‘Climate Deniers’ Follow ‘Creationists’ to Undermine Public Education

By on February 17, 2012 in News 71

Arctic_sea_ice_loss_animationVia Common Dreams:

The Heartland Institute, a right-wing think tank funded by the Koch brothers, Microsoft, and other top corporations, is planning to develop a “global warming curriculum” for elementary schoolchildren that presents climate science as “a major scientific controversy,” according to a report by Think Progress.

Today’s report reads in part:

[The Heartland Institute's] effort, at a cost of $100,000 a year, will be developed by Dr. David E. Wojick, a coal-industry consultant.

“Principals and teachers are heavily biased toward the alarmist perspective,” Heartland’s confidential 2012 fundraising document bemoans. The group believes that Wojick’s project has “potential for great success,” because he has “contacts at virtually all the national organizations involved in producing, certifying, and promoting scientific curricula.” The document explains that Wojick will produce “modules” that promote the conspiratorial claim that climate change is “controversial” [...]

Wojick will receive $25,000 per module, with four modules produced a year. Wojick, who manages the Climate Change Debate listserv, is not a climate scientist. His doctorate is in epistomology.

The Heartland Institute also runs the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change, a conspiracy-theorist parody of the Nobel-prize-winning U.N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Heartland’s NIPCC project “pays a team of scientists approximately $300,000 a year to work on a series of editions of Climate Change Reconsidered.” Their climate-denial work is funded anonymously.

The full excerpt from the Heartland document:

Though troubling to both advocates of quality education and those concerned with the increasingly destructive impact of global warming and climate change, the Heartland’s plans are hardly surprising. In fact, they follow a troubling trend among rightwing think tanks and the conservative movement to undermine education by generating and then inserting invented scientific controversy into public school curricula…

[continues at Common Dreams]

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  • Redacted

    I suppose it’s too much to ask that the average working person is clever enough to spot whats going on. Those who would deny them free thought and action are certainly clever.

    Of course, such an obvious ploy begs the question of what is happening that is not so obvious?

  • marklar_primus

    Weather deniers say the science is settled yet cannot backup their claims scientifically. Nobody has ever claimed that the climate doesn’t change yet alarmists deny that it can change due to factors other than mankind’s activities as a prime mover. This is weather denial. Back up your claims that the sun causes no significant change in climate or give it up. Make predictions that can be validated or give it up. 

    Associating anyone who doesn’t believe in anthropogenic global warming with creationists just shows your weak position by relying on logical fallacy in order to bypass reason and elicit emotional responses in the reader. Pretty lame, and definately NOT scientific.

    • Jin The Ninja

       actually in the conception of people whose reality is awakened to the destruction, pollution and catastrophic man-made causes (not the least of which is climate change) to the earth and her ecosystems- you are very much in the same inerudite, ridiculous vein of creationists.

      • felix felicis

        The earth is not a her.

        • Jin The Ninja

          but neither is it a him or an ‘it.’

          it’s actually quite historical to personify the earth using the female gender.

          ‘justice’ is also often personified with a feminine pronoun.

          i prefer the feminine pronoun in order to refer to gaia, but it’s purely a subjective choice based on my worldview. in the same way, i also refer to G-d, or divinity as female.

        • Andrew

           The Earth is an “us.”

          • Butter Knife

            Earth is far more than humans, far more than animals, far more than biology.

            When we talk about the perils of climate change, we do not refer to any existential threat to Earth itself: we are largely incapable of destroying Sol 3. Indeed, we pose very little risk even to ‘all life on Earth”, as life has proven consistently capable of persisting under even the most extreme circumstances (see: deep sea vents).

            What we speak of is the extermination of a highly infectious, invasive and potentially contagious species which has become highly prevalent and prolific at exploiting various energy sources within the ecosystem, a pernicious apex predator that has become perilously overpopulated and faces impending crisis.

            Climate change will kill all of us humans. That is what we really care about. The extinction of other species is not, ultimately, what concerns us, but rather our own. They are, perhaps literally, our canary in the coal mine… less adaptable species will succumb to the ravages of ecological change before we do, perhaps long before, but we ignore that plight at our own peril, because eventually the world will be too different for us to survive as well.

          • Andrew

            I didn’t mean to imply Earth was us humans, but that we humans are part of Earth.

