As I detailed in my recent book, Science
Left Behind, the media’s eagerness to criticize
unscientific conservatives is surpassed only by its timidity
in the face of equivalent misdeeds from progressives. I
exposed some of the left’s anti-science beliefs because,
quite frankly, few others in science journalism seemed
willing to do so.
Any dispassionate analysis of the goings-on in Washington
would conclude that it is plagued by dysfunction. Only a
partisan zealot would blame just one side but not the other.
Is it really necessary to point out to journalists that,
while the Republicans control the House, the Democrats
control the Senate and Presidency? In times like these, when
D.C. is gridlocked, both sides are to blame for failing to
lead on important issues.
To be fair, Plait does toss in a token criticism of
President Obama for insufficiently funding NASA. (But,
considering he used to work for NASA, he is perhaps
particularly sensitive to this issue.) As usual, Plait
reserves his ire almost exclusively for Republicans.
Unfortunately, his retelling of history is rather
incomplete.
For instance, Plait criticizes Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal
of Louisiana for signing into law a policy that could
undermine the teaching of evolution in schools. Absent from
Plait’s analysis is the fact that, when the bill was passed
in 2008, the Louisiana legislature was controlled
by Democrats.
He 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.
The biggest bee in Plait’s bonnet was the latest bill
proposed by Rep. Lamar Smith, which orders the National
Science Foundation to only fund research which is in the national
interest. This is a very bad idea for multiple
reasons, and Plait is correct to call for its defeat.
But Plait’s characterization that “Smith wants politics to
trump science” Soviet-style is absurd. The NSF’s mission is
to promote science, engineering and technology. The fact
that fields like psychology and sociology receive funding
from the NSF means that politics has already
trumped science. The NSF should never have gotten involved
in social studies, especially political science, and Smith’s
bill – while poorly thought-out – is almost certainly aimed
at them.
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.
This is why many Americans find the media so infuriating.
There is barely even a pretense of giving both sides of the
story. Instead, the media is divided into ideological camps,
and each side only tells half the truth. It’s like watching
litigation on Judge Judy, except far more
obnoxious.
Besides, as journalists and science writers, it really is
unbecoming to so openly display partisan politics. Not only
is it bad for the public’s faith in science journalism, but
it is equally bad for the public’s faith in the scientific
enterprise itself.
Dr. Alex B. Berezow is the editor of RealClearScience
and co-author of Science
Left Behind. He holds a PhD in microbiology.
