Michael Hiltzik: How MIT whitewashed the climate change denialism of a major donor, David Koch
Obituary writers have been struggling for days with the task of balancing the philanthropic record of billionaire David H. Koch with his baleful influence on democratic electoral principles and the science of climate change.
Massachusetts Institute of Technology seems to have found a solution to the challenge. In its send-off to Koch published Friday, the day of his death, the university went on at length about his donations to MIT in the fields of cancer research, child-care and even basketball. Of his role in suppressing the facts of climate change, fighting access to medical coverage for low-income Americans and undermining the expansion of renewable energy, MIT was completely, utterly silent.
The university's reluctance to deliver an objective assessment of Koch's career is perhaps understandable, up to a point. Koch, like his brother Charles, was an MIT alumnus.
