One of the aspects of the global warming/climate change debate that should have raised a red flag for journalists is the reluctance of the promoters of the hypothesis to share their raw data that they say proves their case. After Congressman Joe Barton forced Michael Mann to release his data, independent researchers who were not in the pay of the government or industry, quickly showed that the work was deficient. Dr. Phil Jones in England, who claims there is not much urban heat island effect, was refusing to release his data the last I heard. These people do not want to share their raw data, nor the methods they use to massage the data to "correct" it. Here is a story about the British MET office complaining about unauthorized possession of their data.