Ah, so a party official must approve the grants?
Trump has been learning from Winnie the Pooh. How very Communist of him.
New executive order puts all grants under political control
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Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control
#112If an executive order can put grants under political control, they were already under political control. We just didn't know it. That is the case with so much of what is happening now. If these things are possible, the system was already broken.
You can’t make an unbreakable system, or, at least, it’s very difficult.
The problem is that a big percentage of the population is ok with this, and in that case it doesn’t matter if it’s illegal or not. There is a reason why, even if allowed, governments didn’t do these kind of things: population didn’t want it.
Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control
#113There's a reason the Americans discovered how to make atomic weapons first and it's because their researchers were living under a less oppressive state that wasn't motivated by anti-intellectualism and dumb ideology.
Lol what? At the time that was done we were drafting people to fight in foreign wars, taxes were extraordinarily high (after having zero income tax just recently) and those weapons were built specifically to support that.
Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control
#114If an executive order can put grants under political control, they were already under political control. We just didn't know it. That is the case with so much of what is happening now. If these things are possible, the system was already broken.
In software terms, there has been a vulnerability in the constitution all along, it just had not been exploited until now.
The three branches of government are supposed to be checks and balances against each other. But turns out two of the three don't have any actual power to enforce their mandates. This has worked as long as the three branches grudgingly respected each others role. But now that the executive branch simply decided to ignore the other two whenever convenient, turns out there is no recourse.
Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control
#115Earlier quoted context omitted.
The Soviets had the first flying object in space, the first animal in space, the first human in space, first spacewalk, first woman, first space station. I doubt those plans were all in the US, and if they were, the US didn’t use them.
> The Soviets had the […]first woman,[…] That is quite the claim !
Claim? It's a matter of history. Her name is Valentina Tereshkova, and she's still alive. [0]
Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control
#116How much of this shit is even legal?
We shall see. Undoubtedly much of this order will be challenged by some pretty powerful institutions and lawyers. Unfortunately, my confidence in the supreme court to uphold the fairest or least destructive interpretation of the law is at an all time low.
I believed this too but the last few months we’ve seen powerful institution after institution just kinda give up or not even try
Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control
#117Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control
#118There's a reason the Americans discovered how to make atomic weapons first and it's because their researchers were living under a less oppressive state that wasn't motivated by anti-intellectualism and dumb ideology.
While I agree in spirit on the concern about political interference in science, the Manhattan Project was actually one of the most secretive, tightly controlled government programs in US history. In addition many scientists involved (like Oppenheimer) later faced political persecution during the McCarthy era. American atomic research succeeded despite, or perhaps because of, intense state control and funding
The "raw material" of the Manhattan Project was a flourishing community of researchers, including many European exiles; "secretive, tightly controlled" management is simply the only reasonable way to run such a military program.
Consider that at the same time the Third Reich also had a nuclear weapons research program, and it went nowhere.
Re: New executive order puts all grants under political control
#119I don’t really understand why so much of science is funded by the government instead of by private philanthropy. It seems like an obvious channel for corruption of science. Sure private donors have interest driven motives too but it would be diffuse across many areas not concentrated like a political party’s interests.
Because imagine just for the sake of discussion (I am well aware this is not possible. Just trying to make an extreme point. You could pick HIV or MS or Parking's or any other incurable disease) there was a magic pill that could cure cancer. You take it once a day for a week and any cancer is gone. Doesn't matter which cancer. All of them, gone for good. Magical! Would would ANY private enterprise (i.e. pharmaceutica…
All companies are not one giant entity. Even when they illegally collude, they're holding onto their knives and keeping a keen eye on one another's backs.
Of course any company would take this deal and make a boatload of money (though less than the $200B / year).
Undercutting all its competitors would be a bonus, not a deterrent.
This has happened so many times throughout history. New tech comes in, does the same thing cheaper and better, old companies die out kicking and screaming.