VISIONSHARE

THE TRUTH SHALL SET US FREE

BUT ONLY IF THE TRUTH IS FREE

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), the leading US agency providing up-to-date climate information, proposed last year year to create a new Climate Service. NOAA Director Thomas Karl outlined how the proposed service aligns with NOAA’s vision:

... of an informed society able to anticipate and respond to climate and its impacts to make the best social and economic decisions. He said that the NOAA Climate Service is designed to inform the mitigation and adaptation decisions needed to respond to the impacts of a changing climate. The Service aims to support decision-makers regionally to globally, on timescales of weeks to decades, in areas including public policy, resource management, infrastructure investment, business development, and decisions of individuals in their daily lives

Even though the NOAA proposal simply proposed to consolidate and reorganize the flow of climate information (adding no new programs), unfortunately but predictably, the US Congress torpedoed the Climate Service in the recent budget battle.

... an initiative that would add no net cost to the budget and would streamline the operations of a Federal agency ... was torpedoed when 227 Republicans and 6 Democrats voted in favor of an Amendment ... prohibiting any funding from being used to establish a NOAA Climate Service.

Why? Because accurate climate information is often inconvenient. Is this unique to the US Congress? Of course, not! The same phenomena occur worldwide as people from the ordinary folks to exalted leaders seek to suppress "uncomfortable conversation and dialogue."