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NASA Public-Affairs Appointee Resigns in Disgrace
belmolis writes "George C. Deutsch, who tried to muzzle top NASA climate scientist James Hansen and ordered NASA web designers to add the word 'theory' to every mention of the Big Bang, has resigned. The New York Times reports
that NASA declines to discuss the reasons for his resignation, but that it came the same day that Texas A&M University, from which Deutsch claimed on his resume to have graduated, revealed that he had attended the university but did not complete his degree."
The New York Times reports it today, but as of yesterday, it was the Times that had unquestioningly passed along the falsehood of Deutsch's graduation, and it was the blog Scientific Activist whose investigation revealed he'd left before graduating to work on the Bush reelection campaign. For more on the 24-year-old political appointee's interesting viewpoints, see World O' Crap; on Monday, we covered the anger over his attempts to squelch science -- something that, sadly, Jim Hansen has gotten used to.
The increasing availability and ease of access of information is making it increasingly difficult to get away with lying.
Good news for the people, bad news for governments.
On a related note, that same increasing availability is starting to render traditional news outlets obselete. No wonder they're so upset.
____
~ |rip/\/\aster /\/\onkey
1. Deutsch is young. True, while at 24, Deutsch is young, that really does not say anything about his ability to be a spokesperson for science policy....if he is capable of representing the science for NASA and not necessarily a political agenda.
2. Deutsch did not graduate college. The fact that he is not a college graduate does not in of itself eliminate him from a spokespersons job. However, the major issue is that he lied about his graduation and because of that lapse in integrity should not be trusted.
3. Scientific integrity. NASA is an organization that should be proud of its scientific accomplishments and should care enough to represent those achievements to the world through the best possible spokespersons possible. Having these positions as appointed posts rather than earned posts or hires based on merit circumvents this process.
4. Motivations. Placing limits on science by appointing sycophantic toadies who are carrying out a politically and/or religiously motivated agenda is becoming a recurring theme in this administration which leads one to suspect potentially other agendas.
Visit Jonesblog and say hello.
Has the Big Bang been established as scientific fact? Not saying it isn't, just would like some more info.
Strange women lying in ponds distributing swords is no basis for a system of government.
With increasing information to the general public comes people who spin it and use that information to justify many things. Then, there is representation of information and how people look at organizations as authority figures. An example here is the Big Bang. To be scientific, as the organization is, shouldn't the big bang be described in accurate scientific terms with using terms such as model or theory? How will misrepresentation of information lead people into paths of believing things that just aren't true. Just because information is out there, doesn't mean the reporting source is honest in the way it conveys that information.
Evolution or ID?
This guy was able to hold a prominent position in the government? Only a day ago we were discussing how this guy was trying to influence NASA's output for a political end and now we find that the people who put him in the job weren't smart enough to do a background check. If you've ever been in poltics this is Lesson #1. Before you put someone in front of a camera to represent you, you make sure of their job credientials.
It's bad enough that a 24 year old was trying to tell NASA what to do but he never even graduated college. Whoever gave him that job should be fired along with him.
On a more personal note, Serves you right you dozy eejit.
I have been 24 years old. And, at that age, you think you know EVERYTHING. And, I have been involed in politics (when I was about 24 years old, as a matter of fact). Guess what? In politics, when you are on the winning side and you get a political appointee job, you have a huge "ego factor".
A 24-year old political appointee is, almost by definition, a cocky S.O.B. (not to say all 24-year old political appointees are cocky, but there is a high probability). Asking him to "keep his feet calm" is like asking a shark to ignore the chum in the water.
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAA!!!!!!
Disgrace and shame is better than folks like this deserve, but it's the best we can realistically hope to see. The appointment of political officers to oversee scientific speech smacks of the bad old days of the Cold War, and I mean the BAD guys.
Unfortunately, this is only one small win for the side of truth, justice, and the American way. We've still got a *long* way to go before honesty and integrity are restored to the government.
It was a joke! When you give me that look it was a joke.
Really? When I studied for my degree in physics the Big Bang was certainly described as a theory. I'd understand a "model" to be something you construct around a "theory" - the two are not really alternatives.
That said, the problem here is not the description of the Big Bang as a theory (clearly correct) but that the word is used in a deliberate attempt to mislead the public by confusing the colloquial meaning of "theory" (i.e. not much more than a guess) with the scientific meaning of "theory". I'm betting that this guy didn't insist on NASA desribing rocketry as a "theory".
I generally laugh when an appointee fails. They aren't a good example of the success of representative democracy, and no matter which side is in power, there are people crying foul about whoever is appointed.
