By Clare Swinney
We are fed the increasingly threadbare illusion that we have a fair and balanced mainstream media in New Zealand, when we evidently have the contrary. The airing of ‘The Great Global Warming Swindle’ and the debate that followed it on June the 1st on Prime TV, were no exception.
Setting the loathsome tone for what was to follow, Eric Young announced like a lawyer in a court room that: "The Great Global Warming Swindle does not represent the views of Prime or Prime News." He also said that the film contained errors that had to be removed. In contrast, while ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ has been airing on Sky TV, a similar announcement has not been made, even though Sky TV owns Prime TV now. And for those who didn’t know, ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ has been ruled to contain nine errors by a UK High Court judge. Please refer: https://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/education/7037671.stm
As for the documentary itself, what was shown was a watered-down version of this hard-hitting documentary. For instance, the scenes taken from ‘An Inconvenient Truth’ in which Al Gore is on a stage displaying the temperature and CO2 graphs separately, saying: “When there is more carbon dioxide, the temperature gets warmer,” followed by the footage of Professor Ian Clark reporting that when the two graphs are put together, the ice core data shows that as the temperature rises, the level of atmospheric carbon dioxide follows, were deleted. This was perhaps the most important point made in ‘The Great Global Warming Swindle’ and one that the public had a right to see, as it reveals that even the fundamental assumption of global warming theory – that carbon dioxide causes the temperature to rise, is not supported by the evidence.
Likewise, the hour long debate that followed, which was introduced as: "Swindle or Science -Let’s put it to the experts," was clearly massaged in favour of the global warming theory, with three people delivering government-friendly propaganda to only two climate realists.
Furthermore, David Wratt, who works for NIWA and the IPCC, seemed to be being given favour by Eric Young – he was introduced first and appeared to be given more time to talk than the others.
Cindy Baxter, who was introduced as a climate campaigner, said she was "tracking the skeptics" and quickly exposed herself as a propagandist by falsely asserting that skeptics were being paid by big business. As for the third voice for the global warming theory, Professor Martin Manning, he seemed to have been trained in propaganda techniques -techniques that ultimately made him seem disingenuous. Manning, who said he had worked for the IPCC at a number of levels, used the phrase "conspiracy theory" and threw personal insults at radio show host Leighton Smith, calling him "strange" and saying "That is a silly.." in response to valid points Smith made. He also followed a statement he himself made with "Your Honour," as if he thought it would add credibility to his position – and like the charlatan Gore, he tried to pull on peoples’ heart strings by claiming he was worried about the future of the climate for his grandson’s sake. (Al Gore pulled his son into it, didn’t he.)
While David Wratt claimed the documentary had not stood up to scientific scrutiny and Professor Manning deceptively implied that ‘The Great Global Warming Swindle’ set up to destroy (invalid) straw man arguments, Leighton Smith trumped them when he pointed out that a recent petition revealed that over 31,000 scientists, of which over 9,000 had PhDs, did not believe in the theory of man-made global warming. (Refer Petition: https://www.petitionproject.org/ ).
In addition, Willem De Lange spoke well about the reasons he could not believe in global warming theory, while Cindy Baxter revealed her lack of knowledge by stating: "The science is getting beyond me," towards the end of the debate.
All in all, the two climate realists were more convincing and more genuine in their appearance than the three who spoke in favour of the IPCC and global warming theory. Compared to the debate the Australians had after ‘The Great Global Warming Swindle’ aired on ABC last year, this did not seem too bad at all.
See the Australian Debate here Part 1/9
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GeQfD2DNnUQ