EXPOSED: The Evil, Corrupt, Bought and Paid For, Mises Institute

My new friend  (See: here and here),  who is very concerned about the climate, has me reading Merchants of Doubt, by by Naomi Oreskes  and Erik M. Conway, which is pretty much a book length ad hominem attack on anyone who doesn't fall in line with prevailing coercive demands against smokers and against those scientists who do not subscribe to the view that global warning is going to soon destroy the planet.

Oreskes is Professor of the History of Science and Affiliated Professor of Earth and Planetary Sciences at Harvard University.

Al Gore on the blurb for the book is quoted as saying, "Anyone concerend about the state of democracy in America should read this book."

I found most interesting this quote on page 248 of the paperback edition:

Phillip Morris's point of view, of course, was that people should not be discouraged from smoking, but they made common cause with various groups and individuals committed to "free market political and economic principles."

Perhaps this is why among the scores of think tanks and organizations that Phillip Morris supported, we find, the seemingly obscure Ludwig von Mises Institue. Ludwig von Mises, an Austrian aristocrat, was, one of the founders of modern laissez faire economics.

I wasn't aware of any funding of the Mises Institute by major corprations, so I asked Lew Rockwell, founder and chairman of the Institute, if Phillip Morris had funded Mises. The Fortune 500 don't fund Mises, because of the Institute's hardcore free market positions, and so Lew's first response was, "We are too pro-cigarettes to get a donation from them."

But, he had the donor base searched for me and found that Phillip Morris made one contribution to Mises, an employee matching fund contribution of $200 (and matching donations from Phillip Morris parent Altria of $1,200). This is what the global warming scare crowd considers "support" of the Institute.

I should add that Lew told me that the Institute would have no problem with accepting donations from Fortune 500 companies, but the companies just don't contribute to Mises becasue of the Institute's consistent free market stance.

   -RW

UPDATE

Lew tells me the last matching donation was in 2009.