Wednesday, February 15, 2012

Heartland leak- or the biter bit

To paraphrase

This week, someone (probably a whistle-blower at the Heartland Institute, Chicago, Illinois) released emails and other documents written by Joseph Bast, and leading denialists who edit and control the content of the reports of the Not the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC).

The release of these documents creates an opportunity for reporters, academics, politicians, and others who relied on the NIPCC and the Heartland Institute to form their opinions about global warming to stop and reconsider their position. The experts they trusted and quoted in the past have been caught red-handed to be on wingnut welfare [1] and conspiring to feed mis-information to gullible journalists [2]. This is new and real evidence that they should examine and then comment on publicly.

For anyone who doubts the power of the Internet to shine light on darkness, the news of the month is how digital technology helped uncover a secretive group of scientists and political operatives. Their behavior was brought to light when files were published online, many of which boasted about how they suppressed hard questions.

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Development of our "Global Warming Curriculum for K-12 Classrooms" project.

[1] Principals and teachers are heavily biased toward the alarmist perspective. To counter this we are considering launching an effort to develop alternative materials for K-12 classrooms. We are pursuing a proposal from Dr. David Wojick to produce a global warming curriculum for K-12 schools. Dr. Wojick is a consultant with the Office of Scientific and Technical Information at the U.S.. Department of Energy in the area of information and communication science. His effort will focus on providing curriculum that shows that the topic of climate change is controversial and uncertain - two key points that are effective at dissuading teachers from teaching science. We tentatively plan to pay Dr. Wojick $100,000 for 20 modules in 2012, with funding pledged by the Anonymous Donor.
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[2] Efforts might also include cultivating more neutral voices with big audiences (such as Revkin at DotEarth/NYTimes, who has a well-known antipathy for some of the more extreme AGW communicators such as Romm, Trenberth, and Hansen) or Curry (who has become popular with our supporters)
Hi Keith


23 comments:

dhogaza said...

"Hi Keith"

Apparently Kloor doesn't rate ... maybe he'll make next year's list.

Mark said...

This is the real Climategate. We can only hope that this does for climate science what the release of the Wedge Document did for teaching evolution (as opposed to intelligent design).

Steve Bloom said...

Nah, any chance he had went away when he reduced his blogging output.

The Bunny's point may have been more related to Kloor's defense of Revkin and Curry, which looks a little thin in the harsh light of knowing how the denial industry actually views the two of them.

I was just inspired to coin (AFAIK) a neologism: "toolish"

Anonymous said...

Dr. Jay Cadbury, phd.

Gee the denial industry seems to have a lot less money than the true believer industry. Maybe there's a huge double standard going on here? Nah, couldn't be.

Lionel A said...

Oh Cadbury, how Pythonesque .

rumleyfips said...

Dr J Cadbury Nutbar:

I suppose one could think that the denial industry has limited funds if you declare that Heartland is the complete , whole, single and total denial organization.

It isn't.

Please let me know when you have detailed all the other denier organization and their funding.

Thank you :

John McManus

THE CLIMATE WARS said...

Why am I not surprised that they read each others mail?

Jim Eager said...

Until you realise that the denial industry is not burdened with having to spend any money at all on doing actual science. All its cash donations can go straight into spreading FUD.

Anonymous said...

Looks like heartland is claiming that one document was falsified: http://heartland.org/press-releases/2012/02/15/heartland-institute-responds-stolen-and-fake-documents


Interestingly, Heartland seems to believe that stealing and posting confidential information should be grounds for imprisonment. Funny how they didn't care when it was climategate related...

-MMM

bluegrue said...

From the 2012 budget:

$88,000
Surface Stations Project
Payments to ItWorks/IntelliWeather to create web site featuring data from NOAA’s new
network of surface stations. First payment of $44,000 in January, second of same amount
contingent on fundraising around mid-year.


And here I thought Anthony isn't getting any money out of this ...

Anonymous said...

Efforts might also include cultivating more neutral voices with big audiences (such as ... Curry (who has become popular with our supporters)

Memo to S Fred - don't waste time recruiting Dr Curry, she already volunteered:

"So in terms of a scandal, I would have to say that Heartlandgate is nowhere near Climategate"

The AnonyBilby

willard said...

