Most Scientific grants go through a confidential peer review, i.e. the reviewed usually don't know who's reviewing them. The ones in which I've been involved focused obsessively on the scientific issues involved, such as how clever and novel was the approach and what were the chances that the investigator would be able to complete the proposed experiments. I have to admit, the bar might have been higher had the hypothesis appeared outlandish, but usually you don't see outlandish conclusions without lots of supporting evidence. If someone thought they could prove there really was no effect of human activities on climate, they'd need some data to back themselves up, but I doubt anyone would gainsay it. If someone could prove there was no anthropomorphic climate change they could publish in the best journals easily. Please don't tell me it isn't so, I personally overturned the decade-old dictums of a large branch of my own field in one paper. We has little trouble publishing it and less getting it funded.
