Thursday, October 22, 2015

Exxon's Climate Lie

The Guardian reports Exxon’s climate lie: ‘No corporation has ever done anything this big or bad’ “In the last three weeks, two separate teams of journalists — the Pulitzer-prize winning reporters at the website Inside Climate News and another crew composed of Los Angeles Times veterans and up-and-comers at the Columbia Journalism School — have begun publishing the results of a pair of independent investigations into ExxonMobil. Though they draw on completely different archives, leaked documents, and interviews with ex-employees, they reach the same damning conclusion: Exxon knew all that there was to know about climate change decades ago, and instead of alerting the rest of us denied the science and obstructed the politics of global warming.”

Instead, knowingly, they helped organise the most consequential lie in human history, and kept that lie going past the point where we can protect the poles, prevent the acidification of the oceans, or slow sea level rise enough to save the most vulnerable regions and cultures. Businesses misbehave all the time, but VW is the flea to Exxon’s elephant. No corporation has ever done anything this big and this bad.

ThinkProgress reports, Exxon’s Climate Cover-Up Should Be Investigated By DOJ. “Sharon Eubanks [A former U.S. Department of Justice attorney who prosecuted and won the massive racketeering case against Big Tobacco], who now works for the firm Bordas & Bordas, told ThinkProgress that ExxonMobil and other members of the fossil fuel industry could be held liable for violations of the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act (RICO) if it’s discovered that the companies worked together to suppress knowledge about the reality of human-caused climate change. She said that, considering recent revelations regarding ExxonMobil, the DOJ should consider launching an investigation into big fossil fuel companies.”

Meanwhile some economists looked at Climate Change and Economic Production by Country

Economic Impact of Climate Change on the World

When you look at it this way, ExxonMobil’s lie could be the most consequential one in history.

Update: At least, Poll Finds Fewer Americans Than Ever Doubt Climate Change Is Happening.

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