Gosh, the heavyweight Heartland Institute has condescended to write for little old Oz. We should feel flattered, even if the opening salvo at 'light-weight liberal academics' does suggest they don't understand the culture is somewhat different to the good old USA.

The deep deliberate dishonesty of these people is embodied in the reference to 'the notion - put forward in Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth and in countless children’s books - that the warming of the second-half of the 20th century was “exceptional” or can only be explained by man-made greenhouse gases.' This fiction that support for the concept of AGW is limited to pop culture and 'liberals' is fundamental to their efforts to misrepresent the issues (and their obsessive hatred of Al Gore is bizarrely disturbing).

The weight of majority scientific opinion is obvious to anyone who approaches the discussion with an open mind, reinforced most recently by a atudy from MIT http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2009/roulette-0519.html which found most previous predictions under-estimated the likely effects of AGW. No doubt the hacks at the Heartland Institute will dismiss the scientists at MIT, one of America's most respected centres of learning in the hard sciences, as more 'light-weight liberal academics'. I'm sure they'll tell us the MIT findings should be ignored in preference to the entirely disinterested opinions emanating from the careerists riding the denialist gravy train at the Heartland Institute.

The way in which a small number of people continue to put obstacles in the way of action to counter climate change for personal and political advantage is utterly contemptible. They may well be respnsible for the deaths and immiseration of hundreds of millions of people, not that this will bother them. They have no consciences, just a commitment to their own self-importance. Fielding is a natural fellow traveller.

I wasn't going to comment on this drivel until I read Peter the Babbler's post:

<< The Climate Change movement is simply a full frontal attack on Christianity. >>

Now I know why so many godbotherers are climate change denialists!

There are two non overlapping areas of enquiry. The first, of which Professor Sharon Beder is a member, is the sociology of science or the history of science or the assumed psychology of named scientists. In the pursuit of motives any scurrilous tit bits may be dredged up by opponents of a particular paradigm. Now the sociology of science can be a worthwhile academic discipline - for instance the seminal work of Thomas Kuhn on scientific revolution. The global warming paradigm is under attack. The classic response is for the defenders to modify the paradigm and/or denigrate the attackers.

The second line of enquiry is the verification of the paradigm. Sociology and the related disciplines have no role to play in the verification process. Verification requires the strict application of the best scientific methodology of the day. The scientist and his work is judged on scientific merit only. It matters not if he/she is an exemplary character or not in some other area of life.

And this tripe from the same author --

The Atlanta Journal and Constitution - 2004)

On May 27, Surgeon General Richard Carmona released a report on the health effects of cigarette smoking. As has been true of every surgeon general's report in recent memory, Carmona's claims smoking is "even worse" for smokers than previously thought.

Everyone knows smoking is bad for you. Billions of dollars are spent each year --- paid by smokers through cigarette taxes and the 1998 Master Settlement Agreement --- to tell us how bad smoking is. Far from ignoring these warnings, studies have shown that smokers actually overestimate the odds that smoking will harm their health.

"The dose makes the poison" is the first law of toxicology, so instead of telling people they either have to quit or die, the surgeon general should be telling smokers to smoke less, switch to lower-tar products or consider smokeless tobacco products.

The current issue of the Journal of the National Cancer Institute reports on a University of Minnesota study of reduced-harm cigarettes and smokeless tobacco. The study documents how these products reduce exposure to harmful carcinogens.

Instead of calling attention to these products, which could actually save the lives of smokers, the anti-tobacco lobby calls for higher taxes and more smoking bans. Taxes on cigarettes are already excessive and grossly unjust.

Smoking bans are also not the answer. Governments don't own private bars and restaurants, and neither do nonsmokers or their lobbying groups.

Carmona's report is just another shot at smokers taken by an anti- smoking movement enriched with billions of dollars from liberal foundations, taxpayers and the MSA.

Enough is enough. Let's show a little tolerance and respect for others.

> Joseph L. Bast is president of The Heartland Institute, a nonprofit research organization based in Chicago that receives tobacco company donations.

Credit: FOR THE JOURNAL-CONSTITUTION

<“Let’s just face facts. The Climate Change movement is simply a full frontal attack on Christianity. It works on the proposition that Almighty God is incompetent, that men are infallible, and that we as a collective human race, are in control.”>

Peter the believer, you certainly have outed yourself as racist, discriminatory and in denial. Your god is not incompetent, it's non existent except in the minds of the weak and dishonest. You've had thousands of years to provide some evidence for the credibility of your god and belief, what's the hold up. Why would we want to listen to a country which has created so much evil and destruction in the world, the USA is a basket case of religious violence, crime, suppression and constant interference and invasion of any who don't submit to their dictates.

The truth according to their site, is, the USA "heartland institute”, consists of right wing materialists who support tobacco, the law of the gun, total privatisation, economic growth no matter what, a fully private and discriminatory health system and schools for those who can afford it and nothing for the rest. They also believe in full de-regulation of business and property rights, so business can seize property for profit, mine and clear anywhere they feel they want to.

The author of this piece, on the heartland site claims 31000 scientists signed a petition disclaiming climate change, yet they don't present it. It's the same with their donors, they make excuses for not revealing them. If you have to do that, you have something to hide.

Attention climate change denialists:

<< Climate report stresses urgent action

Researchers are warning the planet is facing a growing risk of abrupt and irreversible climatic shifts unless carbon emissions are reduced.

A new report says greenhouse gas emissions and other indicators are closing in on the upper limits forecast by the United Nation's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change two years ago.

The University of Copenhagen released the Synthesis Report overnight which draws on 1,600 scientific contributions to a global climate summit held in Copenhagen earlier this year. >>

http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/06/19/2602694.htm

Personally, I think that the University of Copenhagen has a tad more credibility than the widely discredited "Heartland Institute". Fortunately, sensible governments such as ours and the USA's do too.