Assessing Trump/MAGA damage: Gutting American science

Broad damage overview

So far, Trump and MAGA elites and their policies (TM) has caused massive damage to all or nearly all major aspects of American government, democracy, civil liberties, rule of law (especially federal courts, and the FBI and DoJ), economy, education, finance, religion, society, the public interest including public health, and science. Multiple independent lines of evidence, including impeachment records, legal scholarship, civil‑rights reporting, and institutional analyses, all show Trump repeatedly choosing actions that attack democracy, undermine honest, competent the civil service, centralize power, and sacrifice American interests for personal or factional gain. Based on available evidence it is reasonable to firmly believe TM are intentionally working to cripple America and its capacity to sustain its power and position in the world. Link, link, link, link, link, link

TM really do act as if they work for Putin and whoever pays to play, e.g., convicted criminal who buy pardons from Trump. Link, link, link, link

Gutting American science: The connection with the profit motive

A constant target of TM and their predecessors has been inconvenient science. In the early decades, prominent targets for neutering included climate and public health science. Research in both of those areas threatened big corporations and their profits. In response, the corporations struck back with decades of massive, highly successful misinformation propaganda campaigns to block regulations and accountability for the deaths and damages they caused. Examples include:

• For decades, the American cigarette industry successfully staved off science-based regulations, restrictions and social responsibility using lies, propaganda, and state and federal politicians they purchased. Millions of people were conned into the false belief that cigarettes did not cause cancer. Link, link

• For decades, the American oil industry staved off science-based environmental regulations using lies, propaganda, and state and federal politicians they purchased. By the early 1960s, the US oil industry knew about global warming their role in creating greenhouse gas and other pollution problems. Under TM, essentially all federal environmental laws are either gone or no longer enforced. Big oil has convincingly won its propaganda war against us and the public interest. Link, link, link, link, link

Corporate oil's propaganda & lies

to deceive and confuse the public  

Source

• For decades, the American chemical and plastics industry staved off science-based environmental regulations using lies, propaganda, and state and federal politicians they purchased. The industry invented the plastics "recycling" and other myths in the 1970s. Those propaganda fantasies conned tens of millions of people into falsely believing that (1) plastics were going to be recycled and thus not a significant source of pollution, and (2) it was all on the consumer to not pollute their waste plastic. Link, link, link

Recycling is and always has been a lie 

~95% of plastic waste is not recycled

it's in our bodies, landfills, oceans, lakes and 

rivers, & most everywhere else

Gutting American science: What TM have done to us

A current Scientific American article, U.S. science is in chaos How did we get here?, summarizes the gutting of American science, the repairable damage will take years, maybe a decade or two. The main point is simple. The decades-long government funding of independent science has ended. In the past, policymakers and politicians relied on that science to make policy. That has ended. US science is in full-blown chaos. We can no  longer rely on new research findings to help solve critical problems and guide new policy.

Before TM's corrupt wrecking ball smashed it all to smithereens, ~40% of U.S. research and development funding supported scientific research. Before TM poisoned and corrupted the process, politicians generally accepted the concept that evidence should guide policy, even when inconvenient. Of course, when the science was too inconvenient affected industries would buy politicians copious amounts of "free speech", also called things like "campaign contributions", "gratuities", payoffs, bribes, etc. 

Now under the ghastly corruption and colossal stupidity of TM politics, corrupt MAGA politics overrides evidence‑based policy. The public interest and most average people lose. America can no longer even try to deal with climate risks, pandemics, and technological change that require competent, honest policy to deal with. American scientists are demoralized. Some are leaving for countries that still value independent research.

Thanks to Trump and his MAGA elites, we're royally fucked. But, Putin loves it. So do TM.