The Atlantic published an article on Tuesday by Mischa Fisher arguing that Republicans have been unfairly characterized as “anti-science.” The piece begins with the lofty assertion that, “Republicans, conservatives, and the religious are no more uniquely ‘anti-science’ than any other demographic or political group. It’s just that ‘anti-science’ has been defined using a limited set of issues that make the right wing and religious look relatively worse.”

It’s another faux-moderate piece where “everyone is to blame,” for underfunding and misunderstanding science. Fisher calls himself a “centrist,” which is hard to square with his bio: “Mischa Fisher is a former Republican science-policy staffer and legislative director in the House of Representatives.”

But let’s look at the case. Fisher starts with global warming, arguing that “the vast majority” of Republicans accept anthropogenic climate change, the problem is, “Conservatives believe many of the policies put forward to address the problem will lead to unacceptable levels of economic hardship. It’s not inherently anti-scientific to oppose cap and trade or carbon taxes.” This statement is dubious on three grounds.

First, it’s not true. As ThinkProgress notes, “almost 58 percent — of congressional Republicans refuse to accept it [global warming].” Second, global warming entails vast and unequal economic consequences, meaning that if we have to sacrifice some economic growth today for more in the future, that is a reasonable decision. And third, Republicans have opposed every Democratic-led initiative to fight climate change, from Waxman-Markey, to carbon taxes to regulation through the EPA (that were based on the estimated cost per ton of carbon dioxide). If Fisher really wants to argue that Republicans understand the science of global warming, he needs to prove they’ve done something other than oppose every effort to stop global warming on the dubious grounds that it will harm economic growth.

The next argument is classic. Fisher argues that for every right-wing denial of science, there’s a hippie lefty denial:

Left-wing ideologues also frequently espouse an irrational fear of nuclear power, genetic modification, and industrial and agricultural chemistry—even though all of these scientific breakthroughs have enriched lives, lengthened lifespans, and produced substantial economic growth over the last century.

This argument rests on a false equivalence. The science of global warming is accepted by 97 percent of climatologists.  In contrast, nuclear energy is still a very alive debate within the scientific community. I would happily debate Fisher on the merits of nuclear power (I’m still undecided) but it’s misleading to compare the two. Fisher also neglects the fact that many Democratic politicians are behind nuclear power (including Obama), so the point is moot, anyhow. As for GMOs, I’m unaware of any bills ever introduced by congressional Democrats to ban their use (the bill Fisher cites is about labeling — and it was bipartisan), and it certainly isn’t in the Democratic platform — while the 2012 Republican platform explicitly dismisses climate science and any attempts to curtail global warming. There certainly is an anti-scientific left, but it hasn’t gained control of the Democratic Party. The practicality of organic farming, like the nuclear power issue, remains a live debate in scientific circles (again, certainly not at the threshold of universal acceptance that global warming has reached).

For good measure, Fisher throws in a Solyndra reference:

Yet at the same time, billions of stimulus dollars were being lost on failed investments in the alternative-energy sector. Just the failed loans to Solyndra and Abound Solar would have kept the Tevatron operating for a decade.

First off, this is a question of politics and economics, not science. Alternative energy is an important part of Obama’s all-of-the-above strategy (which, remember, includes the nuclear power Fisher is so excited about) and stimulus spending was justified because of the recession. Scientific research is an important part of what the Congress does, but it’s not stimulative. So it would be absurd for the stimulus package to include money to keep the Tevatron open. Instead the stimulus package invested in energy efficiency ($29 billion), renewable energy ($21 billion), high-speed railway ($18 billion), research into carbon capture ($3 billion) among other investments.

Solyndra was one of many investments, and it’s expected that some of the companies that received a loan guarantee would fail, but the number of bankrupt firms has actually been rather low. As it happens, often research projects fail to produce results, but we don’t stop performing research. Fisher’s argument here appears to be that Obama should look into the future and determine which investments and research projects will reap rewards.

Fisher argues that it is not Republicans, but rather Obama (!) who is underfunding the basic sciences (with another Solyndra reference!):

For every cheap shot a Republican member of Congress like Senator Tom Coburn has taken at National Science Foundation grants (see the unfairly maligned robo-squirrel), there are areas where Obama has undercut American leadership in basic science by favoring loan guarantees and industrial subsidies to the alternative-energy industry at the expense of science elsewhere.

We’ve seen this in his proposed cuts to high-energy physics, nuclear physics, planetary science, and other areas of research. Even in the much-maligned “Tea Party-dominated” House of Representatives, the GOP budget proposals provided more funding for the NSF than those of the Senate Democrats for the current 2013 fiscal year.”