Politics always affects research, even private research. This is simply a fact of life - there is no taking it away from politics entirely. What this does is r

Politics always affects research, even private research. This is simply a fact of life - there is no taking it away from politics entirely. What this does is removes the second portion of research/policy connection - when policy changes based on the results of the science. It can disallow for proper public discussion. For example, I fully expect the justice department to not convict someone over a flawed forensic science, once we find out it is flawed. Only, with the internal review, we might not find out it is flawed at all. The 'official' report might just say this is stellar when it isn't.