Nick Sundt of the World Wildlife Fund was present in a recent congressional hearing in which members of the administration were asked to respond to questions about "climate gate." You should read Sundt's whole report, as it is very impressive, but I particularly enjoyed White House science adviser John Holdren's incredible refutation of all the overreaching concerning "ClimateGate":
The e-mails are mainly about a controversy over a particular data set and the ways a particular small group of scientists have interpreted and displayed that data set. It is important to understand that these kinds of controversies and even accusations of bias and improper manipulation are not all that uncommon in science – in all branches of science. The strength of science is that these kinds of controversies get sorted out over time as to who is wrong, who is right, and how much it matters, by the process of peer ...
