Originally published February 23 2006
NASA Administrator faces complaints of stifling discussion
by Mike Adams, the Health Ranger, NaturalNews Editor
NASA Administrator Michael D. Griffin sent an e-mail to the agency's 19,000 employees pledging his commitment to "scientific openness." Recently NASA's senior climate scientist said the agency tried to keep him from speaking about global warming.
NASA Administrator Michael D. Griffin, facing complaints from agency scientists that political appointees were stifling discussion of global warming, acknowledged problems late Friday and pledged his commitment to "scientific openness."
In an e-mail to the agency's 19,000 employees, Griffin wrote, "It is not the job of public affairs officers to alter, filter or adjust engineering or scientific material produced by NASA's technical staff."
NASA Administrator Michael D. Griffin responded to concerns that scientists were being censored.
For nearly 50 years, federal law has required NASA to widely disseminate information about its activities and scientific research in a timely way, Griffin wrote.
The e-mail was first reported yesterday by the New York Times.
Griffin's statement came four days after House Science Committee Chairman Sherwood L. Boehlert (R-N.Y.) asked NASA to respond to charges by its most senior climate scientist that the agency had tried to keep him from speaking out about global warming.
More recently, NASA officials tried to discourage a Washington Post reporter from interviewing Hansen for an article about global warming and later insisted he could speak on the record only if an agency spokeswoman listened in.
Boehlert asked Griffin to explain NASA's policy.
"Good science cannot long persist in an atmosphere of intimidation," the congressman wrote in his Jan. 30 letter.
Griffin encouraged employees to bring any concerns to NASA leaders "so we can work together to ensure that NASA's policies and procedures appropriately support our commitment to openness."
"We have identified a number of areas in which clarification and improvements to standard operating procedures of the Office of Public Affairs can and will be made," he wrote.
Hansen said public affairs staffers have to shed "their obvious ideological bent" and stick to helping scientists communicate in language the public can understand.
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