If you’re in Knoxville tomorrow, stop by the Al Gore protest and lend your support to the right to question climate change.

CFACT and a few grassroots groups have teamed up to have a great event. In the morning from 8-11:30 a.m., they will protest outside of Thompson-Boling Arena to during the commencement event. See the Facebook invitation for more information.

TONIGHT, the filmmakers behind Not Evil, Just Wrong will be in town with a screening of their documentary at the World’s Fair Park Amphitheater. For more details, look at the Facebook invite.

From the CFACT website:

First, on Thursday, May 13th at 7 PM CFACT will host “Climate: The Counter Consensus” at the Tennessee Amphitheater in the World’s Fair Park.   The event will feature Lord Christopher Monckton who last weeked testified before Congress on global warming, Ann and Phelim McElhinney, producers of the documentary ‘Not Evil, Just Wrong’ which debunks Gore’s film “An Incovenient Truth” and others.

I heard Lord Monckton speak at the Tax Day Rally in DC. Don’t miss this opportunity if you’re in the Knoxville area.

Like most bloggers, I get a log of blog pitches. As a communications professional, I regularly reach out to bloggers and have led training sessions on blogger relations. When I get a good pitch, I generally email the person to thank them. Most of the time, they are simply horrible.

Today, I got a pitch that shows what happens when a Google search for certain keywords is done without looking at the context of those keywords. Given my recent comments on climate change, I’m not the best candidate to approach about this. I hope the language barrier was an issue, but Christin uses perfect English in her pitch. Also, generic blog pitches are never the best way to go.

How does a blog have CO2 emission of 8 lbs per year? A blog doesn’t exist outside of cyberspace. There are no physical properties to a blog. I’m all for planting trees. As a conservationist and nature lover, please plant more of them, but do it to simply plant a tree. Don’t approach me about planting a tree to eliminate virtual carbon footprints.

Offline, I’ve gotten a lot of criticism for writing about this Al Gore situation at UT. In the long-run, I fully agree with all of you that this doesn’t matter. As I’ve said numerous times, honorary degrees are publicity stunts. But I’m truly bothered by what UT is doing. Good news! You’ll get a break. I’m going back to  Chattanooga this weekend for a wedding, so I doubt that I’ll have time to write.

When I first heard about this ridiculous decision to politicize UT’s commencement, I instantly thought of the promotional campaign that UT was running my senior year of high school. It’s one of the reasons I originally looked at the University. Despite growing up in Chattanooga, I had never felt a desire to become a Volunteer.

Coming off of the 1998 National Championship, UT ran a campaign that said, The University of Tennessee/2 Nobel Laureates/7 Rhodes Scholars/6 Pulitzer Prizes/10 Astronauts. We also play a little football.” I remember landing at the airport in Nashville after my senior trip to LA in 2000 and seeing the ad. For the first time, I got really excited about college. Since I attended an uber-Baptist high school, every teacher clearly expressed his/her disappointment in me for not choosing a Christian college, and my parents had their own qualms about sending me to such a big school.

There was a poster that accompanied it, but I can’t find a graphic of it. Once upon a time, I had a copy, but it got destroyed in one of my many moves. The poster had the slogan printed on an awesome photo of Neyland Stadium. It captured UT perfectly. Great football (at the time) and athletics combined with strong academics. That poster made me realize that there was more to UT than just Peyton Manning and Jeff Hall. (My best friend and I had  bit of a crush on Jeff Hall in high school.)

What happened to recognizing those people? I realize that not all of them are probably alive. In fact, it’s sad that I don’t really know who any of those people are. The 10 astronauts are a lot cooler than Al Gore, but that’s a personal preference.

This morning, I was greeted by an email alerting me to the fact that the Drudge Report had linked to a Knoxville News Sentinel story on what I’m naming DegreeGate. A KNS poll is overwhelmingly against it.

Now, I know that web polls are hardly scientific, but 96% against the decision should be telling. Then Red State picked up on the story.

Oh UT, why? Why did you willingly walk into another controversy on the heels of the Kiffin scandal? I also appreciate the smug column from KNS telling people like me to, “Get over it.” Well, KNS, I refuse to get over it. I’m outraged at the actions of my alma mater, and I plan on making as much noise about it as possible. I’d also like to explain a thing or two to editor who wrote this paragraph:

Some objectors have pointed specifically to Gore’s involvement in the global-warming debate, suggesting that man-made climate change has been disproven by the “Climategate” e-mails. That’s far from true. Republican Sen. Lamar Alexander is among those who still say climate change must be addressed, and he certainly shouldn’t be disqualified from some future honorary degree. In fact, he would be an excellent choice.

