http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/29/science/...h/29climate.htm

Yes, isn't that a charming story? Although completely typical for this administration. I've sent it out to my network of commie-pinko political blog contacts.

So who is lying? Dr. Hansen, or the Deputy Assistant for public affairs?

Neither...the administration does not threaten individuals, they subdue entire organizations. Speak openly, and your entire research center's budget will hit the axe...and god forbid any NASA contractor blow any whistles.

Everyone put your helmets on, dig in, and pray for your program, and most important, let the president know you are praying.

Heh, yeah, I heard about this. The administration's doing the same thing to the EPA. Screw over the future for present gratification. How wise.

House Science Committee Chairman Boehlert has just raised hell about the administration's apparent attempts to stifle Hansen ( http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.html?pid=18878 ). I was hoping he would, but the question is now whether this bunch of megalomaniacs will try to stifle Boehlert as well.

That would be tough, Boehlert is not one to be bullied. We should all thank him.

There was also the directive issued a few months ago, directing every email requests for information from the public be forwarded to the office of propaganda - there was a half-assed retraction, but it was never clarified as to who could speak for themselves, and who was supposed to put a sock in it.

I think it was 'NASA Watch' that pointed out Griffin's hand-picked advisory panel was all-male. So far his 'NASA is a public agency with an open door policy' is a lot of reteoric and plenty of fodder for skeptics.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/04/science/04climate.html

Excerpt:

<<The Big Bang memo came from Mr. Deutsch, a 24-year-old presidential appointee in the press office at NASA headquarters whose résumé says he was an intern in the "war room" of the 2004 Bush-Cheney re-election campaign. A 2003 journalism graduate of Texas A&M, he was also the public-affairs officer who sought more control over Dr. Hansen's public statements.

In October 2005, Mr. Deutsch sent an e-mail message to Flint Wild, a NASA contractor working on a set of Web presentations about Einstein for middle-school students. The message said the word "theory" needed to be added after every mention of the Big Bang.

The Big Bang is "not proven fact; it is opinion," Mr. Deutsch wrote, adding, "It is not NASA's place, nor should it be to make a declaration such as this about the existence of the universe that discounts intelligent design by a creator."

It continued: "This is more than a science issue, it is a religious issue. And I would hate to think that young people would only be getting one-half of this debate from NASA. That would mean we had failed to properly educate the very people who rely on us for factual information the most."

The memo also noted that The Associated Press Stylebook and Libel Manual specified the phrasing "Big Bang theory." Mr. Acosta, Mr. Deutsch's boss, said in an interview yesterday that for that reason, it should be used in all NASA documents.

The Deutsch memo was provided by an official at NASA headquarters who said he was upset with the effort to justify changes to descriptions of science by referring to politically charged issues like intelligent design. Senior NASA officials did not dispute the message's authenticity.>>

I am [/U]not[U] making this up: the same Presidential appointee to NASA's press office who was censoring Hansen's climatology statements has now demanded -- with some success -- that NASA give equal time to Intelligent Design with the Big Bang theory. It turns out that he's a 24-year-old worker in the 2004 Bush campaign with no science education:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/04/science/...agewanted=print

I see John Rehling beat me to it by about 30 seconds. By the time this administration is out of office (assuming that Bush doesn't decide that his virtually unlimited power as a wartime commander constitutionally allows him to override the 22nd Amendment and the 2008 election), we will be picking up what's left of the United States with a spoon.

Footnote ( http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-ep...ines-california ):

"In an unprecedented action, the Environmental Protection Agency's own scientific panel on Friday challenged the agency's proposed public health standards governing soot and dust...

"Some panel members called the administrator's actions 'egregious' and said his proposals 'twisted' or 'misrepresented' their recommendations...

"Cal/EPA's air pollution epidemiology chief, Bart Ostro, charged during the teleconference that the EPA had incorporated 'last-minute opinions and edits' by the White House Office of Management and Budget that 'circumvented the entire peer review process.'

