{"id":11690,"date":"2021-03-23T13:32:38","date_gmt":"2021-03-23T20:32:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/?p=11690"},"modified":"2025-06-15T18:46:41","modified_gmt":"2025-06-16T01:46:41","slug":"al-im-on-first-name-basis-with-him","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/?p=11690","title":{"rendered":"&#8220;<i>Al &#8212; I&#8217;m on first name basis with him<\/i>\u201d"},"content":{"rendered":"<p style=\"padding-left: 40px;\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Oreskes-1st-name.jpg\" width=\"383\" height=\"305\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Regarding Naomi Oreskes&#8217; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.google.com\/search?&amp;q=%22Erik+Conway+Merchants%22\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">&#8220;Merchants of Doubt&#8221; co-author<\/a> also being on a similar first-name, or any-name basis with Gore \u2026.. <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=hd4Udhnha2A&amp;t=3210s\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">not so much<\/a>, it seems.<\/p>\n<p>I pointed to Oreskes&#8217; <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Oreskes-1st-name-colleagues.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">little name-drop<\/a> in only fleeting fashion in <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/?p=10283\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">my June 17, 2020 blog post<\/a>. Time now to explore it further as yet another example of a widespread problem with the entire &#8216;crooked skeptic climate scientists&#8217; accusation: pull on even the smallest of loose threads in that accusation, and the fabric of the overall accusation starts to unravel in multiple directions instead of cinch together more tightly.<!--more--><\/p>\n<p>Just askin&#8217; \u2014 why is she on a first-name basis with Al Gore?<\/p>\n<p>In all my efforts to sift through Oreskes&#8217; explanations of why she&#8217;s involved in the global warming issue in any capacity, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.myclimatejourney.co\/episodes\/naomi-oreskes\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">her March 2020 podcast interview<\/a> is the only one I&#8217;ve found so far that mentions anything about how her <a href=\"http:\/\/science.sciencemag.org\/content\/306\/5702\/1686.full\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">December 2004 <em>Science<\/em> magazine paper<\/a> (which supposedly proved there was a 100% science-based consensus about the certainty of global warming being primarily driven by human activity) got included in Al Gore&#8217;s &#8220;An Inconvenient Truth&#8221; movie. But as she implies in <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Oreskes-Gore-1st-name-1024x842.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">her podcast remark<\/a>, that inclusion back around 2006 didn&#8217;t earn her the privilege she has right now.<\/p>\n<p>What did?<\/p>\n<p>Keep in mind that Gore&#8217;s 2006 movie is a case study example of how the whole issue boils down to the three talking points of &#8220;<em>settled science<\/em>&#8221; \/ &#8220;<em>industry-corrupted skeptic climate scientists<\/em>&#8221; \/ &#8220;<em>we all may ignore those skeptics because of points 1 &amp; 2<\/em>. The first hour and twelve minutes was about the settled science, then Gore prominently showed Oreskes&#8217; 928-to-0 consensus notion <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/05\/Gore-Oreskes-928-0.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">in a can&#8217;t-miss manner<\/a>, after which he <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/AnIncTr-Oreskes-928-0v2.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">segued just seconds later<\/a> into spelling out the <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/?p=7477\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">worthless<\/a> &#8216;leaked memo&#8217; phrase &#8220;<span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">reposition global warming as theory rather than fact<\/span>&#8221; while comparing it in equally <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/AnIncTr-Reposti-Doubt2.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">can&#8217;t-miss fashion<\/a> to a leaked memo from the tobacco industry. On screen, but barely seen, Orestes&#8217;s science paper is only credited as the partly visible words &#8220;Science, Dece .. Vol. 306, Issue..&#8221; Gore&#8217;s movie companion book <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/07\/AnIncTr263-Reposit-Gelb2.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">credits Ross Gelbspan<\/a> in a big &#8211; and <a href=\"https:\/\/www.pulitzer.org\/search\/Gelbspan\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">hugely incorrect<\/a> &#8211; way for the &#8220;reposition global warming&#8221; phrase. Is Gelbspan on a bigger first-name basis for that?<\/p>\n<p>Oreskes didn&#8217;t bring up the &#8220;reposition global warming&#8221; memo set in any prominent way after 2004 until <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/11\/Oreskes-PPT-strat-target2.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">she featured it<\/a> in her oft-cited 2008 PowerPoint presentation (full presentation online <a href=\"https:\/\/www.slideserve.com\/liam\/text-has-been-made-available-online-by-the-scientist-naomi\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">here<\/a>), where she falsely attributed it to the Western Fuels Association (WFA) &#8220;Information Council for the Environment&#8221; (ICE) public relations pilot project campaign. Her most famous publication, the <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/MoD5-25-10.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">May 25, 2010-published<\/a> &#8220;Merchants of Doubt&#8221; book she co-authored with Erik Conway, never even mentions the ICE campaign, its Index <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/MofDwaib.