I spent a fair amount of time last week talking to Iris Kuo, author of this Knight-Ridder story about the meaning of the phrase "sound science." I urged Kuo to check out my book--which contains one of the most extensive analyses of the "sound science" movement that I'm aware of--so that she could actually see that the term has a specific meaning on the political right, and that there are specific "sound science" policies that have been endorsed by conservatives that clearly seek to raise the scientific burden of proof before regulatory action can be achieved. Oh well. Instead, the frame of Kuo's article is that "No one, however, is sure what 'sound science' means." Wrong, wrong, wrong: It is a term that has been strategically introduced into the discourse by the right, and it means something very specific to conservatives. If that's accurate--and my analysis is very thorough--then a journalist should say it plainly, instead of pretending that no one knows what the phrase means and then relying upon quotes from people like myself to give "opinions" as to what it might mean. Granted, there's one piece of news in Kuo's piece that I found useful: Apparently Republican pollster Frank Luntz has a book coming out in which he recommends the use of the term "sound science" to his flock...which is my point exactly, and which provides still more evidence that Kuo could have used to show that this is a term embraced on the political right. To be fair, though, science may not be her main beat. In the past year, she has written articles with titles like "Super Bowl seen having a powerful impact on American life" and "Men spend lots more than women on Valentine's day"....
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