Assorted content for your weekend reading. – Paul Krugman writes a long-overdue obituary for the confidence fairy who was supposed to turn needless austerity into growth contrary to all economic evidence: So, about that doctrine: appeals to the wonders of confidence are something Herbert Hoover would have found completely familiar
Continue readingTag: Koch brothers
DeSmogBlog: Koch Brothers fund Fraser Institute
Fraser Institute.gif Hats off to Alex Stoymenoff at the Vancouver Observer for turning up evidence that the Koch Brothers have been ladling money into Canada's own climate dissembling Fraser Institute since at least 2008. It helps to answer why a so-called "think" tank – even one so ideologically hidebound as the
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Fact Checking The New Paul Ryan Budget on Energy and Environment
ryan_620x350.jpg Representative Paul Ryan (R–WI) has released his budget for fiscal year 2013. To almost no one’s surprise, his outline is filled with too many falsehoods and outright lies to count. After analyzing just one section of his proposal – the section on energy and the environment – more than
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: See No Evil At George Mason University
monkeys.shutterstock_10567591.jpg George Mason University (GMU) has labored for 2 years on simple plagiarism complaints. It has just written self-contradictory findings that avoided seeing plagiarism in the 2006 Wegman Report (WR) while admitting the same text elsewhere was plagiarism. In March 2010, climate scientist Ray Bradley complained to GMU of 2.5 pages
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Republican Claims About Gas Prices Demonstrate Lack Of Knowledge About “Free Market”
gas prices.jpg As the national average for gas prices pushes closer and closer towards $4 a gallon, Republicans have wasted no time in attempting to convince the public that President Obama and his “hostility” towards the oil industry is the reason we’re feeling the squeeze at the pump. read more
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Heartland Institute: A Manifestation of the Kochtopus Empire
Kochtopus-3.png It is nearly impossible to discuss the vast climate change denial echo chamber and not mention the Koch Brothers, Koch Industries, and what some have called the Koch Empire. Perhaps unsurpisingly then, the origins of the Heartland Institute — whose internal documents were recently leaked to DeSmogBlog — have a direct historical link to the rise
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: Climate Change Deniers Get Caught With Their Carbons Down
Heartland Institute is an oil industry front group, devoted to dispelling the science of climate change. The bulk of their funding comes from Exxon and the Koch brothers. The same Koch brothers that Stephen Harper is using our tax dollars to build a pipeline for, so that they no longer have to
Continue reading350 or bust: Heartland Institute: Funded To Spread Misinformation About Climate Change
The Heartland Institute is a right-wing “think-tank” that describes itself as a “devoted to discovering, developing, and promoting free market solutions to social and economic problems.” However, as DeSmogBlog has recently revealed, Heartland is much more interested in promoting the bottom line of its pro-pollution funders than it is about
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: Not Everyone Can Graduate from the Charles Koch Institute
Ezra Levant, above, when he was running for the Canadian Alliance Party. After a heated battle, he stepped aside so that Stephen Harper could run in a safe riding, after being voted head of the Alliance Party. Close confidant of Jason Kenney and Stockwell Day (coined the term “Stockaholic”) Levant is
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: Americans Fear Their Election Could End up Like Canada’s. I Can Help
In the upcoming election, Barack Obama will not be challenged by the Republicans, who frankly have given up on even pretending to be politicians serving the public, but by the Super PACs. Political Action Committees financed by wealthy corporations, who are tired of democracy getting in their way. Remember that
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: The Year In Dirty Energy: Keystone XL
tarsands protests.jpg This year, a deal between TransCanada and the U.S. government almost allowed one of the most disastrous plans in energy history to win aproval. The deal would have allowed TransCanada to build the Keystone XL pipeline across the U.S. border to carry an exceptionally dirty form of oil
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: The Year In Dirty Energy: The Koch Brothers
Kochtopus money bags.jpg Over the last 12 months, DeSmogBlog contributors have helped spread the word about some of the most dastardly deeds of Charles and David Koch. Here are some of the biggest stories we covered this year on the issue of corruption and dirty energy money. It is impossible
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Koch Brothers Behind Push To Dismantle EPA
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During last week’s Americans For Prosperity (AFP) event, a common theme kept creeping into the speakers’ presentations: Dismantle the EPA. And as the major funders of…
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: Should We Be Concerned With Those Harper is Passing the Pipe With?
In 1911, the United States Supreme Court broke up Standard Oil, then the largest multinational corporation, because it was simply becoming too big and powerful. The company’s battles with former president Teddy Roosevelt were legendary, as depict…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: The Daily Show Notes Irony of Koch-Funded Study Affirming Global Warming is Real
Last night's entire first segment of The Daily Show focused on the recent study funded by the Koch Brothers that confirmed (again) that climate change is indeed a reality – an ironic twist given the Kochtopus' track rec…
Continue readingPushed to the Left and Loving It: So Would Stephen Harper Vote for Rick Perry or Herman Cain?
I originally thought that Stephen Harper had more in common with Rick Perry. Both are strong advocates of the death penalty, guns and the flat tax.However, Rachel Maddox revealed something on her program this week, that connects him closer to Her…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Harry Reid to Hillary Clinton: Drop Keystone XL Pipeline Plan
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Opponents of the Keystone XL pipeline have gained a new ally in the fight to prevent this disastrous oil boondoggle from moving forward: Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D&ndas…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: BEST busts Urban Heat Island Myth
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Richard Muller not a Koch lackey after all …
During all the bad days when people were coughing up chunks of lung while the TV still touted Camels, it was never…
350 or bust: Chris Hedges: At This Moment In History, Either You Are A Rebel Or A Slave
Chris Hedges, Pulitzer Prize-winning war correspondent and author, had this to say about the “Occupy Wall Street” movement last week: “The only word that these corporations know is ‘more’…There is no way within the A…
Continue readingDeSmogBlog: Koch Brothers Exposed: Cancer Risk In Crossett Arkansas Blamed On Georgia Pacific
Brave New Foundation, which is producing a series of videos called "Koch Brothers Exposed" taking a close look at many aspects of the billionaire Koch Brothers' business interests, just released a new installment probing the link between …
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