This email from Heartland communications director Jim Lakely is published unedited except for some email address and some telephone number redactions to prevent unwanted spam and calls –Anthony
UPDATE: I’ve run the email through this tool (Thanks Tom Nelson) to make it a bit easier to read, and added [BREAK]s to separate the messages, fixed broken links, plus cleaned up the flow. Oldest is at the bottom, read from bottom up. – Anthony
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From: Jim Lakely
Date: Thursday, February 23, 2012 10:41 AM
To: Anthony Watts
Subject: Peter Gleick Debate Invitation email thread
Anthony,
Below my signature is the email thread between me and Peter Gleick from last month when The Heartland Institute invited him to debate James M. Taylor at our anniversary benefit dinner this August.
I think you’d find the correspondence interesting in light of Gleick’s recent confession in Fakegate – especially the timeline. Feel free to share and publish any and all of this correspondence, quote me directly, and inform your readers that I sent it to you.
Let me know if you have any questions.
We’ve also posted proof that we’re open to debate on Fakegate.org: Two videos of Scott Denning (one thanking us for inviting him to ICCC4, and one of a cordial luncheon debate at ICCC6).
http://fakegate.org/climate-debate-videos/
Best,
Jim Lakely
Director of Communications
The Heartland Institute
One South Wacker Drive #2740
Chicago, IL 60606
office: 312.377.4000
See who endorses The Heartland Institute!
CONFIDENTIALITY: This e-mail (including any attachments) may contain confidential, proprietary and privileged information, and unauthorized disclosure or use is prohibited. If you received this e-mail in error, please notify the sender and delete this e-mail from your system.
[BREAK]
—–Original Message—– From: Jim Lakely Sent: Saturday, January 28, 2012 8:06 PM To: Peter H. Gleick Subject: RE: Debate Invitation
Dr. Gleick,
I’m sorry to hear that you’ve declined our invitation, but I am thankful that you gave it serious consideration. If you’d ever like to engage in a public debate with a Heartland scholar on the topic of climate change, our door is always open.
As for the “entertainment” bit … I think you misunderstand. That word was not intended to make frivolous what Heartland does — in general, or certainly at our annual benefit dinner. We’re a think tank. We love debate, and thrive on intellectual back-and-forth. To me, and our supporters, such a stimulating discussion IS ALSO entertaining. Learning should ever be so.
Regardless, the invitation to our benefit dinner is open. We’ll happily comp you two tickets if you’d like to come to one of the world’s greatest cities for a day of leisure and an evening with Heartland’s scholars, staffers and supporters.
Warm regards,
Jim Lakely
Communications Director
The Heartland Institute
19 S. LaSalle St., Suite 903
Chicago, IL 60603
office: 312.377.4000
[BREAK]
—–Original Message—–
From: Peter H. Gleick [mailto:pgleick@xxxxx.com]
Sent: Fri 1/27/2012 9:33 AM
To: Jim Lakely
Subject: RE: Debate Invitation
Dear Mr. Lakely,
After reviewing your email and after serious consideration, I must decline your invitation to participate in the August fundraising event for the Heartland Institute.
I think the seriousness of the threat of climate change is too important to be considered the “entertainment portion of the event” as you describe it, for the amusement of your donors.
Perhaps more importantly, the lack of transparency about the financial support for the
Heartland Institute is at odds with my belief in transparency, especially when your Institute and its donors benefit from major tax breaks at the expense of the public.
Thank you for considering me.
Dr. Peter Gleick
[BREAK]
At 03:25 PM 1/17/2012, Jim Lakely wrote:
Peter,
Thanks for your reply. Travel and lodging expenses would be covered by Heartland. Our annual dinner is tentatively set for August. This would be a moderated debate, though details about the question on the table, the time for each side, etc., is yet to be determined.
I will get back to you on your other questions.
But I’m sure you’ve seen James M. Taylor’s response to the funding questions at Forbes.com – a question he has answered publicly many times. In short: We used to publicly list our donors by name, but stopped a few years ago, in part, because people who disagree with The Heartland Institute decided to harass our donors in person and via email.
