Tag Archives: Trump

The Anti-science War

This blog will highlight some of the current battle lines, and also describe the heroic measures now being formulated and implemented to fight this War on Reason.

We have all heard about President Trump’s penchant for making up facts and pushing them out to his followers, but this blog series is not about that on-going, and unprecedented, problem. Since Day 1, this administration has begun the process of actively (or by accident!) suppressing scientists who are working in politically uncomfortable fields such as climate change and Earth science. This is only the beginning of what will be a long battle against clarity and reason.

 

Bad News Bullets.

January 25 – The Trump administration has told the EPA to remove its climate change data from its website (The Business Insider)

January 24 – Badlands National Park deletes tweets on climate change(CNN)

January 24 – Trump imposes gag order on EPA and USDA (USUNCUT)

January 24 – Trump Administration Restricts News from Federal Scientists at USDA, EPA (Scientific American)

January 23 – EPA freezes grants. Tells employees not to talk about it – (Huffington Post)

January 23 – CDC abruptly cancels long-planned conference on climate change and health (The Washington Post)

January 20 – White House Office of Science and Technology climate change webpage disappears after Trump’s inauguration (The Hill)

December 20 – Canadian Scientists Warn U.S. Colleagues: Act Now to Protect Science under Trump (Scientific American)

December 13 – Scientists are frantically copying U.S. climate data, fearing it might vanish under Trump (The Washington Post)

November 23 – Trump adviser proposes dismantling NASA climate research (Chicago Tribune)

October 30 – Trump takes aim at NASA’s climate budget (The Hill)

May 15 – House Budget Cuts NASA Earth Science By More Than $250 Million  (SpaceNews)

 

Good News Bullets

January 26 – CDC’s canceled climate change conference is back on — thanks to Al Gore (Washington Post)

January 26 – NPS Climate Change website still online (NPS.gov)

January 26 – National Park Service staff escalate campaign against Trump – No one from the Trump administration has complained or asked them to remove the posts – (CBSnews)

January 26 – USDA Office of Chief Economist – climate change report still online (USDA.gov)

January 26 – EPA climate change website still online (EPA.gov)

January 26 – The Department of Energy Climate and Environmental Science Division webpage is still online (energy.gov)

January 25 – USDA scrambles to ease concerns after researchers were ordered to stop publishing news releases (Washington Post)

January 25 – Scientists planning their own march on Washington (CNN)

January 25 – Report: Trump Team Backtracks On Order To Remove EPA Climate Site (InsideEPA)

January 25 – NASA scientists join resistance with rogue Twitter account @rogueNASA with over 27,000 followers. (USUncut)

January 25 – National Park Service employees set up rogue twitter account to disseminate climate change information @AltNatParkSer (USUncut)

January 25 – EPA employees set up rogue twitter account to disseminate science @AltUSEPA (USUncut)

January 24 – Badlands NPS goes on climate change tweetstorm (USAToday)

January 24 – People’s Climate March being organized for April 29 in Washington DC.  (PeoplesClimate.org)

January 24 – USDA disavows gag-order emailed to scientific research unit (Reuters)

January 24 – March for Science starts organizing on Facebook with 500,000 registrants in 24 hours – #ScienceMarch #ScienceResists #USofScience (MarchForScience)

January 24 – Trump’s pick to lead Commerce Department says NOAA scientists can freely share their work (Washington Post)

January 10 – NASA Earth science director expects short-term budget stability (for FY17: The division received $1.92 billion in 2016, and requested $2.03 billion for 2017) – (SpaceNews)

December 28 – Earth scientists are freaking out. NASA urges calm. (SpaceNews)

Bookmark this blog for future updates as new news develops!

March..March..March!

 

 

We have been here before.

In Nazi Germany of the 1930s, Deutsche Physik swept the German science community and Einstein’s relativity was denounced as Jewish Physics and banned from the classroom and social discourse. If you think I am making a mountain out of a mole hill in worrying about president Trump’s recent edicts, you are delusional.

First he expunged all mention of climate change from the White House website, then he forced the US Forest Service to take down its climate change facts, finally he has suppressed the USDA and NIH from posting new public content, and placed a freeze on research funding pending this administration’s evaluation.
He has threatened to de-fund all of Earth Science research at NASA, and I am sure that once the new NASA administrator has been appointed by Trump, we will see changes in the public content at NASA with no mention of climate change or the annual evaluations of global warming trends. These institutions are political, top-down systems in which what the Administrator says becomes law within each institution and scientists have no real recourse to protest pull backs in what they can post online, or even whether they can get travel authorization to attend important conferences. We will soon see whether Trump forces NASA to abide by the same gag orders he is placing on other research institutions across the federal government.

We can sit back and profess caution, with the hope that clearer GOP minds in Congress will prevail, but the moral ineptitude of the GOP party in the face of Trump has been a cautionary tale these last few weeks. The calculus is already being performed behind closed doors that any source of information contradicting Trump’s delusions will be strongly restrained. It is not out of the question that entire research grant areas will vanish overnight. I even wonder about the security of our armada of Earth research satellites, which are supported by budget ‘line items’ and can be terminated by Congress even as they are taking invaluable historic data proving the case for climate change. Weather satellites, of course, will be maintained because the GOP owns lots of property across the USA whose assets need protection.

So what to do?

For one, join EVERY march you hear about whether it relates to science or not. Show your solidarity with all other organizations that are marching to protest the new policies. Even now, Scientists March on Washington is starting to organize .It went from 200 members last night to over 30,000 by morning’s light the next day! Some worry that it will be ‘hijacked’ by other causes, but the goal is to show huge participant numbers to make the evening news and to really piss off Trump. So embrace your LGBT, Women’s, and all other groups, many of whom are themselves scientists or science literate members of the public!

Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/groups/1862739727343189/

Website: http://www.scientistsmarchonwashington.com/2017/01/what-is-scientists-march-on-washington.html

Washington Post: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/speaking-of-science/wp/2017/01/24/are-scientists-going-to-march-on-washington/?utm_term=.a89504086621

UK Telegraph: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2017/01/25/scientists-plan-climate-change-march-washington/
Daily KOS: http://www.dailykos.com/stories/1624864

Check back here on Monday January 30  for a new blog!