PBS: Tell the Koch Brothers To Take a Hike
Most of us read George Orwell’s 1984 in high school, and since incorporated the adjective “Orwellian,” into our vocabularies as a result of the enormous impact this masterpiece made upon us. As it’s usually used to describe language, “Orwellian” refers to words or phrases that have been deliberately manipulated to convey meanings that are in direct opposition to the normal concepts they would have implied. For example, 1984’s protagonist works at the “Ministry of Truth,” whose function is to rewrite history, forever obscuring historic truths from the citizenry.
I try not to miss an episode of NOVA, PBS’s terrific series on science. But whenever I tune in, I’m reminded, “This series is funded in part by David H. Koch … to promote the public understanding of science.” Each time I hear this, I can’t help thinking: Now that’s Orwellian. You seriously want me to believe that David Koch wants people to understand science? Here’s a message that could have come only from the Ministry of Truth.
According to the University of Massachusetts at Amherst’s Political Economy Research Institute, Koch Industries is one of the nation’s top 10 polluters, with their enormous plays in crude oil and coal. Through its subsidiaries, Koch operates refineries with a combined crude oil processing capacity of more than 800,000 barrels per day. Koch and its affiliates market and trade more than 40 million tons of coal, coke, and other related products annually.
Now obviously being a polluter — even a gargantuan one — while it may not be a good thing, has no bearing on someone’s rhetoric’s being labeled as Orwellian. But while being on the “dark side” is one thing, lying about it and creating massive PR campaigns (like the sponsorship of PBS shows on science) to cover it up or excuse it are another. The very last thing David Koch wants is a public that really understands science –- at least as it relates to the physics, chemistry, and biology of our environment — and how his life’s work has been built squarely around enriching himself beyond the wildest dreams of avarice by destroying the ecosystems upon which all living things depend — all the while cleverly covering his tracks.
I invite the reader to check out a few articles here:
Koch Brothers Exposed: Fueling Climate Denial and Privatizing Democracy
Charles And David Koch Exposed For Insidious Role In Crafting The Modern Right
Covert Operations – The Billionaire Brothers Who Are Waging a War Against Obama
When you’re finished, feel free to Google a few of these search terms; there are hundreds of thousands more where these come from. E.g., “Koch Brothers Exposed” returns 538,000 pages, including a film by that name.
I take flak when I write things like this, but it pains me to see PBS prostitute itself like this. I know public television and radio are desperate for the funding to keep them going. But has it come to this? Can’t you just tell these people to take a hike?
Sadly, the answer appears to be no.
Hooray for the Koch brothers and hooray for PBS for getting it right!
The public broadcasting system is not supposed to be partisan about what it is allowed to produce and promote. When there are opposing views held by large numbers of citizens it is obligated to be unbiased when it decides to cover a particular topic. Getting money from conservative value people may help to get a bit more balance to the menu of ideas expressed on the show.
LL
I suppose that’s one way of looking at it. You’re actually not the only one who said that NOVA is left-leaning; that thought had not occurred to me. As I wrote below, NOVA seems to be a pretty straight-forward presentation of scientific fact.
Craig, NOVA (and the rest of PBS/CPB programming) does not appear to be left-leaning…to someone who is ON the left! Having worked in broadcasting for 30 of the last 40 years, I can tell you that the outright hatred for the GOP, conservatives and (sometimes) this very nation is palpable, especially around the water cooler or the local watering hole after the day’s work in the newsroom or studio. I have personally met fewer than five actual conservatives in broadcasting; the liberals who hold sway in most of America’s newsrooms will savagely attack Republicans on the air and in person. Media’s overall left-wing bias is belied at least as much by what is omitted than what is comitted. I spoke with Newt and Callista Gingrich two weeks ago (I worked on their Delaware campaign.) and told them that, where media’s liberal bias is concerned, they “don’t know the half of it.” The Speaker seemed to understand that, but Callista looked shocked, blond hair and all.
I don’t have to review any of the linked-to articles; I already know very well what the Koch brothers are doing. I also wonder whether some PBS programs may be biased as the result of their source of funds, i.e., the Koch brothers.
