izzit.org
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</font></div><div><div id="Post09000110000000" class="row-wrapper clearfix " style="margin-bottom: 12px; margin-right: -12px; margin-left: -12px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><div class="row px20" style="margin-left: -20px; margin-right: -20px; overflow: hidden; margin-bottom: -40px;"><div id="Post090001100000000" class="col sm-mb-2 md-mb-4 s12 m12 l12" style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 40px; float: left; box-sizing: border-box; padding-left: 20px; padding-right: 20px; width: 836.922px; margin-left: auto; left: auto; right: auto;"><div id="Post0900011000000000" class="post-partial articlesplash-custom" style="margin-bottom: 40px; overflow: visible !important;"><div class="post-splash-custom sm-mb-1 quality-HD" data-attr-style_post-date-text_all_default_position="absolute" data-attr-style_post-headline-wrapper_all_default_padding="10px 12px" data-attr-style_post-headline_all_default_line-height="22px" data-attr-layout_section="top" data-attr-style_post-section_all_default_margin="0 12px 12px" data-attr-style_post-headline_tablet_default_font-weight="700" data-attr-style_post-section_all_default_float="right" data-attr-id="Post0900011000000000" data-attr-layout_date="top" data-attr-layout_author="top" data-attr-layout_headline="bottom" data-attr-style_post-authors-name_all_default_font-weight="700" data-attr-style_post-section_all_default_font-size="14px" data-attr-layout_mobile_image_crop="1x1" data-attr-style_post-headline_tablet_default_font-size="14px" data-attr-style_post-authors-name_all_default_line-height="1" data-attr-style_post-date-text_all_default_font-size="11px" data-attr-style_post-authors-avatar_all_default_width="30px" data-attr-style_post-headline-wrapper_all_default_margin="0" data-attr-style_post-headline_all_default_font-weight="500" data-attr-style_post-authors-name_all_default_vertical-align="top" data-attr-style_post-body_all_default_background="none" data-attr-style_post-headline_all_default_font-family="Georgia" data-attr-style_post-headline_tablet_default_line-height="18px" data-attr-format="splash-custom" data-attr-layout_all_image_crop="3x2" data-attr-style_post-headline_mobile_default_line-height="18px" data-attr-style_post-authors-container_all_default_margin="0 12px" data-attr-style_post-section_all_default_padding="5px 0" data-attr-style_post-authors-avatar_all_default_height="30px" data-attr-style_post-section_all_default_font-weight="700" data-attr-style_post-date-text_all_default_top="16px" data-attr-style_post-authors-name_all_default_font-size="14px" data-attr-style_post-element_all_default_background-color="rgba(255, 255, 255, 1)" data-attr-style_post-section_all_default_color="rgba(82, 149, 70, 1)" data-attr-style_post-headline_mobile_default_font-size="14px" data-attr-data-rm-device-crops="true" data-attr-style_post-headline_all_default_font-size="18px" data-attr-style_post-headline_mobile_default_font-family="Helvetica" data-attr-style_post-headline_mobile_default_font-weight="700" data-attr-all_element_order="section,badges,author,date,headline,subheadline,badges_sponsored,photo_credit,body,snark_line,post_shares" data-attr-style_post-date-text_all_default_color="rgba(164, 162, 160, 1)" data-attr-style_post-date-text_all_default_left="49px" data-attr-style_post-section_all_default_display="inline-block" data-attr-layout_all_date_format="%b. %d, %Y %I:%M%p EST" data-attr-style_post-headline_tablet_default_font-family="Helvetica" style="position: relative;"><div class="row px10" style="margin-bottom: -40px; margin-left: -10px; margin-right: -10px; overflow: hidden;"><div id="col-center" class="col sm-mb-1" style="line-height: 1.4; margin-bottom: 40px; float: left; box-sizing: border-box; padding-left: 10px; padding-right: 10px; width: 816.922px;"><div class="headline-container" style="margin: 0px; padding: 10px 12px;"><div class="headline" style="position: relative; line-height: 22px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"><b>Koch-Funded Group Tries to Persuade 200,000 Science Teachers That Climate Change Is Debatable</b></font></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div></div><div id="Post09000110000001" class="post-partial articlebody" style="margin-bottom: 40px; overflow: visible !important;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span class="js-scroll-trigger" data-target="body" data-triggers="render-rebelbar" data-toggle-class="with-floating-shares" data-loaded="true" /></font><div id="utm_campaign" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);" /><div class="article-body js-expandable sm-mb-2 md-mb-4 js-update-url expanded" data-url="http://www.ecowatch.com/heartland-institute-climate-science-2334892782.html" data-headline="Koch-Funded Group Tries to Persuade 200,000 Science Teachers That Climate Change Is Debatable" data-elid="2334892782"><div class="article-description" style="margin-bottom: 20px;"><div class="widget__brief"><p style="line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/heartland-institute" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Heartland Institute</a> is trying to nurture the next generation of <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/climate-denier" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">climate change deniers</a>.</font></p><p style="line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">The conservative and libertarian think tank has sent out 25,000 copies of the organization's <a href="https://www.heartland.org/template-assets/documents/publications/12-04-15_why_scientists_disagree.pdf" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">book</a>, <em>Why Scientists Disagree About Global Warming, </em>and an accompanying 10-minute DVD to 25,000 science teachers this month, according to a <a href="http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/article/climate-change-skeptic-group-seeks-to-influence-200000-teachers/" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Frontline</a> report. The book argues that <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">climate change</a> is not settled science.</font></p></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Katie Worth, who authored the Frontline report, <a href="https://twitter.com/katieworth/status/846919035900121088" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">called</a> the effort a "massive propaganda campaign by the nation's leading climate change skeptical think tank."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">The Heartland Institute, which has received funding from polluting industries such as <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/exxon" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Exxon</a> and the <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/tag/koch-brothers" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Koch</a> family, <a href="https://www.heartland.org/topics/climate-change/" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">rejects</a>the scientific community's widespread consensus that human activity causes climate change.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><b>The organization plans to send the materials to another 25,000 teachers every two weeks until every public-school science teacher in the nation has a copy, Heartland president and CEO Joseph Bast said.