Climate Denial Playbook: Marc Morano's History of Bullying Scientists

onSep 10, 2013 @ 22:41 PDT

If you’ve even heard of Marc Morano, you probably watched him angrily attacking a climate scientist, journalist or Al Gore on Fox News or on his blog Climate Depot, a project of the Donors Trust and oil industry-funded CFACT. Morano is so agitated in his climate denial that he once advocated that climate scientists be “publicly flogged.”

Originally a producer for the Rush Limbaugh Show, Morano ascended (descended?) to the position of Communications Director for Sen. James Inhofe (R-Denial), where he helped his boss to abuse the power of the Senate hearings process to attack climate science and promote conspiracy theories. Inhofe and Morano were corrected and debunked endlessly, but facts have proven no obstacle to Morano’s crusade against science confirming the role of fossil fuel pollution in driving global warming.

Morano has also worked for extreme right wing operatives Howard Phillips, Paul Weyrich and Brent Bozell. Morano once quipped to a group of Agenda 21 conspiracy theorists that, “Inhofe is as far left as I’ll go for an employer.”

Morano’s current organization, the Committee for a Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT), has received over $4.1 million in funds from the shadowy Donors Trust and Donors Capital Fund between 2002-2011, plus an additional $582,000 from ExxonMobil between 1998-2012, according to Greenpeace’s updated report, Dealing In Doubt.

In partnership with Polluterwatch, DeSmog presents the first in a series of Climate Denial Playbook entries for some of the most notorious climate deniers. Fittingly, Marc Morano kicks off the series:

By Brendan DeMelle

Brendan is Executive Director of DeSmog. He is also a freelance writer and researcher specializing in media, politics, climate change and energy. His work has appeared in Vanity Fair, The Huffington Post, Grist, The Washington Times and other outlets.