Fake document planted in attempt to incriminate skeptics of Global Warming

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  Feb 17, 2012 5:23 PM GMT

  A pretty comprehensive take down of the central document that global warming campaigners say is the smoking gun. Too bad it is fake.
  
  http://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2012/02/leaked-docs-from-heartland-institute-cause-a-stir-but-is-one-a-fake/253165/
  
  

  The climate blogs have been swept by quite a scoop in the past few days. An anonymous leaker identified only as "Heartland Insider" has dumped a cache of documents on climate blogs purporting to reveal the inner workings of the Heartland Institute, a vigorous promoter of skepticism about anthropogenic global warming.
  
  Over the course of a few days, details have emerged. According to Heartland, someone contacted them pretending to be a board member, and requested that the organization "resend" their annual meeting board package to an alternative email address. And apparently some gullible staffer actually complied. The result is here. There are loads of juicy details about who donates what, and who gets money from Heartland. [...]

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  Feb 17, 2012 5:27 PM GMT

  "And apparently some gullible staffer actually complied. The result is here. There are loads of juicy details about who donates what, and who gets money from Heartland."
  
  
  So how are the documents fake?
  
  
  Was it proved so?
  Or is it just the author's personal opinion that they are?

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  Feb 17, 2012 5:37 PM GMT

  meninlove said "And apparently some gullible staffer actually complied. The result is here. There are loads of juicy details about who donates what, and who gets money from Heartland."
  
  
  So how are the documents fake?
  
  
  Was it proved so?
  Or is it just the author's personal opinion that they are?

  
  
  Heartland has effectively acknowledged the other documents - while only disputing this one particular one as the author notes. The well recognized author (an economist formerly writing for the Economist), points out how the document is further inconsistent in the context of both the writing and content.
  
  So yes, I think that there's some fodder here - ie who donates money and where the money goes, but that's not exactly that secret. Look at another worse scandal that is developing with Media Matters that shows it collected donations specifically on advocating gun control while hiring armed body guards for their delusional and paranoid leader (who at the same time maintained hit lists and was proposing private investigators to dig up dirt on opponents to the Administration).

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  Feb 17, 2012 5:41 PM GMT

  I saw your argument on the Media Matters topic, but gun control was to address guns NOT used by security companies and law enforcement.
  
  
  

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• GQjock
  
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  Feb 17, 2012 5:49 PM GMT

  Lol... Incriminate ?
  
  Dude if you're a skeptic of climate change .... You got plenty worse prob,ems than someone planting papers
  

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  Feb 17, 2012 9:19 PM GMT

  OMG the Alarmists will not like this wee bit of truth coming out; many of us down in Oz are pissing ourselves with laughter at all the propaganda of climate change; OMG it was warmer than this in Roman times.

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  Feb 18, 2012 12:15 AM GMT

  meninlove said I saw your argument on the Media Matters topic, but gun control was to address guns NOT used by security companies and law enforcement.
  
  
  

  
  
  Ah so it's ok just to use guns for hire? Rules for some but not for others... his hypocritical (beyond the crazy town that seems to be Media Matters versus by comparison pretty mundane stuff here except for the planted doc)

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  Feb 18, 2012 12:49 AM GMT

  Riddler, I read about this days ago and how Heartland was attempting early on to discredit their real document exposesure as fake. I believe it was on Care2Causes or CommonDream.org.
  
  Wasn't this the same group that a few years ago stretched some miniscule 'tweeking' done among scientists which didn't amount to changing facts about global warming, but by the time Heartland got done with it that's how they made it out to be.
  
  
  This is how these groups work to confuse issues, they'll throw in lies, twist and turn the facts and making up some off the wall comparisons, then accuse the victim of their propaganda as the one that's confusing the issues.
  
  
  Very much like the tactics used by the RJ pain in the ass LIL'AIPAC, (Ceaserea4, now Wolverine4) Their whole point is to confuse the issues so much that facts are neutralized, sound reasoning is thrown to the winds all for the sake of the rights fear of change from the status quo. Success for them, and a regression of progress toward a better world environment for the masses, all for the sake of keeping the oil riches for the few in place for a few more years.

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  Feb 18, 2012 1:25 AM GMT

  riddler78 said

  meninlove said I saw your argument on the Media Matters topic, but gun control was to address guns NOT used by security companies and law enforcement.
  
  
  

  
  
  Ah so it's ok just to use guns for hire? Rules for some but not for others... his hypocritical (beyond the crazy town that seems to be Media Matters versus by comparison pretty mundane stuff here except for the planted doc)

  
  
  Good grief.
  
  Look, I'm not a fan of the gun registry, but do think there should be some restrictions on the proliferation of firearms.
  
  You're now insinuating that a gang member that does a drive by shooting is equal to the armed security hired to protect a city, town or individual.
  
  

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  Feb 18, 2012 1:42 AM GMT

  realifedad said Riddler, I read about this days ago and how Heartland was attempting early on to discredit their real document exposesure as fake. I believe it was on Care2Causes or CommonDream.org.
  
  Wasn't this the same group that a few years ago stretched some miniscule 'tweeking' done among scientists which didn't amount to changing facts about global warming, but by the time Heartland got done with it that's how they made it out to be.
  
  
  This is how these groups work to confuse issues, they'll throw in lies, twist and turn the facts and making up some off the wall comparisons, then accuse the victim of their propaganda as the one that's confusing the issues.
  
  
  Very much like the tactics used by the RJ pain in the ass LIL'AIPAC, (Ceaserea4, now Wolverine4) Their whole point is to confuse the issues so much that facts are neutralized, sound reasoning is thrown to the winds all for the sake of the rights fear of change from the status quo. Success for them, and a regression of progress toward a better world environment for the masses, all for the sake of keeping the oil riches for the few in place for a few more years.

  
  
  Megan Mcardle (article I linked) has done a pretty comprehensive take down of why the document is likely a fake.

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  Feb 18, 2012 7:20 AM GMT

  Update:
  
  http://www.theatlantic.com/national/archive/2012/02/heartland-memo-looking-faker-by-the-minute/253276/
  
  

  For me, this leaves the most fascinating question of all: who wrote it? We have a few clues:
  
  1) They are on the west coast
  
  2) They own or have access to an Epson scanner--though God knows, this could be at a Kinkos.
  
  3) They probably themselves have a somewhat run-on writing style
  
  4) I'm guessing they use the word "high-profile" a fair amount.
  
  5) They are bizarrely obsessed with global warming coverage at Forbes, which suggests to me that there is a good chance that they write or comment on the website, or that they have tangled with writers at Forbes (probably Taylor) either in public or private.
  
  6) The last paragraph is the biggest departure from the source documents, and is therefore likely to be closest to the author's own style.
  
  7) I have a strong suspicion that they refrained from commenting on the document dump. That's what I'd do, anyway. A commenter or email correspondent who suddenly disappeared when they normally would have been reveling in this sort of story is a good candidate.
  
  8.) They seem to have it in for Andy Revkin at the New York Times. There's nothing in the other documents to indicate that Heartland thinks Revkin is amenable to being . . . turned? I'm not sure what the right word is, but the implication in the strategy memo that Heartland believes it could somehow develop a relationship with Revkin seems aimed at discrediting Revkin's work.
  
  Unfortunately, I'd imagine that this is still a sizeable set of people, and it will be hard to identify the author. I suspect that it will be easier to do if the climate-bloggers--who may well know this person as a commenter or correspondent--get involved in trying to find out who muddied the story by perpetrating a fraud on their sites.

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