Anthony Watts has just come across the tale of the senior EPA official who pulled a giant scam. Probably because he's now coming up for sentencing so it's in the news again. The official pretended to work for the CIA and instead just took months off work. He also made huge claims of travel expenses.
It's another example of the sort of thing that happens sometimes in government agencies and, more commonly, in the private sector (but most of those aren't made public for obvious reasons). There was a case in Queensland a couple of years ago of a man who defrauded the government of millions while working at the health department.
It's 'the cause' wot done it! sez Anthony
What Anthony sees, though, is another climate conspiracy. (Archived here.) It's not of course. It's a case of fraud and deception quite unrelated to climate science. But anything to get his denialati riled up. Anthony writes:
This is stunning, yet not surprising. We know people get caught up in “the cause”, and that there are massive egos involved in some of the more visible climate advocates that lead them to irrational excesses of word and deed, but this one takes the cake.
Anthony is trying to say that he committed the fraud because climate advocates have big egos! That's a stretch. But he goes further and twists the meaning of a quote from Patrick Sullivan, an Assistant Inspector General at EPA:
And of course, here’s the “anything for the cause” blindness that allowed it all to happen:
Sullivan said he doubted Beale’s fraud could occur at any federal agency other than the EPA. “There’s a certain culture here at the EPA where the mission is the most important thing,” he said. “They don’t think like criminal investigators. They tend to be very trusting and accepting.”
Translation: he’s doing good work for “the cause”, so there’s no need to look further.Trust a conspiracy theorist to come up with a spin like that. And there's more. Anthony goes the whole hog into full blown conspiracy ideation, writing:
While this is a massive fraud of salary and benefits, one has to wonder what sort of fraud this man may have perpetrated in his role as a climate official. ...In this EPA document, they don’t seem to be looking into any of those things, only his travel abuse. I think they have “team blinders” on since I haven’t found anything where they look into the quality of his climate work.
Aha! Climate science is a hoax because a government employee defrauded the government of funds. Anthony has handed his science deniers a new conspiracy theory.
Anthony doesn't let it rest even there. He decides the entire government is rife with corruption and reckons he's living in a third world country now.
The culture of corruption in Washington will be the death of the republic if it isn’t reigned in soon. Already our government feels like that of a third world country.
America the brave is no more. I wonder if Anthony Watts is thinking of moving to a developed nation? And which one? (Maybe one where the cost of a five day conference will be less than $415 and won't break his piggy bank.)
From the WUWT comments
No-one else seems to be buying Anthony's climate conspiracy. There aren't too many comments yet, so I guess there's still time. But this could be a case of WUWT deniers being jaded. So many conspiracies to choose from and this one of Anthony's doesn't carry as much excitement or flair as the terribly secret (and outrageously public) Agenda 21 and New World Order and Lizard Men.
I'll see his lone EPA employee and raise him ENRON.
ReplyDeleteThen Qwest, Lehman Bros, Fannie Mae, Madoff etc etc plus all the banks involved in the Libor scandal, plus all the other scams in the private sector that are swept under the rug so as not to damage the reputation or share price.
ReplyDeleteI wonder how many of them could be put down to acceptance of climate science.