A Tale of Two Perspectives
The truth is, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton has joined the chorus calling for an investigation into whether or not petroleum giant ExxonMobil has been engaged in "covering-up" the fact their products contribute to climate change since back in 1977. Investigations by Inside Climate Change and the Los Angeles Times allege that the ExxonMobil has been donating to climate change deniers and politicians who support them since then.
Here are two pieces on this topic, one from ThinkProgress.org and one from Breitbart.com.
Breibart attempts to make a casual connection between Secretary Clinton's call for investigation to the fact that ExxonMobil has stopped funding her family foundation's Clinton Global Initiative, insinuating that the funding was pulled in late September.
"But the company decided not to co-sponsor the Foundation’s annual meeting in New York City in late September 2015, according to a report by International Business Times."
If you click on the link in the Breitbart quote, it takes you to a story dated in September. There is a link in that story to a USA Today article on the subject. But nowhere in either of the links, IBT or USA Today is there any reference to a decision by ExxonMobil in September regarding cutting off funding to the Clinton Global Initiative. That's because if the spin-doctors at Breitbart would read more carefully, they'd have caught this little nugget in the IBT piece.
"Her call for an investigation comes only months after the company decided to stop sponsoring her family’s foundation."
That's right, months. In fact, the Washington Post reported on May 5, 2015 of a statement from an ExxonMobil spokesperson that the company had pulled the funding. So nearly six months passed between the decision to cut funding before Secretary Clinton joined the "we need an investigation" chorus. Her main opponents in the battle for her party's presidential nomination had joined that chorus some time back.
There is no causal connection. Further, if you read the Think Progress piece, you'll see them referencing contributions from lobbyists who represent ExxonMobil and other oil companies, showing money still going from them to Hillary's campaign. But if you read the detailed FEC report, you find those contributions were all made before June 30th.
As always, the devil is in the details. Lots of spin-doctoring going on here.
Here are two pieces on this topic, one from ThinkProgress.org and one from Breitbart.com.
Breibart attempts to make a casual connection between Secretary Clinton's call for investigation to the fact that ExxonMobil has stopped funding her family foundation's Clinton Global Initiative, insinuating that the funding was pulled in late September.
"But the company decided not to co-sponsor the Foundation’s annual meeting in New York City in late September 2015, according to a report by International Business Times."
If you click on the link in the Breitbart quote, it takes you to a story dated in September. There is a link in that story to a USA Today article on the subject. But nowhere in either of the links, IBT or USA Today is there any reference to a decision by ExxonMobil in September regarding cutting off funding to the Clinton Global Initiative. That's because if the spin-doctors at Breitbart would read more carefully, they'd have caught this little nugget in the IBT piece.
"Her call for an investigation comes only months after the company decided to stop sponsoring her family’s foundation."
That's right, months. In fact, the Washington Post reported on May 5, 2015 of a statement from an ExxonMobil spokesperson that the company had pulled the funding. So nearly six months passed between the decision to cut funding before Secretary Clinton joined the "we need an investigation" chorus. Her main opponents in the battle for her party's presidential nomination had joined that chorus some time back.
There is no causal connection. Further, if you read the Think Progress piece, you'll see them referencing contributions from lobbyists who represent ExxonMobil and other oil companies, showing money still going from them to Hillary's campaign. But if you read the detailed FEC report, you find those contributions were all made before June 30th.
As always, the devil is in the details. Lots of spin-doctoring going on here.
posted by me at 1:21 PM
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