From reading the biographies of the Captains of Industry from the gilded age, I know full well that no matter how much money some (but not all) people have, they still want more, often regardless of how they get it. Many of them have no ethical standards. The reason that they seem more ethical now than they did in the gilded age is that we have more laws and regulations to force them to act more ethically. In countries where such laws and regulations do not exist, they behave just as badly as they did during the gilded age.
For a more thorough understanding of the science that explains global warming, I recommend reading “Beyond Smoke and Mirrors” by Burton Richter. The author is a Nobel Laureate. Although the book contains considerable scientific detail, it is written in such a way that non-scientists can understand it. Although there can be little doubt that global warming is real and that our activities are responsible for most of it, much remains unknown. We cannot yet know exactly how serious the problem is or exactly what its effects will be.
I’ve read bits of it; it sounds excellent.
To suggest that only one side of the global warming discussion is funded by wealthy donors is just ridiculous. why don’t you publish an article which details funding sources for the Al Gores of the world and NASA. There’s plenty of evidence on both sides of the debate that results are skewed so that funding continues
I don’t know, TD. I encourage you to look into this further.
Let’s start by putting on the table that the Koch’s clearly have a lot riding on our carbon economy keeping a statue quo. Having said that we have to acknowledge that these are clearly not anti-science people. Their business model today relies on concrete advances in the sciences of geology, engineering (especially mechanical engineering), computer science, advanced satellite imaging, mathematics (especially fluid dynamics), chemistry not to mention any number of sub-disciplines in economics and a fair bit of political theory.
Clearly they have a vested interest in a scientifically literate population and labor pool.
Now, with all that on the table, it should also be obvious that a scientifically literate mind is still subject to a lot of cognitive dissidence especially where billions of dollars are on the line. Look no further than most biblically centered religions and you’ll find well educated people who have no problem squaring their personal beliefs with claims unsupportable by (or in violation of) good science.
This is normally not really anyone’s problem. When awesome amounts of money get involved though this can lead to really damaging results.
To put this all another way; it’s not that the Koch’s are “anti-science”. They’re just “pro-wealth”. Environment be damned.
I’m not sure this is consistent. To be “environment be damned” pretty much requires being “anti-science,” as the scientific evidence about the damage we’re doing is so overwhelmingly large.
A couple of comments …
to Larry Lemment … as far as I understand science, there is no left or right side to it … Science is a methodology to understanding the world … What I see part of the right side (only part) is a self centered interest in sustaining their business and not science.
to TD … There is not plenty of evidence on both sides … The evidence is clear, what is needed is a less ignorant public.
Re: your comment to Larry Lemmert, yes, that’s the way I see it too; NOVA seems to be a fairly straight-forward exposition of science, with little if any political spin.
Re: your comment to TD: Exactly.
I was not specifically referring to NOVA when I said that PBS has a left leaning orientation. It has the least amount of slant IMO but when it comes to climate change I have never seen NOVA present a balanced program that examines the science on both sides of the issue. LL
So the Koch brothers’ crime is that they make enough money to fund NOVA?
You then put words in David Koch’s mouth “The very last thing David Koch wants is a public that really understands science.” and say that’s his crime.
I’m sorry, but funding NOVA, which I think leans left, is a great piece of philanthropy. Objecting to that is shooting yourself in the foot.
It’s certainly no crime to be rich. And unfortunately, it’s not even a crime to use one’s riches to mislead a credulous population as to the massive damage one is doing to the planet. The only good news here is that many thousands of bloggers like me are onto this is a big way.
Craig, how many bloggers are drawing attention to Chinese pollution? I mean, really, their particulate output is, last I saw, roughly fifteen times per capita US output. The blogosphere condemns America but is virtually dead silent about China. How fair is that? It seems to me that the leading, fuzzy-thinking “one-worlders” ought to try to at least FAKE some semblance of consistency, but they’re too focused on using pollution as a fig-leaf for their ACTUAL agenda, which is to hamper and reduce Western industrial output and capacity, in favor of “socialist” nations that have never even heard of a catalytic converter. If pollution is bad, why should the nation-state or political system whence it comes matter?
Duke,
Considering that the Sierra Club seems to find fault with every possible energy source, including both wind and solar, it does indeed seem that they want everyone on this earth to return to living the way they did before the Industrial Revolution. Either that, or they have not carefully thought out their positions. But with the current population of the earth, returning to pre-industrial living would not be possible.
