BIG TOBACCO & BIG OIL: BOTH BROTHERS AGAINST THE AMERICAN PUBLIC?

…Big tobacco CEO’s lying to the US Congress that smoking doesn’t cause cancer.

Both the tobacco industry and big oil continue trying to defy science.

How many Americans today remember the 1999 civil RICO lawsuit against major tobacco companies and their industry groups?

Well, to most people, it was a big deal back then, and there was lots of TV coverage, but it has obviously faded away over the last 15 years. 

However, a memo now has been leaked to the New York Times about a meeting from the Washington office of the American Petroleum Institute that documented their plans for a multimillion-dollar public relations campaign to undermine all climate science.  The memo states that their plan is to raise “questions among those in Congress who chart the future US course on global climate change.” 

 

It’s interesting how this memo brought back all those memories of how big tobacco tried so hard to fool the American public about the health risks of smoking. 

 

This latest memo  referenced here came from the industry and its trade associations and the conservative policy institutes that often do the petroleum industry’s dirty work.

In other words, just as big tobacco years ago was denying the health risks of smoking, a report has been published that describes a wide range of activities, including political lobbying, contributions to political candidates, and a large number of communication and media efforts that are aimed at undermining the claims of climate science.

The report referred to here came from a Drexel University professor, Robert Brulle.  In the 2013 paper published in the journal Climatic Change, Brulle described a complex network of organizations and funding that appears designed to obscure the fossil fuel industry’s involvement.

According to the Justice Dept’s documents, the way the tobacco industry was going to pull-off their dirty-deeds was first to pay the scientists to produce the studies defending the tobacco products.  Then they would develop a web of PR experts and front groups to spread all the doubt about the real science as they continued to attack their opponents.  

But as this was occurring, the government was also getting prepared as well, as the Congress passed the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, or RICO Act.  Then the US Justice Dept. filed a civil RICO lawsuit against the major tobacco companies and their associated industry groups.  They alleged that the companies “engaged in and continued to engage in and execute a massive 50-year scheme to defraud the public, including consumers of cigarettes, in violation of RICO.”

Even though the tobacco industry spent millions of dollars and years of litigation fighting the government, they were unable to cover up all they had tried to do.  Through the legal discovery process, government lawyers were able to peel back all the layers of deceit and denial to see what the tobacco companies really knew all along about the danger of cigarettes.

The Washington Post recently wrote, “In 2006, Judge Gladys Kessler of the U.S. District Court for the District of Columbia decided that the tobacco companies’ fraudulent campaign amounted to a racketeering enterprise. According to the court: Defendants coordinated significant aspects of their public relations, scientific, legal, and marketing activity in furtherance of a shared objective — to . . . maximize industry profits by preserving and expanding the market for cigarettes through a scheme to deceive the public.”

So, it is appearing that the petroleum industry is now attempting a mirror image of what the tobacco industry attempted a couple of decades ago.

According to the Brulle Report, the coordinated tactics of the climate denial network, “span a wide range of activities, including political lobbying, contributions to political candidates, and a large number of communication and media efforts that aim at undermining climate science.” Sounds like all they did was “copy and paste” the tobacco’s approach and then just change a few key words.

There’s isn’t enough proof today for the US Justice Dept. showing that the fossil fuel industry and its allies has actually engaged in the same kind of racketeering activity as the tobacco industry. We all pretty much know it, but just can’t prove it yet as they did with big tobacco….but it also appears it’s just a matter of time.

As with big tobacco, the discovery process will probably reveal as to what extent the fossil fuel industry has crossed that same legal line.

We do know that it has funded research that directly contradicts the vast majority of peer-reviewed climate science. We know they have continued to financially fund those Republicans in the US Congress such as Jim Inhofe of Oklahoma, that continues to deny climate change.  One scientist, who consistently publishes papers downplaying the role of carbon emissions in climate change, Willie Soon, has reportedly received more than $1.2 million from oil and electric utility interests.

Hopefully, it won’t be too late before the petroleum industry gets itself into the same position as the tobacco industry is in today.

Copyright G.Ater  2015