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Yet it still seems there is a double standard at work. Where are the stories on individuals and organizations who promote the agendas of government agencies from which they also receive substantial sums? As Gallagher wrote, "Until today, researchers and scholars have not generally been expected to disclose a government-funded research project in the past, when they later wrote about their field of expertise in the popular press or in scholarly journals." Indeed, this is true even when such articles appear in Kurtz's own Washington Post.
In October 2003, for example, World Wildlife Fund (WWF) chairman William K. Reilly wrote an op-ed, "The EPA's Cost Underruns," celebrating the cost-effectiveness of federal environmental regulation. Reilly claimed Environmental Protection Agency programs have produced a "solid return on our investments and declared environmental protection "one of the two foremost achievements of American public policy in the post-World War II period." Yet while Reilly's byline acknowledged he was EPA administrator from 1989 to 1993, there was no mention that WWF is a substantial recipient of EPA funds well over $1.5 million in the past ten years. According to WWF's Form 990s filed with the IRS, the group received over $15 million in government funds in both 2002 and 2003.
Three months earlier, another environmental advocate, Jeremy Symons of the National Wildlife Federation (NWF), was on the Post editorial page attacking the Bush administration for constraining the EPA's regulatory efforts. Like WWF, NWF receives substantial federal funding. In 2004 the EPA awarded NWF eight separate grants, totaling over $100,000, according to the agency's publicly accessible grants information database. A recent Senate report disclosed that NWF typically receives over a quarter million in taxpayer funds each year. Again the byline noted the author's former employment at the EPA, but failed to mention his new employer received substantial government funds.
These are hardly isolated examples. To the contrary, most major environmental organizations are on the federal dole. Environmental Defense received a $240,000 EPA grant last September and has received over $4.5 million from the EPA since 1993. Likewise the World Resources Institute has been awarded over $1 million from the EPA in the last five years. The Natural Resources Defense Council is one of the loudest advocates for increasing the EPA's regulatory authority and one of Bush administration's most persistent critics. Yet NRDC has received over $6.5 million since 1993. Just last month the EPA awarded NRDC another $400,000 grant. Yet when these organizations appear in the Washington Post, whether in bylined pieces or reported articles, their federal support is scarcely, if ever, disclosed....
DISCLOSURE [Mark R. Levin]
In furtherance of Jonathan Adler's point, if you go to Landmark Legal Foundation's website you will find thousands of environmental groups that receive government grants. The Washington Post has used scores of these groups in its news stories. Does the Washington Post have a policy of disclosing the groups' government connections in its news pages? Not that I can discern. When the groups' representatives are on radio and TV shows, do they disclose that they've received money from the government? Not that I can discern. And when Kurtz took an incredibly lame slap at (my friend, associate, advisory board member, and brother in arms) Sean Hannity the other day, did he reveal at the time that he's paid by a competing cable network, CNN? No, he did not. Does CNN have a policy that requires its guests to reveal any government money groups they represent have received? Looks like a bad game of gotcha, not ethics.
Posted at 05:34 PM
) mouthpiece on the planet (okay, at least in the USofA).
