More complaints from the know-nothing, liberal elite:

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February 18, 2004

Preeminent Scientists Protest Bush Administration's Misuse of Science

Nobel Laureates, National Medal of Science Recipients, and Other Leading
Researchers Call for End to Scientific Abuses

Washington, D.C.-Today, more than 60 leading scientists-including Nobel
laureates, leading medical experts, former federal agency directors and university
chairs and presidents-issued a statement calling for regulatory and
legislative action to restore scientific integrity to federal policymaking. According to
the scientists, the Bush administration has, among other abuses, suppressed
and distorted scientific analysis from federal agencies, and taken actions that
have undermined the quality of scientific advisory panels.

"Across a broad range of issues, the administration has undermined the
quality of the scientific advisory system and the morale of the government's
outstanding scientific personnel," said Dr. Kurt Gottfried, emeritus professor of
physics at Cornell University and Chairman of the Union of Concerned Scientists.
"Whether the issue is lead paint, clean air or climate change, this behavior
has serious consequences for all Americans."

"Science, to quote President Bush's father, the former president, relies on
freedom of inquiry and objectivity," said Russell Train, head of the
Environmental Protection Agency under Nixon and Ford, who joined the scientists in
calling for action. "But this administration has obstructed that freedom and
distorted that objectivity in ways that were unheard of in any previous
administration."

The statement notes that while scientific input to the government is rarely
the only factor in public policy decisions, this input should be weighed from
an objective and impartial perspective. However, the administration of George
W. Bush has disregarded this principle.

"The Earth system follows laws which scientists strive to understand," said
Dr. F. Sherwood Rowland a Nobel laureate in chemistry. "The public deserves
rational decisionmaking based on the best scientific advice about what is likely
to happen, not what political entities might wish to happen."
"We are not simply raising warning flags about an academic subject of
interest only to scientists and doctors," said Dr. Neal Lane, a former director of
the National Science Foundation and a former Presidential Science Advisor. "In
case after case, scientific input to policymaking is being censored and
distorted. This will have serious consequences for public health."

In conjunction with the statement, the Union of Concerned Scientists today
released a report Scientific Integrity in Policymaking that investigates
numerous allegations in the scientists' statement involving censorship and political
interference with independent scientific inquiry at the Environmental
Protection Agency, the Food and Drug Administration, and the Departments of Health and
Human Services, Agriculture, Interior and Defense.

One example cited in the statement and report involves the suppression of an
EPA study that found the bipartisan Senate Clear Air bill would do more to
reduce mercury contamination in fish and prevent more deaths than the
administration's proposed Clear Skies Act. "This is akin to the White House directing the
National Weather Service to alter a hurricane forecast because they want
everyone to think we have clear skies ahead," said Kevin Knobloch, president of
the Union of Concerned Scientists "The hurricane is still coming, but without
factual information no one will be ready for it."

Comparing President Bush with his father, George H.W. Bush and former
president Richard M. Nixon, the statement warned that had these former presidents
similarly dismissed science in favor of political ends, over 200,000 deaths and
millions of respiratory and cardiovascular disease cases would not have been
prevented with the signing of the original Clean Air Act and the 1990 amendments
to that Act.

The statement demands that the Bush administration's "distortion of
scientific knowledge for partisan political ends must cease" and calls for
Congressional oversight hearings, guaranteed public access to government scientific
studies and other measures to prevent such abuses in the future. The statement
further calls on the scientific, engineering and medical communities to work
together to reestablish scientific integrity in the policymaking process.

# # #
Among the statement signers are:
Philip W. Anderson**
David Baltimore**
Paul Berg**
Lewis Branscomb
Thomas Eisner*
Jerome Friedman*
Richard Garwin*
Walter Kohn**
Neal Lane
Leon Lederman**
Mario Molina*
W.K.H. Panofsky*
F. Sherwood Rowland*
J. Robert Schrieffer**
Richard Smalley*
Harold E. Varmus*
Steven Weinberg**
E.O Wilson*
* National Medal of Science
** Nobel laureate

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For the complete statement, list of original signers, the report, and more:

     http://www.ucsusa.org/global_environment/rsi/index.cfm

Wirt Atmar

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