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Government United States

The White House Now Has Zero Science Advisors (cbsnews.com) 405

DogDude shares an article from CBS News: The science division of the White House's Office of Science and Technology Policy was unstaffed as of Friday as the three remaining employees departed this week, sources tell CBS News... On Friday afternoon, Eleanor Celeste, the assistant director for biomedical and forensic sciences at the OSTP, tweeted, "Science division out. Mic drop" before leaving the office for the last time...

Under Mr. Obama, the science division was staffed with nine employees who led the charge on policy issues such as STEM education, biotechnology and crisis response. It's possible that the White House will handle these issues through staff in other divisions within the OSTP.

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The White House Now Has Zero Science Advisors

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  • The New Formula (Score:5, Insightful)

    by MightyMartian ( 840721 ) on Saturday July 01, 2017 @02:50PM (#54725909) Journal

    A government of the idiots, by the idiots and for the idiots.

    • Re:The New Formula (Score:5, Interesting)

      by Archtech ( 159117 ) on Saturday July 01, 2017 @03:00PM (#54725957)

      A government of the idiots, by the idiots and for the idiots.

      More accurately: a government of the people, by the employees of the super-rich, for the super-rich.

      In one word, a plutocracy.

      • by shanen ( 462549 )

        Again, I have to disagree (though I'm repeating myself). America has become a government of the corporations, by the lawyers, for the richest 0.1%. You're going in the right direction in the last two parts, but I have doubts about the last one. If corporate cancerism finally triumphs, it might be reduced all the way to the richest person.

    • In fairness, this administration did reinstate the National Space Council https://www.geekwire.com/2017/president-trump-signs-executive-order-reactivate-national-space-council/ [geekwire.com]. Unfortunately, it appears that they aren't going to do much and what is on their agenda is at best deeply misguided.
    • where idiot = someone who doesn't think like me. And once you cast out the first batch as idiots, among those who remain you will pretty soon find those who still don't think like you, so you'll cast out those idiots too, and then you'll repeat, and repeat... until only one remains. It's a lonely, tortured world.

    • I remind you that the "idiots" voted for the OTHER PERSON!
    • Hell, that's not new. The only novel thing with this is how obvious they're being about it.

      That's not even new, it's just a recent resurgence of willful ignorance.

    • Re:The New Formula (Score:4, Insightful)

      by Anonymous Coward on Saturday July 01, 2017 @05:59PM (#54726715)

      A government of the idiots, by the idiots and for the idiots.

      It appears that Trump's mental health may really be in question. Is there no one that can order him to sit a professional exam with a team of non partisan psychiatrists?

      I'm not fan of pence either. He might get all kinds of things I hate done, but he does appear to at least be mentally stable and at this point that is looking like an improvement. We can't have all this crap going on in a rather dangerous world and have someone mentally unfit in charge. This time it may be a hell of a lot worse than 9/11.

      They attacked Obama for everything they could possibly think to do so, real or imagined, and he didn't once loose his cool or act unpresidential. Hell his biggest mistake might have been the red line with no response. His options sucked then and they still do, but responding was required. Beyond that he didn't make the personal relationships required to get some things done, but then half the congress was perfectly fine with whatever shit was being shoveled, including by the chief birther who strangely enough became our president. Trump is still attacking Obama with made up crap left/right and center and Obama doesn't even respond, which I think is a mistake, but it is a hell of a lot better than Trump's actions.

      Trump has gotten around the world something like a 22% approval rating. The only country that likes him is Russia, and that is because Putin is propping up his investment there, most likely in the hope that he can last long enough to do a lot more damage to our country.

      The US is supposed to be the leader of the free world, but right now we are anything but... Not leading on the climate. Not leading in equality (muslim ban), Not leading in opportunity (mexicans are rapists and we must build a wall), Not leading on health care (going backward), Not leading on science (the office in the white house now has 0 staff.), Not leading on Innovation (coal appears to get more support than newer techologies), Not leading on the environment ( rolling back regulations left and right, without even any real analysis if it is a good idea), Not leading on transparency (no tax returns, still taking money at trump properties, no real divestment, tax cuts planned will likely directly benefit Trump and his companies, health care bill created in secret, limiting video and time at daily briefs, saying questions will be answered but never actually answering them.)

      Hell about the only thing the current admin is leading on is bullshit. In that we have made America #1. It is all rather sad.

    • by shanen ( 462549 )

      Sorry, but I must beg to disagree. It's government of the corporations, by the lawyers, for the richest 0.1%. At least that's what #PresidentTweety says he remembers hearing Abe Lincoln say on the tape recording. Notwithstanding, he REALLY thinks it's government of the Donald, by the Donald, for the Donald, but I'm betting that Amazon, the google, Apple, Microsoft, Goldman Sachs, and all their little friends will eventually put Trump in his place.

      The idiots? No one cares about the idiots. Especially not the

  • I can see why they need a science advisor.
  • Great! now I know where to go when I need advice on the science of zeros.

  • by Anonymous Coward

    So, under Obama, they had 9 people working in this office, making $150,000 a year, doing... what exactly?
    What were the great visionary policies for science coming out of the Obama White House?
    What great technologies did the administration sponsor?
    Maybe they advised the President well on internet and cybersecurity issues, to the benefit of the nation's retailers and online account holders?

