Steve McIntyre asked me if I could fill in a little on history of Gleick in blog posts focusing on discussions prior to “fakegate”. I searched my database and discovered I had blogged about his three times prior to February 2012. The stories and links are provided below:
- Irony Indeed: Comments at Gleick’s word choice in his Huff-po blog post article defending his article on Climate Change and the Integrity of Science 5/10/2010.
- Time Line of L’affaire “Gleick/Ursus Bogusâ€: Explains why I thought Gleick’s reaction to criticism of the photoshopped polar bear had given the story about the photoshopped polar bear legs. 5/14/2010
- LaFramboise: Gleick, Curry.I suggest the effect of Gleick’s negative review of Donna’s book may have resulted in more sales. 10/20/2011.
A search for comment containing “Gleick” indicates the earliest comments mentioning Gleick appear to date from May 10,2010 the date of the “Irony Indeed” linked above. Feel free to visit the Gleick posts to inspect his use of () and ,’s. 🙂
Lucia,
I’m sure you meant May 10, 2010 🙂
Denny– Took me a bit to find the typo… yes. First comments were in 2010. Fixed.
McCardle:
http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/02/the-most-surprising-heartland-fact-not-the-leaks-but-the-leaker/253449/
Here is a lying and cheating self quiz.
http://www.truthaboutdeception.com/surveys/2-compulsive-lying.html
My score was perfect. In fact, it said I was genius.
Dr Ruth has experience:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mx3wrfhQaqk
While it’s hard to disagree with McCardle I’m a little bit wary of the number of times people in the climate debate are accused of ‘brain farts’.
The question is if Gleick is willing to beak the law and lie to achieve his ends, why should his scientific work be treated without skepticism? Especially considering that his work and ideology overlap.
McCardle:
“And ethics aside, what Gleick did is insane for someone in his position–so crazy that I confess to wondering whether he doesn’t have some sort of underlying medical condition that requires urgent treatment.”
I am getting a distinct notion about McCardle’s reaction to all this and that is that she would love the story to go away and control the damage. Gleick was a firebrand before this incident and I suspect he still is. Maybe she could do more reporting on those who have come to Gleick’s defense and particularly those who have and continue to put the forged document together with the valid HI documents to make points about that vast well funded movement out there that is attempting undermine climate science and immediate mitigation.
She has already attempted to salve her criticism of Gleick’s actions by pointing to her dislike of organizations like HI and her conclusion that we need AGW mitigation to start yesterday.
I thought the story about Urus bogus, which I really did not pay attention to the first time around, was telling about the degree to which climate science and politics are mixed. First of all the adjusted Polar Bear photo was very much an attempt to send a political message. The reaction of Gleick was very much political in that he attempted to turn the criticism/observation around on the those critizing/observing. How many times have you seen politicians attempt to do that?
It is NOT necessary to posit mental illness or medical conditions to explain Gleick’s actions (regarding the pretexting).
There are apparently thousands, probably tens of thousands of people, who have now openly come out and said they support his actions, they admire him for doing them, and they would love to do the same if they had the means, the opportunity, and could keep their nerve.
Furthermore, I have no doubt that when it is proven the strategy doc is faked, and who faked it, there will be thousands expressing admiration for that to. (although maybe not quite as many thousands).
They are not all mentally ill. They simply believe that such activities are justified.
The real story is not mental illness, but why they believe it.
Such hypotheses miss the real story.
The re
This is eas
Going back to the fake memo.
Am I the only one who has thinks something else might odd about it, quite apart from its content? Is it really a low quality scan? Look closely.
I am still checking this out, so could be wrong, but I wondered if anybody else is thinking along the same lines?
Kenneth Fritsch (Comment #91293)
The interesting thing for me with McCardle’s reporting on this issue is her apparent surprise that folks like Gleick are less than honest. I mean, it is like she imagines an unhinged nut-cake advocate for forced draconian reduction in material wealth is not likely to be deceptive/lie. I really wonder how blind to evidence she must be to not see that extreme advocates (of any political persuasion) are trustworthy sources of neither information nor guidance.
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What is most missing from an analysis like McCardles is an informed understanding of the technical issues. It appears she can’t begin to appreciate just how uncertain the projections of doom (routinely used to justify huge cost!) really are. The challenge that ‘climate realists’ face is finding a way to convey to honest people like McCardle the degree of uncertainty, and how risky/unwise a huge public ‘investment’ in reduced fossil fuel use is.
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The only encouraging thing is that international agreement on economically destructive policies seems decades away. By then, the uncertainty will have been greatly narrowed, and people can make a more reasoned choice on policy.
What lines?
Is it really a low quality scan? Look closely
Copner–
So, are you suggesting it’s not a scan? Or that it is a scan? Will looking at the document yet again tell me which one you are thinking?
Spit out your theory when you ask us if we are thinking along the same lines you are.
I am seeing more and more of a …..conversion is the wrong word…lifting of the veil perhaps?
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McArdle.
.
Curry.
.
Kloor.
.
Vahernholt
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Appel.
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By no means are they deniers. They are like most denizens of this blog, lukewarmers. But they all have, or are starting to, to point to the naked dude with the crown.
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Interesting times indeed.
My contribution to l’affaire Gleick.
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http://blog.sfgate.com/gleick/2010/12/30/the-2010-climate-b-s-of-the-year-award/?plckOnPage=2&plckItemsPerPage=10&plckSort=TimeStampDescending
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From Gleick, in reponse to my post (page 2 of the above link):
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False and false. Jones has explicitly described how he was misquoted. The NAS has explicitly rejected the Wegman report and vindicated the hockey stick.
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You can have your own opinion, but not your own facts.
.
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In my reponse, I quoted the BBC interviw with Jones, and the Congressional tesimony of North regarding Mann and Wegman.
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Gleickman is a serial denier, and when presented with the facts, simply ignores them.
No I’m suggesting it’s not a scan. I’m suggesting it may not be a low quality scan, because at first glance it looks like a pretty high quality scan to me.
But the text is full of jaggies, which would be surprising unless the jaggies were in the paper document.
It could be wrong, the thought occurred to me a few hours ago while driving, and I didn’t have time to check it out.
So I’m just checking out now. Does anybody know how to the DPI resolution of the images in the fake memo?
Copner (Comment #91303) February 22nd, 2012 at 4:45 pm “Is it really a low quality scan? Look closely”
It looks like a default scan with PDF OCR applied. I can send something with similar properties later if you want to compare (not from any evil source or via nefarious means)
“Does anybody know how to the DPI resolution of the images in the fake memo?”
Based on recent scanning I did, it looks like a 200dpi black and white scan. A scan like that with OCR done in Adobe Acrobat will give output just like that. 600 dpi and the letters won’t show any jaggies.
(side issue – I can’t get my scanner to show paper folds at all
copner
I noticed all the artifacts in the scan. Maybe I am over thinking it too….he could just have a crappy scanner or he smokes a pipe and a bunch of smoke residue is on the glass……….
Huhuhuhuhuhuhuh( deep breath) is he a Smoker?????
I think the images are 1700X2200 pixels. That is what A-PDF image extractor says. Which for 8.5 by 11, would make them 200 DPI.