You see Climategate is a big deal. The East Anglia CRU emails and subsequent stories prove that the data that created the infamous “hockey stick” graph is completely flawed. Al Gore used the hockey stick graph in his documentary. The same documentary for which he won an Oscar and a Nobel Prize, and the main reasons that the administration cites in giving him this degree.

Essentially, KNS is defending the decision by the University to award a man who has knowingly spread misleading information and refuses to acknowledge that. That is academic fraud, and it is shameful that my alma mater, a research institution, is willing to be complicit in what could be the biggest scandal of the 21st century.

The Facebook page has 1,100 people less than one week after it was started. Drudge has linked to the story. Red State is covering it. Doesn’t the University realize that it’s only going to get worse the closer we get to graduation? People are only just now learning about it.

Many have argued that Gore deserves this as a public figure. Why do universities award honorary degrees? Essentially, they’re PR stunts and a nice recognition to prominent figures.

However, what happens when the university awards a degree to a controversial and polarizing figure? Well, alumni like me get ticked off and withhold fundraising dollars. The university needs to weigh the opportunity costs of recognizing a political figure or threatening their donation base.

Now, if Vice President Gore would come clean and say that he apologizes for fraudulently using bad data, and that we need to put more open-minded resources towards the climate change debate, I’d be ok with UT’s decision. Until then, I’m going to be an unhappy and very vocal alumna.

In UT’s defense, I just got off the phone with Megan Smith in the Chancellor’s office. She was very nice and reacted the way all PR people are supposed to. I’ve been on her end of the phone before and feel for what she’s either going through or likely to go through. However, UT made a huge mistake here, and it keeps getting worse.

A number of people that I respect have attacked me for making this “political.” It’s not that at all, and I’m offended that friends are trying to silence me. I deeply care about my alma mater, and my blood runs orange. It always will. My four years at UT were amazing, and my education was outstanding. However, as the leader in the climate change debate, Al Gore is suspect when the science ends up being questionable. As I said in my original post, if Climate Gate is remedied or climate change proven, give Al Gore every prize you want.

My main concern is with the University. If Climategate keeps getting worse, Gore’s reputation is going to be incredibly tarnished. Any organization that recognizes him for his work on this issue will look foolish. As a leading research institute, UT has an obligation to only support legitimate and honest research. Why doesn’t UT wait and see how Climategate plays out?

This is not a personal vendetta or a political fight. This is questioning why my alma mater is partnering with a promoter of bad science. Ultimately, my right to freely express my opinion and protest the actions of my alma mater should be respected. Nothing less than that is acceptable.

It’s official. The University of Tennessee will grant an honorary degree to Al Gore.

Per UT’s web site:

Former Vice President and Nobel Peace Prize winner Al Gore will be honored by the University of Tennessee, Knoxville, with only the third honorary degree granted by the campus. The degree was approved by the UT Board of Trustees at their meeting today.

Why UT? Why? There are many other examples of non-controversial Tennesseans who should be honored before Gore. Why is the University willingly walking into the controversy surrounding the former vice president and Climategate? The Trustees really want to honor a man who could possibly be questioned before Congress for promoting inaccurate information?

I’m truly bothered by the fact that this degree comes AFTER Gore endowed a professorship at UT. In my four years at the university from 2000-2004, there was absolutely nothing from the Gore family on campus. It really looks as though the University is trying to cash in on the crisis that Gore manufactured and then capitalized on through ventures like “carbon off-sets.” According to the press release:

Gore’s appreciation and personal interest in the institution of higher education is apparent as he serves as faculty member/visiting professor at various institutions across the country. A UT Knoxville faculty member holds the Nancy Gore Hunger Chair for Excellence in Environmental Studies, endowed by Gore to honor his late sister. Gore also is a distinguished member of the Howard H. Baker Jr. Center for Public Policy’s board of directors and honorary co-chair of the Tennessee 4-H Club Foundation Inc. with UT Extension.

