Leaked documents reveal extent of efforts taken by the climate change denier industry to mislead
How very interesting. It seems the climate change deniers at the Heartland Institute (a prominent U.S. think tank) have been trying to teach schoolchildren skepticism about global warming and planned other behind-the-scenes tactics using millions of dollars in donations from big corporate names.
Now what are the chances we hear as much about this as we did the so-called (and now thoroughly discredited) ‘Climategate‘ email hacking scandal? I wonder, for example, if CBC’s Rex Murphy will run a feature editorial about this on the National, as he did on the ‘Climategate’ story (an editorial missive that was filled with misleading insinuations and false allegations for which Murphy has never issued a mea culpa). Well, I’m not holding my breath. The climate change denial industry and the hold it has on prominent U.S. politicians and major media outlets (as well as some in Canada) will not easily be overcome.
Heartland Institute’s Leaked Documents Reveal Climate Skepticism Efforts.
Here are some excerpts from the article:
Heartland’s plans for this year included paying an Energy Department consultant $100,000 to design a curriculum to teach school children that mainstream global warming science is in dispute, even though it’s a fact accepted by the federal government and nearly every scientific professional organization. It also pays prominent global warming skeptics more than $300,000 a year and plans to raise $88,000 to help a former television weatherman set up a new temperature records website.
The most sensational parts of the documents — and much of what has been confirmed independently — had to do with global warming and efforts to spread doubt into what mainstream scientists are saying. Experts long have thought Heartland and other groups were working to muddy the waters about global warming, said Harry Lambright, a Syracuse University public policy professor who specializes in environment, science and technology issues.
“Scientifically there is no controversy. Politically, there is a controversy because there are political interest groups making it a controversy,” Lambright said. “It’s not about science. It’s about politics. To some extent they are winning the battle.”
A 2010 study in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences surveyed more than 1,300 most cited and published climate scientists and found that 97 percent of them said climate change was a man-made problem. Yet, public opinion polls show far more doubt in the American public.
