Eideard

The Heartland Institute, the libertarian thinktank whose project to undermine science lessons for schoolchildren was exposed this week, faces new scrutiny of its finances – including its donors and tax status.

The Guardian has learned of a whistleblower complaint to the Internal Revenue Service about Heartland’s 501(c)(3) tax-exempt status…

The unauthorised release of internal documents indicated Heartland had received $14 million over several years from a single anonymous donor as well as tobacco and liquor companies and corporations pledged to social responsibility, including the General Motors Foundation.

The release of the donors’ list led a number of environmental organisations to demand GM, which gave $30,000, and Microsoft, which gave $59,908 in free software, to sever their ties with a thinktank that has a core mission of discrediting climate science…

Others are focusing on Heartland’s support from the tobacco industry as well as major health and pharmaceutical companies for a thinktank which has opposed smoking bans and healthcare reform.

John Mashey, a retired computer scientist and Silicon Valley executive, said he filed a complaint to the IRS this week that said Heartland’s public relations and lobbying efforts violated its non-profit status. Mashey said he sent off his audit, the product of three months’ research, just a few hours before the unauthorised release of the Heartland documents.

Mashey said in a telephone interview that the complaint looked at the activities of Heartland and two other organisations that have been prominent in misinforming the public about climate change, the Science and Environmental Policy Project, run by Fred Singer, and the Centre for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, run by Craig Idso. Both men were funded by Heartland, with Idso receiving $11,600 per month and Singer $5,500 a month, according to the 2012 budget…

“I believe there was a massive abuse of 501c(3),” Mashey said. “My extensive study of these thinktanks showed numerous specific actions that violated the rules – such as that their work is supposed to be factually based. Such as there was a whole lot of behaviour that sure looked like lobbying and sending money to foreign organisations that are not charities.”

Mashey later published his audit of Heartland finances in Desmogblog, which was the first outlet to run the trove of Heartland documents.

Overdue. Creeps like this violate federal law on non-profit status all the time when they serve as a lobbying front for corporations with a vested interest in Heartland’s comments – whether that be climate, tobacco or fronting for pharmaceutical companies.

The editor of a science journal has resigned after admitting that a recent paper casting doubt on man-made climate change should not have been published.

The paper, by US scientists Roy Spencer and William Braswell, claimed that computer models of climate inflated projections of temperature increase. It was seized on by “sceptic” bloggers, but attacked by mainstream scientists.

Wolfgang Wagner, editor of Remote Sensing journal, says he agrees with the criticisms and is stepping down.

“Peer-reviewed journals are a pillar of modern science,” he writes in a resignation note published in Remote Sensing. “Their aim is to achieve highest scientific standards by carrying out a rigorous peer review that is, as a minimum requirement, supposed to be able to identify fundamental methodological errors or false claims.

“Unfortunately, as many climate researchers and engaged observers of the climate change debate pointed out in various internet discussion fora, the paper by Spencer and Braswell… is most likely problematic in both aspects and should therefore not have been published…”

In essence, Dr Wagner, a professor of remote sensing at Vienna University of Technology, is blaming himself for this failing. But he also blames the researchers themselves for not referencing all the relevant research in their manuscript.

“The problem is that comparable studies published by other authors have already been refuted…, a fact which was ignored by Spencer and Braswell in their paper and, unfortunately, not picked up by the reviewers…

Scientific papers that turn out to be flawed or fraudulent are usually retracted by the journals that publish them, with editorial resignations a rarity.

But Bob Ward, policy and communications director at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment at the London School of Economics, said Dr Wagner had done the decent thing. “It was a mistake, he’s owned up to it and taken an honourable course, and I think he’s to be commended for it,” he told BBC News.

“I think it remains to be seen whether the authors follow a similar course.”

Since the authors of the crap article have their strongest commitment to right-wing politics and a “Christian” view of science – I think there is little or no likelihood of honor and ethics straying into their path.

We haven’t the time to speak to our little brown brothers

It was billed, in part, as a forum for the 2012 Republican presidential field to speak directly to Hispanics — a replica of the vaunted Conservative Political Action Conference, but tailored to the fastest-growing slice of the electorate.

Yet, when former Gov. Jeb Bush, former Sen. Norm Coleman and former Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez open the first Hispanic Leadership Network conference next month in Miami, the only potential presidential candidate confirmed to attend — so far — is Minnesota Gov. Tim Pawlenty.

Former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney declined the invite. So did South Dakota Sen. John Thune, Indiana Gov. Mitch Daniels and Texas Gov Rick Perry.

Newt Gingrich is “amenable” to attending but hasn’t committed yet, his spokesman said.

And others in the group, including former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee and Mississippi Gov. Haley Barbour, didn’t respond to inquiries from POLITICO.

A poor showing could raise doubts about the commitment of Republicans to court Hispanics, one of the open-ended questions of the 2012 presidential cycle.

Jim Landry, spokesman for the American Action Network, which created the Hispanic group, said the organizers extended invites to the entire presidential field, but it was never the main reason for holding the conference…

Yet another “grassroots” organization created, bought and paid for by Republican corporate Anglos. Ready to assume the mantle of “spontaneous” conservative resurgence, an Hispanic Tea Party. Hogwash!