Unless technology intervenes, China, India, and other developing nations will soon be emitting many times as much CO2 as we here in the U.S. emit. But China has recently committed itself to expanding nuclear power greatly. If they do so safely and quickly, and enough other countries also do so, it is conceivable (though just barely so) that CO2 emissions will be brought under control before disaster strikes. But emphasizing renewables will, in the long run, delay adequately reducing CO2 emissions. Renewables would cause an extremely sharp increase in the cost of electricity and an unacceptable drop in reliability which would precipitate a rebellion resulting in a lack of concern for emissions coupled with a rapid expansion of the cheapest methods to produce electricity no matter how dirty.
It will be interesting to see what happens in Japan. Already shutting down nuclear plants has impacted Japan’s balance of trade, and it remains to be seen whether they can solve that problem without nuclear power; I have serious doubts.
Not all “socialist” nations oppose nuclear power. I’m less concerned with whether a nation is socialist than I am with how well it meets the needs of its people without unduly restricting individual freedom. It should be understood that private companies can be just as repressive as governments. If necessary, I can provide examples.
Frank, we’ll wait and see what the Japanese eventually do…they are not a technologically-unsophisticated society. Chances are good they’ll solve their problem somehow.
France, after all, gets 70% of its power from nukes…and, as far as I know, they’ve never had an accident.
Maybe we should let the market set the price of energy; if it becomes too high, innovators and the market itself will correct it.
And one thing underlies your assertion that “…companies can be just as repressive as governments.” A company can control things only to the extent that capital, income, output and markets can. Companies will seek to control people with prices and paychecks. Government can control people with deadly force. Huge difference, isn’t it?
The Koch brothers also spent heavily on California Prop 23 which would have repealed Clifornia’s global warming law
http://thegreenwombat.com/2010/09/03/koch-brothers-jump-into-california-prop-23-climate-fight/
Of course hey do not live in California. Happily the Californians defeated the porposition.
Personally I am somewhat torn in the NOVA taking money from the Koch brothers. I haven’t watched NOVA for a while but when I did it typically had very good science. It would bias them in terms of energy policy, but is the other 85%+ part of the programs worth the 15% or so biased reporting?
P.S. I agree with you that the Koch brothers are scum.
Craig: Please take me off your email list. You are very much a “green” person who believes that Obama can do no wrong. I am a conservative Republican who is currently developing renewable projects and it bothers me that writers such as yourself seem to continue to rank against conservatives. We have families and workers that we love and try to protect. I have not killed a baby in a long time but you continue to run down anything in congress and business that is not a democrat. I was a democrat when I graduated from college but have found that today’s democratic party is not the same as years ago.
So, drop me from your list, vent your anger at someone other that conservatives who are in the renewable industry.
Donald Barry
Donald,
I tend to be an economic conservative and until recently was a Republican. However, I was forced to change political parties when the Republican party lost its conservative outlook and became strongly reactionary after becoming dominated by reactionaries. It was quite a shock when I returned to the U.S. in 2004 after living in Fiji for 10 years and found that the Republican party as I knew it no longer existed (it had been hijacked) and that the Democratic party had shifted to the right and was roughly equivalent to what the Republican party had been. To get an idea of how much the Republican party has changed, one can read the biography of Teddy Roosevelt, a Republican who became president when McKinley was assassinated.
There has never been a president “who can do no wrong;” all have had checkered performances, and Obama is no exception.
I do not cut myself off from any viewpoints and I often read material with which I do not agree. Thus, I’ve read the Koran, a book on scientific creationism, etc. etc., and intend to continue reading a variety of viewpoints.
Donald, I’ve known Craig for almost forty years. He does not hate us conservatives but, like most liberals, he doesn’t understand the ideas for which we truly stand. Liberals live in a miasma of emotions, feelings and theory; Craig, a physics major who was very strong in science and math in prep school, is too practical and logical by nature to join an “occupy” group or dedicate his life to other silly leftist causes. And although Craig and I don’t agree on the market fitness of most “green” energy projects, I think you’d be doing yourself a disservice by ignoring his insights and ideas.
Just a thought.
Duke, I tend to agree with your post.
I am, in some respects, a gearhead. I like to have adequate information before making decisions and am very uncomfortable with making decisions, or seeing others make decisions, in the absence of adequate information.
