NOTE: Since WUWT has the broadest reach of any climate blog and is essentially a “publication of record”, I have been asked to carry this opinion piece by the Heartland Institute. I have not received any compensation directly or indirectly for publishing this rebuttal. – Anthony Watts
By Joseph L. Bast, Director, Heartland Institute
On May 3, Jeffrey Sachs, a Columbia University professor and “special adviser” to United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon, wrote a commentary condemning global warming “deniers” that appeared on a Catholic website called Pewsitter. Since he takes aim specifically at The Heartland Institute, a reply seems to be in order.
Sachs wrote about an event convened by Pope Francis on global warming and sustainability at the Vatican in Rome the prior week. Observing that only alarmists and advocates of population control – most notably, Jeffrey Sachs – were on the program, I decided Heartland should send some real scientists and other experts to Rome to provide a different opinion. Our delegation to Rome consisted of the following individuals, all of them willing to travel a great distance on short notice and participate without honoraria:
- E. Calvin Beisner, Ph.D., national spokesman for the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation
- Hal Doiron, former NASA Skylab and Space Shuttle engineer
- Richard Keen, Ph.D., meteorology instructor at the University of Colorado
- Christopher Monckton, chief policy advisor to the Science and Public Policy Institute (SPPI)
- Marc Morano, executive editor and chief correspondent, ClimateDepot.com
- Tom Sheahen, Ph.D., vice chairman of the Board of Directors of the Science and Environmental Policy Project (SEPP)
- Elizabeth Yore, J.D., former general counsel at the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children in Virginia
Jim Lakely and Keely Drukala, Heartland’s director and deputy director of communications, respectively, traveled to Rome as well and managed the complicated and last-minute logistics of the trip.
We created a webpage at https://www.heartland.org/Vatican-Environment-Workshop where we posted news releases and opinion-editorials expressing our concern that the pope was being misinformed and offering links to more reliable scientific research and commentary on Christian views toward the environment. Following the event and safe return home of our delegation, we posted all the presentations and video from the event on the website.
Our presence generated extensive worldwide press attention. We were able to reach millions of people with our simple message that “climate change is not a crisis.”
The Vatican and United Nations seemed shocked that anyone would criticize their bias or the lack of scientific credentials of their speakers. Peter Raven, a speaker at the summit, devoted several minutes of his remarks to commenting on our presence, and now Sachs’ essay appears to be part of the UN’s effort at damage control.
Sachs did not attend our press conference or any of the presentations our experts made the following day. To our knowledge, none of the persons scheduled to speak at the “summit” chose to attend our public events. Nevertheless, Sachs writes: “the libertarian Heartland Institute, supported over the years by the Koch brothers, mounted a fruitless protest outside of St Peter’s Square.”
The Heartland Institute has received just $25,000 from a single organization, a charitable foundation, affiliated with “the Koch brothers” during the past 15 years. Our annual budget is approximately $7 million. Even that small gift was earmarked for our work on health care reform, not global warming. Why does Sachs mention “the Koch brothers” unless his intention is to smear an independent organization by falsely implying a much larger or somehow improper level of support from some singularly unpopular billionaires?
Our press conference and seminar were not a “protest.” We weren’t on the street waving signs or shouting slogans. Our speakers were highly qualified and their writing and speaking relating to the pope and the Catholic Church were respectful and focused narrowly on the science, economics, and politics of climate change.
The dishonesty in Sachs’ reference to The Heartland Institute would be startling, coming from a person of Sachs’ stature, if this sort of misrepresentation of facts weren’t so common in the debate over climate change. President Barack Obama sets the tone, comparing global warming realists to members of the “flat earth society” and rather ominously calling on his supporters to “hold climate change deniers’ feet to the fire.”
In fact, those who say global warming is a man-made crisis gave up arguing the science and economics behind their campaign long ago. They now rely only on exaggeration, lies, and ad hominem attacks on anyone who disagrees with them.
Sachs is correct about one thing: The Heartland Institute is indeed a libertarian organization. We are devoted to discovering, developing, and promoting free-market solutions to social and economic issues. We make it very clear on our website and in interviews that it was this perspective that led us to examine the science behind the global warming scare. That examination led us to become (in the words of The Economist) “the world’s most prominent think tank supporting skepticism of man-made climate change.”
