JLVernonPhD presents "American SciCo"

It would be arrogant of me to assume that Chris Mooney was speaking directly to me in his most recent post at DESMOGBLOG.COM, but for the sake of this blog post, I’ll pretend that he was.  After all, when reading his article, I couldn’t help but feel that he was criticizing specific arguments posed in my most recent blog post that might make it seem as though I am a closet Obama hater.

In his piece, Mooney defends the Obama administration against accusations of abuses of science and scientific integrity.  I support Chris in his effort to protect our very “science friendly” president.  Obama has become a hero to me and the scientific community by appointing one of the most spectacular science and technology advisory councils in history and allocating billions of dollars for research and development.  He has taken brave steps toward the restoration of science to a nonpartisan and honorable force in federal policy making.  There have been few presidents who have been so friendly to science.  Shall I go on?

All these things are true, but, in some cases, I feel that scientists are being treated as a constituency rather than part of an institution.  

Recent events have forced me be skeptical of certain members of the administration.  These events were covered in detail in my recent post.  It is not that I have lost my appreciation for the championing that the administration has done in the name of science.  It is that I do not believe that we should look away simply because they have been so supportive.  I do not believe we should be blinded by the ARRA bling. Cha ching! 

We must hold the Obama administration to the same standard to which we held the Bush administration.  Of course the Bush administration was more brazen and carefree about their transgressions, but that doesn’t mean we can give Obama a get out of jail free card just because we have drinks with him on Saturday nights, if you know what I mean.  That’s just another form of cronyism.  Some call this drinking the kool-aid.

In regards to the recent “abuse charge” in which the White House has been accused of skewing an Interior Department report, Mooney states that there are “people who aren’t using the proper analytical criteria to assess whether a serious abuse of science actually did occur, and whether it’s in any way comparable to the Bush era abuses.”  This is where I felt that Mooney was sticking his writing pen directly into my side.  I will grant him that the officials involved apologized effusively, but we are at the mercy of our own gullibility as to whether they are truly remorseful.  Would they have been so apologetic had they not been called out by the scientists?  We may never know.  What I would like to know is, as Mooney points out:

“Why has no change been made to the online version of the report to reflect that this mistake was made?”

Mooney has chosen to give the president the benefit of the doubt on these issues whereas with the previous administration, science transgressions were cool, calculated deceptions.  For me, it’s not so cut and dry.  Even though the Obama administration has been undeniably supportive of science, they have been slow to respond to the obvious corruption that remains in our government.  The 18-month delay on the delivery of the OSTP scientific integrity guidelines offers little comfort.  However, because I bought into the “HOPE” that Obama offered during his campaign, I remain a steadfast supporter of this administration.  I just refuse to be an “okey doke.”

Merry Christmas!