OK, that was funny. But the 97% number is nonsense, just for the record. Skepticism about AGW catastrophism is rampant among the world's scientists at large (physicists, biologists, etc.), and many climate scientists have been cautiously coming out of the closet and poking sticks at the shaky foundations as well.

Two questions were key: have mean global temperatures risen compared to pre-1800s levels, and has human activity been a significant factor in changing mean global temperatures.
About 90 percent of the scientists agreed with the first question and 82 percent the second.

Ordinary people hear "supercomputer driven model simulation" and they think "oooh, it must be really accurate and able to predict the future".

Anybody who understands statistics and the banal realities of computation knows the good old GIGO principle. Not to mention the reality that nobody has ever successfully predicted long term climate changes, so throwing a supercomputer at an impossible problem doesn't magically add credibility. *sigh*

You can continue to attempt to obfuscate the issue but the facts remain: Lois Lerner and a bunch of other people associated with this issue failed to preserve official records as required by IRS policy and federal law. The IRS failed to preserve records even though they certified their systems would preserve those records.

Stop trying to project your corporate IT mentality onto systems managed by federal agencies. Watergate and 18 missing minutes helped shape the requirements found in the federal records act for good reason.

These emails were official records. Being official records they had to be maintained in an official recordkeeping system. The IRS email system is not an electronic recordkeeping system, by definition. Lois Lerner's hard drive was not an electronic recordkeeping system, by definition. The IRS official recordkeeping system for email is, by evidence of the letter I've already cited, hard copy print outs of the email.

as evidence of the organization, functions, policies, decisions, procedures, operations, or other activities

Any email that went to the White House concerning the business of the IRS is, by definition, an official record requiring preservation.

Any email that constituted a decision making process, procedures or operations is, by definition, an official record requiring preservation.

Perhaps you would care to actually identify a class of emails that pertain to auditing, evaluation of applications for tax-exempt status, procedures to follow when processing such applications or emails that discuss IRS business between the White House and the IRS that would not be official records. Until you can accurately define such a class of emails then it is safe to say that the emails were official records requiring preservation.

As I showed you in the letter from the Department of the Treasury, Lois Lerner was required to physically print those emails and store them. The IRS's failure to properly preserve those records was a violation of law. Lois Lerner's failure to preserve those records was, at least, a violation of IRS policy.

No, agencies cannot do that. All federal agencies are bound by FOIA and transparency requirements. Even if it was voluntary, Obama promised transparency and record keeping during his campaing.

Emails are NOT FOIA requests. There are special forms to request the information. Any emails that pertain to FOIA requests must be kept but normal emails are not. So again, it's Obama's fault that he has not changed every single agency in the government especially those with antiquated IT systems and procedures. Give me a break.

Um, no. Leading the country is his primary job. Managing individual agencies are the responsibilities of the individual directors. Is Obama ultimately in charge, yes. Does he manage operational aspects? Hell no. Furthermore, Lerner was not an appointee. She was a career government employee. And she rose to her position under Bush not Obama.

THIS particular issue may not have had anything to do with Obama. It was the actions of government employees that he did not appoint. Bush appointed individuals like Gonzales that definitely played partisan politics.

When a user needs to create space in his or her email box, the user has the option of either deleting emails (that do not qualify as official records) or moving them . . . if an email qualifies as an official record, per IRS policy, the email must be printed and placed in the appropriate folder . . .

IRS offices will not store the official recordkeeping copy of e-mail messages that are federal records ONLY on the electronic mail system, unless the system has all of the features of an electronic recordkeeping system, some of which are specified in paragraph 2 above. If the electronic mail system is not designed to be a recordkeeping system, ask an E-Mail/System Administrator to instruct you on how to copy the information from the electronic mail system to a recordkeeping system or produce a hard copy[emphasis mine] for recordkeeping purposes.

4. IRS offices that maintain their e-mail records electronically will move or copy them to a separate electronic recordkeeping system unless their system has the features specified in IRM 1.15.6.6.2above. Backup tapes are not to be used for recordkeeping purposes.[emphasis mine] ...

The basic requirements applicable to all records apply to e-mail records as well. If they are not in an approved electronic recordkeeping system, then the e-mail messages identified as records must be printed out and placed in the appropriate record system[emphasis mine]. However, there are some specific elements for records sent or received through e-mail which also must be captured in addition to the message to satisfy recordkeeping requirements. You should ensure that...