Scientist to Congress: Partial shutdown a 'deep hardship'

The United States Capitol building.Architect of the Capitol

During her time as head of the U.S. Geological Survey, Marcia McNutt had to prep for many government shutdowns but never had to temporarily lay off any employees, as is happening under the current shutdown.

Now, she's the editor of Science, one of the world's top science journals, and has the freedom to let Congress know what she thinks about the current budget impasse.

"The entire scientific community will suffer if the shutdown is allowed to endure for any substantial length of time," McNutt wrote in an editorial published Thursday 3 in the journal Science.

'The entire scientific community will suffer.'

- Marcia McNutt, editor of Science magazine

"The government rules for a shutdown are so strict that many scientists are not allowed to continue their work, even as unpaid volunteers. They have no access to their facilities or their government-issued computers. Experiments are interrupted, time series are broken, continuity is destroyed and momentum is lost."

The government shutdown has a direct economic hit on the 800,000 federal workers who are not allowed to work, with no guarantee of back pay. "Many federal agencies are already furloughing employees for part of the year to cope with the recent budget sequester," McNutt wrote. "Adding the shutdown to any furlough is a deep hardship for families just making ends meet." [6 Ways the Government Shut Will Impact Science, Health]

The science impact is also widespread, McNutt noted.

"The science mission agencies have been responsible for much of the applied science done in the public interest; with the shutdown, they will no longer be able to track flu outbreaks, update real-time information on water quality and quantity, improve weather forecasts, develop advanced defense systems to keep us safe and serve many more immediate needs," she wrote.

The cascading effects of the shutdown are already spreading outside the federal science world. Here are just a few examples: Researchers at universities can't get data locked behind shuttered federal websites. Scientists planning Antarctic expeditions later this month are grounded, and their entire campaign may be called off if the prep work isn't completed in time. Field workers studying seasonal habits of animals, plants and insects may miss their research window due to a lack of grants. The delay could also push the planned Nov. 18 launch of NASA's next Mars mission, called MAVEN, to 2016.

"I urge the research community to take stock of real economic hardships, opportunities lost and damage done, so as to more effectively argue for congressional action on the federal budget," McNutt said.

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How Much Say Should Congress Have in Science Funding?

A battle over science is under way in the halls of the Capitol, with some in Congress calling for more say in which research projects receive federal dollars.

Political science studies funded this year must show their results will benefit U.S. economic or security interests, and another proposal imposes similar new criteria on other scientific studies.

In response, critics have charged lawmakers with intruding into the National Science Foundation’s approval process.

“Every scientific discipline has a stake in undoing the damage inflicted on political science, and, in fact, to the national interest,” by the new criteria, writes Kenneth Prewitt of Columbia University, in a commentary published in tomorrow’s (May 3) issue of the journal Science. “Every scientist should vigorously contest any effort to apply those criteria more broadly.”

Congress and science

The new rule for political science comes from legislation passed in March, which denies the National Science Foundation (NSF) the ability to fund political science studies unless the research will promote national security or the economic interests of the United States. A proposal by Rep. Lamar Smith (R-Texas) would expand that requirement to all NSF-funded studies.

Smith’s draft bill, obtained by Science Insider, would require the NSF to certify that any project it funds meets new criteria, including being “in the interests of the United States to advance the national health, prosperity, or welfare and to secure the national defense by promoting the progress of science.” [7 Great Dramas in Congressional History]

During a hearing in April, presidential science adviser John Holdren objected to applying new criteria to funding proposals: "I think it's a dangerous thing for Congress, or anybody else, to be trying to specify in detail what types of fundamental research NSF should be funding,” Holdren said, according to a Science Insider report.

Prewitt and others say these efforts by lawmakers bring a number of risks, including valuing short-term pay off at the expense of long-term, and often unanticipated, benefits. For instance, narrowly targeted criteria would have prevented the funding of the defense research that led to the Internet, Prewitt says.

“Today, we cannot know how and when the science of the Higgs boson sub-atomic particle will prove useful. But conditions will change; the knowledge will be used,”writes Prewitt, referring to a newly discovered particle thought to explain how other particles get their mass.

