Inhofe Ambushed on CNBC's 'The Kudlow Report' by Fill-in Host over ClimateGate

When viewers tune into watch CNBC's "The Kudlow Report," they may not anticipate a host interrupting conservative Republican Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla.

But on CNBC's Nov. 24 "The Kudlow Report," fill-in host Simon Hobbs attempted to do just that. Hobbs, a regular on CNBC Europe, suggested there was nothing to emails unveiled after a hacker allegedly accessed the Climate Research Unit at University of East Anglia in Britain. These emails showed an effort by scientists, some on the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), to manipulate data to strengthen the claim of anthropogenic global warming.

"You're well-known as a campaigner or man that believes humans are not the cause of global warming," Hobbs said. "I mean, specifically if you look at the coverage we have, the allegation is that the emails indicated that they were declining to share data with fellow scientists or they were seeking to keep other researchers with dissenting views from perhaps joining them on some platform. It doesn't indicate that the science was wrong or that the science was manipulated."

Inhofe refuted the claim and explained this was something he had suggested all along - that this theory of manmade global warming was a hoax.

"Oh yes it does, it shows that the science was manipulated and that some science was excluded, Simon," Inhofe replied. "Let's keep in mind now, it first started way back with Kyoto. I was a believer because everyone said that anthropogenic gases cause climate change. Or cause global warming. And until we found out what it would cost the people of America when the Wharton School did their thing, MIT did their thing, it would be a tax of $300-to-350 billion a year. So I though let's really check into science."

Hobbs interrupted Inhofe and demanded to know what specific evidence he had that those emails indicated "manipulation."

"I'm sorry, but I'm going to be terribly rude Senator, but I'm going to interrupt you again," Hobbs said. "What specifically in these emails indicates that the science was wrong or that the science was manipulated because that is not the reading that the international newspapers who have poured over them have to a man or woman come to."

But James Delingpole of the Telegraph (U.K.), in a post dated Nov. 20, has actually found several points to contend Hobbs' claims there was no effort to manipulate data to push the anthropogenic global warming theory:

• Manipulation of evidence
• Private doubts about whether the world really is heating up
• Suppression of evidence
• Fantasies of violence against prominent Climate Sceptic scientists
• Attempts to disguise the inconvenient truth of the Medieval Warm Period (MWP)

Still Hobbs' pressed on and accused detractors of global warming alarmism of engaging in a "witch hunt."

"They've declined to share data - I mean, isn't there - the emails are naïve," Hobbs said. "They demonstrate a frustration from the limited ones that I've read, a frustration that the scientists so fervently believe what they believe can not in a marketing sense get their message across. But, isn't there a danger that we turn this into a witch hunt for a global conspiracy that for which there is absolutely no evidence?"

Inhofe fired back and explained it wasn't an "witch hunt," but an effort to show only one side of the science.

"Boy, I don't know where you come from - call it a witch hunt," Inhofe replied. "I can assure you that Kudlow wouldn't. This is something where one half - one side of the science has been shown all the way through and that's why these scientists, some of them have changed over like Claude Allègre from France, like David Bellamy from U.K., like Nir Shaviv from Israel. They were the ones who were marching down the aisle with Al Gore at one time."