Bryce, R

promoted 8/16 exxon

see manhattan

=of course he has a podcastgmail alert 11 21no lnxThis article or excerpt is included in the GLP’s daily curated selection of ideologically diverse news, opinion and analysis of biotechnology innovation.Energy journalist Robert Bryce interviews Genetic Literacy Project executive director Jon Entine on the politics of innovation in biotechnology—how precautionary skeptics are retarding efforts to address a range of challenges, from climate change to food insecurity.In this episode, Jon addresses how “our genes carry meaning,” the “disinformation industry” that makes money by promoting catastrophism, why Africa is a “cold spot” for Covid-19 infections, and why we are only in the second inning of the genetics-led revolution in agriculture and medicine.As Bryce has written:I was particularly struck by Jon’s own history and how the death of his mother, grandmother, and aunt within a few months became a key motivator for him to become a journalist. We also discuss some beautiful lines that he wrote for Abraham’s Children: “Our genes carry meaning. This ancient script now being deciphered is literally lifting the curtain on God or Nature’s plan. While often at odds, religion and science are spinning an interlaced narrative of identity.”Entine is the author of several books including Taboo: Why Black Athletes Dominate Sports and Why We are Afraid to Talk About It; Abraham’s Children: Race, Identity, and the DNA of the Chosen People; and Scared to Death: How Chemophobia Threatens Public Health.
Entine is the founder and executive director of the Genetic Literacy Project, a non-profit that promotes science literacy and supports “transparent, ethical, science-based regulations of biotechnology and related sciences.”
Listen to the podcast below:...=extensive:http://mediamatters.org/research/2016/09/01/study-newspaper-opinion-pages-feature-science-denial-and-other-climate-change-misinformation/212700<h2 style="box-sizing: border-box; line-height: 1.5em; margin: 15px 0px; padding: 0px 0px 2px; clear: both; border-bottom: 1px dotted rgb(0, 153, 255); background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">Three Major Newspapers Published Climate Science Denial On Opinion Pages, Led By The Wall Street Journal</h2>Analysis: Three Major Newspapers’ Opinion Pages Published Climate Science Denial And Other Antiscience Claims. Media Matters examined op-eds, editorials, and columns in The Wall Street Journal, USA Today, The New York Times, and The Washington Post from January 1, 2015, to August 31, 2016, to determine how often climate science denial and other false statements about climate science appeared on each newspaper’s opinion pages. We found that the Journal, the Post, and USA Today all published climate science misinformation on their opinion pages, while the Times avoided doing so. Unlike the Journal editorial board, which has denied climate science, the editorial boards of the Times, the Post, and USA Today all recognize the scientific consensus around man-made climate change. But our analysis found that the Timeswas the only one of these newspapers that did not publish an op-ed or column containing climate science denial during this time period. [Media Matters, <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PnvucqIBBWlAOgAyBP_G7QLLdtqOIoj0nlW12adewVk/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Climate Denial/Misinformation Spreadsheet</a>; The New York Times, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/04/29/opinion/the-pope-joins-the-climate-wars.html" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">4/29/15</a>; The Washington Post, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/just-about-every-big-measure-of-climate-change-was-bad-last-year/2015/07/21/113ecea6-2cc8-11e5-a5ea-cf74396e59ec_story.html?utm_term=.f11af2c1f6b1" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">7/21/15</a>; USA Today, <a href="http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2015/11/30/climate-paris-talks-obama-global-warming-editorials-debates/76578684/" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">11/30/15</a>]punked on op eds by CTT:
Fossil Fuel Front GroupsManhattan Institute’s Robert Bryce: Five Op-Eds. During the time period examined in this study, Robert Bryce, who is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, authored three op-eds in The Wall Street Journal, one in USA Today, and one in The New York Times. The Manhattan Institute has received at least $800,000 from ExxonMobil and millions from Koch-affiliated organizations. In one Journal op-ed, Bryce presented a false choice between acting on climate change or protecting wildlife, and in another, he falsely claimed the people of Vermont oppose wind energy. [Media Matters, <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bRDqPd8Dt4Z64s13dcdyGbcfVHROb4KrAX50qlM_ttQ/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Frequent Misinformers Spreadsheet</a>; <a href="http://mediamatters.org/research/2015/07/31/media-disclosure-guide-here-are-the-industry-fu/204708#manhattan" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">7/31/15</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/02/08/bernie-sanders-wind-energy-plan-falsely-attacke/208440" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">2/8/16</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/05/16/big-oil-cheerleader-robert-bryce-predictably-misleads-wind-energy-and-eagle-deaths-wsj/210445" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">5/16/16</a>, Manhattan Institute, accessed <a href="https://www.manhattan-institute.org/expert/robert-bryce" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">9/1/16</a>]Heartland Institute: Four Op-Eds. USA Today and The Wall Street Journal published three op-eds and one op-ed, respectively, written by people affiliated with the climate denial organization Heartland Institute, which has received over $700,000 from Exxon and significant funding from organizations tied to the oil billionaire Koch brothers. Three of the Heartland Institute op-eds peddled climate science denial, and the fourth also contained climate-related misinformation. Heartland Institute’s Marc Morano asserted in a November 30 USA Today op-ed: “The U.N. summit's goal of limiting the Earth's temperature to a rise of no more than 2 degrees Celsius is also not based on science. … The notion that a U.N. agreement to limit emissions will somehow alter the Earth's temperature or storminess is bordering on belief in witchcraft.” In an April 22 USA Today op-ed, Heartland’s John Coleman described himself as a “skeptic of man-made global warming” and wrote that "the hard cold truth is that the basic theory has failed. Many notable scientists reject man-made global warming fears.” Heartland’s Patrick Moore wrote in a September 3, 2015, Journal op-ed that “the real threat” is not global warming but a coming “cooling of the climate.” And in a June 18, 2015, USA Today op-ed, Heartland president Joseph Bast criticized Pope Francis’ climate encyclical by pushing the myth that climate action harms “the poor and the elderly, the sick, and vulnerable populations in all countries, but especially in Third World countries.” [Media Matters, <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bRDqPd8Dt4Z64s13dcdyGbcfVHROb4KrAX50qlM_ttQ/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Frequent Misinformers Spreadsheet</a>; <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PnvucqIBBWlAOgAyBP_G7QLLdtqOIoj0nlW12adewVk/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Climate Denial/Misinformation Spreadsheet</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/research/2015/07/31/media-disclosure-guide-here-are-the-industry-fu/204708#heartland" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">7/31/15,</a> <a href="http://mediamatters.org/research/2015/07/06/experts-debunk-the-coal-industrys-energy-povert/204260" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">7/6/15</a>; Heartland Institute, accessed <a href="https://www.heartland.org/about-us/who-we-are?page=36&type=policy-experts&q=" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">9/1/16</a>, <a href="https://www.heartland.org/about-us/who-we-are?page=10&type=policy-experts&q=#content" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">9/1/16</a>, <a href="https://www.heartland.org/about-us/who-we-are?page=35&type=policy-experts&q=" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">9/1/16</a>]Cato Institute: Three Op-Eds. The Wall Street Journal published three climate- or energy-related op-eds by members of the Cato Institute, which was co-founded by the oil billionaire Koch brothers and has received millions of dollars from the Koch family. One of the op-eds falsely attacked attorneys general investigations of Exxon, and the other two op-eds promoted climate science denial. In an August 21 op-ed, Cato's Elizabeth Price Foley wrongly claimed that a group of attorneys general, who have committed to holding fossil fuel companies -- including Exxon -- accountable if they obfuscated climate change research in order to protect their financial interests, had pledged to take action against "climate wrongthink." A March 4, 2015, op-ed by Cato's Richard Lindzen questioned “the popular alarm over allegedly man-made global warming,” and criticized world leaders for “demonizing carbon dioxide.” And a January 24 piece by Cato's Patrick Michaels, titled “The Climate Snow Job,” was critiqued by Climate Feedback, an organization that publishes scientists’ assessments of the accuracy of news articles and opinion pieces. Ten scientists analyzed the op-ed and in their summary wrote, “Most of the article is devoted to casting doubt over the accuracy of the global temperature record. The author uses detailed technical descriptions to distract readers from the inaccuracies of the article, which involve cherry-picking data to support multiple unsubstantiated and discredited claims.” They rated its scientific credibility to be “low" to "very low.” [Media Matters, <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bRDqPd8Dt4Z64s13dcdyGbcfVHROb4KrAX50qlM_ttQ/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Frequent Misinformers Spreadsheet</a>,<a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1PnvucqIBBWlAOgAyBP_G7QLLdtqOIoj0nlW12adewVk/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Climate Denial/Misinformation Spreadsheet</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/research/2015/07/31/media-disclosure-guide-here-are-the-industry-fu/204708#cato" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">7/31/15</a>; Florida International University Law School, accessed<a href="https://law.fiu.edu/faculty/directory/elizabeth-price-foley/" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">9/1/16</a>; InsideClimate News, <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/news/30032016/climate-change-fraud-investigation-exxon-eric-shneiderman-18-attorneys-general" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">3/30/16</a>; Climate Feedback, <a href="http://climatefeedback.org/evaluation/patrick-michaels-the-climate-snow-job-the-wall-street-journal/" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">1/24/16</a>]Competitive Enterprise Institute: Two Op-Eds. Representatives of the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI), which has recently received attention for having peddled climate science denial while receiving funding from Exxon, authored two op-eds during the time period examined in this study, both of which falsely claimed that the Exxon investigations are an attempt to criminalize free speech. In The Washington Post, CEI general counsel Sam Kazman and president Kent Lassman co-authored an op-ed describing the attorneys general investigations of Exxon as an attempt to criminalize “dissent” and “run roughshod” over First Amendment protections. And David B. Rivkin Jr. and Andrew Grossman -- the lawyers that represented CEI in its response to an Exxon-related subpoena from the attorney general of the U.S. Virgin Islands -- wrote an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal alleging that the attorneys general investigations of Exxon are part of a strategy of “punishing dissent from an asserted ‘consensus’ view” on climate change. [Media Matters, <a href="https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1bRDqPd8Dt4Z64s13dcdyGbcfVHROb4KrAX50qlM_ttQ/edit#gid=0" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">Frequent Misinformers Spreadsheet</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/04/11/usa-today%C2%A0bloomberg-contributors-obscure-role-industry-funded-think-tank-%E2%80%9Cexxon-knew%E2%80%9D-scandal/209863" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">4/11/16</a>, <a href="http://mediamatters.org/blog/2016/06/27/dean-yale-s-law-school-just-schooled-washington-post-exxon-and-first-amendment/211221" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">6/27/16</a>; CEI.org, <a href="https://cei.org/content/cei-strikes-back-at-unlawful-subpoena" style="box-sizing: border-box; text-decoration: none; outline: none; font-weight: 700; border-bottom: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); background-color: transparent;">4/20/16</a>]=<div></div><div>