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">has a &#8220;Western Aerosol Information Bureau&#8221; reference<\/a> but lists no &#8220;Western Fuels Association,&#8221; and the one place where WFA actually <strong><em>is<\/em><\/strong> mentioned, it&#8217;s in association to skeptic climate scientists Dr Patrick Michaels <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/MofDwfa.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">and Dr S Fred Singer<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Why didn&#8217;t Oreskes use the &#8220;reposition global warming&#8221; memo set in &#8220;Merchants of Doubt&#8221;? Did the book publisher reject it?<\/p>\n<p>She was perhaps perturbed enough about this &#8211; whatever the reason for the exclusion was &#8211; that she <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Oreskes-AAAS-reposit2-BadFacts.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">specifically brought it up in an Australian television appearance<\/a> a month before &#8220;Merchants of Doubt&#8221; was published, with a particular cryptic reference to the, well \u2026<strong><em>non-<\/em><\/strong>WFA strategy goal:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The number one point of this strategy was to <strong>reposition global warming as theory, not fact.<\/strong> That is to say, it&#8217;s just a theory, it&#8217;s just an idea, we don&#8217;t really know for sure if it&#8217;s true.<\/p>\n<p>So step one was to cast doubt on the fact of global warming, and then step two actually was construct it as a <span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">bad fact<\/span>\u2026<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;<em>Bad fact<\/em>\u201d?? What a weird way of putting it. But when examiners look deeper into this, the question arises on whether she was alluding to the <strong><em>entire book chapter<\/em><\/strong> that she was contributing at that time to the <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/How-well-facts-2010.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">soon-to-be-published<\/a> anthology book titled &#8220;How Well do <span style=\"color: #ff0000;\">Facts<\/span> Travel?&#8221; in which her contributed chapter about the WFA and the &#8220;reposition global warming&#8221; memo set was titled &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/09\/My-Facts-Chap-5-Oreskes.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">My <strong>facts<\/strong> are better than your facts<\/a>.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p>The question about her wording there just one small loose thread in that situation. There&#8217;s far more when you pull on that one. Not only did she mention (falsely) in her &#8216;Better Facts&#8217; chapter that the &#8220;reposition global warming&#8221; memo set was attributed to the WFA, she <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/MyFacts-reposit-AMS.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">said the set<\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2019\/02\/OreskesFacts-ICE-ads-Socci-1024x799.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">other WFA documents<\/a> were available in the archives of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) (they were <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/AMS-archivist2.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><strong><em>never there<\/em><\/strong><\/a>) and further that a man named Anthony Socci <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/02\/Oreskes-Socci-AMS-1024x858.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">had alerted her<\/a> to that WFA documents collection.<\/p>\n<p>Socci, a <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/Socci-hearing-92.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">1990s-era Senate staffer<\/a> who had <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/WashExam-Socci-Gore.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">prominent association with Al Gore<\/a>. Why would Socci know of this WFA document collection at AMS, and if it really was <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Soccis-personal-WFA-docs.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">only a personal copy set<\/a>, did he himself get it directly from Al Gore? Beyond that, what possible reason would Socci have to alert Oreskes to this &#8216;nonexistent&#8217; \/ &#8216;personal document file&#8217; at AMS, and when did he do this? Oreskes&#8217; Bibliography line for &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Socci-2000-footnote-1024x642.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Socci 2000<\/a>&#8221; (referring to those WFA newspaper ads) doesn&#8217;t answer anything, it only opens up more questions about why there is a reference to Ross Gelbspan&#8217;s &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20100710062041\/http:\/\/www.heatisonline.org\/contentserver\/objecthandlers\/index.cfm?ID=4461&amp;Method=Full&amp;PageCall=&amp;Title=The%20Coal%20Industry%27s%20%22ICE%22%20Campaign%20(1999)\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Coal Industry&#8217;s &#8220;ICE&#8221; Campaign<\/a>,&#8221; and what the significance of Socci&#8217;s &#8220;E-mail to self&#8221; bit is.<\/p>\n<p><img src=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/MyFacts-Socci-2000-HiO-1024x570.jpg\" \/><\/p>\n<p>Why would anybody email a note to themselves about Ross Gelbspan&#8217;s false diatribe about the Western Fuels Association?<\/p>\n<p>I am unable to interview and &#8211; far more importantly &#8211; properly record responses from people ranging from Gelbspan to Oreskes, Socci and Al Gore. Professional <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonexaminer.com\/author\/ron-arnold\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">article writer<\/a> \/ <a href=\"https:\/\/www.amazon.com\/Ron-Arnold\/e\/B001JRZU76\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">researcher<\/a> Ron Arnold, using tips I supplied, directly interviewed more participants of that ICE campaign than I had access to for his examination of this <a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20160603141454\/http:\/\/leftexposed.org\/2016\/06\/naomi-oreskes-warps-history\/\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">&#8216;Naomi Oreskes \/ Anthony Socci&#8217; mess<\/a>. Additional professional investigators like Ron Arnold are desperately needed in order to get all the way to the bottom of this. Since Oreskes&#8217; &#8216;Better Facts&#8217; chapter is cited in global warming lawsuits such as <em>Delaware v BP, et al.