Republicans have no concern about grassroots resentment over bigots who ignore the needs and desires of minority populations. Lip service ain’t gonna cut it on the battlefield of the next presidential election in 2012. Or 2016 for that matter.

A public relations company and its owner have been cited for having staff post glowing reviews of game applications for companies it represents at the online iTunes store.

According to the U.S. Federal Trade Commission, Reverb Communications and its owner Tracie Snitker engaged in deceptive advertising by having its employees pose as ordinary consumers when posting the reviews.

“Companies, including public relations firms involved in online marketing need to abide by long-held principles of truth in advertising,” said Mary Engle, director of the FTC’s advertising practices division.

The California-based Reverb Communications represents dozens of major video game companies and developers.

The FTC, however, claims Reverb did not disclose the reviews were written by its staff, nor that they were hired to promote the games and that they often received a percentage of the sales.

That information is relevant to consumers who were using the endorsements as a guide to whether or not to buy the games…

Under a proposed settlement order, Reverb will have to remove any previously posted endorsements that misrepresent the authors as ordinary consumers.

Sleaze ain’t any less relevant when it’s geeks and gamers indulging in the practice.

Fishing grounds closed – 2200 extra licenses sold – uh, huh

BP has paid out more than $308m in compensation to individuals and businesses since the oil spill, but fishermen and Gulf of Mexico officials fear some of that money might have gone to fraudsters.

Oysterman Pete Vujnovich has been out of work for the past several months. He spends most of his days tidying his boat – the Captain Pete – waiting for the waters around his home in Barataria Bay to reopen to fishing.

A couple months ago, he says, two men he had never seen before approached him near his boat and asked him to sign a paper saying they had worked for him – so they could claim BP compensation.

“Of course,” he says. “I didn’t sign.” Mr Vujnovich says he has heard of other fraud attempts. “Some of the other boat captains have been offered a thousand dollars to sign a piece of paper vouching for other people,” he says.

In order to claim compensation from BP, fishermen must prove they hold a commercial fishing license. The only place to get one in Louisiana is the Department of Wildlife and Fisheries (LDWF) in Baton Rouge.

Since the oil spill, roughly 2,200 more commercial licences have been sold than in the same period last year, despite many fishing grounds being closed.

No – I’m not surprised.

Lt Col Jeff Mayne of the LDWF Law Enforcement Division says some of those licences may have been used to commit fraud.

“Originally BP was paying cheques to just anybody who had a licence and that may have spurred some of the fraud,” he says. “There were no real checks and balances on whether they were they really commercial fishermen.”

In the past week, LDWF made its first three arrests in relation to fraudulent oil spill compensation claims…

BP has a special unit currently investigating several hundred cases of possible fraud. Adjusters in claims centres around Louisiana have also been warned to be on the lookout…

Oysterman Pete Vujnovich says, “At the heart of this industry is a core of really good people, and we don’t want that reputation tarnished.”

I wish I could say the same about Louisiana politicians – right down to the level of parish pundits who get on TV every chance they can to blather about how no one is trying hard enough to solve whatever it is they’re whining about this week – to get re-elected this Fall.

Tomorrow Gordon Brown will ask for a dissolution of parliament, and on Sunday week I shall fly away. An engagement to lecture at the University of Texas means that I shall be out of the country for most of the election campaign.

And I don’t care. My absence is of no concern at all to anyone else, but I mention it since I’ve realised that for the first time in my life I can’t summon up any real interest in a general election. Even as someone who has to write about politics as a trade, I feel barely a flicker of election fever coming on. What’s more, this ennui is clearly shared by my compatriots. We are bored, jaded, and fed up with politics and politicians, and with good reason.

Even if you didn’t wear a red or blue rosette, election campaigns used to be absorbing, and election nights exciting…

You could dislike Wilson or Thatcher, but still regard them as real leaders. The mood now is quite different. We’re disgusted by Blair, more so than ever as we learn about his awe-inspiring avarice, and we’re depressed by Brown, but we haven’t taken to Cameron either…

As the election approaches, the mood is thus rather like the old Viennese phrase: the situation was serious but not hopeless, now it’s hopeless but not serious…

The historian Tony Judt says…”I was born in 1948 so I am more or less the same age as George W. Bush, Bill Clinton, Hillary Clinton, Gerhard Schröder, Tony Blair and Gordon Brown – a pretty crappy generation, when you come to think of it, and many names could be added. It is a generation that grew up in the 1960s in western Europe or in America, in a world of no hard choices, neither economic nor political.”

But in truth there are hard choices ahead, from the economy to Afghanistan, and while “hopeless but not serious” may capture the public mood, it’s a form of denial. No wonder the coming orgy of dishonesty and evasion from all our would-be rulers inspires such revulsion. No, deep in the heart of Texas is a good enough place to be: I really shan’t mind watching this unseemly contest from afar.

I can’t help adding – take a good look around while you’re in Texas. You can actually photograph the stink of corporate power; Tea Party populism; traditional racism and bigotry [you will be hated for your accent] – you will be lecturing in a state which as much as any in this imperfect union rejects science and knowledge, education and justice.