Prior to this spring, the Heartland Institute was a relatively obscure think tank that was primarily known for organizing an annual conference of people who take issue with mainstream climate science. That changed when an environmental researcher tricked the group into sending him internal documents, setting off a public drama that ended up leaving both parties worse off (Heartland lost sponsors, while the researcher had to resign a number of his positions).

Apparently, the experience left Heartland craving more public controversy, and it responded with what can best be described as a bit of trolling. In advance of this year's climate-skeptic conference, Heartland paid for a billboard that showed a picture of the Unabomber accompanied by the text "I still believe in Global Warming. Do You?" In a press release, Heartland said future iterations would feature Charles Manson, Fidel Castro, and possibly Osama bin Laden.

Instead, the campaign was stopped after 24 hours as prominent conference speakers threatened to cancel and a number of the Institute's financial backers threatened to depart.

Teach Use the controversy

How did Heartland justify the comparison between murderers and tyrants and anyone who believed in global warming? "Because what these murderers and madmen have said differs very little from what spokespersons for the United Nations, journalists for the 'mainstream' media, and liberal politicians say about global warming," according to the press release that announced the ads. It went on to claim that "[t]he people who still believe in man-made global warming are mostly on the radical fringe of society."

This has not gone over well. Several of the speakers, including Representative Jim Sensenbrenner (R-WI), threatened to withdraw unless the ads were pulled. So Heartland backed down and pulled them after only the first had run, claiming they were just an "experiment," one that only set the institute back $200. “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," the latest statement claims, going on to say, "We do not apologize for running the ad."

Their lack of apology may be the most sincere aspect of the entire effort.

A single billboard on the outskirts of Chicago, no matter how visually arresting it may be, would reach a very limited number of people. Heartland was clearly counting on the controversy associated with it to ensure that its message went much further than the billboard would take it.

Losing its grip on reality and sponsors

Although most of the outrage has focused on the comparison between those who accept the evidence for climate change and murderers, many of the statements in the release are simply false. Many of the people and groups who do accept the evidence are anything but "the radical fringe of society." And, despite what Heartland would like to think, there's absolutely no evidence that "[s]cientific, political, and public support for the theory of man-made global warming is collapsing."

In many cases Heartland has suggested that their difference with climate science is primarily an issue with scientifically questionable "alarmism" of the sort typified by James Lovelock. With these ads and the accompanying announcements, however, it's clear that Heartland's issue is with the very basics of climate science and anyone who accepts it.

This is now creating a problem for the Institute as a whole. Heartland is ostensibly focused on offering free-market solutions for various policy issues and has attracted a wide range of backing from corporations that favor limited regulation. But for both secondhand smoke and climate change, it has decided to attack the scientific evidence that is driving policy rather than offering a solution. And that is causing some of its backers to rethink their involvement with Heartland. Several of them dropped support when the internal documents were leaked, and others are doing so now. One report indicates that an entire initiative done in cooperation with the insurance industry is at risk.

Heartland's continued efforts in this area seem to risk turning it into a single-issue think tank. And that may actually make sense; the leaked financial documents indicate that some of its largest donations come from single individuals who are targeting money for climate efforts.

In any case, the Institute's climate conference will occur towards the end of this month and, now that the ads have been pulled, most of the planned speakers will still attend. If years past are any indication, it will feature opinions ranging from questioning of basic facts (some speakers have claimed temperatures and sea levels haven't gone up) to a general sense that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change estimates of temperature changes are probably overstated. About the only common theme among the speakers is the belief that scientific mainstream is wrong.