We'll never know whether the great empiricist John Locke would have been part of the global warming denial industry, but we can be pretty darn sure that the self-proclaimed "John Locke Foundation" (JLF) is.

The JLF is a well-heeled political organization based in North Carolina that has recently published a "North Carolina's citizen's guide to global warming" (pdf). The guide contains the usual global warming myths perpetuated ad naseum by the global warming denial echo machine; water vapor, medieval warming period etc.

The American Enterprise Institute (AEI ) is once again offering $10,000 payments to scientists who will comment on climate change - this time in the search for policy options that will open up a "middle ground" in the debate over climate change policy.

This fascinating-if-true development is reported here on the Science and Politics of Global Climate Change Blog.

Kenneth Green, the "visiting scholar" who last year offered $10,000 payments to any scientist who was willing to provide an "independent" analysis of the report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, was the former Director of the Centre for Studies in Risk and Regulation at The Fraser Institute - which is set to release such an "independent analysis" on Monday.

For those who are attending the London press conference, it might be reasonable to ask if any of the contributors to this report actually received the $10,000 payment.