Anatomy of Denialist Tactics, or how to know you're being conned

Fortunately I’m a self-employed working stiff, since it’s great having work and people hiring me... the unfortunate part is that when I have work it doesn’t allow me the time to properly pursue this main interest of mine.  That being to participate in the struggle against the dysfunctionality that our Anthropogenic Global Warming discussion has been forced to descend into - Thanks to a selective few, supported by some very rich individuals who’s wealth enables them to create “Think Tanks” dedicated to agenda over substance; to debate over learning; to self interest over citizenship.  
 
Heartland Institute, being but a recent superstar in that arena of public relations manipulation over substantive learning, recently released papers showing us how one ultra rich “Anonymous Donor” can supply the backbone for a group of ideologues to manufacture what amounts to nothing more than political crazy-making. - focused on diverting attention from the real issues we should be facing.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 
 
Unfortunately right now my time is limited so all I can do is post the following outline, one that was ironically supplied by Professor Peter Gleick some five years ago.  Still the following is a good outline of the deceptive tactics employed by the likes of Heartland Institute - and I will find many examples to attach to it, as time permits.  
 
That’s why I’m looking forward to examining Heartland Institute’s own ruthless actions over the years against the moralizing cloak they have draped themselves in...
but alas, that will take a few days... stay tuned.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The following comes from Senate testimony Dr. Peter Gleick gave regarding the degeneration of the standards of discussion and the tactics global warming denial organizations such as Heartland Institute resort to in their attack against rational peer reviewed science.

http://www.pacinst.org/press_center/press_releases/20070207.html
Pacific Institute
Reported:  Wednesday, February 7, 2007

Washington’s Attacks on Science “Pervasive” 
Peter Gleick Provides Testimony to Senate Hearing

(WASHINGTON, D.C.) Political distortions of the scientific process have undergone a dramatic rise in Washington over the past six years, according to the Senate testimony of Dr. Peter Gleick, president of the Pacific Institute. Gleick’s testimony (download - PDF) was provided to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation hearing on Climate Change Research and Science Integrity Wednesday. Misuse of science and attacks on scientists, Gleick finds, have been pervasive and categorical.

“Good, independent science – indeed good information in general – is crucial to making good political decisions,” Gleick wrote. “It is difficult enough to make intelligent policy choices given the complexities of today’s political, environmental, economic, and social challenges. It is almost impossible when good science or data are ignored or distorted, or when bad science is sought out to support pre-determined political conclusions.”

{I have found it appropriate to add another category heading to Gleick's list}
==========
http://www.pacinst.org/topics/integrity_of_science/categories_of_deceitful_tactics_and_abuse.pdf


Testimony of Dr. Peter Gleick, February 7, 2007  Senate Commerce, Science, and Transportation

Categories of Deceitful Tactics 
and Abuse of the Scientific Process

(source: P.H. Gleick, Pacific Institute, 2007)

There are many tactics used to argue for or against scientific conclusions that are inappropriate, 

involve deceit, or directly abuse the scientific process. 

Appeal to Emotion

This is a large category and involves using various tactics to incite emotions in people in order to persuade them that a particular argument or hypothesis is true or false, independent of the scientific evidence. 

     Appeal to Fear
     Appeal to Flattery
     Appeal to Pity
     Appeal to Ridicule
     Appeal to Spite

 ~ ~ ~

Personal (“Ad Hominem”) Attacks

This approach uses attacks against the character, circumstances, or motives of a person in order to discredit their argument or claim, independent of the scientific evidence.

     Demonization
     Guilt by Association
     Challenge to Motive (such as greed or funding)

 ~ ~ ~

Mischaracterizations of an Argument

This approach typically mischaracterizes an issue or evidence and then argues against the mischaracterization. It can include.

     Begging the Question
     Circular Reasoning
     Partial Truths (willful ignorance)
     Selective Choice of Problems (willful ignorance)

~ ~ ~

 

Straw Man Argument (includes substituting a distorted, exaggerated, or misrepresented position for the one being argued

Loaded Question (includes posing a question with an implied position that the opponent does not have.)