</div><div><a href="https://www.nationalreview.com/2016/10/wikileaks-john-podesta-silenced-climate-change-dissent/">https://www.nationalreview.com/2016/10/wikileaks-john-podesta-silenced-climate-change-dissent/</a></div><div>
</div><div><div>no lnx</div><div>
</div><div>WikiLeaks Exposes Podesta-Steyer Climate McCarthyism</div><div>
</div><div>Tom Steyer at a Center for American Progress conference in 2014. (Reuters photo: Gary Cameron)</div><div>
</div><div>
</div><div>By ROBERT BRYCE</div><div>October 26, 2016 </div><div>
</div><div>How the Center for American Progress campaigned to suppress speech</div><div>
</div><div>The latest WikiLeaks dump contains plenty of insider dirt on John Podesta, the founder of the Center for American Progress and the campaign manager for Hillary Clinton. Perhaps the tawdriest story to be exposed by Podesta’s pilfered e-mails is the bragging by an employee of ThinkProgress, an arm of the Center for American Progress, about how they got Roger Pielke Jr.’s scalp.</div><div>
</div><div>A July 2014 e-mail from Judd Legum, an editor at ThinkProgress, to billionaire Democratic climate activist (and former coal-mine investor) Tom Steyer exposes the climate-change McCarthyism that the Left — and its myriad allies in the liberal media — use to discredit or silence anyone who doesn’t adhere to the orthodoxy of the climate catastrophists.</div><div>
</div><div>In the e-mail, Legum boasted to Steyer about how ThinkProgress had silenced Pielke by preventing him from publishing at Nate Silver’s then-new website, fivethirtyeight.com, on the issue of climate change. Legum was also asking Steyer, indirectly, for more money. Steyer and Podesta both sit on the board of the Center for American Progress. Between 2008 and 2014, Steyer gave the Center for American Progress some $3.85 million. I’ll come back to the specifics of that e-mail shortly.</div><div>
</div><div>First, some background. Pielke, a professor at the University of Colorado since 2001, holds degrees in mathematics, public policy, and political science. He has authored or co-authored seven books. He has won several awards for his academic work. For about two decades, he was a prolific writer and speaker on climate issues. In 2013, he testified before Congress and declared that there is “exceedingly little scientific support for claims found in the media and political debate that hurricanes, tornadoes, floods and drought have increased in frequency or intensity on climate timescales either in the United States or globally.” During that same testimony, he said that global weather-related losses have not increased since 1990 as a proportion of GDP. He went on, saying that there were also no observable increases in floods, tornadoes, or droughts.</div><div>
</div><div>Pielke’s work was backed up by data and, in many cases, by the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. But that didn’t matter to Podesta’s attack dogs at ThinkProgress. Long before his congressional testimony, Pielke had been the subject of a years-long smear campaign led by ThinkProgress’s Joe Romm. In fact, Romm had what can only be described as an obsession with Pielke. In a recent Twitter posting, Pielke wrote: “Propaganda works: I count more than 160 articles at the Center for American Progress trashing me over the years.”</div><div>
</div><div>A review of those articles shows that the vast majority of them were written by Romm. In reply to Romm’s increasingly shrill attacks, Pielke was civil, even gentlemanly. In 2010, Pielke challenged Romm to a public debate — in Romm’s hometown, at a date and venue of his choosing — offering to contribute up to $10,000 to the winner’s favorite charity. Romm, to his eternal discredit, refused. Furthermore, on his blog, Romm routinely deleted comments he didn’t like, including those that called him out for ducking Pielke’s challenge to debate.</div><div>
</div><div>[More from</div><div>ROBERT BRYCE</div><div> </div><div>Freeman Dyson, RIP</div><div>Why Climate Action Flopped at the G-7</div><div>Cuomo’s Silly War on Natural Gas]</div><div>
</div><div>I have followed Pielke’s work for years. In 2007, while editing Energy Tribune, I published an interview with his father, Roger Pielke Sr., who is also a climate scientist. In 2009, I published an interview with the younger Pielke on the same subject. I find both of them to be careful observers and thoughtful writers. Last year, I reviewed one of Roger Jr.’s books for The Weekly Standard.</div><div>
</div><div>This week I spoke to Pielke by phone. Asked for his initial reaction to the ThinkProgress e-mail, he replied, “I was just a professor with a blog. I had no funding. Really? They are going to go brag to a billionaire to shut down a professor with a blog? If that’s the case, I guess I was doing some pretty good stuff.”</div><div>
</div><div>Pielke went on to say that Romm had waged a “campaign of personal destruction” against him. “Nothing less than removing my voice from the public space was acceptable.” That campaign was carried out by Romm and other members of the Green Slime Machine at liberal media outlets like the Daily Kos and Huffington Post. Among other things, those outlets labeled Pielke a “disinformer” and “climate confusionist.” They did so even though Pielke’s views on climate are decidedly mainstream: He favors a carbon tax, increased energy efficiency, and a global effort at “removing incentives for fossil fuels and creating incentives for carbon neutral sources, including both nuclear and renewable.”</div><div>
</div><div>ThinkProgress’s smear efforts reached an apogee in 2014, after Pielke published a single article on fivethirtyeight.com — the website Silver had launched with the goal of using data and statistics to inform a new style of journalism. Pielke’s article addressed the inflation-adjusted cost of hurricanes. “I made the fairly mundane but obvious observation that disaster costs are not increasing because of extreme weather events,” Pielke said.</div><div>
</div><div>‘I made the fairly mundane but obvious observation that disaster costs are not increasing because of extreme weather events,’ Pielke said.</div><div>
</div><div>Nevertheless, Pielke’s article met a storm of protest, led by the bloggers at ThinkProgress, who published not one but two articles on the same day (March 19, 2014) that Pielke’s article was published on fivethirtyeight.com. The first person quoted in both of ThinkProgress’s articles was none other than Penn State climate scientist Michael Mann, one of the originators of the much-disputed “hockey stick” graph. It is worth noting that four years ago this month (October 22, 2012, to be precise), Mann sued National Review, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, Rand Simberg, and Mark Steyn for defamation. That litigation is still pending. (For Steyn’s paint-blistering take on Mann, the lawsuit, and climate McCarthyism, read his December 15, 2015, testimony before a U.S. Senate committee.)</div><div>
</div><div>And it wasn’t just ThinkProgress. Immediately after Pielke’s article appeared on fivethirtyeight.com, the Green Slime Machine went into overdrive. The Daily Kos expressed dismay that “Silver would hire as one of his science writers the egregious purveyor of disinformation on climate change, Roger Pielke, Jr.” Pielke was also trashed by writers at Slate, Earth Island Journal, and the Guardian. Rather than stand behind Pielke, Silver fired him. Silver didn’t even favor him with a phone call. Pielke told me that two and a half years later, Silver still hasn’t contacted him. “You can’t have a real journalistic enterprise if your only goal is to be popular,” Pielke told me.</div><div>
</div><div>Now, back to WikiLeaks. In Legum’s e-mail to Steyer, he wrote that “it’s fair to say” that without ThinkProgress’s continual trashing of Pielke and his work, “Pielke would still be writing on climate change for 538.” Legum continued, “He would be providing important cover for climate deniers backed by Silver’s very respected brand. But because of our work, he is not. I don’t think there is another site on the internet having this kind of impact on the climate debate.” Legum concluded his note by writing, “Thanks for your support of this work. Looking forward to doing even more in the coming months.”</div><div>
</div><div>So there you have it: One of Podesta’s highest-profile operatives is bragging to one of America’s richest climate activists that he and his team have silenced a prominent academic for the sin of disagreeing with Mann and other climatologists. ThinkProgress, Romm, and their fellow travelers denigrate anyone who might be getting money from the “wrong” funders. But when it comes to soliciting big bucks from Steyer — and then bragging about how effective you are at defaming people on the other side — well, that’s okay because, you know, climate change.</div><div>
</div><div>The WikiLeaks story about Pielke has, predictably, been ignored by the liberal media. No stories about it have appeared in the Daily Kos, Huffington Post, or Media Matters. It doesn’t fit their narrative. A few pieces about the Podesta-WikiLeaks story have appeared in conservative outlets, include a recent piece published on Breitbart by the British journalist James Delingpole, who got it exactly right. He wrote: “If the ‘science’ is as settled as it frequently claims, why is it necessary to orchestrate attacks on any scientist who speaks even slightly out of turn?”</div><div>
</div><div>Since the fivethirtyeight.com uproar, Pielke has quit publishing about climate change. He’s gone on to become a world-leading expert on sports and doping. He now heads the Sports Governance Center at the University of Colorado, which is housed within the university’s athletics department. He has more than 8,000 followers on Twitter and is an active, maybe rabid, tweeter. “I’m having a blast,” he told me. Working on climate change, he said, “you wake up, it’s the same people arguing about the same stuff. In sports, you have no idea what idea you will be writing about. . . . There’s so much going on. There’s so much upheaval.”</div><div>
</div><div>What lessons did he learn from his stint in the climate-change discussion? He replied that the debate is “almost religious in its intensity.” Instead of having a rational discussion about the best ways to reduce carbon dioxide emissions, the debate has become solely “about power, about who gets to speak and whose voices are deemed legitimate.” The smear campaign against him by Romm and ThinkProgress was designed “to make public speech costly.”</div><div>
</div><div>In a concluding thought, he told me: “After all this, I’m a big supporter of academic tenure. I have no doubt that if I didn’t have tenure, I’d be doing landscaping now.”</div><div>
</div><div>Robert Bryce is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.</div></div><div>=</div>exxon knew 8/1//16
In any case, according to its own figures posted last week, ExxonMobil <a href="https://s3.amazonaws.com/ucs-documents/global-warming/ucs-exxonmobil-climate-denial-funding-1998-2015.pdf" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">spent</a> $1.96 million on 16 denier and obstructionist groups last year. Ten of them, including the American Enterprise Institute, <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/search/?q=ALEC" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">American Legislative Exchange Council</a>, Federalist Society and Hoover Institution, were among those listed in the 2007 UCS report.So what is ExxonMobil getting for its money? Let's take a look at a handful of last year's grantees to find out.U.S. Chamber of Commerce:Half of ExxonMobil's 2015 denier donations—$1 million—went to the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the same amount it gave the Chamber in 2014.The chamber acknowledges that climate change is happening, but discounts the prevailing scientific consensus that it is largely due to human activity, mainly burning fossil fuels. When pressed about the Chamber's position during a March 2014 Senate hearing, Karen Harbert, head of the Chamber's Institute for 21st Century Energy, <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/03/here-is-exactly-what-the-chamber-of-commerce-thinks-about-global-warming/447177/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">replied</a> that there is a "robust debate" over what is causing <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/climate-change/" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">climate change</a>. "It is caused by a lot of things," she insisted.