From a Heartland media release:
FEBRUARY 19 — The Heartland Institute has sent legal notices http://heartland.org/press-releases/2012/02/19/heartland-institute-sends-legal-notices-publishers-faked-and-stolen-docume to numerous Web sites, blogs, and publications asking them to take down the stolen and forged documents and what it views as malicious and false commentary based on them.
The following statement by Heartland Institute President Joseph L. Bast may be used for attribution. For more information, contact Director of Communications Jim Lakely at jlakely “at” heartland.org or 312-377-4000.
_____
“We realize this will be portrayed by some as a heavy-handed threat to free speech. But the First Amendment doesn’t protect Internet fraud, and there is no right to defamatory speech.
“For 28 years, The Heartland Institute has engaged in fierce debates over a wide range of public policies – school reform, health care, telecommunications policy, corporate subsidies, and government waste and fraud, as well as environmental policy. We frequently and happily engage in vigorous, robust debate with those who disagree with our views.
“We have resorted in the past to legal means only in a very few cases involving outright fraud and defamation. The current situation clearly fits that description, and our legal counsel has advised that the first step in defending ourselves should be to ask the blogs to take down the stolen and forged documents.”
President
The Heartland Institute
jbast”at” heartland.org
312-377-4000
_____
The Heartland Institute <http://www.heartland.org> is a 28-year-old national nonprofit organization with offices in Chicago, Illinois and Washington, DC. Its mission is to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems. For more information, visit our Web site http://www.heartland.org or call 312/377-4000.
====================================================================
Here’s the letter being sent to some websites and bloggers, DeSmog Blog and Greg Laden of ScienceBlogs (already in legal trouble over the Tallbloke libel) both got copies.
February 18, 2012
By e-mail to: editor “at” desmogblog.com
By Federal Express to:
Mr. Brendan G DeMelle
Editor
DeSmog Blog
[street address redacted]
Seattle, WA 98117-2303
Re: Stolen and Faked Heartland Documents
http://www.desmogblog.com/heartland-insider-exposes-institute-s-budget-and-strategy
Dear Mr. DeMelle:
On or about February 14, 2012, your web site posted a document entitled “Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy” (the “Fake Memo”), which is fabricated and false.
On or about the same date, your web site posted certain other documents purporting to be those of The Heartland Institute (“Heartland”). Heartland has not authenticated these documents (the “Alleged Heartland Documents”).
Your site thereafter has reported repeatedly on all of these documents.
Heartland almost immediately issued a statement disclosing the foregoing information, to which your web site has posted links.
It has come to our attention that all of these documents nevertheless remain on your site and you continue to report on their contents. Please be advised as follows:
1. The Fake Memo document is just that: fake. It was not written by anyone associated with Heartland. It does not express Heartland’s goals, plans, or tactics. It contains several obvious and gross misstatements of fact. Publication of this falsified document is improper and unlawful.
2. As to the Alleged Heartland Documents your web site posted, we are investigating how they came to be in your possession and whether they are authentic or have been altered or fabricated. Though third parties purport to have authenticated them, no one – other than Heartland – has the ability to do so. Several of the documents say on their face that they are confidential documents and all of them were taken from Heartland by improper and fraudulent means. Publication of any and all confidential or altered documents is improper and unlawful.
3. Furthermore, Heartland views the malicious and fraudulent manner in which the documents were obtained and/or thereafter disseminated, as well as the repeated blogs about them, as providing the basis for civil actions against those who obtained and/or disseminated them and blogged about them. Heartland fully intends to pursue all possible actionable civil remedies to the fullest extent of the law.
Therefore, we respectfully demand: (1) that you remove both the Fake Memo and the Alleged Heartland Documents from your web site; (2) that you remove from your web site all posts that refer or relate in any manner to the Fake Memo and the Alleged Heartland Documents; (3) that you remove from your web site any and all quotations from the Fake Memo and the Alleged Heartland Documents; (4) that you publish retractions on your web site of prior postings; and (5) that you remove all such documents from your server.
Please do not hesitate to contact me if you require any further information.
Very truly yours,
Maureen Martin
General Counsel
original Heartland PDF is here: Tier One – DeMelle
With the exception of the faked document this is not the response I would have hoped from the Heartland’s Institute.
This whole affair however has been very educational about which AGW bloggers are true believers who couldn’t give a s**t about truth. The combination of jumping the gun and their weasel word responses after Heartland said the memo was fake was ample demonstration of where their priorities lay.
steven mosher says (February 20, 2012 at 9:10 am): “If its ok to post fake but true documents, then i suggest a WUWT Competetion!!!”
