Environmentalism, profit, and crime

Is "green energy" just a scam? Apparently, yes.  The Italian police have uncovered close links between organized crime and the wind and solar energy sector. The Washington Post reports:

In an unfolding plot that is part “The Sopranos,” part “An Inconvenient Truth,” authorities swept across Sicily last month in the latest wave of sting operations revealing years of deep infiltration into the renewable energy sector by Italy’s rapidly modernizing crime families.

The still-emerging links of the mafia to the once-booming wind and solar sector here are raising fresh questions about the use of government subsidies to fuel a shift toward cleaner energies, with critics claiming huge state incentives created excessive profits for companies and a market bubble ripe for fraud. China-based Suntech, the world’s largest solar panel maker, last month said it would need to restate more than two years of financial results because of allegedly fake capital put up to finance new plants in Italy. The discoveries here also follow so-called “eco-corruption” cases in Spain, where a number of companies stand accused of illegally tapping state aid.

How extensive was mafia involvement with "green energy"?

Roughly a third of the island’s 30 wind farms — along with several solar power plants — have been seized by authorities. Officials have frozen more than $2 billion in assets and arrested a dozen alleged crime bosses; corrupt local councilors and mafia-linked entrepreneurs.

Hat tip: Instapundit.

 PREVIOUSLY on "green energy":
•Stimulus bill-funded 'green' disaster
•Wind turbines pose threat to songbirds
•Victims say clean energy is making life "unbearable" and destroying their property values
•Alternative energy meets reality in NYC
•Environmentalists and corporate welfare

It is never too cold for a Climate Crisis Rally

You think that you had a bad day? It could have been worse. You could have been freezing your rear end off at a `global warming' rally like these people on the steps of the Washington State Capitol Building in Olympia, Washington:

The Bellingham Herald reported on the freezing-cold weather which greeted the "Climate Crisis Rally":

Freezing weather with light snow flurries greeted about 200 climate activists gathered on the steps of the state Capitol noon Monday to demand the state Legislature get serious about climate change.

The above photos of the shivering crowd were captured from this video taken at the event.  More about the rally can be found here and here.

Obama is not carbon neutral II

Pres. Obama has his barber, Zariff, flown in from Chicago to D.C. to cut his hair every two weeks.

Remember that the next time that you are asked to sacrifice in the name of "global warming."

(What level of vanity does a person have to have to think he requires a haircut every two weeks?)

PREVIOUSLY on eco-hypocrisy:
•Pres. Obama is not carbon-neutral
•Study: Environmentalists more likely to "cheat" and "steal"
•The UN's global warming advocates vs. their own carbon footprint
•Eco-hypocrite of the day: supermodel Giselle
•The ever-increasing energy use of Al Gore's mansion
•With five private jets, Travolta still lectures on global warming.

Charges against spotted owl scientists may go Federal

In a case that has left environmentalists in shock, two "widely respected" environmental researchers are accused of fraudulent research on spotted owls and currently face state charges. The Times Standard reports that state proceedings have been temporarily postponed as the US Attorney's Office is now considering filing Federal charges. The two scientists specialized in endangered species studies and had been paid $870,00 by the Yurok Tribe using Federal funds for spotted owl research that is now alleged never to have been done. The Times Standard reports:

Mad River Biologists' senior biologist Ron LeValley, 65 [picture at right], and associate biologist Sean McAllister, 45, have pleaded not guilty to charges of embezzlement and conspiracy to commit a crime stemming from their alleged roles in a scheme carried out by former Yurok Tribe Forestry Director Roland Raymond, 49, to defraud the tribe of more than $870,000 over the course of more than one year by billing for surveying work that was never done.
Raymond remains at large, wanted on a $1 million arrest warrant. He was last seen the morning of Feb. 23, hours before law enforcement officials arrived at his home with search and arrest warrants, according to Del Norte County District Attorney Jon Alexander.

The case began as the tribe noticed that equipment was missing.

