09 Dec 2009 Media Matters Tries to Blame Climategate on Exxon Mobil, Fails Utterly

The Media Matters Action Network has a page up claiming we at the National Center for Public Policy Research are “doing everything in [our] power” to draw “attention to the so-called ‘Climategate’ scandal” and implying that the fact that Exxon Mobil has donated to us is the reason.

What dishonest dopes. We’ve barely touched on Climategate. A few sentences here and there. In fact, given the gravity of the scandal, we really should have done more.

Media Matters is trying to claim it is relevant that handful of groups that have in the past received funding from Exxon Mobil have mentioned Climategate, which is a huge, major story (not broken by any of these groups, incidentally) repeatedly covered by every major newspaper in the English-speaking world and in many many newspapers and other media elsewhere. Hello? Are all the major papers in Britain, including the openly left-wing Guardian and its most famous ultra-green columnist (who takes Climategate very seriously indeed), in the pockets of Exxon Mobil?

Sorry, Media Matters, your desperate ploy won’t work. Climategate has shown the unreliability and unprofessionalism of some Ph.Ds the U.N.’s IPCC and other organizations — including yours, Media Matters — have relied on for many years to help prove to the world that massive job-killing, government-growing treaties and policies are necessary. This is YOUR scandal, not ours, and even if you put a nice pretty red bow on it, we aren’t going to accept it from you as a gift.

Yes, Exxon Mobil has contributed to us and we appreciate its support as we do the support we receive from any of our 100,000+ supporters. (Without Exxon Mobil, the whopping approximately 1.5 percent of our annual revenue that comes from corporate sources would be a little smaller. How much corporate support do you get, Media Matters?)

But Exxon Mobil’s funding does not specifically support our work on climate nor has the corporation suggested in any way, shape or form that we mention, promote, acknowledge or otherwise notice Climategate, a scandal that is getting worldwide attention because it is newsworthy.

And we remind Media Matters that the only reason Media Matters knows about Exxon Mobil’s gifts to public policy institutions is because Exxon Mobil and many of the recipient foundations (including us) freely and voluntarily disclose this information. (Does Media Matters CEO David Brock voluntarily disclose which corporations and special interests help pay for his nearly $300,000 salary?)

Which reminds me. Media Matters found eight public policy groups that have received at least one contribution from Exxon Mobil since 2001 that either have mentioned Climategate or, in the case of one, are affiliated with an individual who wrote a story about Climategate in an unaffiliated opinion journal (wow, there’s a smoking gun for you). Here’s a seven-page list of all the public policy institutions that received gifts from Exxon Mobil in 2008 alone. Over 130 institutions, some of them very liberal, are listed, and yet Media Matters could only find eight public policy groups receiving such gifts since 2001 that have mentioned Climategate or work with someone who has? Only eight?

P.S. to Media Matters: Have you guys apologized yet for promoting environmentally-useless climate policies that can hurt people based on unverifiable information? People really do rely on the jobs you want to kill, you know.

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Labels: Business, Climate, Corruption, Energy, Environment, Jobs, Liberals, Scandals