Even 20 years ago, the default setting on nearly all A size scanners was 300 DPI. Today, document scanners typical have DPis 600 or even 1000+ DPI (and higher for photo scanners). Epson’s cheapest document scanner has a DPI of 600 DPI.
e.g.
600 DPI – http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/jsp/Product.do?BV_UseBVCookie=yes&sku=B11B206201
1200 DPI X 2400 DPI – http://www.epson.com/cgi-bin/Store/jsp/Product.do?BV_UseBVCookie=yes&sku=B11B206201
I am trying to figure why such an important document would be scanned at such a low resolution?
Possibly more to follow…
Copner,
Gleick probably faxed it to himself. That would put the resolution close to 200 DPI.
Actually I am of the opinion that the printer was the issue and the scanner picked up what was there. Or …..instead of scanning he set the machine to “copy” and copied it to the desktop and then printed it again……..
Steve
If it was faxed now we have better records. There has to be a better answer for the crappy resolution and copner is on to something.
If he copied it like I said now we have records on his computer.
Dude,
“now we have records on his computer”
What computer? I understand that the hard drive crashed and all records were lost on about February 16… oh, and sorry, the hard drive was buried in a land fill somewhere in central California. 😉 Even Gleick is not dumb enough to let people find verifiable records on his computer.
The scan was done at exactly 200 DPI, not close to 200 DPI.
And yes that is a group 3 fax resolution.
It would also explain why despite being stored in 24 bit color depth, the image is monochrome.
Also if you extract the image and zoom in, you can see the edges of some letters are distorted in odd ways (not just badly scanned), and a few little black dots in whitespace areas of an otherwise pristine document (I’m not talking about the ones at the top, but some odd groups of black pixels between lines and paragraphs). Those look to me like fax artifacts, not scan artifacts – random pixels caused by noise on the line, rather than imperfections in the document.
So if he had a paper document and he had a scanner, why did he fax it to himself, rather than simply scan it? What would be the motive for that?
I can only think of 3 motives:
1. He didn’t know how to use his computer. I can’t believe this is likely, because faxing through a scanner is harder than simply scanning, since you have to get the phone connection setup and all that stuff.
or
2. He wanted the document quality to be poor for some reason.
or
3. At the point he scanned the document on Feb 13th (remember he scanned at midday Feb 13th, and didn’t email the docs until the following morning), he was considering explaining the document as having been received by fax.
> Even Gleick is not dumb enough to let people find verifiable records on his computer.
There would be an outgoing phone record if he faxed a document to himself.
And if he did the easiest thing – which would be fax it from his PC/scanner to a fax service which then forwards him the PDF in email, there would be internet or network records of the email, and possibly at some internet fax website.
Copner,
“So if he had a paper document and he had a scanner, why did he fax it to himself, rather than simply scan it? What would be the motive for that?”
Maybe in an effort to make the trail so complicated that it would be difficult to finger him. Of course, an actual phone connection would leave traceable records. My fax machine (old) has a copy function at exactly that resolution. Feed the original document as if you were faxing it, and you get a so-so (200 DPI) quality copy on plain paper…. and no incriminating records, unless the fax uses printing film that retains a mirror image copy of everything that is printed by the fax machine. Of course, that printing film could end up in a land fill as well, or set on fire.
> Feed the original document as if you were faxing it, and you get a so-so (200 DPI) quality copy on plain paper….
No that doesn’t explain it.
Because then he’d only generate a poor quality plain paper copy. He then needs to scan that to get a PDF. And when he scanned it, he’d get a 300 DPI (or higher) version of a poor quality original – and it would be color or grey scale, not monochrome. (Also it doesn’t explain fax artifacts in the image)
The document was scanned at 200 DPI in mono.
Received as a Group 3 fax is the most likely explanation. It’s the only still-in-use technology where this combination is widely used.
The only other reasonable alternative explanation is Gleick going out of his way to change the scanner settings to an obsolete format, and not making any mistakes when imitating a fax (and that still doesn’t explain fax artifacts in the image).
Copner,
One other bit of information: the copy function on my fax machine is subject to “noise” as well, even though the document never goes over the wires.
0. Write the fake document.
1. Print with your high quality office printer.
2. Make a crappy quality copy with your fax machine.
3. Scan it with your Epson scanner into a PDF file
4. Scrub the drive of all incriminating files
5. Throw the drive in the trash (or burn it), when you realize they know it was you.
Copner,
I think you can tell your scanner to scan most any way you want. Color, monochrome, low or high resolution.
> I think you can tell your scanner to scan most any way you want. Color, monochrome, low or high resolution.
You can. But they’re not usually the defaults (unless actually faxing). So why would he choose to scan with the fax settings?
He either faxed it, or wanted it to look like a fax.
Why would he do that?
(step 2 not need in your summary btw if he changes the scanner settings)
Copner,
“Why would he do that?”
Maybe he was aware that printers often leave information on printed pages (at very high dot resolution) that is traceable, and he wanted to get rid of that information. A low resolution copy sure does that. Step 2 is needed to add noise to the image.
Maybe he’s organized his scanner to use mostly as a fax?
“I am trying to figure why such an important document would be scanned at such a low resolution? ”
Because it is a default setting on many scanners*. Tried it and sure enough the scan without me making any choices was a b&w 200 dpi oyutput to PDF. Not on an Epson either. I’ll show examples later.
Other artefacts? Hmm no the sample scan I’ve now done didn’t have extra fuzzy bits at the corners unlike the alleged-fake.
[*by ‘default’ I don’t mean that is what you will always get but what the auto-detect functions of modern scanners will give you. Possibly it is too keep file size down and because 200 dpi is usually plenty good enough for OCR]
Alternative theory:
Gleick gets the real documents and shares them with someone he trusts (a fellow loony green activist). Someone composes the fake document (maybe they do it together) and the other person keys it in and faxes it to Gleick, who likes he result so much that he includes it in the packet.
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Problem is: the document sounds just like Glieck himself wrote it, not someone else.
Yes that’s one possibility.
By why would he want to remove that information?
Scenario 1: He receives the document on paper as he now claims.
Question: Does he want to remove the traceability info?
1(a) If believed it was a genuine Heartland document, he would reason it should have been printed on one of Heartland’s own printers, and any traceability information would help expose the evil deniers, by preventing Heartland disavowing the document
1(b) If he’s planning to reveal the document anyway, but has doubts about the paper document, the traceability information wouldn’t lead to him, it would actually lead to the person that tried to play a trick on him.
Scenario 2: He prints (and possibly creates) the document himself as some now allege
Question: Does he want to remove the traceability info?
lucia (Comment #91372) February 22nd, 2012 at 9:47 pm
“Maybe he’s organized his scanner to use mostly as a fax?”
Nah. Seriously a modern scanner will, without user intervention, produce a 200 dpi scan if it feels like it. Is there a way I can send a PDF here to show people?
NyQ,
Put it on tinypic.
Free of charge.
Tinypic won’t do a PDF 🙁
Sort of important if you want to see how my sample compares
I think my comment got eaten.
Nyq Only may be right. Or not.
But it’s not just 200DPI. It’s also mono. Not even grey scale. But stored as color image. That doesn’t feel quite right.
Would be good to do some tests on scanners, preferably Epson’s with the default settings, and see what happens.
