Clinton and the Office of Technology Assessment

I meant to mention this a long time ago, but as you can see, I haven't made any entries for awhile. Life's been a little crazy.

In a speech to the Carnegie Institution for Science on the 50th anniversary of Sputnik's launch last week, Hillary Clinton noted that she would re-establish the Office of Technology Assessment..

Admittedly, re-establishing the OTA was not what caught the Associated Press reporter's eye. The headline on the article is “Clinton Would Fund Stem Cell Research&rdquo. And the list of science-related things that Clinton said she would do had re-establishing the OTA at the end:

• Expand human and robotic space exploration and speed development of vehicles to would replace the space shuttle.
• Launch a space-based climate change initiative to combat global warming.
• Create a $50-billion strategic energy fund to research ways to boost energy efficiency and reduce reliance on fossil fuels.
Comply with a legal requirement that the executive branch issue a national assessment on climate change every four years. She would also expand the assessment to reflect how U.S. regions and economic sectors are responding to the challenges posed by climate change.
• Name an assistant to the president for science and technology, a position that was eliminated in the Bush White House.
• Re-establish the Office of Technology Assessment.

But at least re-establishing the OTA is there. That means it's on the radar screen, if only as a small blip. Now we need to find a way to make that blip grow larger.