Sachs says some “free-market conservatives … have followed their ideology to the point of denying well-established science.” He seems blind to the possibilities that the science is not “well-established” or that his fellow socialists and “progressives” have themselves fallen prey to this malady. What else explains their refusal to admit there has been no warming for more than 18 years, that real data show no increase in extreme weather events, and that the benefits of using fossil fuels outweigh the costs, by orders of magnitude, even including the vastly inflated costs attributed to climate change that might occur centuries from now?
Sachs has had a long and distinguished career as an academic and in various government agencies, but on this issue he is letting his liberal ideology cloud his judgment. His short essay reveals a disturbing lack of knowledge about climate science and compassion toward the billions of people in the world who will be harmed by the UN’s plans to make energy more expensive and less reliable.
Sachs ends his essay with a call to people of all faiths to “fulfill our moral responsibilities to humanity and to the future of Earth.” That responsibility starts with truth-telling. Sachs and his colleagues on the left haven’t reached the starting line yet.
# # #
Sadly, this pope is a sucker for socialist causes. He ought to stick to morals and religion.
“Koch Brothers!,” the cry of desperation.
Why should anyone be ashamed of accepting grant money from a Koch charitable foundation?
The Charles Koch Foundation provides research and education grants to nearly 250 U.S. colleges and universities.
The David H. Koch Charitable Foundation has pledged or contributed over $1.2 billion to cancer research, medical centers, educational institutions, arts and cultural institutions, public policy organizations, and Richard Muller. (BTW, David Koch is a chemical engineer with a masters degree from MIT.)
Koch Industries employs close to 60,000 Americans in well-paying jobs producing household products, construction materials, pollution control equipment, fertilizer, refined petroleum products, and much more.
Meanwhile, Tom Steyer, billionaire big spender promoting climate legislation, is a profiteer who produces nothing of value for anyone but himself and his investors.
Apparently, the Kochs are bad because they promote a smaller, less intrusive federal bureaucracy. Steyer’s good because he promotes a more intrusive, centralized welfare state.
Will the useful idiots who promote more centralized control over their lives ever notice that the more powerful the government, the more profitable its corruption?
nutso fasst,
You are exactly right. The Koch brothers are a self-made American success story. The Left hates that (unless the successfull entrepreneurs are leftists).
Good for the Kochs! Almost anyone would trade places with them. It is only green-eyed, liberal jealousy that triggers the criticism. The rest of us admire their accomplishments.
The family business was started by Fred C. Koch, the father of the Koch brothers. The present day Koch brothers have no accomplishments, only their $$$$. They are certainly not entrepreneurs.
Except that Fred Koch made his initial fortune by selling critical oil extraction technology to Stalin after he failed in business in the United States. Yup, that’s right, your self-made American success story made his wealth from selling valuable made-in-American technology know how to a socialist dictator. If you don’t believe me, you can read about it in The American Conservative – you can’t accuse them of bias: http://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/koch-brothers-the-real-thing/
Not true, Trafamadore. Read the biography of them published last year, I think by a left-sympathiser. I heard him interviewed at length on NPR. The Koch brothers have turned a small enterprise into a much larger one.
Not true, Trafalmadore. The brothers have vastly increased the fortune they were left. Their biographer was interviewed last year on NPR. It’s in their archives. He isn’t a political sympathizer of the Kochs.
Chris,
We can smell your green-eyed jealousy.
Someone else smarter than you made a pile of money.
Ooh, that stings. And the Kochs are Conservative, to boot!
You’re stupid & poor. Sad. But amusing to the rest of us.☺
dbstealey,
It’s such a pity that you run away from the very points you make when painted into a corner. It’s neither sporting or effective, but I’ve seen you do it so many times here that I am no longer surprised.
And for someone who calls out others for resorting to insults, you then call me stupid and poor. Smart people don’t stoop to personal attacks, they defend their point with facts – so what does that say about you? Wow, my ego has taken a real blow at being criticized by you, being (I’m sure) the enormously successful businessman that you are.
