Bush's Bad Science Horrifies Scientists

[suedanim]

Isn't this exactly the same pattern gw and his administration followed regarding Iraq, terrorists and pre-9/11 data??

This administrations track record is worse on environment and science than Ronald Reagan's and thats say a LOT.

Scientists horrified by Bush's Bad Science (http://www.theregister.co.uk/2004/07/12/bush_bad_science///url)
By Ashlee Vance in Chicago
Published Monday 12th July 2004 17:21 GMT

What started as a group of 62 scientists fighting what they saw as Bad Science being practiced by the Bush administration has now bloated to a body with more than 4,000 whitecoats calling for change.

The Union of Concerned Scientists (UCS), in a new report, has again expressed its feeling of "embarrassment and disgust" over the way the Bush administration uses - or misuses - science when making policy decisions. The scientists have found that the administration often ignores the recommendations of advisory panels and "suppresses, distorts and manipulates" scientific work. In particular, the group is concerned about Bad Science affecting environment, emergency contraception and endangered species policies .

UCS issued a previous complaint in February with 62 signatures but has amassed over 4,000 signatures for its latest report released this month. The signers include 48 Nobel laureates, 62 National Medal of Science recipients and 127 members of the National Academy of Sciences.

"The actions by the Bush administration threaten to undermine the morale and compromise the integrity of scientists working for and advising America’s world-class governmental research institutions and agencies," UCS said. "Not only does the public expect and deserve government to provide it with accurate information, the government has a responsibility to ensure that policy decisions are not based on intentionally or knowingly flawed science. To do so carries serious implications for the health, safety, and environment of all Americans."

To its credit, UCS has laid out specific instances where it believe the Bush administration ignored science - the first being an environmental impact statement (EIS) on mountaintop removal mining in Appalachia. As it turns out, the removal of mountain ridges to reveal coal punishes the environment near the mines.

"Scientists working for various federal agencies have documented a wide range of enormously destructive environmental impacts from this mining technique," the UCS said. "More than 7 percent of Appalachian forests have been cut down and more than 1,200 miles of streams across the region have been buried or polluted between 1985 and 2001.

"According to the federal government’s scientific analysis, mountaintop removal mining, if it continues unabated, will cause a projected loss of more than 1.4 million acres by the end of the next decade - an area the size of Delaware - with a concomitant, severe impact on fish, wildlife, and bird species, not to mention a devastating effect on many neighboring communities."

The EIS presented by scientists had over 5,000 pages detailing the destructive nature of this type of mining. The Bush administration, however, "softened" the report by ordering words such as "significant" and "severe" to be excised from the documents and by massaging economic data. Scientists were politely told that the EIS "was going to be taken in a different direction."

A number of scientists complained that no alternative to mountaintop removal mining was even considered when that is supposed to be part of any EIS.

UCS is also upset by an FDA (Food and Drug Administration) official's decision to ban "Plan B" - a drug for preventing pregnancy up to 72 hours after sex - from being prescribed.

"In the case, Steven Galson, acting director of the FDA’s Center for Drug Evaluation and Research, acknowledged to reporters recently that he overturned the recommendations of his own staff and two FDA advisory panels in declaring the drug “not approvable” for nonprescription status," said UCS. "A joint meeting of two independent FDA scientific advisory committees voted 23 to 4 in December 2003 to recommend the emergency contraceptive as an over-the-counter drug. The panel also voted unanimously that the drug could be safely sold over the counter."

Overwhelming testimony by doctors pointed to the drug being safe and effective at preventing unwanted pregnancies.

"Nonetheless, Dr. Galson broke with agency protocol by overruling FDA staff scientists who had concluded that this drug met FDA criteria for nonprescription status and overwhelmingly recommended the switch," UCS said. "In overruling his staff and the advisory committee, Galson offered no substantial new evidence, and took the unusual step of writing the official response to the drug company himself."