 False Dichotomy (for or against)/False dilemma (includes assuming that there are only two possible opinions or choices.)

 Misplaced Burden of Proof 

 Confusing Cause and Effect

 Red Herring (includes presentation of an irrelevant topic to divert attention from another topic.

 Slippery Slope (includes the assertion that one event must inevitably follow from another)

Partial Truths

Willfully Ignoring (excluding all portions of information that undercut your argument)


~ ~ ~ 

Inappropriate Generalization

Accusing all of a group of people or arguments or set of facts as having the characteristics of a subset of that group. 

 ~ ~ ~

Misuse of Facts

     Numerical Mischaracterization 
     Selective Choice or Presentation of Data; Biased Sample
     Inadequate Sample; Hasty Generalization; 
                Leaping to a Conclusion
     Selective Omissions of Data  (willfully ignoring)
     Illusory Precision (where precision isn’t needed or available)
     Inappropriate Vagueness (where precision is needed)
     Unrelated Facts 
      (bringing unrelated facts that seem to support a conclusion)
     Willfully Ignoring (important facts)

 

 ~ ~ ~

Misuse of Uncertainty
     Misplaced Certainty
     Misrepresentation of Uncertainty

False Authority

Including appeal to authority not competent to address issue

Hidden Value Judgments

Including judgments based on ideological or religious rationales rather than reviewable and testable evidence.

Scientific Misconduct 

The violation of the standard codes of scholarly conduct and ethical behavior in professional scientific research, including: 

    Fabrication (the fabrication of research data and observations)

    Falsification (manipulation of research data and processes or omitting critical data or results)

    Failure to Acknowledge and Correct Errors

Willfully Ignoring (inconvenient Earth Observation data)

~ ~ ~ 

Science Policy Misconduct 

The manipulation of the process of integrating science and policy, including:

    Packing Advisory Boards

    Imposing Litmus Tests

    Altering or Suppressing Information

    Bullying of Scientists

    Selective Funding or De-funding

HeartlandGate; FakeGate; DenialGate, what's the real debate

I listened to an interview that disturbed me. 

It highlighted a few core problems/symptoms of today’s crazy climate debate vs. climate science.  Since my perspective wasn’t represented in this discuss 
I’ve decided to make my own essay out of it.

I’ve, sort of, quoted from the broadcast, though with many gaps since in this exercise it’s the broader issues I want to touch on, besides no time for a polished version.  
The program is available at

================================
89.3 KPCC ~ AirTalk online
http://www.scpr.org/programs/airtalk/2012/02/23/22646/heartland-leak
« Episode: AirTalk for February 23, 2012

Heartland leaker comes clean, stirs ethical debate
================================

Heartland Institute's Hired Guns & The NIPCC... Mr. Littlemore

Watts has been having a rager over at his blog... adding his own spin fast as he can.  Here's a recent update:  UPDATE 55: 1:50PM 2/25 The Weekly Standard has a great story up.
(Anthony) Loved this part:

Finally, “coordinated”? Few public policy efforts have ever had the massive institutional and financial coordination that the climate change cause enjoys. That tiny Heartland, with but a single annual conference and a few phone-book-sized reports summarizing the skeptical case, can derange the climate campaign so thoroughly is an indicator of the weakness and thorough politicization of climate alarmism.

Yes it is disgusting that a tiny Heartland can get the type of financial backing to pay professional contrarians in a media effort far removed from doing actual science.  But, folks like Anthony are so focused on their political goals they feel justified doing anything and saying anything so long as they can out shout the voices of science and rationality.

Richard Littlemore at DeSmogBlog.com has a great article highlighting one aspect of that rational.  Hire scientists - not to learn but to create rhetorical parlor debate tricks intent on stonewalling any recognition of what climate science is teaching us. 