"He said research that he and others had conducted also had been misrepresented in the EPA's lengthy justification for the proposed new standards.

"In an interview later, Ostro said he was referring to marked-up drafts of Johnson's proposals that showed changes by the White House budget office and language that was 'very close to some of the letters written by some of the trade associations.' "

Yeah...I just keep envisioning the scene from Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, where Palpatine declares himself leader of the Galactic Empire, in order to promote security. "So this is how democracy dies. To thunderous applause."

That's exactly how democracy died in Nazi Germany. If you've never seen it, y'all ought to watch Leni Riefenstahl's film "Triumph of the Will," which "documented" the 1936 Nuremburg Nazi Party rally. Pay close attention to parallels with current events. And try not to be scared spitless.

-the other Doug

My theory on what Bush and his cronies are doing: Just get a flunky to espouse the big guys' views: If they are accepted, they look like heroes; if the outcry is negative, they can just blame it on a minion who overstepped his authority - all on his own, of course.

Of course the kid also could have done it on his own thinking it would get him points and advancement with his bosses. A lack of science education on his part: When did that ever stop someone from achieving high political office?

Regarding Triumph:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triumph_of_the_Will

http://www.geocities.com/emruf4/triumph.html

If the public does not learn from history, we can forget journeying to the stars any time soon.

I had heard that Lucas used imagery from Nazi Germany to help set up some scenes in Star Wars.

Yes indeed, and The Lion King and - no shock here - Starship Troopers:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Triumph_of_th...nces_and_legacy

Here's Kevin Drum's take on it.

The New York Times reports that George Deutsch has resigned amid reports that his resume claims a BA degree that he has not received.

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/08/politics/08nasa.html [This link will only work for a week unless you're a premium subscriber on the NYT site.)

More info about the degree flap here.

However, the degree flap is a sideshow. The NYT article concludes:

>Yesterday, Dr. Hansen said that the questions about
>Mr. Deutsch's credentials were important, but were a
>distraction from the broader issue of political control of
>scientific information.

>"He's only a bit player," Dr. Hansen said of Mr. Deutsch.
>"He's amusing because he goes to these extremes,
>but the problem is much broader and much deeper and
>it goes across agencies. That's what I'm really concerned about."

>"On climate, the public has been misinformed and not informed,"
>he said. "The foundation of a democracy is an informed public,
>which obviously means an honestly informed public.
>That's the big issue here."

TTT

I figured it was a serious mistake for the Bushites to try to stifle Hansen. He's the 800-pound gorilla of climate science. (Or, as the Waco Kid said about Mongo in "Blazing Saddles": "Don't shoot him. You'll only make him mad.")

Bush obviously has yet to learn about what happens when appointing cronies and flunkies in various political positions. And as I said before in this topic, the kid made a good scapegoat when the big boys' agenda pushing got snagged.

http://www.unmannedspaceflight.com/index.p...indpost&p=40184

How many other "appointees" like Deutsch are out there, just waiting to go off like those Soviet sleeper agents in Telefon?

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0076804/

At least we can be assured they won't be at any Robert Frost poetry recitals.

I just got a phone call from my roommate -- it seems that, after a review of the situation by NASA Administrator Mike Griffin, George Deutsch (the 24-year-old political appointee we've been discussing here) has been fired from his post at NASA.

HA!

-the other Doug

Congratulations!

Here in Sweden it is an accepted fact of life that only members of the ruling Social Democrats and their allied parties can get appointments to leading public positions.
Recently the Prime Minister appointed one of his cousins with absolutely no scientific qualifications (but a party member) as head of a research institute. The opposition groused a bit, but of course nothing came of it.

tty

The Washington Post and the NY Times have both done editorials tonight on this little affair and its implications:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/09/opinion/09thu2.html

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...6020801991.html

When a minority of scientists accuse the Administration of deliberate distortion of what scientists are telling it, you might put it down to political bias. When a landslide majority of them in virtually every field say so -- and when Bush's own NASA Administrator says so -- you can no longer do so.

