E-mails stolen from climate scientists show they stonewalled skeptics and discussed hiding data – but the messages don't support claims that the science of global warming was faked, according to an exhaustive review by The Associated Press. The 1,073 e-mails examined by the AP show that scientists harbored private doubts, however slight and fleeting, even as they told the world they were certain about climate change. However, the exchanges don't undercut the vast body of evidence showing the world is warming because of man-made greenhouse gas emissions. The scientists were keenly aware of how their work would be viewed and used, and, just like politicians, went to great pains to shape their message. Sometimes, they sounded more like schoolyard taunts than scientific tenets. The scientists were so convinced by their own science and so driven by a cause "that unless you're with them, you're against them," said Mark Frankel, director of scientific freedom, responsibility and law at the American Association for the Advancement of Science. He also reviewed the communications. Frankel saw "no evidence of falsification or fabrication of data, although concerns could be raised about some instances of very 'generous interpretations." – AP

Dominant Social Theme: The AP is on the case.

Free-Market Analysis: This article really is a hoot. After reading ALL the Climategate emails, the AP has widely disseminated a story (it's really all over the ‘Net) revealing that global warming is taking place even though some of the major scientists analyzing data proving global warming have revealed tremendous biases. As to how AP arrived at its decision, here's the crux explanation as revealed in the article itself:

The AP studied all the e-mails for context, with five reporters reading and rereading them – about 1 million words in total.

So from this we can see that five reporters read every single email before reaching their conclusion. From our perspective, this is a little bit like reading a novel in order to learn how to write one. The mechanics will inevitably prove elusive and the inherent geography will remain submerged. Indeed, it seems that the real problems lie not with the emails but with source code which was disgorged along with the emails. Here's an excerpt from a more dependable analysis found at The American Thinker (a rabidly conservative site that we usually avoid but this article really was good) as follows:

CRU's Source Code: Climategate Uncovered by Marc Sheppard … One can only imagine the angst suffered daily by the co-conspirators, who knew full well that the "Documents" sub-folder of the CRU FOI2009 file contained more than enough probative program source code to unmask CRU's phantom methodology.

In fact, there are hundreds of IDL and FORTRAN source files buried in dozens of subordinate sub-folders. And many do properly analyze and chart maximum latewood density (MXD), the growth parameter commonly utilized by CRU scientists as a temperature proxy, from raw or legitimately normalized data. Ah, but many do so much more.

Skimming through the often spaghetti-like code, the number of programs which subject the data to a mixed-bag of transformative and filtering routines is simply staggering. Granted, many of these "alterations" run from benign smoothing algorithms (e.g. omitting rogue outliers) to moderate infilling mechanisms (e.g. estimating missing station data from that of those closely surrounding). But many others fall into the precarious range between highly questionable (removing MXD data which demonstrate poor correlations with local temperature) to downright fraudulent (replacing MXD data entirely with measured data to reverse a disorderly trend-line). In fact, workarounds for the post-1960 "divergence problem", as described by both RealClimate and Climate Audit, can be found throughout the source code.

So much so that perhaps the most ubiquitous programmer's comment (REM) I ran across warns that the particular module "Uses ‘corrected' MXD – but shouldn't usually plot past 1960 because these will be artificially adjusted to look closer to the real temperatures." (Emphasis ours.)

Now we would like to point out that this article (and others like it) spread quickly around the ‘Net and thus this was public information by around November 25. That's nearly three weeks ago. AP, which just released its report, read a million words but STILL couldn't be bothered to deal with the issue of the source code. And we've read elsewhere that there are additional comments within the purloined code itself commenting on the ludicrousness of the exercise.

Now the AP is not alone in its almost comical refusal to deal with the full gamut of repercussions from Climategate. We analyzed an article last week on how major American television programming had not covered Climategate even once. We imagine of course that these same television stations are bringing American viewers breathless reports from Copenhagen where complaisant political figureheads are arguing over the diminution of cow flatulence.

Can such reporting simply be attributed to ignorance and oversight? Or is there is a power elite – a muscular, generational entity of wealthy families and individuals responsible for what we call dominant social themes – promotions that are disseminated to frighten (mostly Western) citizens with an eye toward gaining additional wealth and power. In the era of the Internet it is especially hard to avoid this conclusion because the evidence is overwhelming if one only chooses to look. The pattern is evident, even though no one (except the Bell) has explained the mechanism in promotional terms. But there are plenty of documented sources – on the Internet of course. Not one or ten, or even a thousand, but tens of thousands, even millions.

One needn't be a "conspiracist" to read blogs, white papers, articles and reports that prove (to anyone inclined to be moderately receptive) that there is a pattern in play. In fact, none of these promotions are based – from what we can tell – on scientific truths but are cobbled together by a variety of speculative and untrustworthy sources. But once the argument is assembled, tremendous support is seemingly arranged.

Indeed, the highest sources in the West, the most prestigious think tanks and academies lend credibility to what is incredible, and their productions are faithfully reported by the most muscular mainstream media. And eventually of course Nobel Prizes are distributed. Curricula begin to be written. From the foundations of the EU, to the mythic underpinnings of Islamofascism, to global warming itself, the average individual is assaulted by this organized, deliberate fear-mongering. And if that's not enough, the Western economic system itself – with its fiat money and central banking – regularly crashes and burns, spreading joblessness and hopelessness at cyclical intervals.

The spectacle in Copenhagen is very obviously an organized one – how could it be otherwise given its political nature. Certainly, the ideology is actually financial and has little or nothing to do with the falsehood of global warming. The AP conclusions are not coincidental within this larger frame or reference. And we have difficulty believing that an absolute news blackout by the major American television stations was somehow coincidental either.

We are not prepared to explain in detail how all this gets done. It is not, in fact incumbent upon us to explain it, merely to observe that there is a wealthy and powerful elite that utilizes sophisticated promotional mechanisms to consolidate increasingly international control and global wealth. We have also noted that in the age of the Internet, these promotions are becoming increasingly difficult to shield from public view. We think, ultimately Climategate may prove illustrative of this.