[tobacco scam]Harbert's scientifically indefensible comment was not surprising. The Chamber has a long history of disputing climate science and that has alienated some of its members. In 2009, Apple, Exelon, Nike, PNM Resources and PG&E, for example, cancelled their memberships after Chamber Vice President William Kovacs <a href="http://articles.latimes.com/2009/aug/25/nation/na-climate-trial25" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">demanded</a> that the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) convene a "Scopes monkey trial of the 21st century" on climate science with witnesses, cross-examinations and a judge ruling on the reality of global warming. "It would be evolution versus creationism," Kovacs explained. "It will be climate change science on trial."Those high-profile defections apparently had little impact on the Chamber's position. In May 2014, just days before the EPA announced its draft Clean Power Plan to reduce power plant carbon pollution, the Chamber released a grossly misleading <a href="http://www.energyxxi.org/sites/default/files/file-tool/Assessing_the_Impact_of_Potential_New_Carbon_Regulations_in_the_United_States.pdf" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">report</a> attacking the proposed rule. The report, which was also sponsored by the American Petroleum Institute, was denounced not only by the <a href="https://blog.epa.gov/blog/2014/05/setting-the-record-straight-on-the-chamber-of-commerces-report/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">EPA</a>, but also by <a href="http://www.politifact.com/truth-o-meter/article/2014/may/30/its-epa-vs-us-chamber-commerce-over-climate-change/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">PolitiFact.com</a> and the <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/fact-checker/wp/2014/06/03/gop-lawmakers-rush-to-cite-study-to-discredit-new-epa-rule-but-study-assumed-epa-rule-would-be-tougher/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">Washington Post</a>. Among its many faults, the report wildly inflated the cost of the rule and failed to consider the benefits of cutting carbon emissions.Last October, the Chamber and 14 other business associations <a href="http://www.ucsusa.org/global-warming/fight-misinformation/whos-fighting-clean-power-plan-and-epa-action-climate#bf-toc-6" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">filed</a> a lawsuit against the EPA, arguing that the Clean Power Plan exceeds the agency's authority to regulate the energy sector and the Chamber's priorities for 2016 include opposing EPA efforts to curb carbon emissions as well as the agency's science-based finding that global warming endangers public health and the environment.Manhattan Institute:ExxonMobil gave the Manhattan Institute $200,000 in 2015, boosting the company's total donations to the self-described free-market think tank to $1 million since 1998. In turn, the institute has been cranking out papers and articles denouncing efforts to cut carbon and maligning renewable energy technologies.Last summer, for example, Manhattan Institute Senior Fellow Oren Cass dismissed the idea of a carbon tax—ExxonMobil's supposed preferred policy—as a "shell game" in an <a href="http://www.nationalaffairs.com/publications/detail/the-carbon-tax-shell-game" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">article</a> he wrote for National Affairs. He followed up that essay in October with a <a href="http://www.manhattan-institute.org/pdf/eper_19.pdf" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">white paper</a> calling the impending UN climate negotiations in Paris a "farce." What did Cass propose as a better solution? He urged policymakers to "abandon fruitless negotiations and focus instead on the realistic option of promoting innovation and preparing for any future adaptation that may be necessary."The institute's longtime point man on energy, Robert Bryce—who previously worked for the ExxonMobil-funded Institute for Energy Research—says he's "agnostic" about climate change. Over the years he has written numerous columns for the Los Angeles Times, New York Times, Wall Street Journal and other publications praising oil, natural gas and <a href="http://www.ecowatch.com/search/?q=coal" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">coal</a> and disparaging wind and solar. A recent Bryce <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/article/436228/wind-energy-subsidies-billions" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">column</a> in the National Review, for instance, denounced tax breaks and subsidies for the wind industry but ignored the fact that, since 1918, federal oil and gas industry <a href="http://www.dblpartners.vc/resource/what-would-jefferson-do/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">subsidies</a> have averaged $4.85 billion a year in today's dollars.American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC):ALEC, a secretive lobby group that drafts sample corporate-friendly legislation for state lawmakers, has received $1.79 million from ExxonMobil since 1998 and that investment is still paying dividends. At ALEC's annual meeting last July, for example, corporate and legislator members collaborated on <a href="http://blog.ucsusa.org/jeff-deyette/alecs-annual-meeting-to-feature-more-attacks-on-successful-clean-energy-policies-813?ga=1.132384654.1683277237.1439828438" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">bills and resolutions</a> that would inhibit state implementation of the Clean Power Plan, hamper the solar industry from selling electricity directly to homes and businesses and undermine state renewable energy standards by restricting investment in wind and solar.One of the keynote speakers at that meeting, Stephen Moore—founder of the Club for Growth and a visiting fellow at the Heritage Foundation—<a href="http://capitalandmain.com/latest-news/issues/society/alec-confidential-tales-from-the-supply-side-0724/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">declared</a> at a plenary session that the "biggest scam of the last 100 years is global warming." ALEC's official position on climate change is only slightly more nuanced, leaving open the question of the role human activity plays. "Climate change is a historical phenomenon," its website <a href="https://www.alec.org/model-policy/alec-energy-principles/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">states</a> "and the debate will continue on the significance of natural and anthropogenic contributions."With that scientifically challenged position, it's no wonder ALEC <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/elliott-negin/more-lies-from-alec-about_b_6149568.html" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">invites</a> speakers for its conferences from such notorious climate science denier groups as the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow, the Heartland Institute and, of course, the Heritage Foundation—all former ExxonMobil grantees.While ExxonMobil and other major carbon producers Chevron and Peabody Energy remain steadfast ALEC members, more than 100 corporations have <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php/Corporations_that_Have_Cut_Ties_to_ALEC" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">severed ties</a> with the organization for a variety of reasons, including its stance on climate change. Those companies include a number of heavy hitters in the energy sector, including American Electric Power, BP, ConocoPhillips and Shell.National Black Chamber of Commerce:From 2002 through last year, the National Black Chamber of Commerce (NBCC) received $1.1 million from ExxonMobil and the organization's president, Harry C. Alford, is unapologetic about taking fossil fuel industry money. "Of course we do and it is only natural," Alford <a href="http://www.nationalbcc.org/news/beyond-the-rhetoric/2428-fossil-fuels-and-african-americans-it-s-family" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">states</a> on the NBCC website. "The legacy of Blacks in this nation has been tied to the miraculous history of fossil fuel ... [F]ossil fuels have been our economic friend."Last summer, NBCC published a report that falsely <a href="http://nbccnow.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/NBCC_FinalRev1.pdf" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">claimed</a> the Clean Power Plan would pose "economic hardship" on poor and minority Americans. A UCS <a href="http://blog.ucsusa.org/john-rogers/new-flawed-study-of-the-clean-power-plan-how-the-misi-study-gets-it-so-wrong-759?ga=1.61558572.1683277237.1439828438" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">analysis</a> found that the report was based on fraudulent claims from previously published studies, including the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's anti-Clean Power Plan report from 2014. In fact, unchecked climate change would likely hurt poor and minority communities most.More recently, Alford wrote an <a href="http://thehill.com/blogs/pundits-blog/energy-environment/285944-the-epa-must-respect-the-supreme-courts-authority" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">opinion piece</a> attacking the Clean Power Plan for The Hill, a Washington political trade publication. Like the U.S. Chamber of Commerce's bogus 2014 report, Alford's June 29 column vastly exaggerated the cost of the proposed rule and did not factor in the billions of dollars in health and economic benefits that would result from cutting carbon pollution.ExxonMobil's Pretzel LogicLast fall, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/elliott-negin/internal-documents-show-f_b_7749988.html" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">UCS</a> and reporters at <a href="https://insideclimatenews.org/content/Exxon-The-Road-Not-Taken" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">InsideClimate News</a> and the <a href="http://graphics.latimes.com/exxon-arctic/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">Los Angeles Times</a> revealed that Exxon's own scientists had warned the company decades ago about the potential for climate catastrophe. The new revelations also showed that the company responded to that bad news by downplaying climate risks and helping establish the climate science denial network.A number of journalists did follow-up stories, pressing ExxonMobil officials about the company's longtime support for denier groups. They didn't always get the same answer.During an interview last September with Richard Keil, ExxonMobil's senior media relations advisor, WNYC's On the Media host Bob Garfield pushed Keil for an explanation. "Please clarify this for me: Are not funding or did not fund them?" Garfield <a href="http://www.wnyc.org/story/exxon-responds-insideclimate-news/#transcript" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">asked</a>. Keil's response was unequivocal. "We are not funding," he said.When asked the same question by the New York Times in early November, then-Vice President of Public and Government Affairs Kenneth Cohen likewise said no. "We stopped funding them in the middle part of the last decade because a handful of them were making the uncertainty of the science their focal point," he <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2015/11/06/science/exxon-mobil-under-investigation-in-new-york-over-climate-statements.html?r=0%20Cohen%20NYT" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">said</a>. "Frankly, we made the call that we needed to back away from supporting the groups that were undercutting the actual risk" of global warming.Cohen's response wasn't a surprise. He made the same disingenuous claim back in February 2007, a few weeks after UCS disclosed that ExxonMobil had been spending millions of dollars on climate science denier groups. Greenwire, a trade news organization, <a href="http://www.ucsusa.org/sites/default/files/attach/2015/11/Greenwire-Cohen-Exxon-2-9-07.pdf" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">reported</a> that Cohen said the company "has stopped funding them."The surprise came on November 9, three days after the New York Times story ran, when PBS NewsHour host Judy Woodruff asked Cohen if ExxonMobil has been funding denier groups. This time he took a different tack."Well, the answer is yes," <a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/exxon-mobil-mislead-public-climate-change-research/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">replied</a> Cohen, who retired from the company in January. "And I will let those organizations respond for themselves."But before anyone declares a victory for corporate transparency, it turns out that Cohen's moment of candor was, well, momentary.On December 1, a Washington Post story quoted yet another ExxonMobil spokesperson who qualified Cohen's remark. Alan Jeffers, a media relations manager, <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2015/12/01/this-is-how-climate-doubt-becomes-powerful-and-spreads-into-the-media/" target="blank" style="color: rgb(78, 147, 66); text-decoration: none;">said</a> the company "rejects the premise" that it has been funding climate science denial."We were engaged with funding public policy groups on policy issues, not on science," Jeffers explained. "We made our position known on some climate policies that made us unpopular with environmental activists and they tried to position that as us funding climate denial. And that's just not accurate."Not accurate? As Jeffers, Keil and their former boss, Cohen, surely know, the think tanks, advocacy groups and associations ExxonMobil has been sponsoring all these years lie about the science to strengthen the argument against doing anything to address climate change. After all, if people believe climate science is a fraud—or at least "far from settled"—they will see no reason to support a carbon tax, cap-and-trade system or any other climate policy. And that line of reasoning, which protects the status quo, seems to suit ExxonMobil just fine.Elliott Negin is a senior writer at the Union of Concerned Scientists