Nyq,
Blow up the pdf on your screen, then capture the image with alt-PrtScr and paste the image into Paint. Finally save as a PNG file, which tinypic will accept.
Used Scribd
http://www.scribd.com/doc/82517606/img-223100903-0001OCR
You’ll need to trust me that I just put it on the scanner without making any setting adjustments. I then got Acrobat to do the OCR.
Result: jaggy low quality looking but selectable text.
Nyq,
Yup, that looks like it. Is Nyq a nom de plume for Peter Glieck?
“But it’s not just 200DPI. It’s also mono. Not even grey scale. But stored as color image. That doesn’t feel quite right.”
Again – it is what scanners will do. Put a colour photo in and it’ll give you a high-res colour file (and possibly as a JPEG or TIFF). Stick plain text in and you get a low-res mono image in a PDF. It is to ensure that no thinking is required 🙂
“Is Nyq a nom de plume for Peter Glieck?”
I was suspicious myself when the thing about using brackets (which I do a lot) was mentioned. Now I’ve shown I also produce scanned documents. The evidence is certainly mounting against me! I intend to investigate myself further. There are whole blocks of time when I can’t account for my whereabouts (sleeping? yeah, likely story).
Nyq Only (Comment #91385) ,
But the crucial question: are you in the West Coast time zone?
Maybe someone (unnamed) faxed it to Gleick’s fax modem/Epson All-In-One from Kinko’s. Mystery solved? 😉
“But the crucial question: are you in the West Coast time zone?”
Phew – looks like I’m off the hook in that case. Different coast on a different continent. 🙂
The Minnesotans For Global Warming add a little levity to the situation with this poster.
http://www.minnesotansforglobalwarming.com/m4gw/2012/02/climate-scientist-poster.html
Click to enlarge.
Okay let’s put fax thing aside.
Just one more thing as Columbo might say…
Some other things have been bothering me:
1. According to Heartland, Gleick did the pretexting in early February. This would mean he sat on the genuine documents for a couple of weeks before releasing them. But the faked document was knocked up at the last minute on February 13th.
2, If you read the faked document, except for some word-choice tells, it does not read like Gleick’s professional documents, nor like his Forbes column, or his documents at the Pacific Institute. It actually reads like Gleick’s blog comments, especially the rushed and highly emotionally charged ones (like where he’s angry about the book review).
3. Why would he copy and paste an information-free line about Dr Wojik’s from a real Heartland document. It stands out line a sore-thumb. He didn’t even bother to re-phrase it? He didn’t add any information. Again, it suggests rush.
4. Why would he not add any real information (except for some errors) about Heartland to the fake document, when there is plenty of information out there that he could have used? Again it suggests rush.
5. Why did he make schoolboy errors in copying information from the budgets into the fake documents? It’s not like he has no experience reading 503(c)’s budgets – he has ran one for 20 years. Again, it suggests rush.
6. It is nice to believe that Gleick thought the game was up because of the speculation at Lucia’s, Mosher fingering him as a suspect, or Roger’s tweet, but he seems to have resigned from AGU before he knew about this.
7. If you read the first Kaminsky article at American Spectator where he fingers Gleick as a suspect, he seems to be doing so using an entirely separate basis from the blog speculation. Go down to the comments section, Kaminsky is asked why he didn’t credit Mosher, but Kaminsky replies he doesn’t know who Mosher is – so it seems unlikely that he got his suspicions from the blogosphere.
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8. Gleick runs a 503(c) himself. When pretexting he would surely not have expected to find anything much in budgets and fund raising plans that get discussed at board meetings. Furthermore he had been examining Heartland’s form 990 since at least early January 2012, so he knew approximately their total funds, etc., just not the names of specific donors. He also surely knew the sort of activities Heartland does – because it’s nearly all listed on their website – it’s no secret for example that they organize skeptical conferences on climate change or write the NIPCC report. The worst that he could expect to find in these types of documents is that Heartland is funded by Koch and big oil – but he has (or greens generally have) been claiming that for years anyway, and nobody except them really cares – at best the documents would serve as proof of this allegation.
9. If he’s prepared to invent an anonymous whistleblower for the fake document, why didn’t he invent an anonymous whistleblower for sending him the real documents?
10. Why would he mention himself and his Forbes column in the fake?
So here is a hypothesis: The fake document was created to cover-up the pretexting
Note: I am not saying this is what happened. I do not know what happened. I am saying this is merely one possibility for what could have happened.
The hypothesis goes:-
1. In August 2011, Gleick becomes a Forbes contributor.
2. In January (specifically January 12) he gets into a fight in the Forbes comments column with a fellow Forbes blogger – James Taylor (of Heartland). Gleick demands to see who is funding Heartland – see http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2012/01/12/please-global-warming-alarmists-stop-denying-climate-change-and-science/?commentId=comment_blogAndPostId/blog/comment/1363-294-2369
3. By early February, Gleick decides to do the pretexting. Maybe it is because he now considers himself a journalist, and considers this to be investigative journalism.
4. It works, he’s got the documents, and he plans to write about it, perhaps even as a scoop in his Forbes column. He can explain the documents as having come from an anonymous source.
5. At some point he discovers pretexting is illegal and/or Forbes would not publish a column based on stolen material. Gleick begins to fear Heartland is on to him.
6. Somehow, perhaps via the grapevine at Forbes, some kind of hint of what has happened, and that it involves Gleick, gets to Kaminsky.
7. Gleick however doesn’t know for sure whether Heartland are on to him. He still wants to use the material he pretexted – but he has a dilemma – if he simply forwards the stolen documents to Desmogblog, etc., he has removed himself from the story, despite doing all the work and taking all the risks!
8. Some Gleick comes up with a cunning plan, he just needs to create one new document, but he needs to do it quickly…
Copner –
Very good.
But I think the last point can be bigger than that. I don’t think it has to be a rush. At that point, the real documents are insufficient and there is all the incentive to fake an anonymous memo. I think there are dozens of reasons and thinking processes and objectives that would go through one’s mind. Deliberately making it appear to be lots of different things – including rushed, sloppy, a junior cleric’s work, a ‘leaker kind of thing, various kinds of impersonations etc etc.
What he actually wanted it to appear as can only be wild speculation, but the need for it is quite different.
So my thinking is that looking very closely at the forged document (other to discern one man’s fingerprints all over it) is likely to lead to a misunderstanding.
He has the ordinary everyday docs but he needs to provide himself with a motive for getting them in the first place [other than the true one] So he simply invents a fake ‘insider’ memo by using info from the real doc’s and messing around with them in a clumsy amateurish trail-hiding way. I’m sure I’d have done the same, in the same, situation (had it been me, or someone, like me)
Another thought. If I was Gleick and innocent (ho ho) I’d volunteer for a polygraph immediately. In public.
I don’t think that is going to happen!
Anteros:
Why does the fake memo look exactly like Gleick’s blog comments, and not so much like his more considered writings?
How did Kaminsky finger Gleick? because it wasn’t by reading Mosher’s near-clairvoyant textual analysis.
Why did Gleick resign from the AGU before being exposed online – unless he had already concluded that Heartland were already on to him?
Copner –
Your second and third questions I don’t know about.
