Ruth Ann Dailey Needs a Better Researcher

I haven't written on Ruth Ann Dailey in a while. She just hasn't been bloggable for a while but today, she does her conservative duty by framing a discussion of Monroeville billboards (yea, no joke - THAT'S the topic) with the same sort of spin about global climate change we've come to expect from the luvly Ruth Ann.

She describes the climate change discussion (which she calls a "shouting match") this way:

You could take a lantern, a la Diogenes, and go searching for an honest man in this matter, but one side would slap you down for unnecessary carbon emissions and the other side would blow out your light. Those are the two extremes, anyway, that are posed for us spectators, with science and politics undifferentiated. [emphasis added.]

And who's on either extreme? Well, Al Gore and James Hansen (more on him in a bit) on one side and:

On the other side of the aisle are plenty of conservatives who don't just criticize these excesses of global-warming alarmists but deny the reality of climate change altogether.

Gore and Hansen on one extreme and unnamed conservatives who "deny the reality of climate change altogether" on the other. Very simple. But look at how she frames things. Gore/Hansen are an extreme and "alarmists." Then she goes on to discuss Hansen, himself:

James Hansen, head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, gives CBS's "60 Minutes" a big story criticizing the Bush administration for editing scientists' reports to downplay the urgency of global warming.

He and CBS, however, neglect to mention that he was a consultant for Mr. Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth," received a $250,000 Heinz Award in 2001, then publicly endorsed John Kerry for president in 2004. Far more damning, Dr. Hansen sanctioned, in a 2003 Natural Science article, the attempt to influence public policy through "emphasis on extreme scenarios," which he then distinguished from "accurate" and "objective" scenarios.

Let's take the last factoid first. The article in question is here.

Not sure if Ruth Ann's actually read it, however.

She criticizes Hansen for "sanction(ing)...the attempt to influence public policy through 'emphasis on extreme scenarios'..." right? You'd think that by Ruth Ann's text, Hansen was doing that now. But take a look at that part of the appendix that mentions "extreme scenarios":

Emphasis on extreme scenarios may have been appropriate at one time, when the public and decision-makers were relatively unaware of the global warming issue, and energy sources such as "synfuels," shale oil and tar sands were receiving strong consideration. Now, however, the need is for demonstrably objective climate forcing scenarios consistent with what is realistic under current conditions. Scenarios that accurately fit recent and near-future observations have the best chance of bringing all of the important players into the discussion, and they also are what is needed for the purpose of providing policy-makers the most effective and efficient options to stop global warming.[Emphasis added.]

That's hardly "sanctioning." And even if it were, Hansen in the next sentence is calling for "demonstrably objective climate forcing scenarios consistent with what is realistic under current conditions." "Objective" and "realistic" - hardly words coming from an alarmist on the extreme.

The fun part comes next - when I googled "'james hansen' +NASA +'inconvenient truth'" I found, third entry down from the top. This article from every conservative's favorite media-analysis site, Newsbusters.org. It points to a "report" by a 15 year old named Kristen Byrnes and quotes these paragraph:

Hansen claims that he is an “independent”, but he seems to be the only person who believes it. Readers may already be aware of this, but if not… James Hansen was granted a quarter of a million dollars from the Heinz Environment Award a.k.a. U. S. Senator and former Presidential Candidate John Kerry’s wife’s foundation. You know the old saying; “nothing in politics is free.” So my first question is: what did he do to get the quarter of a million dollars? Was it the price for switching his political standing from “independent” to democratic when he later endorsed John Kerry for President? Was it payment for interpreting his department’s data in a way that would benefit his political friends?

More evidence of his connections to the Democratic Party was his endorsement of Al Gore’s presidential campaign in 2000. James Hansen was also a science advisor to Al Gore’s movie An Inconvenient Truth.

And then this paragraph follows right after:

James Hansen is a scientist who admittedly uses scare tactics to convince the public that global warming will be “potentially disastrous”. Consider this statement from Hansen in his own document called “Can We Defuse the Global Warming Time Bomb?” in August of 2003.

“Emphasis on extreme scenarios may have been appropriate at one time, when the public and decision-makers were relatively unaware of the global warming issue, and energy sources such as "synfuels," shale oil and tar sands were receiving strong consideration. Now, however, the need is for demonstrably objective climate forcing scenarios consistent with what is realistic under current conditions. Scenarios that accurately fit recent and near-future observations have the best chance of bringing all of the important players into the discussion, and they also are what is needed for the purpose of providing policy-makers the most effective and efficient options to stop global warming.”

At least she used the whole paragraph from Hansen. Ruth Ann didn't. But notice anything familiar? Here's Ruth Ann's paragraph again:

He and CBS, however, neglect to mention that he was a consultant for Mr. Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth," received a $250,000 Heinz Award in 2001, then publicly endorsed John Kerry for president in 2004. Far more damning, Dr. Hansen sanctioned, in a 2003 Natural Science article, the attempt to influence public policy through "emphasis on extreme scenarios," which he then distinguished from "accurate" and "objective" scenarios.

It's all there. The $250K Hansen received from the Heinz Endowment, the "extreme scenarios" quote from "Natural Science" magazine, and, of course, Hansen being a consultant for "An Inconvenient Truth."

Somebody please please please tell me that Ruth Ann Dailey, columnist for the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette didn't just use a "report" from a 15-year-old from Maine as research for her column.