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How the Bush administration muzzles the…: How the Bush administration muzzles the world’s top global warming scientist: “In my more than three decades in the government, I’ve never witnessed such restrictions on the ability of scientists to communicate with the public.”

(Via towleroad.)

A couple excerpts from the linked article at Think Progress:

CICERONE: I can’t think of anybody who I would say is better than Hansen. He might argue that there’s two or three others as good, but nobody better.

PELLEY: And Cicerone, who’s an atmospheric chemist, said the same thing that every leading scientist told us.

CICERONE: Climate change is really happening.

PELLEY: So what is causing the changes?

CICERONE: Well, the greenhouse gases. Carbon dioxide and methane and chloro fluoro carbons and a couple of others – which are all, the increases in their concentrations in the air are due to human activities. It’s that simple.

Every other leading scientist. There isn’t a controversy over global warming. Climate change is happening. If humanity is not the cause, we are at least a significant source of change. To stand by and do nothing is criminal, and Hansen is right to speak out. I think he probably feels that if he had not spoken out during this time, then when catastrophic change finally did occur, he would not be able to live with himself.

HANSEN: I find a willingness to listen only to those portions of scientific results that fit predetermined, inflexible positions. This, I believe, is a recipe for environmental disasters. [ . . . ]

HANSEN: And I object to the fact that I’m not able to freely communicate via the media. National Public Radio wanted to interview me, and they were told they would need to instead interview someone at NASA headquarters. And the comment was made that they didn’t want Jim Hansen going on the most liberal media in the nation.

Open exchange of scientific ideas has been one of the founding principles of the modern applied scientific method. Before the best minds kept their knowledge secret, and every generation had to begin anew. It’s difficult to know if this administration’s war on science at every level is done out of malice or merely willful ignorance. So far science has been resilient, but it cannot stay so forever.

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