Geoff,

Wow - thanks for bringing up the Mooney article. I couldn't agree more myself. My grad school classmate Naomi Oreskes has just come out with her book The Merchants of Doubt where she talks about the skillful role that a handful of scientists (three, actually) played in sowing doubt on a host of issues including second hand smoke, the ozone hole and climate change. Scientists would dearly prefer to be able to communicate the facts and let the politicians debate the course of action. But when one side doesn't like the proposed course of action, can anyone be surprised if they dispute the facts? The challenge that "Science" has as a community (in the US at least) is to project truth without feeling the need to choose one faction over another. Both political parties use and science when it aligns with their agenda and abuse science when it does not. Scientists need to figure out how not to simply ping-pong back and forth across the political aisle depending on the issue (on climate - we're Democrats; on GMO foods - we're Republicans...) Rather, scientists need to triangulate from a third position: one that upholds factual analysis, proposes practicable solutions, and engages both sides rather than chooses between them.