of the site.
So, how does Monckton’s post fit into the category of extreme views? That, really, is the easy part.
BACK in July last year in a boardroom of a western Australian free-market think tank, the extrovert British climate change sceptic Lord Christopher Monckton was holding court.
The topic for discussion? How to better capture the Australian media to help push a right wing, free-market and climate sceptic agenda. At the time, Lord Monckton was in Australia at the behest of a mining association and Gina Rinehart to deliver a series of talks on climate change and spread his conspiracy theories that human-caused climate change is a left-wing plot to bring down the West.
At one point during the tour, Monckton told a boisterous partisan crowd: “So to the bogus scientists who have produced the bogus science that invented this bogus scare I say, we are coming after you. We are going to prosecute you, and we are going to lock you up.”
Lord Monckton had been invited to Australia by the iron and coal mining boss Rinehart, the country’s richest woman with a rising personal fortune in the region of $20 billion.
Hosting the meeting was the Mannkal Economic Education Foundation, a group chaired by mining “Hall of Fame” member Ron Manners to promote free-market ideals and low government intervention.
Manners is also a member of Gina Rinehart’s lobby group ANDEV, which has been joined by the Institute for Public Affairs to lobby for a separate low-tax low regulation economic zone for the north of Australia to make mining projects easier to develop.
It would be safe to presume, given Manner’s background in mining and the make-up of his staff, that this aim to lower government intervention would include any regulations and taxes on mining.
As far as its position on climate change goes, Mannkal’s website only appears to promote sceptical and largely debunked views on climate science, with links to many climate change denial websites which form part of a global network.
The Lord Monckton gathering, posted on YouTube [see below], had all the air of a strategy meeting. ***SEE UPDATE BELOW***
The image of Monckton dropping from the sky, eyes closed, destined to decry his well-worn "U.N. world-domination conspiracy" is just priceless. Witness the great non-Lord's descent unto the masses, assisted by a hunky "paratrooper" to guide him to dry land since he couldn't bear to watch himself:
Democracy is utterly dependent upon an electorate that is accurately informed. In promoting climate change denial (and often denying their responsibility for doing so) industry has done more than endanger the environment. It has undermined democracy.
There is a vast difference between putting forth a point of view, honestly held, and intentionally sowing the seeds of confusion. Free speech does not include the right to deceive. Deception is not a point of view. And the right to disagree does not include a right to intentionally subvert the public awareness.
