While for individuals like Christopher Hitchens this has led them into a more or less consistent embrace of neoconservatism, for a cult-like post-Trotskyist sect like the RCT it has produced an often interesting if toxic intellectual cocktail.

Re the ‘therapy culture’ strand of the RCT’s thinking it is not anywhere near as original as it has been presented and IMO Furedi, Fitzpatrick et al add little fundamental to the insights published by Christopher Lasch and Philip Rieff nearly half a century ago.

Whenever watching the right, as I know some bloggers do, always keep one eye on ‘Spiked.’ You never know if Brendan O’Neill or Mick Hume is lurking under your bed.

This has been the basis of the debate. Climate change is happening, that is the bullet proof consensus. Climate variability is part of life on earth. But humanities contribution to climate change, that is not bullet proof consensus. That’s why Vicky Pope can say that the earth will continue to warm, and predictions are quite robust. Well that’s not saying anything at all really, the earth has been warming at a relatively steady pace since around 13,000 years ago (Younger Dryas event). And with a fair amount of confidence it will continue to warm until the next cooling event (another Younger Dryas perhaps). Implying that humans have caused it over the past 150 years is a large leap of faith. The time period is too short, and thermometers were hardly reliable 150 years ago. A leap of faith too far for many people, including Stott.