Rex Murphy: intellectually bankrupt

Rex's latest consists of a two-pronged fallacious attack on the science of global warming and the Copenhagen climate summit. He begins with an insinuation of guilt by association: any political movement that allows Robert Mugabe to participate must itself be morally suspect. Yes, Mugabe is a thug who leads an extremely oppressive regime; but no, that fact that he was allowed to speak at Copenhagen does not impugn the motives of advocates diminishing greenhouse gas emissions. There are a number of different strategies that have been advocated for regimes of this kind: constructive engagement (apartheid era South Africa); international isolation (Libya); and invasion (Iraq). And there are good arguments in favour and against all of them. The organizers of the Copenhagen summit may have made a mistake by advocating a policy of constructive engagement towards the Mugabe regime, but it's certainly a common mistake.

Rex follows this up by repeating the lie vis-a-vis the illegally obtained CRU emails: that they reveal an attempt at subverting the peer review process; that they reveal that primary climate data has been destroyed; that they reveal that the science of climate change has been deeply flawed. But these claims are false -- and the stolen emails show nothing of the kind. No data has been destroyed: all primary climate data is readily available. The peer review process was not subverted: a suggestion was made to the effect that a journal where the peer review process was subverted should be boycotted -- but there is no evidence this suggestion was acted upon. And there is no evidence that the science of global warming was flawed: all the emails show is the gallows humour of a few scientists who were being systematically harassed by shills for (and dupes of) the oil industry.

Repeating the lie is among the most cynical and disreputable strategies for influencing public opinion. Which raises the question: is Rex really dumb enough to believe what he says, or is he simply an intellectually bankrupt corporate shill?