[JCTheDenthog]

>Private citizen fund scientific research [under threat of prison or deadly force.]

I mean I'm not inherently opposed to laws or government, but I think a lot of people need to be more measured and considerate of what they are using tax money for when it is being taken from their fellow citizens at gunpoint.

[convolvatron]

ignoring a gratuitous reference to use of force, absolutely. having a discussion as society about what we are funding is in fact democracy. sadly there is an issue in the sciences in that lay people may have difficulty seeing the benefit of connecting the dots. but we should try. and as flawed as it is, the adversarial system we have in the US is at least a forum for those discussion.

using grep to defund grants that contain words we don't like is the exact opposite of measured and considerate. so is punishing scientists for the sin of working for a 'woke' institution. in fact all this seems extremely punitive, and not in the spirit of optimizing outcomes for costs at all.

note that this policy explicitly removes the requirement to provide any kind of rationale. that sort of directly contradicts the notion that this is a measured discussion about priorities.

[frigidwalnut]

I agree. This administration is ground zero for mismanagement of funds and outright corruption. Just look at the director of the FBI and former secretary of DHS. Both have used and continue to use tax payer money for personal use. It should make every tax payer livid.

[JCTheDenthog]

It does make me livid, just as much as the waste of taxpayer money on pointless (and sometimes outright racist) research here makes me livid: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48335722

Believe it or not, it's possible to hate both Kash Patel/Kristi Noem and the unelected bureaucrats burning tax money on awful research.

[frigidwalnut]

Sure that’s fine. They funded research that you think is wasteful and you would like to have tools to provide that feedback. The issue with this OMB change is that it is not that. The OMB change is a change that allows the administration to cancel any grant for any reason without answering to citizens about it.

BTW your “believe it or not” is quite condescending. Do you talk to people in real life like that?

[JCTheDenthog]

The president is elected, the bureaucrats that were making the decisions before were not, that's the difference.

>BTW your “believe it or not” is quite condescending. Do you talk to people in real life like that?

Yes, especially when they're the sort of people who support taking my tax money to fund idiotic and outright racist "research".

[conception]

So you want every decision in government to be made by a politician instead of an expert? We should start with the military right? Get those bureaucrats generals out of the battlefield and put some elected officials in charge of our battle plans so our plans aren’t wasting tax dollars!

If that sounds absurd… you’re right! It is!

[gammarator]

> the bureaucrats that were making the decisions before were not

Russ Vought was not elected either.

[JCTheDenthog]

Correct, bur he is directly accountable to and acting under the direction of elected officials, most other bureaucrats in the civil service are not.