Report That Exonerated CRU Also Said Global Warming Hockey Stick Exaggerated

Another sacred cow ( a non flatulent one) of the climate change moonbats has been taken down a peg, Professor Michael Mann's hockey stick In the same report exonerating the CRU scientists for Climate-gate, the data compiled for the Hockey stick was bashed because the data it used was compiled through inappropriate methods.

The term "hockey stick" was coined by the head of National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's (NOAA) Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, Jerry Mahlman, to describe the pattern of historical temperatures in the northern hemisphere (it kind of looks like a hockey stick on its side). The chart, created by Dr. Michael Mann (now at Penn State University) shows relatively stable temperatures until around 100 year ago when we see a spike up. It is one of the key pieces of information the global warming moonbats use to prove that global warming is about to destroy the world.

The  Chart became the center of the IPCC's argument that man-made global warming was real, even though (as memos released as part of the Climategate scandal revealed)  the CRU at the University of East Anglia , had serious problems with the Hockey Stick chart, but it was pushed through by the chart's creator Dr. Mann.

...there were two competing graphs – Mann's hockey stick and another, by Jones, Briffa and others. Mann's graph was clearly the more compelling image of man-made climate change. The other "dilutes the message rather significantly," said Folland. "We want the truth. Mike [Mann] thinks it lies nearer his result." Folland noted that "this is probably the most important issue to resolve in chapter 2 at present.

Briffa believed that the world's temperature heated up about 1,000 years ago (the Medieval Period) as much as they seemed to in the 1990s, and was upset that Mann's chart did not reflect that climate change. Even the co-creator of Mann's paper on the hockey stick began to walk way from it. That missing warming trend from 1,000 years ago has been criticized from many directions.

As part of the investigation of Climate-gate, Professor David Hand, president of the Royal Statistical Society, said that the hockey stick:

“...used a particular statistical technique that exaggerated the effect [of recent warming],” he said

“...It is very surprising that research in an area that depends so heavily on statistical methods has not been carried out in close collaboration with professional statisticians,” the report concluded.

Other than the hockey stick, Professor Hand takes the "corporate line."

Prof Hand said his criticisms should not be seen as invalidating climate science. He pointed out that although the hockey stick graph – which dates from a study led by US climate scientist Michael Mann in 1998 – exaggerates some effects, the underlying data show a clear warming signal.

Even so, this "crack' in the wall of those skeptical that global warming is a hoax, is a first. As the anti-global warming consensus continues to build expect that crack to become a major breech.