[Del Norte County District Attorney's Office investigator A.C.] Field said the investigation started in October when the Yurok Tribe came to the Del Norte County District Attorney's Office with information about Raymond. He said the district attorney's office has had the full cooperation of the tribe during the investigation.
”The Yurok Tribe discovered missing items during an inventory search, and it spilled out from there,” Field said. “They couldn't find the equipment (Raymond) supposedly bought.”
Alexander said the alleged embezzlement is related to spotted owl research by Mad River Biologists and other incidents, including charging the tribe for the cost of putting tires on a personal vehicle and paying for new shower doors. He said at least $870,000 of the embezzled funds are specifically related to the spotted owl project. [Emph. added]

The spotted owl has been in the news recently after the Obama administration decided to start killing barred owls in an attempt to favor the spotted owl. Previously, much of the Oregon lumber industry was shut down after the spotted owl was given endangered species status.

Windfarms have been killing endangered species of birds but that seems not to bother environmentalists very much.

This case comes in the wake of "respected" climate scientist Peter Gleick's admission of using identify theft against the Heartland Institute (Gleick still claims not to be the source of the fake document) as well as the investigation of Charles Monnett, the environmental scientist whose questionable work led to the classification of polar bears as "endangered." It makes one wonder how much of "environmental science" is actually real.

Hat tip: Leonard

PREVIOUSLY on the failures of environmental science:
•Whistleblower exposes Obama junk science •Politicized Science, the delta smelt, and California farmers
•EPA uses phony peer review
•Environmentalism inspires more murders •National Academy of Sciences warns EPA on junk science
•The failed science of environmentalism
•Federal Judge rejects Federal enviromental "science" as "arbititrary and capricious"
•2 more examples of politicized science: Gulf oiil spill and California's air regulations
•Bee colony collapse disorder: the cause is whatever your politics say it is
•Ozone hole and politics

How global warmists view the world

For global warming's true believers, truth is optional:

• “The data doesn’t matter. We’re not basing our recommendations on the data. We’re basing them on the climate models.” -Prof. Chris Folland, Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research

• “The models are convenient fictions that provide something very useful.” -Dr David Frame, Climate modeler, Oxford University

•  “It doesn’t matter what is true, it only matters what people believe is true.” -Paul Watson, Co-founder of Greenpeace

•  “Unless we announce disasters no one will listen.” -Sir John Houghton, First chairman of the IPCC

• “No matter if the science of global warming is all phony … climate change provides the greatest opportunity to bring about justice and equality in the world.” -Christine Stewart, former Canadian Minister of the Environment

(These quotes were collected by Prof. S. Fred Singer. Hat tip: Ed Driscoll.)

Whistleblower exposes Obama junk science

Against intense local opposition, the Obama administration wants to demolish three dams on the Klamath River in Siskiyou County, California. Low-cost clean hydroelectricity as well as water for irrigation would be lost if the dams were removed. Removal of the dams would also cause chaos for ranchers, homeowners, and small business who live and work in the downstream of the dams. Despite this, Interior Secretary Ken Salazar has been trying to force dam removal for the supposed benefit of some salmon and steelhead spawning habitat.

Now, Prof. Paul R. Houser of George Mason University alleges that the administration's plan is all based on junk science. In his role as science advisor to the Bureau of Reclamation, he was closely involved in the project. He has filed a formal complaint (PDF) alleging "intentional falsification" and "intentional . . . compromise of scientific and scholarly integrity." In particular, he says that, under orders from Ken Salazar, the department produced a "summary" report that "intentionally distorts and generally presents a biased view of the Klamath River dam removal benefits." In particular, he alleges:

• The summary section on Chinook Salmon recovery projects an 81.4 percent recovery, but says nothing about the nine contingencies summarized in the June 13, 2011, Klamath River Expert Panel Final Report: Scientific Assessment of Two Dam Removal Alternatives on Chinook Salmon report that could completely negate this projected recovery . . . .
• The summary states that "Coho salmon reclaim 68 miles of habitat", but says nothing about the April 25, 2011 statement in the Klamath River Expert Panel Final Report: Scientific Assessment of Two Dam Removal Alternatives on Coho Salmon and Steelhead that "the difference between the Proposed Action and Current Conditions is expected to be small, especially in the short term (0-10 years after dam removal)." . . . .
• The summary states that dam removal will likely reduce salmon disease, but does not properly state its uncertainty [which is] very high".
• The summary also spins an optimistic outlook for Steelhead trout, providing access to 420 miles of historical habitat. However, the April 25, 2011 Klamath River Expert Panel Final Report: Scientific Assessment of Two Dam Removal Alternatives on Coho Salmon and Steelhead states that this success would be dependent on effective implementation of the proposed and related actions [e.g.Total Maximum Daily Load (TMDL)]; whereas ineffective implementation would result in no detectable response.