"The problem is much broader and much deeper and it goes across agencies."
Quote by George C. Deutsch.

I just wonder exactly how many other organizations have been infiltrated by agents of the administration. I only hope that the next administration declassifies a LOT of documents, and puts the appropriate individuals behind bars. The abuses of power are just insane.

Actually, it was Hansen who said that -- not Deutsch. Deutsch, however, has been heard from tonight, complaining aggrievedly that he is the victim of a Vast Conspiracy of Democratic Party Scientists led by Hansen, and that he holds in his hand a list of 208 scientists in the State Department who... oh, wait, that was last time:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/10/science/...artner=homepage

Some rude researcher has also dug up the fact that, during Deutsch's days on the Texas A&M newspaper (before he quit without graduating), he was also a big fan of the idea that Lacey Peterson was killed by a gang of Satanists.

Former NASA Public Affairs Official Says He's Under Attack

http://www.space.com/news/ap_060210_deutsch_response.html

A staffer who resigned from NASA after he was accused of restricting access to a
noted climate scientist said Thursday he was targeted because of his political
ties.

WHAT'S NEW Robert L. Park Friday, 10 Feb 06 Washington, DC

1. GLOBAL WARMING: MAYBE SCIENTIFIC OPENNESS IS "ONLY A THEORY."
Last week, WN reported that top NASA climate scientist James
Hansen was under pressure to cool it on global warming. The
pressure, we have since learned, was coming from 24-year old
White House appointee George Deutsch, who had been an intern in
the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign. Earlier, Deutsch had
informed a NASA contractor that the word "theory" had to be added
to every mention of the Big Bang. "This is more than a science
issue," he declared, "it is a religious issue." On Friday, NASA
chief Michael Griffin made it clear to all NASA employees that
it's not the job of public affairs to "alter, filter or adjust"
material from the technical staff. Wednesday, Deutsch resigned.
What was he doing in a sensitive position in the first place?
Although his job at NASA was a reward for work in the re-election
campaign, he did have a journalism degree from Texas A&M, didn't
he? Well, actually no. He lied about that. Deutsch was right
about one thing: science issues can also be religious issues.

2. EVANGELISTS: MAYBE GOD DIDN'T MAKE HIMSELF PERFECTLY CLEAR.
There is a rare split among evangelical Christians. A group of
86 evangelical leaders formed the Evangelical Climate Initiative
to combat global warming www.christiansandclimate.org , even
taking out a full-page ad in the NY Times. However, a number of
evangelical heavy weights, including Jerry Falwell and James
Dobson, oppose the initiative, and the National Association of
Evangelicals has decided not to take a position. But what does
God say? "Be fruitful and multiply, and replenish the earth and
subdue it: and have dominion over the fish of the sea, and over
the fowl of the air, and over every living thing that moveth upon
the earth," Genesis 1:28. Well, we've done it. We've subdued
just about everything. Consider the plight of the polar bear.

3. POLAR BEARS: MAYBE THEY'LL GROW FLIPPERS WHEN THE OCEAN MELTS.
Environmental groups sued the government in December to add polar
bears to the endangered species list; their habitat is fast being
destroyed by global warming. According to the Wash Post, the
Bush administration has agreed to study whether polar bears
should be on the list. Coming just as the Evangelical Climate
Initiative is announced, the reality of global warming now seems
to be accepted by almost everyone except petroleum geologists.

4. JOURNALISM? PETROLEUM GEOLOGISTS MOVE TO THE ALTERNATE WORLD.
The American Association of Petroleum Geologists is presenting
its annual journalism award to novelist Michael Crichton for
"State of Fear," a fictional story in which global warming is not
for real. AAPG was presumably unable to find a journalist
sufficiently divorced from reality to meet oil company standards.

5. BLASPHEMY: ITALIAN JUDGE DISMISSES CASE AGAINST PARISH PRIEST.
The priest had been accused of "abuse of popular credulity."

THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND.
Opinions are the author's and not necessarily shared by the
University of Maryland, but they should be.
---
Archives of What's New can be found at http://www.bobpark.org

The Bad Astronomer's detailed take on this latest round, from his blog:

http://www.badastronomy.com/bablog/2006/02...sigh-of-relief/

It's simple: his cover was blown, his usefulness gone = time for him to leave of "his own choice." Disposable underlings. Willing disposable underlings. Convenient.

Hansen today publicly compared Bush's attitude toward scientists to that of the Soviet Union: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/conte...1001766_pf.html . I knew it was a mistake for them to jump that guy.

The same article confirms that Deutsch is now saying Hansen is out to get him because he's a Christian. Maybe we should sic the Moslems on him.

Just like anyone who criticizes the government is now branded unpatriotic by the Bush Regime.

Twisting reality for their own purposes, rather than serving the public as they were elected to do. Of course in certain cases even that much is questioned.

It would be nice to just focus on science and keep above mundane worldly issues and transient politics. But what is happening now threatens science and society.


'But the world itself is only a speck of dust. And man is tiny helpless! How long has he been in existence? For millions of years the earth was uninhabited.'

'Nonsense. The earth is as old as we are, no older. How could it be older? Nothing exists except through human consciousness.'

'But the rocks are full of the bones of extinct animals -- mammoths and mastodons and enormous reptiles which lived here long before man was ever heard of.'

'Have you ever seen those bones, Winston? Of course not. Nineteenth-century biologists invented them. Before man there was nothing. After man, if he could come to an end, there would be nothing. Outside man there is nothing.'

'But the whole universe is outside us. Look at the stars! Some of them are a million light-years away. They are out of our reach for ever.'

'What are the stars?' said O'Brien indifferently. 'They are bits of fire a few kilometres away. We could reach them if we wanted to. Or we could blot them out. The earth is the centre of the universe. The sun and the stars go round it.'

Winston made another convulsive movement. This time he did not say anything. O'Brien continued as though answering a spoken objection:

'For certain purposes, of course, that is not true. When we navigate the ocean, or when we predict an eclipse, we often find it convenient to assume that the earth goes round the sun and that the stars are millions upon millions of kilometres away. But what of it? Do you suppose it is beyond us to produce a dual system of astronomy? The stars can be near or distant, according as we need them. Do you suppose our mathematicians are unequal to that? Have you forgotten doublethink?'

http://www.online-literature.com/orwell/1984/

"The nation is sick. Trouble is in the land. Confusion all around... But I
know, somehow, that only when it is dark enough, can you see the stars."

- Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.

http://www.stanford.edu/group/King/

An egregious example on one front

"He shows his audiences a graphic that places the theory of evolution at the root of all social ills: abortion, divorce, racism, gay marriage, store clerks who say 'Happy Holidays' instead of 'Merry Christmas.'"

"Happy Holidays" is a social ill? He'd really hate me. 1) I'm an atheist. That aside, I.....I don't say "Bless You" when someone sneezes. And that can be dangerous.

I just think that, if all this evidence of God's work was so self-evident, we wouldn't need people like Ham going around preaching it.

"A is for Adam, God made him from dust / He wasn't a monkey, he looked just like us."
So wait, people would then rather believe that we came from dust than from ape-like ancestors?

But damn, the guy makes $120,000 a year. Maybe I'll have to consider a career change.

He's smart enough to go for the easy "safe" targets, the ones that the public doesn't know enough about or consider worthy of supporting.

And he does this to thousands of school aged children. Now who is the real root of all evil and corruption? Why does the attitude of so many people have to be so black and white? Does it give them a sense of security in a big, scary, indifferent Universe?