The Koch Brothers’ grandpa, Henry, worked as a printer’s apprentice in the Netherlands before emigrating to the US to work for newspapers in Chicago and Grand Rapids, MI. He saved enough money to buy a small newspaper in Quanah, Texas, which he ran successfully.
Thanks to Henry’s success, son Fred was able to attend Rice Institute and earn a degree in chemical engineering from MIT. He later became chief engineer with the Medway Oil & Storage Company before joining an MIT classmate, P.C. Keith, at Keith-Winkler Engineering in Wichita, Kansas. When Keith left the company, Koch became a partner and the business was renamed Winkler-Koch.
In 1927, Henry Koch developed a more efficient cracking process for making gasoline, allowing his small company to compete with ‘big oil’. The big oil companies immediately filed 44 lawsuits in an attempt to put Koch out of business. Koch won 43 of those suits. The 44th was overturned when it was revealed that the big oil companies had bribed the judge.
The lawsuits took their toll, however, effectively putting Winkler-Koch out of the US oil business. Koch took his expertise overseas, building cracking installations in Russia, Europe, the Middle East and Asia.
Having regained his fortune, Koch returned to the US in 1940 and formed the Wood River Oil and Refining Company. Business operations were turned over to Charles Koch in 1966. The company was renamed Koch Industries after Henry’s death in 1967.
What’s your success story, Chris?
I may have found where Chris gets his views of reality:
http://exiledonline.com/a-peoples-history-of-koch-industries-how-stalin-funded-the-tea-party-movement/
Note that when Freddie K. was building refineries overseas, readers of the NY Times were being told that Stalin’s Russia was a model for the rest of the world. And while Stalin’s liquidation of the Kulaks and collectivization of their farms caused an estimated 7 million deaths, Freddie was bringing $500K of Soviet cash into the U.S. And Freddie’s efficient refineries may have made it possible for Stalin’s army to whup Hitler. Bad Freddie, bad!
There may be some truth to both sides of the Koch story. The question is whether accepting Koch donations to fund research taints the research any more than accepting funds from other organizations or a government with an overriding agenda. Using Muller as example, the answer is clearly NO. The only “outside” funding Muller took that had conditions attached was $100K from the Energy Foundation after that organization had received $500K from Tom Steyer.
Whether the $188,587 taxpayer funding Muller took from the U.S. Energy Department had any conditions, stated or implied, is open to question.
@ur momisugly dbstealy,
You might want to cut back on those 4:00am comments, leave that saying crazy/stupid stuff to me, I’ll do it in prime time.
Just looking at some of the foreign news reports on this event the fact that the Vatican was challenged has made major headlines… It explains the onslaught of damage control propaganda..
Just maybe some of the faithful across the pond will wake up to the bowl of cr@p they have been fed by the UN.
Publication of Record
Yes, Anthony, I think you have earned the appelation “Publication of Record”.
higher standards of journalism than most print media
editorial independence
attention to accuracy
renowned internationally
My standard is groklaw.net. In some respects, I think Wattsupwiththat exceeds the standard set by Groklaw.
It is not a problem that Wattsupwiththat cleaves to the skeptical viewpoint. Many/most “newspapers of record” reflect a certain political viewpoint. Absolute neutrality isn’t even possible. What is necessary is integrity and honesty. I don’t think you could sustain a case that Anthony lacks either.
Congratulations, Anthony, for a job very well done.
Thank you. Many others agree with you.
Excellent, excellent.
But I do dislike the reference to “exaggerated costs” centuries from now. The alarmists are not “exaggerating,” they are 180 degrees wrong. As to warming and “the pause” of 18 years, it is hard to see a signal if you realize that the planet entered the 20th century still warming up from the “Little Ice Age.”
More importantly, as a biologist, I am concerned at the attack on beneficial things. We need to use the term “climate optimum” a lot more often here, and accuse our opponents of trying to harm everything alive–because THAT is the crux of the issue.
—
I hope Pewsitter has the integrity to publish your reply, but that has not been our general experience. We have long noticed that it is not about tho science, but politics. Why are alarmists willing to do so much biological damage for political power.
