鈥淚T鈥橲 the economy, stupid!鈥� So said Bill Clinton, encapsulating the defining issue of the 1992 presidential election. When the race between George W. Bush and John Kerry is decided on 2 November 鈥渋t鈥� could also be Iraq or homeland security.
Climate change, globalisation, the oil economy and the politicisation of science will not be setting the voting agenda. Perhaps they should, for these are issues where American money, influence and power can shape the world. They are the global issues a president can鈥檛 ignore.
鈥淎T ITS birth two centuries ago, this republic was governed by men who had a deeper understanding of science than most of their successors. The Founding Fathers were children of the Enlightenment, of the Age of Reason. Today we are governed by people who do not believe in evolution. They have few qualms about distorting scientific knowledge when it does not conform to their political agenda. They speak as if they are entitled not only to their own opinions but also to their own facts.鈥�
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So said Kurt Gottfried, chairman of the Union of Concerned Scientists, in the opening passage of a damning report released in July on the politicisation of science in 21st-century America. Put bluntly, Gottfried鈥檚 charge, and that of the UCS, is that President Bush does not understand science. He has little interest in the subject, and his administration has grossly manipulated the process by which objective science informs policy. As a result, the US has made the wrong decisions over issues such as climate change, energy, reproductive health and the environment.
It is a provocative and often repeated charge, one whose implications go beyond America鈥檚 borders. The US stance on global warming and energy use inevitably affects the world. But of the countries that are members of the OECD, the US spends 44 per cent of the total funding allocated to research and development, and hosts 37 per cent of the scientists, making any issue with American science an issue for world science. So does the charge stick?
鈥淭his administration has a clear record of interfering in the scientific process,鈥� says Democratic congressman Henry Waxman, who has been a standard-bearer for scientists critical of Bush. 鈥淭here is a repeated pattern of distorting science to support a narrow political or ideological agenda.鈥�
In August 2003, Waxman issued a report detailing instances of alleged misuse of science by the administration. This was followed by two similar reports in February and July from the UCS. These were accompanied by a letter critical of the administration that has now been signed by over 5000 scientists, including 48 Nobel laureates and 127 members of the National Academy of Sciences.
Republicans have dismissed the campaign as politically motivated. But Gottfried, a physicist at Cornell University in New York, denies that the signatories are merely a collection of the usual Bush-hating suspects. 鈥淢any people who signed have never signed political statements of any kind,鈥� he says. What鈥檚 more, he points out that some of them are lifelong Republicans.
The UCS charge sheet covers a multitude of sins. One of the most persistent is that scientists serving on government advisory committees are appointed for their political views rather than their scientific expertise.
From 1998 to 2003, Gerald Keusch was associate director of the Fogarty International Center, part of the National Institutes of 午夜福利1000集合. He says the contrast between the Clinton and Bush administrations is stark. Under Clinton, all seven of his suggested appointees to his scientific advisory committee, which makes recommendations on public health issues in the developing world, such as stemming the spread of HIV, were approved within three weeks. Under Bush, 19 candidates out of 26 were rejected. In some cases the Department of 午夜福利1000集合 and Human Services (HHS) took many months to make its decision.
When Keusch queried one tranche of rejections he was told that one candidate had been rejected because of her pro-abortion stance, a second was unsuitable because of her involvement with an organisation promoting contraception, and a third, a Nobel laureate, had 鈥渟igned too many letters in The New York Times critical of President Bush鈥�.
鈥淭he attitude of HHS towards scientists has been one of disdain,鈥� Keusch told New Scientist. 鈥淭here is clearly a concern about people who think individually.鈥� Other candidates for scientific advisory positions have reportedly been asked by administration officials who they voted for in the last election, and what they think of President Bush.
The response from many Republicans to such complaints is simply 鈥渢ough鈥�. Every administration, they say, has the right to put its friends in high places. 鈥淚f this is such a major issue why did they not object when Mr Clinton hired primarily Democrats for his scientific staff and scientific appointments?鈥� says Vernon Ehlers, a Republican congressman who sits on the House Committee on Science. 鈥淚 would wonder about a president who didn鈥檛 ask those questions,鈥� echoes fellow committee member and Republican Michael Burgess.
Another serious charge is that the administration decides on the answer it wants from science, then manipulates the scientific process to support that conclusion. A now famous example concerns alleged White House interference with a report in June 2003 from the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA). The report was billed as 鈥渁 frank discussion of what we know 鈥� and what we don鈥檛 know 鈥� about the condition of our nation鈥檚 environment鈥�. But it did not mention what many environmentalists regard as the gravest threat: climate change.
UCS claims that the EPA ended up dropping a chapter on global warming after extensive interference from White House officials. According to an internal EPA memo they demanded so many qualifiers in the text that the result would have given the impression of 鈥渦ncertainty鈥� where there is essentially none鈥�.
John Marburger, the White House science adviser, plays down the incident. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 a spurious case,鈥� he told New Scientist, pointing out that another report due for release weeks later dealt with climate change in depth. He says the administration is very careful about how it describes climate change, because of the issue鈥檚 political sensitivity. In the case of the EPA report, he says there wasn鈥檛 time to resolve differences over the wording. 鈥淥ther people, usually scientists, can鈥檛 see the point of making those fine distinctions,鈥� he adds.
The UCS cites numerous other examples, including industry insiders being placed on committees, spurious scientific evidence being used to promote sexual abstinence, and scientists being told they must represent the federal government鈥檚 line when working with international organisations.
Marburger accepts that some of the incidents cited by UCS should not have happened, but he argues that a collection of anecdotes does not add up to a master plan. Their report 鈥渢ends to short-circuit serious discussion of the very issues they raise by sweeping them into a conspiracy theory鈥�, he says. 鈥淚 just don鈥檛 buy that.鈥� What鈥檚 more, he points to the large funding increases enjoyed by science under Bush. If you include the current budget request, research and development investment will have increased 44 per cent since Bush took office.
So what鈥檚 really going on? Bruce Alberts, head of the National Academy of Sciences, does not believe there is a systematic pattern of manipulation. 鈥淚n both administrations I have observed there have been attempts to twist science to meet the agenda,鈥� he says. 鈥淲hat鈥檚 happening in this administration may be different in magnitude, but it鈥檚 certainly not different in character.鈥� In other words, it was ever thus.
So why are scientists so critical of the Bush administration? Alberts believes that under the Clinton administration, scientists found the outcome more palatable because they more often agreed with the resulting policy. And opinion polls tend to show that scientists overwhelmingly vote Democrat. They also dislike the centralising tendencies of the Bush administration, which they believe restricts their autonomy.
Kathy Hudson, director of the Genetics and Public Policy Center in Washington DC, accepts that all administrations create advisory committees in their own image. But she says the contrast between the Bush and Clinton administrations is particularly stark because Clinton and his vice-president, Al Gore, shared a genuine enthusiasm for science. 鈥淚t鈥檚 been a big comedown for scientists,鈥� she says. 鈥淭his administration has not been particularly excited about science.鈥�
With an election looming, the relationship between the objective discipline of science and the dirty business of politics has never been more fragile.