Posted on 01/07/2002 6:45:43 AM PST by Stand Watch Listen
Dennis T. Avery, a senior fellow for the Hudson Institute and a former senior policy analyst for the US Department of State, recently took note of sanctions applied to Steven R. Arnold, a former researcher at the Tulane University Center for Bioenvironmental Research. The Federal Office of Research Integrity found that Arnold had "committed scientific misconduct by intentionally falsifying the research results published in the Journal Science and by providing falsified and fabricated materials to investigating officials."
His punishment? He will be unable to receive federal research funding for five years. Avery called it "one of the most dramatic scientific frauds of modern times," noting that the Tulane Center said it found that various pesticides, safe when tested individually, were 1,000 times more dangerous when tested together. It raised the specter of modern agriculture's chemicals undermining the health of the human population and the natural ecology through a blind spot in our regulatory testing." And it was a lie.
This is part of the campaign of endless lies designed to secure the ban of every single pesticide and herbicide that protects human health against insect and rodent predators, and the vast food crops produced by American farmers. In 1996 a book was published, "Our Stolen Future: Are We Threatening Our Fertility, Intelligence and Survival? - A Scientific Detective Story." Written by Theo Colbert, even the author her book admitted it was based on mere suspicions. It has been cited, however, as proof of yet another bogus threat conjured up by environmentalists. "
The book speculated that man-made chemicals were causing ailments ranging from cancer to attention deficit disorder by disrupting our endocrine systems," noted Avery. The book's forward was written by then Vice President Al Gore. When Arnold's falsified research was published in 1996, Carol Browner, the Administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency, said, "The new study is the strongest evidence to date that combinations of estrogenic materials may be potent enough to significantly increase the risk of breast cancer, prostate cancer, birth defects and other major health concerns."
As we now know, there is no such evidence, except that purposely created to further the goal of the environmental movement to end the use of pesticides and herbicides. Beginning with Rachel Carson's bogus and discredited "science" in "Silent Spring", this attack on beneficial chemicals has never ceased.
In a similar fashion, Michael Bellesile's book, "Arming America" was seized upon by gun-control advocates as having demolished "the myth" that individuals have the right to gun ownership. The book asserted that private gun ownership was uncommon in early America. It turns out that the author deliberately misinterpreted Colonial documents, misquoted early federal laws, distorted historical accounts, and cited San Francisco records that experts agree were destroyed in the 1906 earthquake.
The willingness to lie regarding environmental issues was revealed in December when it was found that federal and state wildlife biologists had planted false evidence of a rare cat species in two national forests, the Gifford Pinchot National Forest and Wenatchee National Forest in Washington State. This is the same forest area that the Earth Liberation Front has recently boasted of "spiking" trees in order to do injury to lumberjacks culling trees for purposes of forest management.
Now comes another report of "bio-fraud" where a Washington State fish and wildlife biologist is alleged to have asked a taxidermist for grizzly bear hair samples in March of last year. The use of such hair samples could have been used to taint a study of grizzly bear habitat, ultimately affecting recreation, timber, mining, road construction and other uses of throughout the State. Officials are beginning to wonder just how much of this kind of deliberate deception has been at work at the state and federal level to achieve the environmental goals of shutting down essential industries and the recreational use of public lands. One is reminded of the "Spotted Owl" hoax that devastated the timber industry throughout the Pacific Northwest.
The cascade of lies about everything environmental should, by now, have convinced the public that US government officials responsible for setting national policies and environmental groups seeking to determine what those policies should be cannot be trusted. The public, however, has rarely paid any attention to anything than the lies published by a compliant and complacent mainstream media that has fully adopted the goals of the environmental and animal rights movements.
The costs of these policies are astronomical. Billions of dollars are wasted on wasteful programs said to "protect" the environment. Billions of dollars are going to be allocated to States and environmental groups to put more and more land aside from any use. Late on the evening of December 20th, the Senate, without any public debate or a recall vote, passed S-990, The American Wildlife Enhancement Act of 2001. We will never know who voted for this act. This was the same tactic used to pass the UN Convention on Desertification. Now $600 million in taxpayer dollars will be given out for "the acquisition of an area of land or water that is suitable or capable of being made suitable for feeding, resting or breeding by wildlife." Translation: Any property can be designated for virtual seizure. One can only pray the President will veto this full-scale attack on property rights in America.
This is how environmental groups achieve their goals. They are goals based in a consuming hatred of humankind and its need for food and shelter. They are goals that are intended to undermine and destroy America's economic power, based on access to its vast natural resources. They are goals intended to strip Americans of the most fundamental right of self-defense. They are the goals of those who believe they are morally superior to you and I, and therefore have the right to subvert the truth to achieve total control over our lives and our nation.
While Americans look to the Middle East and elsewhere, fearful of terrorist organizations intent on harming our lives and our society, they continue to ignore the internal enemies who, by stealth and deception, work to destroy the progress of real science that protects and extends our lives, and to undermine our most fundamental Constitutional protections.
If we lose this struggle, it will be because of our inertia and indifference. The environmentalists, animal rights, and gun control advocates are counting on that. In the political year ahead, their closest allies will be the Democratic Party.
Alan Caruba writes a weekly column, "Warning Signs", posted on the Internet site of The National Anxiety Center.
