Thomas James (who reads this stuff so you don't have to, though it's entertaining even if you do) has the latest roundup, including a certain NASA scientist who's been in the news recently.

The misquoting of Hansen continues.
The snippet:
Emphasis on extreme scenarios may have been appropriate at one time, when the public and decision-makers were relatively unaware of the global warming issue....Now, however, the need is for demonstrably objective climate forcing scenarios...

The full article is here. (PDF) and the full quote is:
Summary opinion re scenarios. Emphasis on extreme scenarios may have been appropriate at one time, when the public and decision-makers were relatively unaware of the global warming issue, and energy sources such as “synfuels”, shale oil and tar sands were receiving strong consideration. Now, however, the need is for demonstrably objective climate forcing scenarios consistent with what is realistic under current conditions. Scenarios that accurately fit recent and near-future observations have the best chance of bringing all of the important players into the discussion, and they also are what is needed for the purpose of providing policy-makers the most effective and efficient options to stop global warming. IPCC scenarios encompass a great range, especially in the IPCC SRES document (Reference 12b), which includes CO2 growth rates faster and slower than the range of “marker” scenarios that are included in IPCC (2001) and illustrated in our Figure 15. However, IPCC does not specify the likelihood of the scenarios or examine the direction of current real-world growth rates. A realistic “business-as-usual” scenario would have CO2 growth rates in the range 1-1.5%/year, thus on a course comparable to our “2°C” scenario for the next few decades.

What Hansen is talking about is that with business as usual (for the seventies and eighties) and without any mitigation, extreme scenarios were scientifically justified. Now that we have a good and general understanding of the climate sensitivity, and there are genuine efforts to respond to it, the big question is what will the anthropological CO2 contribution be (i.e. how effective will the regulation of greenhouse gases be, and have we hit a hysteresis point in out output).

This is a point that Hansen is consistently taken out of context on.

And the second quote in the article, as pointed out here is also creativily edited.

Hansen discusses global warming trends which happen to be at the extreme low end of the IPCC estimates. Of course, the context for those estimates is with full mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions!

I find your interpretation of his quote less than convincing. It still seems to imply that he's quite at peace with using "extreme scenareos" on the "public and decision makers". But no matter. From reading other sources, it's apparent that Hansen is emulating the moonbaticus apocalypticus in full bloom. Perhaps he's bucking for NASA chief administrator under AlGore.

K: in other words, the quotations were fake but accurate. Nice retreat to unverifiable sources, btw.

Patrick Michaels' American Spectator piece is a hatchet job that is itself internally inconsistent. For starters, Hansen did not write those words in the March 2004 issue of Scientific American. They never appeared in the magazine article itself. They did appear in a supporting paper mentioned in the article.

Second, Michaels proceeds from a relatively innocuous statement "Emphasis on extreme scenarios may have been appropriate at one time..." to the libelous charge that Hanson "admits to having misrepresented the facts in the past." Hansen did NOT admit to misrepresenting anything. In fact, his statement was not about his own research, but was instead about the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC); it was a statement that IPCC was responsible for emphasizing extreme scenarios in the past, and a call for ending this practice and relying upon sound data.

Michaels then undercuts his whole argument by pointing out that Hansen's own estimates have been on the LOW end of the "extreme" IPCC claims. In other words, Hansen has NOT emphasized "extreme scenarios." So Michaels is on the one hand callling Hansen dishonest, and then a few paragraphs later is claiming that he agrees with Hansen.

Finally, it is worth noting that in the print version of the Scientific American article, Hansen actually says that nuclear power is an acceptable solution to reducing greenhouse gasses. He hardly sounds like a leftwing moonbat there.

It's no surprise that TL James linked to such a sloppy article with a title of "Fake but Appropriate." He has a problem with reading comprehension.

why is the whole climate change thing so hard for right-wing people? I mean, the lefties want jobs and thus the industry to grow as well. That is at least the case here where labor unions and all are very averse to all environmental things.

Not being a "right-wing" person, I couldn't say. You'll have to ask them.

why is the whole climate change thing so hard for right-wing people?

I suspect it's because, prima facie, it would be a situation where extensive government interference in the market would be warranted.

"why is the whole climate change thing so hard for right-wing people?"

I think it is because they don't trust environmentalists and environmental issues. Therefore, they have a visceral/emotional reaction to the topic and refuse to believe that it _could_ be true. You can hear this in Rush Limbaugh's dismissal of "environmental wackos." As an end result, a substantial body of scientific work is dismissed without even considering the evidence.

TS: "He has a problem with reading comprehension."

Must be. Elaine Supkis said the same thing last week.

meiza,
Here is a very good reason:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4762720.stm

With a very very few exception anytime any scientist discussing climate change it is presented in such a way that the only solution is a left leaning program of social engineering. The term "watermelon" refers to someone who is 'green' on the outside and 'red' on the inside and I have yet to meet anyone who talks about climate change that isn't a watermelon. If you want those of us on the right (not that I'm on the same 'right' as someone like Pat Buchannan or even Mark Whittington) to take your climate change claims seriously then you should come at it from the point of view of a problem to solve, not a cover for the left to install its favorite anti-capitalist, tax everyone to death, lets-all-dance-in-fields-with-flowers-in-our-hair pastoral hippy utopia.

Or, I could also put it another way but William Gillis said it better:
http://williamgillis..com/2006_03_01_williamgillis_archive.html#114132462123046110

sigh.... silly blog spam rules....

In that last URL I have there stick BLOG SPOTS domain-name after the "williamgillis." bit...