Outside of print media, these organizations’ pundits are frequently featured on the Sunday talk show

circuit, mainstream television networks, cable television, national magazines, online publications, and

as guest speakers. All of these placements increase their ability to penetrate the media and expand the

mindshare claimed by their viewpoint.

For example, Media Matters chronicled the media appearances of Manhattan Institute’s energy fellow

Robert Bryce between January 2011 and October 2011 in media outlets ranging from mainstream

newspapers to television to major internet platforms. Media Matters found that Mr. Bryce alone received

39 media mentions during that nine-month period.15 Table 9 shows the media mentions of Mr.

Bryce for a nine-month period in 2011. checks and bal rept

...But the national conversation about our energy future is vitally important, as is the need for the media’s

vigilance in informing readers on “expert” sources’ possible motivations. If the media does not

demand answers, these organizations certainly will not supply them.

We confirmed that firsthand when, as part of our True Ties campaign, we attempted to pin down

whether Manhattan Institute’s prolific pro-fossil fuel pundit, Robert Bryce, had ties to the fossil fuel

lobby. When asked if he had direct or indirect ties to fossil fuel interests, Mr. Bryce repeatedly refused

to answer the question.18 19

The unwillingness of fossil fuel-funded advocacy groups to report their financial support from fossil

fuel lobbying interests demands the media strengthen its watchdog role on the “expert” sources they

mention.

Mr. Bryce and fossil fuel-funded organizations have every right to participate in the public debate.

But readers have every right to know that those who are mentioned are financially tied to lobbying

interests that benefit from their point of view. ...

15. Media Matters for America, “Who Is Robert Bryce?”

<a href="http://mediamatters.org/research/201110070015">http://mediamatters.org/research/201110070015</a>

Environmental Law Institute, “Energy Subsidies Black

Not Green.” http://www.eli.org/pdf/Energy_Subsidies_

Black_Not_Green.pdf

Earth Track, “Subsidies in the US Energy Sector: Magnitude,

Causes, and Options for Reform.” http://www.earthtrack.

net/files/legacy_library/SubsidyReformOptions.pdf

Since that conversation, Mr. Bryce and the Manhattan

Institute has indicated in some articles that the Institute has

received “4 percent” of its funding from the “hydrocarbon

sector” while omitting this disclosure from others. This

small amount likely does not include support from foundations

connected to fossil fuel interests, such as the numerous

Koch Family Foundations controlled by Charles and

David Koch of Koch Industries.

Checks & Balances Project, “Robert Bryce tied to

the fossil fuel industry.” http://www.youtube.com/

watch?v=57zyh7sc9VA

New York Times, The Public Editor. “The Times

===

<a href="http://mediamatters.org/research/2011/10/07/who-is-robert-bryce/181888">http://mediamatters.org/research/2011/10/07/who-is-robert-bryce/181888</a>

<h2>Bryce Works For The Manhattan Institute, An Industry-Funded Think Tank</h2>

Robert Bryce Is A Senior Fellow At The Manhattan Institute. Bryce is "a senior fellow with the Center for Energy Policy and the Environment at the Manhattan Institute." The center "seeks to influence today's energy policy debate by developing and advancing ideas rooted in free-market economic principles" and disseminates its message "through research papers, op-eds and interviews." According to The Manhattan Insitute's 2009 990 form, accessed through GuideStar.org, the center had expenses of $496,692. [Manhattan Institute, accessed <a href="http://www.manhattan-institute.org/html/ce.htm">10/6/11</a>]

Manhattan Institute Is Funded By ExxonMobil. According to ExxonSecrets.org, the Manhattan Institute has received $385,000 from Exxon since 1998, including $50,000 in 2010. [Exxonsecrets.org, accessed <a href="http://www.exxonsecrets.org/html/orgfactsheet.php?id=51">9/13/11</a>]

Manhattan Institute Has Received Funding From The Koch Family Foundations. The Manhattan Institute has received over $1.3 million total from the Claude R. Lambe Foundation and the David H. Koch Foundation over the years, both of which are associated with Koch Industries, an oil, gas and chemical corporation. From 2001 to 2009 (the most recent year for which data is available), the Lambe Foundation gave The Manhattan Institute $200,000 annually. The Lambe Foundation's board of directors is "comprised entirely of Koch family members, senior Koch executives, and staff who serve Koch foundations," including the CEO of Koch Industries Charles G. Koch, according to Greenpeace. [Greenpeace, <a href="http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/campaigns/global-warming-and-energy/polluterwatch/koch-industries/the-manhattan-institute/">accessed</a> <a href="http://www.greenpeace.org/usa/en/campaigns/global-warming-and-energy/polluterwatch/koch-industries/claude-r-lambe-foundation/">10/7/11</a>]

Manhattan Institute Obscures The Science Supporting Manmade Climate Change. In a 2007 report, the Manhattan Institute stated:

To what degree are human-induced greenhouse gases responsible for warming the atmosphere? The answer is unclear. Despite the certitude with which the media and politicians treat the issue, the science remains muddled. Temperatures fluctuate: they go up in some regions, down in others, and may be affected by naturally occurring phenomena, such as El Niño. [Manhattan Institute, accessed <a href="http://www.manhattan-institute.org/energymyths2007/myth9.htm">10/6/11</a>]

</blockquote>

In a second edition of the report, the Manhattan Institute stated in 2009:

Both the Earth's average temperature and global carbon-dioxide emissions increased during the twentieth century. But what should we make of research showing recent warming on Mars and Pluto, planets without power plants or automobiles? Is planetary warming simply a natural phenomenon? A better understanding of the issues surrounding these and similar questions is needed, if policymakers intend to craft prudent energy policies. [Manhattan Institute, <a href="http://www.manhattan-institute.org/energymyths/myth10.htm">April 2009</a>]

