While most deniers are pretty easy to peg as fossil-funded scientists-turned-celebs, Georgia Tech's Judith Curry started as a legitimate scientist. Over the past year or so, though, she has descended from the outskirts to the heart of Denierville.
For a more complete tracing of Curry's trajectory, Sou at HotWhopper deviates from her usual focus on science to recount Curry's sad story. It's an interesting piece, showing how Curry walked the line between legitimate scientist and denier for years before finally embracing her status as a frequent GOP witness, prized for her scientific credentials and willingness to provide stock denier answers. Among other common talking points, Curry has remarked on the faux pause, supported temperature record conspiracies and relied upon the Big Tobacco strategy of citing scientific uncertainty to stave off regulation.
The most current example of Curry's willingness to serve as a flack for deniers is a recent Fox News op-ed, where Curry sides with witch hunter Lamar Smith (R-TX) against the scientists of NOAA. She says this is totally different from Rep. Grijalva's efforts to suss out fossil fuel funding from deniers (of which Curry was one), because government labs have "different responsibilities" than university researchers. According to Curry, Grijalva's inquiries about denier funding (a proven problem) were "a politically motivated fishing expedition," but when Smith subpoenaed NOAA for data as well as personal correspondence, this was just, "concern about the quality of a specific data set."
Except that the data set is already public, anyone can test its accuracy, and Smith is also demanding access to NOAA scientists' private correspondence. But we shouldn't be surprised. As HotWhopper points out, Curry's latest step is not unexpected, given what a long strange trip it’s been.
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