Check out The Heartland Institute’s “Brain Trust” - who are incidentally, pretty much the same dozen folks who produce the Nongovernmental Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change reports.

I'm posting this {words are all Littlemore, highlight are all mine} because in conversations at various internet discussion forums, one of the main refrains that gets tossed in my face is how it all comes down to which scientist you choose to believe.  Coupled onto that is the claim that government and university scientists manipulate their data to achieve some mandated consensus.  

Sadly those charges come from people who have either remained blessedly ignorant of the parade of scientific literature and the history of their learning process - or folks who are hired guns and for whom honesty is a joke when it gets in the way of 
their corporate wild west style free-market agenda.

As support for this image of The Heartland Institute as ruthlessly dedicated to a message rather than learning about climatology I copy the following from Richard Littlemore’s February 24, 2012 post at Desmogblog.com because it contains names and sums and reveals Heartland Institute for the agenda driven lobby organization that it is.  Dedicated to undermining serious rational science.  

It scares the hell outta me that such people remain so powerful and are allowed to cause such counter productive crazy-making...  since there's not much I can do, here's my contribution to the effort... to witness and document this scandal as it plays out.
 

What passes for a Brain Trust at Heartland?

Keep Climate Denial Out of Our Schools, Corey Husic

VIDEO WORTH WATCHING. . .  THEN SIGNING HER LETTER TO HEARTLAND INSTITUTE

I'm sharing the following because people need to stand up to the willful manipulation and lying that is Heartland Institute's stock'n trade.
Corey Husic and high school friends put together this
video and open-letter to Heartland Institute
as a response to Heartland Institute's plans for flooding schools with contrarian fiction/science
focused on creating confusion rather than supporting any serious learning process.

http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2012/02/24/431922/heartland-institute-keep-climate-denial-out-of-our-schools/?mobile=nc

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Corey Husic, a student and trained Climate Presenter, is sending the message below to Joseph Bast, President and CEO, Heartland Institute. Sign our petition and join Corey in standing up for reality. Say NO to climate denial in our schools. (my highlights)

Dear Mr. Bast {Heartland Institute},
I'm Corey Husic, and I'm a high school student in Pennsylvania. It's come to my attention that you are prepared to spend a significant amount of money on a "global warming curriculum" to teach kids that climate change isn't real.

That's right. According to your own budget documents, you want to hand teachers a curriculum that says global warming is "a major scientific controversy" and that carbon dioxide might not even be a pollutant.

Please be advised: Your entire premise is false. The reality is that our climate is changing now and human activities are a primary cause. I’m just a high school student, so please don’t take my word for it. Just ask any National Academy of Science in the world or just about any actual climate scientist.


Given who pays your bills, your plan doesn’t come as a surprise. According to your own documents, your organization is funded by coal and oil companies with a financial stake in denying climate science — not to mention tobacco companies that tried to convince us smoking doesn't cause cancer.

My generation is already experiencing a very different climate from our parents and grandparents. We will be the ones responsible for making sure coastal cities are able to withstand rising sea levels. We are the ones who will have to protect ourselves from weather extremes like stronger hurricanes, longer droughts and hotter heat waves. Instead of trying to undermine the science that shows humans are causing climate change, we should be learning how those changes are going to affect us and what we can do about it. In other words, teach us something useful.

We respectfully demand that you cease and desist your effort to bring climate change denial into our schools.

Corey Husic
Age 17
Climate Presenter

Please click on  Climate Reality Project site and sign Corey's letter.
       

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Another interesting report on Heartland Institute's crazy-making agenda:

Ana Kasparian and Cenk Uygur discuss the HI's school initiative on The Young Turks


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IvT4VTgf_bY

Uploaded by TheYoungTurks on Feb 18, 2012

 

"...internal documents acquired by ThinkProgress Green reveal that 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"...".

* http://thinkprogress.org/green/2012/02/14/425354/internal-documents-climate-d...