Searching for

site:wattsupwiththat.com/ "any money"

provides more hundreds of digs deserving due diligence.

So much to do, so little time.

a_ray_in_dilbert_space said...

Dr. Jay,
Dude, it speaks volumes that you consider the activities of scientists doing science to be equivalent to the activities of the lie machine run by the spinmeisters at Heartland.

Dude, have you ever even taken a science class?

Anonymous said...

Dude, have you ever denied you were involved with the Constellation fiasco? Now that's real money!

Martin Vermeer said...

Dr. Jay forgot to include in the budget of the 'denial industry' its distribution network: Fox News, Murdoch's many outlets, ...

guthrie said...

Did someone say Murdoch? You should all be aware that last year one of his newspapers was shut down because of its illegal activities. Now many senior Sun journalists have been arrested for bribing police and other unsavoury and illegal activities. Murdoch has been running a criminal enterprise for years.

Anonymous said...

willard sez:

"Searching for

site:wattsupwiththat.com/ "any money"

provides more hundreds of digs deserving due diligence."

People may like to start here:

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/05/14/smear-job-by-the-carbon-brief/

Quiet Waters

Anonymous said...

Dr. Jay Cadbury, phd.

You know what, the deniers have been caught. Obviously, the Heartland Institute has more money than the U.S. government!

"Al Gore spent $300 million advertising the global warming hoax. Greenpeace, the WWF (World Wildlife Fund), the Sierra Club, the National Resources Defense Council, NASA, NOAA, the UN and nation states have collectively poured billions into climate research, alternative energies, and propaganda, supported along the way by most of the broadcast and print media."


a_ray_in_dilbert_space said...
Dr. Jay,

"Dude, it speaks volumes that you consider the activities of scientists doing science to be equivalent to the activities of the lie machine run by the spinmeisters at Heartland.

Dude, have you ever even taken a science class?"

@A_ray

When I was in college, my history teacher told me that if I listened to Rush Limbaugh, I was being lied to. He told me that all citizens should have to contribute to the government, unions were so important to the middle class and the teachers union was wonderful.

After I graduated, I wondered why my teacher had told me all these things. This was about the point I discovered to my chagrin, that over 90% of teachers are democrats. So sorry I'm extremely suspicious of Eli and many others here, because I don't see how them taking more of my money helps me.

Furthermore, most of my friends went to Penn State, so I have the inside track on Michael Mann, and I know he is an extreme left winger. There's a big difference between someone like Michael Mann and somebody like Isaac Held.

Tenney Naumer said...

Calling Michael Mann an extreme left-winger is ludicrous.

a_ray_in_dilbert_space said...

Jaybird, Did you ever consider that perhaps the reason so many scientists vote democratic is because the Repubs are so anti-science? They deny climate change. They deny evolution--or at least insist creationism be taught along side it. There are many of us who are fiscally conservative (albeit socially liberal if not libertarian). I cannot vote for a party that rejects reality.

Taylor swift said...

thats real money ofcourse

J Bowers said...

"Greenpeace, the WWF (World Wildlife Fund), the Sierra Club, the National Resources Defense Council, NASA, NOAA, the UN and nation states have collectively poured billions into climate research, alternative energies, and propaganda, supported along the way by most of the broadcast and print media."

And to buy and run ships, and to do scientific studies in the field, and to finance scientific studies in the field, and to protect rainforests in the field, and to run hundreds of regional offices on every continent in the field, and to employ thousands in the field, ....

How do you think that new office in Chicago's financial district is going? The commute must be hell.

Anonymous said...

Dr. Jay Cadbury, phd.

@a_ray

As far as denying things go, I would say I accept evolution but there are exclusive traits to humans that evolution does not explain that no other animals share. For example, animals do not ponder their own existence. We don't see any religous symbols built by even the smartest animals like primates.

You said you cannot vote for a party that denies reality. Well, here's reality. In 150 years, the temperature has gone from 288.0k to 288.8k. Your side evidently thinks this is a massive problem, I would call this a denial of reality.