Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman from Texas, the chairman of the Science, Space, and Technology Committee, and especially for sponsoring this legislation, the HONEST Act. As the chairman of the Environment Subcommittee on the Science Committee, I fully support this bill that will require EPA regulations be based on science that is publicly available. The HONEST Act pushes forward the basic principles of the scientific method, which is critically important in instances in which science and Federal Government policy intersect. Regulations put forward by the EPA impact all Americans, including my constituents in the East Valley of the Greater Phoenix area, the four cities of Chandler, Gilbert, Queen Creek, and Mesa. So it is imperative that the citizens of this country be able to see the data that underpin these rules. What is even more important is that the scientific community be able to scrutinize EPA data to ensure that the Agency is using the best available science, regardless of the administration. Critics of the HONEST Act claim that scientific data underpinning EPA's regulations are already subject to the standards of peer review. While this may be true, peer review of scientific studies is not adequate because this process seldom involves a close scrutiny of the data used in these studies. Peer review rarely double-checks the analysis, and very rarely does it attempt to actually replicate the results of a study.…”