Why can’t a Republican with different values but who supports the scientific process also find it better for Bush to do as Clinton did, and simply say stem cells are a moral issue and regardless of the number of cell lines, he doesn’t think they ought to be used? Then even though our values differ, I would not have a problem with it. That is acceptable political discourse. If DeLay acted as Clinton had, he wouldn’t have accused Schiavo’s husband of attempted murder or claimed she was responsive, but said regardless of her mental state, killing her is wrong. After all, isn’t their stand that ANY life is valuable? If they took that position, despite my disagreements in terms of values, I could have a reasonable debate. I would look forward to it. The fact that our values differ is fine. It’s the fact that they are afraid to debate these values in the open, so they have to malign and distort to prevent that values debate from occuring.

If you think a stem cell is human life, then don’t hide behind faked numbers. Stand up for what you believe in. If mental vegetables should not be taken off their feeding tubes, regardless of whether they’ll come out of it – fine. Stop hiding behind character assassination and bogus medical diagnoses and say so.

Stop fudging the science and say what you really believe, and I’ll respect you for it.

First, lets cite Machiavelli, “Although men are apt to deceive themselves in general matters, yet they rarely do so in particulars.” – The Discourses. 1517. Mooney has not once responded to my specific criticisms of his book, either on climate change or ID, or any assertions of the misuse of science on the left, which I have backed by examples. His argument is clearly easier to defend at the general level rather than in terms of specific cases.

Mooney writes, “So, in short, one needn’t accept a naïve “linear model” of how science relates to policy in order to point out that misinformation–bad science, bad information, bad data, a bad understanding of the world–can drive bad decision-making, or have other very negative real world consequences.”

Well, in fact this is the linear model! Mooney restates the linear model again when he says, “he time has come to mount an active defense of the integrity of science as a source of policy relevant, but not policy prescriptive, information.” The language of “policy relevant, but not policy prescriptive” comes straight from the IPCC which has institutionalized the linear model.

Mooney criticizes the Bush stem cell policy as an example of bad policy resulting from bad science. Again, the linear model. But Mooney fails to appreciate that he thinks that it is “bad policy” only because his values differ from those held by President Bush. It has nothing to do with science. There are many people equally sure that the Bush policy is good policy. And it streches credulity to think that the Bush policy is in place because the president inflated the number of stem cell lines available in making his decision. Mooney’s interpretation of the stem cell case as an issue of science is a perfect example of how people map their values onto questions of science. See this op-ed:
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/admin/publication_files/resource-1619-2004.16.pdf

When Mooney writes, “The abuses of science have gotten so bad under the Bush administration, and the Republican-controlled Congress, that the time for reconciliation–for making nice–is long past” it seems clear that his interest is not in science policy and decision making, but gaining partisan advantage over Republicans. There is not much point in debating issues of science policy when the real issue is achieving a political victory. Before long, George Bush will be retired and yet the issue of the politicization of science will remain.

Mooney’s calls to politicize of science policy in the form of attacking Republicans clearly resonates with the ideologically predisposed, including many scientists and academics. This is really too bad because in the long run it can mean nothing but bad outcomes for the scientific community. The long-term support of science depends upon maintaining the bipartisan support for science that has existsed for decades among poliycmakers and the public. Scientists dismiss this at their own peril.

My final point – if the politicization of science is undesirable, when then should it be acceptable to politicize science policy?

The data on who supports ID is fascinating. There can be no doubt that a signifigant part of the Republican strategy is to court evangelical voters. As Rove was often quoted as saying, “one million evangelicals stayed home in the last election”. Getting them to show up was the core of his re-election strategy, mostly through exploiting the gay marriage amendments. So how do you explain this paradox?

http://bookclub.tpmcafe.com/story/2005/10/13/122337/79

Yes, intersting! And from that website to which you hyperlinked (the period at the end needs to be removed from the hyperlink)…the 8 Senators who voted against the Amendment were all REPUBLICAN!

P.S. According to the website, the 8 Republicans who voted against the amendment did so on the grounds of the federal government interfering with local schools, rather than science-vs-religion grounds.

P.P.S. Apparently, the Santorum amendment did NOT make it into the final versions in the House and Senate, and was therefore NOT in the bill signed into law:

http://www.millerandlevine.com/km/evol/santorum.html

P.P.P.S. Apparently, the final bill signed into law was 1600+ pages in length…so every other word ever written did make it into the bill! (Interesting how the final bill is approximately a hundred times the length of the Constitution!)

Thanks for your comment. It is worth noting that the so-called “Santorum Amendment” which provides language discussing education in the report of the No Child Left Behind Act was passed in the Senate 91-8. Democratic Senators Kennedy and Byrd both publicly supported the Santorum Amendment and as well, the teaching of diverse views on evolution, see this story: http://www.aip.org/fyi/2001/081.html.

While the teaching of ID is being pushed most strongly by Senator Rick Santorum, presumably Senators Kennedy and Byrd and all of the other Democracts who voted for the Santorum amendment are also part of the war on science.

We discussed ID at length in a number of posts, such as:

http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/science_policy_general/000530why_id_wont_go_away.html
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/science_policy_general/000534finding_god_in_scien.html
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/hodge_podge/000550party_id_and_id.html

You are moving the goalposts again Roger. Where is your evidence that LEADERS of the Democratic party are pushing ID. Is there a Feingold equivalent to the Santorum Amendment that I’m not aware of?