    No, the OSTP focused on education policy, advocated for more women in science, preached climate change, and worked for so

    • by rastos1 ( 601318 )

      So, under Obama, they had 9 people working in this office, making $150,000 a year, doing... what exactly?
      What were the great visionary policies for science coming out of the Obama White House?

      So under Trump you have 1 man working in office making $400000 a year doing what exactly? Being an embarrassment for all Americans? Surrounding himself with idiots defending undefendable? What great visionary policy came out from the Oval office? Mexican wall? Firing Comey? Travel ban? Offending allies? Banning cam

  • I know that we would like to view every country on Earth as occupants of this cooperative spaceship that has to sustain humanity, and therefore in a sense it doesn't matter all that much that we get set back by one country slowing its science progress for a few years...

    But in reality...

    It's still a race for competitive advantage between countries, and seriously, the Chinese, Indians, Singaporeans, etc.etc are going to start eating our lunch, guys (even more than they are) -- and every move we make gets us forward or back a step in the race against them.

    I think a lot of people don't want to admit this winner-takes-all reality... especially if they grow up in a highly liberal California environment where everyone is supposed to be nice to each other...
  • science is just a mater of opinion! Everybody's voice counts!

    • science is just a mater of opinion! Everybody's voice counts!

      Is that like how we should make policy because 99.7689278174956377596% of scientists agree that man made global warming is an imminent threat to the world population?

      Why does it take so many people to prove catastrophic anthropogenic global warming is real? Should it not take just one? I'm pretty sure Albert Einstein said something to that effect concerning disproving his theories.

  • The vast majority of supporters of the buffoon-in-chief not only do not like science, but they actively despise it.
  • by OYAHHH ( 322809 ) on Saturday July 01, 2017 @03:49PM (#54726203)

    For he certainly put them to good use.... What with the "Focus on Muslim Outreach" mandate Obama issued to NASA.

    Look, Trump already has a scientist he can refer to if so be. His name is Ben Carson. And he is as good as anyone Obama had working for him.

    • by mean pun ( 717227 ) on Saturday July 01, 2017 @04:07PM (#54726287)

      >

      Look, Trump already has a scientist he can refer to if so be. His name is Ben Carson. And he is as good as anyone Obama had working for him.

      You mean the genius that claimed that the pyramids were there to store grain? See https://www.theguardian.com/us... [theguardian.com]

      • At least he didn't try to learn Austrian...
    • Focus on Muslim Outreach

      I just googled those words intrigued as to what I may find. Results:
      - One Daily Telegraph.
      - One Fox News.
      - 4 links to conspiracy theorists nut pages including "truthrevlot" and "barenakedmuslim"
      - 2 links to youtube videos by different conspiracy theorist nuts.
      and one link to a page at some IP address, not even a domain name.

      That results list says a lot.

      • Re: (Score:3, Informative)

        Your Google [telegraph.co.uk] Fu [politifact.com] is [space.com] weak [youtube.com]. Pay attention to the Youtube video where you can watch Charles Bolden, NASA Chief under Obama [wikipedia.org], state unambiguously that he was directed to reach out to the Muslim world to make them feel good about their contributions to science and engineering.
        • by bongey ( 974911 )
          Don't argue with liberals, they really don't difference between being "politically correct" and actual science. Large portion of them think there is 30 different genders.
        • Actually I retract that statement, you aren't really bad at googling. You just refused to follow up the information in the Telegraph article, which would have easily led you to the Al Jazeera interview, to find out he was factually correct. Instead you took the relatively few number of times the truth leaked out in the mainstream media as a proxy to disprove it.

          The result lists did indeed say a lot.

  • They'll handle these issues in the office of creationism and other bullshittery.
  • by buss_error ( 142273 ) on Saturday July 01, 2017 @05:56PM (#54726703) Homepage Journal

    For more than a decade, I tried to serve the public good by working in the public sector. I finally got fed up with the shit pay, the shit I got when people found out I worked in the government (called a pig at the trough, incompetent, stupid, lazy, a drone, had my car vandalized multiple times, threaten with death on a weekly basis, and assaulted) and got a job in the private sector that pays one hell of a lot better.

    The key here is that there is now a majority of people that think science and engineering are "just someone's opinion." That is true to a limited extent that it is indeed an opinion - but it's an opinion formed from training, intense study, experience, and perseverance. These opinions are not something someone pulls out of their ass.

    The current administration was elected by the sorts of people that deny scientific opinion because it conflicts with their world view. The sorts of folks that think welfare is for the lazy the drug addicted, and cheats. Of course the white house science department has no employees. The people that elected this administration do not value science, compassion, empathy, or Christian Values, despite many of them calling themselves Christians. They are not Christians. At best they mistake their fear and anger for piety, their selfishness, lack of compassion and imagination as "being strong". These attitudes serve no one but the top 1%. The key here is that if you read this, you will never be one of the top 1%.

    "The world isn't fair" is an excuse I hear a lot, which is true, life frequently isn't fair. Evil prospers when good men do nothing. There's nothing like doing nothing to ensure that life will remain unfair, and uncaring.

One man's constant is another man's variable. -- A.J. Perlis

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