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The Heartland Institute is a conservative and libertarian public policy think tank that was founded in 1984. Based in Arlington Heights, Illinois, its stated mission is to discover, develop, and promote free-market solutions to social and economic problems. However, it is perhaps most widely known for its controversial stance on climate change and its efforts to question the scientific consensus on the matter.

Early years and focus areas

Initially, the Heartland Institute focused on a broad range of issues, including education reform, health care, tax policy, and environmental regulation. It positioned itself as a proponent of free-market policies, arguing that such policies lead to more efficient and effective solutions than those proposed by government intervention. Later, it would begin to pivot towards advocacy around a singular issue: climate change denialism.

Climate change and environmental policy

The Heartland Institute’s engagement with climate change began to intensify in the late 1990s and early 2000s. During this period, the Institute increasingly questioned the prevailing scientific consensus on climate change, which holds that global warming is largely driven by human activities, such as the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation.

The Institute has been accused of being a key player in the campaign to spread doubt about climate change science — following the disinformation playbook first established by Big Tobacco in the 1950s to fight against public awareness of the lethal dangers of smoking. Critics argue that Heartland has worked to undermine public understanding and acceptance of global warming through various means, including:

  1. Publication of Skeptical Research and Reports: Heartland has funded and published reports and papers that challenge mainstream climate science. Notably, it has produced and promoted its own reports, such as the “NIPCC” (Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change) reports, which purport to review the same scientific evidence as the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) but often arrive at starkly different conclusions.
  2. Conferences and Workshops: The Institute has organized and hosted numerous conferences that have brought together climate change skeptics, scientists, and policymakers. These events have served as platforms for presenting and discussing views that are at odds with the mainstream scientific understanding of climate change.
  3. Public Relations and Media Campaigns: Through press releases, op-eds, and social media, the Heartland Institute has actively worked to disseminate its views on climate change to the wider public. It has also attempted to influence policymakers and educators, at times by distributing educational materials that question the consensus on global warming.

Funding and controversy

The funding sources of the Heartland Institute have been a subject of controversy. The organization has received financial support from various foundations, individuals, and corporations, including those with interests in fossil fuels — including the Koch network and the Joseph Coors Foundation. Critics argue that this funding may influence the Institute’s stance on climate change and its efforts to challenge the scientific consensus.

In 2012, the Heartland Institute faced significant backlash following the leak of internal documents that revealed details about its funding and strategy for challenging climate change science. These documents shed light on the Institute’s plans to develop a K-12 curriculum that would cast doubt on climate science, among other strategies aimed at influencing public opinion and education.

Lies, Incorporated

The Heartland Institute’s role in the climate change debate is a highly polarizing one. Proponents view it as a bastion of free speech and skepticism, vital for challenging what they (ironically) claim to see as the politicization of science. Critics, however, argue that its activities have contributed to misinformation, public confusion, and policy paralysis on one of the most pressing issues facing humanity — as well as playing a role in fomenting a broader shift towards science denialism in American culture.

By questioning the scientific consensus on climate change and promoting “alternative facts,” the Heartland Institute has played a significant role in shaping the public discourse on global warming. Its actions and the broader debate around climate science underscore the complex interplay between science, policy, and public opinion in addressing environmental challenges.

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  • proteanism is Robert Jay Lifton’s idea of a model for the self that could serve as an aspirational escape hatch from the clutches of cultism, which is otherwise always happening
  • cultism (i.e. “losing reality“) is what happens “by default” if effort is not made to form and maintain healthy cultures
  • cultism is what most individuals devolve to or maintain throughout their lives, if they lack proteanism
  • I believe professor Lifton is onto something real in this particular interpretation of our Manichaean struggle — in which the political left and the right have self-sorted into separate clusters with wildly disparate interpretations of reality
  • the cultists are dying (quite literally) for the words of a delusional sociopath who swept them out of power with his spew of thinly veiled white supremacy and gold veneer charm
    • they want the apocalypse to come
    • The oil preachers have brainwashed the masses into believing climate change is The Rapture — they want climate change. They think it’s God’s plan.

Cultism as a kind of collective personality disorder

  • we all get stuck in our own mental loops sometimes. Some people are exclusively stuck in their own mental loops — most are disregarded, but some achieve wide notoriety, wealth, and sometimes political power.
  • Some nefarious mental predators thrive on getting other people stuck in *their* loops — everyone from garden variety abusers to cult leaders take this general approach to convincing others to abandon their own ways of thinking and spend all their time consumed with thoughts of The Authority’s Philosophy. Some individuals with an authoritarian worldview willingly submit to a strongman and abdicate decision-making to untrustworthy others.
  • Charismatic leaders have ruled over human groups since the dawn of humanity itself, but only in the past century with the invention of mass media technologies and techniques have demagogues been able to achieve a kind of totalist saturation of the common space and common understanding — giving them an ability to spin the entire agenda in their favor, and in turn, effectively “own reality”
  • When a leader with a personality disorder achieves power, he draws the other antisocial sleeper cells out of hiding for the coming feast.
  • The leader installs his cronies into positions of power and corrupts the institutions that are meant to safeguard democracy. Instead of acting as a bulwark against nefarious intent, these agencies begin to look the other way against crimes committed by the leader and his buddies — and later, will directly participate and optimize their contributions.