Judging by his fake open letter to Heartland from “Ray, Gav, & Dave”, Josh will have the inside track:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/18/joshs-open-letter/
Publishing these documents is incomparable to the hacking and distribution of private emails that Heartland was party to. In there own interest they should just shut up.
wheresmyak47 says:
“Publishing these documents is incomparable to the hacking and distribution of private emails that Heartland was party to.”
What documents would those be? Surely you’re not referring to the work product that my taxes paid for, and which I have every right to review.
And:
“In there [sic] own interest they should just shut up.”
I disagree. Publicizing wrongdoing is most appropriate. By knowingly and maliciously perpetuating a lie, their reputations will always be damaged. Because the internet never forgets. Desmog now has the option of climbing down, or expending funds on hefty legal bills. Easy choice, really.
I this a fake too? Wow! http://climateaudit.org/2012/02/20/peter-gleick-confesses/
Breaking news:
Many more details are at Gleick’s weblog.
GHE 
AGW 
CAGW is a sobering reality.
Now if only the hacker of the CRU emails would similarly come forward, the world could start to rationally address the only question that counts for our children: whether or not the link GHG
Smokey says:
February 20, 2012 at 5:50 pm
“wheresmyak47 says:
“In there [sic] own interest they should just shut up.”
I disagree. Publicizing wrongdoing is most appropriate. By knowingly and maliciously perpetuating a lie, their reputations will always be damaged. Because the internet never forgets. Desmog now has the option of climbing down, or expending funds on hefty legal bills. Easy choice, really.”
I agree. The creation of The Protocols Of The Elders Of Heartland was an amateurish fake but a professional PR campaign. Many PR people involved here. Why is the DeSmogBlog PR person taking these risks? Well, it’s a gamble. The PR henchmen of the warmists calculate that they can build on that freedom of information leakage trend the public seems to like even if legally they don’t have a leg to stand on. Also, by adding forged documents, they repeat a tactic that has often been successfull in smearing the opponent. Joe Stalin did it from the beginning of his career and he was quite successfull, might the warmist PR persons think.
We also see here that they have unleashed a lot of astroturf, at least that’s what I think, I’ve never heard of all these Matts and Phils and Mikes who all talk like they’ve been lobotomized.
Probably they’re Pearl scripts anyhow.
So this is really warmist knucklebending 100%. We’re approaching the endgame. It’s TIME for the lawyers.
Ahhh damage control begins — “that post reads like an “My lawyer told me I should …” admission which shunts responsibility for the fabricated document off on some unnamed anonymous source while admitting to the lesser crime of fraudulently obtaining confidential documents as a means to avoid larger exposures.
It will be interesting to see how this plays out and if the “offending” documents get pulled down per the HI request.
Larry
Talk about false equivalence.
If nothing else, the “hacker” appears to be much, much smarter than Gleick.
Beyond that, there is no evidence that the “hacker” distributed false documents to anyone.
yawn says on February 20, 2012 at 2:56 pm
Except, as we now know from ClimateGates I and II, they are not really independent.
This is just unmitigated blarney. No self-respecting US Marine would take calumny, insult, and libel lying down, and if legal action were the best riposte (as opposed to the rational alternative, a fist to the nose), that’s what he would take.
You have just turned “truth” on its head. Truth is an absolute defense against libel. So let’s have the Warmist clique defend their forged document and the allegations stemming therefrom as the “truth” and see how far they get.
Heartland has had its honor and reputation besmirched by unscrupulous miscreants. It owes its donors and supporters a vigorous and unrelenting defense. Let’s hope their lawyers have the fists; watch out Warmist noses!
/Mr Lynn
Crazy Californian fakes Heartland document, confesses.
http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/20/peter-gleick-admits-to-deception-in-obtaining-heartland-climate-files/
Mr Lynn says:
February 20, 2012 at 6:20 pm
” A physicist says:
February 20, 2012 at 7:02 am
[…]
You have just turned “truth” on its head. ”
Hey, he’s a warmist. (Maybe even a professional one…)
yawn says:
“Your mindless parroting of the “Harry_read_me” lie…”
I’ll let the readers decide for themselves if that is a “lie”:
Here’s the programmer’s words, verbatim:
“Here, the expected 1990 – 2003 period is missing so the correlations aren’t so hot!
Yet the WMO codes and station names /locations are identical (or close).
What the hell is supposed to happen here?
Oh, yeah – there is no ‘supposed’, I can make it up. So I have.“
[my emphasis]
Thirteen years of fabricated temperature records! And you can bet the invented numbers didn’t show cooling.
