… James Delingpole’s Hate Speech in the UK Telegraph

This is James Delingpole demonstrating his prowess when it comes to understanding and commenting on climate science. Dellingpole is the one on our right:

OK, now that we’ve established Delingpole to be a misinformed misguided intellectual lighweight, let’s look at his latest piece from the UK Telegraph:

Should Michael Mann be given the electric chair for having concocted arguably the most risibly inept, misleading, cherry-picking, worthless and mendacious graph – the Hockey Stick – in the history of junk science?
Should George Monbiot be hanged by the neck for his decade or so’s hysterical promulgation of the great climate change scam and other idiocies too numerous to mention?
Should Tim Flannery be fed to the crocodiles for the role he has played in the fleecing of the Australian taxpayer and the diversion of scarce resources into [bla bla bla]

It ought to go without saying that my answer to all these questions is – *regretful sigh* – no…. it would be counterproductive, ugly, excessive and deeply unsatisfying.

The last thing I would want is for Monbiot, Mann, Flannery, Jones, Hansen and the rest of the Climate rogues’ gallery to be granted the mercy of quick release. Publicly humiliated? Yes please.[bla bla bla] But hanging? Hell no. Hanging is far too good for such ineffable toerags.

… it would be nice to think one day that there would be a Climate Nuremberg. But please note, all you slower trolls beneath the bridge, that when I say Climate Nuremberg I use the phrase metaphorically.

A metaphor, let me explain – I can because I read English at Oxford, dontcha know – is [bla bla bla]

… Our culture deserves better than to have the terms of debate dictated by malign, politically motivated, professional offence-takers….Let’s stop surrendering and start fighting back.

My only response to this (because I have more interesting things to do) is the following. Imagine a call for violence and death and so on such as this coming after, rather then before, some nut bag actually kills a climate scientist? Or, to put it in more realistic terms, imagine an analogous (you know what an analogy is, right?) stream of hate speech about, say, how bad Democrats are (by a Rush Limbaugh type character) just AFTER the Gabby Gifford shooting, or a rant from a frenzied fundy on how great it would be to kill abortion providers just AFTER such a doctor is killed, or a rant from some libertarian yahoo about how teachers and schools all suck and shooting a few would be beneficial just AFTER the Sandy Hook Massacre. Think about this and then go read this man’s hate post.

Delingpole’s rant is manic and over the top. Some are calling for the Telegraph to sack him. I’m not. I’m calling for his editors to sit down and speak with him about therapy options. I do think the calls for his removal are well grounded. I just think it should be plan B and not plan A.

Meanwhile, my friend Joe Romm, author of Language Intelligence: Lessons on persuasion from Jesus, Shakespeare, Lincoln, and Lady Gaga, has a detailed dissection o Delingpole’s post, HERE. Among other things, Romm makes the link between Delingpole’s tactics and those of the nefarious Heartland Institute:

Apparently Delingpole thinks it is perfectly fine to “metaphorically” mark some politicians in cross-hairs. And the response to Palin’s misuse of the “blood libel” metaphor again underscores the fact that metaphors can hurt.

By the way, Delingpole’s whole notion that this is somehow a “liberal war on metaphor” is laughable. Who precisely gets so worked up over the term “denier,” arguing (weakly I believe) that the term inherently must connect one to a Holocaust denier?

What really is a difference between all of Delingpole’s noxious metaphors, including his wish for a “Climate Nuremberg” and the Heartland Institute comparing “Climate Science Believers And Reporters To Mass ‘Murderers And Madmen’

(click on over to Joe’s post to see the traphic he provides to illustrate this point)

Also, check out Delingpole’s main target, Nobel Laureate Professor Michael Mann’s twitter feed for his reaction.

*Note: The quote in the headline is a paraphrase. It’s a rhetorical device I learned in school.

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