Why Let the Facts Stand in the Way?

Most careful, intelligent people make important decisions by first gathering the facts. Decisions, rules, regulations and laws must be based upon the facts. Not so in the Trump administration. Trump starts with his desired policy and then tries to do whatever is necessary to make the facts appear to conform to, support or justify the policy. Sometimes this means ignoring science. Sometimes this means hiding the facts. Sometimes this means twisting the arms of agency employees to reach conclusions which the employees know are not supported by the facts. Sometimes this means firing or reassigning people who won’t do what they are ordered to do.

It should not be surprising that employees of federal agencies, particularly scientists, do not take kindly to being forced to agree that 1 plus 1 equals anything other than 2. Their dilemma is described in a March 31, 2020 article in The New York Times, “For Environmental Rollbacks, Devils Lurk in the Details”.

The article states that some professional scientists have embedded critical scientific data into the assessments which are required by law even though the data are at odds with the policy. They hope that when the rules and regulations are challenged in court, the data will be used to overturn the rules and regulations.

More power to them. Maybe someday we can get back to the truth.