The best I can tell is PewSitter is some kind of news aggregator: it doesn’t publish anything. The closest I can find is this–05/04/2015 Notorious UN advisor Jeffrey Sachs defends Pope Francis’ ‘momoral case’ from self-interested Conservatives!–which redirects to the same commentary Anthony links to: http://www.pewsitter.com/view_news2_id_202942.php
Note to self: Close Italics. From the name of the link “Notorious UN advisor Jeffery Sachs” it doesn’t seem that they are promoting it.
Because they seek a tyrannical form of government to rule the masses and reduce their numbers, especially the poorest who cannot fight back.
Joe Bast and Anthony,
You guys are heros of truth and I am so happy you made the effort and sent a delegation.
There are many Catholics who are deeply offended that the church has been seduced by fake science, to lend moral credibility to this latest push to tax carbon etc. I know many who are quite besides themselves.
What you did is important. You made a presence and that made the difference. Had you not been there, then there would have not been any skeptics there and the proceedings would seem to have the unanimous imprimatur of the entire scientific community of the WORLD.
Now there is a visible stain on the shining armor of the AGW juggernaut.
There are many theologians and bishops who see the green movement for what it is, heresy and the undoing of mankind, and the making of the UN as a God-like organism.
These people within the Church can point this this small contingent and say that there is no unanimous voice and that the subject demands review and caution. Without you, they have only their philosophical objections.
The church does not object to science. In fact, it is a champion of the discipline of scientific inquiry. It is suffering the sheer weight of politics and those politics are shrouded in the cloak of deception of social good.
I believe this one act of defiance from these good men and woman, is the alarm bell that the orthodox theologians can rally around.
Only you could have done it.
Now Jeffery Sachs, by mentioning your presence, has breathed life into our protest. That is the deeper magic.
For me, I thank you so much.
BRAVO!
Some Catholics are complaining also: An Unholy Alliance
H/T to Free Republic.
many many catholics are seriously disturbed by attending to the green god.
Sachs is just a pretentious profit of cliamte doom dressed up as an academic.
It is honorable to reply to his low class smears even if it might be waste of time in the short run.
Jeffrey Sachs is a failure. His only redeeming qualities are a pretense to free(ish) markets and the fact that he’s willing to take on Krugtron the
invincibleincompetent.That title, “pewsitter”, is quite funny but funnier would be “Godbotherer”
[Sachs] seems blind to the possibilities that the science is not “well-established” or that his fellow socialists and “progressives” have themselves fallen prey to this malady.
————
Fallen prey? They are perps, not victims.
Wow! Pure projection Mr guest blogger. You described AGW skeptics perfectly.
I’m too nice a guy to be thrown into the “eternal damnation” bin.
Try me.
I guess it does show that Catholicism is compatible with other Religions.
It isn’t compatible with Pantheism which is what children are being taught in many schools around the world, including (maybe even especially) Catholic ones. Mikhail Gorbachev, Maurice Strong and Stephen Rockefeller proudly take responsibility for the Earth Charter, written in hopes that it will replace the Ten Commandments and lead to global governance where everyone can practice their own religion as long as it is by the16 principles of the Charter. It doesn’t mention God.
except islam
Seems like this Sachs old boy is a latter-day Soviet without a Soviet. Thus, he goes to the Vatican, attempts to remake a very conservative ideological union (they call themselves a “Church”) and is met with little change, perhaps chump change, i.e. lip service. Kissy kissy
But you *have* taken money from Heartland, haven’t you Anthony? You can’t even be honest about that…
Doesn’t seem to be honest about anything.
It’s amazing much made up garbage gets published here.
Did you just question Anthony’s honesty ??
You mean you don’t?!?
I thought I made my meaning clear, what part of it didn’t you understand ?
SH, what is your point? Do you think that taxpayer-funded alarmist scientists are tarred by the brush of the taxes paid by illegal drug dealers?? What about the slimy characters who give money to Greenpeace, WWF etc. Surely you think the scientists who are funded by them cannot be trusted either? If you don’t, then you are a hypocrite to ask Anthony about getting funds from a legal institution, whatever its political persuasion.
It seems that Mr Watts get’s funding from the heritage foundation, according to SH. The rest of your comment is nonsense.