The changes, Prof. Houser alleges, report only the positive while distorting or falsifying the science.

You can read more about Prof. Houser's extensive qualifications here. Congress has not yet approved Salazar's plan. With luck, they will block it entirely.

UPDATE: Over a month, later, the MSM is catching up: the Daily Caller has a story on this scandal here.

Hat tip: Leonard

WELCOME to readers of Michael Savage, GatewayPundit, QuiteNormal, TalkStraight, TunnelWall, ImpeachObamaToday, DaleyGator, Tea Party for California, Cornwall Alliance, Armstrong, TheTownCrier, Support Rural America, The Persistent Patriots, and DorkFishExpress.

PREVIOUSLY on politicized science:
•Politicized Science, the delta smelt, and California farmers
•EPA uses phony peer review
•National Academy of Sciences warns EPA on junk science
•The failed science of environmentalism
•Federal Judge rejects Federal enviromental "science" as "arbititrary and capricious"
•The politicization of medical research funding
•2 more examples of politicized science: Gulf oiil spill and California's air regulations
•AIDS advocates distorted science
•Politicized science of crime statistics
•Politicization of medical science
•Bee colony collapse disorder: the cause is whatever your politics say it is
•Ozone hole and politics

Environmentalism vs. Anti-semitism

The Jerusalem Post reports that Israel is offering to connect 22 Palestinian villages to its sewage pipe and water treatment system.   Currently, their sewage flows into the aquifer and surface streams.  All but one of the villages refused.  Israel had hoped "that donor countries would agree to only
continue giving the villages financial support if they agree to connect to the
sewage pipeline" but they won't help either.  Apparently, anti-semitism is a much stronger force than environmentalism.

More here.

Pres. Obama is not carbon-neutral

Much attention has been given to Pres. Obama's traveling to a "clean energy" event yesterday in gas-guzzling motorcade. This is, of course, not new. Below is my video of Obama's motorcade going to the San Francisco Airport after an October-2009 fund-raiser in the City. Can you count all the vehicles?:

The kicker is that newspapers reported the next day that Obama spent the night in the City. This motorcade, with all its carbon emissions, was just practice.

P.S. Did you include in your vehicle count that there are multiple police vehicles blocking traffic at every cross-street along the path of the motorcade?

4.5 Billion to die this year, or maybe not

In 2007, The Canadian, which bills itself as a "socially progressive and cross-cultural national newspaper," warned of a possible global warming disaster to occur by 2012:Since the world population in 2007 was only 6.6 billion, the claim that 4.5 billion of us would die by 2012 is non-trivial.

In science, hypotheses ("theories") are tested against experiment. Hypotheses which fail to agree with experiment are to be discarded.

Newspaper reporters operate by a different standard: if something is scary and attention grabbing, then it should be printed before anyone has a chance to refute it. In John Stokes case, he has been promoted to National Co-Managing Editor at The Canadian.

Hat tip: WattsUpWithThat.

PREVIOUSLY on global warming:
•More ethics problems among Global Warming "scientists"
•Global warmists propose mass killing of animals
•Democrat: Global Warming will destroy Washington DC by the year 2000
•Earth Day: environmentalism and the test of science
•The collapse of the UN IPCC's credibility
•Yet another UN IPCC Glacier-gate scandal
•UN IPCC claims of melting Himalayan glaciers exposed as fraud
•Environmentalists at war with environmentalists over green energy
•EPA's new global warming rules, illustrated
•California global warming rules backfire
• France's carbon tax ruled unconstitutional
•UN IPCC responds to Climategate with wild accusations
•Surprise: EU's carbon trading riddled with fraud
•Global warming and the test of science, III
•Global warming and the test of science, II
•Global warming and the test of science, I
•141 scientists wrote letter to UN challenging global warming hysteria.
•Ma'am Sen. Boxer for and against climate whistleblowers.
•BBC propaganda on global warming
•Climate alarmist Phil Jones to step down pending review
•Why Penn State's investigation of its global warmist will go nowhere
•Former boss calls James Hansen call an embarrassment to NASA
•NASA's global warming scientists caught hyping false data
•The resemblance of global warming true-believers to Islamists
•James Hansen "muzzled" by Bush White House?