The looking like Gleick’s blog comments could well have been because of a real rush. But I think it’s something that would have a lot of thought given to it – even if time was short (what can be the reason for the haste to save minutes or half an hour?) My feeling is that such things as deliberately faked documents have a great deal of intentionality about them – there is a desperate attempt to make them seem like something – to be something that they are not. And that is true whether we are expert forgers or first time amateurs [which we pretty much all are, including Gleick, despite our imaginings]
I have no idea what the thinking was during or before the actual composition but I think it unlikely that it was solely “shit, I’ve got to concoct this is the next ten minutes”.
If it came out looking like his blog comments, maybe that is just how he thinks every sloppy casual writing appears. Perhaps he doesn’t realise that his rushed writing is actually quite idiosyncratic. Maybe he had no idea that it would be at all obvious?
We don’t know this. He resigned on the same day he was named here in comments. He was named when I responded to a comment by Mosher– and that was mid-day Chicago time. Plenty of time to resign. As I have fallen in love with this theory, I can envision plenty of ways that it could happen. What I don’t have is evidence of:
1) Time of resignation.
2) Evidence Gleick knew we were talking about him before we resigned.
3) Evidence someone at AGU might have known.
4) Evidence of any discussion between Gleick or AGU.
I’m in love with the theory… but…. it could be wrong.
I cross posted to Wattsup & climateaudit. A commentator found a link by Kaminsky to a Forbes comment, and the Forbes comment was probably written by somebody who read Mosher. So it’s possible Kaminsky did unknowingly get his info from Mosher’s incredible mind.
But if we cross out the items relating to Kaminsky & AGU, the hypothesis still hangs together quite well, and explains quite a lot.
By biggest question is if Gleick is prepared to invent an anonymous insider, why didn’t he do so prior to Feb 13th, and have the anonymous insider send him the real documents – which he could then publish in his Forbes column?
If that was his plan, and if the plan worked – he would expect
(a) to win the argument at Forbes (which seems very important to him),
(b) come off as a hero and great investigative journalist himself
and (c) be in the clear for pretexting.
Anyway, here is the revised version of the hypothesis:
1. According to Heartland, Gleick did the pretexting in early February. This would mean he sat on the genuine documents for a couple of weeks before releasing them. But the faked document was knocked up at the last minute on February 13th.
2, If you read the faked document, except for some word-choice tells, it does not read like Gleick’s professional documents, nor like his Forbes column, or his documents at the Pacific Institute. It actually reads like Gleick’s blog comments, especially the rushed and highly emotionally charged ones (like where he’s angry about the book review).
3. Why would he copy and paste an information-free line about Dr Wojik’s from a real Heartland document. It stands out line a sore-thumb. He didn’t even bother to re-phrase it? He didn’t add any information. Again, it suggests rush.
4. Why would he not add any real information (except for some errors) about Heartland to the fake document, when there is plenty of information out there that he could have used? Again it suggests rush.
5. Why did he make schoolboy errors in copying information from the budgets into the fake documents? It’s not like he has no experience reading 503(c)’s budgets – he has ran one for 20 years. Again, it suggests rush.
8. Gleick runs a 503(c) himself. When pretexting he would surely not have expected to find anything much in budgets and fund raising plans that get discussed at board meetings. Furthermore he had been examining Heartland’s form 990 since at least early January 2012, so he knew approximately their total funds, etc., just not the names of specific donors. He also surely knew the sort of activities Heartland does – because it’s nearly all listed on their website – it’s no secret for example that they organize skeptical conferences on climate change or write the NIPCC report. The worst that he could expect to find in these types of documents is that Heartland is funded by Koch and big oil – but he has (or greens generally have) been claiming that for years anyway, and nobody except them really cares – at best the documents would serve as proof of this allegation.
9. If he’s prepared to invent an anonymous whistleblower for the fake document, why didn’t he invent an anonymous whistleblower for sending him the real documents?
10. Why would he mention himself and his Forbes column in the fake?
So here is a hypothesis: The fake document was created to cover-up the pretexting
Note: I am not saying this is what happened. I do not know what happened. I am saying this is merely one possibility for what could have happened.
The hypothesis goes:-
1. In August 2011, Gleick becomes a Forbes contributor.
2. In January (specifically January 12) he gets into a fight in the Forbes comments column with a fellow Forbes blogger – James Taylor (of Heartland). Gleick demands to see who is funding Heartland – see http://www.forbes.com/sites/jamestaylor/2012/01/12/please-global-warming-alarmists-stop-denying-climate-change-and-science/?commentId=comment_blogAndPostId/blog/comment/1363-294-2369
3. By early February, Gleick decides to do the pretexting. Maybe it is because he now considers himself a journalist, and considers this to be investigative journalism.
4. It works, he’s got the documents, and he plans to write about it, perhaps even as a scoop in his Forbes column. He can explain the documents as having come from an anonymous source.
5. At some point he discovers pretexting is illegal and/or Forbes would not publish a column based on stolen material. Gleick begins to fear Heartland is on to him.
7. Gleick however doesn’t know for sure whether Heartland are on to him. He still wants to use the material he pretexted – but he has a dilemma – if he simply forwards the stolen documents to Desmogblog, etc., he has removed himself from the story, despite doing all the work and taking all the risks!
8. So Gleick comes up with a cunning plan, he just needs to create one new document, but he needs to do it quickly…
Copner –
I think that is solid – to my mind, everything points to that.
I’m guessing your number 9 is explained by paranoia/an accurate sense that people were on to him. He couldn’t get away from the fraudulent way he got the real docs – but he could give himself a half decent excuse, even though it meant some much more serious lying. He desperately needed some cover for his rash impersonation.
I’m still not 100% convinced by the necessity for real genuine haste, as in ‘I’ve got to knock this fake doc’ up really quickly. But then again, it is possible..
Guys—
There is an issue though.
Desmog blog and Laden ran articles on 2/22/2012 insisting fake is real based on Gleick’s confession being true. It’s difficult for me to believe either DeSmog or Laden are doing that without communicating with Gleick who must telling them he really got the fake the way he says. Of course, something being difficult for me to believe doesn’t mean it’s not so. But…. still….
I rarely send email back and forth with other bloggers– but what with various people trying to put a timeline together, I’ve skyped and emailed.
Oh… does anyone know of any nice free “make a gradeschool timeline graphic” software?
An excuse for pretexting, which for certain he would be found out on, because email messages never really die, seems the only reasonable motive. It has the added fall on your sword and be a hero advantage of (falsely) portraying HI people as being evil, being aware they are evil, and gleefully celebrating their evil actions.
.
Such obtuse thinking does not seem surprising for a zealot. Note that he continues to point to the fake document as “proof” HI is evil, while his actions were simply an error of judgement.
.
He is, IMO, just disconnected from reality, as most zealots are.
@Lucia:
Desmogblog & Laden definitely seem to be working together
I had both open in separate windows when Laden’s latest article appeared about Heartland appeared. I had just gone away from Desmogblog where there was no new article. When I went back Desmogblog had their new article about the fake being authenticated up. So if they were not working together, how did Laden write 200 word article in seconds?
Anyway, that doesn’t prove that Desmogblog & Laden are working with Gleick, or have been able to contact him.
Like I said previously, Laden’s response to comments on the previous Heartland story at his blog, suggest a willful blindness to anything pointing to the document being faked.
