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US Dismantles Forensic Science Commission (washingtonpost.com)
hondo77 writes a report via Washington Post: Thought the Trump Administration's war on science was just about climate change? Think again. "Attorney General Jeff Sessions will end a Justice Department partnership with independent scientists to raise forensic science standards and has suspended an expanded review of FBI testimony across several techniques that have come under question, saying a new strategy will be set by an in-house team of law enforcement advisers," reports Washington Post. The National Commission on Forensic Science, "jointly led by Justice and the Commerce Department's National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) has prompted several changes," including "new accrediting and ethical codes for forensic labs and practitioners" and the FBI abandoning "its four-decade-long practice of tracing bullets to a specific manufacturer's batch through chemical analyses after its method were scientifically debunked." "The availability of prompt and accurate forensic science analysis to our law enforcement officers and prosecutors is critical to integrity in law enforcement, reducing violent crime, and increasing public safety," Sessions said in the statement. "We applaud the professionalism of the National Commission on Forensic Science and look forward to building on the contributions it has made in this crucial field."
You don't care about Russian control over the United States government?
What the fuck is wrong with people? Did Donald Trump turn all of America's racist idiots into pro-Russian traitors?
Stand up for your country you pathetic cuckolded fucking turncoat!!
Seriously. Who the fuck was calling for lowered standards in forensic science? I'm to the point where if there's a lobbying group for it, I assume the GOP is going to be for it. If it's something sane people really like, the GOP is going to be against it. But this? I'm honestly caught off guard.
At this rate, I can only assume that next week, the GOP will announce that the official guidelines for miles, pounds, feet, and gallons are "too restrictive to business" and the new standard for how much gas will be in a gallon will be "whatever the fuck exxon says it is, peasant."
For Trump supporters and most Republicans, it's always Trump/party before country. No matter what issue.
and two-bit crooked real estate salesmen are now running the US government.
Seriously. Who the fuck was calling for lowered standards in forensic science?
Private prisons. They lobby for anything that results in higher and longer incarceration rates.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
https://www.usatoday.com/story...
Basically they're trying to limit what the expert witnesses for the prosecution can say. Those people are not scientists, they're defense lobbyists.
The courts have always limited what expert witnesses could say. It's called "Admissibility."
Start with Frye v. United States, which applied to a criminal case, where the Supreme Court ruled that lie detector tests couldn't be admitted as evidence because there was no scientific evidence for them. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/...
That was superseded by Daubert, a civil case, where the judge decided to throw out evidence of birth defects against a corporation,
Read the article again:
The issue here isn't whether the commission gets renewed. The issue here is that this is a prosecutor's wish list to keep giving juries unproven and disproven "scientific" evidence with the authority of "FBI agents."
These prosecutors are the same ones who ( while they smoke cigarettes) insist that marijuana is so dangerous that users should go to jail.
They want to be free to use bullshit evidence because that way they can get convictions, and advance their careers, whether the defendant is innocent or guilty. DNA testing exposed that whole fraud.
At one time there were intelligent, principled conservatives who understood logic and science, and were even committed to justice, not convictions, and sometimes the weight of the evidence would convince them to change their minds. There were also liberals like that.
Today, as Chris Mooney documented in The Republican War on Science, some of the Democrats are ignoring the scientific evidence, but almost all the Republicans have followed the Republican party line.
Think about it. The Trump administration rejects global warming, and hasn't even hired scientific advisers. How can they be competent to understand the scientific validity of criminal evidence?
Sadly, it's a waste of time to argue with you, because you have your position and I don't think any evidence would convince you. I'm writing this for the benefit of the other readers of Slashdot who want a better understanding of the issues.
Don't leave the Democrats out of this grouping, they're just as much party/anti-Trump before country.
You said nothing for years while Obama was bombing Syria.
Now all of a sudden you think its, and I quote, "Unconstitutional and Unwise" to bomb Syria.
The other guy has it right. Your attitude is exactly why the Democrats got murdered last election.
You can sit there cherry picking all the things that you have an issue with on a daily basis, but that falls apart when you arent consistent. A politician can get away with some flip-flopping, but you guys are all over the place constantly.
"His name was James Damore."
Seriously. Who the fuck was calling for lowered standards in forensic science?
Private prisons. They lobby for anything that results in higher and longer incarceration rates.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...
https://www.usatoday.com/story...
I'm sick and fucking tired of hearing about business models that can only "grow" only by crossing the ethical line. Fuck private prisons and their reasons to destroy the advances we've made in forensic science. You want profits? Then create business that benefits members of society instead of finding more creative ways to imprison them. If this kind of bullshit lobbying continues, you'll be behind bars for jaywalking, because it helps feed someone's bottom line.