We’ve got our own HE funding crisis in the UK but this is an order apart - even if some great scientists move to Europe it’s a real threat to scientific/economic progress generally. American retreat in every sphere, from global networks only now realising how reliant they are on US participation - ThreadSky

gabyhinsliff.bsky.social • 15 days ago

We’ve got our own HE funding crisis in the UK but this is an order apart - even if some great scientists move to Europe it’s a real threat to scientific/economic progress generally. American retreat in every sphere, from global networks only now realising how reliant they are on US participation

Reposted from Carl T. Bergstrom

1. Today the NIH director issued a new directive slashing overhead rates to 15%.

I want to provide some context on what that means and why it matters.

grants.nih.gov/grants/guide...

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gabyhinsliff.bsky.social•15 days ago

But what I don’t get is: what happens when Republican voters with kids of college age start seeing consequences? Is this like a zero lining of budgets where you axe everything initially & then put back just enough to keep your base happy? Or just a ‘burn it to the ground’ plan?

thumbtech.bsky.social•15 days ago

They will learn from Fox News that anything bad that happens to them is the left's fault and we just need to work harder to defeat them. That's all. It is a cult of irrationality.

dompates.bsky.social•15 days ago

Most likely neither.

Dog chases car > catches car > ‘What you going to do now?’ > ‘Don’t know. The point was to chase and catch it’.

rebussy.bsky.social•15 days ago

There is the point that none of those making the decision care about anyone being affected, including their supporters.

On top of which, they're restoring active discrimination, so the pool of 'eligible' university/college students will shrink.

garethknapman.bsky.social•15 days ago

I don’t think they actually have a plan.

ianinspen.bsky.social•15 days ago

Most were not seeing beyond the next week. Quite a lot couldn't if they tried.

lincolnskayak.bsky.social•15 days ago

Pretty sure it’s always been a burn it to the ground plan.

lincolnskayak.bsky.social•15 days ago

Remember Rick Perry’s 2012 campaign for President (GOP primary debate) when he *accidentally* said he wanted to eliminate the Dept. Of Education? Destroying public education has been a GOP plot for a long long time. An educated proletariat is *dangerous*.

https://theintercept.com/2022/08/25/student-loans-debt-reagan/

goldstein.bsky.social•15 days ago

Why do you assume there will still be elections at that point?

paulallopenna.bsky.social•15 days ago

Many will find a way to blame anyone except the Trump admin (now with extra government powers!). When your emotionally tied to a demigod, it’s difficult to let go.

deborah122.bsky.social•15 days ago

Trump’s grassroots supporters are being alienated - who thinks this might not matter to him, he is going to make himself lifetime president. He tried before.

euantaylor.bsky.social•15 days ago

Same with UK HE, they think that they can burn the people that they want to without changing everything else. They don't see the consequences.

Uk wanted to strike migration. USA wants to be racist and hit out against people that disagree with Trump.

icedropbear.bsky.social•15 days ago

They want the rapture. They are going to burn everything.

abbyinnes.bsky.social•15 days ago

I suspect it’s a burn it down strategy based on both dogma / ignorance of the implications, and a winner-takes all assumption that the next election will be rigged, so even widespread dismay cannot change the new regime. They are surely not proposing to all put this to a free ballot again.

gsoh31.bsky.social•15 days ago

No-one really cares that much about basic research - they just want to see their kids in a well known uni with a good name and getting a job. The basics that underpin all that have always been hidden from voters.

anghyflawn.net•15 days ago

If anything, a gutting of research capacity means that we fall back on other signals of ‘quality’ (ie vibes and unearned prestige reputation), guess who that benefits?

magsmanston.bsky.social•15 days ago

This. I suspect they have no idea what the actual consequences of this will be. It's all "evul DEI hur hur" to them. Not admin wages, heating bills, pension & insurance contributions cleaning & maintenance overheads. Righteous disruption is the point.

abbyinnes.bsky.social•15 days ago

And parties like PiS were smart about that, targeting benefits to families where the worst Polish poverty really was, for example, thus making an actual material improvement for many….

abbyinnes.bsky.social•15 days ago

It’s an authoritarian playbook so the calculations change, but it doesn’t make it smart. They’re copying Orban, but Hungary has EU subsidies, SEM access and the FDI to show for it. It also has none of the US’s democratic history or architecture. Likewise the US doesn’t have the history of the USSR.

abbyinnes.bsky.social•15 days ago

So …I’d tend to say all bets are off…🌻

foundationsofthedigitalstate.com•15 days ago

and also Orban both had to learn to be a thief in office and had less to loot

Trump's a pro in a target rich environment where *everybody* has the exceptionality expectations that can't happen here for all flavours of it

abbyinnes.bsky.social•15 days ago

But that made Orban stealthy and smart, where Trump is greedy as f#£& and a bullying racist moron surrounded, this time, by people no better adjusted. The biggest danger at this point is the timidity of the Democrats and judiciary and the craven media, not the unsurpassable genius of the vandals.

pdanderson.bsky.social•15 days ago

They don't plan for there to be any more voting.

mikemca.bsky.social•15 days ago

It’s almost like an early experiment for the future AI using public sector workers. What happens when vast swathes of the middle classes don’t have well paid jobs.

I suspect they will eventually reconstitute some programmes - partisan and in their own image ofc.

thurberteam.bsky.social•15 days ago

This order is illegal, by the way.

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