> I’m guessing your number 9 is explained by paranoia/an accurate sense that people were on to him.
Maybe,
Or alternatively, what I’m suggesting is why creating the anonymous whistleblower on Feb 14th, and have the whistleblower email desmogblog and others – with both fake and real documents.
Wouldn’t it be more logical to create the anonymous whistleblower sometime between Feb 3rd (start of pretexting) and Feb 13th (when the fake was scanned), and have the whistleblower email Gleick only the real documents. That way, Gleick gets to publish the real docs at Forbes, gets a scoop, wins the argument at Forbes, and comes off as the new Woodward & Bernstein.
My thinking keeps returning to Watergate, and it not being the initial crime, but the cover-up that causes the biggest problems.
In his own mind, Gleick thinks he’s a good ethical guy. So why embark on creating a fraudulent document, unless it was an attempt at self-preservation?
“So why embark on creating a fraudulent document, unless it was an attempt at self-preservation?”
I think this is an excellent observation.
I detect coercion in a lot of things Warmers do.
Andrew
“The first thing a man will do for his principles is lie.”
People writing in a state of anger or frustration also tend to write hastily and fire off their messages without revising, even if they have all the time in the world.
Copner, SteveF, Anteros: You seek a motive for the fraud memo.
I wonder if you noticed the long post I made on another thread which deals with a real possible motive – one which would both further Gleick’s career, and enhance his reputation – I will copy it below. I think nothing more needs to be added. Sorry I have to post and run today. May be back later on.
EDIT: several of the activities of NCSE and Gleick mentioned below occurred much earlier than Feb15. You can find the dates in the WUWT thread the posts came from.
———–>>>>>>>>>>>>
I have just waded through many comments on the WUWT thread wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/21/ncse-accepts-gleicks-resignation/
I was simply, almost mindlessly, reading until a comment at 11:16 by Stephen Rasey went through a tremendous string of analysis and concluded with, “How does E.C. Scott at NCSE come to that conclusion without the faked document or private potentially defaming discussions (from Gleick)? I think Scott at NCSE just opened itself to Heartland discovery motions.â€
INDEED! That caught my attention.
A little later, Richdo @12:00 pm goes through another marvelous string of fact that includes, “Chris Mooney at DeSmogBlog was one of the first (if not the first) to publicise NCSE’s climate education initiative launch, … [but] notes “There Is No Clear “Opponent.†In the evolution fight, there was … Discovery Institute[and other]. In the climate education battle, there is no central clearinghouse organization … pushing global warming denial in schools. … So how can [NCSE] manage climate education conflicts profitably …†“- Now we have Gleick, the newly appointed member of NCSE’s board, (appointed specifically because of their new climate initiatives) at the center of a fraud to create a “clear opponent†and provide a wondefull springboard for NCSE’s climate launch.â€
And finally, DirkH says to the original “Joe @ 10:03″, “VERY GOOD! You found the motive. So we KNOW now that -this was not masterplanned to blow up in their faces like it did. -the left/warm media are just winging it as good as they canâ€
So back to read what Joe actually said at 10:03: “So Gleick, in his hubris, attempted to prime the pump for a battle against Heartland that he intended to wage as a board member at NCSE by releasing a fake document that portrayed Heartland as an anti-science organization. This plan had the ultimate effect of undoing Gleick just when he should have been reaching the zenith of his career and casting him in the nadir of his career instead.
It’s a Gleick Tragedy.â€
My own opinion has been greatly affected by these posters and I believe if others who have been mulling over this event, it may greatly affect them, too. If I were Heartland, I would immediately subpoena for all NCSE documents and communications with Gleick and Dessmogblog, since it seems clear that NCSE and Gleick have clear motivation for producing that particular fraudulent document given his intended association with them before the incredibly rapid discovery of the fraud.
I urge people to go read the full posts made by those folks since I edited them down to give the gist of their reasoning.
I really do think these thoughts of how deeply NCSE was involved in this bears specific discussion.
I have a sneakin’ suspicion that this fraudulent memo was created for the sole reason to provide NCSE a target, and their new golden boy, Gleick, probably by Gleick himself.
Copner: I offer an alternate scenario:
1) Gleick scores the HI docs in obsessive scheming rage over dispute with Taylor.
2) Realizes the docs are boring. HI’s entire AGW budget would not cover NWF or Sierra Club’s typical caterer’s bill much less cover either of their respective lobbying shops. And not even one evil chortle in the whole batch.
3) Now worries about being caught. For nothing.
4) Solves problem by inventing fake fictitious intern persona who stole the docs, wrote and planted the fake. Fake will be attention grabbing. Will force HI to disclose all if they want to refute it. They are hosed either way. He chortles at his own cleverness.
5) Gets drunk. Uses mucho crystal meth to stay awake while driving to Kinko’s in Amarillo TX to complete the fake and send the docs to Dan rather. OR (more likely 5a) Includes cheapo scan of bogus doc for inclusion and sends to trusted alarmist ally for public release.
6) Realizes no way he can redirect enough funds from Pacific Institute to pay for a hit on Mosher and lucia. Resigns from AGU instead.
7) Asks for asylum at Ed Begley’s house in exchange for composting services until George Soros sets up his legal team.
What about pro-bono? He’s got a pro-bono PR guy.
@AFPhys. I read those posts sometime ago.
Sometime ago, I also have pointed out that NCSE stood to benefit from Gleickgate.
And I pointed out that there is a strange mirroring of the language between NCSE & the fake memo:-
NCSE wants to encourage teachers to teach science [by which they mean CAGW]
The fake memo says Heartland want to discourage teachers from
teaching science.
BUT
While that is all true, then if that was the motivation for Gleick to forge the memo, then it would simply make him a financial fraudster. I think in his own mind, he’s better than that. In his own mind, he is one of the good guys.
That’s why I think it unlikely that he committed the fraud simply to raise funds.
That’s why I posit that the motive was self-preservation.
P.S.
I agree Heartland should subpoena Desmogblog, Greg Laden, NCSE, Pacific Institute. Even if they only sue Gleick.
But I don’t think they can until they file a civil case against somebody involved.
What I think they can probably do is put these guys on notice to preserve the evidence.
In Washington, pro bono services usually mean that (a) it is really a favor to a client or potential client or (b) a third party is paying the bill, perhaps indirectly.
No one has ever mistaken Chris Lehane for Mother Theresa so his generosity in this instance is…surprising.
Expect some rather ugly “pro bono” generated publicity contra Heartland and others.
Mosher should check to see if the guys who pick up his trash are Teamsters.
Does anybody have a realistic idea of the chances of Gleick getting away with it? [assuming of course that the faking-in-his-style-of-writing was done by himself]
Is there a chance that no conclusive evidence will come to light, and he will remain a celebrated hero? Of course, he’ll remain that in some people ‘s eyes anyway, but I have a feeling getting nailed for the fakery – and all the subsequent lying – would be tough for some to swallow.
Is he the kind of rash individual that would throw himself, not under a bus, but off a tall building?
Is it any clearer who Gleick’s 15 are? (assuming “15” isn’t New Math for “3 or 4”)
Greg Laden
DeSmogBlog’s Richard Littlemore
DeSmogBlog’s Brendan Demelle
ThinkProgress.org
Has any other recipient come forward? (I likely omitted some names)
I think he’ll be nailed if Heartland sue him. He’ll settle if he’s wise. Or he’ll lose.
