New Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) replies have exposed more misdeeds by Professor Edward Wegman and Yasmin Said at George Mason University (GMU), closely involved with the Kochs, Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli and many others known for attacks on climate science. This post reviews background and attaches FOIA files that unearthed evidence for:
-pervasive mis-use of Federal funds for inappropriate work,
-plagiarism or falsification in documents used to seek grants or credit,
-GMU violations of Federal...
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A few notes
1) There are some font problems introduced somewhere in the path from my PDF through DC and WordPress. DC should be back online fairly soon and hopefully we'll get that fixed.
2) To clarify, I don't *know* of any reviewers who *never* saw the report. At least one reviewer only got 3 days to look at a 91-page report covering many topics, and her comments were mostly ignored. Another had seen an earlier version, asked for another week, got a new version, sent comments back a week later ... but the WR had been finalized the day after he got his copy, so they had no impact.
For sure, at least some (maybe all) of the commenters were mis-used.
Getting quick comments from busy associates at the last minute is nothing like the rigorous review process used in a National Research Council report, where reviewers commit to serious reviews on a clear schedule months in advance. In the corresponding NRC effort, reviewers averaged ~5 pages of single-spaced comments/questions, required to be addressed by the report writers. Reviewers are anonymous, until listed as a group on the final report.
Anyway, the real issue is that Reps. Barton & Whitfield, and Wegman, repeatedly tried to liken the WR to an NRC report with similar process, and give an impression that this was somehow requested by the National Academy of Sciences. It wasn't. Barton and Whitfield rejected an offer or a nomral NRC report as not meeting
Let's Hope the DoJ Screws Wegman et al. to the wall.
Wegman needs to be investigated, if Dr Mashey is correct. And I believe he is. Essentially, it looks like Wegman has been caught red handed copy-pasting.
It would likewise also be nice to see Wegman's proteges face-up to the consequences of apparent plagiarism in their dissertations.
After all if it is plagiarism, why should they benefit from deception when everyone else has work hard to to gain a doctorate?
Somehow there seems to be a most unpleasant smell emanating from the Kochs and their funding of GMU / Mercatus Center and Wegman report.
Someone really needs to do one of those 'spider' diagrams which analyses the links in Dr Mashey's study: like the ones on www.dirtyenergymoney.com which shows the links of corrupt politicians to the oil and coal industry.
Plagiarism or just a difference of opinion on attribution?
Mashey has actually done a service here - albeit 4 years late. To the extent Bradley agrees, again 4 years after the fact, he simply needs to call Wegman with his concerns.
And you just can't let go of the oil industry thing, notwithstanding most of the oil industry is funding all sorts of people and programs associated with the AGW industry!