</b></font></p><p style="line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">This means the book and DVD could end up in the mailboxes of <a href="https://nces.ed.gov/programs/digest/d15/tables/dt15_209.20.asp?current=yes" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">more than</a> 200,000 K-12 science teachers in the country. </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">The campaign began in mid-March.</span></font></p><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: large;">Frontline also published a</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: large;"> </span><a href="https://www.documentcloud.org/documents/3526415-Heartland-Institute-letter-to-educators.html" target="blank" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: large; text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">cover letter</a><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: large;"> </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: large;">of the materials from Lennie Jarratt, project manager of <b>Heartland's Center for Transforming Education,</b> who asks that the teacher "consider the possibility" that climate science is not settled.</span></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: large;">img</span></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><span style="font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: large;">
</span></div><div class="js-appear-on-expand" style="transition: all 350ms; height: auto; overflow: hidden; opacity: 1;"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); font-family: "Times New Roman"; font-size: large;"><b>The 2015 book is coauthored by Drs. Craig D. Idso, Robert M. Carter and S. Fred Singer, who have been heavily involved in the "debate" over global warming.</b></span><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Here are some tidbits about the authors:</font></p><ul style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 40px;"><li><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">According to <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/craig-idso" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">DeSmog</a>, Idso believes that "CO2 is not a pollutant" and is the chairman and former resident of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, which has a mission is to "separate reality from rhetoric in the emotionally-charged debate that swirls around the subject of carbon dioxide and global change."</font></li></ul><ul style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 40px;"><li><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Carter, who passed away last year, was an Australian marine geologist and a paid climate change denier, <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Bob_Carter" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">SourceWatch</a> noted. He once asserted that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has not found evidence that global warming was caused by human activity.</font></li></ul><ul style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); margin: 1em 0px; padding: 0px 0px 0px 40px;"><li><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Singer, a former space scientist and government scientific administrator, founded the Science & Environmental Policy Project in 1990, a 501(c)(3) "educational group" focusing on global warming denial, according to <a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/s-fred-singer" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">DeSmog</a>. Idso and Singer helped develop the Heartland Institute's "Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change. Singer said in Jan. 2016 that "the real threat to humanity comes not from any (trivial) greenhouse warming but from cooling periods creating food shortages and famines."</font></li></ul><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">The letter directs teachers to visit <a href="http://www.izzit.org/" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Izzit.org</a> to access an online guide to using the DVD. Izzit.org is a "<a href="https://www.desmogblog.com/heartland-institute-tricked-video-subject-in-unstoppable-solar-cycles" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">right-wing advocacy organization</a>" that provides free educational videos to U.S. educators and homeschoolers.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">The <a href="https://ncse.com/" target="blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">National Center for Science Education</a>, an Oakland, California nonprofit that monitors climate change education in classrooms criticized the mailing campaign.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">"It's not science, but it's dressed up to look like science," NCSE executive director Ann Reid told Frontline. "It's clearly intended to confuse teachers."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Climatologist <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/community/michael_mann" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">Michael Mann</a> also tweeted that the Heartland Institute is trying to "indoctrinate children with climate denial propaganda."</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Bast, Heartland's president, said that some teachers have appreciated the information and even asked for a Heartland speaker to visit a class.</font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">However, many science teachers have not welcomed the campaign.</font></p><p style="line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">As </span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);">Frontline</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"> wrote:</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px 10px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">Lori Baker, a sixth-grade science teacher at North Putnam Middle School in Roachdale, Indiana, found the package in her school mailbox and was dismayed by its contents. "I read quite a bit of the book, actually, and it was extremely frustrating. It's an attempt to sound science literate, but there's very little actual data," she said.
</font></p><p style="line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px 10px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000"><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Baker pointed to the first paragraph of the</span><span style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 102);"> foreword, written by <b>Marita Noon, executive director of Citizens' Alliance for Responsible Energy</b>, a nonprofit and lobbying group that advocates for the use of fossil fuels. In it, Noon writes that Obama's <a href="http://www.cnn.com/2015/01/21/us/climate-change-us-obama/" target="_blank" style="text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;">description</a> of climate change as the greatest threat facing mankind is "laughable" at a time when "ISIS is beheading innocent people."</span></font></p><p style="background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255); line-height: 21px; margin: 10px 0px 10px 20px;"><font size="4" face="Times New Roman" color="#000000">"That as a foreword to something claiming to be scientific is pretty shocking," said Baker.</font></p></div></div></div></div></div><div><font size="4" face="Times New Roman"></font></div>