Debunked: "The U.S. and many NATO countries are spraying in order to save the planet"

Mick West

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Amateur climatologist Cliff Harris wrote an article in which he makes the following claim:

[ex=http://www.longrangeweather.com/ArticleArchives/Chemtrails.htm]David Keith, a well-known geoengineer from the University of Calgary, said recently in a San Diego Climate Seminar, "the U.S. and many NATO countries are spraying in order to save the planet from runaway global warming."[/ex]

This is at best an entirely inaccurate paraphrasing, and at worst a lie.

David Keith did not say this. In fact David Keith has said quite the polar opposite. He has very explicitly, and in no uncertain terms, said that spraying for geoengineering is NOT taking place. He went on to say that if there was a secret program of spraying, then he would risk his life to try to stop it. See following video, particularly at 12:40 and 25:10



There's a full breakdown of the video here:
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/16...y-meets-David-Keith-Chemtrail-Geo-engineering

This is a very obvious falsehood. A blatant misrepresentation of the position of David Keith. Anyone who is repeating this lie is obviously not at all interested in the truth.
 
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....which also defines nearly every earth scientist's reason for believing in what they do.....to preserve the earth.
If the chemtrail believers think that the vast majority of "earth scientists" are trying to hide something that is detrimental to the earth, then that is the most skewed viewpoint of all.

If you believe otherwise....think about it.
People dedicate their lives to "earth sciences'....because the believe they can help make a difference in order to preserve the earth....and they love doing-so.
If you think those collegiate graduates who have completed and graduated from one of these geo PHD earth sciences....hate the world enough to have had spent their entire learning years only to hide some gov't sponsored rally of lies.......them please disclose them......or at least ask them privately of their real feelings.....and expose their feelings here.
 
I thought I'd track him down and contact him with details of this page. I've never heard of any respected meteorologist associating themselves with the promotion of the chemtrail hoax, and I felt certain he would want to distance himself once he realised what this hoax is all about.

Then I read his articles on this page, called weather gems. There are two at the top which discuss the chemtrail hoax.

The first basically the standard laundry list, repeating a summary of all the 'claims' in WITWATS, without mention of the dubious/non-existent supporting evidence. The second is another list, of more general GE assertions and answers to previous comments, again without the encumbrance of evidence. Both articles are useful, insomuch as they collect together all of the current misunderstandings / hearsay / errors / lies / imaginings / delusions in one handy place. So much so that comprehensively debunking each point in turn would be almost exhaustive.

As a qualified meteorologist, I'm slightly worried that someone advertised as having a scientific background specific to professional climatology could be taken in by these people.

On the plus side, the majority of comments on those two 'articles' seem to reflect the thankfully high skeptical standards of their readership.

[edit] I've invited him to visit the page here and discuss his assertions openly. Hopefully he'll see that it is his argument and evidence we are questioning, not his character.
 
The articles are seasoned with inaccurate and misleading quotes, such as the infamous 'free-riding on our Grandkids' quote:

When asked about the possible harmful effects of dumping 10 MILLION MEGATONS of aluminum and other heavy metals on an unsuspecting population, the evasive Mr. Keith said this in a futile attempt to be humorous;

"We don't know yet about any harmful side effects. We're taking our chances for possible good results. One might say that we're 'free-riding' on the future health of our grandkids." (Well, Mr. Keith, the joke is apparently on these kids!)
Content from External Source
The actual quote in context (if you're reading this Cliff) is examined here:
https://www.metabunk.org/threads/16...ing-is-like-free-riding-on-our-Grandkids-quot
As explained there:
Once you know what he's talking about, it's quite straightforward. He's making a slightly subtle distinction between two economic terms to emphasis that by not addressing the questions around global climate change now, it's not just a "moral hazard", where people are being less careful now because they think the problem will be fixed later. It's really more serious that that. It's deferring a major problem to future generations. It's free-riding on our grandchildren.

Keith is talking about the dangers of doing nothing about climate change, and how it might force our grandchildren to perform risky geoengineering later if we don't start trying to fix the problems of climate change soon.
 
