… and maintain your status as ‘heroine-exposer-of-fossil-fuel-industry-disinformation’ if people interrupt your presentations to say, “wait a minute, what you said there isn’t supported by the actual reality of the situation”? Continue reading
Author Archives: Russell Cook
Part 1: But Can You Argue with Fiction ….
…. and retain credibility derived from your self-imposed title of ‘expert about the history of climate disinformation’?
Just askin.’ Continue reading
“Brief Of Amici Curiae, Brulle .. Oreskes .. & Supran” Redux 3 — the Hawaii version
As much as “Merchants of Doubt”documentary movie star/book author Naomi Oreskes wishes to be a “Friend of Various Courts” and a friend to plaintiffs Honolulu and Maui County in particular, her fourth filing of one of these only points a giant arrow once again at the way enviro-activists across the board really only have one viable weapon in their arsenal when it comes to supporting their notion that fossil fuel companies engaged in disinformation campaigns. Continue reading
The Real ICE ads, Part 5: How long has this disinformation been going on?
Enviro-activists say that not only did Exxon and the rest of the fossil fuel industry know the science of man-caused global warming was settled as far back as the 1970s, they paid ‘shill’ expert climate scientists to say it was not settled in deliberate disinformation campaigns. Enviro-activists, however, are loathe to engage in any direct science discussions with those skeptic scientists because, well …, quite simply they do not have expert level climate science experience or knowledge to match the expertise of those skeptics. How do enviro-activists circumvent that fatal problem? They need a shell game diversion. They have one in the claim that smoking gun proof for those corrupt disinformation efforts was revealed in ‘leaked industry documents’ in which – I’m paraphrasing here – industry executives declared ‘victory will be achieved when we reposition global warming as theory rather than fact.’ No joke on the literal words there, anyone can undertake an extensive internet search to see just how widespread the primary “reposition global warming as theory rather than fact” memo strategy phrase is (along with its directly related audience targeting phrases “older, less-educated males” and “younger, low-income women”), and then do the same deep search for the secondary “victory will be achieved” memo set. Both memo sets are worthless as evidence because neither were ever implemented anywhere by any fossil fuel industry executive. It is disinformation, whether accidental or deliberate, on the part of any enviro-activist to say any fossil fuel company operated under the directives of either memo set.
The most plausibly sinister-sounding of the two sets was used by Al Gore in his 2006 movie in an accusation comparison of its strategy to a tobacco industry memo strategy, and he first quoted the set’s audience targeting phrase in his 1992 book; yet the rejected “reposition global warming” set’s key strategy was so obtusely worded that it was rejected outright by the people it was presented to. One of the officials in the “Information Council for the Environment” (“ICE”) PR campaign told me firsthand that their official copy was ultimately tossed into the trash, while the head of the campaign implied elsewhere that its too-narrow audience targeting suggestion was idiotic.
But someone else apparently thought the memo set copy they had, including its worthless discarded unused bits, could be turned into a weapon to use against the fossil fuel industry. Who ‘leaked’ it and when, and how did they portray the set to the recipients back then? What did the recipients know about the validity of the set, and did they undertake any due diligence to find out anything about the set? Continue reading
Passacantando’s co-founding of Ozone Action ….. or not
When prominent people tell and retell the details of what led them to heroically fight the forces of evil, we’re dazzled every time. It’s inspirational. I’ve suggested this before; when audience members spot significant changes in the details, they wonder about that, particularly when more details start to unravel. A once praiseworthy story suddenly begins to look more like it’s filled with lines designed as mind control, in support of a larger and rather suspect agenda to spread self-serving propaganda.
When it comes to the overall tales of heroism from the folks on the Al Gore political side of the global warming issue, I’ll paraphrase from a famous Avengers movie line:
I’ve seen the inconsistent narratives. Not a fan. Continue reading
Why would Kalee Kreider leave Ozone Action?
Just askin,’ yet another in my series of posts asking questions that not only the inquisitive public and unbiased reporters should be asking, but also the law firms working for the defendant energy companies in the current 25 “Exxon Knew”-style global warming damages/cost recovery lawsuits, along with unbiased, objectives members of the US House Oversight Committee. You’ll never how weak and indefensible that situation is until you know what and who led to the current situation.
Kalee-who? You’ll be glad you asked. I covered her problems back in September 2013, but there’s always more to cover, especially when it is relevant to current-day situations and questions that should be asked in courtroom settings and congressional hearings. Continue reading
Dr Michael E. Mann & his Errant “reposition global warming as theory” Luntz Memo Oops
Dr Mann placed himself in a world of hurt on February 2 when he rather thoughtlessly hurled a very thinly veiled accusation on Twitter that a sitting U.S. Senator is an outright racist (hat tip to Tony Heller for that situation). Just that blunder alone might be a crippling credibility problem for Dr Mann to explain when he appears as a witness before the U.S. House Committee on Oversight and Reform on February 8, if the GOP Committee members are aware of it. But that’s not the only recent declaration that Dr Mann couldn’t prove to be true if his reputation depended on it. He might try deleting his Tweet and hope nobody notices, but his other declaration would require quite a large book burning effort …. of his own 2021 “The New Climate War: The Fight to Take Back Our Planet” book.
Ross Gelbspan & his seemingly larger Ozone Action connection
First, some elemental background info on this: folks might wonder why I focus so narrowly on the one set of supposedly ‘leaked fossil fuel industry memos’ which enviro-activists say are smoking gun evidence proving disinformation campaigns (and other alleged attacks against ‘settled global warming science’) operated under the widely adopted directive to “reposition global warming as theory (not fact).”
My reason is elemental. It’s because the enviro-activists are so focused on that specific phrase and the worthless accusation surrounding it. It’s the most damaging weapon they have to use in their relentless effort to steer the world away seeing whether the science-based climate assessments from skeptic climate scientists are worthy of serious consideration.
If the sole excuse – ‘industry-paid skeptic scientists’ – implodes as the reason the public and policymakers and journalists have for ignoring skeptics’ climate assessments, then the ‘man-caused global warming’ issue is imperiled, perhaps to the point of imminent collapse. For influential investigators/prosecutors to begin to realize how vulnerable the egregiously false ‘crooked skeptic climate scientists’ accusation itself is to total collapse, they will need to fully comprehend why repetitions of accusations surrounding that memo set looks like an ongoing deliberate conspiracy, and they need to know exactly who the core people are in that situation, and how that core group apparently steered those memo phrases into the way that’s still exploited today. Continue reading
Drop the “reposition global warming” Phrase Casually into a Sentence … the Pa$$acantando Way
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
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