Monday, January 07, 2008

Science and the Presidential Election

The the tedious US Presidential Election in full swing right now with the primaries and caucuses for each party, science continues to take a back seat in terms of importance. I'll have more to say on this later, but for now, it might be useful to see if there's anything we can infer regarding each candidate's view on science. The Jan. 4th 2008 issue of Science has a summary for the leading candidates in each party regarding their views of science, and possible science policy. Hillary Clinton turns out to have the most detailed and comprehensive policy on science, which isn't surprising since she probably got the same network of advisers that Bill Clinton had. Still, she has stated that the Presidential Science Adviser will report directly to her, and not through several layers of commands the way George Bush currently has it.

Anyhow, you might want to pick up this issue of Science. This might be one of the few places that have such a concise description of the candidates' views on science and science policy. It is also why we should have a presidential debate on just science.

Zz.

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