I fondly recall the spanking that Steve Milloy gave to Lambert in their debate, so using Deltoid as an ‘authority’ is pretty weak tea. Lambert is about as wacked-out as they come, almost as bad as Tamina. Furthermore, it’s a strawman link that didn’t even refer to my statement.
yawn says: “This blog is nothing but an echo chamber…”
How deluded. WUWT has gained enormous popularity primarily because it never censors different scientific points of view. RealClimate, Pseudo-Skeptical Anti-Science, Closed Mind, and most other alarmist blogs routinely censor polite, factual comments simply because they score points for the skeptic side. Thus, they become echo chambers consisting of only like-minded commenters. And as a result of their censorship, their traffic numbers suck. WUWT is the antonym of an echo chamber. But as I’ve oftern said, if it were not for psychological projection, the alarmists wouldn’t have much to say.
Next, yawn steps in it again:
“The hockey stick has not been debunked. Rather, it has been confirmed over and over. Where did you get the idea that the IPCC can no longer publish it?”
Post any IPCC publication dated after 2007 showing Mann’s original hockey stick chart and I’ll retract. I have not been able to find it. And the IPCC LOVED Mann’s MBH99 chart! It was much scarier than what they use to alarm the public now. The IPCC hated to give up Mann’s chart, but face it: it was so thoroughly debunked by McIntyre and McKittrick that no one can use it any more without sacrificing their credibility.
Next, yawn says:
“Your attacks on Mann are simply pathetic.”
On the sidebar you can find A.W. Montford’s The Hockey Stick Illusion. Read it, and you will never look at Michael Mann the same way again. It is a damning indictment of a mendacious little tyrant who schemes to pervert the peer review system, threaten journals, get colleagues fired, conspire to dishonestly inflate Phil Jones’ CV, and in general act like the reprehensible, unethical individual that he is. The book is extremely well documented, indexed, and referenced with footnotes, and it’s an easy read. Mann is the worst of a conniving lot, but you can see the lengths some people will go when big money is at stake.
Finally, yawn says:
“Mann brings in millions? What are you talking about?”
I’m talking about this:
Recent Michael Mann grants:
Development of a Northern Hemisphere Gridded Precipitation Dataset Spanning the Past Half Millennium for Analyzing Interannual and Longer-Term Variability in the Monsoons: $250,000
Quantifying the influence of environmental temperature on transmission of vector-borne diseases: $1,884,991
Toward Improved Projections of the Climate Response to Anthropogenic Forcing: Combining Paleoclimate Proxy and Instrumental Observations with an Earth System Model: $541,184
A Framework for Probabilistic Projections of Energy-Relevant Streamflow Indices: $330,000
AMS Industry/Government Graduate Fellowship,: $23,000
Climate Change Collective Learning and Observatory Network in Ghana: $759,928
Analysis and testing of proxy-based climate reconstructions: $459,000
Constraining the Tropical Pacific’s Role in Low-Frequency Climate Change of the Last Millennium: $68,065
Acquisition of high-performance computing cluster for the Penn State Earth System Science Center (ESSC): $100,000
Decadal Variability in the Tropical Indo-Pacific: Integrating Paleo & Coupled Model Results: $102,000
Reconstruction and Analysis of Patterns of Climate Variability Over the Last One to Two Millennia: $315,000
Remote Observations of Ice Sheet Surface Temperature: Toward Multi-Proxy Reconstruction of Antarctic Climate Variability: $133,000
Paleoclimatic Reconstructions of the Arctic Oscillation: $14,400
Global Multidecadal-to-Century-Scale Oscillations During the Last 1000 years: $20,775
Resolving the Scale-wise Sensitivities in the Dynamical Coupling Between Climate and the Biosphere: $214,700
Advancing predictive models of marine sediment transport: $20,775
Multiproxy Climate Reconstruction: Extension in Space and Time, and Model/Data Intercomparison: $381,647
The changing seasons? Detecting and understanding climatic change: $266,235
Patterns of Organized Climatic Variability: Spatio-Temporal Analysis of Globally Distributed Climate Proxy Records and Long-term Model Integrations: $270,000
Investigation of Patterns of Organized Large-Scale Climatic Variability During the Last Millennium: $78,000
Total:
$6,232,700
Mann collected $1.8 million to ‘study mosquito vectors’ – in addition to many $millions more in other payola not listed here. Why would someone pay Mann, instead of a biologist or an epidemiologist, to study disease transmission? It was payola, pure and simple. Big money is the motivation for climate charlatans like Michael Mann. He had a choice between being ethical and being dishonest. We know which path he chose.
A physicist, your cheap exploitation of the US Marines’ good name to make illogical arguments in defense of fraudsters while attacking the victim is cringingly tasteless and quite frankly, disgusting. Clearly you lack common sense, but have you no shame as well, Sir?
Smokey said, “Mann is the worst of a conniving lot, but you can see the lengths some people will go when big money is at stake.”