<\/em> as evidence <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Delaware-Oreskes-Better-Facts.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">just one page away<\/a> from those ICE newspaper ads that <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Socci-Chicken-ads.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">she connected to Socci<\/a>, the teams at the law firms defending energy companies might also want to pull as hard as they can on these loose threads.<\/p>\n<p>The questions about Socci \/ Oreskes \/ Gore don&#8217;t end there.<\/p>\n<p>It could be arguably said that Oreskes put her credibility on the line by describing what is tantamount to a <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/OreskesSciMag928toZip.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">100% consensus of science papers favoring<\/a> the notion of man-caused global warming. The late Dr S Fred Singer had a viewpoint that decidedly undercut that notion on no uncertain terms in a language the general public could easily understand. He <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/02\/Singer-show-of-hands-Sept-04.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">stated that before<\/a> Oreskes consensus paper came out, and again later in <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Singer-PBSFrontline-science-vote.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">a 2000 PBS Nova \/ Frontline program<\/a>, while also being <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/ABC-established-consensus.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">essentially ridiculed for it<\/a> at another news outlet, and also at a particular website in \u2026. <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Desmog-consensus-smear.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">guess what utterly predictable way<\/a>?<\/p>\n<p>Naomi Oreskes probably didn&#8217;t like Dr Singer very much if he could derail all that she said about consensus opinion validating science conclusions. Is she on a first-name basis with Al Gore because of their shared fear of Dr Singer?<\/p>\n<p>After all, Dr Singer <a href=\"https:\/\/web.archive.org\/web\/20040306091915\/https:\/\/www.hoover.org\/publications\/books\/fulltext\/polscience\/283.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">described in quite some detail<\/a> how Al Gore, <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2021\/03\/Lancaster-Socci-v-Singer.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">apparently with assistance<\/a> from Justin Lancaster (<a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/?p=2450\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\"><em>that<\/em><\/a> Justin &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Lancaster-3.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">contradicts Gelbspan<\/a>&#8221; Lancaster) and Anthony Socci, tried to intimidate him into silence over the news of Gore&#8217;s influential college science professor recanting his viewpoints on man-caused global warming. That effort <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/01\/Singer-Hoover-setttlement.jpg\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">ultimately fell apart<\/a> not long after another of Gore&#8217;s very prominent <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/?p=6997\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">efforts to suppress Dr Singer backfired<\/a> in an <a href=\"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=HM9SNjRXIxs&amp;t=1739\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">acutely embarrassing way<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>There doesn&#8217;t seem to be any graceful exit for Oreskes out of her appearance of having a rough time keeping her personal narratives straight. If Al Gore is put under oath in one of the <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/?page_id=18\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">current 20+ global warming lawsuits<\/a>, will he be able to offer a straightforward explanation of why she claims to be on a first-name basis with him, or will that narrative crumble apart, too?<\/p>\n<p>Just askin&#8217;.<\/p>\n<p>Naomi &#8220;<a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/GelbspanFiles\/status\/1366523984842420226\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">loose threads<\/a>&#8221; Oreskes \u2014 just sayin&#8217;. Imagine if someone with far more influence and prominence than me starts pulling on all those threads and unravels who&#8217;s apparently behind the nearly 30 year smear of skeptic climate scientists.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Regarding Naomi Oreskes&#8217; &#8220;Merchants of Doubt&#8221; co-author also being on a similar first-name, or any-name basis with Gore \u2026.. not so much, it seems. I pointed to Oreskes&#8217; little name-drop in only fleeting fashion in my June 17, 2020 blog &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/?p=11690\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[166,157],"tags":[107,117,4],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11690"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=11690"}],"version-history":[{"count":30,"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11690\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18663,"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/11690\/revisions\/18663"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=11690"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=11690"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/gelbspanfiles.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=11690"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}