</blockquote>

Manhattan Institute Was Previously Funded By Tobacco Industry. In a 1990 memo, tobacco company RJ Reynolds said: "For the past few years, R.J. Reynolds Tobacco Company has been a corporate sponsor of the Manhattan Institute," which "has done much to stimulate thought at policy-making levels about the ramifications on American life of the product liability situation." The Manhattan Institute also received money from other tobacco companies. A 1997 RJ Reynolds strategy memo brainstorming ways to improve the image of the tobacco industry proposed working with the Manhattan Institute to "educate the public about epidemiology and put risk in perspective." [Legacy Tobacco Documents Library, <a href="http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/pup90e00">10/19/90</a>, <a href="http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/hsx14d00">12/10/90</a>, <a href="http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/rou11c00">4/11/95</a>, <a href="http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/orw87d00">10/19/95</a>, <a href="http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/tlv20e00">10/25/95</a>, <a href="http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/ntl01d00">1/14/97</a>, <a href="http://legacy.library.ucsf.edu/tid/crl63a99">2/4/97</a>]

Manhattan Institute Worked With Philip Morris On Piece Criticizing Clinton Health Care Plan. A Philip Morris memo revealed that the tobacco company "worked off-the-record" with the Manhattan Institute's Betsy McCaughey on her "three-part expose in The New Republic on what the Clinton plan means to you." The plan included an increase on tobacco taxes. [The Atlantic, <a href="http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2009/09/one-crucial-b-mccaughey-update/27320/">9/28/09</a>]

<h2>Bryce Has Been Criticized For Questionable Data, Misleading Claims</h2>

Texas Tribune: "Bryce Relies On Skewed Research And Fuzzy Math." From an October 2010 review of Bryce's book:

In an author's note, Bryce writes that he "believe[s] in the relentless application of logic to our discourse on energy, power, and the future." He accuses others of ignoring "logic and common sense as well as hard facts and figures." Indeed, Power Hungry is loaded with charts, statistics and footnotes, but some of it doesn't wash. Bryce, for example, tries to prove that wind power consumes enormous amounts of land relative to nuclear power. He does so by including all the land on a typical wind farm rather than the actual footprint of a turbine, which is much smaller. By my calculation, his math is off by a factor of around 300.

Bryce relies on skewed research and fuzzy math as he tries to prove that wind farms do nothing to displace dirty-fuel power plants or reduce carbon emissions. As a grand example, he takes on Denmark's successful wind-power sector, asserting that it has had minimal effect on carbon dioxide emissions. In fact, the amount of CO2 produced by Denmark's electricity sector has dropped by nearly a quarter since 1990, even as the economy has grown.

Worse, Bryce lends aid and comfort to some tinfoil ideas. He cites something called "wind turbine syndrome"--the theory that low-frequency sounds from turbine blades make people sick. No matter that there is no peer-reviewed research documenting the effect. [Texas Observer, <a href="http://www.texasobserver.org/component/k2/item/17023theecoheretic/17023theecoheretic">10/14/10</a>]

</blockquote>

FrumForum: Bryce's Claim "Presents A Misleading Picture" Of "How Science Works." Responding to Bryce's October 6 Wall Street Journal op-ed, science writer and libertarian conservative Kenneth Silber wrote:

This attempt to stuff climate science into a black hole is a non sequitur. That's not just because the neutrino finding, even if confirmed, has nothing to do with the data or theories of climate science. It's also because the analogy Bryce is making -- if relativity could be wrong, so could global warming -- presents a misleading picture of the respective scientific theories and how science works. [FrumForum, <a href="http://www.frumforum.com/why-we-should-still-be-sweating-global-warming">10/6/11</a>]

</blockquote>

Energy Writer: Bryce's Book Includes "Questionable" Data Crunching "And Outright Deceptions." From a review of Power Hungry by energy writer A. Siegel:

Masquerading as an unbiased, fact-based look at America's energy situation and viable paths forward into the future, Robert Bryce's Power Hungry is a mixed collection of factual material, thought-provoking constructs, selective 'truthiness', questionable (if not simply wrong) data crunching, and outright deceptions. This mix of material makes Bryce's work dangerous reading for those without a serious grounding in energy (related) issues while that same mix calls into question this work's value for anyone with that more serious background. [Climate Progress, <a href="http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2010/09/14/206723/power-hungry-robert-bryce-debunkin/">9/14/10</a>]

</blockquote>

Ecologist Matt Wasson: Bryce Relies "On Bad Science." Responding to Bryce's April 25, 2010, Washington Post op-ed, Matt Wasson, ecologist and Director of Programs for Appalachian Voices, wrote:

Bryce's piece was part of the Post's "<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/linkset/2010/02/10/LI2010021001916.html">5 Myths</a>" series, which invites readers every Sunday to "challenge everything you think you know."

While challenging everything you think you know is generally a good idea, it's not a good idea to replace what you know with what Bryce thinks he knows because, as it turns out, he doesn't know much about renewable energy. Relying on bad science like the <a href="http://blogger.huffingtonpost.com/mt.cgi?_mode=view&type=entry&id=306051&blog_id=3">Nature Conservancy's "Energy Sprawl"</a> study and <a href="http://switchboard.nrdc.org/blogs/ssuccar/the_danish_wind_experience_tru.html">thoroughly discredited</a> white papers like "The Case of Denmark" from Bjorn Lomborg's Institute for Energy Studies, Bryce deftly turns common sense on its head to convince his readers that burning more fossil fuels is really the best path to a green energy future. [Huffington Post, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/matt-wasson/extreme-misinformation-in_b_552097.html">4/26/10</a>]

</blockquote>

<h2>Bryce On Climate Change: "Don't Know ... Don't Really Care"</h2>

Bryce: "I Don't Know Who's Right. And I Don't Really Care." From Bryce's 2010 book:

I've seen Al Gore's movie, An Inconvenient Truth, and I've read some of the reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. I've also listened to and read some of the things published by the climate "skeptics," including Richard Lindzen, the climate scientist from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. I have interviewed climate scientists. I regularly read blogs on climate from both camps.

My position on the science of global warming and climate change: I don't know who's right. And I don't really care. What can be demonstrated without any caveats is this: The carbon dioxide reduction targets being advocated by the U.S. Congress and the Democratic leadership in Washington are pure fantasy. [Power Hungry, <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Power-Hungry-Myths-Energy-Future/dp/1586487892">Chapter 15</a>]

</blockquote>

Bryce Cited Unrelated Neutrinos Observation To Call Into Question Manmade Climate Change. From Bryce's October 6 Wall Street Journal op-ed, "Five Truths About Climate Change":

The science is not settled, not by a long shot. Last month, scientists at CERN, the prestigious high-energy physics lab in Switzerland, reported that neutrinos might--repeat, might--travel faster than the speed of light. If serious scientists can question Einstein's theory of relativity, then there must be room for debate about the workings and complexities of the Earth's atmosphere. [Wall Street Journal, <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203388804576612620828387968.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_LEADTop">10/6/11</a>]

</blockquote>

National Research Council: "The Core Phenomenon, Scientific Questions, And Hypotheses Have Been Examined Thoroughly And Have Stood Firm." In a comprehensive report reviewing the state of climate science, the National Research Council said:

There are still some uncertainties, and there always will be in understanding a complex system like Earth's climate. Nevertheless, there is a strong, credible body of evidence, based on multiple lines of research, documenting that climate is changing and that these changes are in large part caused by human activities. While much remains to be learned, the core phenomenon, scientific questions, and hypotheses have been examined thoroughly and have stood firm in the face of serious scientific debate and careful evaluation of alternative explanations. [National Research Council, <a href="http://dels.nas.edu/Report/Advancing-Science-Climate-Change/12782">2010</a>]

</blockquote>

<h2>Bryce Boosts Exxon In Op-Eds Without Disclosing Conflict Of Interest</h2>

Bryce Discussed ExxonMobil Lawsuit In CNN.com Op-Ed. In a September 9 CNN.com op-ed, Bryce wrote about "a lawsuit filed by ExxonMobil Corp. against Obama's Interior Department in which the energy giant claims it has been 'singled out' for 'unprecedented adverse treatment.'" Bryce added: "Unless the Interior Department changes its position, years of litigation will delay the production of millions of barrels of domestic oil and, with that delay, a postponement of what could be $11 billion in royalties payable to the federal government over the life of the field." [CNN.com, <a href="http://articles.cnn.com/2011-09-09/opinion/opinion_bryce-obama-energy-jobs_1_energy-policy-biofuels-oil-companies?_s=PM:OPINION">9/9/11</a>]

Bryce Wrote About ExxonMobil In Washington Examiner. In a May 15 Washington Examiner op-ed, Bryce criticized democrats for "vilify[ing]" ExxonMobil without disclosing that his employer is funded by Exxon. [Washington Examiner, <a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/05/manhattan-moment-rex-and-jeff-illustrate-washingtons-gas-price-hypocrisy">5/18/11</a>]

<h2>In 39 Media Appearances This Year, Not One Mention Of Bryce's Ties To Oil Industry</h2>

<ul>

<li>Wall Street Journal, <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203388804576612620828387968.html">10/6/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/276671/ten-reasons-why-keystone-pipeline-will-be-built-robert-bryce">9/12/11</a></li>

<li>Huffington Post, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-bryce/solyndras-bankruptcy-show_b_944901.html">9/7/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/275673/texas-wind-energy-fails-again-robert-bryce#comments">8/29/11</a></li>