Either way, a lot of greens will say he’s innocent really. Even if he confesses to faking the document, they’ll say Heartland and Big Oil pressured him to confess.
But I bet he’ll be caught because look at the time stamps for the scan, and the email to Dear Friends. Both during work hours. So what are the chances, he did some of the effort from hisoffice, not his home?
Look at the 2 statements from Pacific Institute. First one looks like it could be written by Gleick saying he remains part of the PI team. In fact, the first one even features commas similar to Gleick’s odd comma style.
The second one, a day later, and reading between the lines, it looks like the board turned on him after donors starting calling up the Institute – I believe one donor is already on record as expressing concern.
Copner –
I thought the same thing about the consequences of Heartland suing, but have heard a fair bit from people saying it wouldn’t be in their interests.
AMac – Keith Kloor was one. I first heard of the whole fabrigate farrago over at collide-a-scape..
Heartland may not care think if greens think them liars and scum.
Greens will think them liars and scum, regardless of whether Heartland win any law suits.
On the other hand, normal people, and donors, will be a lot more sympathetic to Heartland, as it becomes more and more apparent that Heartland are the victims.
The only problem with Heartland sitting on their hands, is I don’t know if they can live with the continued claims that the fake is really authentic. If it was me, I couldn’t.
Anteros (Comment #91431),
Yes, for sure there is a chance he will get away with the fake document. Discovery can’t discover things long ago “lost” or destroyed. I would bet there is not more than a 50/50 chance he will ever be formally found culpable wrt the fake document.
.
But I don’t think it matters all that much. Many of those who believe the things Grieck believes will never condemn what he has done. Some will give it lip service and recommend a wrist slap (and a wink). Many will be furious that one of their own could be so stupid as to get caught, but not furious that he did what he did. A few (IMO, very few) will be truly offended by Gleick’s actions because they see that he is an unprincipled individual who has traded honesty for a perceived political advantage.
.
Except for a costly financial settlement with HI (paid for by donors, not Gleick), and being banned from participation on committees discussing ethics, I think it likely he will suffer no terrible consequences. People who do not share his “vision” will mostly believe he faked the document, independent of whether he is found officially culpable. (After all, OJ Simpson got off on the murder rap, but that didn’t keep people from believing he was in fact the killer.) But few who don’t share his “vision” would ever have believed anything Gleick said, even before his fraud(s) were exposed.
Copner,
“The second one, a day later, and reading between the lines, it looks like the board turned on him after donors starting calling up the Institute – I believe one donor is already on record as expressing concern.”
Interesting; I had not read that statement from the board. Reviewing who is on the board: about half or a bit more seem to have backgrounds similar to Gleick’s, and probably hold very similar extreme political views. About half or a bit less have more diverse backgrounds and may not share all of Gleicks extreme views. But the major donors will be the ones who ultimately decide if Gleick goes or stays. My guess: unless he is forced to admit he created the fake, he will receive a reprimand, but stay on.
SteveF –
A sobering analysis, but I agree. I suppose if Heartland had any other information we’d have heard about it by now.
I might have missed it, but has there been an outright public denial from Gleick? [cf “I did not have relations with that document“] No reply to Pielke’s email?
Presumably ‘no comment’ in perpetuity is fairly damning?
SteveF–
Maybe. Or not. As Gleick founded and is president of the institute, it’s likely the directors are all strong backers of Gleick. (We could call them Friends of Gleick or FOG”. )
That said, the institute needs money to achieve its goals. It appears there is an accounting rule that requires a certain amount of funding from small donors to show the tax-favored entity has public support. The large donors may be willing to give an awful lot, but a) there are other institutes and b) other people could lead this one.
Given both (a) and (b), Gleick might actually lose his position even if the current board consist of FOG.
The second statement is notable in that they don’t suspend or fire him based on what he’s already admitted to having done. He is still the President as of the second statement.
I think that’s a very big mistake for them.
And I noticed this line: “Neither the board nor the staff of the Pacific Institute knew of, played any role in, or condones these events.”
They’re only claiming lack of knowledge. They don’t say whether he did the pretexting, or the scanning, or emailing the 15 from the PI offices. They don’t say he did. They don’t say he didn’t.
But we know, some of these activities (scanning & emailing the 15) were conducted during working hours.
Most likely the pretexting would have to be done during working hours too. He’d probably call during office hours to get hold of the admin person at Heartland (although there is the time difference).
Working hours wouldn’t mean he did from the PI offices, but it would be possible.
If you were on the PI board, how confident would you be that he didn’t do any of these activities from the PI offices?
“I think he’ll be nailed if Heartland sue him. He’ll settle if he’s wise.”
Not sure you can “settle” when the feds come knocking asking about wire fraud.
Copner,
Just sent you this comment over on the WUWT ‘BREAKING: Gleick Confesses’ post:
– – – – – – –
Copner,
First I would like to recognize your considerable energy and focus along with Mosher/Lucia & her commenters on the discussion/investigation of the Hoax by Geick. You guys/gals did it well.
As you suggest, I think it seems reasonable to infer that something did happen that caused Gleick to resign from AGU and then eventually do his initial partial confession and non-apology.
Your hypothesis is interesting. I would speculate that the tight communications groups that act in vigilante mode to defend the cause everywhere, against independent (aka skeptic) climate science, would appear to be unusually non-vigilant if they did not have a nexus to Gleick’s evolving hoax activities from early stages. Speculation on my part to be sure, but, to me it seems unusual that those groups (a prime example of the groups being the CSRRT) would not have at least awareness of the ongoing perpetration of the Gleick Hoax from its inception. An anomaly.
John
Feds may or may not prosecute. (They should. Obviously).
I strongly doubt HI would reveal all information they have. They are telling us they are contemplating lawsuits. People contemplating suits are generally counseled to keep information related to the case close to the vest.
Here is why:
Currently, Gleick’s story is vague. The letter came “sometimes early in 2012” which, if it were now 2013 could cover January through March. Gleick didn’t say whether the memo was printed on paper, provided of a DVD or some other media. If we parse finely crossing our eyes, it’s possible to read the confession as not actually saying that the strategy memo in the packet is the original document in the mail. (If it’s not and this goes to court, judges are going to deem Gleick not credible. But that’s another issue.) Gleick represented himself as someone– but we don’t know who. All we know is it was someone other than Gleick. This happened on on some unstated day and solicited documents, which some unnamed person at Heartland sent.
If this goes to court in a civil action, cases are decided by preponderance of the evidence. Based on my extensive viewing of “the people’s court” and “judge mathis” while working out, I think for Gleick to convince people the document is not fake or that he believed it was not fake, in the face of HI saying it’s fake and it’s looking so obviously fake, Gleick will have to firm this story up and the story is going to have to rebut whatever evidence HI brings in. Otherwise, no one will believe he’s telling the whole truth — after all, if he’s telling the truth, the dates, times, envelopes etc. should fit the story.
Now turn to HI: They believe he Gleick lying or at least not telling the whole truth.
