National Academy of Sciences Plots Attacks on AGW Skeptics [UPDATED]

Ed Morrissey reports:

... Today, an American newspaper breaks news of yet another scandal involving AGW scientists and e-mail — but this time here in the US. The Washington Times obtained e-mails sent through the National Academy of Sciences that show AGW scientists conspiring to attack critics:

Undaunted by a rash of scandals over the science underpinning climate change, top climate researchers are plotting to respond with what one scientist involved said needs to be “an outlandishly aggressively partisan approach” to gut the credibility of skeptics.

In private e-mails obtained by The Washington Times, climate scientists at the National Academy of Sciences say they are tired of “being treated like political pawns” and need to fight back in kind. Their strategy includes forming a nonprofit group to organize researchers and use their donations to challenge critics by running a back-page ad in the New York Times.

“Most of our colleagues don’t seem to grasp that we’re not in a gentlepersons’ debate, we’re in a street fight against well-funded, merciless enemies who play by entirely different rules,” Paul R. Ehrlich, a Stanford University researcher, said in one of the e-mails.

Some scientists question the tactic and say they should focus instead on perfecting their science, but the researchers who are organizing the effort say the political battle is eroding confidence in their work.

Perhaps the scientists should concentrate more on science than advocacy. In fact, that was the conclusion of several people in the e-mail chain, warning against getting into a big public-relations battle when the supposedly “settled science” of the IPCC has all but utterly collapsed. Even if one is inclined to the most paranoid possible perspective on the meltdown, a $50,000 back-page ad in the New York Times will hardly offset all of the negative publicity that AGW scientists have managed to create on their own.

And besides, a $50,000 back-page ad in the New York Times isn’t going to reach people inclined towards skepticism on AGW anyway. Do these scientists realize who reads the Gray Lady? The only people impressed by an ad in the NYT will be the Times’ business office...

[Read the whole thing]

UPDATE
I knew Paul Ehrlich's name rang a bell. See Ed's update to his post:

... Ehrlich wrote The Population Bomb, which also included this interesting advice for governments of the future: that they should put “temporary sterilants” in the water supply and then closely regulate the antidote in order to choose who could reproduce and when. If he’s the leading light of AGW theory, that explains (a) why it’s not science-based at all but rather a screen for statist control, and (b) why it’s collapsing as a science.

As this blogger puts it, "Paul Ehrlich is one of the most discredited pseudo-scientific alarmists of all time." Yep.


Previous Pro Ecclesia posts on this subject:
Political Accountability for Scientific Arrogance

Another American Media Failure

World May Not be Warming, Say Scientists

Nope, No Reason for Skepticism Whatsoever

Sen. Inhofe Sticks Fork in Global Alarming Hysterics

BBC Asks "What Happened to Global Warming?"