The problem I have with renewables, except in certain limited situations where they seem to be the only practical choice, is that we are being asked to commit ourselves to spending countless billions of dollars on renewables in the absence of data which indicate that they are a practical choice. If it could be shown that the numbers indicate that renewables are a practical choice for large prosperous nations, and that they would also be a practical choice to provide for the growing energy requirements of developing nations, I’d be all for them. But I have seen no study that indicates that renewables are practical except for small island nations, people who live in very small remote communities, etc., in which situations there seems to be no practical alternative.
I am very uncomfortable with labeling people as conservative or liberal. Where economics is concerned, in many respects I would be considered conservative although I am basically pragmatic. However, because of my concern for human values, total separation of church and state, and individual freedom (with the responsibilities with it which are too often overlooked), probably I’d be considered very liberal. Also, it seems to me that many people who are now considered conservative would, 20 years ago, have been considered reactionary. The line between liberal and conservative has shifted far to the right in recent years and I haven’t shifted.
Frank, actor Rob Lowe, in an interview, said that “conservatives are long on logic; liberals are long on empathy…at least, that’s the way I see it.” I think, in basic terms, he was right. But the GOP, and society in general, is moving to the left. Romney, McCain, Lugar, Hatch…all favor gov’t.-run healthcare in one guise or another. I work at the local GOP in my county, and the conservatives there can’t point out one difference between the “establishment” GOP of today and the Democrat party of LBJ. “Reactionary” is a label used to denigrate the thinking of those who oppose liberal ideology (in a vernacular sense); I’ve been conservative for fifty years, as Craig will gladly attest.
A Koch Brothers organization just gave a million dollars to Troy University Alabama to fund an economics department to teach and research the benefits of unregulated capitalism….
The head of the Energy Committee in Alabama, Greg Wren, lauded the tax cuts that were recently passed for coal and oil companies in Alabama.
IMPORTANT !!!!!.
Who’s Really Writing States’ Legislation? Greg Wren Chairman of the Alabama Energy Committee is a member of ALEC.
http://www.npr.org/2011/07/21/138537515/how-alec-shapes-state-politics-behind-the-scenes
Since then a new mine, railroad and port infrastructure is being built to export the last of our coal to China so they can underprice our solar manufacturers in the USA and put them out of business.
These are the benefits of unregulated capitalism….the Koch brothers can teach.
We need to find out what Koch Brothers make and try to boycott it worldwide to save the planet. It could be a rallying point for good.
PS
Our electric COOPS give hour long lectures about how solar does not work in Alabama, with incorrect graphs and maps…,and constantly ask us to tell our legislators that coal and nuclear are the answers………….
That’s nauseating.
“…the last of our coal”? Seriously? We’re out of anthracite now?
So, Troy U. (I’m not familiar with it.) in Alabama has a department exploring unregulated capitalism. How OUTRAGEOUS! I’m shocked, SHOCKED, to read that. Any news on the myriad poli-sci, sociology and history departments at virtually every U.S. college that are teaching un-democratic communism? No? I guess that’s not news, after all…it’s been de rigeur for decades.
Craig,
Probably we shouldn’t be surprised.
During the Gilded Age (about 1865 to 1900), it was widely recognized, even by some very wealthy captains of industry, that laissez faire capitalism was not workable. The evils of it were legion. Under laissez faire, Andrew Carnegie’s steel workers worked 12 hours per day for 6 or 7 days a week. Railroad rate wars caused bankruptcies and, from inadequate concern for safety, many serious accidents. To maximize profits, railroad magnates sent representatives to Europe to use false information to entice Europeans to move to areas of the U.S. where they would increase railroad profits. It took Congress many years to enact safety regulations to prevent steamboat boiler explosions which caused numerous painful deaths.
These same captains of industry spent millions of dollars to bribe lawmakers. Corruption then was far worse than it is now. It was experience that resulted in regulations to prevent economic abuse and improve safety. When the public would no longer tolerate the corruption, the voters finally acted to end it.
I do not understand how anyone who has carefully studied the economic history of the U.S. can favor laissez faire capitalism. I’m not opposed to capitalism; it seems to be the only system that works, so I support it. However, there have to be regulations to prevent abuses. Sometimes we have to tread a fine line between insufficient regulation and regulation that strangles economic development. We will not get it right every time, i.e., we will make mistakes, and continually have to correct those mistakes, since the predicted effects of legislation are rarely totally accurate.
