Fighting Back - The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars - page 169

scientists and academics signed a petition demanding that Cuccinelli withdraw his CID, noting that
“The request is unfounded and could undermine the effectiveness of not only climate scientists but
also thousands of other Virginia researchers.” 89 Shortly thereafter, on May 27, the University of
Virginia filed papers in court challenging Cuccinelli's CID. Its statement of justification 90 was both
compelling and eloquent, invoking the name of the university's founder, Thomas Jefferson
(incidentally, one of the first to collect climate observations in America 91 ). It stressed Jeffersonian
principles of the “illimitable freedom of the human mind” and the “tradition of limited government
framed by enumerated powers, which Jefferson ardently believed was necessary for a civil society to
endure,” and suggested that Cuccinelli's actions “threaten these bedrock principles.”
In fall 2010, as Republicans vied to take back majority control of the U.S. House of
Representatives, there were renewed threats. Several of the usual suspects, including Darrell Issa and
James Sensenbrenner, promised they would once again pursue inquisitions against climate scientists
were Republicans to regain control of the House. 92 The Washington Post granted me an op-ed in
which I urged my colleagues to “be ready to stand up to the blatant abuse of politicians who seek to
mislead and distract the public.” 93 Other voices soon answered the call. Sherwood Boehlert in a
subsequent Washington Post op-ed implored his “fellow Republicans to open their minds,”
explaining, “I can understand arguments over proposed policy approaches … what I find
incomprehensible is the dogged determination by some to discredit distinguished scientists and their
findings.” 94 Later that month, 95 a group of scientists announced a Climate Change Rapid Response
Team to combat climate change misinformation and disinformation, through a network of more than a
hundred experts who would respond quickly to questions from journalists. 96 Similar efforts by other
scientific groups were soon underway. 97
Following the election, congressional deniers seemed surprisingly reticent to follow through
with their campaign threats, despite having seized control of the House of Representatives. They
collectively backed away from holding hostile show trials, diverting their attention instead to related
issues, such as the supposed job losses that would arise from the EPA's endangerment finding. 98 I like
to think that their hesitance was a result of the degree of mobilization demonstrated by the scientific
community in recent months, and the worry they'd stir up a hornet's nest if they actually pursued
McCarthyist attacks against scientists. But the overriding consideration, I suspect, was that fossil fuel
special interests were actually quite happy with the current status quo. Thanks to an assist from a
lagging economy, environmental matters had been pushed way down in the hierarchy of public
concern. Any meaningful climate legislation had almost certainly been scuttled for the foreseeable
future under partial Republican control of the government. It simply wasn't worth risky
McCarthyesque hearings that held out the distinct threat of backfiring. 99
The years ahead will still present a great challenge for climate scientists—and, indeed, all of us
whose future is threatened by the prospect of powerful vested interests dictating environmental
policy. With key committees of the House now controlled by politicians with close ties to special
interests such as Koch Industries, 100 perhaps for some time to come, attacks against the science of
climate change are certain to continue. 101 While Cuccinelli was dealt a major setback in late August
2010 by a Virginia judge who found that the attorney general had not managed in a forty-page filing
with the court to even explain “the nature of the conduct” supposedly constituting fraud 102 —and
though the Washington Post has called his rationale for continuing “so tenuous as to leave only one