How can we determine President Trump’s actual agenda?

With the release of the first Trump White House budget, we know what some in the White House are trying to accomplish. There is, however, a great deal of discord within the White House staff and cabinet. It’s still not clear how many of the proposals come from Mr. Trump’s overarching objectives and how many are the work of members of his entourage, some of whom might be “fired” at any time. And, our Tweeter-in-Chief has been known to say two opposite things in the span of less than 24 hours. So in terms of specific ways that his nationalist and anti-regulations agenda will be carried out, this budget is our best indication of his agenda to date. It includes

• big increases in Dept. of Defense
• big increases in Dept. of Homeland Security
• big wall
• big decreases in health/medicine
• big decreases in science and technology
• big decreases in education
• big decreases in environmental protection
• big decreases in foreign aid

How do we translate these budget priorities into the Trump White House agenda? Fortunately, the budget document that was submitted to Congress explains the rationale pretty clearly. This gives us the assumptions they’re making and their “agenda.” Two examples give an idea of the agenda with respect to domestic policy.

Example #1: Trump put Scott Pruitt at the head of the EPA— a spokesperson for climate change deniers who sued the EPA about a dozen times, and Trump has now proposed an EPA budget cut of 31%. As outlined in the budget document, this guarantees there will be no further federal support for cleaning up toxic sites (like the Great Lakes, which hold 20% of the world’s fresh water). Pruitt’s EPA has already removed all the confirmed data on climate change (such as the relative contributions of natural meteorological variations on Earth, natural variations in solar energy release, and human use of fossil fuels) that was on the EPA website.

Pruitt and his advisors are “working on” a replacement for the 2016 EPA website. They say that the new website will focus on commerce (turning away from the EPA as our environment protector). Pruitt intends for the new site to explain how economic growth requires greater use fossil fuels, which will happen if businesses can pollute more (Some environmental regulations are already being repealed.) At the same time, the EPA has an updated section of the overall website that specifically addresses the importance of reducing pollution by U.S. businesses: https://www.epa.gov/p2/p2-resources-business [May 2017].

Pruitt recently claimed that carbon dioxide is not a “greenhouse gas.” (Pruitt has no background in chemistry, biology, or atmospheric sciences, so it is not surprising that he would make such a fundamental “misstatement.”) The EPA budget greatly decreases support for renewable energy options. The most recent headline regarding Trump’s position is that he is moving away from contending that the claims about climate change are part of an international hoax. This, after hearing from G17 leaders that he needs to adhere to the Paris Climate Agreement and why.

White House Assumptions & Rhetoric: If businesses can be free to pollute more, they will create more jobs and enjoy larger corporate profits. This is a specific instance of how trickle-down economics is purported to work. If toxic sites are going to be cleaned up, it’s on each state to find the budget to do so. If fossil fuel drilling and mining do not have to meet standards for toxic and polluting releases into the air, water, and land, then those in the fossil fuel industry will expand their drilling and mining (which feeds back into the first two assumptions).

Agenda:

#1-- Support the fossil fuel industry’s dominance as a provider of U.S. energy.

#2-- Convince working-class people that more manufacturing jobs will come their way as a result of significantly more jobs in the fossil fuel industry and, indirectly, more jobs in the business sectors that choose to increase the pollution they create.

(Republican caveat: There is also talk of Washington dictating to states that they cannot have more stringent laws regarding environmental protection, which flies in the face of Republicans’ strong push for states’ rights over federal rights.)

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Example #2: Science, health, and technology are taking huge hits. Trump’s right-wing cronies are not fans of scientific research in many areas. The explanations for these reductions are mentioned in the budget proposal document. However, one recent White House comment is that these cuts are, in part, because scientists within the federal government have gone “too far” in their research on climate change. Here are a few of the agencies that are being cut to or through the bone.

National Science Foundation: 11% reduction in budget
This is how university innovation is funded: through NSF grants. Academic scientific research and early prototyping of applications are a major way that the United States develops advances in science, health, and technology. The majority of American businesses that used to have their own research labs have changed their innovation model so that they take the results of academic research (free and open to all because they’ve been federally funded) and develop their own products and services. (That is not to say that there is no research in these businesses, only that the investment is modest compared with what it used to be.) This new model substantially reduces the risk to businesses that used to have a one-in-ten internal research outcome that could be turned into profitable product lines and services.

Department of Health and Human Services: 16% reduction in budget
The stated intention is to cut Medicaid severely, to greatly reduce eligibility for children’s health insurance, and to eliminate the low-income energy assistance program. There is no acknowledgment that most Medicaid recipients have jobs, jobs that do not pay enough to be able to afford health insurance and co-pays for medical services. Instead, White House officials suggest that Medicaid can be cut significantly if recipients would “just get jobs.” According to the Congressional Budget Office, there will be about 23 million more people without health insurance. This, compliments of the House AHCA proposal. Trump has vacillated on his policy intentions regarding healthcare coverage for Americans. It appears that the vacillation may be due to gauging the reaction to his political base of supporters (who seem equate reduced coverage with reduced income taxes), but some of that vacillation appears to be due to learning-on-the-job about these federal services’ benefits to his base.

National Institutes of Health: 19% reduction in budget
These are the experts who regularly make breakthroughs in medicine and related health problems. It’s also the NIH that funds university research in important problems, from technology that will help elderly people live longer and more safely in their homes to prevention and cure of cancers. Notice how these would be ways to reduce the government’s costs for the AHCA, Medicare, and Medicaid.