At least you can't accuse Bush of bowing to the pharmaceutical industry here.

On the subject of endangered species, UCS is particularly concerned with the Bush administration's salmon policy. A number of scientists have argued that wild fish and hatchery fish should be kept separate when counting the population of a particular species. This seems to make sense - best to gauge the success of a population by looking at it in the wild rather than in a petri dish. Ah, but no fast.

"The development of a new Bush administration policy on hatchery fish was overseen by Mark Rutzick, who early in 2003 was appointed by President Bush as special adviser to the NOAA General Counsel," UCS said. "Previously, Rutzick served as a lawyer for the timber industry and was a strong opponent of fish and wildlife protections that logging companies viewed as overly restrictive. Rutzick first proposed the strategy of including hatchery fish in population counts for endangered salmon while he worked on behalf of timber interests."

After taking some criticism over Rutzick, the Bush administration did make some changes to its proposed hatchery policy but still a number of population counts combine wild and hatchery fish for certain species.

The UCS report points out several other instances where Bush's endangered species policies resemble those of a nineteenth-century fur trader. The report also documents a number of scientists complaining that they were asked who they had voted for in the Presidential elections when being interviewed for various scientific panels.

In total, UCS called for the Bush administration to have a much more open, investigative approach to scientific matters. Something along the the lines of actually considering the evidence presented. ®

[thaanatos]

"More than 7 percent of Appalachian forests have been cut down and more than 1,200 miles of streams across the region have been buried or polluted between 1985 and 2001.
what could Bush have been thinking of when he permitted this to happen?

A number of scientists have argued that wild fish and hatchery fish should be kept separate when counting the population of a particular species.
so if there are ten billion fish in a river and only a hundred of them are wild and the others were stocked there, the fish are endangered?

[lily]

What surprises me Sue is that this surprises you.

so if there are ten billion fish in a river and only a hundred of them are wild and the others were stocked there, the fish are endangered?

Wouldn't it be telling him that the waters were poluted, thus making them endangered?

[suedanim]

There are a number of reactions I have at the Bush admin's treatment of science and environmental issues.. surprise is not one of them, lilly.

I am though very pleased at the unity in the science and research community.

[thaanatos]

Wouldn't it be telling him that the waters were poluted, thus making them endangered?

nope, if both the ten billion planted fish AND the 100 wild ones were dying it would tell you the waters were polluted and killing fish.....a river with 10 billion fish is a healthy river even if most of them are fish that have been restored.....if there is a forest fire and we go in and replant a billion trees, do we go in and say there is no forest because we only count the trees that grew from wild stock? No, you count the trees that are growing there.....

[thaanatos]

I am though very pleased at the unity in the science and research community.
4000 signatures? Wonder what percentage that makes up....1%, 2%?

[lily]

nope, if both the ten billion planted fish AND the 100 wild ones were dying it would tell you the waters were polluted and killing fish.....a river with 10 billion fish is a healthy river even if most of them are fish that have been restored.....

If this hypothical river had enough healthy fish to begin with......why would it need planted fish?

[thaanatos]

If this hypothical river had enough healthy fish to begin with......why would it need planted fish?
it wouldn't......but if it was polluted in the 60s and fish were an endangered species, but we restored the river and stocked it with fish and now it has billions of fish.....doesn't a restriction that we can only count the fish that were there before we restocked it lead to the incorrect conclusion that the river is STILL polluted? I say we count the fish in the river....and reach a conclusion as to whether it is polluted from that data....

[Fredfredson]

The issue WRT the Salmon count is not that the river is polluted but that the habitat is endangered.

The guy who was responsible for changing the way the salmon were counted was a TIMBER INDUSTRY rep/lobbyist. The timber industry doesn't necessarily pollute the rivers but they screw up the watersheds in a way that prevents natural salmon spawning. The only way to keep salmon in these rivers is to use hatchery raised fingerlings.

