More Anti-Science Chicanery At The Trib

They must've been running low on teh crazie at the Tribune-Review over the past few days. Take a look at this convoluted route to try (yet again) to do their pro-business science debunking:

Kudos to JunkScience.com's Steve Milloy for debunking suspect blame-mankind research behind demonization of humanity's mercury emissions.

A new Harvard University study links such emissions with increasing levels of methylmercury -- "inorganic" smokestack and tailpipe mercury in the food chain -- and reproductive problems in black-footed albatrosses over the last 140 years.

But as Mr. Milloy points out, the study is manifestly flawed.[Italics in original.

This being the braintrust the first thing a rational person would do is to ask about the source. And the writer, Steven Milloy.

What those sources don't tell you is that Milloy according to the Competitive Enterprise Institute he's (or at least had been, depending on the reliability of the website) an adjunct analyst at CEI as well as an adjunct scholar at the Cato Institute.

What the braintrust won't tell you is that both institutes have been beneficiaries of Scaife Foundation funding.

• $2.9 million for CEI.
• $2.5 million for Cato.

Shouldn't they have?

Milloy is also an "expert" over at Fox "News" and accourding to sourcewatch.com

In January 2006, Paul D. Thacker, a journalist who specializes in science, medicine and environmental topics, reported in The New Republic that Milloy has received thousands of dollars in payments from the Phillip Morris company since the early nineties, and that NGOs controlled by Milloy have received large payments from ExxonMobil. A spokesperson for Fox News stated, "Fox News was unaware of Milloy's connection with Philip Morris. Any affiliation he had should have been disclosed."

Someday the braintrust will disclose that info, too.