Why did I put dollar signs in ex-Greenpeace USA / ex-Ozone Action Executive Directors John Passacantando’s name, the man who arguably was the first to infuse the “reposition global warming” phrase with sustainable major media traction as an indictment of skeptic climate scientists colluding with Big Coal/Oil executives to undercut the ‘settled science’ of man-caused global warming? Hold onto that question until the latter part of this blog post. If you are an aspiring journalist, are you assured good good grades in your journalism classes and great job prospects if you never question anything you are told about that whole “reposition global warming” phrase situation? Hold onto that question as well. Continue reading
Author Archives: Russell Cook
The Real ICE ads, Part 4: what the public actually saw in Flagstaff Arizona & Bowling Green, Kentucky
And now, the actual publicly seen Western Fuels Association “Information Council for the Environment” (ICE) newspaper ads that were printed in the Flagstaff Arizona and Bowling Green, Kentucky newspapers, which I suggested at the end of my October 8, 2021 Part 1 blog post that I needed to find. As usual, what I actually found within this latest exercise does not resolve and solidify widespread accusations that these newspaper ads are definitive proof of coal/oil industry-led disinformation campaigns, what I’ve found instead raises significantly more questions about the core clique of enviro-activists who’ve long promulgated the accusations. Continue reading
Naomi Oreskes’ Additional Oops on Gordon J.F. MacDonald Undercuts the “was no global cooling” Talking Point
Hat tip to Marc Morano / Patrick Moore for the alert about John Robson’s excellent Dec 21 video, “The 1970s Cooling Scare Was Real.” While I was already quite familiar with the existence of the global cooling craze of the 1970s (I mentioned my own personal experience with that craze in the 4th paragraph of my 2011 CEI guest post), I learned one very interesting new detail concerning the geophysicist Gordon James Fraser MacDonald, whose name comes up beginning at the 8:25 point. He was prominently quoted in a July 9, 1971 Washington Post article as saying he agreed with another scientist about the distinct possibility of the Earth cooling as much as six degrees. Since I’ve already knew that the name Gordon MacDonald was an integral part of one of “Merchants of Doubt” book author / documentary film star Naomi Oreskes’ tales of how she became involved in the global warming issue, I was prompted by what I just learned to look a little deeper into what Oreskes thought was so important about Dr MacDonald. Continue reading
The Real ICE ads, Part 3 – what’s real and what isn’t
Slight change in plans, where previously at the end of Part 2 I had planned next to show what the genuine “Information Council for the Environment” public relations campaign newspaper ads looked like in their actual publication pages at the Kentucky Bowling Green Daily News and Flagstaff Arizona Daily Sun. However, that will have to wait for Part 4. After I put Part 2 online, I spotted a new big problem that really undercuts the credibility of the people who say these ads prove the fossil fuel industry ran disinformation campaigns in order to deceive the public about the ‘seriousness’ of man-caused global warming. Continue reading
The Real ICE ads, Part 2
I could have just as easily titled this post “The First, the Last, and the Only Accusation Against Global Warming Skeptics, redux” or “Put all your Eggs in the ‘Reposition Global Warming as Theory’ Memos Basket, redux,” since what’s going on lately is pretty much exactly that. Give Naomi Oreskes credit for her most recent co-authored effort at the UK Guardian to infuse the ‘fossil fuel industry-led disinformation campaigns’ accusation with a new shot of ye olde “reposition global warming” memos, complete with a pair of never-used ads with the unsolicited, never-used “Informed Citizens for the Environment” labels. Her credibility suffers just that much more every time she attempts to incorrectly glue that name over the actual “Information Council for the Environment” (ICE) public relations campaign. Incrementally worse now, her Guardian article’s citation of Kert Davies’ Climate Files website as her source for the two never-used ads only ends up digging a deeper hole for herself and Davies, along with any others who keep making the mistake of drawing attention to those alleged ‘disinformation’ ICE ads as smoking gun evidence of fossil fuel deception efforts.
My latest screencapture links illustrate how these folks don’t provide tidy answer on whether the fossil fuel industry deceived the public about the ‘harm’ of man-caused global warming; their clumsy inconsistent narratives seem to point a giant arrow in the other direction on where all the disinformation is in the political accusation side of the issue.
