'Climate Gate' Development: CEI Files Notice of Intent to Sue NASA

FYI,

"'Climate Gate' Development: CEI Files Notice of Intent to Sue NASA"
The American Spectator
http://spectator.org/blog/2009/11/24/climate-gate-development-cei-f

: Today, on behalf of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, I filed
: three Notices of Intent to File Suit against NASA and its Goddard
: Institute for Space Studies (GISS), for those bodies' refusal - for
: nearly three years - to provide documents requested under the
: Freedom of Information Act.

: The information sought is directly relevant to the exploding
: "ClimateGate" scandal revealing document destruction, coordinated
: efforts in the U.S. and UK to avoid complying with both countries'
: freedom of information laws, and apparent and widespread intent to
: defraud at the highest levels of international climate science
: bodies. Numerous informed commenters had alleged such behavior for
: years, all of which appears to be affirmed by leaked emails,
: computer codes and other data from the Climatic Research Unit of
: the UK's East Anglia University.

: All of that material and that sought for years by CEI go to the
: heart of the scientific claims and campaign underpinning the Kyoto
: Protocol, its planned successor treaty, "cap-and-trade" legislation
: and the EPA's threatened regulatory campaign to impose similar
: measures through the back door.

: CEI sought the following documents, among others, NASA's failure to
: provide which within thirty days will prompt CEI to file suit in
: U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia:

: - internal discussions about NASA's quiet correction of its false
: historical U.S. temperature records after two Canadian researchers
: discovered a key statistical error, specifically discussion about
: whether and why to correct certain records, how to do so, the
: impact or wisdom or potential (or real) fallout therefrom or
: reaction to doing so (requested August 2007);

: - internal discussions relating to the emails sent to James Hansen
: and/or Reto A. Ruedy from Canadian statistician Steve McIntyre
: calling their attention to the errors in NASA/GISS online
: temperature data (August 2007);

: - those relating to the content, importance or propriety of
: workday-hour posts or entries by GISS/NASA employee Gavin A.
: Schmidt on the weblog or "blog" RealClimate, which is owned by the
: advocacy Environmental Media Services and was started as an effort
: to defend the debunked "Hockey Stick" that is so central to the CRU
: files. RealClimate.org is implicated in the leaked files, expressly
: offered as a tool to be used "in any way you think would be
: helpful" to a certain advocacy campaign, including an assertion of
: Schmidt's active involvement in, e.g., delaying and/or screening
: out unhelpful input by "skeptics" attempting to comment on claims
: made on the website.

: This and the related political activism engaged in are inappropriate
: behavior for a taxpayer-funded employee, particularly on taxpayer
: time. These documents were requested in January 2007 and NASA/GISS
: have refused to date to comply with their legal obligation to
: produce responsive documents.

Mark Reiff