          • marklar_primus

            Let me just point out the most obviously falsity here. Sol is the sun, not the Earth.

          • Brian Real

            Sol 3= third planet from the sun… It’s an accurate way to describe the planet we call home.

          • Misinformation

             wouldn’t sol 3, logically = sun 3?

          • Jin The Ninja

            no, it refers directly to earth’s position on a heliocentric astronomical model.

            it’s also been used extensively on Dr. Who, as a way for alien civilizations to describe earth.

          • Jin The Ninja

            Let me help YOU:

            an adverb (obviously) does not and cannot intrinsically describe a noun (falsity).

            ‘Obvious Falsity’ although ‘falsity’ already denotes an obvious error or mistake.

            hmm….

          • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jason-P-Levy/687540234 Jason P. Levy

            That was a Dr Who reference I think.

          • JaceD

            Agreed. We are all one thing, including the Earth. We’re the consciousness of the stars.

        • Redacted

          The Earth is going through a cross dressing phase. Being stuck between Mars and Venus, I can’t blame s/he.

      • marklar_primus

        Actually I  base my opinion on science rather than faith in screwy straw man arguments as presented in this article. That would put you in the faith based creationist camp, not me.

        • Jin The Ninja

          Science that no scientists agree with. Tell me Camron, why are you aligning yourself with the Koch Bros, Bill Gates, and Far Right Think Tanks? It seems an odd and anti intellectual opinion to take.

          • Camron Wiltshire

            Why are you invoking a false dichotomy?  I’ve not “aligned” myself with anyone.  Before you invoke “intellectualism” again you might want to consider not launching into fallacious responses without having thought it through.  Do you want to discuss the science or not?

          • Jin The Ninja

            remarkably, you have in fact allied yourself with alex jones, mega corporate, right wing think tanks, and those paid by them . Science agrees with me wholeheartedly and the rest of the world on this subject. the so-called `dissent` is an extreme fringe and minority. i`d like to discuss science, but your so-called science is thinly veiled libertarian economic theory, and pseudo- christian domionism. that`s not science.

            i posted the initial response to `marklar`, i`d prefer to hear his opinion on the subject lest we descend into ad hominem attacks and unmovable stances which we both have on the subject.

            as a person whom deeply values a holistic relationship to the land, i simply will never agree with you on the subject of the environment, it doesn`t make you right or wrong; it simply means you too far removed from my conscious and subconcious experiences, and those ethics i value personally, religiously, and spiritually to understand the meaning of environmentalism as i understand it.

    • Andrew

       > Back up your claims that the sun causes no significant change in climate or give it up.

      The problem is that the sun has been in a dimmer trend for the past few decades.

      • marklar_primus

        Overly simplistic thinking here. There is far more to the sun’s effect on climate than the sun’s brightness including the effects of solar wind upon the Earth’s ionosphere which bears an inverse relationship to the amount of galactic cosmic radiation (GCR) that is able to penetrate the Earth’s magnetic field. A direct relationship between GCR and temperature has been established. In simpler terms the less sun the more GCR gets through hence warmer climate.The relationship between CO2 and temperature has been established as well but the actual relationship is that CO2 follows temperature which reveals it as an effect of warming rather than it’s cause contrary to the pablum you have been fed by the MSM.

        Please get yourself a basic grasp of science so that you can come up with an arguement that doesn’t actually confirm what I said in the first place.

        • Andrew

           It doesn’t confirm what you said, you’re just claiming it does.

        • Mysophobe

          You must be referring to the work of Henrik Svensmark. The rest of the scientific community would find his conclusions to be a lot less dubious if he were to ever actually share his methods for reaching them. You know, the way scientists customarily do.

          http://ossfoundation.us/projects/environment/global-warming/galactic-cosmic-rays

          There’s a scientific consensus on greenhouse gases being the driving factor of climate change. Even the denialist side agrees with that. The pretend debate is whether the greenhouse gas increase is caused by human activity or not. You’re on the side of not. Get with the times.

    • JaceD

      I don’t think anyone denies the fact that the Earths climate changes naturally, however to say that the pollution, deforestation, extinctions of animal and plant life etc that have only occured in the last 50 years or so isn’t a direct consequence of humanity is just plain short sightedness.

      • marklar_primus

        Which is of course why I never said that so who are you argueing with.

