Tuesday, February 26, 2008

Exxon Misleads On Funding Denialists

From The Environmental Law Prof:

This time last year ExxonMobil waged a campaign with bloggers to convince us that they recognized the reality of anthropogenic global warming and were serious about solutions.

[...]

I looked up ExxonMobil's contributions to 'Public Information and Policy Research' for 2006, when supposed ExxonMobil was not in the business of funding denialist nonsense. Well, there it is, $180,000 to Frontiers of Freedom and its CSPP. That's more than they gave to Brookings ($135,000), Asia Society ($90,000), Council on Foreign Relations ($110,000) or most of the legitimate organizations to which they contribute. I can't say they lied last year, but I can say they deliberately misled me.

Take a look at the CSPP website. If that's not denialist nonsense, I don't know what is!

Here is a link to the CSPP website, and indeed it is denialist nonsense.

18 comments:

Anonymous said...
This comment has been removed by a blog administrator.
Ti-Guy said...

I wonder where "Ding Dong Kyoto's Dead" fit into all this? Was he a highly-paid disrupter, a cheap rent-a-shill or was he just a two-a-penny TROLLop, giving it away for practically nothing?

John Mashey said...

1) Rob Ferguson set up CSPP for FoF.

2) Rob (apparently) left FoF to do his own spinoff, SPPI, http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/

3) You'll notice that CSPP climate stuff ramps down in August 2007, about the same time as SPPI ramps up.

4) What we don't know:

Does SPPI have EM funding?
Maybe funding from Viscount Monckton?

Dante said...

Anything about that whore Gore who doesn't disclose the companies that he is tied to that financially benefits from the whole carbon trading scam?

Didn't think so

Big friggin news...Big Oil looking after it's own interests. Stop the presses

Anonymous said...

Well I sure hope all you Believers are enjoying such a pleasant dose of global warming this winter. And its not over by along shot.

And it gets colder every year . . . while your precious CO2 increases.

Go figure. It's the Sun, stupid.

Where's Dr. Fruit Fly or the Goreacle when you need them to preach for you ?

Anonymous said...

Whewwww, I am glad that is over. I didn't think Dion would call an election over the budget, but there was that slight chance he grew some balls.

I think Harper is going to have to bring about a bill that would call for Dion and all liberals to dress in french maid outfits before the ball-less wonders go down for the count.

bigcitylib said...

John, I think you sent me the stuff on Schulte or whatever his name was. If doing this kind of research is a hobby for you, please send along anything you're working on.

John Mashey said...

Sure. The thing I sent you is what set Susan off on this at Environmental Law Prof.

If you haven't seen Naomi Oreskes' recent video, you should, because it's just the tip of the iceberg. I heard her give an earlier version at Stanford a year ago, to an audience of climate scientists, so there was less on the long history of climate science, and more on the weird origin of climate denialism ~1990 by cold-war physicists with no Cold War left to fight...

Recall that George H. W. Bush (NOT W.), in 1989,said:
must stabilize CO2 ASAP

i.e., that was before politicization.

Naomi's bio

Video, "The American Denial of Global Warming", 58 minutes, and well worth it:

UCSD Video

Unknown said...

Article

Graph

Ti-Guy said...

Video, "The American Denial of Global Warming", 58 minutes, and well worth it:

Great video; thanks for the link. Disguising political arguments within the framework of a scientific debate is what these frauds did and continue to do. I'm more willing than Naomi Oreskes (for obvious reasons) to assert that these frauds are far more self-serving than one would expect from being simply laissez faire ideologues.

Wayne...don't bother watching the video...it doesn't feature any sexy ungulates.

Anonymous said...

Funny, no post on the budget,

or Dion's slinking away with his tail between his legs once again.

It's looking like it'll be at least another year of Harper in power.

It seemed like just yesterday the Liberals were painting Harper as a neofascist maniac intent on destroying the fabric of Canada.

Now the Liberals are agreeing with his every move.

Interesting times indeed.

Anonymous said...

Governing like a majority.

That appears to be the consensus at Liblogs.

Dion has effectively handed Harper a majority is right. What's worse, Harper has the Liberal Senate saying "how high" when he says "jump!"

Anonymous said...

Sorry. I was orgasming during that last comment. Hence, the incoherence.

Pardon me while I clean up.

Anonymous said...

John, your material over on ELP mentions that SPPI and CSPP occupy two suites in that DC building, but a google of the main address finds this. So those could just be mail drops, although a small cheap office is also possible. The Haymarket address is a UPS Store (i.e. definite mail drop).

This is starting to look a bit like Rob Ferguson sitting in front of his computer at home.

Stepping back and considering the denialist network as a whole, I wonder how many FTEs there are. I'm guessing less than 50, which means that the Scaife/Koch/EM crowd is getting the whole thing for pocket change. Of course they also have to pay for the AEI/CEI etc. infrastructure costs, but on the whole these outfits look to be a real bargain.

John Mashey said...

Steve: thanks.

This is reminiscent of: John Casey & SSRC. (i.e., virtual office, but has a nice picture., looks impressive).

In the taxonomy of these these things, there is a clear range:

a) Larger organizations, of which climate change denialism is a small branch.

b) Smaller ones dedicated to the topic, which often seem more like one-band bands, or close, with the usual case of advisors.


Did you happen to examine page 40?

Anonymous said...

Page 40 of...?

bigcitylib said...

Steve, John,

I know several one person PR firms that are exactly like that. One person serves as PR for several related associations. At home with a PC and a nice printer.

Anonymous said...

John, somehow I had managed to miss the fact that you had put out that paper, but just now spotted a reference and link to it at ELP. I'll have a read. Re page 40, that looks about right. Willie's a busy boy!

BCL, that sounds about right. Based on a quick glance at the site content it seem unlikely that it's anything more than a very part-time gig for Ferguson. I'd be curious to know what he spends the rest of his time on, although not curious enough to put any effort into researching it.