Science! Science Again!

President-elect Obama recently selected the new administration's primary science advisers, and the selections signal a dramatic turn from the Bush Administration's perspective that science can tell us whatever our politics want it to.


--> For all the lip-service that every national politician gives to making America competitive in science and technology, Obama's choices actually follow through on that priority. Harvard physicist John Holdren will become the director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy while marine biologist Jane Lubchenco will head the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Holdren will be joined by former National Institute of Health director Harold Varmus and MIT professor Eric Lander as co-chairs of Obama's Council of Advisers on Science and Technology.


The choices, especially Holdren, signal an increased desire to focus national energies on combating global warming. A couple of years ago, Holdren told the BBC that “it is too late for avoiding dangerous climate change. We must focus now on avoiding catastrophic climate change.” Obviously, President Obama and his advisers believe that this is inevitable:


Thankfully, Obama also appointed this guy as a science advisor. He's our only hope:


--> Meanwhile, Obama announced his new Secretary of Energy: Steven Chu. Chu is a historic, barrier-breaking pick: the first Nobel laureate selected to a presidential cabinet. (Is anyone else annoyed that NO federal government has felt the need to employ the smartest people they could find?) He also signals a major shift in the role of the Department of Energy, focusing on green technologies and renewable energy instead of the traditional attention paid to nuclear waste.


By the way, Chu's Nobel Prize was won in 1997 for his work "trapping atoms with lasers," which will no doubt come in handy as a member of Obama's Cabinet. So will his ability to teach himself how to pole vault. At least that makes up for his being basically the only Cabinet appointment that isn't a basketball player.

In fact, the quotes attributed to him in the afore-linked article are hysterical. Among them, he suggests a hypothetical involving him as "emperor," explains that he had no idea what the significance of having trapped an atom was (that makes two of us), and much much more.


Up next time: an obvious James Bond pun, an easy Star Trek reference, a Cabinet member from "La Hood," and a slamdunk of an Education Secretary.