        Deforestation is certainly a problem but by the theories espoused by global warming alarmists deforestation should help rather than being part of the problem since oxygen is 10x as influential as CO2 as a greenhouse gas.

        • JaceD

          I wasn’t arguing with anyone, simply saying that “people” who believe that humanity doesn’t have an impact on the environment are short sighted.

          • NWW

            And people that think humanity has a greater impact than nature are?

          • JaceD

            What?

        • mysophobe

          You are horribly mistaken. O2 is NOT a greenhouse gas by any definition of the term. Look it up, it just isn’t. You should be very suspicious of whatever source you got that little tidbit from. What you have in common with creationists is that you begin with a firm (albeit faulty) conclusion based on nothing more than a gut feeling, then attempt to prove it by inventing convoluted supporting evidence such as your silly deforestation theory, all the while ignoring and denying mountains of evidence to the contrary. That’s not science. That’s not logic. You’re doing it wrong.

      • Undulu

        Not short-sightedness. More like intelligence and critical thinking.

        Pollution:

        Pollution is at an all time low. Carbon monoxide levels have dropped 58% in the passed 20 years. In fact, levels of carbon monoxide have been exponentially dropping since the Industrial Revolution. There was more pollution before factories, cars, and the modern world. Cities were once cesspools of squalor and filth. Before modern sanitation and plumbing, people dumped their feces and urine into the streets. Before cars, the main transportation was by horse. Imagine thousands of horses releasing tons of methane daily and defecating in the streets. Pre-Industrial cities usually had thick clouds of black smog that hovered over them, blocking people from even seeing the sun. It is only due to this modern age of unparalleled cleanliness age that these problems have been eradicated. And when it comes to CO2, it has been shown to be amazing for the environment, helping trees to grow stronger and faster than ever before.

        Deforestation:

        This is such a redundant myth. Currently the United States grows 36% more trees than it harvests. In fact, there are more trees in American now than there were when Europeans first landed. How can this be, you ask? Because the harvesting of trees is a business. Lumber, paper, furniture, and a thousand other products we enjoy come from trees. As long as a market for these items exists, trees will thrive in abundance. This is good, because trees are the earth’s natural filtering system, feeding off of noxious toxins and enhancing the strength atmosphere. Now that logging has been commercialized and the old ways of recklessness ceased, we can focus on promoting the protection of old growth forests and the beginnings of future ones.

        Extinction of Animals and Plants:

        Extinction is a natural part of the Earth’s ecological systems. Without it, the world would not be able to support life. 99.9 percent of all animal and plant species have become extinct. Most likely, in a million years, every species of plant and animal that now exists will be extinct, replaced by new forms of life. That is just the way the Earth naturally functions. In spite of the claims of “humans are evil!” we hear every day, we are just animals. Yes, we cause the extinction of other animals, but so do other species who are chastised much more infrequently. What makes us different is that we have the chance to save other animals from extinction rather than only cause it, and we have. The biggest threat to an endangered species is government, riddled with corrupt agencies like the Environmental Protection Agency. Tigers and rhinos are going extinct because people use them for medicine, elephants because of the pursuit of ivory. The real problem is that it is illegal to farm these creatures. If laws were lifted on the farming of endangered species, they would thrive in abundance just like the trees, and poaching would die out do to the influx of cheap materials produced by farming.

        Climate Change:

        Global warming and cooling is a natural occurrence mostly influenced by the sun and the oceans more than anything else. Our effect is negligible. All of this hysteria was manufactured by ministers of propaganda who used twisted data models to predict a future they desired. Then the thousands of intelligent, free-thinking scientists who disagreed were strong-armed into compliance as they faced impending threats of career homicide and ridicule. Many who refused to adopt the religion were fired and labeled outcasts. Now we know, as many knew then, that the models have not and will not become reality. Now we are entering into another age of global cooling, and people still cling to the dogma. They’ll still be clinging to it as they cling to their heavy winter coats.

        So, I’m not short-sighted. I just have a good nose for sniffing out BS, and I like to actually research the claims of infallible humans instead of taking them as gospel. You need to realize that “Environmentalism” is the new form of control, and it works like a charm. They are using your big, human hearts to manipulate your malleable human brains.

        Follow the money. You’re all being used.

