New Meme: Hansen Paid by Soros

Investor's Business Daily (IBD) has a new hit piece on NASA climate scientist James Hansen, in which they try to paint him as some sort of liberal shill under the control of George Soros.

Hansen was packaged for the media by Soros' flagship "philanthropy," by as much as $720,000, most likely under the OSI's "politicization of science" program.

There's really a whole lot wrong with this. In 2005, college dropout George Deutsch was appointed as a NASA press officer. He did a lot of crazy things, such as altering references to the Big Bang (which he called merely an "opinion"), and trying to prevent NASA scientist James Hansen from speaking to the media about climate change. Hansen rightfully resisted. In the process Hansen accepted pro bono legal representation from the Government Accountability Project, a non-profit and non-partisan whistleblower protection organization. GAP also offered Hansen a Ridenauer award, which included $10,000, but Hansen declined.

Therefore, the IBD editorial is flat out wrong. Hansen received $0 from George Soros (or from anyone else) in this entire exchange.

So where did the $720,000 for the "politicization of science" claim come from? Well, the non-profit GAP accepts donations from many organizations interested in protecting whistleblowers (including the Ford Foundation and Rockefeller Family Fund). One group that recently donated was the Open Society Institute (OSI), a part of the Soros Foundation, which donated $100,000 total to GAP for the purpose of protecting whistleblowers in science and engineering. IBD picked the $720,000 figure because that was OSI's total budget for combating the politicization of science. It seems like IBD just picked the biggest figure they could find in their cursory glance at all the budgets that could have possibly been involved.

Of course, this is really nothing new for IBD, which had previously incorrectly asserted that James Hansen predicted an imminent ice age.

Nonetheless, as expected, this meme has already taken off. In a recent Newsbusters article, Jake Gontesky makes the following claims about James Hansen.

Under the so-called "politicization of science" program, George Soros' (the favorite fundraiser of many democrats) has reportedly given as much as $720,000 to Hansen to help package his alarmist claims and get them pushed by the mainstream media...

So he got some big paychecks from Soros - but was there a quid pro quo? The evidence certainly indicates as much

Basically, Gontesky is trying to push the "global warming is a conspiracy by Big Environment" meme. Oh, and Brent Bozell's Media Research Center (of which Newsbusters is an arm) has accepted $202,500 from Exxon-Mobil since 2003. Nice.

College dropout Rush Limbaugh has also picked up on the story, reporting that "Soros Paid Off NASA Scientist".

UPDATE: You can always count on Free Republic to pass a meme like this along. They're now reporting "NASA's Hansen Mentioned in Soros Foundations Annual Report." According to Free Republic, "As is typical, a global warming obsessed media don't find this newsworthy. Think they'd be so disinterested if this smoking gun involved an oil company giving money to a Republican official?"

UPDATE II: The Seattle Post-Intelligencer handles the story appropriately here: "The swift boating of a climate scientist"

UPDATE III: The awful Daily Tech handles the story inappropriately here: "NASA, James Hansen, and the Politicization of Science." According to the factually challenged Daily Tech:

For Hansen to secretly receive a large check from Soros, then begin making unsubstantiated claims about administrative influence on climate science is more than suspicious -- it's a clear conflict of interest.

Never mind the fact that Hansen didn't receive a single penny from Soros.

You might remember that the people at Daily Tech are the ones responsible for spreading the false "Less Than Half of All Published Scientists Endorse Man-Made Warming Theory" meme.

UPDATE IV: FOX News hack John Gibson weighs in:

Remember the name Soros. His Open Society Institute has just released its 2006 report on the way it has spent Soros' millions, $74 million just this year. Did you know that in addition to funding groups to try to kneecap Bill O'Reilly and me, Soros' stooges have also cut a $720,000 check to the so called NASA whistleblower, who claimed the U.S. government was covering up global warming?

How is it that this guy can still have a job? Doesn't anyone in his office do any rudimentary fact-checking before making a claim about some fictional "$720,000 check"?

UPDATE V: If there's ever a rumor that supports his pre-conceived notions, Drudge is sure to report it: "Report: NASA scientist who accused Bush Administration of censorship received $720,000 from George Soros"

UPDATE VI: Human Events has its own shallow commentary, titled "It's All About the Money":

Forget the fact that the whole man-made global warming theory is a gigantic scam with not a shred of genuine scientific evidence to prove it. Instead, follow the money trail to get an idea of what it’s all about. And what it’s all about is money -- the big bucks the disciples of Al Gore will rake in, and the big bucks you’ll have to pay to finance this incredible con game...
Then there’s NASA’s hysterical James Hanson, the media’s favorite climate change alarmist who Williams reveals was financed by ultra lefty George Soros.

Among other factual inaccuracies, Human Events author and former game-show host Michael Reagan spells Hansen's name wrong.