US Senate's top climate sceptic accused of waging 'McCarthyite witch-hunt'

[OKIsItJustMe]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/mar/01/inhofe-climate-mccarthyite

US Senate's top climate sceptic accused of waging 'McCarthyite witch-hunt'

James Inhofe calls for criminal investigation of climate scientists as senators prepare proposal that would ditch cap and trade

Suzanne Goldenberg, US environment correspondent
guardian.co.uk, Monday 1 March 2010 17.14 GMT

The US Congress's most ardent global warming sceptic is being http://www.climatesciencewatch.org/index.php/csw/details/sen._inhofe_inquisition_seeking_to_criminalize_climate_scientists/">accused of turning the row over climate science into a McCarthyite witch-hunt by calling for a criminal investigation of scientists.

Climate scientists say Senator http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Files.View&FileStore_id=7db3fbd8-f1b4-4fdf-bd15-12b7df1a0b63">James Inhofe's call for a criminal investigation into American as well as British scientists who worked on the UN climate body's report or had communications with East Anglia's climate research unit represents an attempt to silence debate on the eve of new proposals for a climate change law.

Inhofe's document ends by naming 17 "key players" in the controversy about CRU's stolen emails, including the Britons Phil Jones and Keith Briffa.

"I think this is like a drag net, just to try and catch everyone whose name happens to be on this list. It's guilt by association and I thought those days were over 50 years ago," said Michael Oppenheimer, of Princeton University, who is on the list of 17 scientists. "It looks like a McCarthyite tactic: pull in anyone who had anything to do with anyone because they happened to converse with some by email, and threaten them with criminal activity."

...

[petronius]

1. I notice he didn't call for a criminal investigation to identify the hackers/thieves

who stole the email. Perhaps it just slipped his mind...

:sarcasm:

[beardown]

2. I guess Inhofe wasn't too busy defending himself.

I mean, the deniers keep repeating that the climate science community is running a witch hunt against anyone who disagrees with them. Meanwhile, the deniers are the ones that are hacking emails, drumming up false controversies against Jones with tricked up "interviews" and now Inhofe is calling for criminal investigations.

For a group that routinely uses these aggressive and intimidating tactics, the deniers sure seem to take what is basically just scientific reviews of their claims that routinely debunk 98 percent of their 'theories' pretty hard. Maybe if they don't like getting shot down so much they should quit dragging out the same crap over and over and stick with the few legitimate research items that can spark more in depth analysis.