<li>Politico, <a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0811/61610.html">8/18/11</a></li>

<li>Huffington Post, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-bryce/wind-industry-backlash_b_923906.html">8/12/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/274388/wind-energy-myth-robert-bryce">8/12/11</a></li>

<li>Washington Examiner, <a href="http://www.robertbryce.com/articles/375-pork-barrel-ethanol-subsidies-have-doubled-corn-prices.html">8/10/11</a></li>

<li>Huffington Post, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-bryce/if-gov-jerry-brown-wants-_b_913731.html">8/1/11</a></li>

<li>Forbes, <a href="http://www.forbes.com/2011/07/19/wind-energy-carbon_print.html">7/19/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/271890/shale-and-its-discontents-robert-bryce">7/15/11</a></li>

<li>Huffington Post, <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/robert-bryce/another-climate-change-meeting-looms_b_893750.html?view=print">7/7/11</a></li>

<li>Wall Street Journal, <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052702304432304576369140191493636.html">6/13/11</a></li>

<li>New York Times, <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/08/opinion/08bryce.html">6/7/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/268815/million-electric-vehicles-robert-bryce">6/7/11</a></li>

<li>Washington Examiner, <a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/05/manhattan-moment-rex-and-jeff-illustrate-washingtons-gas-price-hypocrisy#ixzz1N8dk2N7s">5/18/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/266775/obama-s-happy-talk-energy-robert-bryce">5/8/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/266243/california-dreamin-robert-bryce">5/3/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/264394/america-s-next-top-energy-slogan-robert-bryce">4/12/11</a></li>

<li>Politico, <a href="http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0311/52354.html">4/1/11</a></li>

<li>New York Daily News, <a href="http://articles.nydailynews.com/2011-03-20/news/29185807_1_nuclear-reactors-turbines-wind-energy">3/20/11</a></li>

<li>Daily Beast, <a href="http://www.thedailybeast.com/articles/2011/03/14/american-nuclear-power-was-doomed-even-before-japan.html">3/15/11</a></li>

<li>Wall Street Journal, <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704900004576152431935573812.html">2/26/11</a></li>

<li>Washington Times, <a href="http://www.robertbryce.com/articles/28-qabsolute-madnessq-of-biofuels.html">2/16/11</a></li>

<li>National Review, <a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/257224/another-texan-running-president-robert-bryce">1/17/11</a></li>

<li>Washington Examiner, <a href="http://washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/columnists/2011/01/obama-needs-step-natural-gas-pedal#ixzz1At1Wogsn">1/11/11</a></li>

<li>Fox Business, The Willis Report, 9/1/11</li>

<li>PBS, PBS News Hour with Jim Lehrer, <a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/environment/july-dec11/oilpipeline_08-29.html">8/29/11</a></li>

<li>Fox Business, The Willis Report, 6/17/11</li>

<li>Fox Business, Stossel, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/user/robertbrycetv#p/u/2/MRVy5l6jhVc">5/12/11</a></li>

<li>Fox News, Your World With Neil Cavuto, 5/10/11</li>

<li>Fox Business, Lou Dobbs Tonight, 4/26/11</li>

<li>Fox Business, The Willis Report, 4/22/11</li>

<li>Fox Business, <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nMKqc-kjOD0&feature=player_embedded">4/20/11</a></li>

<li>Fox Business, 3/24/11</li>

<li>Fox Business, Lou Dobbs Tonight, 3/17/11</li>

<li>Fox Business, The Willis Report, 3/14/11</li>

<li>Fox Business, The Willis Report, 1/4/11</li>

</ul>

50 Journalism Professionals Call For News Outlets To Improve Disclosure. In an October 6 letter to the public editor of the New York Times, 50 journalism professionals and educators wrote:

Unfortunately, when media outlets quote or publish op-eds from "bought and biased" pundits, the conflict of interest goes unmentioned. Instead, Mr. Bryce and others are simply identified as a "senior fellow" or an "energy expert." As a result, these pundits mislead media outlets and leave readers in the dark about their true ties. Surely, these outlets can't expect their readers to know about these connections.

We are asking the New York Times to lead the industry and set the nation's standard by disclosing financial conflicts of interest that their op-ed contributors may have at the time their piece is published. By simply asking a few standard disclosure questions, the New York Times can avoid any confusion and ensure better transparency. [TrueTies.org, <a href="http://www.trueties.org/letter-to-the-new-york-times">10/6/11</a>]

</blockquote>

<h1 class="print-title" style=" margin-bottom: .2em;">Major News Outlets Give Fossil-Fuel-Funded Think Tanks a Free Platform</h1>

<div class="dek" style=" font-style: italic; margin-bottom: .5em;">National newspapers publish anti-green-energy articles—without disclosing that the authors work for industry-backed groups, a new study finds.</div>

By <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/authors/kate-sheppard" rel="author">Kate Sheppard</a> | Thu Dec. 13, 2012 3:03 AM PST

The fossil fuel industry has long been a source of talking points and "studies" aimed at spreading doubt about climate change, and over the past few years, it has broadened its scope to undermine support for clean energy, as well. Often, this criticism is published in the form of articles in major media outlets—penned by employees of think tanks who don't disclose their groups' industry funding, a new <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2012/12/12/report-fossil-fuel-front-groups-on-the-front-page/">study</a> [1] finds.

The <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/">Checks and Balances Project</a> [2], a pro-clean-energy watchdog group, surveyed stories published over the past five years in 60 news outlets, including national and regional newspapers, the Associated Press, and Politico. Researchers found that only 6 percent of the stories disclosed the funding when they cited "experts" from those think tanks. Typically, the stories referred to the groups as "free-market" or "libertarian," without mentioning the dirty-energy support.

</div>

Among the most frequent op-ed contributors is Robert Bryce, a senior fellow with the <a href="http://www.manhattan-institute.org/">Manhattan Institute</a> [3], a think tank that has made promoting fossil fuels and downplaying climate change a central focus—and that has received $1.21 million in funding from the likes of ExxonMobil and <a href="http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/03/06/953240/-Who-is-this-Claude-R-Lambe">Claude R. Lambe</a> [4], a Koch-owned charitable organization. Bryce is quite deft at mowing down clean energy, which is probably why he's become a regular in the op-ed pages of the New York Times and the Wall Street Journal, on TV, and speaking at events.

The Checks and Balances report notes that Manhattan Institute was mentioned 65 times in the papers it surveyed. That count includes pieces like Bryce's April 2010 <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/23/AR2010042302220.html">op-ed in the Washington Post</a> [5], "Five Myths About Green Energy," which includes lines like, "[I]n in the electric car's century-long history, failure tailgates failure." The piece describes Bryce as a senior fellow at Manhattan Institute, but doesn't mention the funding. Nor does his Wall Street Journal piece from August 2010, "Wind Power Won't Cool Down the Planet," which claims that increasing the use of wind will actually increase our emissions of carbon dioxide. Bryce also <a href="http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2010/0710/Six-lessons-from-the-BP-oil-spill/%28page%29/7">popped up in</a> [6] a Christian Science Monitor piece on lessons from the BP oil spill, arguing that nothing can compete with oil—again, with no indication that his organization has a dog in the fight. (Media Matters also <a href="http://mediamatters.org/research/2011/10/07/who-is-robert-bryce/181888">posted a piece in 2011</a> [7] that noted Bryce had made 39 different media appearances that failed to disclose the fossil fuel ties.)

<div class="pullquote-right">Fossil-fuel-funded AEI fellow Steven Hayward has penned WSJ op-eds with titles like "No: Alternatives Are Simply Too Expensive."</div>

Other conservative think tanks have jumped in the clean-tech-bashing game, too. Take the American Enterprise Institute, recipient of at least $2.8 million in money from fossil-fuel interests like ExxonMobil since 1998. AEI fellow Steven Hayward has penned Wall Street Journal op-eds with titles like <a href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203440104574406673454653820.html">"No: Alternatives Are Simply Too Expensive."</a> [8] Then there's the Institute for Energy Research, an <a href="http://grist.org/article/2009-04-30-industry-front-group-goes/">industry aligned</a> [9] nonprofit that has taken money from Exxon and the Claude R. Lambe Charitable Foundation, one of the Koch family foundations. The institute's president, Thomas Pyle, appeared in a January 2010 <a href="http://www.chron.com/business/energy/article/Texas-is-in-line-to-get-clean-energy-tax-credits-1694015.php">Houston Chronicle article</a> [10] arguing that the government should not provide tax credits to renewable energy, because it's been proven that they are "not economically viable in the marketplace."...

In October 2011, Bryce did get some flack when an <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/08/opinion/08bryce.html">op-ed he wrote</a> [11] for the New York Times bashing California's clean-energy mandate failed to disclose that the Manhattan Institute is supported by oil and gas interests. Checks and Balances, along with a group of 50 journalists and journalism educators, <a href="http://www.cjr.org/behind_the_news/journos_call_for_more_transpar.php?page=all">launched a campaign</a> [12] in response, asking the Times to disclose any financial ties of op-ed contributors. The public editor responded with a column <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/opinion/sunday/the-times-gives-them-space-but-who-pays-them.html">calling for more transparency</a> [13] on contributors.

Bryce bristles at the suggestion that Manhattan's funding might have anything to do with his positions—and indeed, he <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2012/02/09/anti-clean-energy-pundit-unhinged-by-basic-question-are-you-bankrolled-by-fossil-fuels/">loudly confronted</a> [14] an advocate from the Checks and Balances Project who asked him about it after a public event earlier this year. He claimed that the percentage of funding that the Manhattan Institute receives from the fossil fuel industry is small—just 2.5 percent of the group's budget over the past 10 years.