True, but the other cad many suspected as the Heartland fraudster, but couldn’t name here until now, Peter Gleick, will steal Mann’s limelight for a while. See: http://dotearth.blogs.nytimes.com/2012/02/20/peter-gleick-admits-to-deception-in-obtaining-heartland-climate-files (h/t for the URL to DirkH).
Peter, please let me commend to you USMC Commandant’s Professional Reading List; a list that for many years has informed our family’s reading choices. If within its compass you discern any substantial departure from the bedrock principle “Be First with the Truth”, then please do not hesitate to post it.
A physicist says:
February 20, 2012 at 6:06 pm
Breaking news:
The Origin of the Heartland Documents
by Peter Gleick
“At the beginning of 2012, I received an anonymous document in the mail describing what appeared to be details of the Heartland Institute’s climate program strategy … In a serious lapse of my own professional judgment and ethics, I solicited and received additional materials directly from the Heartland Institute under someone else’s name. … I deeply regret my own actions in this case. I offer my personal apologies to all those affected.”
Many more details are at Gleick’s weblog.
Now if only the hacker of the CRU emails would similarly come forward, the world could start to rationally address the only question that counts for our children: whether or not the link GHG GHE AGW CAGW is a sobering reality.
———————————-
Leave my children out of this birdbrain.
I’m proposing this as a strong contender for most idiotic post of the year so far.
REPLY: Ditto that, “A Physicist”, take a timeout, I’m done with your thread bombing for 24 hours at least – Anthony
A physicist, you don’t think too good, do you? What do the USMC and your family’s book selections have to do with your defense of a self-confessed cad and your patronizing and scolding of his victim for seeking legal redress? You can’t blame yhe USMC for that…one would hope.
A physicist says:
Peter, please let me commend to you USMC Commandant’s Professional Reading List; a list that for many years has informed our family’s reading choices.
Uh huh.
Say, while you are enjoying that well deserved vacation that Anthony has sent you on, you might want to add the UCMJ to your reading list. Then you might gain a frigging clue as to the matters you are blathering on about. They are not as you claim.
I confess I don’t precisely remember what was snipped out, but I believe I said “of excellence”.
Bad weekend guys?
R. Gates says:
February 20, 2012 at 7:21 am
What is the matter with you half-witted trolls. The CRU emails and documents belong to the taxpayers of the UK and in some part, the US. They are not PRIVATE PROPERTY, you idiots. Can’t you grasp even the simple basics of the language.
HI is a private charity. In the same way that WWF, Greepeace, FoE etc would not want their private details published and in the same way that you cannot walk into Monsanto and steal their documents. They’re Private, plonkers !!
Smokey says:
February 20, 2012 at 6:43 pm
yawn says:
I have watched and read the sceptic sites for many many years and your post here is the most cleverly put together, the cleanest and clearest put down of a complete idiot and the most ‘precise’ I have ever read.
It’s a great shame that the idiot to whom you addressed it is too stupid to recognise it’s qualities
@Smokey
“WUWT has gained enormous popularity primarily because it never censors different scientific points of view.”
ROTFLMAO! The mods are nuts here. Every single comment is screened, and the censorship is one of the heaviest I have ever seen on any site!
Wow, you really are something… Talk about closing your eyes to reality!
And that Gish Gallop of yours… priceless.
[you would need to advance evidence of your assertions . . the policy here is to allow everything “sciency” through while snipping profanity, ad homs, religion and politics at all times taking account of the context. Discouraging trolling is a judgement call always and when in doubt decisions are kicked up the line. Point out the heavy censorship please . . . I would say that the wide range of dissenting opinions posted here are not equalled anywhere on the web quite frankly . . . kbmod]
Stephen Richards,
Thank you.
I note that Mr Yawn wasn’t censored, despite his squeals of censorship. The glaring difference between WUWT and alarmist blogs like RealClimate, tamina, Closed Mind, and Pseudo-skeptical Anti-science is that those blogs all heavily censor opposing points of view if they contain scientific facts contrary to the blog’s narrative. They do not want readers to even be aware of any facts that contradict their climate alarmism. As a result, they turn into self-reinforcing echo chambers, inhabited by a handful of closed-minded head nodders like Mr Yawn. WUWT, on the other hand, allows all scientific points of view without censorship, letting readers decide what is true and what is nonsense. The result is over a hundred million hits in only five years, and close to a million reader comments.
I’ve provided a thorough refutation of yawn’s assumptions and specifically answered his question about Mann, which is no doubt why he’s so angry. But then he seems to be an angry person anyway. If he was snipped I suspect it was for using the D-word or being off topic. It was certainly not for expressing a scientific point of view, as anyone who visits this site knows. Just ask R. Gates, Joel Shore, Phil., or any other warmist commenter.