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UPDATE: After posting this, I realized that the idea that climate denial is ideological, rather than corporate driven, is also the explicit and central argument of Oreskes and Conway, Merchants of Doubt. There was no intention to slight them—it’s just that I’d read Dunlap and McCright more recently, so their work was at the front of my mind. I’ve added a reference below, and my apologies to Oreskes and Conway.

Recently, I’ve been reading some research by Riley Dunlap, a sociologist at Oklahoma State University who collaborates frequently with Aaron McCright, another sociologist at Michigan State. Together, they’ve done penetrating work on the right wing resistance to climate change science in the US, and in particular, on the role of conservative think tanks in driving this resistance.

In a series of 2010 papers, however, I’m detecting a theme that runs contrary to what many often assume about the driving forces of climate denial. It is this: McCright & Dunlap argue that while corporate interests may once have seemed front-and-center in spurring resistance to climate science, at this point it’s becoming increasingly apparent that ideological motivations are actually the primary motivator. Or as they put it: “conservative movement opposition to climate science and policy has a firm ideological base that supersedes the obvious desire for corporate funding.”

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Charles Alexander, the former editor of TIME Magazine, has praised the book Climate Cover-Up by DeSmog co-founder Jim Hoggan and contributor Richard Littlemore as a “superb” resource documenting the political attacks on climate science.

Writing in the current issue of Conservation Magazine, Alexander highlights Climate Cover-Up as one of three books written this year “documenting the paid political attack on climatology, which is nothing less than a paid political attack on science itself.”  The other titles Alexander recommends include Eric Pooley’s The Climate War and Naomi Oreskes’ Merchants of Doubt, both excellent and complimentary resources for anyone wishing to learn more about the ongoing attack on climate science and scientists.

Here is Alexander’s full review of Climate Cover-Up:

The Huffington Post featured Alexander’s review of the three books today on its website, generating an all-too-common flame war in the comments section, with climate deniers offering up plenty of misinformation and talking past everyone else, including Alexander, who tries in vain to steer them towards credible sources on the realities of climate change.  Some things never change, unfortunately.

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Naomi Oreskes,  professor of history and science studies at the University of California, San Diego, and Erik Conway, an historian at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Lab are stumping about these days in support of their excellent new book, Merchants of Doubt.

As you might expect from someone with Oreskes’ exemplary background, Merchants is a painstakingly careful review of the climate change denial campaign. She and Conway have traced the whole, odious action back to the late 1980s and the early work of the George C. Marshall Institute, which they aregue convincingly was ground zero for the denial industry.

For a taste quick taste of their position, check this CNN feature.

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University of California (San Diego) science historian Naomi Oreskes has a new lecture on line, promoting her upcoming book: Merchants of Doubt: How a Handful of Scientists Obscured the Truth on Issues from Tobacco Smoke to Global Warming

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Ari Berman’s must-read article “The Dirt on Clean Coal” upholds The Nation’s proud reputation for investigative reporting which separates it from most mainstream outlets, posing relevant questions and actually attempting to find answers to them.

Berman asks the critical, overlooked question of the day, “Can the same people who told us that global warming didn’t exist—or that it was a good thing—suddenly be trusted to help solve the climate crisis?”

As you might guess, the answer is a resounding “no.”

Berman details how the coal industry - through its $40 million Astroturf campaign by the front group “American Coalition for Clean Coal Electricity” - is working feverishly to fight Congressional efforts to limit greenhouse gas emissions, hoping to ensure that the world’s coal supplies – and the climate – continue to burn for decades to come.