More donor information from our Web site:
Diverse funding base: Heartland has grown slowly over the years by cultivating a diverse base of donors who share its mission. Today it has approximately 2,000 supporters. In 2010 it received 48 percent of its income from foundations, 34 percent from corporations, and 14 percent from individuals. No corporate donor gave more than 5 percent of its annual budget.
Also from our Web site:
Policies regarding donors: The Heartland
Institute enforces <http://heartland.org/PDFs/DonorPolicies.pdf policies >
that limit the role donors may play in the selection of research topics, peer review, and
publication plans of the organization. Heartland does not conduct contract research. These
policies ensure that no Heartland researcher or spokesperson is subject to undue pressure from a donor.
And more donor policy/information from our Web site:
Q: Why doesn’t Heartland reveal the identities of its donors?
A: For many years, we provided a complete list of Heartland’s corporate and foundation donors on this Web site and challenged other think tanks and advocacy groups to do the same. To our knowledge, not a single group followed our lead.
After much deliberation and with some regret, we now keep confidential the identities of all our donors for the following reasons:
· People who disagree with our views have taken to selectively disclosing names of donors who they think are unpopular in order to avoid addressing the merits of our positions. Listing our donors makes this unfair and misleading tactic possible. By not disclosing our donors, we keep the focus on the issue.
· We have procedures in place that protect our writers and editors from undue
influence by donors. This makes the identities of our donors irrelevant.
· We frequently take positions at odds with those of the individuals and companies who fund us, so it is unfair to them as well as to us to mention their funding when expressing our point of view.
· No corporate donor gives more than 5 percent of our budget, and most give far less
than that. We have a diverse funding base that is too large to accurately summarize each time we issue a statement.
And, as you know, we are under no legal obligation to release a detailed list of our donors – nor is any other non-profit organization. Our 990 forms are in full compliance with the IRS.
More here:
http://heartland.org/reply-to-critics>http://heartland.org/reply-to-critics
Regards,
Jim Lakely
Communications Director
The Heartland Institute
19 S. LaSalle St., Suite 903
Chicago, IL 60603
office: 312.377.4000
<http://heartland.org/media-library/pdfs/Endorsements.pdf>See
who endorses The Heartland Institute!
[BREAK]
From: Peter H. Gleick [mailto:pgleick@xxxxx.com]
Sent: Monday, January 16, 2012 1:39 PM
To: Jim Lakely; pgleick@xxxxx.org; James Taylor
Subject: Re: Debate Invitation
Dear Mr. Lakely,
Thank you for your email of January 13th, 2012, inviting me to participate in the Heartland Institute’s 28th Anniversary Benefit Dinner.
In order for me to consider this invitation, please let me know if the Heartland Institute
publishes its financial records and donors for the public and where to find this information.
Such transparency is important to me when I am offered a speaking fee (or in this case, a
comparable donation to a charity). My own institution puts this information on our website.
Also, I would like a little more information about the date, venue, and expected audience and format. In addition, I assume your offer includes all travel and hotel expenses, economy class, but can you please confirm this?
Sincerely,
Dr. Peter Gleick
[BREAK]
At 11:12 AM 1/13/2012, Jim Lakely wrote:
Dr. Gleick,
I’ve enjoyed the lively discussion via dueling Forbes.com columns and replies between you and James Taylor.
The Heartland Institute is in the early planning stages for our 28th Anniversary Benefit Dinner later this year. We usually have a keynote speaker or debate for the “entertainment” portion of the event, and I was wondering if you’d be willing to come to Chicago to debate James Taylor. We’d donate $5,000 to the charity of your choice in lieu of an honoraria.
I think such a debate would be enlightening, and a lot of fun. Folks at Heartland don’t bite, and treat those with whom we disagree with respect.
(You can ask Scott Denning at Colorado State University about how he was treated at our last two climate conferences, or <http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kkL6TDIaCVw>go here to view his words of thanks at our 4th conference.)
Let me know if this offer is appealing to you, and if it might fit your schedule. (Our dinner
is tentatively scheduled for the second week of August.)
Regards,
Jim Lakely
Communications Director
The Heartland Institute
19 S. LaSalle St., Suite 903
Chicago, IL 60603
office: 312.377.4000
<http://heartland.org/media-library/pdfs/Endorsements.pdf>See
who endorses The Heartland Institute!