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I figured may as well include these links courtesy of Richard Littlemore
http://www.desmogblog.com/heartland-insider-exposes-institute-s-budget-and-strategy

Heartland Insider Exposes Institute's Budget and Strategy

Deep Climate – Heartland Institute Budget and Strategy Revealed
Greg Laden – Anti-Science Institute’s Insider Reveals Secrets
Planet 3.0 – Is turnabout Fair Play?
Climate Crocks - How is Joe Bast like Joe Camel?
Climate Progress - Heartland Documents Reveal Fringe Denial Group Plans to Pursue Koch Money, 
Dupe Children and Cultivate Revkin

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

 

Speaking of getting the message across, here's a look at young climatologists on their day off. 

 

~ I'M A CLIMATE SCIENTIST ~

"In the media landscape there are climate change deniers and believers, but rarely are those speaking about climate change actual climate scientists... "

Here's a little ditty, and it goes like this:
Yo....we're climate scientists.. and there's no denying this Climate Change Is REEEEALL..

Who's a climate scientist...
I'm a climate scientist... . . . . .

{...} 

EXTENDED ON iTUNES:
http://itunes.apple.com/au/album/im-climate-scientist-nsfw/id437765051?i=4377...
CLEAN VIDEO VERSION HERE:
http://youtu.be/H7wdKg8rYL0

Fritz Vahrenholt, Der Spiegel: I Feel Duped on Climate Change... A Review

Examining Fritz Vahrenholt's 
answers in his Der Spiegel's interview


'I Feel Duped on Climate Change'
 

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 

The outgoing German electric utility executive Fritz Vahrenholt recently published a book "Die Kalte Sonne" (The Cold Sun) that put him at the top of the media circuit for a while.


I was given Vahrenholt’s interview with Der Spiegel {Germany’s premier news magazine} as a supposed eye opener.  Instead I found a man way too convinced of his own infallibility, who described the science with appalling deceitfulness.  Olaf Stampf and Gerald Traufetter do a nice job of interviewing and getting Vahrenholt to open up.  Still answer by answer he says things I know are blatantly false.  Then Vahrenholt’s constant disingenuous complaints about the IPCC went so over the top, they demanded a rebuttal. 

By the end of it I was angry enough to start all over again, to consider and research Vahrenholt’s answers.  My intention was to document his nonsense answer by answer.
After many delays and other projects I’ve fairly finished it, 
though I have the feeling I'll be working on it for a while yet.
Review of Fritz Vahrenholt A Denialist In Action. 



I do warn you, it's a long one (23 questions), specifically intended for the student of the Art of Denial.




Der Speigel’s article, published February 8, 2012, includes a hefty six hundred word introduction to this “practiced provocateur” that makes for a good read: 
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,813814,00.html

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Examining  Fritz Vahrenholt replies to Der Spiegel interviewers {Stampf and Traufetter}: 

'I Feel Duped on Climate Change'

It's Time That Climate-Change Deniers Were Exposed ~ David Suzuki

Getting caught up on the news this morning I read David Suzuki's article 
"It's Time That Climate-Change Deniers Were Exposed."  
It's another original that deserves to be added to this collection.  
His refreshing appraisal of Heartland Institute’s handling of this affair was an excellent counterbalance to the onslaught of the professional HI PR juggernaut and incidentals like Bud Ward’s nose dive over at Yale Forum.

Once again I tried grabbing key paragraphs, and once again, it don't work. 
With a twinge of trepidation {in advance, thank you David Suzuki} here is another essential-reading 
article for students of:

~ Anthropogenic Global Warming Denial ~
 
Chapter - Heartland Institute Mindset...  
Sub-heading - Puzzling over Heartland Institute's disconnect from our planet's realities? . . . 
{dare I say their Willful Ignorance? . . .}

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

It's time that climate-change deniers were exposed

By  David Suzuki,  ~ February 21, 2012 ~ David Suzuki Foundation

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

When hackers broke into an Internet server at East Anglia University in the U.K. and selectively released massive amounts of correspondence from the world’s leading climate scientists, folks at the Chicago-based Heartland Institute were quick to exploit it.