They would like Gleick to divulge more information and they do not want to make it easy for him to create a story that matches details they volunteer. So, it is not in their interest to reveal publicly that the outgoing email was sent by “X” with time stamp “0X/XX/2012”. It is not in their interest to reveal the headers, the email address to which thing were sent, or really much of anything. To the extent that they reveal true details that Gleick cannot be sure they have, Gleick has the opportunity to develop a story that matches the facts he knows they can prove in court. Meanwhile, to the extent that Gleick doesn’t know exactly what they have, he can’t tailor future confessions or announcements to what has been revealed.
Whether Gleick faked or not, to the extent that there are things he may not wish to make public, he is in the position that Anthony Weiner was. Weiner was dribbling out stuff that matched known facts. The trouble for Weiner is that it turned out people hadn’t just thrown away images on their cell phones etc.
The current situation in Gleickgate is that both major parties have an incentive to reveal as little as possible.
Copner,
“The second statement is notable in that they don’t suspend or fire him based on what he’s already admitted to having done. He is still the President as of the second statement.”
See Lucia’s FOG explanation #91453. 😉
I am not sure if where he committed his fraud will make so much difference, unless it leads to significant legal liability for the Institute (which it may). Tax exempt charitable organizations that become involved in fraudulent activities tend not to do so well.
Lucia,
Yes probably most really are FOGs. But a couple look to be directly tied to outside funding agencies, which is I suspect pretty common.
John Witman,
Oddly, I think Gleick may have been acting mostly alone until he sent the “Dear Friends (15 of you)” email. The vigilant might have wished to know. But their wishes would be irrelevant unless Gleick told someone something. If we accept Gleick’s account that he got that memo in the mail, I think most people who received that letter in the mail would have told someone–but maybe Gleick is the sort who would not. Also, if he faked the memo Feb. 13, I see no reason to believe he wasn’t just acting entirely on his own.
NCSE capitalizing on the Gleick affair?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/ezra-klein/post/will-your-kid-be-taught-that-climate-change-is-a-hoax/2012/02/22/gIQAp6fFVR_blog.html?tid=pm_business_pop
> The current situation in Gleickgate is that both major parties have an incentive to reveal as little as possible.
Agreed.
I don’t know whether Gleick will be able to keep his mouth shut for all those coming months. It doesn’t seem to fit with his past behavior. He’ll surely be tempted to revel in being a hero to some, or attacking stories that paint him as a villain.
Any communications he had with Desmogblog or Greg Laden are not privileged but discoverable.
And if he is going to continue to work at Pacific Institute, there are bound to be internal questions there. Again discoverable.
Copner (Comment #91457)
“Feds may or may not prosecute. (They should. Obviously).”
.
Barack Obama is POTUS and Eric Holder is AG, and every district assistant AG works at Holder’s (and Obama’s) pleasure. Gleick lives in Oakland California, where the State prosecutors are unlikely to hold HI in high regard, and are likely to adore Gleick. I will go way out on a limb with a prediction: Nobody is going to prosecute Gleick on criminal charges.
I don’t believe the system is that corrupt or that politicized. We’ll see.
Copner,
“And if he is going to continue to work at Pacific Institute, there are bound to be internal questions there. Again discoverable.”
Sure, but lawyers are going to tell everyone at PI to not communicate with each other at all and especially not create internal documents about pending legal issues involving the organization. Already seen it happen. Say a word, and you could be fired.
The lawyers will say it now, from now on. But there was a nearly a week between a memo revealing the PI President was #1 on the denialist’s enemies list, and him admitting involvement in the affair.
You don’t think this was a topic for rampant discussion within the PI in the interval? It’s not like the other PI staff are uninterested in the climate change debate. So there might already be stuff floating around there.
And at least at the beginning, Gleick must have thought he’d get away with it – why do it otherwise? So he wouldn’t have wanted to attract suspicion to himself by immediately bringing a bunch of lawyers into PI.
Heartland’s main office is in Chicago, Illinois:
http://www.ilga.gov/legislation/ilcs/fulltext.asp?DocName=072000050K17-24
I don’t know if electronic documents are “property”.
Chicago is in Cook County. Anita Alvarez is the states attorney. She’s a Democrat. I don’t know much else about her but I could see where this case might not propel itself to the top of her to-do list. Most people in Cook County aren’t going to care on way or the other.
If Heartland’s offices were in DuPage county, Gleick would probably be toast. But they aren’t.
Copner (and others)- Glad that you at least saw and considered the comments made regarding motive and NCSE stuff. I understand that it is rather thin gruel, but I have to point out that such a scenario satisfies more than simply money concerns. That satisfies the whole MICE ( http://www.redstate.com/moe_lane/2012/02/22/more-on-the-peter-gleick-fakegate-memo/ ) spectrum of motive, for not only Gleick, but for NCSE.
I surely will not assert that I believe NCSE and Gleick colluded on this, but I do believe that dismissing such a scenario without having something other than “I don’t believe it” is premature. The time lines sure seem to fit, and there is in addition lurking in that intersection of NCSE&Gleick a possible reason for the faked memo being “rushed” as you have so astutely pointed out.
Again – I have to get out of here again but I will return later on. I sure wish I had time to take part in the writing analysis challenge/experiment going on at WUWT – perhaps tonight or the next couple days…
Copner,
“I don’t believe the system is that corrupt or that politicized. We’ll see.”
I don’t think the system is that corrupt, but I do think prosecutors tend to ignore small offenses, especially when the case is less that absolutely certain in its outcome and there might be politically disadvantageous results.
Hhhmmmm… Reading. You can never be sure where someone receives a transmission. Some one could received a pick up their email from their phone while sitting on the train commuting in from Lake or DuPage Counties.
– – – – – –
lucia,
Sadly, I am not a Witman where ‘wit ‘ is defined as clever/smart, as in witty. But I am a Whitman where ‘whit’ is defined as the smallest amount or the smallest imaginable degree or amount.
: (
As to my speculation versus yours, Gleick’s personality strikes me as being prone to clique consensus participation and not as a lone wadi kind of independent intellect. He had bad guidance in his perpetration of the hoax by my speculation, but I think guidance none-the-less.
John
I suspect that if Heartland was in NYCity, this would be prosecuted despite the Democrats owning the whole machine. Like Copner, though, I am not so cynical as to believe that the Illinois AG office would lightly dismiss a request for prosecution brought by Heartland.
Gasp.
http://ncse.com/climate-change/leading-climate-change-expert-joins-ncse-board
“Climate change is the fundamental environmental challenge of our time,” says Gleick. “And how we educate our citizens—and especially our children—about climate change will have repercussions for generations to come.”
Climate change isn’t just a science issue, says Gleick. It’s a socio-political-economic issue. “I would roll climate change into every relevant class, from physics and biology to economics and political science. We’re irreversibly committed to climate change, and we’d better understand how it works and what we can do slow and diminish the now unavoidable impacts.”
Copner,
“Climate change isn’t just a science issue, says Gleick. It’s a socio-political-economic issue. “I would roll climate change into every relevant class, from physics and biology to economics and political science.”
Yikes. I think I’m gonna vomit. I’m outta here.
Copner (Comment #91463)
> NCSE capitalizing on the Gleick affair?
Humorously, (perhaps), the link you gave to the WaPo’s Will your kid be taught that climate change is a hoax? goes to a piece authored by Brad Plumer on “Ezra Klein’s Wonkblog.”
