Another black eye for PR (and the Bush administration)

George Deutsch first came to public attention as the NASA flack who warned NASA Scientist James Hansen not to speak out about global warming and sent an e-mail message to a NASA contractor saying that the word "theory" needed to be added after every mention of the Big Bang.

It turns out that in addition to having no idea about the proper role PR at NASA, he lied about graduating from college.. I agree with others that Deutsch’s lies about his resumé are the least important aspect of this case.

Yesterday, Dr. Hansen said that the questions about Mr. Deutsch's credentials were important, but were a distraction from the broader issue of political control of scientific information.

As an American citizen I want to publicly thank Dr. Hansen for not only going pubic with the information, but doing so on the record. Americans owe this scientist a great deal, at minimum we must work to see that his career does not suffer as a result of his willingness to keep us informed.