"I have been targeted by the left and I think by people who have a lot of interest in pushing renewables," Bryce told Mother Jones in an interview earlier this year. "When it comes down to it, facts can't be bought, and people who attack me on the whole question of funding, they can't attack my numbers, they can't attack the physics, so they attack me."

The complaints haven't slowed Bryce down at all; he's continued to place op-eds bashing renewables and promoting fossil energy in prominent national outlets. Meanwhile, his criticism has expanded from seemingly reasonable concerns about the ability to bring renewables to scale to more bizarre allegations about "wind-turbine syndrome"— purported mental and physical health effects attributed to the low-frequency noise of turbines that have been widely debunked as having no scientific or epidemiological evidence to support them—and complaints about how the wind industry has a "license to kill golden eagles."

For its part, the Checks and Balances Project says it just wants groups backed by dirty-energy money to disclose their funding when they're cited in the press. From the report: "Overall, we think that whether it's for a quote, background information, a citation or a byline, 'think tank' sources should be asked a simple, step-and-repeat question: 'Do you get money, directly or indirectly, for interests that stand to benefit from what you are saying?'"

<div class="print-source_url">Source URL: <a href="http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2012/12/manhattan-institute-climate-energy-bryce">http://www.motherjones.com/environment/2012/12/manhattan-institute-climate-energy-bryce</a></div>

Links:

[1] http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2012/12/12/report-fossil-fuel-front-groups-on-the-front-page/

[2] http://checksandbalancesproject.org/

[3] http://www.manhattan-institute.org/

[4] http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/03/06/953240/-Who-is-this-Claude-R-Lambe

[5] http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/04/23/AR2010042302220.html

[6] http://www.csmonitor.com/Environment/2010/0710/Six-lessons-from-the-BP-oil-spill/(page)/7

[7] http://mediamatters.org/research/2011/10/07/who-is-robert-bryce/181888

[8] http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052970203440104574406673454653820.html

[9] http://grist.org/article/2009-04-30-industry-front-group-goes/

[10] http://www.chron.com/business/energy/article/Texas-is-in-line-to-get-clean-energy-tax-credits-1694015.php

[11] http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/08/opinion/08bryce.html

[12] http://www.cjr.org/behind_the_news/journos_call_for_more_transpar.php?page=all

[13] http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/opinion/sunday/the-times-gives-them-space-but-who-pays-them.html

[14] http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2012/02/09/anti-clean-energy-pundit-unhinged-by-basic-question-are-you-bankrolled-by-fossil-fuels/

