Saturday, July 29, 2017

(Part 30): U.S. Attorney General Jeff Session's war on forensics/crime: Context: A brief survey of Pres. Donald Trump's assault on science (and scientists) in America. (Author Jimmy Tobias: PSMag)..." In a new report, "Sidelining Science From Day One," released on July 20th, the Union of Concerned Scientists attempts to document this "war on science" in detail. The report contains, among other things, a timeline of all the actions the administration has undertaken since inauguration day to ignore or intimidate scientists and undermine their important work. "By our measure," says Gretchen Goldman, a UCS research director with a Ph.D. in environmental engineering and one of the report's co-authors, "the administration has averaged one major attack on science every four days."


PUBLISHER'S NOTE: In numerous posts, I have lamented the assault on science launched by 'beleaguered' U.S. Attorney General Jeff Sessions. This assault was aptly set out by reporter Spencer S. Hsu in the Washington Post, on April 10, 2017, as follows. "Attorney General Jeff Sessions will end a Justice Department partnership with independent scientists to raise forensic science standards and has suspended an expanded review of FBI testimony across several techniques that have come under question, saying a new strategy will be set by an in-house team of law enforcement advisers.
In a statement Monday, Sessions said he would not renew the National Commission on Forensic Science, a roughly 30-member advisory panel of scientists, judges, crime lab leaders, prosecutors and defense lawyers chartered by the Obama administration in 2013. A path to meet needs of overburdened crime labs will be set by a yet-to-be-named senior forensic adviser and an internal department crime task force, Sessions’s statement said." The following article, "A brief survey of Trump's assault on science,'  by Jimmy Tobias, allows readers to see how Session's (Trumps's) assault on science in the context of America's criminal justice system, fits in with Trumps overall assault on science (and scientists)  in America.

Harold Levy: Publisher; The Charles Smith Blog;

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STORY: "A Brief Survey of Trump's Assault on Science," by Jimmy Tobias, published by PSMag  on July 24, 2017.