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What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

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Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#811

Post by chasing »

Gabriel54 wrote: post #331
chasing wrote: post #299

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unethical race-based preferences is what those policies have been trying to fix. Not sure you’re aware of this, but academia used to be basically off-limits to anyone not white and male.

> Unethical race-based preferences is what those policies have been trying to fix. I understand that that is the stated intention. I also believe they are racist and discriminatory. > Not sure you’re aware of this, but academia used to be basically off-limits to anyone not white and male. I also understand this. And now it is not. What is the point here?

> And now it is not.

Um. Racism and sexism have not been eliminated in our country. I mean, just look at who's running the executive branch of the government at the moment. We need initiatives to lift up traditionally underrepresented groups now more than ever.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#812

Post by nanoyster »

brylie wrote: post #497
jmward01 wrote: post #490

This is a coup and we are calmly debating budgets. Debating the % of budget and how useful organization x is and if y will still get grant money, and, and, and... All of this is ignoring the big elephant in the room that there is one single person deciding everything that happens in government as if they were a king. The right thing to be debating is how we can stop this from continuing and how we can hold those resp…

As an expat in the EU, I have a surreal sense of being a bystander at an ongoing emergency scene. I don’t want to be yet another gawker as this situation is unfolding but am struggling to come up with actions that are within my power to take as a form of protest, resistance, or solidarity. What are some practical actions that we can take to resist these sweeping changes?

[dead]

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#813

Post by sam345 »

This is such a politically charged article and full of political hate. Is this really worthy of HN. Are political editorials now ok for HN? In addition to his obvious political hatred of the current president, the author goes out of his purview to repeat third hand rumors and allegations of illegality at other agencies he has no experience with.

Just a few quotes from the article:

"...This is amply laid out in the Project 2025 documents, and let me say right here that I was volcanically pissed off at the way that topic was handled during ..the campaign.", and

.. That’s a gigantic can of worms that I don’t have the energy to open at the moment, but past that, there is a broader hatred of education and expertise of all kinds. I hate to bring that one up, because it makes me sound like a crank, but there really is a strain of Trumpism that is nothing more than a desire for revenge against snooty over-educated elites who try to tell people what they should do based on their so-called "research." So if by pummelling the NIH and NSF you can simultaneously punch some huge bureaucracies in the face, revenge yourself against your imagined pandemic enemies, and cause distress at a bunch of big universities where they mostly hate you anyway, well. . .what's not to like? ... I strongly urge everyone to make their voices heard with their Senators and Representatives about these issues: the Republican ones need to hear that not everyone agrees with this stuff, and the Democratic ones need to hear that their constituents are not in a handshaking bipartisan mood."

We wouldn't be here if government funding was not overrun by leftist politics. How many grants have been rewritten the past few years to put a facade of DEI or to grab funding from funds specifically targeted for DEI or other leftist goals?

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#814

Post by subpixel »

KennyBlanken wrote: post #224
lanstin wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The weird spanner in the works is that while people may be unhappy, they are unhappy because of things they believe that aren't true. Covid response in the US wasn't that bad; global warming really is causing the floods and fires and hurricanes and the EVs really are helping, as would methane emissions rules and so on; if people think the bi-coastal elites are looking down on them (and they are), like so what; that's…

> Covid response in the US wasn't that bad ...what? Trump's son-in-law was put in charge of supply distribution, refused to invoke the defense production act, and when they finally did, Trump took ages to actually "order" ventilators. They refused to implement testing because they knew that tests would show how bad things were and justify measures that would hurt the stock market. Trump largely didn't do anything at…

I think what the commenter meant to address was the right-wing perception that mask mandates and shutdowns were the first step that ends with the government taking away your guns.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#815

Post by jandrewrogers »

3D30497420 wrote: post #588
nlitened wrote: post #562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> deciding everything that happens in government as if they were a king Isn’t it what the head of executive branch supposed to mean? Trump does exactly how he promised he would do if you elected him, and you guys elected him overwhelmingly to do exactly that.

> you guys elected him overwhelmingly to do exactly that Most certainly not overwhelmingly: Trump: 49.80% Harris: 48.32% This is one of the more frustrating aspects of the United States. Not even 1.5% more and the result is "near total evisceration of the federal government" compared to "largely the same". The result is even worse with the Senate. 55.9m votes for Democratic Senators, 54.4m for Republican Senators, an…

Both the President and the Senate are representatives of and voted on by the States, not the people. The only representative of the people in the US Federal government is aptly named House of Representatives.

When people vote for President, it is only to inform the State of how they want the State to vote, and the State has significant freedom to allocate its votes for President how it wishes e.g. some States use a proportional allocation instead of winner-takes-all.

Popular vote for Federal office was largely a 20th century invention.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#816

Post by kergonath »

insane_dreamer wrote: post #761
jmward01 wrote: post #490

This is a coup and we are calmly debating budgets. Debating the % of budget and how useful organization x is and if y will still get grant money, and, and, and... All of this is ignoring the big elephant in the room that there is one single person deciding everything that happens in government as if they were a king. The right thing to be debating is how we can stop this from continuing and how we can hold those resp…

The other big elephant in the room is that the self-appointed wanna-be ruler, Musk, owns companies which have received very large amounts of both government (taxpayer) grants and contracts. Back in 2015, the LA Times reported Musk's companies had received nearly $5 billion in grants. That's taxpayer money. Plus there's the SpaceX contracts--not saying those are unwarranted, certainly SpaceX deserves the contracts mor…

> Back in 2015, the LA Times reported Musk's companies had received nearly $5 billion in grants.