How to use environmental regulations to stifle competition

A real estate developer shows how the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) can be used against competitors, as the LA Times reports:

To halt a competing project near USC, Conquest Student Housing turned to a legal weapon that one of its co-owners allegedly compared to a crude bomb: cheap and destructive.

Conquest owned 17 buildings that rented to USC students. When the developer Urban Partners proposed erecting a new complex to house 1,600 students, Conquest sued under California's landmark environmental law.

It then filed similar challenges to unrelated Urban Partners projects elsewhere in the state.

That last step was apparently one too many:

Conquest withdrew its challenges only after Urban Partners filed a federal racketeering lawsuit.

For a developer, the ultimate solution to environmental regulations, of course, is to have supported the right politicians. Politicians, no matter how liberal, are happy to give you a free pass:

In September, Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law to allow a football stadium proposed for downtown Los Angeles to avoid drawn-out CEQA litigation. He signed a second bill that would allow an unspecified number of other major projects to gain the same treatment.

If environmental regulations are good, shouldn't they apply even to politically-favored projects? Apparently not. That seems to support Urban Partners contention that environmental lawsuits really are just racketeering.

San Franciscans protest against the United Nations

There are those who idolize the United Nations as mankind's last best hope. Among other things, they see the United Nations as working to protect the world's environment. The affects of this work are starting to appear locally in the form of "green power" (i.e. expensive and unreliable power), and UN-advocated (via ICLEI) zoning regulations that strip home owners of rights to their private property. Today, a crowd, concerned largely with the "green" agenda, gathered in UN plaza in San Francisco, where the UN charter was signed in 1945, to protest against the UN:
It was a bi-partisan crowd: this is one of those rare issue cuts across party lines.

If you want to read more about this, see:

http://www.sfagainstagenda21.org/

http://www.democratsagainstunagenda21.com/

and, for the other side:

http://www.iclei.org/

Why today? The UN declared that today is United Nations Day.

Colorado cantaloupes have killed more people this year than US commercial nuclear power in its entire history

The UK Guardian reports:

A listeria outbreak linked to cantaloupes from Colorado has killed 13 people and infected 59 others, US health officials have said. [Emph. added]

The FDA associates the outbreak with Jensen Farms’ Rocky Ford-brand cantaloupes.

How many people have been killed by commercial nuclear power plants in the US? None, as best I can tell. This Wikipedia article lists deaths from nuclear and radiation accidents and none are attributed to US commercial nuclear power in its entire history. (The Wikipedia article does not list Three Mile Island because no one died at Three Mile Island. For more details, the US Nuclear Regulatory Commission's summary of the health effects of Three Mile Island is here.)

Hat tip: Instapundit

The environment: communists vs. capitalists

Liberals often blame pollution on "greedy corporations." So how do communist societies deal with pollution? The New York Times reports on how Chinese Communist Party officials lower pollution:

This capital city’s skies were clogged with pollution, as is often the case, and China’s government was concerned. So it summoned officials of the American Embassy here to a meeting.

But the session had nothing to do with hazy skies. Rather, Chinese officials were peeved that the Americans were monitoring pollution themselves, and posting on Twitter for anyone to read, their more precise findings, which usually judged the smog far worse than official Chinese readings.

Chinese officials feared the conflicting information “might lead to ‘social consequences,’ ” an American Embassy cable quoted the officials as saying. So could the Americans please block Chinese citizens from visiting the Web site?

In sum, the communist solution for pollution: lie about it.

The details my differ but Al Gore uses the same strategy.

Yet another "green" disaster

In July, the National Park Service proudly announced the completion of a solar energy system at Yosemite. From the National Park Service press release:

Yosemite National Park Superintendent Don Neubacher led a ribbon cutting ceremony today, July 27, to dedicate the El Portal Photovoltaic Project. Neubacher was joined by representatives from the offices of Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-CA), Congressman Jeff Denham (R-19th), Mariposa County Supervisor Lee Stetson, contractors, and National Park Service staff. The event dedicated the largest grid-connected photovoltaic system within the National Park Service (NPS).