Dr. Peter H. Gleick
President, Pacific Institute
Phone: +1-510-251-xxxx
Assistant: Terry Asbury (tasbury@xxxxxx.org)
<http://www.pacinst.org/>www.pacinst.org
Dr. Peter H. Gleick
President, Pacific Institute
Member, US National Academy of Sciences
MacArthur Fellow
Phone: +1-510-251-xxxxx
Assistant: Terry Asbury (tasbury@xxxxx.org)
www.pacinst.org
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Priceless !!!!!
Considering the recent events !!!
Oh, how the noble have fallen.
sarc/
How do we know this email thread isn’t faked? Did you bother to check with Dr. Gleick to confirm it is authentic?
/sarc
Kidding aside, I’m very happy to see this, as it shoots all sorts of holes in Gleick’s story that Heartland is trying to silence debate.
I’m not a huge fan of Heartland (despite my strong libertarian leanings), but the text of this exchange casts the in a rather favourable light. And I trust Lakely’s got the good sense to release the transcript verbatim, lest the alarmist fringe claim that Heartland is somehow distorting it to further discredit Gleick.
My Real Science comment: “The guy [gleick] looks like a weirdo. A super geek. Gleick the Geek is a Berkeley “scientist,” a leftist radical who dons an unkempt oily beard and gaunt vegetarianish facade. A good spin would be that he’s a genuine bona fide hippie, but I like hippies, and this is no hippie. Real hippies, like in Santa Cruz, are open-minded, honest, decent. This self-righteous unctuous Berkeley radical is no hippie, and not a scientist per se, but a man with an agenda. And come hell or high water he’s going to try to foist this leftist agenda on the rest of us. Truth be damned.”
The only response I’ve gotten from the Chicken Littles is that his beard is not oily, or unkempt. That’s arguable. But what about the other issues I raised? Silence.
Ah so he was directly informed prior to the document release that the donors had been harassed.
I guess he can’t claim ignorance as to the damages caused at this point – he knew what would happen which should help prove the “malice” requirement.
Nice! But … would it be such a chore to rearrange the emails in order oldest first so it’s not necessary to loop-read from the bottom up to get the right sequence?
Could we not reverse the order of these e-mails for easier reading?
Libertarians et al. need to wise up and form a Tides Foundation thru which donors can spend vast sums of money beyond inquiring eyes…for progressive causes
It’s not [a crime] if you ask nicely first… Right?
REPLY: Had to snip that and replace with a generic in brackets – too ugly – Anthony
Wow, what principles and integrity !
I’m guessing that this is in the AGW crowd’s playbook for how to artfully avoid the debate (that Gleick ironically mentions in his apology that needs to happen): Don’t debate with anyone until you know their funding sources. If subsequently presented with such sources, then decline based on not wanting to take money from such entities nor wanting to encourage such sources – no matter what or who those funding sources are.
Gleick: “especially when your Institute and its donors benefit from major tax breaks at the expense of the public.”
Didn’t Gleick’s Pacific Institute get taxpayer money? It wasn’t unethical when HE got the funding, right?
The guy really had serious issues.
LOL, Belief in transparency and yet he kept his mouth shut during all the CRU FOIA refusals
HYP-O-CRITE
According to its website, the Pacific Institute is a tax-exempt 501 (c) (3) organization, so the institute and its donors benefit from exactly the same tax breaks that Gleick was so high and mighty about.
The contrast in that e-mail thread between the graciousness, warmth and cordiality of Lakely — even after Gleick had insulted Heartland — and the snarky smug rudeness of Gleick is so telling.
On other threads, I’ve written that HI should take Gleick to court and then return damages received to Gleick, so that the only thing ruined for Gleick would be his reputation.
After reading this, I take it back. Gleick deserves everything that’s going to happen to him. I just hope he drags the whole bunch of ideologically corrupt climate scientologists with him
I’m definitely no fan of PG (his actions are dumb at best) or the HI (my politics wouldn’t fit there, although I am a climate skeptic)* – although the latter’s funding of the surfacestations projects seems fine to me.
However I wonder if the HI were really serious ? If I were a “subscriber” (not meant as an insult, just looking for a word here) to the theory behind CAGW then I would find it hard accept this phrase: “the entertainment portion of the event”. It seems like HI are asking someone that they don’t agree with to be some kind of “performing bear” for them.