The enemy at the gates is us

  • Cultism can be induced very simply, by stressing a population. That’s it — that’s all it takes, for people to turn inward, become suspicious, and react with excessive fear in the face of gnawing uncertainty.
  • It takes strong character to resist the siren songs of disinformation and spoon-fed flattery
  • Building strong character is hard work. Much much harder than most people are interested in putting in — or even capable of
  • Consequently, many people of weak character are easily taken in by con men, grifters, and slick talkers of all stripes.
  • However, these con artists are very good at one thing: convincing people of weak character that specific enemies are to blame for all their troubles, and getting them to give money or take action against these Satanic Democratic pedophiles who want to ruin the world with their Leftist Apocalypse, instead of ruining the world with the proper Rightist Apocalypse and Rapturing all the evil elites away!
  • These pawns, peons, and proles will dutifully go looking over hill and dale, under Pelosi’s chair for the violent Antifa socialists who want to take over the government
  • They want to build a physical border wall to keep out poor, bedraggled refugees while allowing foreign bidders to pay pennies on the dollar to buy political influence through Facebook, Google, and other unregulated new media platforms
  • It’s McCarthyism turned on its head — but since we’ve already cried wolf once, no one will really believe that Russians pulled off the greatest psyops campaign of all time
proteanismcultism
seeks expansion of event horizonradical reduction of the "size of the universe" and human potential
open systemclosed system
personal growthstagnation; stasis
Bayesian logicmotivated reasoning
collects dataselective exposure
positive disintegrationimmaturity
questions authorityfollows orders
new ideasold dogma
improvisationalritual
iterativerecursive
expansivelimited
motivated by lovemotivated by fear
generativedestructive
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These numbers come from the FEC by way of opensecrets.org, and indicate the industry each donor reports they work for (or Retired, if they report not working any longer). The overall political contributions have skyrocketed within our system since the Citizens United ruling gave corporations wide latitude to give money to political campaigns, without necessarily any disclosure or transparency requirements attached. The era of dark money in politics has not been a healthy one in terms of preserving our democracy.

Of note:

  • Retired folks tend to lean Republican in their political contributions (i.e. older skews GOP)
  • Finance and Real Estate are more seemingly even or slightly Democratic than I would have predicted
  • Manufacturing and Oil & Gas are the 2 largest Republican leaning industries — both dwindling and diminishing over the long term horizon.
  • The Entertainment industry is one of the most left-leaning of the bunch, giving more than about 90% overall to Democratic candidates or causes. No wonder it’s a favorite target of the Sedition Caucus!
  • Any way you slice it, Democrats appear to be vastly outpacing Republicans in terms of fundraising efforts — yet they are the ones calling for campaign finance reform, because the system of peddling influence is so out of hand.
  • Business is definitely outspending labor, however.
IndustryOverall TotalTo Democrats & Liberal GroupsTo Republicans & Conservative GroupsLean
Retired$1688335247$558769474$956076774Leans Republican/Conservative
Securities/Invest$799576406$195353417$119774048Leans Democrat/Liberal
Democratic/Liberal$774146476$317188055$154316Solidly Democrat/Liberal
Misc Finance$485711802$74077242$57181223On the fence
Real Estate$413020609$140563098$176894028On the fence
Education$348509465$288454435$31460036Solidly Democrat/Liberal
Repub/Conservative$339055614$69348$157252042Solidly Republican/Conservative
Lawyers/Law Firms$335929913$257159915$57685804Leans Democrat/Liberal
Health Professionals$269975444$140853584$78014653Leans Democrat/Liberal
Electronics Mfg/Eqp$208004155$94608885$32603257Leans Democrat/Liberal
Non-Profits$202452440$69589426$19720845Leans Democrat/Liberal
Candidate Cmtes$188819128$136105830$51564268Leans Democrat/Liberal
Misc Mfg/Distrib$157276344$29647438$48516563Leans Republican/Conservative
Business Services$156224706$103637971$33237078Leans Democrat/Liberal
Civil Servants$152396172$108270008$32933733Leans Democrat/Liberal
Health Services$151572671$30508636$20672661Leans Democrat/Liberal
TV/Movies/Music$148578590$94319349$11506121Solidly Democrat/Liberal
Oil & Gas$138613800$12208486$62767803Leans Republican/Conservative
Casinos/Gambling$135900829$11447516$12059744On the fence
Insurance$124556637$47865829$53786498On the fence
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