“Corruption then was far worse than it is now.”
Are you sure?
It’s hard to quantify corruption. However, at least the Captains of Industry and their representatives no longer go to legislative halls with suitcases full of money, which they actually did during the gilded age.
Actually, the voters could solve the problems of corruption if they chose to do so. Buying political advertisements and spending excessive $$ on political campaigns would have little detrimental effect if voters thought more critically rather than responding to constantly repeated sound bites which contain no substantial information. So, in actual fact, the voters are just as guilty as influence buyers.
“I do not understand how anyone who has carefully studied the economic history of the U.S. can favor laissez faire capitalism. I’m not opposed to capitalism; it seems to be the only system that works, so I support it. However, there have to be regulations to prevent abuses. Sometimes we have to tread a fine line between insufficient regulation and regulation that strangles economic development. We will not get it right every time, i.e., we will make mistakes, and continually have to correct those mistakes, since the predicted effects of legislation are rarely totally accurate.”
While your laissez faire comment seems to be a paper tiger, I do agree that we need some regulation. I believe that the danger of over regulation is mostly in the area of picking winners and losers in technology by carefully crafting rules that make certain enterprises uneconomic. When rules are formulated that actually promote public safety, like stop signs at busy intersection…. go for it. When the number of lights, spacing and colors of transit vehicles are specified in detail to the point that domestic manufacturers cannot bid on a contract…. the regulators have taken a far left turn. There is something suspect about central authority that makes decisions affecting personal and corporate liberty. I draw a line on regulation that does not benefit more than it impedes free commerce. LL
Too much detail in regulations is a problem.
Years ago, when I worked for a manufacturer of engines and generators, I learned how detail can be misused. The company published specifications for architects to use to ensure that only one manufacturer could meet the specifications. The specifications indicated the exact displacement and compression ratio of the engines, the exact details of the exciters for the generators, etc., so that only one company could meet the specifications. More reasonable specifications would have specified power output, frequency accuracy, fuel efficiency, etc.
Certainly it is possible for regulations to be more effective in impeding commerce than providing benefits and I don’t doubt that that occurs.
Regulations are there PRIMARILY for the benefit of the regulators (bureaucrats) and not for anybody else. We could take a fresh look at a variety of issues; we could, in fact, toss out ALL the N.R.C.’s nine-million page handbook and replace it with ONE regulation: “Supervisory, engineering and management personnel seeking licensure from the U.S. for a nuclear power plant must live, at least ten months of the year, within one mile of the subject facility.” That would do it, don’t you think?
I’m not sure it would do it, but it’s a fantastic idea.
It is strange to me how we make ourselves feel better by demonizing the producers of things we use by calling them polluters in this case. Somehow we feel that we are not at fault because they are the evil enablers of pollution. Wake up, if you want to stop pollution, stop polluting yourself and quit blaming the people that enable you to do the dirty work yourself. Take some personal responsibility. Environmental issues are never going to be solved as long as we concentrate on what others should do instead of what we ourselves can do. What are you going to do today? What choices are you going to make? If we stop using polluting things then people won’t be able to get rich providing them to us. Please don’t take the role as a helpless pawn under the spell of the evil puppet master by replying that you have no choice. You have a choice. Stop talking and start doing or quit whining.
You make some good points here. Please see: http://2greenenergy.com/quit-whining/22641/.
Bruce, in a democracy we have to tolerate a bit of whinning. Even when the whinners are hypocrites!
It is far more palatable to listen to a rant against corporate America when it is coming from someone who is living off-grid and did not have to inherit their fortune to afford the green amenities they have grown to love.
Even those Hollywood types who supposedly earned their bucks by destroying decency and family values can rant about the polluters but I don’t have to go see their movies. Viva ladifference (or something like that) LL
Craig, I understand political movements must have someone against whom to focus their hatred. Hitler had the Jews, Stalin had the bourgeousie, Napoleon had the church, and the environmentalist left has the Koch’s.
