'Science will not intrude on public policy'

From Hot Air headlines, who got it from Ace of Spades HQ, we hear of a Princeton scientist fired from his Department of Energy job in 1993 by Al Gore. The reason for his dismissal? He concluded that "Fears about man-made global warming are unwarranted and are not based on good science."

Dr. [Will] Happer views climate change as a predominately natural process. "The earth's climate is changing now, as it always has. There is no evidence that the changes differ in any qualitative way from those of the past."

In 1991, Happer was appointed director of energy research for the US Department of Energy. In 1993, he testified before Congress that the scientific data didn't support widespread fears about the dangers of the ozone hole and global warming, remarks that caused then-Vice President Al Gore to fire him. "I was told that science was not going to intrude on public policy", he said. "I did not need the job that badly".

Dr. Happer is one of the 650 scientists mentioned in this earlier post.