Is Nova Catering to Its Anti-Science Sugar Daddy?  Nova:
Becoming HumanPBS's Nova is taking money from one of the biggest
bankrollers of climate change denial–and, surprise surprise, the
resulting programming tells viewers not to worry about climate
change. But PBS's ombud doesn't see this as a conflict of
interest–because Nova is a "consistently first-rate program,"
and he trusts it.  Nova's conflict of interest was highlighted
out by Climate Progress blogger Joe Romm (9/7/10), who had
previously caught the Smithsonian promoting strange climate
science after getting a grant from oil billionaire David Koch
(Climate Progress, 4/1/10). Koch, who's a major funder of
propaganda rejecting the science of climate change, is also one
of the main underwriters of the popular PBS science program
Nova–which is in itself a case of strange bedfellows. (Another
major sponsor of Nova is ExxonMobil, the other top funder of
science-denial in support of oil industry profits.)  With the
New Yorker's Jane Mayer (8/30/10) calling