Trump Will Blind NASA's Eye on Earth

Donald Trump is poised to eliminate all climate change research conducted by Nasa as part of a crackdown on “politicized science”, his senior adviser on issues relating to the space agency has said.

Nasa’s Earth science division is set to be stripped of funding in favor of exploration of deep space, with the president-elect having set a goal during the campaign to explore the entire solar system by the end of the century.

Here's how Trump strategist, Steve Bannon's Breitbart responded to the news:

Trump at NASA: Hasta la Vista Climate Fraud and Muslim Outreach…

NASA’s top climate scientist Gavin Schmidt has warned President-Elect Donald Trump that the planet just won’t stand for having a fully-fledged climate denier in the White House.

Good luck with that one, Gavin. Or “Toast” as we’ll shortly be calling you…

Schmidt, director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS), told the Independent:

“The point is simple: the climate is changing and you can try to deny it, you can appoint people who don’t care about it into positions of power, but regardless nature has the last vote on this.”

This is the worst possible time for NASA's Earth imaging programme to be shuttered. Like all demagogues, including the one we just got rid of, Trump's decision making is informed, not by knowledge and fact, but by belief and ideology. To the extent that there's still time to do meaningful things to slow or adapt to climate change, that won't be accomplished if we're guided by belief and ideology or, as Trump describes it, "gut instincts."