Luckily, that is unlikely to happen again. Now, the broligarchs are in power and the LA times has been captured and turned into a propaganda tool.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#817

Post by SquibblesRedux »

tstactplsignore wrote: post #407
SquibblesRedux wrote: post #327

The financial position of the US is precarious, at best. I seriously doubt there is any painless way to correct course, as Congress seems to have lost the ability to compromise. Looking into the future, the US will go the way of the former Soviet Union if it does not take corrective action. Is the current situation the only way, the best way, or even a good way to address the country's economic position? That is a ma…

How do you reconcile these deeply basic facts with your point of view? 1. The US economy was the best in the world in 2024. 2. The NIH, USAID, and NSF budgets make up just a percentage point or two of US spending. 3. These programs consistently generate ROI >>1. In light of these painfully obvious facts, isn't it clear that the priorities of this administration have nothing to do with government finances? And that ev…

Although there are minor fluctuations in the US debt load, the mean is clearly going up without bounds. Interest creates an exponentially worsening problem with increasing competition for resources. Competition for resources breeds conflict.

Congress' lack of will to compromise leads to winner-take-all scenarios with wild swings in policy.

Language such as "deeply basic facts" and "blatantly irresponsible" is part of the problem. I am as guilty as the next person for experiencing heightened emotions and using adverbs carrying negative connotations that lack denotational substance. However, my experience has been that the storms are best weathered by calm, consistent, and persistent actions or behaviors.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#818

Post by teeray »

rayiner wrote: post #778
waveBidder wrote: post #739

Earlier quoted context omitted.

the Congress. the president doesn't have the authority to unilaterally shut down entire departments

Precedent holds that Congress has the power to establish executive branch agencies and lay out their jurisdiction and functions. It also holds that, once so established, the president has the power to decide how they’re operated. There’s a constitutional distinction between this power to create/define (legislative) and the power to run (executive). The article doesn’t seem to be about abolishing the NIH and NSF. Inst…

It would seem to follow that the executive’s power to run has limits itself. If the legislative has the power to create an entity and the executive runs that entity at such minimal function that the entity effectively doesn’t exist, that usurps the legislative of their creation powers. You could tarpit any agency they establish. The power to run still means you must run the agency in good faith.

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#819

Post by Take8435 »

xp84 wrote: post #503
jmward01 wrote: post #490

This is a coup and we are calmly debating budgets. Debating the % of budget and how useful organization x is and if y will still get grant money, and, and, and... All of this is ignoring the big elephant in the room that there is one single person deciding everything that happens in government as if they were a king. The right thing to be debating is how we can stop this from continuing and how we can hold those resp…

As far as I can tell, Trump is doing things he openly announced he would do for at least a year. So all of this is either a result of robust public support for his policies, or, (my preferred explanation) an even more robust public repudiation of the only alternative that was put forward by the other party, a candidate famous for dropping out before Iowa in 2020 but somehow was coronated the nominee without any voter…

> but even when SCOTUS was friendly to the anti-Trump cause

Sources requested for this statement, made unilateral with no evidence.

> Declaring it a 'coup' is as silly as when Trump lost in 2020 and declared it a 'rigged election.

A single person, who somehow owns multiple major companies with, clear conflict of interest, is not a coup? What? He & his "engineers" reportedly have access to American citizen information. Where's the required oversight by Congress? I get trimming the government, but let's talk about it in the open rather than relying on his word and his word alone.

> You don't win by insulting, by dunking on the other guys on ~Twitter~ bluesky, or by protesting.

Would you say that to Tea Party folks who widely protested Obama? What? This makes no sense. Didn't they also insult Obama and his birth? Or anyone who voted for Obama? Whataboutism.

Frankly, I feel you are delusional and have bought into the ruse of the current news cycle.

> "Everyone not already in our tent is evil, fascist, dastardly white supremacists," but to their chagrin, their current tent is under 50% of the voting public and it isn't growing.

Trumps share of the vote was https://www.fec.gov/resources/cms-content/documents/2024pres...

Re: What's happening inside the NIH and NSF

#820

Post by Der_Einzige »

CalRobert wrote: post #589
mnky9800n wrote: post #481

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I dunno man my salary is six figures and I’m an academic scientist living in the Netherlands. My life is much higher quality than the equivalent could buy me in anywhere worth living in the USA. Like I agree the salaries can be low but you simply don’t need to make 300k usd to have a nice life here. I have a flat in the middle of the city of Utrecht where I cycle to work and pop off to the pub after and the gym is tw…

Hear hear - Utrecht might be the finest city in the world, too. And Europe is missing a gigantic opportunity right now. The fact that talent is cheap, there's a strong social safety net, and we don't have enormous amounts of entrepreneurship is really strange.

Maybe because the "greed is good" thesis of America really is "correct" with respect to geopolitical competition?
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