CENSORSHIP 'JUST TIP OF ICEBERG' (News in Science, 14/2/06)

Allegations the Australian government has pressured some of its top
scientists to keep quiet about the implications of climate change are just
the tip of the iceberg of scientific censorship, commentators say.

http://www.abc.net.au/science/news/stories/s1569599.htm


GLOBAL WARMING HITS EUROPE'S GLACIERS, SCIENTISTS SAY (News Online:
09/02/2006)

Europe's longest glacier shrank by 66 metres last year because of global
warming, Swiss scientists said.

http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200602/s1565583.htm

News Release: 2006-023

February 16, 2006

Greenland Ice Loss Doubles in Past Decade, Raising Sea Level Faster

The loss of ice from Greenland doubled between 1996 and 2005, as its glaciers flowed faster into the ocean in response to a generally warmer climate, according to a NASA/University of Kansas study.

The study will be published tomorrow in the journal Science. It concludes the changes to Greenland's glaciers in the past decade are widespread, large and sustained over time. They are progressively affecting the entire ice sheet and increasing its contribution to global sea level rise.

Researchers Eric Rignot of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., and Pannir Kanagaratnam of the University of Kansas Center for Remote Sensing of Ice Sheets, Lawrence, used data from Canadian and European satellites. They conducted a nearly comprehensive survey of Greenland glacial ice discharge rates at different times during the past 10 years.

The rest is here:

http://www.nasa.gov/home/hqnews/2006/feb/H..._corrected.html

Well sure - first you convince them completely that the Universe is in fact big, scary, and mostly evil. Then they'll be more willing to accept anything that might provide some sense of security.

The fac that both NASA & NOAA scientists were ' censored ' in some way was just briefly in the radionews over here ...
About time we get those Hydrogen cars commercialized !

For those of us outside of the USofA, American politics tend to be extremely confusing. How could such a clown, who uses English as a second language, get re-elected?

What is not heard by other nations, is the constant drumming of conservative talk shows in the American AM radio bandwidth. When Ronald Reagen gutted the fairness doctrine, that required AM radio station owners to present all sides of an issue, the wealthy right-winged radio station owners coverted the American airwaves into a propoganda mill that rivals Nazi Germany. (It is ironic that largely because of American interjections to the constitutions of Japan and Germany, this would not likely happen in either country.)

As a result, every long haul tractor, every white-bunned angry hayseed has been ween on angry blame-the-godless-liberals for every malady from gas prices to the fact that my neighbor has a bigger fishin' boat than I do. And all scientists are just plain evil.

Two developments:

(1) A parade of scientists with experience with this Administration heaped scorn and wrath on it for trying to censor and distort scientific findings at the AAAS meeting. David Baltimore suggested that this effort is part of their "Unified Executive" theory of government, which I've always felt could be most accurately described as Creeping Fascism -- but which we are certainly going to have to put up with for at least three more years, since Cheney's philosophy bears a close resemblance to Caligula's ("Let them hate as long as they fear"):
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/19/national...agewanted=print

(2) The White House picked another political flack to replace George Deutsch. This one, however, spent a period putting out press releases for the Coalition Provisional Authority in Iraq -- which means he has ample experience in lying, something that should serve him well at NASA:
http://www.nasawatch.com/archives/2006/02/...pao_is_hir.html

I would rarely be inclined to quote Machiavelli however the insanity behind this quote of Caligula's is even more glaring when read in the light of that other nutter's advice:

The first part is fairly commonly thrown around but the slightly later paragraph is the real meat of the argument in my book. Machiavelli might have been a more or less complete nut job most of the time but he was a lot more astute than Caligula and in this case he is certainly making a lot of sense.

The reference is probably meant to be an intentional slur by who ever originally thought it up because I'm reasonably sure that most of the current US government's ideologues are perfectly familiar with and even fans of Machiavelli, especially in the context of his more or less correct analysis of why Caligula's (and Nero etc) downfall resulted from the actions that caused his enemies to hate rather than fear him.

Apologies for being OT - I couldn't read the article itself because of that silly registration thing required by the NYT.

You know, not all of us Republicans are "white-bunned angry hayseeds" in long-haul tractor trailers... though helvick, I am a fan of machiavelli, how'd you guess?

