When the New York Times first opined on Climategate (December 6, 2009), the paper called it “noise.” On Saturday, the paper had this to say about Polar bear-gate in an editorial entitled “A Polarizing Polar Bear Investigation“:
… Whatever the ultimate verdict on Dr. Monnett, the controversy over his observations is a minor sideshow in the global warming debate. A broad array of evidence suggests that polar bear populations — and the health of the planet — will be threatened by climate change in future decades even if not a single additional polar bear drowns while swimming far from shore.
But given that Climategate’s “noise” helped take down cap-and-trade and, now, the seminal study in polar bear hysteria may be yet another example of alarmist scientific misconduct, perhaps the Times ought to be questioning that “broad array” of “suggestive” evidence rather than simply dismissing Polar bear-gate as a “minor sideshow.”
Jeff – I think you may be referring to Absense of Malice, where after being snookered by Paul Newman (Michael Gallagher), Sally fields tells the reported that is going to break the story, “No, its not true, but its accurate”.
This reminds me of the backpedaling by Dan Rather after Memogate – how he claimed that even though the memos were faked, he still stood by the story. Basically, in a nutshell, that they were “fake, but accurate” (I can’t remember where I heard that phrase.)
Same thing with CRU, and same thing here. “Sure, it was a bogus study intended to reach a predetermined outcome, but polar bears are still endangered by man-made global warming, trust us!”
The Grey Old Lady is ‘all in’ on the AGW hype – after all, hype is their stock in trade.
They have selective amnesia about anything that threatens their Weltanschauung, though.
The fact is that there have been so *many* ‘side shows’ that have discredited the AGW meme that it carries less and less weight each day, as does the NYT.
The NY Crimes is hardly a paper of worth. While a 4.6% unemployment rate was a catastrophy under Bush, a 9.2% rate is healthy under Obama. While a $413b deficit under Bush was a catastrophy, a $1.5t deficit under Obama is healthy. See the pattern?