Monday, June 23, 2008
Another government official proposes to criminalize speech
Another government official, tired of his ideas losing in the marketplace, proposes to criminalize the speech of his political opponents:
James Hansen [who heads Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studies], one of the world's leading climate scientists, will today call for the chief executives of large fossil fuel companies to be put on trial for high crimes against humanity and nature, accusing them of actively spreading doubt about global warming in the same way that tobacco companies blurred the links between smoking and cancer.
Hansen will use the symbolically charged 20th anniversary of his groundbreaking speech (pdf) to the US Congress - in which he was among the first to sound the alarm over the reality of global warming - to argue that radical steps need to be taken immediately if the "perfect storm" of irreversible climate change is not to become inevitable.
Speaking before Congress again, he will accuse the chief executive officers of companies such as ExxonMobil and Peabody Energy of being fully aware of the disinformation about climate change they are spreading.
In an interview with the Guardian he said: "When you are in that kind of position, as the CEO of one the primary players who have been putting out misinformation even via organisations that affect what gets into school textbooks, then I think that's a crime."
Officials of the United States government are supposed to uphold the Constitution. It is nothing less than outrageous that a government employee would propose to criminalize speech with which he disagrees. If Hansen's ideas, which enjoy the support of Al Gore, the United Nations, the Democratic Party, virtually every OECD government, and the vast majority of the media and academic establishment, cannot win in the marketplace, perhaps it is because they are not so persuasive as he maintains.
MORE: Anthony Watts, who knows a lot more about climate science than I do: "I suspect he’ll be calling for the jailing of bloggers like myself next. I think Mr. Hansen has lost all sense of reason, and his last shred of credibility."
11 Comments:
By 
Steve M. Galbraith, at
Mon Jun 23, 10:04:00 AM:
"Auto Da Fé, what's an Auto Da Fé?"
"It's what you oughn't to do but you do anyway!"
By 
, at
Mon Jun 23, 10:59:00 AM:
Isn't this also the 30th anniversary of his alarm-sounding "global cooling" speech? You know, before he jumped on the AGW gravy train?
*rolls eyes*
By , at
Mon Jun 23, 11:12:00 AM:
By Ray, at
Mon Jun 23, 11:40:00 AM:
Fire him. Irrespective of his science, his behavior is unacceptable in an employee of the United States government.
By Purple Avenger, at
Mon Jun 23, 04:07:00 PM:
People who complain this loudly are hiding something.
By Mystery Meat, at
Mon Jun 23, 04:15:00 PM:
NASA employees are forbidden from public commentary of this kind. Hansen reminds me of Canadian moonbat David Suzuki, who's degree is in zoology, yet he is another climate expert who wants global warming "deniers" put in jail.
By , at
Mon Jun 23, 06:20:00 PM:
It would seem that a law that criminalizes speech that “puts out misinformation” would have to have a clause excluding members of congress.
By Jim VAT, at
Mon Jun 23, 08:34:00 PM:
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
David Roberts of Grist.org proposed Nuremberg-style trials almost two years ago.
Liberal fascists. My post on the subject.
http://vitalaccuratethinking.blogspot.com/2006/10/anti-global-warming-nuremburg-trial.html
By , at
Mon Jun 23, 10:22:00 PM:
and I laughed when they told me that if Bush was reelected those who questioned the government's version of the truth would be thrown in jail
By , at
Tue Jun 24, 02:38:00 AM:
Hansen is the guy who has been altering NASA's historical temperature figures to show more warming over the past several decades.
His intemperate outburst is in line with his honesty.
JC
By davod, at
Tue Jun 24, 04:22:00 AM:
Hansen, because of his premptive cry that his was being gagged by the adminatration, is almost untouchable.