Siberian Husky, Lee grable and u.k.(us),
When you state your true names, your financing and your affiliations then – and only then – you will obtain a moral right to question the honesty and integrity of our host.
For now, your unsubstantiated smears in response to the above article are merely the noise of you and your ilk being flushed away to the sewerage treatment works.
Richard
I’ve read this blog for some time Richard. So far, it’s blatant propaganda, and inane garbage. My so called smears are clearly substantiated by the body of posts and comments right here on this blog. If you, and the rest of the ghosts here can’t see that, then that’s on you.
Do you ever wonder why this blog is ignored outside the septic echo chamber?
Lee grable
You add to your unsubstantiated smears. But that pleases me because your noises are the gurgles as you are flushed through the U-bend.
And the only thing I “wonder” about falsehoods is why the likes of you make them.
Richard
Richard, Mr Watts spent the last of his integrity when he reneged on his promise to honor Muellers findings.
So, why is this blog ignored outside the septic echo chamber?
Lee grable
You write
That is yet another unsubstantiated smear!
“Reneged”? “promise”? “Muellers findings”?
And it is ‘goal post moving’. I wrote
Troll, put up or shut up.
Richard
@ur momisugly Lee garble” It seems that Mr Watts get’s funding from the heritage foundation, according to SH. The rest of your comment is nonsense.”
So is that all you can say? “according to SH”? Are you and him the same guy? If not, your statement is nothing but conjecture.
Lee grable
I answered your red herring which you now repeat asking
This blog is NOT “ignored outside the septic echo chamber”: as I said, that is a falsehood. Indeed, this thread is because the Heartland Institute asked this blog to publish a statement.
Your posts demonstrate you know your assertion is a falsehood because you say you have taken sufficient interest in this blog to read it “for some time” and you are posting to it. Why do that if you and/or your employers think “this blog ignored outside the septic echo chamber”?
Furthermore, your posts are direct evidence that this blog is NOT an “echo chamber”.
If you are employed to do your trolling then your employers are entitled to their money back.
Richard
So I guess the idea that these Warmists really are a bunch of religious fanatics is correct.
how special/convenient? Pope Francis’s well-premature Holy Year/Jubilee/Year of Mercy will begin in December. perhaps he will announce it at the UN Climate Convention in Paris?
7 May: WaPo: Michael E. Miller: Pope Francis will send ‘missionaries of mercy’ to absolve women of abortion ‘sin’
On Tuesday, Archbishop Fisichella was back in the news, but this time firmly in line with his boss. During a news conference at the Vatican, Fisichella announced that Pope Francis would be empowering his priests to pardon women for having abortions. Moreover, the Vatican would be sending these “missionaries of mercy” all across the world as part of the Pope’s Jubilee, or ***Holy Year, of Mercy, which begins in December.
Francis has spoken sharply about abortion, calling it “a sin against God.” But his year of mercy is aimed at bringing back estranged Catholics by emphasizing outreach, even for those who have committed grave sins in the eyes of the church…
The announcement is in line with a number of controversial moves from the Argentine pope. Since his election in 2013, Francis has pushed the church to become more tolerant. He reportedly met with a transgender man at the Vatican, seemed to endorse family planning by saying Catholics don’t need to breed “like rabbits,” indicated that divorced individuals could take communion, and has met with victims of clergy sex abuse.
Most shocking of all, he expressed an openness towards embracing gays and lesbians…
The pope’s sometimes seemingly off-the-cuff statements have made him the most popular pontiff in a generation…
***Normally, Holy Years occur once every quarter century. The last one was in 2000 under Pope John Paul II. In March, however, Pope Francis announced plans to hold a special jubilee ten years early. It is only the third special jubilee in church history…
http://www.washingtonpost.com/news/morning-mix/wp/2015/05/07/pope-francis-will-send-missionaries-of-mercy-to-absolve-women-of-abortion-sin/
MSM reported in January that Pope Francis was ‘truly sorry’ for offending large Catholic families by saying that there was no need to breed ‘like rabbits’, but it would seem he is getting closer to the CAGW depopulation advocates by the day.