That’s a new endowment. The Center for Public Policy is also a new program at UT that opened up in 2004 or 2005. Until the last five years, the Gore family has had zilch to do with the UT system. I remember it was something of a slap in the face when Gore opted to teach at MTSU shortly after he lost the 2000 election. I was sophomore or junior in Knoxville at the time. The absence of Gore’s involvement at UT sharply contrasts with the long history that Howard Baker has with the University and the legacy of service and commitment that Dolly Parton has shown East Tennessee. Gore’s connection with the UT system is tenuous at best.

I’m ashamed to be a Vol today. UT has a ripe history of stepping into PR disasters with back-to-back embarrassments of presidents, arrests of athletes, and a shifty football coach. Through all the scandals of the UT system, I’ve always cared about my alma mater. Now, it appears that the Board of Trustees are selling out the University to gain PC points and a pile of cash.

Good job, UT. You may win a few points with the far-left and extreme environmentalists, but you proceeded to tick off a lot of alumni.

Upset? Call the University at 865-974-3265 or email Chancellor Jimmy G. Cheek at chancellor@utk.edu or join the Facebook page.

As a University of Tennessee alumna and proud Volunteer, I have never been more disappointed in my University.

The UT Board of Regents wants to award Former Vice President Al Gore an honorary doctorate. They’re voting on it it today. According to the Knoxville News Sentinel:

The proposal was approved by the UT Board of Trustees Academic Affairs and Student Success Committee, but the proposal will go before the full board for final approval this afternoon. Trustees are on the UT Martin campus for their winter board meeting.

As a donor to the UT system, I pledge to NEVER give my alma mater another dime if this happens.

If you are just as outraged as me, call the Chancellor’s office at 865-974-3265. Tell the administration and the Trustees that this is not acceptable. Also join the Facebook Page.

Why does UT want to recognize someone who is currently in the spotlight for pushing questionable science? Regardless of how you feel about Climate Change, should you give such a high honor to someone who is possibly a flake? Al Gore should not be honored by the University. It’s even more sketchy since he endowed the department chair of the degree he would be getting. Can anyone pay to play to get an honorary degree?

Look at the situation.

The now infamous hockey stick graph that he used in an Inconvenient Truth has been debunked.

The IPCC is distancing themselves from Climate Change science.

Senator Inhofe is threatening to haul Gore before the Senate for a hearing on Climate Change.

There are calls for Al Gore to return his Nobel Prize, which is one of the reasons the UT Trustees want to recognize him. Per the KNS article:

Board vice chairman Jim Murphy encouraged trustees not to view the honorary degree as an endorsement of Gore’s advocacy areas or political beliefs but as a way to recognize Gore as an accomplished Tennessean who has received national acclaim. By shying away from awarding honorary degrees to people who are deemed too controversial, “more people would be disqualified from receiving honorary degrees,” Murphy said.

“Not many Tennesseans have received the Nobel Prize – that alone distinguishes Al Gore from many other folks,” Murphy said. “The area of his current advocacy is an area UT and Oak Ridge National Lab have a significant area of expertise, and it’s an area we need to promote that area across the globe. Nothing will do that more than (presenting the honorary degree to Gore).”

This can only bring disgrace and ridicule to the University of Tennessee. Why recognize someone this controversial? The earned media isn’t worth the reputation and potential loss in donation dollars. This is a bad move.

As the Center for a Just Society noted, Al Gore has not been very prominent in answering the recent challenges to Climate Change credibility:

In the face of the embarrassing Climategate scandal and an unprecedented winter season that has for the first time ever delivered measurable snowfall to all 50 states, Al Gore’s absence from the public stage has been conspicuous.  Perhaps he’s taken a page from Punxsutawney Phil’s playbook and is hibernating in hopes of a sunnier forecast come April.

Why is the University doing this now? In a time when corporations and scientists are distancing themselves from climate change research, this only makes UT look foolish and will hurt them in the future. Students at Penn State have protested the actions of Professor Michael Mann. Why does UT want to willingly walk into this controversy?

Also at Instapundit and Post Politics.

Last week during Snowmageddon, I missed posting the awesome igloo that Senator Inhofe and his family built in DC.

As a former constituent of Al Gore and one of the voters that helped protect the country from having that lunatic in the White House, I thoroughly enjoyed Senator Inhofe’s antic.