Heartland president Joseph Bast wrote: “The release of these documents creates an opportunity for reporters, academics, politicians, and others who relied on the IPCC to form their opinions about global warming to stop and reconsider their position.”

He may have been correct, although “reconfirm” would have been a better word than “reconsider” as seven independent investigations cleared the scientists of any wrongdoing and confirmed the credibility of their research.

Now the tables have been turned on the libertarian “charitable” organization, which devotes its resources to questioning the reality of climate change and the dangers of secondhand tobacco smoke, among other issues.

Heartland is just one of many organizations dedicated to spreading doubt and confusion about legitimate science. These groups share a lack of transparency and an agenda to promote corporate interests at the expense of human health, the environment, and even the economy (if we believe the economy should function primarily in the interests of citizens rather than corporations).

Recently, someone—since identified as climate scientist Peter Gleick—sent documents from the Heartland Institute’s board of directors’ January 17 meeting to a number of people and organizations, including Desmog Blog, a website devoted to exposing the spin around climate change denial. The documents confirm much of what we already knew about Heartland, although they provide interesting details about its connections and motives.

Not surprisingly, the Heartland people don’t see this as “an opportunity for reporters, academics, politicians, and others” to learn more about the secretive group’s agenda. Instead, Heartland posted a statement on its website saying, “honest disagreement should never be used to justify the criminal acts and fraud that occurred in the past 24 hours.”

Unlike most environmental and social justice organizations, including the David Suzuki Foundation, the Heartland Institute doesn’t publicly reveal information about where it gets its money and what it does with it.

These documents indicate that Heartland has offered U.S. weatherman blogger and climate change denier Anthony Watts close to $90,000 for a new project. They also reveal that Heartland funds other prominent deniers, including “Craig Idso ($11,600 per month), Fred Singer ($5,000 per month, plus expenses), Robert Carter ($1,667 per month), and a number of other individuals..."

The papers also confirm that the institute’s primary mission is to discredit the established science of human-caused climate change. And even though it has received funding from wealthy individuals and corporations in the fossil fuel and tobacco industries, including the Koch brothers and RJR Tobacco, it gets most of its money from a single anonymous donor, who has ponied up as much as $4.6 million in a single year, 2008.

If these groups were truly engaged in questioning the science, using valid scientific methods and principles, it wouldn’t be a problem. Science is strengthened through scrutiny and challenges; that’s how it works, and that’s what the peer-review process is about. But these organizations are engaged in secretive and dishonest lobbying and public relations efforts aimed at stalling measures to protect the environment and health.

Gleick has admitted that he made a mistake in posing as someone else to obtain the documents. The unidentified East Anglia hackers were also wrong to have stolen the emails, and the Heartland Institute is wrong when it lies about the most serious threat to humanity.

Three wrongs don’t make a right, but there are some differences. In the East Anglia case, the investigations turned on those who were hacked and ultimately proved that the climate scientists, although human, are engaged in sound and verifiable science and that they have been subjected to years of harassment and bullying for their work. The Heartland documents show that the organization is using its taxpayer-supported status to spread lies and misinformation.

It’s about time these “merchants of doubt” were exposed. It’s time to get back to real science as practiced by scientists. We must get beyond the false debate about the reality of climate change and into the real debate about what to do about it.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

http://www.straight.com/article-612156/vancouver/david-suzuki-its-time-climatechange-deniers-were-exposed

Written with contributions from David Suzuki Foundation
Editorial and Communications Specialist Ian Hanington
Learn more at www.davidsuzuki.org.

Text is 100% David Suzuki, formatting is all mine.  ;-)

Scientists can also wear their citizen hats, Scott Mandia

Another installment of my history of the Unfolding DenialGate story.  As told by timely articles.

