We Can’t Have Nice Things

Over at the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Chris Mooney has written a nice article about the legacy of the Office of Technology Assessment, reminding us of a time when politicians actually gave a damn about science. The Republicans in Congress, as part of the Gingrich Revolution, defunded the OTA in 1995, and in the succeeding ten years, have managed to put forward leadership that shows even greater contempt for the role of science in society.

The collection of reports prepared by OTA can be accessed online here. As Chris notes, many of them have held up remarkably well for having been prepared fifteen and twenty years ago.