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Some people will say anything for money. Sometimes, this comes back to bite you, especially when you get called out. By famous scientists, no less. Take for example the great call-out of Alan Oxley, the corporate equivalent of Lindsay Lohan’s publicist. His job is to make the reckless and incredibly destructive actions of exploitative corporations like APP and Sinar Mas look like gestures of Mother Theresa, existing to charitably benefit the world’s poor through no-holds-barred development. And boy, does his job pay well. Alan Oxley is finally discovering that if you lie, people don’t believe you. Especially scientists, who base collaborative conclusions on objective evidence. In the past several months Oxley has asserted that environmental organizations are hurting the world’s poor through stymieing development by asserting such preposterous demands as advocating for palm oil customers to develop policies that include FPIC standards (Free Prior, and Informed Consent from affected communities) and commitments to uphold moratoriums on clearing of rainforest to make way for monoculture palm oil plantations that enforce slave-labor-like conditions. We even went as far as to demand that corporations like Sinar Mas stop illegally clearing forests. The nerve! While Oxley masquerades his claims with nice letterhead from the World Growth Institute, the real paper to pay attention to is his pay stub. It seems that the villainous corporations Oxley defends are the very ones bankrolling his claim. When asked directly about this, Oxley declines to comment. Hmmm. However, don’t just read my opinionated, snarky gloating over Oxley getting called out. Read “An Open Letter About Scientific Credibility and the Conservation of Tropical Forests” and decide for yourself who you want to believe: a conservative think-tank industrial lobbyist or an impressive collection of Nobel-level scientists from around the world.