Congressional criteria also put agencies in a situation where they must consider whether or not a project is politically feasible, on top of reviewing its scientific merits, said Robert Cook-Deegan, a research professor at the Duke Institute for Genome Sciences and Policy.

Currently, the NSF awards grants based on intellectual merit and the broader impacts of the research. Decisions are made by peer review, a process in which experts in a particular field evaluate a proposal. New criteria threaten this process, and as a result, politically controversial science, such as climate change and stem cell research, could be stifled, Prewitt argues.

In a statement, Smith defended his proposal, writing: “The draft bill maintains the current peer review process and improves on it by adding a layer of accountability.” 

Constitutional privilege?

Proponents of more oversight do have a strong argument, Cook-Deegan said, because the U.S. Constitution gives Congress oversight over executive branch agencies, including the NSF. (Congress, as part of the federal budget, approves the NSF’s budget.)

Both Smith and Sen. Tom Coburn (R-Okla.), who proposed the criteria for political science studies, have questioned the merits of individual, NSF-funded studies. Their lists have included studies on the evolving depiction of animals in the magazine National Geographic; on attitudes toward majority rule and minority rights focusing on the Senate filibuster; and on the International Criminal Court and the African Union Commission’s interpretation of international justice and human rights.

These lists are the latest in a well-established history of singling out individual research projects for criticism. Beginning in March 1975, Wisconsin Sen. William Proxmire began issuing “Golden Fleece Awards,” highlighting what he considered wasteful government spending. His research picks included studies to determine why people fall in love, and under what conditions people, monkeys and rats bite and clench their jaws, according to the Wisconsin Historical Society.

It is unlikely to be a coincidence that social science research, including political science, has been a particular target for Republican lawmakers. Historically, conservatives have perceived social science as a tool to advance the liberal agenda, Cook-Deegan said.

This perception has created political conflict over research in a number of topics, including gun violence, he said. Gun violence research, stymied for many years by congressional decree, received a boost from President Barack Obama earlier this year as part of his response to the shootings in Newtown, Conn. 

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Let the Space Shuttle Rest in Peace, Experts Tell Congress (SPACE.com)

The space shuttle isn't going to fly again, no matter how often supporters of the iconic winged vehicle trot out the possibility, a panel told lawmakers Wednesday (Oct. 12) on Capitol Hill.

Ever since NASA grounded its shuttle fleet in July, some prominent voices have been calling for the venerable orbiters to be pressed back into service. But that's simply not going to happen, panelists said, so continuing to pound the drum won't do any good.

"This would have been a great research question three or perhaps four years ago," Joseph Dyer, chairman of NASA's Aerospace Safety Advisory Panel, told members of the House of Representatives' Committee on Science, Space and Technology Wednesday. "But it's not a good question, or a practical question, at this time." [NASA's Space Shuttle Program In Pictures: A Tribute]

Gap in American spaceflight capabilities

The administration of President George W. Bush decided back in 2004 to end the shuttle program. And this finally came to pass in July, when the orbiter Atlantis wrapped up its STS-135 mission and touched down for the last time.

With the shuttles retired, the United States is now completely dependent on Russian Soyuz vehicles to ferry American astronauts to and from the International Space Station. NASA wants private spaceflight companies to take over this taxi service eventually, but that likely won't happen until 2015 at the earliest, officials have said.

A number of observers seem unwilling to accept this four- or five-year gap in American human spaceflight capabilities. One possible solution they offer is bringing the shuttle back.

For example, former Apollo astronaut Gene Cernan suggested as much last month in his testimony before this same House Science Committee, saying the nation should "get the shuttle out of the garage."

And at the same September hearing, Neil Armstrong, the first human to set foot on the moon, maintained that proposals to continue flying the shuttle under commercial contract "should be carefully evaluated prior to allowing them [the shuttles] to be rendered 'not flightworthy' and their associated ground facilities to be destroyed."

Shuttles are museum-bound

House Science Committee member Lamar Smith (R-Texas) raised the possibility of reviving the shuttles again Wednesday, but Dyer shot it down.

