Bob Ward: This climate email-hacking episode is generating more heat than light | Environment | guardian.co.uk

It is inevitable as we approach the crucial meeting in conference in Copenhagen in December that the sceptics would try some stunt to try to undermine a global agreement on climate change. There is no smoking gun, but just a lot of smoke without fire.

• Bob Ward is Policy and Communications Director at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics and Political Science

Slashdot Politics Story | Climatic Research Unit Hacked, Files Leaked

Reader aretae characterized the emails as revealing "...lots of intrigue, data manipulation, attempting to shut out opposing points of view out of scientific journals. Almost makes you think it's a religion. Anyone surprised?"

Instapundit » CLIMATE RESEARCH DATA UNIT HACKED, embarrassing data leak out

CLIMATE RESEARCH DATA UNIT HACKED, embarrassing data leak out.

UPDATE: Tim Blair: “If true . . . the phrase ‘hide the decline’ may mark something of a turning point.”

Hacked E-Mails Fuel Climate Change Skeptics - Andy Revkin - NYTimes.com

Some skeptics asserted Friday that the correspondence revealed an effort to withhold scientific information. “This is not a smoking gun, this is a mushroom cloud,” said Patrick J. Michaels, a climatologist who has long faulted evidence pointing to human-driven warming and is criticized in the documents.
...
The revelations are bound to inflame the public debate as hundreds of negotiators prepare to hammer out an international climate accord at meetings in Copenhagen next month, and at least one scientist speculated that the timing was not coincidental.

The documents will undoubtedly raise questions about the quality of research on some specific questions and the actions of some scientists. But the evidence pointing to a growing human contribution to global warming is so broad and deep that the hacked material is unlikely to erode the overall argument.