Harold Ambler's Huffington Post climate misinformation-ganza

onJan 5, 2009 @ 12:45 PST

A new Huffington Post blogger named Harold Ambler has posted an unoriginal rehashing of the same old global warming denial talking points that we’ve seen over and over again for close to a decade now.

What’s newsworthy here though is the venue.

Huffington Post has long been a place where this type of junk science has been debunked, not promoted.

This little coup has the climate skeptics all giddy and bloggers like Adam Siegel at Get Energy Now rightly ticked off:

Huffington Post published Harold Ambler’s Mr Gore: Apology Accepted which is notable in its breadth and audacity of disinformation, truthiness, and simply wrong-headedness. Literally books and hundreds (actually, thousands) of scientific studies and analyses have been written that provide the substance to prove Ambler’s words false. What is shameful, on top of this, is that this is not just the ‘false’ and misleading material, but its deceit in support of recklessly dangerous policy concepts that would hinder our ability to move forward to greater prosperity and a stronger American future.”

The question for me is: who the heck is Harold Ambler?

And what makes Ambler such an authority on climate science to so confidently make the bold claim that global warming is a lie? By the looks of his various bios smattered around the internet it appears that Ambler’s background in the area of climate science is non-existent, he is the author of an upcoming book on a rowing team at Brown University and a musician.

Such an outrageous claim as: “It [global warming] is the biggest whopper ever sold to the public in the history of humankind,” flies in the face of what the top scientific institutions in the world like NASA, the US Academy of Science and the Royal Society have been saying for years and its going to take a lot more than the ramblings of rowing guitarist to prove it.

By Kevin Grandia

Kevin is a contributor and strategic adviser to DeSmog. He runs the digital marketing agency Spake Media House. Named a “Green Hero” by Rolling Stone Magazine and one of the “Top 50 Tweeters” on climate change and environment issues, Kevin has appeared in major news media outlets around the world for his work on digital campaigning. Kevin has been involved in the public policy arena in both the United States and Canada for more than a decade. For five years he was the managing editor of DeSmogBlog.com. In this role, Kevin’s research into the “climate denial industry” and the right-wing think tank networks was featured in news media articles around the world. He is most well known for his ground-breaking research into David and Charles Koch’s massive financial investments in the Republican and tea party networks. Kevin is the first person to be designated a “Certified Expert” on the political and community organizing platform NationBuilder. Prior to DeSmog, Kevin worked in various political and government roles. He was Senior Advisor to the Minister of State for Multiculturalism and a Special Assistant to the Minister of State for Asia Pacific, Foreign Affairs for the Government of Canada. Kevin also worked in various roles in the British Columbia provincial government in the Office of the Premier and the Ministry of Health. In 2008 Kevin co-founded a groundbreaking new online election tool called Vote for Environment which was later nominated for a World Summit Award in recognition of the world’s best e-Content and innovative ICT applications. Kevin moved to Washington, DC in 2010 where he worked for two years as the Director of Online Strategy for Greenpeace USA and has since returned to his hometown of Vancouver, Canada.

Analysis

Why Is Alberta Falling for Kevin O’Leary’s AI Data Centre Stunt?

ByMitch Anderson

onDec 20, 2024 @ 08:52 PST

The celebrity investor pitched ‘Wonder Valley’ with no committed investors, no Indigenous partnership, and about 27 megatonnes of projected annual emissions.

New Orleans Residents Face Surge in Energy Costs from Sale of Gas Utility

ByDelaney Nolan

onDec 19, 2024 @ 16:51 PST

City Council OKs private equity firm’s purchase of Entergy gas utility, undermining climate goals and jacking up prices for the city’s poorest.

DOE Study Finds LNG Exports Don’t Just Hurt the Climate – They Hit Americans in Their Pocketbooks

BySharon Kelly

onDec 19, 2024 @ 15:12 PST

With LNG export terminals already authorized to ship nearly half of U.S. natural gas abroad, DOE warns build-out would inflate utility bills nationwide.