Monday, February 20, 2012

Heartland Accuses Gleick of Faking the Memo, Too

At a time when an evening's silence would have shown a little class and dignity, the Heartland Institute instead chooses to stay in the muck and mire:
FEBRUARY 20, 2012: Earlier this evening, Peter Gleick, a prominent figure in the global warming movement, confessed to stealing electronic documents from The Heartland Institute in an attempt to discredit and embarrass a group that disagrees with his views.

Gleick’s crime was a serious one. The documents he admits stealing contained personal information about Heartland staff members, donors, and allies, the release of which has violated their privacy and endangered their personal safety.

An additional document Gleick represented as coming from The Heartland Institute, a forged memo purporting to set out our strategies on global warming, has been extensively cited by newspapers and in news releases and articles posted on Web sites and blogs around the world. It has caused major and permanent damage to the reputations of The Heartland Institute and many of the scientists, policy experts, and organizations we work with.

A mere apology is not enough to undo the damage.

In his statement, Gleick claims he committed this crime because he believed The Heartland Institute was preventing a “rational debate” from taking place over global warming. This is unbelievable. Heartland has repeatedly asked for real debate on this important topic. Gleick himself was specifically invited to attend a Heartland event to debate global warming just days before he stole the documents. He turned down the invitation.

Gleick also claims he did not write the forged memo, but only stole the documents to confirm the content of the memo he received from an anonymous source. This too is unbelievable. Many independent commentators already have concluded the memo was most likely written by Gleick.

We hope Gleick will make a more complete confession in the next few days.
What a pitiful display by both sides.

4 comments:

Anonymous said...

"Heartland Accuses Gleick of Faking the Memo, Too "

Because he did fake the memo. The only reason he "confessed" now is because everyone was starting to say he faked the memo. He is going to go prison now.

Anonymous said...

i'm not sure why you think HI should remain silent when someone has disseminated a fake memo designed to discredit them

if someone did the same to you, would you remain silent?

Headmistress, zookeeper said...

The only muck and mire here is the stuff created by Gleick and those who republished the forged memo as true.

Defending oneself against an obviously dishonest smear campaign is not disgraceful.

Anonymous said...

It makes no sense for Gleick to forge a Strategy paper, when he already had all the other documents.

As the post points out, Heartland would have been better advised to keep silent at this point. Gleick has re-iterated that he received the Strategy document in the package he received from the Institute, as well as from the whistle-blower.

If they say he is lying, then they must take legal action to restore their good name.