They lie? Don't all politicians? They're too white? They're too left? They're too right? They're unqualified? They're qualified but they don't have real life experience? They're cronies?
Let's look at how this works in a free market:
John Johnson hires his son John Johnson, Jr, to help run his company. Nepotism. John I dies. John Jr takes over, and the general history of business shows us the John Jr has never felt pain, so he doesn't work as hard as he should. Business fails. The market solution is to give the person with the best output and lowest price the work. John Jr rarely will be that person.
In the market of government, we don't really have much to control. We can't vote with our dollars OR vote with our ballot. We can't directly affect the actions of the appointee, and some appointees are so powerful it amazes me that the country doesn't cry foul more often (see Ben Bernanke).
Positions of power are better suited to be competitive rather than elected, and better elected rather than appointed. Do you feel better when "your man" is the appointee? Do you forget all the damage that occurs when it isn't "your guy?"
Because some other asshole will be asked to step into his place.
Have we already forgotten Mike Brown, the ex-head of FEMA who had practically no experience in emergency services, disaster response, or incident management. Heck, in his previous job (Judges and Stewards Commissioner for the International Arabian Horse Association) he was forced our for "accounting irregularities".
I'm expecting a good many of Bush's appointees follow the same pattern, much as Clinton's did (Chief of White House Personnel Security was a bouncer at a strip club). This is just how the Executive Branch of government works today. Credentials be damned, which of my childhood friends/campaign supporters/cronies needs a job?
Finkployd
Let's start with the President! *ducks*
You better watch out, there may be dogs about . .
> The Big Bang is actually a model according to scientific methods. To call it a theory is a stretch. To have something as a model is not a bad thing it's just a different descriptor for it.
A theory is a model.
Sheesh, evil *and* a jerk. -- Jade
I work in the Exploration Systems dept. at NASA.
/.ers belive anything they hear.
---Oh really? What do you do exactly?
So I am really getting a kick out of most of these replies.
---That's cool because I wouldn't want this to distract you from your work.
Some of you guys are very good at making it sound like you know what you are talking about.
----Welcome to Slashdot!!
But trust me.... You don't.
----Oh really? Is this some kind of Jedi mind trick?
I think you just want to make yourself sound smart, when in reality you dont know what you are talking about.
-----Well, reality is a subjective thing these days, but sounding smart is an art form.
This is how bad info gets passed around.
---As we all know that everybody reads Slashdot as fact - and there is no room for dissent!
If you dont know about the topic....Dont make yourself sound like you do.
----Well, it would be nice if you could give us an example here because it sounds like you are doing the same.
Cuz some
---Sad, isn't it? But those people aren't the ones we are worried about, just the guys who resign in disgrace for making us try to believe lies that we hear from them.
He who knows best knows how little he knows. - Thomas Jefferson
You lose the luxury of being considered "just a kid" at age 18. Period.
It implies a source of the bang that makes Creationists salivate.
How so? By admitting that we don't understand how it came about and what caused it? For someone to think that this supports creationism, there are two issues. Firstly, this is a "God of the Gaps" argument. This is just a statement about their disbelief that science will ever provide explanations for everything so they fall back to their default position, "God did it" which still explains or proves nothing. Secondly, "what occured before the Big Bang" cannot be answered with the creationist position of "God did" as the immediate response is "what occured before God?". The creationist might say that God has always been present which is no more or less valid that saying that the Big Bang has always been present (Big Bang --> Big Crunch --> Big Bang .... etc) so neither position has been shown to be any more valid.
So to say that the Big Bang is no longer popular with the evolutionist debate crowd, you must be referering to the sophists who debate for fun as opposed to scientists/evolutionists who still very much believe in the Big Bang.
Uh, last time I checked, the Big Bang IS just a theory, just as black holes are. They may be credible theories, theories with a lot of evidence, but are still just theories. There is nothing wrong with not proclaiming a theory to be fact.
The Christian Right is Neither (Christian nor right). See: Matthew 23, Matthew 25, Ezekiel 16:48-50
Deutsch is only a minor (and obvious) part of a larger problem with the NASA public-affairs branch.
But he represents a more fundamental problem: the way we govern our country is broken. Given that, it's not surprising that the government is dysfunctional in the realm of space science. It's dsyfunctional period.
Look, the guy's 24 years old and he gets a political appointment? Now prove to me this country isn't being run by an aristocracy. It used to be connected people got their kids internships, or made congressional pages. They didn't get them policy level poliltical appointments.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
I invite them to test the theory of gravitational attraction by jumping off the top of a very tall building. After all, if they had faith the size of a mustard seed, they'd be able to land safely, right?
