“Another skeptical university professor fired – related to CARB’s PM2.5 air pollution regulation scandal“ (2012-06-16). In case you were wondering, every time a prickly right-winger gets fired from a university it’s because of persecution by the oppressive liberal intelligentsia. Anthony Watts wants to make sure you learn what he discovered on the always-reliable WingNut Daily (fyi, it’s all driven by intellectuals resentful over the failure of Communism). The Los Angeles Times has some coverage too.

Seems the John Galt wannabes at the American Center for Law and Justice are fightin’ the good fight for James Enstrom, a UCLA researcher fired after 35 years for daring to expose fraudulent research that was used to “justify draconian diesel vehicle regulations” as well as fake credentials at the “vile” (that’s Anthony’s description) California Air Resources Board. I guess the wheels of liberal oppression grind slowly.

Diesel exhaust is good for you and should not be regulated (pay no mind to the 750,000 annual Chinese deaths from particulate pollution). So is second-hand smoke.

Dr. Enstrom was defending his conclusions about the pish-poshedness of secondhand smoke years ago. Back in 2005 he was already invoking the right-wing’s favorite boogeyman Lysenko in defense of his tobacco epidemiology research. His Scientific Integrity Institute, solely concerned with the integrity of one J.E. Enstrom, Ph.D., came into existence at around the same time.

I suppose I have to say it: there’s no question that academic freedom needs protection and that legitimate examination of any scientific consensus is deeply important. Too bad that hypocritical partisan zealots like Anthony are so busy poisoning the debate. By the way Anthony, which is it? Close all universities because they’re dens of communism leeching off the noble taxpayer, or don’t touch the freedom of academics? ‘Cause if you only howl about the plight of right-wing allies you’re not really operating on principle, are you? What we actually get from you are incessant calls to fire academics that you don’t like and to strip funding from programs that don’t support your politics.

It’s YOU that academic freedom needs protection from, not Enstrom or Drapela.