If we don't keep track of the wild populations the real ecological health of the river system is masked.

a river with 10 billion fish is a healthy river even if most of them are fish that have been restored.....

QED

It may not be a "healthy" river as salmon are a peak species, if their spawning is damaged the rest of the system is probably compromised seriously as well. We will never know if the mesurements that can tell us what's happening are politically manipulated.

F
:pooter

[thaanatos]

by why is it only relevant if 'wild' salmon are spawning as opposed to both 'wild' and 'hatchery' salmon spawning

[Zan de Man]

Because farmed salmon, like people who live too close together, harbour diseases that kill outsiders without immunity - or the huge doses of antibiotics added to their food intake.

I never agreed with you Thaan, but I used to think you had a brain.

[thaanatos]

Zan, please get with the story here.....this article is not about objecting to stocking fish.....if it were your comment about diseases might have been relevant to the issue.....these fish have already been released and they have passed all their 'diseases' on to the wild fish already.....

what we are talking about is whether it is 'bad science' to count all the fish in the river instead of only the wild fish.....your comment has no bearing on that issue, nor does your incorrect assumption about my brain....go sit in the corner with ninjafawn......you are starting to sound like him....

[sinterest]

All make points but Thaan is right. Some are arguing apples and oranges.
If we forbade fishing entirely, we would not have to stock. Bush is not helping the environment, but thank god others have. Rivers are much better since my childhood and Bush wants to slow it down to save industries money so they can invest and hire more people. I don't agree with him - it's the OLE trickledown.
But environmentalists are to the environment as Hawks are to war.
Their myopic views are counter productive to their causes.

If we all would start caring more about what is “The Right Thing” (result) instead of wanting “to be right”

I bet many don’t discern the difference – I hope all my fellow posters do.

[jpn of Seattle]

But environmentalists are to the environment as Hawks are to war. Their myopic views are counter productive to their causes.

I don't know how myopic it is to try to protect our natural world, but I know what you're getting at. I think the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge is a good example. I think we could allow a certain amount of drilling without it being the end of the world, and at the same time the conservatives need to be less rapacious.
But non-ideological statesmen who can make reasonable compromises seem to be a thing of the past.

[jpn of Seattle]

The Republican's new buzz phrase is "sound science." When you hear that phrase, beware:

Dig into the origins of the phrase "sound science" as a slogan in policy disputes, and its double meaning becomes clearer. That use of the term goes back to a campaign waged by the tobacco industry to undermine the indisputable connection between smoking and disease. Industry documents released as a result of tobacco litigation show that in 1993 Philip Morris and its public relations firm, APCO Associates, created a nonprofit front group called The Advancement of Sound Science Coalition (TASSC) to fight against the regulation of cigarettes. To mask its true purpose, TASSC assembled a range of anti-regulatory interests under one umbrella. The group also challenged the now widely accepted notion that secondhand smoke poses health risks.
Since then, other industry groups have invoked "sound science" to ease government restrictions. In 1996, Jerry J. Jasinowski, president of the National Association of Manufacturers, said GOP presidential candidate Bob Dole's "emphasis on sound science, the need to apply cost-benefit analyses and finding some way to enforce common sense in the regulatory process are most important to the business community." In April 2001, Vice President Cheney's energy task force urged the Interior Department to open up more of Alaska for oil and gas drilling based on "sound science and the best available technology." Last October, Allen James, president of Responsible Industry for a Sound Environment, a group of manufacturers and suppliers of pest management products, urged the use of pesticides to kill disease-carrying mosquitoes in a letter to the Post. "As a citizen, I expect my elected officials to consider sound science in making decisions that affect my health and the health of my neighbors. Sound science says pesticide sprays are safe and effective," he wrote.
Recently, the Department of Health and Human Services, citing the need for "sound science," challenged a World Health Organization report linking obesity to soft drinks, junk food and fast food. "Only by employing open and transparent processes that are science-based and peer-reviewed can the WHO . . . produce a credible product," HHS said.
The administration has tampered with the scientific process at the personnel level, too. In a January 2003 editorial titled "An Epidemic of Politics," Science magazine editor in chief Donald Kennedy lamented the politicization of scientific advisory committees -- a little noticed alphabet soup of boards, panels and study groups sometimes called the "Fifth Branch" of government -- across numerous federal agencies.
By Chris Mooney
Sunday, February 29, 2004; Page B02