<a href="http://www.motherjones.com/print/210806">http://www.motherjones.com/print/210806</a>
=<h2 style="font-weight: normal; margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px 0px 5px; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-bottom-style: dotted; border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); line-height: 20px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2012/02/09/anti-clean-energy-pundit-unhinged-by-basic-question-are-you-bankrolled-by-fossil-fuels/" style="text-decoration: none;">Anti-Clean Energy ‘Pundit’ Unhinged By Basic Question: Are You Bankrolled By Fossil Fuels?</a></h2><div class="post-info" style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase; line-height: 20px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">FEBRUARY 9, 2012 BY <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/author/checksandbalancesproject/" title="Posts by Checks And Balances Project" rel="author" style="text-decoration: none;">CHECKS AND BALANCES PROJECT</a> <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2012/02/09/anti-clean-energy-pundit-unhinged-by-basic-question-are-you-bankrolled-by-fossil-fuels/#respond" title="Comment on Anti-Clean Energy ‘Pundit’ Unhinged By Basic Question: Are You Bankrolled By Fossil Fuels?" style="text-decoration: none;">LEAVE A COMMENT</a></div>By Gabe ElsnerThe fossil fuel lobby aggressively uses lobbying and propaganda to <a href="http://www.chron.com/business/article/Industry-slams-federal-plan-to-list-fracturing-3087948.php" style="text-decoration: none;">block public health protections</a>, <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2011/12/18/behind-the-scenes-american-petroleum-institutes-commercial-shoot/" style="text-decoration: none;">manipulate</a> the energy debate, <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2011/07/20/more-handouts-to-big-oil-how-barrasso-is-pushing-their-agenda/" style="text-decoration: none;">defend</a> their massive government handouts and <a href="http://cleantechnica.com/2011/07/20/the-fossil-fuel-industry-continues-attacks-on-wind-energy-the-wind-industry-pushes-back-with-facts/" style="text-decoration: none;">attack</a> clean energy sources that threaten to displace them.No tool goes unused: Traditional lobbying, “<a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/bit.ly/wo5LZL" style="text-decoration: none;">Super PAC</a>” donations, software that floods opinion websites with favorable comments, and a network of well-funded front groups and commentators who launder fossil fuel industry talking points.<a href="http://www.robertbryce.com/" style="text-decoration: none;">Robert Bryce</a> and his employer, <a href="http://www.manhattan-institute.org/" style="text-decoration: none;">The Manhattan Institute</a>, are among the most aggressive of a growing class of talkers underwritten by fossil fuels to write commentary talking down clean energy and playing down the cost and public health problems of fossil fuel dependence.Bryce has written <a href="http://www.amazon.com/Robert-Bryce/e/B001JP34OY" style="text-decoration: none;">four books</a> and appeared in hundreds of articles and opinion pieces, from the conservative<a href="http://www.nationalreview.com/articles/289920/wind-energy-noise-pollution-robert-bryce" style="text-decoration: none;">National Review</a>, to mainstream media outlets such as <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/08/opinion/08bryce.html" style="text-decoration: none;">The New York Times</a>, <a href="http://articles.cnn.com/2011-09-09/opinion/opinion_bryce-obama-energy-jobs_1_energy-policy-biofuels-oil-companies?s=PM:OPINION" style="text-decoration: none;">CNN</a>, <a href="http://www.npr.org/2011/03/14/134533401/can-clean-energy-drive-the-economic-recovery" style="text-decoration: none;">National Public Radio</a> and <a href="http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/environment/july-dec11/oilpipeline_08-29.html" style="text-decoration: none;">PBS</a>. Mr. Bryce is quickly securing the top position as the leading marketer for fossil fuels.Bryce, a former journalist, has consistently been able to position himself as an intellectually independent energy expert. He has never acknowledged fossil fuel underwriting – though Manhattan Institute records show that since 1985, it has <a href="http://mediamattersaction.org/transparency/organization/Manhattan_Institute_for_Policy_Research/funders" style="text-decoration: none;">received</a> $6.7 million from fossil fuel interests, <a href="http://mediamattersaction.org/transparency/organization/Manhattan_Institute_for_Policy_Research/funders" style="text-decoration: none;">including</a> the Koch brothers and ExxonMobil.I asked Bryce if he had financial ties to the fossil fuel industry after his debate appearance before the National Association of Regulatory Utility Commissioners <a href="http://winter.narucmeetings.org/" style="text-decoration: none;">conference</a> on Monday. Not only did Bryce refuse to answer the question, he also launched into an angry, finger-pointing tirade saying that I’d “made up” the amount of fossil fuel support documented by Manhattan Institute records.I break it down <a href="http://youtu.be/SM2K4ZDDjlo" style="text-decoration: none;">here</a>: video<div class="entry" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; line-height: 20px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">And the raw video is <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-6ZJeki19c&feature=email" style="text-decoration: none;">here</a>.As 50 current and former journalists <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2011/10/06/disclosing-the-true-ties-of-op-ed-writers/" style="text-decoration: none;">told</a> The New York Times in a petition we launched last year, it’s fine for Bryce to echo fossil fuel talking points. But it’s not acceptable for him to hide that he’s doing that for the fossil fuel industry and leave himself positioned in bylines as somehow intellectually honest. Based on records and Bryce’s response, it seems pretty clear that Bryce is functioning as a paid spokesman of the natural gas industry (and other fossil fuels). But wearing that on his sleeve would lose his “echo chamber” effect because he wouldn’t be the seemingly independent voice that fossil fuel industries need to say things they don’t have the credibility to say themselves.–Note: Based on our experience from last year’s True Ties petition, this will draw a pretty aggressive response from Bryce’s fellow travelers, such as Washington Examiner Editorial Page Editor, Mark Tapscott (CPAC “conservative journalist of the year”), and National Review Online Editor, Ed Craig, a former Manhattan Institute PR guy. To put their mind at ease, we do answer the funding question <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/about/" style="text-decoration: none;">here</a>. We’re unabashedly clean energy, and we’d love to get support from clean energy industries (potential funders – please consider!).<div class="clear" style="clear: both;"><div class="post-meta" style="text-transform: uppercase; margin: 0px; padding: 5px 0px 0px; border-top-width: 1px; border-top-style: dotted; border-top-color: rgb(204, 204, 204); line-height: 20px; background-color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">FILED UNDER <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/category/blog/" rel="category tag" style="text-decoration: none;">BLOG</a> TAGGED WITH <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/tag/bryce/" rel="tag" style="text-decoration: none;">BRYCE</a>, <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/tag/exxonmobil/" rel="tag" style="text-decoration: none;">EXXONMOBIL</a>, <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/tag/fossil-fuels/" rel="tag" style="text-decoration: none;">FOSSIL FUELS</a>, <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/tag/manhattan-institute/" rel="tag" style="text-decoration: none;">MANHATTAN INSTITUTE</a>, <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/tag/media/" rel="tag" style="text-decoration: none;">MEDIA</a>, <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/tag/pundit/" rel="tag" style="text-decoration: none;">PUNDIT</a>,<a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/tag/robert-bryce/" rel="tag" style="text-decoration: none;">ROBERT BRYCE</a></div>see wind<h2 style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px; font-weight: normal;">Robert Bryce Spreads More Falsehoods About Clean Energy</h2><div class="top-tools" style="clear: both; width: 519px; padding: 5px 0px; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-bottom-style: solid; border-bottom-color: rgb(227, 227, 228);">Posted By Lowell F. on June 9th, 2011</div><div class="entry" style="margin: 0px; padding: 0px;">For several years now, <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Bryce(writer)#Career">Robert Bryce</a> has established himself as a leading shillfor dirty energy, relentlessly spreading disinformation about clean energy. The titles of his books and articles – <a title="Power Hungry: The Myths of " green="Green" energy="Energy" and="and" the="the" real="Real" fuels="Fuels" of="of" future="Future" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Power_Hungry:The_Myths_of%22Green%22_Energy_and_the_Real_Fuels_of_the_Future">Power Hungry: The Myths of “Green” Energy and the Real Fuels of the Future</a>, <a rel="nofollow" href="http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123621221496034823.html">“Let’s Get Real About Renewable Energy”</a>,  and <a rel="nofollow" href="http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/cifamerica/2009/feb/18/james-hansen-coal-power-plants">“James Hansen’s war on coal”</a> – can save you from having to wade through them. In addition, Bryce  is a senior fellow at the <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Manhattan_Institute_for_Policy_Research">Manhattan Institute</a>, a front group that <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Manhattan_Institute_for_Policy_Research#Funding">receives its funding</a> from, among others, the <a href="http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Koch_Family_Foundations">Koch Industries Family Foundation</a>.So, that in a nutshell is where Robert Bryce is coming from – dirty energy all the way.  And that’s why we weren’t surprised to see<a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06/08/opinion/08bryce.html"> Bryce’s latest screed</a>, “The Gas is Greener,” in yesterday’s New York Times.  According to Bryce:<blockquote style="padding: 18px 0px 0px 26px; margin-left: 0px; background: url(http://scalinggreen.com/wp-content/themes/VersatilityLite/images/bquote.gif) 0% 0% no-repeat;">…while energy sources like sunlight and wind are free and naturally replenished, converting them into large quantities of electricity requires vast amounts of natural resources — most notably, land. Even a cursory look at these costs exposes the deep contradictions in the renewable energy movement.[...]</blockquote><blockquote style="padding: 18px 0px 0px 26px; margin-left: 0px; background: url(http://scalinggreen.com/wp-content/themes/VersatilityLite/images/bquote.gif) 0% 0% no-repeat;">…In the rush to do something — anything — to deal with the intractable problem of greenhouse gas emissions, environmental groups and policy makers have determined that renewable energy is the answer. But in doing so they’ve tossed Schumacher’s dictum into the ditch.All energy and power systems exact a toll. If we are to take Schumacher’s phrase to heart while also reducing the rate of growth of greenhouse gas emissions, we must exploit the low-carbon energy sources — natural gas and, yes, nuclear — that have smaller footprints.</blockquote><div id="mcePaste">So, we’re to believe that the full life cycle of natural gas and nuclear, including fracking waste disposal and uranium mining, totals less than the land footprint of solar and wind?  And we’re supposed to believe this, even though natural gas has been shown, in <a href="http://www.news.cornell.edu/stories/April11/GasDrillingDirtier.html">a recent study by Cornell researchers</a>,  to not necessarily be a “low-carbon” footprint energy source?</div><div id="mcePaste">Finally, did the New York Times bother to ask Bryce if he or his “Institute” have financial ties to the industries he’s touting? Such ties shouldn’t disqualify Bryce from submitting pieces to the Times, but he should at least be asked if he has them.</div></div><h1 style="font-weight: normal; margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px 0px 5px; border-bottom-width: 1px; border-bottom-style: dotted; border-bottom-color: rgb(204, 204, 204);">Lisa Linowes and the Disinformation of Industrial Wind Action Group</h1><div class="post-info" style="margin: 0px 0px 10px; padding: 0px; text-transform: uppercase;">AUGUST 12, 2011 BY <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/author/checksandbalancesproject/" title="Posts by Checks And Balances Project" rel="author" style="text-decoration: none;">CHECKS AND BALANCES PROJECT</a> <a href="http://checksandbalancesproject.org/2011/08/12/lisa-linowes-and-the-disinformation-of-industrial-wind-action-group/#comments" title="Comment on Lisa Linowes and the Disinformation of Industrial Wind Action Group" style="text-decoration: none;">1 COMMENT</a></div>Lisa Linowes is the Founder and Executive Director of Industrial Wind Action Group, a group dedicated to “counteract misleading information” and provide “residents, as well as government officials, the information to make informed decisions” about wind energy projects.However, the organization routinely promotes discredited problems and messengers instead of credible sources.  On their website, the Industrial Wind Action Group links to articles and information from sources whose work is unscientific or has been linked to the fossil fuel industry – rather than objective sources that could help residents and government officials make informed decisions.  According to our investigative research, the Industrial Wind Action Group continues to hype anti-wind rhetoric above reality.Promotes Discredited “Problems”<table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; margin: 0px 0px 15px; width: 628px; line-height: 20px;"><tbody><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Claim</td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Reality</td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Wind energy installations cause “Wind Turbine Syndrome” by Nina Pierpont</td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Discredited by panel of scientists and medical professionals including a professor of audiology (<a href="http://www.awea.org/issues/siting/upload/Executive_Summary_AWEA_and_CanWEA_Sound_White_Paper.pdf" style="text-decoration: none;">Expert Panel Review</a>, 2009)</td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Birds populations are disproportionately affected by wind turbines</td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Most construction including housing and skyscrapers impact bird populations. Wind’s impact on bird populations is much less than traditional energy sources, with coal being the largest risk to wildlife (<a href="http://www.nyserda.org/publications/executive%20summary%20report.pdf" style="text-decoration: none;">New York State Energy Research and Development Authority</a>, 2009)</td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">The Shadow Flicker caused by spinning turbine blades are causing health problems</td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Expert panel for the National Academy of Sciences found shadow flicker to be harmless to humans (<a href="http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=11935" style="text-decoration: none;">National Research Council</a>, 2007)</td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Property Values decrease because of wind energy facilities</td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Wind energy facilities were found to have no evidence of widespread impacts on home property values (<a href="http://newscenter.lbl.gov/press-releases/2009/12/02/wind-power-property-values/#hide" style="text-decoration: none;">Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory</a>, 2009)</td></tr></tbody></table>“Experts” tied to the Fossil Fuel Industry<table border="1" cellspacing="0" cellpadding="0" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); border-image-source: initial; border-image-slice: initial; border-image-width: initial; border-image-outset: initial; border-image-repeat: initial; margin: 0px 0px 15px; width: 628px; line-height: 20px;"><tbody><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">“Expert”</td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Tied to</td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Andrew P. Morriss<ul style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px;"><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Senior Scholar at the Mercatus Institute</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Senior Fellow at the Institute for Energy Research</li></ul></td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;"><ul style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px;"><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Mercatus Institute: $1.44 million in funding from 1999-2006 from Koch Industries, a major fossil fuel conglomerate.</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Institute for Energy Research: over $300,000 from Exxon Mobil since 1998, funding from other coal and oil companies</li></ul></td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Glenn Schleede<ul style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px;"><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">former Vice President of the New England Electric System</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">former Senior Vice President of the National Coal Association.</li></ul></td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;"><ul style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px;"><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">New England Electric System: recently acquired by the National Grid, it is the largest natural gas distributor in the Northeast</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">National Coal Association: now known as the National Mining Association, it represents the coal industry in Washington, D.C.</li></ul></td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Robert Bryce<ul style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px;"><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Senior Fellow at the Manhattan Institute</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Former Fellow at the Institute for Energy Research</li></ul></td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;"><ul style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px;"><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Manhattan Institute: significant funding from the Koch Family Foundations and over $50,000 in 2009 from Exxon Mobil.</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Institute for Energy Research: over $300,000 from Exxon Mobil since 1998, funding from other coal and oil companies</li></ul></td></tr><tr><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;">Robert Bradley<ul style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px;"><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Adjunct Scholar, Cato Institute</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Adjunct Scholar, Competitive Enterprise Institute</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">CEO and Founder, Institute for Energy Research</li></ul> </td><td valign="top" width="221" style="border: 1px solid rgb(230, 230, 230); padding: 0.25em 1em;"><ul style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px; padding: 0px 0px 15px;"><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Cato Institute: founded by Charles Koch, CEO and Chairman of Koch Industries, a major fossil fuel conglomerate and supported by the Charles G. Koch Foundation.</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Competitive Enterprise Institute: funding from the Koch Family Foundations and oil companies including Texaco and Amoco (now owned by BP)</li><li style="list-style-type: square; margin: 0px 0px 0px 20px; padding: 0px;">Institute for Energy Research: over $300,000 in funding from Exxon Mobil since 1998, funding from other coal and oil companies</li></ul></td></tr></tbody></table>Not Fulfilling The MissionThe Industrial Wind Action Group states its mission is to “counteract misleading information” and to “provid[e] residents, as well as government officials, the information to make informed decisions.”  Unfortunately, the sources routinely cited on <a href="http://www.windaction.org/" style="text-decoration: none;">www.windaction.org</a> spread misleading information and promote fossil fuel talking points through purportedly neutral third party sources.=

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