In the middle of today’s economic address by the President-elect you will find mentions of investment in science and technology as well as infrastructure.  In fact, the President-elect made a better effort of noting how science and technology investment is necessary for the infrastructure investments he wants than what I’ve seen from others trying to engage the issue.  From the address:

To build an economy that can lead this future, we will begin to rebuild America.  Yes, we’ll put people to work repairing crumbling roads, bridges, and schools by eliminating the backlog of well-planned, worthy and needed infrastructure projects.  But we’ll also do more to retrofit America for a global economy.  That means updating the way we get our electricity by starting to build a new smart grid that will save us money, protect our power sources from blackout or attack, and deliver clean, alternative forms of energy to every corner of our nation.  It means expanding broadband lines across America, so that a small business in a rural town can connect and compete with their counterparts anywhere in the world.  And it means investing in the science, research, and technology that will lead to new medical breakthroughs, new discoveries, and entire new industries.

While the other priorities listed in the speech (clean energy, computerized medical records, school equipment) will benefit science and technology research (and vice versa), it is in the above paragraph where the connection is most explicit.  Of course, this is not a main point of the speech, nor are the relevant science and technology communities the primary audience for the speech.  But persistent axioms of science policy can start from references peppered in speeches and minor documents.  I hope to see this argument from the President-elect’s speech reiterated in other policy documents and addresses