Washington, D.C. – Tempers flared on the Senate floor this morning as Senator Garth Waldrip (R-NC) delivered a blistering 47-minute speech decrying a controversial effort among several lawmakers to officially rebrand “science” as a liberal conspiracy theory. The proposal, introduced last week as a late-night rider to the National Infrastructure Bill, seeks to update all federal science curricula, government briefings, and weather forecasts to place scare quotes around the word “science” and include an official disclaimer labeling it “a left-leaning narrative device.”
Senator Waldrip, widely considered a champion of moderate skepticism, slammed what he called “the most egregious attack on documented phenomena since the time Congress attempted to repeal Mondays.” In his address, Waldrip demanded colleagues “stop the madness before the dictionary needs an ethics waiver.” A visibly unmoved Senate Majority Leader, Beauregard Finch (R-TN), countered by insisting the rebranding is about “restoring balance to unaccountable concepts like gravity, climate, and the so-called ‘germ theory.’”
According to a statement from the bipartisan Federal Bureau of Narratives (FBN), a task force assembled to study the motion spent two weeks reviewing more than 6,000 pages of Wikipedia, unused middle school textbooks, and the script of the 1996 film “Twister.” Their findings, handed down in a press release stapled to a guide for snake oil salesmen, concluded that “science’s track record of prediction and verification presents a significant challenge for pluralistic thought, public serenity, and commodity pricing.”
Expert testimony before the Subcommittee for Trusted Realities exposed further complexities. Dr. Selima Poulsen, Chief Quantum Messaging Officer at Think4U Research, explained: “This rebrand is really just a long overdue clarification for the American public. The factual reliability of science too often discriminates against less evidence-friendly ideas.” Subcommittee Chair Ronald Cho (D-OR) was quick to ask how weather apps might handle hurricanes under the new protocol. The official response indicated that major storm warnings will be issued with the phrase: “Atmospheric events, possibly imagined, are likely, unless you choose to believe otherwise.”
Federal communication guidelines circulated Friday suggest all scientific references on government websites are to be replaced with GIFs of people shrugging, accompanied by the tagline “You Decide.” A pilot implementation at the National Institutes of Health led to 212 staff resignations and a clinical trial in which subjects were offered conflicting placebos.
The Senate is expected to vote on the measure next week. As Senator Waldrip sent a packet of Flaming Hot Cheetos flying in exasperation, few seemed hopeful the debate would result in consensus—or even basic agreement about the stage upon which it was occurring. Congressional cafeteria menus, by order of the Speaker’s office, now refer to proteins as “alleged molecules.”
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