Update, 4 days later: And I've now also asked Russ to come over and submit a comment saying that this is correct, since I haven't heard from him in response.
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Upon reading this IJI post on The Way of the Astroturf, after watching the new Naomi Oreskes talk on the Western Fuels Association, and after being rebuffed by local denier Russ Steele when I sought to talk to him in person about why our views on climate differ, I called him just now at his home and asked,
"Have you ever received direct or indirect compensation, directly or indirectly, from the Western Fuels Association?"
Russ responded "I haven't received any funding or anything from anybody" - not for his blog, not for his public speaking on climate, or any other such action. And he reported that to his knowledge, the Sierra Environmental Studies Foundation (ncfocus coverage) is only funded by its three board members, except for some donations "which go exclusively to college scholarships for local high school students", and that to his knowledge, the board members don't receive any outside funding that's subsequently funneled through them to SESF.
(Russ, if I got any of this wrong, please set it straight in the comments below. And to be 100% clear, "indirect compensation" includes compensation of any sort - including past and expected future - to family members.)
of course, now I'm thinking of additional questions that I should have asked, but didn't think to. Anyone else have suggestions, put them in the comments...
5 comments:
Noted!
Dittoed! *
*[Since I might be Russ' sockpuppet, this is possibly redundant.]
Hey Ann.
It looks like you are making it your mission in life to hound Russ Steele. Well, that cool.
A committed contrarian will lead to longer discussion threads, and we all love that.
But I notice a pausity of posting and a lack of compelling argument on your part.
This is possibly due to the restrictive nature of source material available to you from the MSM, Tamino, Realclimate, ect.
Swatting Bee articles is old hat and frankly those sources haven't come up with anything scientific or complex enough to really make me stretch my brain housing group - ever.
But I do know of a guy who comes up with angles to the climate change that knock me back on my toes once in a while.
It's Eric Berger, the Sciguy blogger for the Houston Chronicle http://blogs.chron.com/sciguy/ .
Go on over and look around a bit. You might find a more compelling argument then "Russ is an oil company shill, and he hates babies".
It would be more fun - you might win once in a while - and I'll get to stretch my thinking cap.
Just a suggestion.
Russ, could you please say "this post is correct", rather than "noted"?
Just for the record.
(and, of course, only if it's true.)
"O, tis a precious apothegmatical pedant, who will find matter enough to dilate a whole day of the first invention of fee, foe, fum" Thomas Nash (1597)
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