[thaanatos]

The Republican's new buzz phrase is "sound science." When you hear that phrase, beware:


is it okay if we 'beware' when we hear other buzz phrases as well? :rollin

the group is concerned about Bad Science

[sinterest]

I think we could allow a certain amount of drilling without it being the end of the world, and at the same time the conservatives need to be less rapacious.
But non-ideological statesmen who can make reasonable compromises seem to be a thing of the past.
_________________

Couldn't agree more - appreciated you post as well.

We need to immediately reduce our oil usage (which takes immediate effect) save the little oil we have left for use when we learn to use it intelligently.

[Fredfredson]

by why is it only relevant if 'wild' salmon are spawning as opposed to both 'wild' and 'hatchery' salmon spawning

I'm assuming you don't know what a "Hatchery" is...

The way it works is that they catch the salmon on their way upstream to the now destroyed spawning grounds. Then they squeeze out the eggs from the females and the sperm from the males, mix it together in a bucket and dump it into a tank filled with water and floored with gravel.
Once the fingerlings hatch they take them in another truck up to near where the spawning grounds used to be, before the timber companies destroyed the watershed and pump them back into the river.

That is why it is critical to count the natural salmon ONLY. We have no way to know how the healthy the river system is because the real situation is masked by this artificial abundance of salmon.

If the environmental degradation continues THERE WILL BE NO SALMON WITHOUT HUMAN INTERVENTION.

But it all looks rosy if we count the hatchery ones as well.

F
:pooter

[thaanatos]

well, correct me if I am wrong, but I believe we are talking about counting adult fish, not fingerlings.....I don't care if they came from hatcheries or the wild.....if the river is full of growing and grown fish we are doing something right.....

[Fredfredson]

Thaan

The problem is that we are counting adult fish WHO ESSENTIALLY DID NOT COME FROM THE RIVER WE ARE STUDYING.

You do know where salmon live 90% of their lives, right?

(hint: it is very salty)

The reason for counting the salmon in the first place is so that we can understand the dynamics of their population. This is for ECONOMIC purposes, because catching the salmon is a commercial enterprise, and also scientific purposes because the health of the NATURAL salmon population is part of the picture of the health of the river system.

Perhaps an analogy from cattle ranching would help. The health of cattle living on an open range is a pretty good indication of the health of the rangeland. If the cattle are starving the range is probably overgrazed or otherwise degraded. Now instead of checking only the range fed cattle lets cloud the statistics with FEEDLOT cattle. How useful are those statistics if what we are trying to understand is the rangeland?

F
:pooter

[thaanatos]

very bad analogy...feedlot cattle are not living on the open range with the rest of the cattle.....I don't care if the fish (or cattle) are natives or stocked.....the issue is whether the river (or the range) is healthy enough to keep them alive.....it sound to me that the article is advocating 'bad science' instead of adequately attacking it....

[Fredfredson]

:lol

As insightful as ever where science is concerned I see.

We won't know about the health of the river because the hatchery fish are counted on their way downriver. We can't tell which is which WHEN THEY COME BACK FROM THE FUCKING SEA!!!!

That means the river could be totally fucked up WRT the natural conditions that will permit salmon to spawn, AND WE WILL NEVER KNOW.

Just because the fingerlings survive till they get washed into the sea after being dumped into the river IN THE MILLIONS doesn't mean that the RIVER is HEALTHY as a functioning ecosystem. Destruction of the spawning areas for salmon also impacts thousands of other species as well as water quality, erosion and sedimentation rates etc.

