Meanwhile, the former Vice President cancelled an event at the Copenhagen summit on global warming. Event attendees paid over $1200/ticket for a photo and a light snack. The carbon footprint of Gore’s travel plans were not known.

Meanwhile, you don’t want to miss Jon Stewart on Climategate.

Poor Al Gore. Global Warming completely debunked via the very internet… you invented.

   (James Wigderson is a blogger publishing at http://www.wigderson.com and a Waukesha resident. His column runs Thursdays in The Freeman.) 

   Who is Patrick Michaels? Michaels is a scientist at the center of the global warming controversy and the target of many e-mails revealed in the Climategate scandal.
   Climategate is the scandal resulting from the public exposure of thousands of e-mails from researchers connected to University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit (CRU). The e-mails allegedly reveal that what underlies the global warming “consensus” is a pattern of data massaging, avoidance of sharing data to prevent proper peer review, and behind-the-scenes efforts to silence critics.
   Not exactly the scientific method we were taught in high school.
   Michaels, who received his Ph.D. in ecological climatology from the University of Wisconsin-Madison in 1979, has challenged the research integrity of one of the leading advocates of the theory of human-caused global warming. As revealed by the Climategate emails, the reaction tended toward the violent. One scientific “peer” of Michaels even suggested he would “beat the crap out of him” the next time he saw Michaels.
   In the case of Michaels, it shows that polite discourse and scholarly debate have no place in an ideologically manipulated scientific field.
   As reported by Bill Osmulski of the MacIver Institute, some of the researchers defending the global warming theory were even considering trying to have Michaels’ Ph.D. from UW-Madison reconsidered. Fortunately, as Osmulski reports, nothing has yet happened on that front.
   It’s just one example of the ugliness behind the groupthink and enforcement of the orthodoxy of man-made global warming revealed by the Climategate e-mails.
   When science is politicized, it becomes subject to the rules of politics. And the first rule of politics is that timing is everything.
   The Climategate scandal is forcing its way into public view as the world’s leaders prepare to gather in Copenhagen to discuss what to do about global warming, if anything. Planning to be in attendance is President Barack Obama, who will use that European trip to pick up his Nobel Peace Prize. Perhaps while Obama is picking up his prize he can drop off former Vice President Al Gore’s Peace Prize for his global warming alarmism with a note explaining it was all just a mistake. Sorry.
   Closer to home, the Wisconsin state Legislature, under the control of the Democrats, is about to consider the recommendations of Gov. Jim Doyle’s Global Warming Task Force. The task force started with the unsettling premise that global warming is settled science.
   One of the recommendations of the task force is an “enhanced renewable portfolio standard,” which is bureaucratese for more alternative fuels providing for Wisconsin’s energy needs.
   More windmills will not just mean more dead birds and ruined rural scenery; Wisconsin’s electricity rates could shoot through the roof.
   The reason why we turn to coal instead of solar and windmills is because coal is cheaper. Seventy percent of Wisconsin’s electricity needs comes from coal, which means in order to reduce greenhouse gasses we are either going to have to invest in “clean coal” technology (unproven and costly) or go with more expensive alternative fuels.
   Not only will this be a cost to the ratepayer in the home, but this will be a hidden but expensive tax on business as well, making the business climate in Wisconsin even more difficult.
   It’s a choice between economic growth and environmental extremism, and the extremists are in control. They will win, and Wisconsin jobs will be lost, all because the science of manmade global warming is supposedly settled.
   Fortunately, the Climategate scandal’s demolition of that myth may make some in the Legislature to think twice until the science is completely reevaluated.
   Less than 400 years ago, Galileo challenged the prevailing orthodoxies and became “the father of modern science.” Today, men like Patrick Michaels are again challenging the prevailing orthodoxies and they may just save science from politics.
   Until this challenge has been answered and a real consensus on global warming has been formed, for or against, Wisconsin politicians should reject the task force recommendations and spare their constituents the terrible costs.

MacIver has discoverd that several UW researchers were included in group email conversations that discussed masking data, incorporating false trends into climate research, and blocking efforts to correct that. Equally alarming, we found that UW grad Pat Michaels, a prominent skeptic of the theory of man-made global warming in the School of Public Policy at George Mason University who is also senior fellow at the Cato Institute, was the target of a campaign of intimidation because of his views.

“At best UW employees appear to have been privy to efforts to mask or manipulate data,” said MacIver Institute President Brett Healy. “Our investigative reporter is in the process of filing open records requests to determine the extent of Wisconsin taxpayer-paid individuals’ participation in such efforts. Furthermore, we’re looking into whether efforts to undermine Dr. Michaels’ University Doctorate escalated into anything more than petty sniping and speculation.”

Last week, someone leaked e-mails obtained by hacking into the server at the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia. Activists who have long denied the reality of climate change say they show that climatologists have engaged in a grand conspiracy to manufacture a case that global warming is occurring due to human activities. Do the hacked e-mails undermine the case for anthropogenic climate change? {emphasis added}

“Activists who have long denied the reality of climate change”. Not scientists, not even critics, but activists. Not theory but the reality of climate change.

Newsweek asked two general questions, and no confrontation of Hansen with the evidence in the e-mails. Perhaps the e-mails reveal more than just corrupt behavior by global warming hawkers, but the corruption of journalism, too.

Ott questions in a Tuesday news release how Gov. Jim Doyle’s Task Force will respond in light of the e- mails.

“Democrats in the state Assembly and Senate have been secretly developing a comprehensive package of legislation that will be introduced in Wisconsin based on the more than 50 recommendations put forth in the task force report,” the news release states. “Opponents have been warning that such a package will result in higher energy prices, oppressive regulations and cost the state thousands of manufacturing jobs.”

Ott told The Freeman the governor’s task force was developed around the scientific consensus that global warming is caused by humans. He also said if the task force’s recommendations go through, it will have a negative effect on Wisconsin’s economy.

“That is why the e-mails are absolutely disturbing,” said Ott, who added he will vote against the task force’s recommendations.

Additionally, Ott said that temperatures have remained steady for the last decade and have been cooler the past two years.

“I am not sitting here saying it is not possible that human activity can impact the earth’s climate … but I guess, on the other hand, I haven’t seen conclusive evidence that whatever warming we do have is caused by man,” Ott said. “I guess my feeling is that what we really should be doing is developing a sensible energy policy, both in Wisconsin and in the country.”