It seems that the professional pasts of some members of Canadian climate change spin machine “Friends of Science [1]” go well beyond the oil and gas industry.

Dr. Fred Seitz [2], listed as a member of the Friends of Science at the inaugural oil industry funded [3] Ottawa kick-off [4], has admitted to helping tobacco giant RJ Reynolds [5] spread out million of dollars in health research grants [6] during the 1970’s and 80’s. Seitz’s role was to assist Big Tobacco in creating the illusion that there was still some debate over whether tobacco was a proven danger to health.

Which coincidentally is the same PR technique that Friends of Science is using to delay action on climate change; creating the public perception of a scientific debate in order to undermine support for the Kyoto accord or for any real public policy action.

Same techniques. Same experts And, we would argue, same degree of credibility.