Climate change hasn’t gotten much coverage here simply because I’m not a scientist. I took a few climatology courses in college, so I’ve followed the issue of global warming closely. However, I’m not qualified to debate the nuances of this issue.

Why am I writing about it tonight then? Because it frightens me that the EPA is about to launch regulations similar to cap-and-trade.

Amidst Climategate and IPCC revelations that keep leaking out and weakening their “claims” that the earth is warming, should a regulatory agency radically change how energy is taxed and used in this country?

According to a Pajamas Media article, Senator Inhofe is once again drawing attention to the questionable science behind the policies regarding climate change. Last week, he gave a floor speech questioning the EPA:

Inhofe’s speech didn’t directly call for any particular action on the part of Congress, but it did point out that the Obama administration has asserted that if a cap and trade bill doesn’t pass, it could achieve similar effects by a simple finding by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) that carbon dioxide is a pollutant — a finding the EPA actually made late last year. However, as Inhofe pointed out in his on-floor remarks, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson had testified to his committee that the CO2 finding was largely based on the IPCC reports.

Today, the New York Times mentioned the EPA in an article on Obama pondering the use of executive orders:

Mr. Obama has already decided to create a bipartisan budget commission under his own authority after Congress refused to do so. His administration has signaled that it plans to use its discretion to soften enforcement of the ban on openly gay men and lesbians serving in the military, even as Congress considers repealing the law. And the Environmental Protection Agency is moving forward with possible regulations on heat-trapping gases blamed for climate change, while a bill to cap such emissions languishes in the Senate.

Is anyone else bothered that a regulatory agency is about to change policies that could impact every single person in this country based on a politicized science?

Climate change is possible. I’m not one of those conservatives who turn a deaf ear towards environmental issues. I’m probably one of the greener conservatives out there.  As a Christian, I believe that it is our duty to take care of the earth and our environment. However, climate change enthusiasts have gone overboard on this issue.

We should not make any drastic changes to any U.S. policy without being 100% sure of the science that drives it. History shows that science of the moment is not always correct, yet anyone that has questioned the science of anthropogenic climate change has been nearly crucified. It’s eerily reminiscent of how the Catholic Church controlled science and persecuted Galileo and Copernicus when they questioned prevailing thought.

Perhaps I went to an old-fashioned high school, but I was taught that the scientific method questions every hypothesis until all other possible conclusions are ruled out. There are endless hypotheses that have not gotten much press or consideration in policy debates. Senator Inhofe is absolutely correct in questioning regulations and bills regarding climate change.

In light of the revelations of the East Anglia CRU and the IPCC coming clean time and time again, neither President Obama, Congress nor any regulatory agency should even consider acting on climate change. This entire issue should be tabled for a while and allow the science community to debate without politics or agenda.

It bothers me that we’re not even allowed to debate this issue. The science is questionable, yet believers expect us to blindly follow their views and radically change our lives. That is not acceptable. We should not be called stupid or ignorant because we dare question policy changes. If scientists and believers are so confident in their research and findings, they should welcome rigorous debate and questioning and not bully those of us who are cautious.

Michelle Malkin has a post up today about new revelations from the IPCC and East Anglia.

This week, we heard another story of stimulus fraud sending millions of dollars to nonexistent zip codes. Prior to that, Americans learned that funding was going to fake congressional districts. Then Senators McCain and Coburn’s released a report that highlighted 100 wasteful projects in the stimulus. I can’t be the only one outraged that digging for dinosaurs in Argentina and sending college students from Alaska to the Copenhagen conference were approved programs.

Seeing the waste on the national level made me question what’s going on locally. Finding out exactly where are taxpayer dollars have gone is critical to ensure that nothing like this bill ever passes again. It’s not enough for the national media or top bloggers to pick out a few egregious examples of stimulus waste. Politicians need to hear from their constituents.

That’s where we come in. Bloggers and activists in every town and county throughout the country need to keep an eye on stimulus funding.  It’s up average taxpayers like you and me to make sure that no fraud is going on in our communities.

How do we start?

The Recovery Act promised transparency to the American people, yet how many Americans have taken time to sift through all of the grants, loans and awards? Do you know what’s going on in your backyard?

Recovery.gov is the official site that documents and tracks all stimulus funds. From the homepage, you can search by Zip code, or you can download detailed information about awarded grants in your community or state. These searches provide the most basic information about what’s going on in your area.