I agree with you about “Nova;” I, too, have loved it for decades. But I would still watch it if Geo. Soros sponsored it…Oh! Wait a minute! He DOES support CPB/PBS, albeit indirectly. Unlike the Koch’s, that is, who are not reluctant to attach their name to TV programming the way Soros is. A fair question is: Would NOVA fold without them? The answer is probably ‘no,’ but in a free market, even taxpayer-subsidized TV needs income. And, under the First Amendment, the Koch’s are just as entitled to advertise on the CPB as Soros is. I despise Soros at least as much as the left despises the Koch’s, and we’re all at free and complete liberty to express our thoughts about them all.
I wouldn’t have it any other way, would you?
Americans who rail against U.S. polluters should probably spend a few days in the world’s most polluted city, Beijing. What’s good for the goose is good for the gander, as they say. But the lack of outrage from the American left over China’s mass particulate output would tend to expose them for what they are: A political, not ecological, movement.
I have heard that the Koch brothers speak very highly of you, by the way.
Duke,
I agree that the ability of private companies to be oppressive is limited by various factors, but still that ability is sufficient to create problems for many people.
Take, for example, the credit industry. Whether one wants to or not, one is practically forced to use credit. If you buy everything with cash, even including a house, you will have no credit rating then you will be forced to pay too much for home and auto insurance since their rates are based partly on credit score. By insisting on using social security numbers for universal identification, the credit industry greatly increases our exposure to identity theft then, when identity theft occurs, forces us to spend thousands of dollars on legal fees to deal with the result. Medical insurance companies come between doctors and patients. Pencil pushers in insurance offices often dictate to doctors what treatments to use.
No doubt others could also list examples of oppressive private companies. These abuses could be controlled by the government, but business lobbies make it very difficult to do so.
Frank, we could go back and forth all day. Here’s my point of differential between gov’t. and corporations: A corporation may wield huge influence over society; it can virtually “force” people to obtain credit, but even in the robber-baron days, it was still possible (although highly inconvenient) for people to avoid Standard Oil if they really wanted to; note that when Rockefeller sought to make it impossible to avoid his company, the government, working on behalf of the people, exerted governmental control over Esso; in other words, it threatened to use violence if Esso didn’t acceed to T.R.’s dicta. Governments have reserved the use of violence in the completion of their agendas to themselves exclusively (with some very rare and limited individual exceptions, such as self-defense); they have a legal monopoly on violence. No matter what a company tries to do, it has no legal authority to inflict violence on its customers, employees, suppliers, creditors, debtors, etc.
I agree that ANY American should be legally entitled to “opt-out” of using SSANs for ID purposes, (In fact, we should be able to legally opt-out of SocSec altogether, but, I digress.) but there are ways to avoid obtaining credit if you really, really want to. “Pay as you go, and you’ll never owe,” is as good advice now as it was centuries ago. As far as lobbies (or foyers, for that matter) are concerned, their influence will shrink when the electorate starts PAYING ATTENTION, agreed?
True; even in the “Robber Baron” days, Standard Oil did not have a complete monopoly and even though it’s behavior was highly unethical, its over-all effect may have been beneficial since it did greatly increase the efficiency of the oil industry.
In the past, the voters eventually became fed up with monopolies, bribery, influence peddling, etc., and forced the politicians to take effective action. As you say, when the voters become sufficiently aware and fed up, they will take action (though belatedly) and things will change. History tends to repeat itself, not exactly, but closely enough that the parallels are clear to people who have studied history.
It would help if the media did a better job. Its coverage tends to be very shallow and lacking in background information. And political campaigns are based on slogans and silly sound bites devoid of useful information. The problem there is that the purpose of the media is not to inform and educate, but rather, to maximize advertising revenue by maximizing audience size by entertaining and the audience puts up with it. The solution is unclear.
Very readable thoughts good points, still Koch Bros. are unethical. The donations are controlled media is controlled and Bill Boards having Charles Manson saying “I believe in Global Warming, don’t you ” is an example of a sick mind. I think what the Koch Bros. do sucks.
Greg Chick
I’m sure Nova will take your suggestion under advisement. How about the PBS News Hour:
Current corporate funders of the PBS NEWSHOUR include Chevron, Bank of America, BNSF Railway, and United Healthcare.