That's our life, the big wheel of shit. - The Fat Man, Blue Tango Salvage
Given this Administration's behavior and appointees of late... Well, any theory that President Bush really wants the US to lead in science and global competitiveness is just that: a theory. And one that has absolutely no evidence supporting it (and which seems to be pretty well falsified at this point, actually). On the other hand, it's comforting to remember that the judge who ruled against ID in the Dover, PA case was a Republican and a Bush appointee. So perhaps all is not lost.
"A statesman is a dead politician. Lord knows we need more statesmen." Opus
The person that is responsible for appointing that underqualified-chucklhead needs to resign or be fired too.
This event is a disgrace to the entire scientific community in the United States.
The Republicans see the cronyism, they see the complete abandonment of most conservative values, they see the wasted money and I just don't think they care. They're in power and want to use that power and noble ideals fall quickly when the perqs of power are in reach.
Hey, the NYTimes gets credit for publishing their story of Bush's domesting spying operation, even though they did so only to preempt the story in the reporter's book about to be published. James Risen, the reporter, had seen his story suppressed by the Times for over a year when his book finally forced the Times to publish its version, allowing the Times to control the "framing" of the explosive issue. A year that included the 2004 presidential campaign season, while the Times therefore skipped its responsibility to inform the public about the president who would be reelected by a slim margin.
But then, the Times allowed its frontpage cheerleader for the Iraq "WMD" War, Judith Miller, to avoid the August 2004 Federal subpoenas into her role outing Valerie Plame, the CIA/WMD agent debunking the Iraq WMD lies sending us to war. Her trial likely would have meant another few points less for Bush in November 2004.
After these yearlong delays escorting Bush through the 2004 election, their final revelations are met with Bush's highest disapproval ratings, now in the 40% approval / 55% disapproval range. A range which itself has been escorted by the Times managing the news for minimum damage to Bush.
With the Times telling the story, why shouldn't the newspaper look even better than Bush does?
--
make install -not war
This theocratic/ideological intervention into science by policy wanks and political hacks has some pretty serious consequences. As an active scientist I see science losing an important cultural war in the US. Yes WE all know the ideosyncratic difference between a "law" and a "theory" but to a vast majority of the public the gap between these 2 ideas seems huge. So in important debates like ID vs. evolution, the side of science and reason gets muddled because of minor differences in the connotation of the word "theory"
I know all of us cringed at the idea of studying linguistics and rhetoric, but they are important tools to have in order to have others understand your position. We need to change our lexicon if we are going to win this argument.
Bush somehow left six months early from the National Guard to go to Harvard Business School. "Bush said on NBC that he had 'worked it out with the military. And I'm just telling you, I did my duty.'"
Maybe Deutsch thought he could also just "work it out" with Texas A&M to leave before finishing his work there, but get a degree nevertheless. After all, he and his boss Bush are above such things as fulfilling one's obligations, that's for the little people that don't have connections. I mean, come on, they both had more pressing things to attend to, so why should finishing their work get in the way?
... a hard-working Republican young man who worked hard to re-elect our President ...
:-)
Sorry, just thought I'd correct that...
The right to offend is far more important than the right not to be offended. (Rowan Atkinson)
Another option - people actually wanted someone they thought was "presidental". If Dean (my choice) had gotten the nomination, the DNC would probably have tried to change him to those ends too. It's a meaningless metric, but in 2004, the dems were (and still are today) facing the "hold fast to our ideals and lose for sure" or "appear as centrist as possible and most likely lose" choice.
HUH???? All of the theories you mentioned - gravity, relativity, evolution, etc. - can and have been subjected to proofs. Just see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_relativity. But if by "proven" you mean "settled and unimpeachable", then nothing in science is ever proven.
It is UNBELIEVABLE that a stupid presidential administration, one that is a mere one year into its 2nd term, has forced us to enter into negotiations over the purpose and meaning of science.
Not only does he get a political appointment, but why the fuck is a PR post for NASA a Political Appointment?!
The system of appointments-as-payoffs is broken beyond belief.
-EvilMagnus
To be fair to the Republicans, this process started under Gore's "National Perofrmance Review" initiative, the point of which was to reduce bureaucracy. Which it did. But at the same time the role of political appointees was expanded.
Of course nobody is holding a gun to the Republicans' heads to continue this trend, much less to encourage it.
Post may contain irony: discontinue use if experiencing mood swings, nausea or elevated blood pressure.
For the gentle reader just checking in, I just got modded as a Troll for citing facts relating to my post that contradicted the general air of global warming is happening on Slashdot.
Moderator that modded that as a Troll, you're a ballsless wonder. Stick to actuall Trolls not bashing informed dreakign discussion.
This guy is way out there