And fellow panelist Thomas Stafford, chairman of the International Space Station Advisory Committee, was similarly bearish on the prospect, citing the time it would take to ramp up the shuttle's infrastructure once again.

For example, each space shuttle launch requires a huge expendable orange fuel tank to be built. There are no such tanks left, and restarting production of the tanks at NASA's Michoud Assembly Facility in Louisiana would be difficult.

"One of the long poles in the tent is that external tank," Stafford said. "And that would probably take about two years to start up."

The current condition of the orbiters also makes it unlikely that they'll ever fly again. NASA technicians have been prepping Atlantis and its sister shuttles Discovery and Endeavour for their retirement roles as museum showpieces ever since they touched down. Already, some components of the orbiters that may harbor toxic residues, such as their main engines, have been removed. Other hardware has been taken off for potential use on future spacecraft.

Atlantis will head to the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex in Florida, Endeavour is bound for the California Science Center in Los Angeles and Discovery will end up at the Smithsonian National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C.

And NASA has already handed Endeavour's keys over to the California Science Center, so even the space agency is ready to say its goodbyes.

You can follow SPACE.com senior writer Mike Wall on Twitter: @michaeldwall. Follow SPACE.com for the latest in space science and exploration news on Twitter @Spacedotcom and on Facebook.

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Withheld Documents Won't Win NASA Any Friends in Congress (ContributorNetwork)

COMMENTARY | The demands of the Senate Commerce Committee for documents from NASA, especially concerning the development of the Space Launch System, and NASA's failure to provide those documents have resulted in a sharply worded letter.

The letter, signed by Sen. Jay Rockefeller, chairman of the committee, and Sen. Kay Bailey Hutchison, the ranking member, expressed exasperation that NASA has failed to provide the requested documents that are required under the 2010 NASA Authorization Act in order to facilitate congressional oversight of the space agency.

The exasperation was clearly expressed in the second to last paragraph of the letter:

"We regret that NASA appears to be unwilling to cooperate with our efforts to conduct legitimate congressional oversight. Although NASA assured Commerce Committee staff in a May 27, 2011, telephone call that your agency was 'not looking to hide anything,' NASA's failure to provide the requested documents over the past month leaves us no choice but to conclude that NASA does not intend to cooperate with our efforts to make sure that your agency is complying with its duties under the 2010 Act and properly spending taxpayers' dollars."

The last paragraph of the letter contained a threat:

"Unless NASA decides to change its approach to our inquiry and provide the Committee with the materials requested in our May 18 letter by 6:00 p.m. on Monday, June 27, 2011, Chairman Rockefeller will issue you a subpoena for production of these documents."

The letter and the controversy surrounding the document request reflects a growing sense of distrust of NASA by Congress, which appropriates the money that NASA needs to operate. The failure to provide legally required documents to the Senate Commerce Committee suggests one of two possibilities.

One possibility is that NASA is unable to provide those documents. That would bespeak incompetence on an epic scale, since record keeping is something one would think that a government bureaucracy would be good at.

The other possibility is that NASA is stalling and, despite protestations to the contrary, actually has something to hide.

Congress has made its will very clear that it wants the MPCV, formerly known as Orion, and the heavy lift Space Launch System, flying by 2016. Congress may not provide enough funding to make this happen and is as yet ambivalent as to what the new spacecraft's mission is, aside from taking astronauts beyond low Earth orbit to -- somewhere. NASA has in turn been ambivalent as to whether it can build the spacecraft or whether it even intends to, despite the congressional mandate.

The tug of war between Congress and NASA, the direct result of President Obama's cancellation of the Constellation space exploration program, seems about to take an ugly turn. What Congress will do if NASA somehow defies the subpoena is as yet unknown. While the Obama administration could attempt to invoke executive privilege, that would tend to contradict the dictates of the 2010 NASA Authorization Act the president signed into law.

The matter could very well wind up in court for a showdown. It all depends on how far NASA, and by extension the Obama administration, intends to take the matter.

Mark R. Whittington is the author of Children of Apollo and The Last Moonwalker. He has written on space subjects for a variety of periodicals, including The Houston Chronicle, The Washington Post, USA Today, the L.A. Times, and The Weekly Standard

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