        • JaceD

          You can’t be serious, some common sense needs to be applied here. Cars cleaner than horses? I wonder at what stage in history there were as many horses being used for transportation as there are cars today? Cars pump out toxic fumes from the moment you turn it on till the moment you turn it off. You’re also only talking about air pollution, there’s abit more to it than that friend.

          With the deforestation argument, you’re right to a point, however not every country does ensure the regrowth of trees for further harvesting, just look at the Amazon.

          Agree completely with your third argument.

          I agree completely that the Earths climate is going to be forever changing, no doubt about that, but the denial of having an impact on the world is ridiculous (Edit gave you wrong info here). Not sure about the last part of your argument, it sounds like a bit of a “conspiracy New World Order thing” but I’ll look into that. With your argument of global cooling, I can tell you now it’s not getting colder.

          You say you have a good nose for sniffing out BS, but that means nothing to me. I would like you to supply some links for me so I can see where you educate yourself from? “Environmentalism” is the “new” form of control? I didn’t realise the old form had gone? I also didn’t realise caring for the planet and the state it should be kept in for future generations was such an evil thing to do?

          Plant some seeds. You’re in need of some vegetables.

          I would also like to point out that through over fishing and trawlers there are massive dead zone in the worlds oceans, also have you heard of the “Great Pacific Garbage Patch”? You might want to look into it if you haven’t heard of it.

        • http://www.facebook.com/people/Jason-P-Levy/687540234 Jason P. Levy

          As for your first point about pollution, you’re making the mistake of assuming that just because its not immediately apparent does not mean that that there is less pollution. When was the last time you saw an honest to god factory in the United States? All the messy pollution causing factories have just moved overseas where its cheaper to operate. They’re still around, they’re just not in America’s backyard anymore. There still exist those filthy cesspool cities, and more people live in them than ever before. Have you seen pictures of some parts of India and Pakistan lately? 
          http://www.bookrags.com/research/third-world-pollution-enve-02/

          As for your second point about deforestation, I’d really like to see something backing up your assertions because that’s just not plausible. Trees don;t grow fast enough to replenish them at the rate that we use paper. You can also take my previous argument about it happening in places other than the US, and apply it here. Maybe the United States has better and somewhat more sustainable logging practices, but the same cannot be said of some loggers in Brazil and Indonesia.  http://environment.nationalgeographic.com/environment/habitats/last-of-amazon/ 

          As for your third point about extinction of species, I agree that it won’t be the absolute end of the world if some species go extinct, but I do think it’s shortsighted and has the potential to screw us over down the road. Ecosystems work through interdependence. If you take one link out of the chain it has an effect on everything. We could end up destroying major food sources for people who rely on the ocean and forests for food. As for your argument about farming endangered species, it wouldn’t work. Its been thousands of years since any new animal was domesticated agriculturally. I would think that if there were some way to domesticate say a grizzly bear, we would have done it by now. There are some animals which simply cannot be domesticated either. Some of them may need too much space to feed and breed. Others might by carnivores who cannot be around large numbers of their fellow beasts. For others it might not be cost effective to domesticate. Furthermore, the fact that they are endangered means that their gene pools are very shallow. There may simply be no ample breeding stock for many endangered species.  

          Finally as for climate change, your overall argument seems to be that any climate scientists who DARED disagree with the climate change dogma was bullied out of his or her position and cast out into the wilderness to die alone and it is for this reason that man made climate change is not happening. Have you ever considered that maybe they were hounded out of their positions because they were wrong? You speak of thousands of climate scientists, but that does a disservice to the reader. Who are these thousands of scientists? What are some of their credentials? You don’t mention that. Come to think of it, you don’t cite a single authority for any one of your claims in this or any other section. You just label climate change a conspiracy without doing anything other than making ad homenim arguments.  

          The truth is there is proportion of the climate science community that does not believe that man made global warming is happening or is a threat. However this is a vanishingly small minority. Man made climate change is a theory the same way that the structure of the atom is a theory. We’ve never seen it firsthand, but  based on the math and science that we do know and objective measurements of whats going on around us, we can figure out whats going on without seeing it directly. And when 97% of scientists in a given field say something is the case, that’s not blindly clinging to dogma. That’s just being smart. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_scientists_opposing_the_mainstream_scientific_assessment_of_global_warming

        • Camron Wiltshire

          Very well said. Thank you Undulu.