Alan Caruba
Bush isn't in charge of it, the heads of the agencies appointed to them are not in charge of them, life time employee's with an agenda that cannot be fired are in charge. Each promoting the necessity of his own little piece of the Fed. and he is busily growing it's power and it's take of the pie.
Ahem... Who are these people. If their job is to review these studies/watch our $$$ then where have they been?
If their 'agenda' gets in the way of their job duties, they can be fired. - Reagan fired hundreds of them.
The media sure won't expose it but reading between the lines and picking up statements they make here and there it doesn't take long to get a picture of what is going on. Federal employees should be subject to termination at the whim of the party in charge. D.C. is an out of control monster and the E.P.A. is just one agency out of many out of control agencies.
It is time to reintroduce the government to the Declaration of Independence and the resultant actions taken thereto.
Steven R. Arnold should Never be allowed to recieve government money through grants or any other way again. That is the people's money.
ORI HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
Scientific misconduct became a public issue in the United States in 1981 when then Representative Albert Gore, Jr., chairman of the Investigations and Oversight Subcommittee of the House Science and Technology Committee, held the first hearing on the emerging problem. The hearing was prompted by the public disclosure of scientific misconduct cases at four major research centers in 1980. Some twelve cases of scientific misconduct were disclosed in this country between 1974-1981. Congressional attention to scientific misconduct was maintained throughout the 1980s by additional allegations of scientific misconduct and reports that the National Institutes of Health (NIH), universities, and other research institutions were inadequately responding to those allegations.
Congress took action in 1985 by passing the Health Research Extension Act. The Act, in part, added Section 493 to the Public Health Service (PHS) Act. Section 493 required the Secretary of Health and Human Services to issue a regulation requiring applicant or awardee institutions to establish "an administrative process to review reports of scientific fraud" and "report to the Secretary any investigation of alleged scientific fraud which appears substantial." The Section also required the Director, NIH, to establish a process for receiving and responding to reports from institutions. This legislation complemented existing authority under which the PHS pursued scientific misconduct in the 1970s and early 1980s. Guidelines were published in the NIH Guide to Grants and Contracts in July, 1986; the Final Rule, "Responsibilities of Awardee and Applicant Institutions for Dealing With and Reporting Possible Misconduct in Science", was published in the Federal Register on August 8, 1989. This regulation is codified at 42 CFR Part 50, Subpart A.
Before 1986, reports of scientific misconduct were received by funding institutes within PHS agencies. In 1986, the NIH assigned responsibility for receiving and responding to reports of scientific misconduct to its Institutional Liaison Office. This was the first step taken to create a central locus of responsibility for scientific misconduct within the Department of Health and Human Services.
In March 1989, the PHS created the Office of Scientific Integrity (OSI) in the Office of the Director, NIH, and the Office of Scientific Integrity Review (OSIR) in the Office of the Assistant Secretary for Health (OASH). The sole purpose of these offices was to deal with scientific misconduct; the creation of OSIR also began the process of removing responsibility for scientific misconduct from the funding agencies. In May, 1992, OSI and OSIR were consolidated into the Office of Research Integrity (ORI) in the OASH. Later that year, HHS established a hearing opportunity for all scientists formally charged with research misconduct.
In June 1993, the process of removing responsibility for handling allegations of scientific misconduct from the funding agencies was completed when President Clinton signed the NIH Revitalization Act of 1993. This Act established the ORI as an independent entity within the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS).
Organizationally, ORI is located within the Office of the Secretary of Health and Human Services in the Office of Public Health and Science which is headed by the Assistant Secretary for Health.
In October 1999, HHS announced several changes designed to improve its processes for responding to allegations of research misconduct and promoting research integrity. The final definition was published in the Federal Register on December 6, 2000. First, HHS will adopt the proposed government-wide definition of research misconduct developed by the National Science and Technology Council after it is finalized by the Office of Science and Technology Policy. The proposed definition was published in the Federal Register on October 13, 1999. Second, extramural institutions and intramural research programs have the primary responsibility for responding to allegations of scientific misconduct. The Office of Inspector General, HHS, rather than ORI conducts any fact-finding required by the federal government. ORI continues to conduct oversight reviews of all investigations. Third, the Assistant Secretary for Health, upon recommendations from ORI, makes the final decisions regarding scientific misconduct and administrative actions, subject to appeal. Fourth, the HHS Departmental Appeals Board continues to hear appeals, but the hearing panels include two scientists rather than one or none. Fifth, all extramural research institutions are required to provide training in the responsible conduct of research to all research staff who have direct and substantive involvement in proposing, performing, reviewing, or reporting research, or who receive research training, support by PHS funds or who otherwise work on PHS-supported research projects even if they individual does not receive PHS support. The PHS Policy on Instruction in the Responsible Conduct of Research was published n the Federal Register on December 1, 2000 and suspended on February 20, 2001 pending review of the substance of the policy and whether the document should have been issued as a regulation rather than a policy. Sixth, HHS published a notice of proposed rulemaking on the protection of whistleblowers in the Federal Register on November 28, 2000; comments were due by January 29, 2001.
To answer "where they have been" you have to look to the underlined parts of the above. You'll notice a change that occured in 1993, that internalized the independancy of the agency and placed it under the control of HHS. You should also notice the sly way that they fixed it, to possibly take effect after/if they were ousted from power.
It just amazes me that this can happen and all we hear from the press is a "ho hum".
I hear that.
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