There were 12 of us skeptics among 12,000 believers at the Bali UNFCCC in 2007. We were a rag-tag team of passionate people, some of whom had PhDs, and most of whom were not paid to be there. We came because we were angry about the way science was being exploited.
It was a convention on a scale I had not seen before. Not just 2,000 for a weekend, which would be big, but 12,000 for two entire weeks, which was an extravaganza.
12,000 people for an two entire weeks was an extravaganza.
The UNFCCC meetings define the term “junket”. These mass climate conventions happen every year in locations like Nairobi (Kenya), Poznan (Poland), Montreal (Canada), Buenos Aires (Argentina), and Milan in Italy. Copenhagen is COP 15, meaning there have been 14 before it. (And at two weeks each, that’s over six months of non-stop PR and “staff incentives”.) Is there any larger yearly congregation in the world?
From the outset the UNFCCC did everything it could to maintain the appearance that it is a fair, transparent, and scientific based organization. Yet on the ground, it did everything it could to make sure that there would be no dissent, no debate, and no free speech unless it was their official line.
The UN are not trying to promote humanities search for knowledge, instead they exploit climate science as a tool to increase their own power. Once again the western media let down the public. The UN got away with being anti-science, and anti-free-speech. The tactics and incidents described below seem minor, but it’s indicative of a deeper systematic censorship what we’ve seen in their assessment reports. Only the light of the media would keep the UN on it’s leash, and the western media are out to lunch.
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| We helped put scientific information in front of delegates (until the UN discovered us and evicted us). |
The UN’s five ways to look “legit” but act like a dictator
1. Filter out skeptical bookings
When booking the event, Greg Balle described the process: all interested parties were told there was a set period (of about two weeks or so) to book rooms and halls for presentations. But suddenly, after a mere 24 hours, it was announced that all the venues were fully booked. You could describe this as poor planning on the part of the UN for underestimating the demand for rooms, but given the way they behaved for the rest of the event, it was par for the course. It’s a good tactic to use if you want to officially allow anyone to book but unofficially filter out anyone who is not on say, your “friends” email-list. You can let select people know that the bookings will close in hours, or possibly allow them to pre-book months in advance.
2. Ban journalists who might ask hard questions
A group of reporters from “Environment and Climate News” were refused press credentials to attend. The UN press office coordinator Carrie Assheuer said the newspaper’s representatives “do not meet the criteria for press accreditation.”
Environment & Climate News has been in continual publication for 10 years; is sent to more than 75,000 elected officials, opinion leaders, and environmental professionals in the United States; and is one of five newspapers published the by 23-year-old Heartland Institute. James M. Taylor, managing editor of Environment & Climate News, stated, “Ms. Assheuer’s decision is stunningly totalitarian.
3. Offer them a room they can’t use
We were allowed to use a tiny meeting room in the secondary venue, that could fit around 20 people. We attracted around 20 to the first event, including some of the press. Word of that success made it to the management, and part way through the second event, which had attracted a larger crowd, the UN secretariat sent an official to shut it down. The excuse? Apparently that room was only for our members to use, not for anyone else. I replied that we could make all the guests members, effective immediately… Lord Monckton announced that press releases would be going out to let the world know that scientists were being suppressed. The UN officials came up with new bureaucratic rules, then rescinded the use of the room entirely.
4. Allow them to “protest” then retract permission
Although Greenpeace was allowed to have a two-story high icon permanently placed outside the front of the venue, and “Women for Nuclear Disarmament” were allowed to protest, (even though no one could understand why it was relevant) we had to apply to hold a banner on the street outside the main venue. Permission was granted, but then retracted (sound familiar?). Apparently with Al Gore arriving that day, there were “security issues”. We ignored the retraction. We’d hand-painted an 8 meter banner, and other groups were protesting freely even though we’d been told there would now be absolutely no protests on Al-Gore-Thursday.
We were stopped by the armed guards doing bag searches at the perimeter because we were armed with a dangerous banner. They confiscated the banner– but only after reading it. It contained the incendiary words: “No Kyoto 2. New science drives out old fears”. So the IPCC thinks Greenpeace has a scientific message, but eight people armed with 17 degrees (including 3 doctorates) and a tame banner was too much? After pleas we got the banner back, took it away and then had to smuggle it with eight lab coats past the same armed guards. Thanks to Dr David Evans distracting the security staff with gifts of free copies of The Great Global Warming Swindle DVD and his calm poker-face, we were waved through the second time with smiles. The guards seemed delighted with their presents.
Mobbed by non western media
The protest was a huge success. Within minutes we were surrounded by media and multiple interviews ran simultaneously and non-stop for thirty minutes. Barbara Black, a big wig at the UN secretariat, appeared very quickly. But her obvious fury was contained quickly as the camera’s panned. Journalists from everywhere except the “first” world, leaped at the chance to get a different view point.
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| Vincent Gray was 85, but passionate |
One of the ironies of this grassroots protest was that the skeptical protesters included PhDs, and the materials cost around $200. Meanwhile to expose the “oil funded Deniers”, Greenpeace had so much cash to spare they were hiring helicopters. The average age of the Bali protest team was 60. Vincent Gray, an IPCC expert reviewer, was 85 years old in the 30 plus heat, yet he soldiered on enthusiastically. It puts things in perspective, that even when Woodstock raged, he was already in his forties.
5. Offer opponents a lecture theater on the second last day – “forget” to put it in the official program
We pointed out to the secretariat that while they claimed there were no venues for us to speak at, there were empty lecture halls available and surely they would not want to be seen as being afraid of skeptics. They reluctantly granted us use of an empty theatre. We complied on time and to the letter with every requirement for forms and information. But on the day, the main venue ticker announcements included only the words CFACT, and not the title or any information about the event. The UN secretariat were unable to explain why the official information we gave them was not publicly posted as it was for the hundreds of other events throughout the conference. Another odd coincidence.
The skeptic’s best friends are color printers, cameras and YouTube.
Color lazer printers produced about 7000 copies of missing hot spot graphs, recent temperature trends, copies of scientific papers, and lists of eminent professors who are disturbed by the IPCC science. Plenty of jaws dropped when full color science was on display.
To all the skeptics going to Copenhagen, be armed with your cameras and your most assertive self. Taxpayers of the world keep the UN flush with funds, and they have every right to expect that the UN is acting in good conscience. The thing the UN is more afraid of than anything is bad press. After all, what if the public should get wind of how self-serving it is? What if the public understood how the UN is using their hard-earned money to create a crisis in order to trick the public into sending even more funds their way?
What if citizens everywhere revolted and called for an end to this corrupt institution which pours money into inflating fake crises while people are murdered en masse in Rwanda, in Bosnia, Darfur, and Somalia: this joke of an institution which installed Gaddafi as head of its “human rights” commission.
Some 15% of Americans already recognize the UN as the enemy. How rapidly will that grow once the story spreads that the UN will do anything to become a World Government, even if that means silencing honest unpaid professors of science while they endorse fraudulent work from fake pretenders?
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Moments from Bali
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| Dr David Evans helped Al Gore get the science right, by issuing copies of the 35 errors in An Inconvenient Truth before Gores’ speech. | ||
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| Dangerous scientists? | …. | David Archibald at work |
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| Monckton was in top form | …. | … leaving people lost for words |
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| The media fray started to gather | Non western media were keen to ask questions |
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| Grassroots work. | …. | 12 against 12,000 makes for a memorable event |
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Bali was a lot of fun. Back then we were fighting a roadmap.
Copenhagen is something far darker.
Send your elected representatives a note. Let them know this fraud is being exposed, despite the media, and all who support it will be brought down with the scam.