    • sonicbphuct

       i think you missed the point. The article above does not state that “Climate Change Denial” = “Creationist”. What it states is that Climate Change Deniers are using the same Tactic of forcing their own ideas into a curriculum under the banner of science (or skepticism) without any evidence, but as some kind of yang to the yin or black to the white.

      I can appreciate your position, however, being obvious about your inability to read and comprehend at an appropriate level does your commentary a disservice.

  • Steve

    Science can now predict weather? This does not pass the Trivium

    • Andrew

      Does equating weather with climate pass the Trivium?

  • PlantsNeedLovingToo

    “…is not a climate scientist. His doctorate is in epistomology.” They aren’t exactly easy to get you know. Plus, if it is a junk science with a global conspiracy around it I would hardly think you’d want someone with a degree in Kool-Aidology to come up with the ultimate findings.

  • http://www.facebook.com/Rev.Lee.Harvey.Roswelld Thomas Watts
    • Mysophobe

      The article you link to refers to a document that the Heartland Intitute itself confirmed as genuine. Reading misinformed tools breathlessly arguing otherwise has been very entertaining. Thanks for the link, good stuff. You too, Camron.

      • Camron Wiltshire

        mysophobe, no need to get all ad hominem.  Let’s stick to the facts and figures.  That is if you can manage.  Riddle me this.  Why is 350ppm seen as the climate singularity we should all be so fearful and willing to endure more pointless taxation for?  Are there any studies that would contradict such an assumption?  Are they peer reviewed. How well do you understand the science that contests the agenda put forward by the IPCC?  

        • Mysophobe

          I was referring to those Internet gumshoes talking about metadata and diction trying to prove fake that which isn’t on the site you linked to, but if the shoe fits… The simple answer to your loaded questions above is that I trust the scientific method and the peer review process much more than I do fossil fuel industry funded propaganda. Why, you may ask? Look no further than the tobacco wars.

  • Misinformation

    First, and possibly foremost, public education needs no undermining, it does that all by itself. Public education got us to where we are now and it’s not going to get us out: http://disinfo.com/2012/01/the-ultimate-history-lesson-a-weekend-with-john-taylor-gatto/

    “Climate change” or, environmental overload or whatever it should be called is certainly real. Humans most likely play a part. But the idea that it’s any but a very small portion of the population that is driving the problem is ridiculous. Am I to believe that getting in my car and driving 20 miles round trip to work or, not changing to the mercury induced cfl bulbs will actually make a difference? These are straw men and part of a larger agenda.

    Less than 1% of the shipping industry emits more CO2 than all the cars on the planet combined: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/apr/09/shipping-pollution Joe citizen didn’t spill millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf. I don’t clear-cut old-growth to get my 4 chords of wood per year. Most folks don’t dump mercury, arsenic, pcb’s, etc. into the rivers or flood the air with benzene.

    The argument of environmental solutions needs to shift to the perpetrators. We need to stop the perpetrators from framing the argument as if average people were making an impact. When the polluters begin to make money from their carbon tax, the proof of their Hegelian Dialectic will be clear.

    Let’s not forget, the dumbing down, through public education has stopped the ability of the citizenry from asking the critical questions.

    • YES!

      THANK YOU!! I’ve been arguing this point forever! THE PEOPLE ARE NOT TO BLAME! 

  • Pinkpanth3rr

    Is it weird I’m not worried about climate change? Carbon dioxide is a perfectly natural. Plants need it. I’m concerned about the carbon monoxide, ozone, nitric oxides, and sulfur dioxide we are expected to breath contently, not to mention the pharmaceuticals and fluoride in the water. This is a civil rights issue. Even if someone can “own” the land, no one owns the air or the environment…

  • Camron Wiltshire

    Spoiler Alert.
    http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/15/notes-on-the-fake-heartland-document/
    Gossip spreads quickly on ye ole internets.
    Jim Hoggan, PR guru is responsible for desmogblog who first issued this obvious smear.

