The Current Occupants have come up with a better way to muzzle NASA scientists who try to tell the truth about global warming, according to the Sierra Club.
Dr. James Hansen appeared on 60 Minutes last year describing how Bush’s team altered scientific reports to falsely make climate change appear a matter of opinion. He defended his actions based on the mission of the agency he served.
Hansen…told New York Times science correspondent Andrew Revkin that it would be irresponsible for him not to speak out on global warming, particularly because NASA’s mission statement includes the phrase “to understand and protect our home planet.”
Hard to get around that…unless you’re a neocon.
As Revkin reported in the Times on July 22nd: “In early February [2006], the [NASA mission] statement was quietly altered, with the phrase ‘to understand and protect our home planet’ deleted. In this year’s budget and planning documents, the agency’s mission is ‘to pioneer the future in space exploration, scientific discovery and aeronautics research.'” A flak-catcher for NASA insisted that the change had nothing to do with Dr. Hansen’s use of the phrase.
But the change is more than skin-deep.
…recent cuts in NASA’s budget also reflect a real shift in priorities, away from science in general and earth science programs in particular. In June — more than a month before the news about the changed mission statement broke — Beth Daley reported in the Boston Globe that NASA had been forced to delay or cancel many satellite programs, including, “almost every planned earth studying mission,” that had some contribution to make to the understanding of (how’d you guess?) global warming.
Bush and his cronies seem to view space much as they do the earth: as a military tableau and potential source of wealth. To them, space is prime real estate for satellite surveillance devices and Star Wars defense shields of questionable utility. And Bush didn’t give a crap about going to the moon or Mars until someone pointed out there are valuable minerals there, just waiting to be extracted. So why not use NASA as they do all other government agencies — as a means to advance their brooding and greedy agendas?