. . . . The park estimates saving approximately $50,000 per year on electricity purchased off the grid . . . .

. . . . The project was funded through the American Recovery and Reinvestment act and cost $5.8 million. . . .

It costs $5.8 million and only saves $50 thousand per year! Not counting interest costs, that means is pays for itself in 5,800,000/50,000 = 116 years, on the unlikely assumption that it lasts that long. No business would touch such a bad deal. It was paid for with American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (A/K/A Porkulus) funds and various "rebates".

Hat tip: Don Surber and Coach.

National Academy of Sciences warns EPA on junk science

From Inside EPA, as quoted by PJ Tatler, the Environmental Protection Agency gets a scolding:

A key EPA science adviser is warning that the agency must succeed in making its scientific research programs more transparent and sound in order to to bring credibility back to agency science, or EPA will risk increased scrutiny from House Republicans and industry that could prompt a “crisis.”

“You can’t fail this time,” Thomas Burke, associate dean of The Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health who also chaired a recent National Academy of Sciences (NAS) panel on ways to improve EPA risk assessments, told EPA officials and other scientific advisers during a discussion on the agency’s new chemical safety research program June 30.

“The sleeping giant is that EPA science is on the rocks . . . if you fail, you become irrelevant, and that is kind of a crisis,” Burke told a joint meeting of EPA’s Science Advisory Board and EPA’s Board of Scientific Counselors (BOSC) charged with looking at the reorganization of the agency’s research programs.

Hat tip: Instapundit.

PREVIOUSLY on politicized science:
•The failed science of environmentalism
•Federal Judge rejects Federal enviromental "science" as "arbititrary and capricious"
•The politicization of medical research funding
•2 more examples of politicized science: Gulf oiil spill and California's air regulations
•AIDS advocates distorted science
•Politicized science of crime statistics
•Politicization of medical science
•Bee colony collapse disorder: the cause is whatever your politics say it is
•Ozone hole and politics

Democrat: Global Warming will destroy Washington DC by the year 2000

Daniel Patrick Moynihan (1927-2003) was a Harvard Sociology professor, UN Ambassador, US Senator (D-NY), as well as advisor to US Presidents from JFK to Ford. As a Democrat working in the Nixon White House, he wrote a memo on September 17, 1969, declaring that Global Warming would cause disaster by the year 2000 (the full text (PDF) is available from the Nixon Library):

Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has the effect of a pane of glass in a greenhouse. The C02 content is normally in a stable cycle, but recently man has begun to introduce instability through the burning of fossil fuels. At the turn of the century several persons raised the question whether this would change the temperature of the atmosphere. Over the years the hypothesis has been refined, and more evidence has come along to support it. It is now pretty clearly agreed that the C02 content will rise 25% by 2000. This could increase the average temperature near the earth ' s surface by 7 degrees Fahrenheit. This in turn could raise the level of the sea by 10 feet. Goodbye New York. Goodbye Washington, for that matter. We have no data on Seattle. [Emph. added]

While CO2 levels did increase from 1970 to 2000, there has been nothing like a 7 deg. temperature increase, the rise of sea level has not changed from its historical trend, and NY and DC are not underwater. The only thing that is under water is the credibility of predictions made by global warmists.

Earth Day: environmentalism and the test of science

In science, one makes a hypothesis and then tests it against experiment. If the hypothesis fails to agree with experiment, it must be discarded. So, let us consider the predictions (hypotheses) made by environmentalists on Earth Day in 1970 and how they compare with experiment (reality) 41 years later:

