Horowitz: Science Rightly Featured on Earth Day

Tuesday, April 25, 2017

Rob Horowitz, GoLocalProv MINDSETTER™

The highlight of the 47th annual Earth Day, which took place this past Saturday, was the first March for Science. Thousands of people in cities and towns throughout our nation and the world, stood up for the spirit of scientific inquiry, facts and truth. While the marchers advocated for this principle across the board, their strongest emphasis was on the reality of climate change and the dominant role of human activity in the earth’s too rapid warming. This fact is backed up by overwhelming evidence and a broad scientific consensus but still resisted by the Trump Administration.

As the Coordinator of the First Earth Day and long-time environmental activist, Dennis Hayes said, “America has had 45 presidents but it has never before had a president who is completely indifferent to the truth.” President Trump’s professed skepticism about climate change and his proposals to make draconian cuts in federal scientific and environmental agencies was the main impetus behind the March and the main focus of the marchers.

The communications impact of the March was enhanced by the fact that it is highly unusual for scientists as a group to be vocal and politically active; they usually prefer to stay in the political shadows. As Beka Economopoulos, a founder of the pop-up Natural History Museum and one of the March organizers, told the New York Times, “This has been a living laboratory as scientists and science institutions are willing to take a step outside their comfort zone, outside of the labs and into the public spheres.”

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And scientists are highly credible messengers. The only group or institution more trusted than scientists or medical scientists are the military, according to Pew Research Center polling. More than 3-out-of-4 Americans’ express “a great deal or a fair amount of confidence” in scientists. This high public confidence in scientists has been relatively stable over the years, according to Pew.

The Marchers succeeded in getting President Trump’s attention. The White House released the following statement from the President as the March winded down: "Rigorous science is critical to my administration's efforts to achieve the twin goals of economic growth and environmental protection. My administration is committed to advancing scientific research that leads to a better understanding of our environment and of environmental risks..As we do so, we should remember that rigorous science depends not on ideology, but on a spirit of honest inquiry and robust debate."

To make these nice sounding words more than empty platitudes, President Trump’s actions in the environmental and scientific arenas require a major course correction. More events like the March for Science can be instrumental in bringing this desperately needed change about.

Rob Horowitz is a strategic and communications consultant who provides general consulting, public relations, direct mail services and polling for national and state issue organizations, various non-profits and elected officials and candidates. He is an Adjunct Professor of Political Science at the University of Rhode Island.

Trump's Win - What Does it Mean for Rhode Island?

Jennifer Duffy

Cook Report

"We don't really know what a Trump presidency means for the nation, never mind the smallest state. One of the unintended consequences of last night's results is that Sen. Jack Reed won't be chairman of the Senate Armed Services Committee. Chalk that up as a loss for RI."

Pam Gencarella

Head of Ocean State Taxpayers' Association

"Trump’s win means that his signature issue, illegal immigration, could have a big impact on RI, hopefully reversing our course as a sanctuary state and saving the state taxpayer millions of dollars. While we agree with his 'repeal and replace' Obamacare stance, we have no idea what that means to the RI debacle known as UHIP. It is not a stretch to believe that federal funding for this kind of system will be off the table so, will RI be stuck with this massively expensive system that still doesn’t work and that is expected to cost another $124 million to fix?

Trump's belief that there is significant fraud in the Food Stamp program and the policies that may come from that belief could have a negative impact on RI's local economy since there are businesses in certain cities that rely heavily on this program, fraud and all. On the upside, we may be able to ditch the UHIP program if there is significantly less need for processing welfare program requests (ie. Medicaid and food stamps) resulting from fewer illegal immigrants and less fraud. While we are ambivalent about his touted child care policies, if enacted, it may force our legislators to revisit the ever growing state cost of subsidies in this area and possibly reduce the fraud and abuse in this system."

Kay Israel

Professor at Rhode Island College

"With a Republican President and Congress, Rhode Island will probably be excluded from the 'fruits of victory."

The congressional delegation will be able to vocally make their presence felt, but in the long term it's more symbolic than substantive.

For Rhode Island it's a matter of holding on and waiting until '18 or '20 and a surge in Democratic influence."

Jennifer Lawless

Professor at American University

"The RI congressional delegation just became even less powerful than it was. With unified government, Trump doesn’t need to quell Democrats’ concerns or acquiesce because he’s worried about a Democratically-controlled Senate.

His appointments will reflect that. His executive orders will affect that. And the conservative policy agenda he puts forward will affect that."

Len Lardaro

Professor at University of Rhode Island

"Well there's a few things -- because there's not going to be gridlock, that's a big difference if it had been Hillary and a GOP Congress, in which nothing would got done. We'll at least get a half a billion in infrastructure that's going to pass which will have an impact.

I think you'll see there will be reduced reliance on government nationally -- and that's where we'll stick out like sore thumb. We've relied way too much on government -- and our government is highly inefficient and ineffective. Maybe, just maybe, in this who cycle of things we might be forced to be small and more efficient for once.

A couple of other things -- interest rates jumped. The one to follow is the ten year government bond rate -- which is tied to mortgages. It went from 1.7% to 2.05% in one day. The point is -- if the ten year stays high, mortgage rates will start going higher -- and in the short time people will run to re-finance.

That's the short term impact -- but then if rates stay hight, that will make mortgages more out of reach. And we just passed a bond issue to limit open space -- housing has limited upside here.
The next thing -- the Fed Reserve will go ahead with tightening next month. A strong dollar will hurt manufacturing. When the dollar is strong our exports become more expensive overseas.

Our goods production sector -- manufacturing and construction -- in the near term will do a little better, but as time goes on will be more limited. But something you won't hear, is there are lags in fiscal policy, of six months to year. So we won't really see the effects until the third our fourth quarter of 2017, going into 2018."

Mike Stenhouse

RI Center for Freedon and Prosperity

"As the unbelievable turned into reality this morning, it struck me that the presidential election was not really all about Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton. It was about a fed-up people, revolting against a corrupt system - the "beast" - that relentlessly favors insiders. Hillary personified the beast, while Donald personified the slayer.

Sadly, based on election results in our state, Rhode Island's version of the beast lives on. I fear our political class has not learned the lessons from the Bernie Sanders and Donald Trump movements - and will continue with their government-centric, anti-family, anti-business status quo."

Kristina Contreras Fox

VP of Young Democrats of America

"A Trump Presidency means the validation of the ugliest part of America. In RI, as with the rest of the country, the hammer of his hatred will fall hardest on minority communities. Being a blue state doesn't make us immune from this danger.

Trump won over 35% (39.5) of the vote here! We need to look in the mirror, and not lie about what the reflection shows us. No more hiding underneath a blue blanket. I expect those who claim Democratic values to be true to those values. The gulf between words and actions have turned into fertile ground for Trump's message to grow here in RI. If you call yourself a Democrat, if you claim to stand in opposition to Trump, now is the time to prove it. Show up and fight back."