The Wegman report to the US House Committee on Energy and Commerce is now available as a PDF here and with a short two page summary here.
The report illustrates how science can be manipulated and that the peer-review process is not a guarantee of either precision nor accuracy in scientific findings.
An argument can be made that the academic "system" of peer-review, grants and refereed journals would eventually have flushed the truth out. It is indisputable, however, that in the case of the hockey stick and the promotion of global warming, this system was instrumental in the promotion of a falsehood and a push a "consensus" that was less about unanimity than it was intimidation for any who would question the orthodoxy.
Luckily, since Galileo's time, technology has changed and there now flourishes a community of bloggers who question and post and resist when told they should just desist and accept whatever those with influence determine to be axiomatic.
Are all blogs useful, right and/or accurate? No they are not. But at least on global warming they have provided a great service and who knows, maybe they will cause those in the mainstream to reflect just a little and be more aware of how their science is reported and used in the politics of the real world.
