Attack on Science
For those wishing to understand the current status of the war that the U.S. congress is waging against science, I heartily recommend this piece from The New Yorker.
Warning: This is really Orwellian. Lamar Smith, the Texas congressman who chairs the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology, is doing everything in his considerable power to mute the voice of science—and especially as it pertains to climate change. Under his leadership, the committee has issued more subpoenas to force scientists working in this domain to make public their internal communications than it had during its previous 54-year history, in an effort to prove that the science of the 21st Century marches to a left-wing/socialist drum beat.
Perhaps the most interesting aspect of this whole case is that, per the article, “Smith introduced legislation requiring that all scientists applying for federal grants guarantee, in a special section of their grant applications, that their work is in ‘the national interest.’” It’s hard to know exactly what that means, but at a minimum, it implies that science for its own sake, i.e., to expand our understanding of ourselves and the world around us, is not supported by the U.S. government.
It’s a sad day. But, hey, Trump is rising in the polls, so essentially it’s a bad time all around for those of us who aspire to reason and compassion.
Craig,
What an odd legislator ! Here’s a guy in charge of administering taxpayer money for scientific research, wanting to ensure that taxpayer funds are spent on legitimate research to benefit the taxpayer, and not funding partisan political advocacy. How dare he ?!
It’s an outrage that an elected public official should dare to question how a self-confessed political-advocate and activist, spends taxpayer money.
Then to make matters worse, we discover that the elected official belongs to a funny sort of religion, has a odd sort name, and hails from Texas. That’s certainly enough for me. You bring the pitchfork, and I’ll bring the tar and feathers, we got to teach this fellow he can’t question his betters !
Just one thing though,… I’m not sure many Texans read the New Yorker,….
LOL. I have to give you credit: you really are a very smart guy with a great sense of humor.
The truth here, though, is that this is one of an incredible number of campaigns to ensure that climate change research doesn’t receive a nickel of public spending. What’s your theory that explains all this? Mine, as you know, is that the fossil fuel industry is the primary driver for politicians’ getting elected. If you have a better one, I’m very interested to hear it.
Craig,
Do you really believe the “the fossil fuel industry is the primary driver for politicians getting elected ” ?
Of all the hundreds of issues by which the electorate chooses it’s representatives, the fossil fuel industry is a long way behind a lot of other issues that are of more concern.
The economy, taxation,employment, local issues, health, education, defence, immigration, personal popularity, party loyalty etc all come before the environment, certainly a long way before issues in the remit of the fossil fuel industry.
What do you mean by the “fossil Fuel industry” ? It’s a huge international industry(s) made up of from thousands of corporations producing maybe a million diverse products and employing millions more.
The corporations compete ferociously with one another and in different resource segments. There isn’t one “fossil Fuel ” industry as such, the industry is hugely diverse.
There are some 600+ industry associations, each representing different facets of the differing resources.
Most corporations donate to all major parties, so the influence is far less than people imagine. Some Oil companies ignore Climate Change, while others (Shell, Chevron etc) fund very extensive and valuable research.
In relevance to your question and the New Yorker article.
Conservative politicians like Lamar Smith (and like much of the electorate) simply react to the confusion caused by excessive politicization of the environmental and climate change science.
It’s an unfortunate reality, that the actual science has been overlooked amid a deliberate plethora of leftist and progressive activism, coupled with confusion as advocates/activists/ political parties all claim a “science agenda”.
The emergence of advocates/activists writing and passionately speaking as Climate Scientists, (often with no relevant academic qualifications) while merging extraneous leftist or progressive agendas, is perceived as a legitimate cause for concern.
Taxpayer funding for scientific research, is a proper use of taxpayer funds. Taxpayer funding for any ideological or partisan political activity is not.
Gay marriage, medical marijuana, social justice for illegal migrants etc, maybe all laudable political objectives, but they’re extraneous to climate change research. By hi-jacking the environmental debate into a leftist agenda, these activists have done the cause a great disservice. It’s inevitable that a perception of leftist bias must result, while confusing serve to and alienating sections of the electorate once sympathetic and supportive of purely environmental issues.
Politicians are elected and rejected for a wide number reasons, identification with party loyalty is the primary reason, but not always.
If your claim that ” the fossil fuel industry is the primary driver for politicians getting elected” was true, how did George H Bush lose ? For that matter, how did Obama get elected over Romney?
When explored carefully, these urban myths never stand the light of scrutiny.
(Having said all that, I won’t be cancelling my more than 50 year subscription to the New Yorker (love the cartoons) and I’ll confess Lamar Smith wouldn’t be my candidate of choice. I certainly wouldn’t appoint him to head the House Committee on Science, Space, and Technology 🙂
In a word, yes. I’m referring to the enormous impact of campaign contributions, and the confluence of big money and politics in America’s law-making processes, as expressed here: http://www.2greenenergy.com/2011/06/21/ed-rendell/
Well done to do for your comment on Lamar Smith at the end here. Btw, the reason who feel that way is that you, as person of considerable intelligence, understand the point of the post itself, i.e., we don’t want someone with political motives (in this case, halting climate change research) in a position of power vis-a-vis the application of science to addressing society’s woes.
I speculate that the purpose of the additional clause is to judge the “research” by a near term economic standard. Because if the standard is that only things that improve the economy are “good for national interest” than anything that costs money or lessons national income in this quarter will by definition be “bad for national interest.”
Many climate change solutions are likely to cost near term in exchange for long term benefits. So this may be a first step to a long term goal of eliminating climate change funding “because of the economic cost.”
While this is very narrow and short term thinking it is consistent with a conservative philosophy and a rational previously proposed.