Republicans for the Environment: 'Climategate 2' Belongs on the Cutting Room Floor

'Climategate 2' Belongs on the Cutting Room Floor
Republicans for the Environment, November 23, 2011

"Climategate" is back. It was a stinker the first time. The sequel is worse.
 
The peddlers of the climate denial genre have gone back to the tried and untrue. The producers of "Climategate" have fished another lemon out of the schlock well and pounded out a dreary sequel, "Climategate 2," just in time for the climate conference season.
 
"Climategate," an overhyped release from 2009 that had the media world buzzing and audiences confused about the true state of climate science, turned out to be a shoddy piece of brain candy. The plot was based on a false premise, the script was thin, and the character development was both wooden and implausible.
 
Numerous expert reviewers gave "Climategate" and its extravagant claims the big thumbs down. The National Science Foundation, a science committee of the U.K.'s House of Commons, and an independent British panel were among the knowledgeable critics who panned that holiday bomb.
 
"Climategate 2" is more of the same. As we've seen all too often with sequels, there are no fresh departures from the original's contrived story line, that an evil cabal of scientists concocted a climate change hoax to push some unspecified diabolical agenda. The script is a hack job straight out of the pulp fiction world—a cobbled-together mash that is supposed to substantiate the trite spin doctoring, banal cherry picking, and self-serving agendas that climate denial productions keep trotting out like warmed-over meatloaf at the neighborhood greasy spoon.
 
The producers of "Climategate 2" shot themselves in the foot with their timing. Just a few weeks ago, an exhaustive review of global temperature records carried out by physicist Richard Muller, hardly a lackey of climate scientists since he has been critical of their work, confirmed the global warming trend. Many lines of observational evidence—not just computer models, but data gathered in the field—lend considerable weight to the conclusion that the warming trend is real and that it bears a strong human fingerprint.
 
"Climategate 2" offers no compelling reason to call the mountain of evidence into question. Like the first installment in the series, it's an attempt to manufacture drama out of a thin gruel of insipid plot elements. The first production was pathetic. The second is simply a bore. Stuff this turkey with raspberries and go watch something else.
http://www.rep.org/opinions/press_releases/backgrounder11-11-23.html