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Yeah, that kind of confirms that the first "quote" is just a paraphrasing, with quotation marks added. David Keith never said that it was geoengineering that was like free riding. I asked him (David Keith) about it and he said:

On “Moral Hazard”, this is a technical point for economists. when you think carefully about the definition its clear that’s quite the right way to describe SRM, “free riding” another econ term that more accurately describes what we are doing when we don’t cut CO2 emissions. To be clear, I do mean “putting off addressing the problem of climate change is like free-riding on our grandkids”. It’s not that SRM is free riding, it’s that over enthusiasm about its potential may encourage less action to cut emissions.
Content from External Source
 
I thought I'd track him down and contact him with details of this page. I've never heard of any respected meteorologist associating themselves with the promotion of the chemtrail hoax, and I felt certain he would want to distance himself once he realised what this hoax is all about.
[...]
[edit] I've invited him to visit the page here and discuss his assertions openly. Hopefully he'll see that it is his argument and evidence we are questioning, not his character.

Unfortunately part of the argument is one from authority, in that he claims to be a climatologist. While that does not effect the accuracy with which he quotes people, it might give people pause when judging any conclusions he arrives at:

[ex=http://web.archive.org/web/20081212131624/http://yetanotheratheistblog.wordpress.com/2007/11/22/sometimes-when-youre-stumbling-you-step-in-a-pile-of-crap/]
According to SpokesmanReview.com, “Harris is not a trained scientist – he studied insurance law in college…” and from TribTalk.com,
Harris is also a devout Christian and believes the Bible is loaded with clues on predicting the weather. “I do believe in a period of extreme global warming. That will be in the tribulation period. That’s when the real global warming will come in,” he said. “Those of us who are believers, we’re looking forward to it.”[/ex]


 
Harris's entire article is riddled with the most bizarre paraphrasing. It's almost as if he watched the film once, and then three days later tried to write down everything he remembered about it. It's almost an interesting perspective on the way regular people perceive the film. For example:

[EX=http://www.longrangeweather.com/ArticleArchives/Chemtrails.htm]These chemtrails are composed of tiny glass fibers coated with light-reflective aluminum that are intended to bounce many of the sun’s rays back into space with the express purpose of cooling the planet.[/EX]

That would be chaff. Even Michael J. Murphy does not think that "chemtrails" are chaff. And nobody has proposed using chaff to combat global warming
 
Actually, WITWATS has a skillfully edited segment which interweaves several newscasts related to chaff with imagery of cirrus clouds.

Whomever edited the segment between 3 and 5 minutes knew that they were doing this, it was edited on purpose to give the impression that chaff produces clouds.

What In The World Are They Spraying 3:00-5:00 said:
-Weather Webcast Channel 10: “That is not rain, that is not snow. Believe it or not military aircraft flying through the region is dropping chaff, small bits of aluminum, sometimes it’s made of plastic or even metallicized paper products, but its use is an antiradar issue and obviously they’re up there practicing. Now they won’t confirm that but I was in the Marine Corps for many years, and I’ll tell you right now. That’s what it is.”

“Webcast Channel 10 Weather: “Now what happens here is military jets come out of Key West Air Force Base and move off into the atmosphere and drop mylar strips. Some could be a little wider, some are small glass fibers that are coated in aluminum. What the Air Force does is they take their military jets and they dump these out of the aircraft and they fall into the atmosphere, and some take as much as a day to fall down.”
(Voiceover Fade to images of ordinary cirrus clouds)

4:00-5:30 Weather Webcast ABC: “This is inevitably military or something going on.
The government, the Air Force. When you see this kind of pattern like this you can rest assured there’s something going on. They’re actually little bitty magnetic, little bitty strips of whether it’s aluminum.”

-Weather Webcast Channel 10: “While it’s a nuisance to you and I, to determine what’s real and what’s not but it looks like it’s a lifesaving operation by the military.”
(voiceover fade to more images of cirrus)
 
I will say that in the five months I lived in Israel (Jerusalem and saw the rest of the country) I never ONCE saw a chem or con trail. And they have jets.

The second I stepped back into America was the second I saw those weird X shapes and lines all over my skies.
 
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