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Clearing the PR Pollution that Clouds Climate Science

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Lexus: the Darker Side of Climate Denial

Blogger Adam Siegel has stumbled across a pretty embarrassing spectacle put on earlier this year by Lexus.

As part of the launch of their "Darker Side of Green" Campaign, Lexus held a debate, hosted by comedian Sarah Silverman about whether climate change is actually happening.

Pretty unbelievable that this would get through their vetting process, unless of course they thought it was edgy or shocking enough to sell more cars.

Either way the debate did nothing more than propagate the myth that climate change is somehow not happening or something we need to worry about.

I would expect this kind of thing from the likes of former tobacco company spindoctors like the Heartland Institute than I would a company trying to promote their hybrid car.

You would also think that a debate about a complicated scientific issue like climate change would involve actual scientists who do research in the field. Instead, Lexus chose to have a filmmaker, who's last film was a propaganda piece paid for by a mining company and a journalist (who made the best of a silly situation).

And the filmmaker, Phelim McAleer, does a good job embarrassing himself but that is beside the point.

Whatever carbon emissions Lexus thinks it's going to reduce with its new hybrid were probably equaled out by the hot air produced at this ridiculous debate over something the likes of NASA and the US Academy of Science say is a real problem and something that needs to be addressed.


Read more: Lexus: the Darker Side of Climate Denial

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More Bumpf on Balling

In response to the critic who complained about our characterization of Robert C. Balling as an energy industry apologist:

Said critic was unhappy that the SourceWatch entry on Balling didn't list a source for the information on who has been paying our skeptic-of-the-day. The source was probably our own Ross Gelbspan, who researched all this for his books, Boiling Point and The Heat is On.


Read more: More Bumpf on Balling

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White House Environmental Chief Launches Stealth Attack on Climate Science

James Connaughton, head of the White House Environmental Office (CEQ)James Connaughton told Congress:  “There’s a lot of agreement … on warming...We begin to get into issues [of disagreement] about the extent to which humans are a problem.”


Read more: White House Environmental Chief Launches Stealth Attack on Climate Science

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Comedians didn't work, bring in the Air Force!

Last week the we had comedians attempting to attack the overwhelmingF15 Eagle scientific consensus on climate change. Now this week we have a retired Air Force Sergeant boosting the fringe science of the small, but vocal skeptic community. No surprise though when you consider that more and more skeptics are jumping ship.

Read more: Comedians didn't work, bring in the Air Force!

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A Hockey Stick that Can't Keep its Tip Up

A tartly critical new reader (see "Cherrypicking" here) complains that the DeSmogBlog has not immersed itself, on every possible occasion in theThe "Hockey Stick" graph "hockey stick" debate.

Our apologies. For those who are unfamiliar, the "hockey stick" defined the shape of an early graph by one of the world's most respected climate scientists, Dr. Michael Mann. The graph appeared to demonstrate a long-term spike in global warming that meant the 20th century was the warmest in more than a thousand years.

In a 2002 book (Taken By Storm), Christopher Essex and the economist Dr. Ross McKitrick took issue with Mann's statistical method, pointing out some matters of legitimate concern, and the climate change denial lobby grasped the now-flacid hockey stick and began shaking it hither and yon, arguing that if this one graph was flawed, all climate change science was similiarly shakey.


Read more: A Hockey Stick that Can't Keep its Tip Up

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Congress Asked If Climate Science is Solid ...

... and the scientists it selected to answer the question said yes.

Read more: Congress Asked If Climate Science is Solid ...

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The Inconvenient Truth about Robert C. Balling

In a recent post in The Citizen.com, Dr. Robert C. Balling, director of the$8 million invested in skeptic movement Office of Climatology at Arizona State University, launches pseudo-scientific attack on Al Gore's move, An Inconvenient Truth.

As with a clutch of other industry-funded academics who quibble over climate change, Dr. Balling is happy to use his Ph.D. and his title to suggest expertise and to imply scientific objectivity. But readers might be better able to judge the quality of his input if they knew that he has been the eager recipient of funding from such philanthropic organizations as ExxonMobil, the British Coal Corporation, Cyprus Minerals and OPEC. Per the link above, Sourcewatch lists his take from these sources at a little over $400,000 in the last 10 years.


Read more: The Inconvenient Truth about Robert C. Balling

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Here Comes the Sun -- Yet Again!

It's all due to the sun -- according to a guest column in the Ft. Wayne News Sentinel.  Unfortunately, none but a few contrarian scientists -- many paid by coal and oil interests -- believe that.

Virtually all legitimate climate scientists conclude that while the sun was the dominant external influence on the climate until about 150 years ago, it has since been swamped by greenhouse gases which, today, comprise about 85 percent of the external influences on the climate.


Read more: Here Comes the Sun -- Yet Again!

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Get Ready for McFuel!

We came across this great campaign video this week. Slightly on the cheesy side, perhaps, but a great little thing to watch if you want some tingly inspirational feelings for a pick-me-up.

It's a video set 50 years down the road, looking back at 2006 as the year that the tide turned for renewable energy. The highlight for me was the idea of MacDonald's completely remaking themselves into a biofuel company.

It was created by RenewUS – a group that "intends to stimulate enactment of broad non-partisan high-impact political and industrial policy to reduce and sequester greenhouse gases. Over the coming months and years, a variety of initiatives will engage a wide range of constituencies in a constructive program of economic, political and industrial endeavors."

Check it out. Think we can do it?

Read more: Get Ready for McFuel!

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Listen Live: Jim Hoggan on CKNW 980 Vancouver tonight

Jim will be on CKNW 980 Vancouver tonight at 7:30 PM (PST) with  guest-host Bill Tielman about the DeSmogBlog's efforts to expose the PR spin confusing the issue of climate change.

Listen live from anywhere in the world from the CKNW website.

Read more: Listen Live: Jim Hoggan on CKNW 980 Vancouver tonight

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Heritage Foundation goes nuclear

The oil money-backed and climate change denier lobby, the Heritage Foundation, will be holding an event later this month to discuss solutions to the impending US energy crisis. Guest speakers will include Craig Hansen, VP of Washington Operations, for the BWX Technology, a leading US nuclear energy company.


Read more: Heritage Foundation goes nuclear

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About the climate cover-up

About the climate cover-up

Democracy is utterly dependent upon an electorate that is accurately informed. In promoting climate change denial (and often denying their responsibility for doing so) industry has done more than endanger the environment. It has undermined democracy.

There is a vast difference between putting forth a point of view, honestly held, and intentionally sowing the seeds of confusion. Free speech does not include the right to deceive. Deception is not a point of view. And the right to disagree does not include a right to intentionally subvert the public awareness.

Although all public relations professionals are bound by a duty to not knowingly mislead the public, some have executed comprehensive campaigns of misinformation on behalf of industry clients on issues ranging from tobacco and asbestos to seat belts.

Lately, these fringe players have turned their efforts to creating confusion about climate change. This PR campaign could not be accomplished without the compliance of media as well as the assent and participation of leaders in government and business.

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Democracy is utterly dependent upon an electorate that is accurately informed. In promoting climate change denial (and often denying their responsibility for doing so) industry has done more than endanger the environment. It has undermined democracy. The Desmog project is our answer to industry PR spin.

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