With the Heartland Institute being such passionate defenders of smokers' rights I thought for sure they would be interested in a debate on the subject.

After what we thought was some constructive dialogue towards making this event happen, the Heartland seems to now be playing a bit of duck and cover.

In the meantime, please enjoy some past posts we have done on the Heartland Institute or the entry for Heartland over at Sourcewatch.

There's been a lot of talk about blogger ethics lately in light of the death threats posted the other week on technologist blogger Kathy Sierra's site. It has raised all sorts of blogging issues, including the important issue of accountability.

A lot of the writing here on DeSmogBlog is considered by some to be controversial and with controversy comes an even higher expectation of accountability. If we write something incorrect, we do not distance ourselves from the mistake, we take ownership and correct ourselves in a timely fashion.

Heartland Institute President Joseph Bast, tireless defender of big tobacco and trenchant critic of climate science advocates, has demanded that the DeSmogBlog "retract an inaccurate statement" that we had included in a post challenging Heartland to a debate over the harmful effects of tobacco.

We would like to make that retraction here and now:

Still haven't heard from them. In the meantime, please enjoy some past posts we have done on the Heartland Institute or the entry for Heartland over at Sourcewatch.

Still haven't heard from them. In the meantime, please enjoy some past posts we have done on the Heartland Institute or the entry for Heartland over at Sourcewatch.