6 May: Vice: Writers, Scientists, and Climate Experts Discuss How to Save the World from Climate Change
#1: HAVE FEWER KIDS
by Alan Weisman, writer
…Overpopulation isn’t just another environmental problem: It’s the one that underlies all others. Without so many humans using so much more stuff with each new generation, expelling waste and CO2 that don’t go away, there wouldn’t even be environmental problems—nor an Anthropocene.
Fortunately, it’s the easiest (and cheapest) problem to solve, both technically and socially—and without resorting to anything so drastic as China’s reviled one-child policy. And doing so will bring unexpected economic dividends, ease injustice, and counter climate change faster than anything else we know…
(Alan Weisman is the author of The World Without Us and Countdown)
#3 MAKE PEOPLE BETTER
Ken Caldeira, climate scientist
#4 FREE THE ENERGY MARKET
Naomi Oreskes, climate historian
Instating a carbon tax, eliminating subsidies, and eliminating environmental exemptions: These measures alone would go a long way toward creating a true free market that would enable renewables to compete on more equal footing…etc
http://www.vice.com/read/sos-0000653-v22n5
Naomi Oreskes is apparently ignorant of how much subsidy “green” energy gets, and is under some delusion that conventional energy gets big subsidies. And a carbon tax is antithetical to equal footing in a free market he gives lip service to.
behind paywall tho some will be able to access it free. by Maurice Newman, chairman of Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s business advisory council, to coincide with the visit to Australia by Christiana Figueres. ouch!
The UN is using climate change as a tool not an issue
The Australian – 14 hours ago
The UN is using climate change as a tool not an issue … of cheap energy and is set to overtake China as the world’s leading importer of coal.
the above article as described by the CAGW-infested Fairfax Media:
8 May: Brisbane Times: Lisa Cox: Climate change a UN-led ruse, says Tony Abbott’s business adviser Maurice Newman
Climate change is a hoax led by the United Nations so that it can end democracy and impose authoritarian rule, according to Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s chief business adviser.
Maurice Newman, the chairman of the Prime Minister’s business advisory council, has written in The Australian that scientific modelling showing the link between humans and climate change is wrong and the real agenda is a world takeover for the UN.
***The column was written to coincide with an Australian visit by the head of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Christiana Figueres…
Mr Newman continued that global warming was a “hook” to install a new world order.
“Figueres is on record saying democracy is a poor political system for fighting global warming. Communist China, she says, is the best model,” he said.
“This is not about facts or logic. It’s about a new world order under the control of the UN.”
He then urges the Abbott government to oppose a regime that was against “capitalism and freedom” by resisting the next global climate treaty in Paris, which countries hope to reach in December.
Mr Newman adds that, like Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Mr Abbott should resist the UN’s calls for coal to stay in the ground…
http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/climate-change-a-unled-ruse-says-tony-abbotts-business-adviser-maurice-newman-20150508-ggwuzt.touch.html?skin=smart-phone
Only alarmists and advocates of population control are on that panel? Why should the Roman Catholic church be swayed by population control? I thought the Roman Catholic church was against population control. What’s up with this population control stuff?
I believe that Heartland should make similar appearances at future CAGW confabs – for example, at the upcoming climate summit in Paris.
Good idea!
I hadn’t seen the Vatican presentations until a few hours ago. Both the press conference day and the presentation day were really uplifting. Truth is.
Thank you Heartland and Thank you to all the participants.
A good rebuttal
Interesting how the Marxists always hate religion until they happen upon something useful to advance their statist, anti-human agenda. An Alarmist Pope!
Since the matter gets into politics to this point, let’s think about this for a moment:
American? Nope.
Republican? Nope.
Retired? Nope.
Privately funded? Nope.
Academic? Check.
Pro-democracy? Check.
Pro-human rights? Check.
Pro-rule of law? Check.
Pro-intergovernmental collaboration? Check.
Socialist country origin? Check.
Atheist? Check.
Quasi-green? Check.
Quasi-left? Check.
Libertarian? Well now. All right, seems like the better option. Do I need to say more?
What????
Sorry meant to clarify better option ‘for me’.
Lets see if I can put this in terms the pope should understand. The global circulation models projecting doom if CO2 levels keep rising are being worshiped as graven images.
big smile, thanks