“We have about five more years at the outside to do something.”
• Kenneth Watt, ecologist
“Civilization will end within 15 or 30 years unless immediate action is taken against problems facing mankind.”
• George Wald, Harvard Biologist
“We are in an environmental crisis which threatens the survival of this nation, and of the world as a suitable place of human habitation.”
• Barry Commoner, Washington University biologist
“Man must stop pollution and conserve his resources, not merely to enhance existence but to save the race from intolerable deterioration and possible extinction.” • New York Times editorial, the day after the first Earth Day
“Population will inevitably and completely outstrip whatever small increases in food supplies we make. The death rate will increase until at least 100-200 million people per year will be starving to death during the next ten years.”
• Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
“By…[1975] some experts feel that food shortages will have escalated the present level of world hunger and starvation into famines of unbelievable proportions. Other experts, more optimistic, think the ultimate food-population collision will not occur until the decade of the 1980s.”
• Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
“It is already too late to avoid mass starvation.”
• Denis Hayes, chief organizer for Earth Day
“Demographers agree almost unanimously on the following grim timetable: by 1975 widespread famines will begin in India; these will spread by 1990 to include all of India, Pakistan, China and the Near East, Africa. By the year 2000, or conceivably sooner, South and Central America will exist under famine conditions….By the year 2000, thirty years from now, the entire world, with the exception of Western Europe, North America, and Australia, will be in famine.”
• Peter Gunter, professor, North Texas State University
“Scientists have solid experimental and theoretical evidence to support…the following predictions: In a decade, urban dwellers will have to wear gas masks to survive air pollution…by 1985 air pollution will have reduced the amount of sunlight reaching earth by one half….”
• Life Magazine, January 1970
“At the present rate of nitrogen buildup, it’s only a matter of time before light will be filtered out of the atmosphere and none of our land will be usable.”
• Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
“Air pollution…is certainly going to take hundreds of thousands of lives in the next few years alone.”
• Paul Ehrlich, Stanford University biologist
“We are prospecting for the very last of our resources and using up the nonrenewable things many times faster than we are finding new ones.”
• Martin Litton, Sierra Club director
“By the year 2000, if present trends continue, we will be using up crude oil at such a rate…that there won’t be any more crude oil. You’ll drive up to the pump and say, `Fill ‘er up, buddy,’ and he’ll say, `I am very sorry, there isn’t any.’”
• Kenneth Watt, Ecologist
“Dr. S. Dillon Ripley, secretary of the Smithsonian Institute, believes that in 25 years, somewhere between 75 and 80 percent of all the species of living animals will be extinct.”
• Sen. Gaylord Nelson
“The world has been chilling sharply for about twenty years. If present trends continue, the world will be about four degrees colder for the global mean temperature in 1990, but eleven degrees colder in the year 2000. This is about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.”
• Kenneth Watt, Ecologist

Clearly, environmentalism is not a science; it is an emotion.

[This impressive list was prepared by IHateTheMedia as a summary of an article in Reason.]

PREVIOUSLY on politicized science:
•Federal Judge rejects Federal environmental "science" as "arbitrary and capricious"
•The politicization of medical research funding
•2 more examples of politicized science: Gulf oil spill and California's air regulations
•AIDS advocates distorted science
•Politicized science of crime statistics
•Politicization of medical science
•Bee colony collapse disorder: the cause is whatever your politics say it is
•Ozone hole and politics

PREVIOUSLY on global warming:
•The collapse of the UN IPCC's credibility
•Yet another UN IPCC Glacier-gate scandal
•UN IPCC claims of melting Himalayan glaciers exposed as fraud
•Environmentalists at war with environmentalists over green energy
•EPA's new global warming rules, illustrated
•California global warming rules backfire
• France's carbon tax ruled unconstitutional
•UN IPCC responds to Climategate with wild accusations
•Surprise: EU's carbon trading riddled with fraud
•Global warming and the test of science, III
•Global warming and the test of science, II
•Global warming and the test of science, I
•141 scientists wrote letter to UN challenging global warming hysteria.
•Ma'am Sen. Boxer for and against climate whistleblowers.
•BBC propaganda on global warming
•Climate alarmist Phil Jones to step down pending review
•Why Penn State's investigation of its global warmist will go nowhere
•Former boss calls James Hansen call an embarrassment to NASA
•NASA's global warming scientists caught hyping false data
•The resemblance of global warming true-believers to Islamists
•James Hansen "muzzled" by Bush White House?

