Fabulous--great book, well-written, unbelievably infuriating. (The story described, not the book itself.) ( )

In their excellent book Merchants of Doubt Naomi Oreskes and Eric Conway expose the whole, horrendous corporate strategy of paying scientists to deny science that threatens corporate profits, from the tobacco companies hiring scientists to "doubt" the evidence through to our own time when degree-laden corporate shills -- often the very same individuals -- try to pretend the science of global warming is unproven or unsound or whatever dishonest description they choose to use this week toward the end of confusing an undereducated and often irresponsibly self-indulgent public. If you read the Oreskes/Conway book you'll reach the end of it horrified and dismayed; they offer the kind of evidence that would have any court of law rushing to a conviction.

Climate Cover-Up, by contrast, is not nearly such a weighty tome; yes, there are citations, but at the level where some chapters have only an essential one or two. Overall, it reads at the pace of a thriller. And, by the end of it, I was hopping mad . . . which is precisely what we all ought to be with those scientific charlatans and the corporate masters at whose teats they shamelessly suck, and precisely the aim of the the authors of this book. Yes, your library is incomplete if you don't have Oreskes/Conway on your shelf; but if you want a blazing polemic that covers much the same ground (and contains probably as much of the essential information) then you should choose this book also, and perhaps you should choose it even in preference to Oreskes/Conway.

For obvious reasons -- I was writing a book called Denying Science after all! -- I read a lot of good nonfiction books in 2010 (yes, I'm a bit late catching up in these notes), but this was one of the very best, and quite possibly the best: certainly among the most important. Please read it. ( )

Climate Cover-Up is a genealogy of the climate denier industry. Assuming Global Warming is real, and it really is, there will be winners and losers. The losers happen to be the worlds richest and most power industries (oil and coal and related sub-industries). They have poured 100s of millions of dollars into public relations campaigns to deny or sow doubt about the science in order to stop or slow down regulation. Each day they continue with business as usual, is money in the bank. It's that simple. Hoggan's book is a tough read because each page is loaded with outrageous actions by climate deniers - logical fallacies, outright lies, astroturfing, etc.. every PR trick in the book. It's far bigger and worse than the tobacco crusade to deny smoking causes cancer. I ended this book wanting to reach out and strangle every professional climate denier. I wish the book had more to offer on ways for the average person to make a difference in the PR wars.

James Hoggan runs DeSmogBlog which is very good. ( )

I'm not one for conspiracy theories, but the evidence presented in Climate Cover-Up (on the privately funded effort to sow uncertainty on climate change in the media) is inescapable. Some people are profiting from making us think there is an unsettled scientific debate on climate change, and this book presents a compelling account of who they are, how they do it, and what can we do to overcome them. It is also a very accessible read. ( )