For the past few days Heartland Institute has been sending out letters demanding that all references and links to their leaked documents be removed.  Can't blame them it's some embarrassing stuff.  But I can't find any sympathy for them either.

This article includes a reply letter from Scott Mandia, Joshua Wolfe and Jeff Ruch to Heartland Institute's threats.  And links to copies of Heartlands Institute's letters.  The post is from Scott Mandia's  Global Warming: Man or Myth?


============================================

http://profmandia.wordpress.com/2012/02/21/heartland-serves-threatening-letters-climate-science-legal-defend-fund-peer-hit-back/

Scientists can also wear their citizen hats
 Heartland Serves Threatening Letters,

Climate Science Legal Defense Fund & PEER Hit Back

Heartland Institute Got Caught With Their Pants Down

Climate Denial In The Classroom ~ LATimes Editorial

News packed days.  
Unfortunately most people don't care and the media is doing little to change that.  
That's why I'm thinking, Jeez someone should be bearing witness.  

For the record after I posting the text of an article, I send the authors an email with a link.  Response has been supportive, no one has asked me to remove my reproductions of their work and I'm encouraged to continue, so, here it is.

I'm starting to think this may turn into a running feature, at least while the DenialGate things is running hot.  A select collection of timely articles. With the passage of months, it'll become a record of these events as they unfolded. The following is highlights from an LA Times editorial:

====================================================

LA Times Editorial ~ February 20, 2012

Climate denial in the classroom
It's bad enough that we're doing so little to fight climate change; let's not ask teachers to lie about it too.

The culture wars {...} The latest skirmish, by contrast, is centered on a scientific issue that has nothing to do with religious teaching: climate change.

{...} Heartland Institute in Chicago, one of many nonprofits that spread disinformation about climate science in hopes of stalling government action to combat global warming, reveal that the organization is working on a curriculum for public schools that casts doubt on the work of climatologists worldwide. Heartland officials say one of the documents was a fake, {...}. According to the New York Times, the curriculum would claim, {...} "whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy."


{...}

On one side of the "controversy" are credentialed climatologists around the globe who publish in reputable, peer-reviewed scientific journals and agree that the planet is warming and that humans are to blame; on the other are fossil-fuel-industry-funded "experts" who tend to have little background in climatology and who publish non-peer-reviewed papers in junk magazines disputing established truths. These are quickly debunked, but not before their findings have been reported by conservative blogs and news outlets, which somehow never get around to mentioning it when these studies are proved to be badly flawed.

{...} battle over classroom instruction {...} won't go on for decades, {...} impacts {...} already patently obvious. 

Seven of the 10 warmest years since global record-keeping began in 1880 have occurred in the 21st century. {...} Pennsylvania State University professor Michael Mann's "hockey stick" graph, which shows that temperatures in the latter half of the 20th century soared to their highest level in 1,000 years, {...} validated repeatedly.

 Last year set a record for the most climate-related disasters in the United States costing more than $1 billion in damage each — drought-fueled wildfires in Texas, Hurricane Irene, and Mississippi River flooding were among the 14 cases.

{...}
Sophisticated climate models show {...} going to get a lot worse. 
It's bad enough {...} gambling our children's futures {...} doing so little {...} fight this problem.

Let's not ask their teachers to lie to them about it too.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~  ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

LA Times Editorial ~ February 20, 2012
Climate denial in the classroom

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/opinionla/la-ed-climate-20120220,0,3564279.story

{selections are unaltered, my emphasis & formatting}:

Heroes and Zeroes In The Heartland, by Steve Zwick

 

     In catching up on the news and Peter Gleick revealing himself as receiver of the Heartland Institute's "DenialGate" documents. 

     I was reading this article written by Steve Zwick and thought: man this guy really nailed it.  I've gone through it a couple times now, trying to cut out highlights to post here, but it's too good, in one piece.