I would also use this as an excuse to refuse, and slightly insulting really. But then again I may accept – the $5K to charity seems worthwhile.
Just a thought.
*(I’m kind of fed up with the right vs left portion of this debate, although I know it won’t play well here, but I had to say it. I’m not alone, Graham Stringer – the strongest ‘skeptical’ questioner in the uk parliament climategate hearings is also ‘of the left…’)
Morph, they asked PG to participate in a debate. I think it was a serious offer. Skeptics have a strong record of trouncing opponents in such debates. They weren’t inviting him to just give a speech or something like that.
CHICKEN little. What a hero of the revolution. Onward comrades. Hahahaha…
I generally don’t like to impugn motives but, in light of recent events, it isn’t a stretch to conclude that Gleick’s excuse about not debating unless donor info is disclosed was disingenuous. Debate or not, he was fishing for a list of HI’s donors.
I can imagine him telling his buddies, like Jones or Mann: “Why would I want to debate them, when all they’re trying to do is prove me wrong?”
Sounds kinda familiar.
[Is it just me or is this just pointless bollocks? . . kb]
Ohh bummer, I wish he would have said a yes to the dinner, he could have bought his brother with him; after all he has two tickets. His big brother properly kicked his arse over this one. So his brother will not come as he is angry with little brother being an embarrassment to the family. I know he can come holding hands with his mate M.Mann. Now that would be something you got to see.
@Morph “If I were a “subscriber” (not meant as an insult, just looking for a word here) to the theory behind CAGW then I would find it hard accept this phrase: “the entertainment portion of the event”. It seems like HI are asking someone that they don’t agree with to be some kind of “performing bear” for them.”
Read the original phrasing of it. “Entertainment” was put in quotes. That totally changes the meaning.
Morph says: February 23, 2012 at 11:47 am
I’m definitely no fan of PG (his actions are dumb at best) or the HI (my politics wouldn’t fit there, although I am a climate skeptic)*
*(I’m kind of fed up with the right vs left portion of this debate, although I know it won’t play well here, but I had to say it. I’m not alone, Graham Stringer – the strongest ‘skeptical’ questioner in the uk parliament climategate hearings is also ‘of the left…’)
xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
There are some political statements here but in general they are respectful.
Many readers here are aware of the “left” beliefs of Steve McIntyre at: climateaudit.org
I’ve never seen him attacked here for his political views. Below is an excerpt:
http://climateaudit.org/2008/11/05/the-us-election/
I think that Obama’s election is also very healthy for the U.S. in world terms. The U.S. stands for both good and bad in world terms. While U.S. economic dominance has faded, it is still the leading world nation and leadership from the U.S. is important. Obama is in a position to provide such leadership in a way that would have been impossible for McCain.
definition of a Gleickopath,
We can prove whatever we want to; the only real difficulty is to know what we want to prove.
Emile Chartier, (Systeme des beaux arts )
My follow up email to my earlier request for financial information from the Pacific Institute:
Dear Ms. Nancy Ross,
My apologies for spelling your name incorrectly in my previous email to you.
Please review the following link to an email exchange in which your President endorses full financial disclosure of your organizations donors and expenditures.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/02/23/peter-gleick-debate-invitation-email-thread/
I trust this is sufficient authorization for you to direct me to where this information is made public.
Thank you in advance.
Chris B
No response yet.
For some real spinning on the subject, check the link below. The author spends hundreds of words deconstructing a single paragraph from a Heartland press release, with the conclusion that they are leaving too much wiggle room. Of course when you look at the paragraph they chose:
An internal investigation by The Heartland Institute has confirmed that the “climate strategy” memo was not written by a staff member, did not originate in The Heartland Institute’s offices, and was not one of the stolen documents. We are still waiting for the report of a forensic investigation firm.
That is from Feb 20. Compare to their original on Feb 15:
One document, titled “Confidential Memo: 2012 Heartland Climate Strategy,” is a total fake apparently intended to defame and discredit The Heartland Institute. It was not written by anyone associated with The Heartland Institute. It does not express Heartland’s goals, plans, or tactics. It contains several obvious and gross misstatements of fact.
No wiggle room in that, is there?
These people are beneath contempt.