There’s a stellar lineup for the green energy crowd, not to mention the chairman of the board of Too Big To Fail, Inc., Barrack Obama. I particularly like the BNSF public service announcement that runs with the News Hour, touting the amount of carbon emissions they’ve saved shipping by rail rather than by truck. (Unfortunately, they fail to mention that one of their cash-cows is transporting coal.)
As for your brain-dead assertion that the Koch brothers are somehow engaged in an Orwellian subterfuge attempting to “deceive, inveigle, and obfuscate” the truth, the invocation of that reference is itself classic projection on a grand scale. Of Orwell’s many prescient but fictional constructs of totalitarian government, the Ministry of Truth is the only one which has come to fruition in the real world. I see it every day in the form of artfully constructed headlines designed to reinforce Leftist pejorative stereotypes of their enemies. Then there is the supposedly “straight news reporting” by supposedly objective mainstream media outlets, which are saturated with unidentified and anonymous attributions like “most believe” or “it is widely considered”, followed by “whatever assertion we want to make without identifying it as our partisan point of view”.
I watched PBS faithfully for about 40 years of my life. It wasn’t until google came along that I actually had an opportunity to find out what was really going on, and how much the supposedly un-biased and honest mainstream media felt I just didn’t need to know.
I wish I had recognized liberalism and Leftist exploiteurs long ago — for the self-serving hypocrites that you are. This country is indeed being suffocated under a blanket of Groupthink, engineered according to the principles of Doublethink, by an effete corps of impudent snobs who characterize themselves as intellectuals — but not from “the Right”. It’s being precipitated as quickly as possible by Leftist Democrats and corporate opportunists (United Healthcare for example), who recognize that their politics of victimhood and entitlement have bankrupted the country, and that the only survivable endgame requires an economic collapse on the critical path towards a totalitarian Utopia, very much like the one Orwell prefigured in his novels.
This country has devolved into a rabble of gluttonous hypocrites, who feed off slave-labor in China, while wallowing in their (your) self-indulgent conviction of moral superiority. Utterly disgraceful.
Yesterday’s (February 13, 2013) NOVA program on PBS proves the thesis of the petroleum billionaires Koch Brothers attempting to continue their promotion of global climate change denial. It was a masterpiece of art and science and lasted for two hours. It dealt with the NASA space satellites which collect data on the Earth’s oceans and atmosphere and all of the interactions, nutrient cycles, climate and weather patterns between those two massive systems that can be imagined.
I waited and waited for two hours to hear how man is interfering with those cycles and then, down to the last five minutes, one minute was spent on man’s interference and it was very, very lightly touched upon and the words global climate change or anything similar was never mentioned. Some vague statement from a NASA scientist about “We are heading for some kind of journey.” All very strange and evasive.
Koch brothers obviously had huge corrupting influence on the content. In fact the main educational point at the end was to advocate for maintaining and promoting the satellites that are now aging and being rotated out—an excellent and positive point—but obviously NASA compromised the public education in order to promote their satellites.
A corrupting influence of huge proportions.
Earth From Space (from NOVA)
“Earth From Space” is a groundbreaking two-hour special that reveals a spectacular new space-based vision of our planet. Produced in extensive consultation with NASA scientists, NOVA takes data from earth-observing satellites and transforms it into dazzling visual sequences, each one exposing the intricate and surprising web of forces that sustains life on earth. Viewers witness how dust blown from the Sahara fertilizes the Amazon; how a vast submarine “waterfall” off Antarctica helps drive ocean currents around the world; and how the sun’s heating up of the southern Atlantic gives birth to a colossally powerful hurricane. From the microscopic world of water molecules vaporizing over the ocean to the magnetic field that is bigger than Earth itself, the show reveals the astonishing beauty and complexity of our dynamic planet.
Published: December 21, 2012
“Koch brothers obviously had huge corrupting influence on the content.”
Maybe they should have gone down the Al Gore route and showed pictures of Polar bears and made wild claims which turned out to be false? Or they could stick to science and what we can actually observe. The problem here is that you were so desperate to hear how man is ruining the world it gave you rose tinted glasses (bias). Guess what? It’s out of mans control. Man is not the driving force of why the climate changes.
George Orwell warned against the centralization of power, i.e Statism, which incidentally leftists advocate, look at the abuses of Obama and how the left clap and dance, insane behavior. So do not use George Orwell as some sort of mascot.