Passacantando’s Millions
John Passacantando, that is, the ex-Greenpeace USA Executive Director who had merged his former Ozone Action group into it in 2000. I term him and his cohorts “Greenpeace USA née Ozone Action” because of that merger situation, with regard to its central role in finally prompting the first useful major ongoing media traction to the “reposition global warming” ‘leaked memos’ accusation that supposedly is proof that fossil fuel executives skeptic colluded with climate scientists to create disinformation which would cause the public to doubt the ‘settled science’ of man-caused catastrophic global warming. This is the same John Passacantando who was seen much more recently with former Ozone Action / Greenpeace USA-ExxonSecrets staffer Kert Davies in an apparent effort to portray Exxon as corrupt in the eyes of the public, the same Passacantando / Davies duo that seems to be swimming in dark money – nearly $5 million not so long ago – to do … what, exactly?
Fair’s fair — when the collective pro-global warming side of the issue claims the mere appearance of possibly illicit funding is enough to indict skeptic climate scientists of spending disinformation, then by default, the notion is not off limits to explore when it comes to the motivations and efforts of those who are the core people hurling the ‘crooked skeptics’ accusation. Continue reading
Ofcom Complaint
Well, I was warned at the very least. But as the old adage goes, “nothing ventured, nothing gained.” If not a single one of us holds the mainstream media accountable for the demonstrably biased inaccuracies they put out, then they will never admit that they commit that kind of journalistic malfeasance, and they’ll keep doing it with reckless abandon. Continue reading
Heartland 14th International Climate Conference / Update: enviro-activists’ “было бы корыто, a свиньи-то будут” problem / BBC bias arises again
I was away for the Oct 15-17 weekend, attending the Heartland Institute ICCC14 climate conference. Poor as I am, I’d be remiss if I didn’t again thank the two people who generously donated to cover the cost of registering for the conference and the costs of the hotel and fossil fuel for the drive there. While there, I not only met up with old friends and benefactors, I gained new friends and supporters, and I gleaned information on both the science side of the issue and its unnerving “Great Reset” / Environmental Social Governance” political side. Plus, a slide from Dr Will Happer’s presentation (FYI, back in late 2015, I covered how he doesn’t like Greenpeace much) turns out to be something I can borrow to illustrate the latest update of how the corrupting money in this issue seems to be found entirely in the enviro-activists side of this issue.
“было бы корыто, a свиньи-то будут.” Roughly translated, “if you have a trough, there will be pigs.”
The Real ICE newspaper ads
Information Council FOR the Environment. For, not on.
What does it tell you when the most prominent promulgators of the accusation about ‘fossil fuel industry executives colluding with skeptic climate scientists in disinformation campaigns’ — either people supposedly closest to very specific details of it, or entities which need to be above reproach when they repeat its specific details — proclaim that one glaring example of industry-orchestrated disinformation was the ‘misleading newspaper ads’ in the Western Fuels Association’s “Information Council on the Environment” public relations campaign? Continue reading
State Of Vermont v. ExxonMobil Corp. et al.
The U.S. House Oversight Committee wasn’t the only major governmental entity to bring up ye olde “victory will be achieved” leaked memo set within the last few weeks as a “smoking gun” piece of evidence to indict the fossil fuel industry of conspiring with skeptic climate scientists to spread disinformation undercutting the certainty of catastrophic man-caused global warming. Just two days before that Committee sent out its September 16th intimidation letters to energy company officials, which prominently quoted the “victory” memos, Vermont’s Attorney General Thomas Donovan Jr filed his Vermont v. ExxonMobil lawsuit on September 14th, which featured that memo set’s notorious phrase on page 28.
AG Donovan’s same day press release succinctly summarized his lawsuit:
The lawsuit alleges past and ongoing violations of Vermont’s Consumer Protection Act for concealing crucial information and disseminating misleading statements and advertising about fossil fuels and climate change …
“Vermont consumers were given false and misleading information about the dramatic effects of these products on the climate. Vermonters have a right to accurate information in order to make informed decisions about the products they purchase.”
The gift AG Donovan hands on a silver platter to the energy companies is how those last two bits could be turned 180° away from the fossil fuel industry and aimed instead at the enviro-activist global warming industry, emphasizing how AG Donovan apparently didn’t undertake elemental due diligence on whether his cornerstone evidence had any validity, and emphasizing how the mainstream media’s abject failure to ask tough questions about the origins of that ‘evidence’ and the core clique of people surrounding it has ultimately led to AG Donovan possibly relying on that core clique for the “smoking gun evidence” in his lawsuit. Continue reading