Me, I prefer the Medici to the Farnesi, but I wonder how realistic it is for me to suppose that I can hijack a thread on space strategy for a discussion of Renaissance Italian politics?

Since I'm a past master of hijacking threads, let me add that I also learned to like Machiavelli when I read him in college. His "Discourses" on moral philosophy reveal him to be every bit as moral as any other major political writer (and more decent than a lot of them), and make it clear that his more sinister-sounding utterances in "The Prince" were (1) a (futile) attempt to butter up the Medicis to achieve a position of power; and (2) just an indication that he was -- to quote Poul Anderson -- "an unusually clear-minded realist" who was painfully aware that in politics (especially the international variety) sometimes you really DO have to break eggs to make an omelet. One of the constant messages in "The Prince" is that you shouldn't break eggs more than is absolutely necessary, and also that you don't ever -- ever -- turn arrogant. If this Administration had read more Machiavelli, they might have performed both more competently and more morally. Unfortunately, they seem to prefer Caligula's philosophy of government.

And now back to our Regularly Scheduled Scandal. The NY Times has a piece on a session at the AAAS meeting, at which a parade of witnesses (including David Baltimore) described more instances of its trying to conceal and distort the statements of scientists, and stated that this is just part of its overall creeping-totalitarian view of proper government:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/02/19/national...agewanted=print

(Courtesy of Andrew Sullivan, who's still a registered Republican.)

Oh, I dunno, say what you like about Caligula, but he knew how to throw a party!

Bob Shaw

CLIMATE SCIENCE

- NASA Under Pressure To Ensure Researcher Independence

http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/NASA_Und...dependence.html

St Louis MO (AFP) Feb 22, 2006 - The US space agency NASA is under increasing
pressure from Congress and the scientific community to make sure its researchers
remain independent after the agency's top expert on climate publicly denounced
attempts to censor his work. The charges, first reported by The NY Times in
January, have since been confirmed by NASA public relations officials.

- Fossil Wood Gives Vital Clues To Ancient Climates

http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Fossil_W...t_Climates.html

NASA puts its weight behind warming signs

Press release on ice sheet survey follows internal changes

Following two recent studies on changes to Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets, NASA is touting a survey that it says confirms “climate warming is changing how much water remains locked in Earth’s largest storehouses of ice and snow.”

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/11745704/

-- Arctic, Antarctic Melting May Raise Sea Levels Faster than Expected
http://www.spaceref.com/news/viewpr.nl.html?pid=19357

"Ice sheets covering both the Arctic and Antarctic could melt more quickly than expected this
century, according to two studies that blend computer modeling with paleoclimate records. Led
by scientists at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and the University of
Arizona, the studies show that by 2100, Arctic summers may be as warm as they were nearly
130,000 years ago when sea levels rose to 20 feet (6 meters) higher than they are today."

Science by popular vote?

ABC News, 31 May 2006

http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/story?id=2025372&page=1

By CLAYTON SANDELL and LIZ MARLANTES

Protesters Call for Resignations, Say Government Ignoring Global Warming Effect
on Hurricanes

May 31, 2006 - To anyone who spent time watching hurricane forecasts last
summer, Max Mayfield may seem like a hero. The director of the National
Hurricane Center predicted many of the season's worst storms.

But a day before the start of the 2006 hurricane season, environmental groups
called for Mayfield and other officials at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration, or NOAA, to resign.

"I'm willing to be convinced either way here," Mayfield told ABC's Ned Potter. "I'm always looking forward to looking at new data. If I get convinced, so be it. But I'm not convinced yet."

This is horrible phrasing for a spokesman for systemic, scientific assessments of a natural phenomenon. It is akin to NASA telling a subcontract 'prove to us it will fail'.

No one is certain. Everyone not living in a cave must concede human-induced global warming is a strong possibility. Mayfield's statement indicates he does not understand the rules: We are playing Russian roulette with the only globe we have. Idiot!