Obama Orders Return to Scientific Integrity in Policymaking

U.S. President Barack Obama signed a memorandum yesterday ordering the return of scientific integrity to policymaking.

Think about that for a minute.

What does that say about our government’s behavior for the past eight years?

In the memorandum, the president orders the new director of the Office of Science and Technology Policy to ensure that anyone hired for a science or technology role in the executive branch be chosen based on their scientific expertise, not their ideological beliefs. He also orders that all agencies ensure that they use scientific and technological information that has been carefully reviewed for accuracy.

Those basic tenants of sound policy should go without saying, yet for years, they have been violated in the name of politics. Science in general was treated with disdain by the Bush administration, and climate science in particular was a frequent target. 

One of the most notorious offenders was former oil industry lobbyist Philip A. Cooney, a non-scientist who the Bush Administration hired as chief of staff of the White House Council on Environmental Quality. Cooney turned the office’s name into a joke by editing scientific reports to downplay connections between greenhouse gas emissions and climate change. As a New York Times investigation discovered, “uncertainties” became “significant and fundamental uncertainties” after Cooney had his way with the reports.

In another case, officials with the Office of Science and Technology Policy edited testimony given in 2007 by Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Julie Gerberding. Much of what the officials cut were her comments about the potential impact of climate change on Americans.

To reboot that troubled bureaucracy, President Obama ordered the office's new director to come up with a strategy to ensure the highest level of integrity in the executive branch’s dealings with scientific and technological issues. 

As the president said in signing the memorandum,

"Today, more than ever before, science holds the key to our survival as a planet and our security and prosperity as a nation. It’s time we once again put science at the top of our agenda and worked to restore America’s place as the world leader in science and technology."

The president also issued a separate memorandum yesterday ordering all senior government officials to check with the U.S. attorney general before relying on any of former President Bush's signing statements. Bush often issued signing statements to manipulate legislation he disagreed with, such as the congressional ban on torture.

Obama is still finding political sand traps as he tries to clean up the federal landscape. His choice to head the Office of Science and Technology Policy is Harvard Physicist John Holdren, however Holdren's confirmation has been held up for apparently unrelated political reasons by a few members of Congress.

Here’s the Presidential Memorandum on Scientific Integrity. It’s how an intelligent government operates.

MEMORANDUM FOR THE HEADS OF EXECUTIVE DEPARTMENTS AND AGENCIES

SUBJECT: Scientific Integrity

Science and the scientific process must inform and guide decisions of my Administration on a wide range of issues, including improvement of public health, protection of the environment, increased efficiency in the use of energy and other resources, mitigation of the threat of climate change, and protection of national security.

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