     It deserves to be echoed in its entirety.  I didn't change any wording. But I have taken over formatting, all highlights and colors reflect my reading, and I've added some extra links to relevant information.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ 
 
Heroes and Zeroes In The Heartland: 

Why Gleick Was Right To Leak the Docs

Murdoch Media Ignores DenialGate News

 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.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

The Heartland Institute And Murdoch Media

By Patrick Lockerby | February 20th 2012 08:32 PM |

The Chatter Box

The Heartland Institute and Murdoch Media

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.

Vahrenholt, Der Spiegel: "I Feel Duped" Interview, #6 examined

Dr. Vahrenholt as featured at WattsUpWithThat on February 13, 2012, personally introduced by Anthony Watts:
"German skeptics Lüning and Vahrenholt respond to criticism"

I myself am again astounded at the frauds Anthony Watts expects us to believe in.  Dr. Fritz Vahrenholt the latest practiced provocateur joining Anthony's parade is a stellar example of the shameless deception these folks peddle.

As it happens I've been taking a closer look at another interview 

Vahrenholt's gave during his media-blitz.  

This interview was printed in the February 8th issue of the German magazine Der Spiegel.  And I want to examine his answers.  For starters:
 

Vahrenholt . . . ‘I Feel Duped on Climate Change’

Question #6: of Research, Models and Earth is Cooling
~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

#6)  DER SPIEGEL: You make concrete statements on how much human activity contributes to climatic events and how much of a role natural factors play. Why don’t you publish your prognoses in a professional journal?

Dr. Vahrenholt: Because I don’t engage in my own climate research. Besides, I don’t have a supercomputer in my basement. For the most part, my co-author, geologist Sebastian Lüning, and I merely summarize what scientists have published in professional journals—just as the IPCC does. The book is also a platform for scientists who apply good arguments in diverging from the views of the IPCC. The established climate models have failed across the board because they cannot cogently explain the absence of warming.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Vahrenholt, exemplifies

Watts Up With DenialGate ?

Anthony Watts has made a good living proclaiming that the scientific community's “consensus” cannot be trusted.  A consensus that's been arrived at after decades of study by literally tens of thousands of researchers.  Instead trotting out a gallery of so-called independent scientists to present an alternative view of reality.

It seems that Heartland likes his work too.  As revealed by the recent revelations of DenialGate, or as I like calling it HeartlandGate.

Of course, Anthony is crying foul and claiming it’s all a fraud... though Heartland sounded less certain when apologizing to donors for their names being exposed.  They do assert at least one particularly damning document was a fake.  Worth mentioning is that Justin Gillis and Leslie Kaufman reporting for the NYTimes weren’t impressed with the denial writing:

“Heartland did declare one two-page document to be a forgery, although its tone and content closely matched that of other documents that the group did not dispute. In an apparent confirmation that much of the material, more than 100 pages, was authentic, the group apologized to donors whose names became public as a result of the leak.”

As for Anthony ~ seems he was paid $44,000 in January with another $44,000 promised for setting up a website “devoted to accessing the new temperature data from NOAA’s website."  Which in Watts' world means finding the slightest flaw and hyper-inflating it to justify a total disregard for what the data is telling us.

Recall that Watts’ previous effort to undermine trust in the official temperature records, the Surfacestations Project turned out to be a dud that, just like the recent BEST Study, turned out to validate the official temperature records {and here}... unless of course one takes Watts’ egomaniacal stand that anyone disagreeing with him is in on the “climate conspiracy” one that involves tens of thousands of researchers across countless scientific disciplines, no less.

Among the contemptible revelations perhaps this one reported at ThinkProgress.org by Brad Johnson is the worst.  A strategic attack on science within schools {no wonder America is falling behind in science education} :

Dr. Wojick proposes to begin work on “modules” for grades 10-12 on climate change (“whether humans are changing the climate is a major scientific controversy“), climate models (“models are used to explore various hypotheses about how climate works. Their reliability is controversial”), and air pollution (“whether CO2 is a pollutant is controversial. It is the global food supply and natural emissions are 20 times higher than human emissions”).