We could run them into the sea via big pipe and the result would be the same.

The problem here is that by forcing the statistics on salmon populations to include the hatchery fish we HIDE the condition of the headwaters where the salmon, and many other non-commercial species, spawn.

It is NOT a coincidence that a TIMBER company rep/lobbyist was responsible for this change as the Timber Companies are the ones who cause the most damage to salmon spawning areas.

It's nice to see that their effort to cloud the issue and confuse people who don't understand science wasn't a total failure, eh Thaan? :/

F
:pooter

[ninjalooter1701]

Par for the course.

[thaanatos]

We won't know about the health of the river because the hatchery fish are counted on their way downriver. We can't tell which is which WHEN THEY COME BACK FROM THE FUCKING SEA!!!!

say, do you think that may be my point? what do you think.....a fish spends its entire youth in a river, goes out to sea, comes back to lay eggs....and you can't tell it apart from a native fish......wow.....and its alive.....and we can count how many of them there are......say, if there's lots....maybe the river is okay.....if there ain't maybe the river isn't okay......say, maybe that isn't bad science......

sorry if I am not as 'insightful' as you Fred, but to be honest, from this angle you don't look to sharp.....sure your not hatchery stock?

[thaanatos]

Par for the course.
and another double bogey for Ninny....

[Fredfredson]

Thaanatos

If we don't have a hatchery and the spawning grounds are destroyed how many salmon would we have?

The answer is NONE.

That means that we have destroyed the viability of the river to support fish populations like the salmon which need these areas to spawn,

Despite what it looks like your lawn isn't a functioning prairie ecosystem.

Salmon are the top of the (economic) food chain for major west coast riverine systems. Consequently they are the ones most effected by headwater erosion and habitat destruction. It is important to understand that they are not the only species which depend on these areas. In addition these areas are crucial to the health and wellbeing of the entire watersheds. This includes the economic and financial effects of silting up our commercial ship channels and harbours because some greedy timer company can't be bothered to protect the watersheds around the headwaters of these rivers.

By including the hatchery fish in the counts we LOOSE ONE OF THE MAJOR MEASUREMENTS we use to determine what is happening in these complex ecological systems.

This move is a cynical attempt to get the Timber companies off the hook by making it look like everything is rosy because, hey, we have lots of salmon right?

what do you think.....a fish spends its entire youth in a river, goes out to sea, comes back to lay eggs....and you can't tell it apart from a native fish......wow.....and its alive.....and we can count how many of them there are......say, if there's lots....maybe the river is okay.....if there ain't maybe the river isn't okay......say, maybe that isn't bad science......


QED

Just for fun let's take it one bit at a time:

"a fish spends its entire youth in a river, goes out to sea, comes back to lay eggs...."

Salmon hatch in May and spend only about a month or so living in the upper reaches of the river before heading towards the sea. Most have entered the sea by June or July and remain at sea for anywhere from 1 to 5 YEARS. They then return to the same river in which they were hatched (or released in the case of hatchery fish). They then migrate up the river to the SAME spawning area in which they were hatched. Hatchery fish will try to do the same but usually their success rate is seriously reduced because unless they are lucky it is unlikely that they were released in areas that would be good NATURAL spawning areas. Hatchery officials try to do this as best they can however.

Salmon returning to the rivers DO NOT EAT they exist solely on their stored reserves of fat.

"and you can't tell it apart from a native fish......wow....."

Correct as noted above. This is why it is important to count the fish that did NOT come from a hatchery because they are the ones that the river supports and whose spawning areas are undisturbed.

"and its alive.....and we can count how many of them there are......say, if there's lots....maybe the river is okay.....if there ain't maybe the river isn't okay......"

