Last week, in response to the hacked emails at East Anglia, Elizabeth May took the time to read every single email.

Providing context and analysis, her report goes a long way, giving us more than just the cherry picked nuggets that skeptics have taken out of context and doggedly been holding on to.

Here, she follows up with a response to the comments on her original posting...

DeSmogBlog comments require response:

I am a neophyte in the blogosphere. The first time something I have written for the Green Party site has been widely picked up was my article on the East Anglia scientists and the stolen emails.  James Hoggan, Kevin Grandia, and Richard Littlemore do a powerful lot of good on “DeSmogBlog” and through James’ and Richard’s new book Climate Cover-Up. 

Posting my CRU email blog on the DeSmogBlog site got it some attention, including in the New York Times. Reading some of the posted comments led me to want to rebut and share that rebuttal with Greens. You may need these points to do your own sand-bagging against the rising tide of skeptic/contrarian propaganda. Here is a sample of the nonsense with my response…

Ms May, with all due respect this is pure nonsence.(sic)

Among the many conservative think tanks faithfully pushing the skeptic message in Washington, D.C., few are as prominent—or, should I say, infamous—as the Heartland Institute. The “independent” research and non-profit group has the dubious distinction of having organized the first major denier-palooza, the “International Conference on Climate Change,” last year. Despite a less than stellar showing, and an even more lukewarm follow-up in March, it’s hoping that the third time will be the charm.

The likes of Senator James Inhofe, Lord Christopher Monckton and Anthony Watts will be descending on the Washington Court Hotel this week to discuss the “widespread dissent to the asserted “consensus” on the causes, consequences, and proper responses to climate change.” Its ostensible purpose will be to “expose Congressional staff and journalists to leading scientists and economists in the nation’s capital” and demonstrate that “global warming is not a crisis and that immediate action to reduce emissions is not necessary”—which it calls the emerging consensus view of (the handful of) scientists outside the IPCC.

The Orange County Register managed to take their complaints about the California Air Resources Board (ARB) doing their job and twist it into a piece denying the realities of climate change and spouting one of the most absurd denier claims; that global warming is benign, even good for us.

The piece starts with an accusation against the ARB of “dictating to private enterprise” by adopting regulations that will force fuel producers to reduce their carbon footprint. The role of the ARB is "to promote and protect public health, welfare and ecological resources through the effective and efficient reduction of air pollutants while recognizing and considering the effects on the economy of the state". Hey OC Register editorial board, protecting the public health and environment from harmful air pollutants is the board’s job description.

It’s sometimes called a mandate.

This is government by administrative decree from unelected ARB board members, administrators and staff, who concocted a fanciful "solution" to so-called global warming, an increasingly disputed phenomenon that hasn't occurred for at least a decade.

You have to love the global warming denial just two paragraphs into this piece. I’m not sure where they are getting their data, but 2008 was tied with 2001 as the eighth warmest year on record using National Climatic Data Center records dating back to 1880.

A new study sponsored by energy-intensive industries claims that the Obama administration's plan to impose a cap-and-trade system to cut U.S. greenhouse gas emissions would result in 1.9 million job losses and cost the average U.S. household $1,400 a year by 2020.

These industry estimates are wildly off the mark, of course.  The Environmental Protection Agency last week concluded that the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade legislation being debated by the House Energy and Commerce Committee would cost the average household just $98 to $140 a year through 2050.

The Coalition for Affordable American Energy, which commissioned the study, was formed in June 2008 by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the National Association of Manufacturers, the National Association of Wholesalers-Distributors, and 73 other industry trade associations. 

The group currently claims more than 180 associations as members, including dozens of local chapters of the Associated Builders and Contractors, Inc. and such noteworthy partners as the International Association of Ice Cream Vendors and the Association for Hose and Accessories Distribution.  (The group has no website of its own, all of its online communications are hosted by the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, which calls itself a "key player" in CAAE.)

Reasonable people can disagree about the particulars of an energy and climate bill.

Some might say that the bulk of renewable investments should go toward wind and others might say solar. Some can insist that money raised from making polluters pay should go toward investments in more renewables and others can insist that such money should go to offset any costs to tax payers.

What is unreasonable is to posit that we should do nothing at all about our reliance on energy from fossil fuels or catastrophic climate change. What is unreasonable is to lie about the effects of proposed solutions. What is unreasonable is to complain about the ideas offered, but offer no alternatives. What is unreasonable is to act as if doing nothing is good for the American people.

So either certain Republicans are unreasonable, playing politics with energy and security, or they don’t care about what’s good for the American people.

Let’s start with the economy.

If you are against clean energy, you are against economic recovery and American jobs. We simply can’t solve the current economic crisis without addressing energy, climate and security. Oil imports cost us as much as $700 billion a year. Add to that $49.1 billion a year spent protecting our interests in the Persian Gulf (not including the costs of the Iraq war or what we spend in South America) and the 830,000 high paying jobs our oil dependence sends abroad.

You have to give it to John Boehner when it comes to looking out for his own interests. That would be $188,700 worth of interests in the form of campaign donations from coal, oil and gas lobbyists in 2008. It seems that to keep that K Street cash cow flowing, he’ll say just about anything.

The Democrats have put out a first draft of a plan that addresses energy security and climate change, The American Clean Energy and Security Act of 2009 (ACES).

The energy component puts efficiency front and center. Efficiency, as in use less energy to get the same return. Efficiency, as in spend less money on energy because things are running more efficiently. Efficiency, as in let’s invest in a more efficient energy grid and more efficient cars instead of shipping money overseas to the tune of $700 billion a year in oil imports.

Efficiency, is good. Efficiency saves consumers and businesses money. Efficiency creates American jobs. According to a report released by American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy, “energy efficiency initiatives that reward consumers and businesses for reducing electricity and gas usage could result in utility bill savings of $168.6 billion.” It could also result in 222,000 permanent, high quality American jobs in construction, manufacturing, and other fields. But John Boehner doesn’t seem to like efficiency. John Boehner would rob Americans of jobs and $168.6 billion. Why? Did I mention the $188,700 he gets from the corner fossil fuel pushers?

And then there’s the renewable energy component of the bill. At a time when coal rates are rising in the U.S. – by 6.9% in Virginia, 45% in Ohio and a whopping 50 – 100% in North Carolina, for example – experts recommend efficiency measures and increasing energy from natural, renewable sources (not nuclear) as the answer. But John Boehner doesn’t want us to move toward renewables, even if they are the answer. He doesn’t want to create American jobs, either – wind and solar are sources not just of clean energy but of good, American jobs. I guess he must have 188,700 reasons for being against that.