Climate Hawks Vote Calls for Obama to Sue Exxon Under RICO
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by Gaius Publius
This is a brief follow-up to the blockbuster Exxon story, about how the company knew as far back as 1977 that burning fossil fuel was a big cause of climate change, that they studied the problem for ten years, then abandoned all that good work and started funding the climate denier campaign — all based on a treasure trove of internal documents.
Our first story, on how much Exxon knew and when they knew it, is here. Our second, on an early call for a RICO investigation into fossil fuel companies — a parallel to the Big Tobacco investigation — is here. Our third, on the op-ed written last May by Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, which also calls for a RICO investigation, is here.
The calls for a RICO investigation are starting again, thanks to the Exxon revelations. Here's Climate Hawks Vote, a climate-conscious PAC that scores congressional climate votes and vets candidates, with their own RICO request. It's in the form of a petition, and you, if you like, can sign it.
They write:
Sign Now: Prosecute Exxon For Deliberate Climate DenialFeel free to join the call. Just click and sign.
Newly revealed documents show that Exxon’s own scientists were aware of and studying the dangerous impacts of greenhouse gases in the 1970s and 1980s -- until Exxon’s leadership decided to shut down the research and promote climate denial instead, in order to protect the company’s unfathomably large profits.
The United States Department of Justice has the power to prosecute Exxon’s deliberate deception under the Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organizations (RICO) Act - just as the DOJ did to the tobacco industry for knowingly lying about the dangers of cigarette smoking.
Source: "Exxon: The Road Not Taken," InsideClimate News.
Tell U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch:
Launch a RICO prosecution of Exxon and its fellow fossil-fuel companies for deliberate and malicious climate deception.
Who's signing:
258 signatures [as of this snapshot]
Will you sign?
GP
Labels: climate change, Exxon Mobil, Gaius Publius
posted by Gaius Publius @ 10:00 AM
1 comments
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1 Comments:
Again, just who will this lawsuit try to prove was damaged by their lies? Can trees and moths and coral become a class of plaintiffs here? Have they ID'd any individual hominid that they can prove was harmed by 400+ ppm today?
Also, and more importantly, what is to be gained? Money?! OK. fine. But, just as in the tobacco case, it won't FIX the problem. It'll just skim some of the profit from it.
Ultimately, not FIXING it will do harm to everyone... in the future... after double jeapordy is in effect.
And all the upcoming xxFTAs will have bigger and better cutouts for carbon extraction/refining/burning to prevent anyone else from ever considering reaching into the pot of gold for their handfuls.
I say all this out of sheer frustration, of course. According to all I can gather from reputable studies, this thing is over. period. We'd need to stop billowing carbon into the air and start sinking it (a trillion new trees, for example) RIGHT NOW... on the off-chance that we can get it down to 350 ppm in a decade. And not only is that unlikely to even work, it's NEVER GOING TO HAPPEN.
This train is on its own careening downhill with no brakes. And we can't jump off cuz we welded the doors and windows shut. **WE** did.
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