Republicans bring the stupid to the Science Committee

I began to have some serious doubts about the overall IQ of the House Science Committee when a particularly stupid, yet outspoken freshman teabagger, Sandy Adams (R-FL), who luckily has since been defeated in a primary, started raving about how the National Weather Service should be disbanded because cable TV does such a great job, obviously never bothering to consider where cable TV gets their information. He did so in an official Science Committee hearing.

Another member of the committee stated that most of the other Republicans saw Adams as an embarrassment and as a focus for scorn and derision... and amusement.

Unfortunately not all of them feel this way.
 
Long passed are the days when mainstream Republicans like Sherwood Boehlert would dominate and chair the Science Committee and spend his career working on environmental policy and energy efficiency.

That kind of agenda has become anathema to today's Republican Party which considers Science as a liberal conspiracy against their single-minded belief in Greed, Biblical Literalism, and power mongering.

 Today the Science Committee is chaired by the oldest and one of the most senile Members of Congress, Ralph Hall, a former Texas "Democrat" who switched to the GOP after voting to impeach Bill Clinton, getting rich off the Abramoff gravy train and endorsing George W. Bush. So what qualifies Hall to be chairman of the Science Committee? 

He's one of Congress' leading Climate Change deniers and has actually accused climate scientists of inventing the evidence for anthropogenic climate change, just in order to receive federal research grants.

What more evidence could the Republican leadership possibly desire in order to give Hall the chairmanship?

In fact, when you look at the current committee, you sense that the Republican leadership chose their members specifically for their ignorance and devout denial of Science.
Aside from weather expert Adams, the committee is chock full of flat-earth idiots, teabaggers like Paul Broun (R-GA), Todd Akin (R-MO), the GOP expert in lady parts, and internet porn expert Ben Quayle (R-AZ). Other notably anti-Science members of the Science Committee include Roscoe Bartlett (R-MD), Randy Neugebauer (R-TX), Steven Palazzo (R-MI), Lamar Smith (R-TX), Frank Lucas (R-OK), Chip Cravaack (R-MN) and Larry Bucshon (R-IN).


This month, with the election coming up, Scientific American decided to ask a simple question-- and answer it scientifically: Does Congress Get A Passing Grade On Science? They contacted 32 congressional leaders involved in science on their committees but only 9-- 7 Democrats and 2 Republicans-- agreed to respond. 

It is an enlightening read.

The Republican denial of climate change science is a textbook example of irresponsibility and borders on depraved indifference.
 According to the scientific journal Nature, members of the House Energy and Commerce Committee have taken positions on climate change that are "fundamentally anti-science" and the result of "willful ignorance," making it "hard to escape the conclusion that the U.S. Congress has entered the intellectual wilderness." 

Notwithstanding the scientific consensus that climate change is occurring and is a serious threat, House Republicans unanimously supported a bill, H.R. 910, to overturn EPA's scientific finding that climate change endangers public health and welfare. 
During the floor debate on H.R. 910, Henry Waxman offered an amendment that stated: "Congress accepts the scientific findings of the Environmental Protection Agency that climate change is occurring, is caused or acceleratedlargely by human activities, and poses significant risks for public health and welfare." 

240 out of 241 House Republican voted to reject these scientific findings.

Many House Republicans explained their rejection of EPA's scientific findings by stating their view that the science is "not settled." , despite 98% consensus of Climatologists.
At the same time, these same House Republicans have voted to cut funding for climate research that could provide more insight into the pace and likely impacts of climate change. They have also refused to hold hearings to better understand the overwhelming body of existing scientific evidence showing that climate change is occurring.

If Policymakers cannot accept scientific fact as evidence for something as serious and potentially disastrous as climate change, how in the fuck can we trust them with women's rights, healthcare or ANY science related issues?
Congress should be holding hearings with the nation's top scientists to understand the problems we face so they can design sensible policies to mitigate these issues. Ignorance is NOT valuable to anyone to anyone except those who will profit from it in the short term.