    James HogganAbout Us (DeSmogBlog)“The DeSmogBlog team is led by Jim Hoggan, founder of James Hoggan & Associates, one of Canada’s leading public relations firms.”Who is James Hoggan? (Financial Post, Canada, June 5, 2008)“So who is James Hoggan? He’s a public relations man, based in Vancouver. His firm, James Hoggan and Associates, is positioned as a feel-good local operation with clients in all the “right” public and private sectors. He also sits on the board of the David Suzuki Foundation.One of his side efforts is a blog operated out of Hoggan and Associates. Funded by retired Internet bubble king John Lefebvre, the blog has one full-time and three part-time staff. They spend their time tracking down and maliciously attacking all who have doubts about climate change and painting them as corporate pawns.There has been no mention on the blog, nor on The Fifth Estate, of James Hoggan’s client list. They include or have included the National Hydrogen Association, Fuel Cells Canada, hydrogen producer QuestAir, Naikun Wind Energy and Ballard Fuel Cells. Mr. Hoggan, in other words, benefits from regulatory policy based on climate change science.”

  • Camron Wiltshire

    There title of this article reveals its bias. When we call someone “Deniers” it accomplishes two objectives:

    1) It associates them with Holocaust Deniers – who of course we all know are vile and dishonest racists.

    2) It implies that what they are denying must be true.

    “Sir, how long will you continue to deny that you’ve been cheating on your wife?”

    That’s such a dishonest tactic.

    It’s a shame that people refuse to look at these issues dispassionately and take evidence from both sides into account.

    Both sides of the debate include people or corporations looking to take advantage for personal or selfish gain.

    -Corporations that want fewer regulations will want to challenge climate change.

    -Individuals and companies who will profit from cap & trade or climate change initiatives will of course support it.

    Pollution is clearly a problem and is damaging the environment. That is undisputed.

    AGW is a theory, not a fact, and is disputed by many scientists. 

    Those who want to take action are using fear to make their argument. “If we don’t do something – NOW – the world will end!” That’s not a logical argument; it’s an emotional one.

    I won’t be persuaded by fear mongering. In fact, it pushes an open-minded and objective person in the opposite direction.
    Reposted from 
    [truthout] Re: Leak Reveals How Big Business Funds Climate-Change Deniers

    • Misinformation

       The Trivium method for the win!

      • Camron Wiltshire

        :)  

    • Mysophobe

      To complete your false equivalency for you:

      Those who don’t want to take any action are using fear to make their argument. “If we do anything to address it – EVER – the economy will suffer and our way of life will end!” That’s not a logical argument; it’s an emotional one.

      To imply that both “sides” of the debate stand on equal footing is a bit of a stretch. To say that an industry in it’s infancy has similar power and resources to the 100+ year-old fossil fuel industry is a bit naive. How do you explain that AGW theory has much more support than it’s competing theories in spite of the disparity of funding behind it?

      • Misinformation

         I looked all over for where Camron Wiltshire said,  “If we do anything to address it – EVER – the economy will suffer and our way of life will end!” Maybe he just paraphrased it and I can’t read between the lines. Could you be so kind as to point where he uses this argument?

        • Mysophobe

          Are you referring to the fact that Camron’s above comment is a re-post from truthout.org and that he is not the original author? Seems to me that he agrees with the opinions expressed in it, so I responded to him. If you’d like me to elaborate as to why said re-post is a steaming turd as it relates to this discussion, I’d be happy to.

          • Camron Wiltshire

            I think it’s rather obvious that a trace gas which has shown to have a phase relationship of about a century to heating (and as a result of increased heat, not as the cause mind you) is not what the Environmental movement should hinge their hopes of preventing the desecration of Mother Earth upon.  I believe the founder of Greenpeace agrees,  opining  that the Environmental movement had been hijacked.  Go figure…  

            Also I am curious as to why a reconstitution of one proxy alone (ice cores) gives anyone such assurance that Co2 has in fact never reached above the hypothetical ceiling of 350ppm.  In fact there are peer reviewed papers preceding all of this hyperbole (even the initial global cooling scares) that support we have had natural fluctuations easily doubling that number pre industrial revolution.  There are dozens of reasons why we should be hesitant to institute a giant derivatives trading scam that would essentially do nothing to protect the environment, but would ensure that the 3rd world never moves into the 21st century and that the so called elite can continue dining on beluga whale caviar at the next COP meeting (complete with running limos and the most expensive hotel rooms for all of their accompanying “environmentalists” http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/copenhagen-climate-change-confe/6736517/Copenhagen-climate-summit-1200-limos-140-private-planes-and-caviar-wedges.html

            But these are “inconvenient truths” that are apparently deemed heretical by the orthodoxy of the IPCC.  Yes of course I would be happy to present the data I’ve attested to above.  Would you promise to read it and respond in a scientific manner? 