Centers for Disease Control and Prevention: 17% reduction in budget from last year, bringing it to the lowest level in 20 years.
The cuts significantly reduce the ability of the CDC to discover new ways to effectively prevent diseases and to respond to emergent epidemics. The budget explanation states the intention to nearly eliminate all CDC aid to populations most at risk regarding health,  such as Native Americans living in tribal “reservations,” where poverty is endemic, and those in socioeconomically “disadvantaged” areas. “Disadvantaged” is a euphemism for disproportionate lack of economic opportunity and availability of services that would lead to improved opportunity and health outcomes.

White House Assumptions & Rhetoric: Federal funds have to come from somewhere to finance increased military costs, homeland security strength, and construction and maintenance of The Wall. It (apparently) isn’t important for the U.S. to be a leading contributor in advances in technology, science, and medicine. Science is highly over-rated as a source of facts. (I’m not sure where they think “facts” originate.)

Agenda:

#1— Fund nationalism (for example, increased investments in the DoD and DHS) through a significant reduction in support for Americans’ health.

#2— Put Americans at ease that science, technology, and health advances aren’t that important to their day-to-day lives.

Believe it or not, our global climate is changing.

Talk is that there’s no proof that our global climate is changing much at all. Talk is that, even if the planet’s weather is changing, it’s only a natural variation—not caused or exacerbated by changes in human behaviors.  Some U.S. Congress members proudly say, “I don’t believe in science."-- as if modern scientific research were part of one huge, globally-coordinated conspiracy to trick people who aren't scientists. 

When it comes to a conversation about Earth’s climate trends, some talk show hosts and "news" media conspiracy theorists make their impressive incomes by creating sensational conspiracy theories about scientific research that capture the imagination of millions of conspiracy-lovers. Professional conspiracy theorists have everything to gain and nothing to lose by coming up with these unsubstantiated theories. These popularity-motivated cynics have picked up on something: Many people have so little understanding of science that it is easy to exploit them. Most theorists' followers have no clue about the statistical methods used (legitimately and correctly) to analyze data; nor could they understand those analyses. So, it's easy to imagine that something their target audience doesn't understand could be presented as "suspicious."

For those who don't understand the research to then claim that it's the scientists who are suspect is... well... shameful audacity. Yes, there are a few unscrupulous researchers who take money from, say, the fossil fuel industry, pharmaceutical industry, tobacco industry, or either side of the agricultural products debate and conduct fraudulent pseudo-research. The so-called news media disproportionately latch onto these exceptions, leaving some audiences to assume that these are typical examples of how scientists draw conclusions rather than sensationalized exceptions. We cannot discredit the vast majority climatology researchers just because there are some researchers in some science disciplines with unacceptable professional ethics. 

Here's the deal:

(1) Global climate is changing. Overall, it's becoming warmer. Overall, global weather is becoming more erratic. Climate change does not mean that every year in every location the weather will be worse than the year before. It means there is a measurable trend in the changes. 

(2) Greenhouse gases, regardless of their sources, are contributing significantly to these climate problems. As the planet warms, sea levels rise and more low-lying land areas flood. As sea temperatures increase, some species are not able to adapt quickly enough; toxic algae blooms are more frequent and widespread. 

(3) Some potential sources of climate change are out of human control. Climatologists and those in related scientific disciplines research and analyze the correlation of those sources, including how human-generated greenhouse gasses contribute. Reducing human-generated greenhouse gases is within our control. 

(4) Rather than bicker about the causes, governments need to prepare for continued ocean elevation rise, increased flooding, and other increases in severe natural weather disasters. Those melted glaciers and disappearing Arctic Ocean ice aren't going to spontaneously refreeze anytime soon. In fact, the melting rate is accelerating. Nations around the world have decided to prepare for that future and to reduce the amount of air pollution they produce in an effort to lessen the severity of future damage to the planet.

(5) Human efforts at greenhouse gas reduction probably can't reverse all the damage that's already been done, but they could reduce the magnitude of change in the future. Those efforts most definitely will help... if they are adequate. Look at one photo of smog in Los Angeles in 1960 and another of the same valley in 2015 to see how aggressive efforts to reduce human-caused air pollution can make a positive difference. Los Angeles could not do anything about the Santa Ana winds or the fact that there are mountains surrounding Los Angeles, but that does not mean they should have thrown up their hands and accepted the smoggy “fate” of the region. They tackled the human causes and people there breathe more easily now.

(6) Greenhouse gasses come from an accumulation of carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide and fluorinated gasses. That combination of chemicals traps heat in our atmosphere. This atmospheric condition has been building since the Industrial Revolution but has accelerated steeply since the 1970s. Ozone-layer depletion is already resulting in increased frequency of skin cancer, cataracts/eye disease, and weakening of immune systems, all of which have occurred with the greater transmission of UV radiation that ozone depletion causes.

(7) Burning fossil fuels is causing a severe increase in the amount of carbon dioxide, which in turn is causing ocean acidification, which in turn benefits toxic algae while harming or killing corals and shellfish populations. The entire aquatic ecosystem has been thrown out of balance.

(8) Some of the air, land, and ocean pollutants and ozone depletion are the result of our agricultural methods, not our fossil fuel use. But that does not eliminate fossil fuels from the air pollution equation. It means that human-managed agricultural methods also need to be improved.

(9) Science does not work in mysterious ways. Even if a person can’t understand statistical methods or how “big data” about Earth’s climate is analyzed, they can understand the fundamentals of the scientific method. This is the method that climatologists and those in related sciences use to explore climate changes. There is nothing about the scientific method that one either “believes” or “doesn’t believe.” One might question the data analysis of a particular experiment and, therefore, question the conclusion. But that’s a single experiment that is in question, not the entire body of research, and certainly not all of science.