Wojick would produce modules for Grades 7-9 on environmental impact (“environmental impact is often difficult to determine. For example there is a major controversy over whether or not humans are changing the weather“), for Grade 6 on water resources and weather systems, and so on.

Wojick will receive $5,000 per module, with twenty modules produced a year. Wojick, who manages the Climate Change Debate listserv, is not a climate scientist. His doctorate is in epistomology.

Another revealing and disturbing quote:

“Efforts at places such as Forbes are especially important now that they have begun to allow high-profile climate scientists (such as Gleick) to post warmist science essays that counter our own. This influential audience has usually been reliably anti-climate and it is important to keep opposing voices out.”

 ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~
For more information:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/denialgate-heartland.html

http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2010/01/13/205343/anti-science-blogger-anthony-watts-wattsupwiththat-conflict-of-interest-weather-stations/

http://thinkprogress.org/green/2012/02/14/425354/internal-documents-climate-denier-heartland-institute-plans-global-warming-curriculum-for-k-12-schools/ 

http://www.desmogblog.com/it-s-bird-it-s-hockey-stick-it-s-faked-document

http://climatecrocks.com/2012/02/16/denialgate-get-it-all-here/

http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0212/73002.html

Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change

Perhaps the finest example of the crazy-making Anthony Watts champions is the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC).

Anthony tells us we are supposed to trust a handful of scientists ~ while disregarding the efforts of tens of thousands of hardworking researchers.  

Ironically the 2011 Interim NIPCC Report's list of intrepid independent scientists consists of a total of three lead authors Craig Idso, Fred Singer, and Robert Carter and eight contributing authors Susan Crockford, Joe D'Aleo, Indur Goklany, Sherwood Idso, Anthony Lupo, Willie Soon, Mitch Taylor, and Madhav Khandekar.

So while WUWT glibly demonizes thousands of mainstream scientists for their greedy grant money grubbing bias ~ we should remain blind to the fact that most of NIPCC scientists are on the Heartland payroll.  

Check it out: “The overall Heartland budget for the NIPCC reports from 2010 to 2013 is nearly $1.6 million ($388,000 in both 2011 and 2012), with $460,000 going to the lead authors and contributors ($140,000 in both 2011 and 2012).”

As those Dana over at SkepticalScience.com have pointed out: 

“Basically these scientists are paid with the specific goal of arguing against the scientific evidence in the IPCC report, whereas the only goal of the IPCC authors {who donate their time}is to produce an accurate, comprehensive review of the climate science literature. 

Indeed, this represents the biggest difference between the IPCC and NIPCC: the former is a comprehensive literature review, while the latter is a very select literature review.”

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RealClimate took a look at NIPCC’s alternate reality back in 2008, it’s worth a read:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2008/11/not-the-ipcc-nipcc-report/

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SkepticalScience reports on the breaking story as do many other good sources.  To mention just a few:

http://www.skepticalscience.com/denialgate-highlights-heartlands-selective-nipcc-science.html

http://www.skepticalscience.com/denialgate-heartland.html

http://www.desmogblog.com/heartland-insider-exposes-institute-s-budget-and-strategy

http://scienceprogressaction.org/intersection/2012/02/dissuading-teachers-from-teaching-science-the-leak-of-alleged-heartland-institute-documents/
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No Need to Panic About AGW ~ important LINKS

This latest tiff regarding Wall Street Journal’s shameful distortion of science centers around a lead letter printed January 27, 2012 and signed by a collection of sixteen engineers and scientists titled:   “No Need to Panic About Global Warming.”
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970204301404577171531838421366.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop 
It repeats the “free-market think-tank” claims that there's no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to 'decarbonize' the world's economy.

In doing research on the signees I’ve come across an assortment of rebuttals to the various misleading and outright false claims made in the letter from a variety of sources. This post is a collection of those varied rebuttals.