            “We need to get out of the adversarial approach. People who base their opinion on science and reason and who are politically centrist need to take the movement back from the extremists who have hijacked it, often to further agendas that have nothing to do with ecology. It is important to remember that the environmental movement is only 30 years old. All movements go through some mucky periods. But environmentalism has become codified to such an extent that if you disagree with a single word, then you are apparently not an environmentalist. Rational discord is being discouraged. It has too many of the hallmarks of the Hitler youth, or the religious right.”  - Patrick Moore Founder of GreenPeace.

          • Mysophobe

            You kindof lost me at “initial global cooling scares”. You seem to be laboring under the assumption that poking holes in a scientific theory weakens it, when quite the opposite is true. Regarding ice cores: if you have a better method for determining the historic composition of the earth’s atmosphere, I’m sure the scientific community would love to hear it.

      • Camron Wiltshire

        I question your assumption that the IPCC pro AGW camp receives less funding for their research.  I also question the validity of the assumption that anyone who disagrees with the assumptions of the IPCC must in fact be funded by Big Petrol.  That would be a composition fallacy as well as a false dichotomy.  Please provide any supporting evidence for your financial aposteriori argument.

        • Mysophobe

          IPCC’s total international budget for 2012 is projected to be about $7,300,000:

          http://www.ipcc.ch/meetings/session29/doc3.pdf

          From sourcewatch.org: The Koch brothers alone gave $5,000,000, earmarked specifically for anti-AGW work to one organization, Americans for Prosperity

          I’d be happy to dig deeper later today, someone else has probably already compiled something regarding this. On the face of it, IPCC sure looks to be way behind in the money game.

  • Jd

    I read an article on here about our prison system becoming a corporate affair…Which was unsettling. Now I might be going a little bit of a leap here but,  it seems our schools might be leaning the same in the same direction…It is also interesting to see who is funding this…Should also be interesting as to what is taught….Can’t wait to hear about the next “projects”…

    • Misinformation

       I’m not sure that making schools a “corporate affair” is the way to go. But bringing an end to the public schooling system as it now operates, can’t come soon enough. A schooling (please note the lack of the word education, in my post here) system designed over 150 years ago to “industrialize” and militarize it’s population, was only ever going to serve a very few, powerful people.

      This may be of interest to you: http://disinfo.com/2012/01/the-ultimate-history-lesson-a-weekend-with-john-taylor-gatto/

      And since you mentioned prisons and public schools in the same breath, so to speak. Here’s a fun one from the “father” of U.S. public education:

      Jails
      and prisons are the complement of schools; so many less as you have of
      the latter, so many more must you have of the former. 
      - Horace Mann

      • Camron Wiltshire

        John Taylor Gatto for the win!  ;)

        • Jin The Ninja

          now there is a person with a specific focus, on which we both agree.

  • DeepCough

    “Science” is now the new “Religion” of Politics.

    Oh, what fresh Hell hath we wrought!

  • http://www.facebook.com/Rev.Lee.Harvey.Roswelld Thomas Watts

    The document in question is a hoax.

    I posted the link below.

    • Mysophobe

      Nice attempt at obviscation, but you are incorrect according to the Heartland Institute’s own press release on the matter. They claim that, of the multiple leaked documents, only one is a fake: 2012 Climate Strategy. The document that this article quotes from – 2012 Fundraising Plan: Global Warming Curriculum for K-12 Schools, is GENUINE.

      • Misinformation

        Setting aside “memogate” for a moment. I’m curious as to what you think solutions to the “climate crisis” are?

        • Mysophobe

          That’s a bit above my pay grade, but I believe the first step is honestly identifying the problem. There are powerful forces at work trying to prevent that here in the US, as exhibited by these leaked documents. People debate it on sites like this, as if there are two different, yet equally valid perspectives. There aren’t. There is no other valid competing scientific theory that explains why the earth’s atmosphere is gaining energy at an unprecedented rate. There is no meaningful debate within the scientific community. The controversy surrounding this subject is purely invented, anyone who has been paying attention can see that. There are long established entrenched interests with incredible resources at their disposal telling us not to believe our own eyes. Sadder still that so many useful idiots carry water for the very perps that contributed to this mess.

