Satisfying, yet creepy

Senator James Inhofe (R-OK) today asked the Obama administration to investigate what he called “the greatest scientific scandal of our generation” — the actions of climate scientists revealed by the Climategate Files, and the subsequent admissions by the editors of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report (AR4).

[The] Minority Staff of the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works believe the scientists involved may have violated fundamental ethical principles governing taxpayer-funded research and, in some cases, federal laws. In addition to these findings, we believe the emails and accompanying documents seriously compromise the IPCC -backed “consensus” and its central conclusion that anthropogenic emissions are inexorably leading to environmental catastrophes.

You should read the whole thing, but this is satisfying becuase indeed: the Big Lie has been told, and used to manipulate the outcome of public policy.

Not like that has never been done before, mind you. Everyone does it these days for one reason or another -- and if some politician says he isn't doing it, he's either self-ignorant or he thinks you're too stupid to understand what he's saying. Lies made to spread panic and cause civil distrust are told all the time in American politics today, and it's reprehensible.

So in one sense, it's totally satisfying to see someone call one of the worst offenders out on his malicious and self-serving campaign to bilk the world out of capital resources. Gore's not the only one who should be on what PJ O'Rourke once called the "enemies list" (cf. "the big lie"), but he's a big fat target for this bit of dirty work.

But this is creepy for a deeper reason:

[the report] suggests scientific misconduct that may violate the Shelby Amendment — requiring open access to the results of government-funded research — and the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) policies on scientific misconduct (which were announced December 12, 2000).

The sentence itself is so Orwellian and totalitarian in substance that I don't really know where to start. The United States has an "Office of Science and Technology Policy"? I mean: I'm in favor of scientists telling the truth and everything -- it seems like the basic part of actually being a "scientist" and not "Dr. Doom" or "Miguelito Lovelace", but when the government starts defining what truth is or ought to be, I'm ready to move to another plant -- with or without oxygen.