In his latest newsletter, Senator Doug Whitsett (R-Klamath Falls), a retired veterinarian, includes an interesting commentary on a looming conflict between the state and scientific freedom.
 
Here’s what he has to say:
 
“An issue that seems at first glance to be rather insignificant may actually carry tremendous implications for a free society.  That issue is freedom of speech and the continuation of separation between the state and scientific freedom.
 
Oregon State University has a climate laboratory which has been in existence for many years. This laboratory comprises a non-partisan group of very well educated earth and meteorological scientists who are, and have historically been instrumental in predicting the climate trends of the state.  George Taylor is the meteorologist who is in charge of the laboratory.  He has been known for many years as the state’s chief climatologist.  He has earned the position through his and the laboratory’s accurate work prognosticating winter snow pack, precipitation trends and overall climatology from year to year.

 
Oregon’s governor and his policy advisors now seek to strip George Taylor of his unofficial title of state climatologist and bestow the title on someone else because Mr. Taylor dares engage in valid scientific debate regarding global warming.  We as a society and government are starting to slide down a slippery slope when we invalidate the work and personages of legitimate scientists and quell scientific debate in favor of “political” agendas.  Under the guise of political correctness and advancement of his political legacy, the governor and his advisors appear willing to go to any lengths to ensure that Oregonians are not presented with the two sides of the anthropogenic causation of global warming debate.
 
Throughout history, science, religion and the state have often times been at odds with each other.  During the Middle Ages, the Inquisition in Europe often had scientists being burned at the state – or otherwise condemned to death – as heretics for suggesting that the earth was round that the earth revolved around the sun, and many other facts that are now commonly accepted.  We are seeing an age of “dis-enlightenment” if you will, where governments are castigating scientists who don’t believe in their agendas and Oregon is at the leading edge of this movement.
 
There are many well educated scientists who do not believe that global warming is caused by humans, if it exists at all over the long term.  Through censorship and intimidation, our governor appears to be attempting to regulate our scientists to expose only those notions that support his agenda.  The debate rages on and scientists on both sides of the issue should be allowed to represent their work and opinions and continue to be held in high esteem for their work.  Science does not have a preset, preconceived agenda; its outcome is not a political “goal” to be attained; and the individuals who work in the field of science should not be politically manipulated, threatened or subjugated by politicians.”
 
Wow.  Discuss.