Free-market think tank The Heartland Institute has taken their policy insights one step further by securing a high-profile billboard on global warming:
According to Joe Bast, the Heartland Institute’s president:
The most prominent advocates of global warming aren’t scientists….They are Charles Manson, a mass murderer; Fidel Castro, a tyrant; and Ted Kaczynski, the Unabomber. Global warming alarmists include Osama bin Laden and James J. Lee (who took hostages inside the headquarters of the Discovery Channel in 2010).
The digital billboard, which was up for just one day along a prominent highway outside Chicago, was intended to both educate the public and draw attention to the think tank’s extensive work debunking global warming science:
This billboard was deliberately provocative, an attempt to turn the tables on the climate alarmists by using their own tactics but with the opposite message. We found it interesting that the ad seemed to evoke reactions more passionate than when leading alarmists compare climate realists to Nazis or declare they are imposing on our children a mass death sentence. We leave it to others to determine why that is so.The Heartland Institute doesn’t often do “provocative” communication. In fact, we’ve spent 15 years presenting the economic and scientific arguments that counter global warming alarmism. No one has worked harder, or better, on that task than Heartland.
And the left is flinching already; the progressive Think Progress referred to the campaign as both “far-beyond-the-pale,” “offensive,” and a “gruesome failure.”
It is “heartening” to see The Heartland Institute think creatively about how to achieve their mission beyond white papers. Stay tuned for their upcoming Seventh International Conference on Climate Change (May 21-23).
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