William Deutsch tried suppressing warnings from NASA experts about climate change which went against the Bush administration policy. Then he was exposed for lying on his resume and now he’s gone.
Which political hack from the Administration of the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) might take a fall for cutting the funding from Oregon State University research that concluded federally sponsored logging after the 2002 Biscuit fire in southwest Oregon actually slowed the recovery of forests.
An article in The Oregonian stated, “Administrators at OSU and scientists elsewhere said they could not recall another instance of the federal government suspending funding for research after controversial results emerge.”
The article concluded with:
Kennedy, the editor of Science, said he could not see how Donato’s paper could be seen as trying to influence legislation. The research findings might be influential, he said, but to bar them “would cripple anyone from ever working on a science problem with a policy impact.”
Andy Stahl, executive director of Forest Service Employees for Environmental Ethics, said the suspension of funding was a “shot across the bows” to researchers who produce findings the government does not like.
“Either way, the administration, regardless of the outcome of this incident, has made its message clear,” he said. “You knuckle under and give us the results we want, or we won’t fund you.”
Regardless of whether another Bush appointee loses their job at the BLM, how many more are out there suppressing research that goes against the Bush administration’s policy?
Andy Hailey