Liveblog - Senate Commerce - Innovation and Competitiveness (Update 4x)

The U.S. Senate Committee on Commerce, Science, and Transportation will begin a full committee hearing on Advancing American Innovation and Competitiveness in a couple minutes.

 

They have put together a pretty great panel:

 

• The Honorable John P. Holdren
  Director
  Office of Science and Technology Policy
• The Honorable Arden L. Bement Jr.
  Director
  National Science Foundation
• The Honorable Patrick D. Gallagher
  Director
  National Institute of Standards and Technology
• Dr. Robert D. Braun
  Chief Technologist
  National Aeronautics and Space Administratio

 

I plan to listen in and liveblog if anything interesting comes up. 

 

The Hearing site is HERE. 

 

If you are interested in some light background reading, check out the National Academies' report, "Rising Above the Gathering Storm".   It has won an amazing amount of praise since its release in 2007 and has really been a benchmark for science policy since then.  Yes, it is a million pages long.  The executive summary is here and is much shorter.

 

Update 1:

 

Rockefeller - Opening Statement - 3rd sentence mentions Rising Above the Gathering Storm.  That was fast.  It is time to reauthorize the America COMPETES ACT (ACA) so we should determine how successful we have been.  He gives a pretty good stance on connecting science to jobs.

 

Kay Bailey Hutchison - Opening Statement - "I agree with everything Senator Rockefeller just said".  She spends a fairly long time emphasizing science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM) education.  She thinks we should lower the tax rate for business and expand the R&D tax credit.

 

I think this should be a pretty friendly hearing.

 

Update 2:

 

Let the testimony begin.

 

John Holdren - Sputnik woke America up and we made a huge investment in science.  He now thinks we are at another "Sputnik moment", but it is not as obvious.  His indicators - U.S. in the middle of the pack for broadband, our students are in the middle of the science and math testing pack, and more patents are issued to people outside the country than inside the country.    Holdren says ACA is a great tool to help us catch up.  The Obama administration supports ACA, but is not waiting for reauthorization, and has moved on a variety of items in science (Holdren provides a long list). Pretty good pitch for science.  I think he may have done this before.

 

Bement - Short version = NSF is awesome and important.  He is reading, which lots of people do, but he should probably look up at some point.   I think he is ready to start his new job.  The vast majority of his testimony is a long list of NSF projects without any context.  Bement thanks the committee for their support during his tenure at NSF.  Kay Bailey Hutchison says thanks and that they appreciate his service, then admits she hadn't heard he was leaving.

 

Gallagher - He is also giving a list of projects.  He is, however, providing some pretty good context for why NIST matters.  He is painting a big arrow from NIST to new jobs.  Smart.  He then launches into a strong pitch for ACA in a broader context than NIST.  "Federal gov't plays a large role in advancing new technology".  He thinks ACA helped  NIST push the tech envelope.

 

Braun - FY '11 budget will help NASA continue to move forward.  He is pretty dry.  He seems to want to tie NASA to jobs but not a good sale.  He should sell the awesomeness of space.  Come on.  Space is awesome.   Okay, he is starting to rattle off what is possible if we continue to invest in space - New men on the moon, robots in space, traveling to other solar systems, precise predictions of weather.

 

Update 3 and 4 - Question Time -

 

A sampling:

 

Sen. Klobuchar - Starts with a strong pitch for science in Minnesota.  Hey Minnesota, Thanks for the post-it notes.  Eventually gets to a question about US competitiveness in world R&D.

 

Bement - If we don't lead, we could get blind sided.  We have to recognize that we are part of a large world that is catching up and "we are the team to beat".

 

Sen. Klobuchar - Asks questions about Visas for bringing scientists here.

 

Bement - Can't put up barriers.

 

Holdren also talks Visas.  They are very important.  Also says it is key for the US to collaborate with other countries.  Holdren brings up Green cabinet inside the White House - people focused on green jobs, economy, etc.

 

Sen. Klobuchar doesn't like the color model.  Thinks we should ditch "green" and call it an innovation challenge.

 

On STEM education - Braun thinks NASA has a huge impact on inspring young people and bringing them to science.  I agree.  Space = awesome.

 

 Sen.  Mark Warner - Thinks innovation and competitiveness strategy has been nonexistant for more than a decade.  We need a real strategy.  We need more R&D tax credits...we are way below OECD countries.

 

 Holdren - sounds a little defensive - Obama put out a pretty good strategy sometime last year.  They just need to make it into legislation.

 

Sen. Warner - not a good rollout.  Made 3rd paragraph in some political articles.  White House should try harder.  Ouch.

 

 Sen. Bill Nelson asks a bunch of questions that are way in the weeds. 

 

Everyone goes on the record as being super supportive of "high risk, high reward" research.  People love the DARPA model.  NSF, NIST, and NASA all have "high risk, high reward" programs or "grand challenges".

 

Sen. Nelson - what she we do to move basic research to market/create jobs?

 

Holdren - more public/private partnership.

 

Sen. Thune - NSF proposal applications have gone up by 50% in the last year.  How is NSF doing this fairly - transparent, etc?  Concerned about geographic disparities.

 

Bement - We are the gold standard in peer review.  Dodges geographic disparity.

 

Sen. Thune asks again. Bement dodges again.  Thune gives up.

 

That is about it.  Thanks for following.   I will try to shrink the hearing into a coherent summary in a follow-up post.