The following appeared at the http://www.science20.com/chatter_box
column by Patrick Lockerby. I found it so relevant I've decided to print all of it.
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The Heartland Institute And Murdoch MediaBy Patrick Lockerby | February 20th 2012 08:32 PM |
Written by Patrick Lockerby
The Heartland Institute story broke on February 14th. The revelation that anti-science bunkum has been funded by corporate dollars was no surprise to those of us who have been investigating these propaganda mills. Peter H Gleik has confirmed that he was the one who obtained the secret documents. In confirming that he got them straight from the Heartland Institute he also confirms their authenticity.
The world at large also needs to know that Rupert Murdoch's media empire - which often cites the Heartland Institute as a source for "climate science" - has managed to block publication of anything relating to this denialgate story in all but two of its outlets.
At the time of writing, of the mighty magnate Murdoch's multiple media mouthpieces only The Australian has covered the denialgate news. The story broke February 14th, but the Australian story was posted February 17th. However, it was straight copy from an AP newsfeed.
The other denialgate material was merely a pathetic bit of blogspin here and here by Andrew Bolt.
In the UK, the Daily Mail, Daily Telegraph and Times also failed to cover the story. The Telegraph - or Toiletgraph as I prefer to call it - instead of this globally important news printed a nasty smear about how Richard Dawkins' ancestors kept slaves. The Daily Mail, a newspaper which once prided itself on investigative journalism, recently managed to distort a news release from the U.K. Met Office so badly that the Met Office felt the need to post this response. The Daily Mail and the GWPF seem to have a cozy relationship in which the GWPF gives "science advice" to the Daily Mail. The Daily Mail is linked through Daily Mail and General Trust plc to DMG Radio Australia - whose chairman is Lachlan Murdoch - the eldest son of Rupert Murdoch.
Not one of the following Murdoch "News" outlets has covered the Heartland Institute deniergate affair as far as I can ascertain:
alicenow.com.au
brooklyndaily.com
brooklynpaper.com
BxTimes.com
couriermail.com.au
dailytelegraph.com.au
dailytidings.com
djnewswires.com
efinancialnews.com
foxnews.com
foxtel.com.au
heraldsun.com.au
marketwatch.com
mxnet.com.au
news.com.au
ntnews.com.au
nypost.com
online.barrons.com
online.wsj.com
postcourier.com.pg
sky.com
sky.co.nz
sky.de
sky.it
the-leader.com
themercury.com.au
thesun.co.uk
thesundaymail.com.au
thesundaytimes.co.uk
thetimes.co.uk
th-record.com
timesledger.com
A news blackout is a very old propaganda trick. The hope is that the target audience will never hear the other side of the argument. Meanwhile, the propagandist keeps repeating the same old propaganda slogans: it's the sun, it's cosmic rays, etc.
Rupert Murdoch, like the old time radio broadcaster: "is a sovereign lord. He decides whether the event is spoken about at all, that is, whether it is broadcast."
"One-sidedness is indispensable because the confusion around us is so great that every impression will quickly be shoved aside by a new one. Nothing is forgetful as the masses. Something can have appeared in a thousand newspapers and have been talked about by the millions, but a few months later it will be completely forgotten."
quoted words from Eugen Hadamovsky.
When it became known that our production of greenhouse gases was unsettling the world's climate system, the world's sovereign states joined together in an unprecedented attempt to identify and address the problem. The sovereign states asked the world's scientists to investigate and the world's scientists responded. Amongst those sovereign states were the U.S., Australia, Canada and the U.K. It is in those countries that political think tanks like the Heartland Institute and the GWPF have been most actively engaged in trying to undermine the scientific base of evidence which informs our democracies. It is notable that in order to undermine the scientific authority of the IPCC, the Heartland Institute funded the NIPCC.
"And what do we do with this money? Well we in turn hire students whose job it is to review current papers in the literature and these are reviewed and get published in the NIPCC reports."
Fred Singer
So, do you trust some of the world's top climate scientists, or a bunch of students who are presumably told which cherries to pick?
These and other paid propagandists have deliberately set out to undermine the democratic process by which climate policy is decided. Under the guise of freedom of speech they have freely lied through their teeth for a few pieces of silver.
Modern democracies depend on science for their very survival, and science depends on true freedom of speech.
Fortunately, ordinary people are now waking up and smelling the bullshit. They know they are being had. You can fool some of the people some of the time, but when you place democracy itself in peril and think you can get away with it, then you fool only yourself.
Democracy and freedom of speech are not for sale to the highest bidder - period.
http://www.science20.com/chatter_box/heartland_institute_and_murdoch_media-87115
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