Federal judge finds Obama administration contemptible

As reported by the Wall Street Journal (Hat tip: MichelleMalkin):

A federal judge Wednesday blasted the Obama administration for "determined disregard" of his order to lift a ban on offshore oil and gas drilling last year, giving fresh ammunition to the oil industry and its allies on Capitol Hill who want the Interior Department to speed approvals of new offshore drilling projects.

The ruling by Judge Martin Feldman of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Louisiana means the Interior Department could have to reimburse Hornbeck Offshore Services LLC, a Louisiana drilling company, for the costs of litigation that the firm brought last year challenging the legality of the drilling moratorium. . . . .

In his ruling, Judge Feldman said Hornbeck was owed the money because the government's conduct amounted to contempt of court. [Emph. added]

Hornbeck may get reimbursed. Too bad, the judge cannot order the Administration to reimburse the whole country for damage done to health care and the economy.

Federal Judge rejects Federal enviromental "science" as "arbitrary and capricious"

The New York Times reports on an important partial victory for California farmers who have been suffering under an artificial government-caused drought for years: The full text of the judge Wanger's decision is here (PDF). In it, he writes:

It cannot be disputed that the law entitles the delta smelt to ESA protection. It is significant that the co-operator of the Projects, DWR [California's Dept. of Water Resources], in its endeavors to protect a substantial part of the State's water supply, opposes as unjustified and based on bad science some of the RPA [Reasonable & Prudent Alternative] Actions. It is equally significant that despite the harm visited on California water users, FWS [Fish & Wildlife Service] has failed to provide lawful explanations for the apparent over- appropriation of project water supplies for species protection. In view of the legislative failure to provide the means to assure an adequate water supply for both the humans and the species dependent on the Delta, the public cannot afford sloppy science and uni-directional prescriptions that ignore California's water needs. [Emph. added]

He continues slicing up various aspects of the environmental regulations. For example, he writes:

Because critical habitat conclusion 3(c) [see p.169 of opinion] explicitly relies upon the flawed analysis regarding the movement of X2 [the mixing point of delta outflow and eastuarine inflow], this conclusion is without support in the record and is arbitrary and capricious. Remand is required.

The environmentalists did win a few rounds. For example, Judge Wanger concluded:

FWS's use of a linear stock-recruit model, although scientifically criticized, was not arbitrary, capricious, or clear error.

Yes, you read that right. The Fish and Wildlife Service is not required to use the best science or even fairly good science. The legal standard is merely that it use "science" which is not "arbitrary and capricious" or a "clear error."

More at Gateway Pundit.

PREVIOUSLY on farmers protesting the government-caused drought:
•Farmers protest in San Jose (Nov. 21, 2009).

PREVIOUSLY on politicized science:
•The politicization of medical research funding
•2 more examples of politicized science: Gulf oiil spill and California's air regulations
•AIDS advocates distorted science
•Politicized science of crime statistics
•Politicization of medical science
•Bee colony collapse disorder: the cause is whatever your politics say it is
•Ozone hole and politics

Public not buying UN IPCC propaganda

Despite decades of propaganda to the contrary, the US public still more likely to believe that the weather is governed by "planetary trends" than by "human activity." Rasmusson reports:

Most U.S. voters continue to be concerned about global warming but still are more inclined to think it's caused by planetary trends rather than human activity.

A new Rasmussen Reports telephone survey of Likely Voters finds that 41% think global warming is caused primarily by human activity, while 47% say long-term planetary trends are to blame. (To see survey question wording, click here.)

REMINDER: Over 30,000 American scientists, including over 9,000 Ph.D.s, have publicly signed this petition skeptical of global warming alarmism.

PREVIOUSLY on the subject of environmentalism:
•A look at the "scientists" at the UN climate conference in Cancun
•The Ignorance of the UN IPCC
•Global warming and the religious left
•Environmentalists more likely to cheat: being a liberal means not having to follow the rules
•The ever-increasing energy use of Al Gore's mansion
•Ethanol subsidies in perspective
•Global warming whitewash: Penn State and the Michael Mann
•Global warming's profiteers
•Penn State to investigate its global warmist Mann, or not
•Climategate: laws were broken
•The collapse of the UN IPCC's credibility
•Yet another UN IPCC Glacier-gate scandal
•UN IPCC claims of melting Himalayan glaciers exposed as fraud