In advance of tomorrow's ExxonMobil shareholders get-together at the Morton H. Meyerson Symphony Center -- always a good time -- the Irving-based oil behemoth announced today it will no longer fund some groups who insist global warming ain't got nothing to with people. Among the organizations to which Exxon's cut off funding: Capital Research Center, which once insisted that a "coalition of environmental heavies and other leftist groups is losing the public debate on global warming"; the Frontiers of Freedom, which, in April, referred to Congressional efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions as "climate extortion"; and the Institute for Energy Research, which published a book titled Scared to Death: From BSE to Global Warming: Why Scares Are Costing us the Earth, which charges that "the global climate change craze" is "fueled by alarmist rhetoric and trumped up scientific claims."
Notes ExxonMobil spokesman Gantt Walton today, "We discontinued contributions to several public-policy research groups whose position on climate change could divert attention from the important discussion about how the world will secure the energy required for economic growth in an environmentally responsible manner." Which is eight years later than some Exxon shareholders would have liked. But, still, John D. Rockefeller's heirs will be happy. --Robert Wilonsky