On Sunday the NY Times reported that the Bush administration attempted to stop a top climate scientist at NASA from speaking out about Global Warming. This comes in a torrent of charges claiming that the US government has been silencing many other scientists in regards to the same issue:
http://www.nytimes.com/2006/01/30/international/middleeast/30diplo.html?_r=1
You know, believe it or not, after reading Michael Crichton's last book "State of Fear," I actually have a few doubts of my own regarding Global Warming. That is not to say I don't believe that the climate is changing because of human actions, but what these changes are and what possible danger this can pose to us and nature I think is open to debate, and more open and free research must be done. The issue has become almost more stigmatized than racism, and any outward dissention or cynicism towards it is responded to with the harshest of reactions. Then we get movies like "The Day After Tomorrow," that stokes this fear, unfounded on any scientific research or theory, and the population remains just as ignorant as before, but twice as terrified. And either way nothing substantial or concrete gets accomplished. This is the danger that comes with silencing opinions. If you think that we haven't changed our environment with industrialization then you're only fooling yourself. Whether or not this change is dangerous or fatal must be investigated, but our President, who has admitted that he doesn't like to read, has pandered so much to elements of the US that are so anti-intellectual that he chooses intelligent design over actual intelligence.
The real danger in my eyes, at this present point, isn't what will happen to our global climate. The Earth is a hardy and rugged thing that endures. The immediate threat is to our civil liberties, especially free speech. If our experts cannot discuss and debate issues relevent and vital to our lives then we are all the worse off. It's become pretty obvious (just look at my last post) that when it comes to intelligence this administration his more leaks than Karl Rove on the Titanic, and silencing the issue does not make it go away. In the age of globalization, it becomes exponentially more important to keep our debate as open as possible to find solutions and intercept possible problems before they occur. The only question is; is the Bush adminstration willing to combat the problems facing the world that don't require bunker busting missles or making record profits for Halliburton and Exxon-Mobil?
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