The mainstream is getting into the meat of the CRU hack – Wall Street Journal;

A partial review of the emails shows that in many cases, climate scientists revealed that their own research wasn’t always conclusive. In others, they discussed ways to paper over differences among themselves in order to present a “unified” view on climate change. On at least one occasion, climate scientists were asked to “beef up” conclusions about climate change and extreme weather events because environmental officials in one country were planning a “big public splash.”
The release of the documents has given ammunition to many skeptics of man-made global warming, who for years have argued that the scientific “consensus” was less robust than the official IPCC summaries indicated and that climate researchers systematically ostracized other scientists who presented findings that differed from orthodox views.
Since the hacking, many Web sites catering to climate skeptics have pored over the material and concluded that it shows a concerted effort to distort climate science. Other Web sites catering to climate scientists have dismissed those claims.
The tension between those two camps is apparent in the emails. More recent messages showed climate scientists were increasingly concerned about blog postings and articles on leading skeptical Web sites. Much of the internal discussion over scientific papers centered on how to pre-empt attacks from prominent skeptics, for example.
Fellow scientists who disagreed with orthodox views on climate change were variously referred to as “prats” and “utter prats.” In other exchanges, one climate researcher said he was “very tempted” to “beat the crap out of” a prominent, skeptical U.S. climate scientist.
In several of the emails, climate researchers discussed how to arrange for favorable reviewers for papers they planned to publish in scientific journals. At the same time, climate researchers at times appeared to pressure scientific journals not to publish research by other scientists whose findings they disagreed with.
One email from 1999, titled “CENSORED!!!!!” showed one U.S.-based scientist uncomfortable with such tactics. “As for thinking that it is ‘Better that nothing appear, than something unacceptable to us’ … as though we are the gatekeepers of all that is acceptable in the world of paleoclimatology seems amazingly arrogant. Science moves forward whether we agree with individual articles or not,” the email said.
More recent exchanges centered on requests by independent climate researchers for access to data used by British scientists for some of their papers. The hacked folder is labeled “FOIA,” a reference to the Freedom of Information Act requests made by other scientists for access to raw data used to reach conclusions about global temperatures.
Many of the email exchanges discussed ways to decline such requests for information, on the grounds that the data was confidential or was intellectual property. In other email exchanges related to the FOIA requests, some U.K. researchers asked foreign scientists to delete all emails related to their work for the upcoming IPCC summary. In others, they discussed boycotting scientific journals that require them to make their data public.

Boston Herald;

In an embarrassing blow to the movement to combat global warming, hackers have posted hundreds of e-mails from a world-renowned British institute that show researchers colluding to exaggerate warming and undermine skeptics.

The story is moving from the blogs to mainstream. Don’t be too critical of the delay – I do know that there are Canadian journalists working on this, but it takes time. Anyone who has been sifting through the database will understand why.

The CRU emails are now searchable. Here’s one I stumbled across. (Bolding mine, read from bottom up.)

From: Keith Briffa
To: mann@xxxxxxxxx.xxx
Subject: Re: quick note on TAR
Date: Sun Apr 29 19:53:16 2007
Mike
your words are a real boost to me at the moment. I found myself questioning the whole process and being often frustrated at the formulaic way things had to be done – often wasting time and going down dead ends. I really thank you for taking the time to say these kind words . I tried hard to balance the needs of the science and the IPCC , which were not always the same. I worried that you might think I gave the impression of not supporting you well enough while trying to report on the issues and uncertainties . Much had to be removed and I was particularly unhappy that I could not get the statement into the SPM regarding the AR4 reinforcement of the results and conclusions of the TAR. I tried my best but we were basically railroaded by Susan*. I am happy to pass the mantle on to someone else next time. I feel I have basically produced nothing original or substantive of my own since this whole process started. I am at this moment , having to work on the ENV submission to the forthcoming UK Research Assessment exercise , again instead of actually doing some useful research ! Anyway thanks again Mike…. really appreciated when it comes from you very best wishes
Keith
Keith
At 18:14 29/04/2007, you wrote:
Keith, just a quick note to let you know I’ve had a chance to read over the key bits on last millennium in the final version of the chapter, and I think you did a great job. obviously, this was one of the most (if not the most) contentious areas in the entire report, and you found a way to (in my view) convey the the science accurately, but in a way that I believe will be immune to criticisms of bias or neglect–you dealt w/ all of the controversies, but in a very even-handed and fair way. bravo! I hope you have an opportunity to relax a bit now. looking forward to buying you a beer next time we have an opportunity 🙂
mike
—
Michael E. Mann
Associate Professor
Director, Earth System Science Center (ESSC)
[snip]

(*I believe he’s referring to Susan Solomon here.)
A more detailed examination of a different series of emails pertaining to Briffa’s work is up at Powerline.
Don’t miss this commentary, either – The Death Blow to Climate Science.

Hide the decline!
Mike’s “nature trick”

[T]he Team had a problem: actual reconstructions “diverge” from the instrumental series in the last part of 20th century. For instance, in the original hockey stick (ending 1980) the last 30-40 years of data points slightly downwards. In order to smooth those time series one needs to “pad” the series beyond the end time, and no matter what method one uses, this leads to a smoothed graph pointing downwards in the end whereas the smoothed instrumental series is pointing upwards — a divergence. So Mann’s solution was to use the instrumental record for padding, which changes the smoothed series to point upwards as clearly seen in UC’s figure (violet original, green without “Mike’s Nature trick”).

But read the whole thing.
Examiner.com

As embarrassing as the e-mails are, some of the documents are more embarrassing. They include a five-page PDF document titled The Rules of the Game, that appears to be a primer for propagating the AGW message to the average subject/resident of the United Kingdom. The document suggests that it is a precis of a longer document housed at the Web site of the UK Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs.

More. The Sound Of Mature Science …

via James M.