That would be fine if the point of the exercise was SIMPLY TO COUNT THE SALMON but it isn't. The counting process is part of a monitoring system that is used to determine if the river systems are endangered. The counts are also used to enable proper monitoring of the HATCHERY PROGRAM ITSELF! If we do not know how the natural fish stocks are fairing we cannot properly adjust the hatchery program to prevent damge to the breeding stock of the fish on which the hatchery system depends.

"say, maybe that isn't bad science...... "

Again if the point is simply to count the salmon it's fine but it's more complex than that. The manipulation of the process by lobbyists for political purposes IS BAD SCIENCE.

F
:pooter

[thaanatos]

Again if the point is simply to count the salmon it's fine but it's more complex than that. The manipulation of the process by lobbyists for political purposes IS BAD SCIENCE.

and that is precisely what I see happening when librulls raise this issue....using science for political purposes


to be honest, I am getting very bored with talking about fish....my point is simply this...a fish is a fish, and if it survived long enough to get back to the river and spawn then the river didn't kill it....I don't care whether it was a restocked fish or from wild stock a million generations old....if the river isn't letting fish survive of either kind then it is being polluted....if the river is letting fish survive of either kind then it isn't being polluted

I am moving on to other threads...

[LottomagicZ4941]

intresting

Just doing a little bottem fishing and found this thread.

Why didn't Noah fish?

He only had two worms.

[CockySOB]

well, correct me if I am wrong, but I believe we are talking about counting adult fish, not fingerlings.....I don't care if they came from hatcheries or the wild.....if the river is full of growing and grown fish we are doing something right.....

As long as the propogation method nearly matches the natural process (i.e. no cloning or genetic tampering) then you are correct, I think.

[Fredfredson]

:dunno

Did you read the thead Cocky?

My point was (and obviously wasted on Thaan) that this is a much bigger issue than simply "number of fish".

F
:pooter

[CockySOB]

:dunno

Did you read the thead Cocky?

My point was (and obviously wasted on Thaan) that this is a much bigger issue than simply "number of fish".

F
:pooter

Yup, I read it. I also know and agree with your point that the need for hatcheries should point out an environmental change which can, and most likely will, impact the rest of the local ecosystem and possibly the larger ecosystems.

But I do agree that hatcheries provide a necessary stop-gap in preventing or slowing the negative impact of the destruction of their breeding grounds.

[Fredfredson]

OK

Thanks for clarifying. :wave

F
:pooter

[jpn of Seattle]

Feb, 2004: The Union of Concerned Scientists has issued a report describing how deeply the ideological tentacles of the Bush administration have extended into the process of scientific research in America. In a lot of ways it represents one of the most chilling aspects of the Bush administration: they just don't care about facts. They want to do what they want to do regardless of whether it will work or whether it makes sense, and this extends to economic policymaking, war planning, and now even scientific studies

[jpn of Seattle]

John DiIulio, former White House official:
There were no actual policy white papers on domestic issues. There were, truth be told, only a couple of people in the West Wing who worried at all about policy substance and analysis, and they were even more overworked than the stereotypical nonstop, twenty-hour-a-day White House staff. Every modern presidency moves on the fly, but on social policy and related issues, the lack of even basic policy knowledge, and the only casual interest in knowing more, was somewhat breathtaking: discussions by fairly senior people who meant Medicaid but were talking Medicare; near-instant shifts from discussing any actual policy pros and cons to discussing political communications, media strategy, et cetera. Even quite junior staff would sometimes hear quite senior staff pooh-pooh any need to dig deeper for pertinent information on a given issue.
Bush’s staff consistently talked and acted as if the height of political sophistication consisted in reducing every issue to its simplest, black-and-white terms for public consumption, then steering legislative initiatives or policy proposals as far right as possible.
There is no precedent in any modern White House for what is going on in this one: a complete lack of policy apparatus. What you got is everything-and I mean everything—run by the political arm. It’s the reign of the Mayberry Machiavellis.