But if that's true, it is a fraud adopted by most of the world's leading scientists, along with NASA, the United Nations, the American Medical Association, and the National Academies of Science of 32 countries including the United States. And to most of them ClimateGate is a sideshow compared to one overwhelming fact:
"The last decade is the warmest decade on record," said Michael Mann.
Taranto also objected to Andrews quoting ClimateGate scandal figure Michael Mann as the unquestioned expert of his piece, as if all his talk of playing "tricks" with the data and squeezing skeptics out of scientific journals doesn’t strain his credibility. Andrews continued:
Mann is the Penn State climate professor who's being lampooned in that video. Mann says "hide the decline" was never an attempt to deceive - it was the use of real global temperatures, to show a real upward trend.
"Those who deny the existence of this problem, who don't have the science on their side have instead engaged in a smear campaign to distract the public and distract policy makers," Mann said.
Taranto explained:
Michael Mann, of course, is the man who developed the "trick" to "hide the decline" in temperatures. To shore up his severely damaged credibility, CBS introduces his quote with a wide-ranging appeal to authority--but its wide range serves only to underscore how preposterous it is. If the American Medical Association is an authority on climate, perhaps the next time Wyatt Andrews needs surgery, he could let a weatherman operate.