If you really want to dig into data, visit the Recovery.gov Download Center and look at spreadsheets that indentify organizations and contacts for all of the awarded grants.

A number of watchdog sites have emerged that track stimulus projects and are easier to use than Recovery.gov. At StimulusWatch.org, you can search by project, agency, state, city, zip code and keyword. I was able to pull up all of the projects in my hometown of Chattanooga, Tenn. Thankfully, all of the projects seem to be legitimate and fall within the parameters of the Recovery Act.

StimulusWatch.org is built as a wiki, so users can vote a project up or down and track the most wasteful project, such as “Explaining the African Vote” project at the University of California, San Diego. They received $233,823 to conduct exit polls in sub-Sarahan Africa.

ProPublica also created a Recovery Tracker. Unlike the other two sites, ProPublica also releases information on businesses that obtained loans through the stimulus. For example, the new Melting Pot in Chattanooga borrowed $684,000.

All of this information can get confusing. While some projects stand out, such as a $950,000 grant to colleges in Arizona to study ants, what is the difference between a grant, contract and loan? How do we know if it should be funded by the stimulus?

How the Recovery Act Works

According to Recovery.gov, the stimulus aims to

• Create new jobs as well as save existing ones
• Spur economic activity and invest in long-term economic growth
• Foster unprecedented levels of accountability and transparency in government spending

How does this work?

After the stimulus was passed, Congress allocated a set amount of funds to different federal agencies. These agencies then established requests for proposals or grant opportunities. These can be accessed through Grants.gov or Recovery.gov. Another pot of money was allocated for states, which turned it over to state agencies to either directly use or create sub-grants.

Often, this is where the waste starts.

Since the federal government allocated funds to various government agencies, the agencies are actually the ones making the grants and distributing funds. This means that the kids who got a free trip to the Climate Change were accountable to the National Science Foundation not the Obama Administration. Many of the questionable grants were awarded through government agencies like the National Science Foundation or the Institutes of Health. These are huge bureaucratic entities, and once they got control of the money there was no accountability.

Since many of the contracts and loans are also awarded by smaller agencies, it’s difficult to track where the money is going. Available contracts are listed on Recovery.gov and the site posts winning contractors. Loans are not as transparent, and ProPublica is the only site that I’ve seen include loans with community information.

What Can You Do?

Tracking stimulus funding in your community is the perfect activity for bloggers, local tea parties or concerned activities. Once you’ve researched the information, there are a number of ways that you can use it to raise awareness or hold your local, state and national elected officials accountable:

• Create a local Google Map of all the projects
• Write a blog post
• Write letters to the editor of your newspaper
• Write or call your local Congressman or Senator
• Create fliers about any questionable projects to hand out at local GOP meetings or Tea Party events
• Contact local media outlets about projects that need attention

The next Recovery.gov filing deadline is January 30, so get ready for another round of stories about government waste.

It’s been a tough couple of weeks for my least favorite Tennessean, Al Gore. First those horrible emails are leaked that start to discredit the one thing that almost gave Al a legitimate platform in the media since his political career went up in flames.

Then he dropped out of a speaking engagement at the the holiest event in the church of climate change, the Copenhagen conference.

Now, two members of the Academy are demanding that he return his Oscar for An Inconvenient Truth according to Top of the Ticket.

But two Hollywood conservatives (yes, there are some) have called upon the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to rescind the prestigious, profitable gold Oscar statuette that it gave ex-Vice President Al Gore two years ago for the environmental movie “An Inconvenient Truth.”

Roger L. Simon and Lionel Chetwynd, both Academy members, are among a small, meandering pack of known political conservatives still believed to be on the loose in the liberal bastion of movie-making.

It’s doubtful that this will ever happen since so many people in Hollywood bought into eco-chic and traded in their expensive cars for a Prius. However, it is entertaining to slowly watch this sham unravel.

I’m not necessarily opposed to global warming. It could be true. We have done a lot of environmental damage in the last few hundred years and haven’t done a very good job of following God’s command to take care of the earth. But I question anything that demands we dramatically change our lifestyles and way of life based on a few years of questionable science. I wish the climate change believers, which at this point are following their science with a cult-like devotion, would be open to an honest debate about how the free market can make changes to better the environment.

Update: Politico has a Q&A with Al Gore about climate change and somehow neglects to ask him about the biggest scandal to face that issue? Great journalism there.