          • Misinformation

             I view it slightly differently. To me, the controversy is that average people, most people, have an impact in this. I don’t think anyone who isn’t completely corrupt believes that there isn’t warming going on. The temperature data is pretty hard to refute. Let’s set aside the fact that we’re talking about the climate of a planet and nobody can know, truly, what comes next.

            As I stated in an earlier post, well,

            “”Climate change” or, environmental overload or whatever it should be
            called is certainly real. Humans most likely play a part. But the idea
            that it’s any but a very small portion of the population that is driving
            the problem is ridiculous. Am I to believe that getting in my car and
            driving 20 miles round trip to work or, not changing to the mercury
            induced cfl bulbs will actually make a difference? These are straw men
            and part of a larger agenda.

            Less than 1% of the shipping industry emits more CO2 than all the cars on the planet combined: http://www.guardian.co.uk/envi…
            Joe citizen didn’t spill millions of gallons of oil into the Gulf. I
            don’t clear-cut old-growth to get my 4 chords of wood per year. Most
            folks don’t dump mercury, arsenic, pcb’s, etc. into the rivers or flood
            the air with benzene.

            The argument of environmental solutions
            needs to shift to the perpetrators. We need to stop the perpetrators
            from framing the argument as if average people were making an impact.
            When the polluters begin to make money from their carbon tax, the proof
            of their Hegelian Dialectic will be clear.”

            I’m not buying the “solutions” to this here problem. That alone makes it a worthy debate.

          • Mysophobe

            I wholeheartedly agree, and I fully realize that commercial interests are far more destructive than all consumers put together. Not to mention that the average consumer has no choice but to buy what they’re selling. I do think we can have an impact in that regard, voting with our dollars. In the end though, the only true progress will be made by way of we the people forcing the perps to alter their destructive practices through legislation or at the very least by making them compete on a level playing field where they are made to absorb the true costs of their destructive practices. This is why I see public opinion as being so critical, and why I’m so troubled by those who act in bad faith to polute the public discourse and prevent even the simplest legislative and market solutions from seeing the light of day.

          • Misinformation

             I suppose this is the impasse for me. I don’t feel government will ever truly lead us out of anything. Government will always tend toward corruption, even if it takes some time.

            Restoring our critical thinking and empowering people to observe, intelligently with their five senses is the only way out of the darkness. And I’m well aware that my desires are, at best, unlikely.

  • http://twitter.com/WarWithEastasia warwitheastasia

    “The Heartland Institute, a right-wing think tank funded by the Koch brothers, Microsoft, and other top corporations”… I’m wondering why the Kochs are listed first.  Is it to imply they’re the biggest donors?  If the Kochs are climate deniers, why do their mouthpieces like the Reason and Cato Foundations promote AGW as real and do research on the subject?  Before the inevitable troll/shill accusations, I checked this out because I’ve read plenty of articles insinuating the Kochs’ are GW deniers, but seen very little actual evidence.  If this is true, why aren’t Reason and Cato, who rely on huge grants from the Kochs, towing the line?  All I did was google “koch heartland”, and I found this:”The Charles Koch Foundation today released the following statement… “Our giving to the Heartland Institute has been repeatedly misrepresented… the Charles Koch Foundation provided $25,000 to the Heartland Institute in 2011 for research in healthcare, not climate change, and this was the first and only donation the Foundation made to the institute in more than a decade. The Foundation has made no further commitments of funding to Heartland”.
    Then, on the “Political activities of the Koch family” wiki: “The Charles G. Koch Foundation is (along with the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory and Bill Gates climate fund) a major funder of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project, an effort to resolve criticism of records of the Earth’s surface temperatures (two of the project’s seven scientists are seen as climate skeptics by many in the climate science world)”.
    So I think you’ve got the wrong shadowy billionaires.  For everything else the Kochs do, however bad it may be, AGW denial is not on the list, at least not through the Heartland Institute.  In fact, they fund people who actively promote the idea of AGW, so I don’t know how this guilt-by-association tactic has survived for so long when its so easily falsifiable.

    • Camron Wiltshire

      Thank you.  Great response.