Politics tainting Bioloical Science at US Fish & Wildlife

Scientists of the US Fish and Wildlife Service report being pressured to alter their findings about endangered species.

Many scientists at the US Fish and Wildlife Service say they have been pushed to alter or withdraw scientific findings on the protection of species for political reasons, according to a new survey.

It doesn't stop with FWS either, other government science is being tainted too,

But Shultz believes political interference in US government science may affect other agencies.

New Scientist

Science is like the plumb line of truth. When you start playing with it things start going out of balance.

It is like a ruler. If you keep scratching out the real marks on it and drawing new ones soon it becomes useless. It eventually measures nothing.

When politics, religion and money are allowed to taint the results of science they are playing with and bending the only rudder that a species in deep space and time has to guide it.

If we are to become the beings of infinite energy and light we can not be steered aside by these false diatribes.
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By slank
It doesn't stop with FWS either, other government science is being tainted too,

Yes, there's a lot of disturbing things going on with political fiddling with science and the environment.

A similar story to recently to fish and wildlife report was the government workers group PEER accusing the EPA of stifling opposition to the Bush administration's plan to allow road building in national forests. Here's the ATSNN story, though the links now appear to be dead:

www.abovetopsecret.com...

"No public expression of dissent is allowed in the federal government now," Jeff Ruch, executive director of Public Employees for Environmental Responsibility known as PEER, said.

An EPA staffer wrote that building roads through swaths of land previously untouched would deteriorate the qualify of water in streams and have an impact on public drinking water.

Ruch said that EPA employees related that Steven Shimborg, a political appointee at the EPA, dismissed the staff draft as a "rant" and ordered the objections stricken from the EPA comments.

A few more examples include scientists now being required to be vetted by a Bush political appointee before they can work with the WHO:

www.msnbc.msn.com...

Rep. Henry Waxman, D-Calif., a frequent administration critic, said Friday it was the latest in a series of actions that in his view contradict the open search for scientific and medical evidence. “It appears to me that the administration is tightening their controls over their professionals and their scientists ... to favor its right-wing constituents,” Waxman said.

He asked Thompson in a letter to rescind the policy, which Waxman said “politicizes the process of providing the expert advice of U.S. scientists to the international community.”

... and Bush admin covert attempts to derail EU regulations on chemical use in industry:

www.sundayherald.com...

A series of internal government e-mails and memos unearthed by a Congressional investigation in the US reveals that senior Bush officials succeeded in weakening proposed new European regulations for controlling the chemicals used in everyday consumer products.

US officials talked of how to “target” the UK, how to “get to” the president of the European Commission, Romano Prodi, and how to “take on” the Environment Commissioner, Margot Wallstrom. They also wanted to “neutralise” the environmental arguments of the Swedish and Finnish governments.

Although the plan was warmly welcomed by environmentalists, it alarmed the $450 billion (£253bn) US chemical industry, including such corporate giants as DuPont, Dow and Intel. Over the last five years the industry has collectively given over £9.3 million to Republican politicians, including £514,000 to President George W Bush.

Along with Soficrows threads there's many other examples but the problem was best encapsulated by the Union of Concerned Scientists, a large group of eminent scientists including 20 Nobel Laureates, 12 holders of the National Medal of Science, university chairs and presidents and former government advisor's, including the head of the Environmental Protection Agency under Nixon and Ford who accused the government of deliberately distorting and omitting scientific facts to conform to its own political agenda:

www.abs-cbnnews.com...

The two documents accuse the administration of repeatedly censoring and suppressing reports by its own scientists, stacking advisory committees with unqualified political appointees, disbanding government panels that provide unwanted advice and refusing to seek any independent scientific expertise in some cases.

"Other administrations have, on occasion, engaged in such practices, but not so systemically nor on so wide a front" the statement from the scientists said, adding that they believed the administration had "misrepresented scientific knowledge and misled the public about the implications of its policies."

The press release from the organisation itself: www.ucsusa.org...


It's not just the US though. In July the WHO's former senior radiation adviser in Europe accused "governments" (without naming them) of "perverting science" in respect to the effect of radiation on humans to avoid huge payouts for the result of nuclear testing and the use of depleted uranium:

www.sundayherald.com...

Dr Keith Baverstock, who was the World Health Organisation’s senior radiation adviser in Europe, says that science has been “perverted for political ends” by government agencies which should be protecting public health.

“Politics, aided and abetted by some in the scientific community, has poisoned the well which sustains democratic decision-making,” he told a conference on low-level radiation in Edinburgh yesterday.

The UK has also been criticised by scientists for its "undervaluing" of proper science in it's policy making:

www.biomedcentral.com...

The criticisms, which parallel those of the Bush administration in the United States, struck a chord within the science community.

"Policy solutions which are based on no science or bad science can be costly, both in terms of resources and reputation,"

Most of the distortions done for political gain are being done solely for the gain of big business. If this trend continues we could enter a modern 'dark age' for science, but this time money is the almighty God that cannot be questioned.

[edit on 14-2-2005 by kegs]

Thanks ..slank, for the information. This is really weird. There was an incident about 2 or 3 months ago where a university student was found dead on a fish/ wildlife preserve, he was working from a grant gathering crabs, for study... I tried to find the story....couldn't. This happened on the Texas Gulf Coast.

Does anyone remember hearing about this?

[edit on 15-2-2005 by ms_Bhavn]