Ezra Klein being the brains behind JournoList, the behind-the-scenes procedure that for a number of years helped guide mainstream media journalists as they jointly developed the correct narrative, and then stuck with it in their reporting and commentary.
Not that anything like that would have anything to do with this story.
I’ve just seen over at CA the email exchange between Heartland and Gleick about the offer for him to debate.
Maybe I’m suspicious [or suspect..] but the first thing that went through my head is that’s exactly what I’d do (ie invite Gleick in friendly terms which he still couldn’t accept) if I was going to sting him by sending him a fake ‘insider’ doc’ in his own style.
Too much imagining probably..
Copner (Comment #91470)
And at least at the beginning, Gleick must have thought he’d get away with it – why do it otherwise?
Like most ‘true believers’ in any cause he probably viewed the ‘venal sins’ of the other side as ‘mortal sins’. Even if he got caught the whole world would have been so overwhelmed by how ‘evil’ and ‘nefarious’ Heartland was that no one would notice his ‘minor’ indiscretion.
He resigned fairly quickly from the AGU ethics committee as that would be a problem…but other then that I’m sure he expected the major media to view the story like the DeSmog blog people did.
> sting him by sending him a fake ‘insider’ doc’ in his own style. Too much imagining probably..
How would they know his response to the sting would be to pretext some documents? He did that all of his own volition without any prompting.
Watts and SteveM have the emails passed between HI and Gleick before the criminal deception. Those emails contain the signature at the bottom
“CONFIDENTIALITY: This e-mail (including any attachments) may contain confidential, proprietary and privileged information, and unauthorized disclosure or use is prohibited. If you received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender and delete this e-mail from your system.”
All my work emails have a very similar wording, written by out lawyers.
Are these confidentiality notices enforceable?
DocMartyn
“Are these confidentiality notices enforceable?”
Probably not. It does however look from the clinical site below that if a recepient causes harm by disclosing what’s in the e-mail, she/he could still be held liable—not necessarily by the sender, but by a victimized third party.
The clinical legal perspective is that even if you receive an e-mail by mistake, shouting to the world “Hey, look at this, Joe Schmoe is seeing a shrink!” may not be a good idea, especially if you were warned that it was confidential.
http://www.out-law.com/page-5536
http://clinicallawyer.com/2007/07/those-confidentiality-disclaimers-at-the-end-of-your-email%E2%80%A6%E2%80%A6/
On the other hand, if you received information that was already being widely circulated, I suspect it would be hard to show that it was truly meant to be confidential.
I don’t think Pacific Institute’s worried about Gleick suing them, be it for defamation, or for disclosing some of the evidence they have on him.
Meanwhile Desmogblog has now turned on PI’s lawyers:
http://desmogblog.com/heartland-s-law-firm-carbon-matters
Incredible find over at WUWT, possibly – on thread http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/22/an-online-and-open-excercise-in-stylometrytextometry-crowdsourcing-the-gleick-climate-strategy-memo-authorship/ –
DukeC at 9:31 suggested that the stray marks in the upper left hand of the fake memo are significant – essentially that something on the paper was blanked out before scanning to PDF. http://img813.imageshack.us/img813/5586/startdocpg2.jpg
A “kim2000”, claims to be and very much behaves as a young female, suggested at 11:12 that it appears possible that it may have been the letterhead used by the Pacific Institute… pacinst.org/reports/success_stories/new_ag_water_success_stories.pdf
I am still working my way through followup comments, but thus far nobody has hammered major holes in the speculation.
I didn’t notice the link had been truncated early enough to simply edit my post… the comparison document is http://pacinst.org/reports/success_stories/new_ag_water_success_stories.pdf
In the rest of that thread there were raised eyebrows about the possibility of a PI base, but the most anyone seems to be able to say is that it sure wasn’t HI or Desmogblog’s letterhead. Also, that it would sure fit into the “reuse and recycle” philosophy for a PI denizen to print it out on reused paper.
AFPhys – wow that is interesting.
They do apparently recycle their paper at the Pacific Institute. I’ve been looking at their PDF publications. Quite a few say “printed on 100% recycled paper”. And then mention vegetable-based ink or soy-based ink. e.g. http://www.pacinst.org/reports/new_economy_of_water/new_economy_of_water.pdf contains on page 3 “Printed on recycled paper with soy-based ink”
@AFPhys:
It could be remnants from a logo that has a box round it, but the position on the page is completely wrong for it to be a standard Pacific Institute logo..
On the strategy memo, the box (page 2 is clearest, but you can see on page 1 too) is only a few millimeters from the top of the page, and a few more from from the left edge.
But in http://pacinst.org/reports/success_stories/new_ag_water_success_stories.pdf the box is a further from the top and left edges.
Open both PDFs side by side in 2 copies of the Acrobat viewer. Make the windows the same size, and set to the same exact zoom % and this should be obvious.
Oh, agreed agreed, Mr.Copner – there is definitely not perfect registration with that PI document. I really wonder if they use more than one type of block.
The remnants of whatever are sure a heck of a lot more suggestive of PI’s logo than HI, Desmogblog, AllState, NYState, or any of the other letterheads that I have laying around my home… I guess a little more sleuthing for other PI documents may be in order, or other organizations who may have contributed to the hoax.
I just looked at a few dozen megabytes of PI documents and did not see even one other document with that boxed logo. They seem to use a new logo style for every document. Not sure it is on the wrong track, but I didn’t find the right track. It is something to store away in memory if some document appears that might fit those remnants.
I think that I re-found what I was thinking about.
A few months prior to Gleick’s May 2010 letter, emails among NAS members talked about what later was the Empire Strikes Back phase of Climategate, though it seemed comic at the time:
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/mar/05/scientists-plot-to-hit-back-at-critics/
http://www.nature.com/news/2010/100309/full/464149a.html
Ehrlich and Schneider wrote some of the emails; Gleick might well have been a participant as he subsequently led the May 2010 letter from the NAS scientists.
Here’s bottled and sold; the story of peter’s obsession with bottled water.
http://islandpress.org/bookstore/detailsfad4.html?prod_id=1858
Ok, but the book has all the idiocin… um, peculiarities of style washed out by editors, you say.
Yes, but there’s a link to Gleick’s facebook page promoting the book. Plenty of weird crap going on there.
http://www.facebook.com/BottledandSold?v=wall&ref=ts
Don’t forget my name.
I am foia.
Oh One other thing.
From RPJ’s blog, Peter Gleick fires back.
http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2010/05/peter-gleick-fires-back.html
that covers the same May 2010 letter from the NAS scientists.
http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2011/04/peter-gleick-responds.html
Nice long response by PG flooded with Gleickism
If art “doesn’t matter”, why include it in the first place.
(Note my clever use of punctuation to aviod asking a rhetorical question.)
Andrew
Copner, your analysis is excellent.
With regard to the press releases from the Pacific Institute and the status of PG’s employment: If there has ever been a ‘strategy memo’ released to a ‘subset’ of the Pacific Institute’s board of directors, that subset of directors would now be in a heart rending ethical situation…
Speculating on if PG might have been the writer of the disputed “Strategy Memo”, it makes me curious what the board packages for the BOD meetings of the PI have included, and what any ‘memos’ looked like. Doubt we’ll ever know…