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Will Science Journalists Ever Confront Democrats?

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mwkruse
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Real Clear Science: Will Science Journalists Ever Confront Democrats

… He [Phil Pliat at Slate] also rattles off a list of anti-science Congressmen, all Republicans. Excluded from his list are the 53 Democratic Congressmen and Senators (compared to only two Republicans) who wrote a letter to the FDA demanding labels on genetically modified food. This policy position is in direct opposition to that held by organizations representing America’s finest scientists and doctors – the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the American Medical Association (AMA).

Plait also failed to mention the group of Democratic Congressmen who support a resolution proposing a new hypothesis about global warming: That climate change will cause an increase in the number of hookers around the globe.

Also AWOL from Plait’s list is Tom Harkin, the quack-loving, homeopathy-pushing Senator from Iowa who is responsible for helping legitimize alternative medicine. Such pseudoscientific voodoo has done more to harm average Americans than any misguided teachings on evolution or climate change.

Plait goes on to lament how scientific reports were censored in the “Bad Old Days” of the George W. Bush administration. He conveniently leaves out that the Obama Administration purposefully withheld information from scientists during the BP oil spill and doctored documents to make it appear as if scientists agreed with the drilling moratorium they implemented. And he did not mention that the Obama administration interfered with the FDA’s approval of genetically modified salmon. …

… Finally, at the end of the article, Plait makes something of a confession:

I know I focus a lot on these attacks coming from the far right—because that’s where the overwhelming majority originate—but in truth they’re coming from all directions, and it’s up to us to do something about it. [Emphasis added]

Wrong. Plait focuses on the far right because he is a partisan. He ignores the equally massive volume of anti-science garbage coming from the far left because he sympathizes with that side of the aisle. It is confirmation bias combined with motivated forgetting. …

Comments

3 responses to “Will Science Journalists Ever Confront Democrats?”

  1. JHM Avatar
    JHM

    I was mid-way through my Environmental Science degree in 2000 when Bush was elected. Many of my professors lamented that science funding was doomed, that the EPA would be shut down, and that scientific progress would be forever stunted. I thought at the time that they were being a bit dramatic.
    Does the party/ideology of the sitting president matter? Yes. Do many scientists exaggerate the benefits of a Democratic president and the drawbacks of a Republican president? Yep.
    Especially these days, there are people on both the left and the right that use science as a villain to rally the troops against.

    Reply
  2. Michael W. Kruse Avatar
    Michael W. Kruse

    “… that use science as a villain to rally the troops against.”
    Or as an unquestionable authority in support of their position in order to shut up opposition.
    Sociologist Anthony Giddens wrote a book a several years ago called “Runaway World” that talks about how we need to do a better job of really bring science into public decision making, respecting both its strengths and limitations. Sometimes I feel like we are moving backwards on that mission.

    Reply
  3. Cameron Avatar
    Cameron

    I regularly read Plait’s column and let me assure you, he has no fondness of scientific illiteracy when it’s sprouted by the left.
    For example, look at the number of articles he’s written about the anti-vax movement, which seems to be far more popular on that side of the political spectrum. New Agey ‘woo’, as Plait calls it, is also more popular in the left, and he regularly calls people out for teaching it. In fact, he was president of the James Randi Educational Foundation for a couple of years, and made a lot of enemies on the left during that time.
    Plait is as biased as anyone, but he does put his cards on the table—he readily admits his political sympathies and regularly reminds his readers about them.

    Reply

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