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NOAA's public weather data powers the local forecasts on your phone and TV
- blueanon 2y ago[flagged]
- hirsin 2y agoIs this something like inverse gell-man amnesia? You're aware of the value noaa provides so you're skeptical about removing it, but when we turn the page to talk about another agency removal makes sense again? Not attempting to dunk, I should say, but wondering how this gets modeled and if there's actually a discrepancy there
- mmooss 2y ago(EDIT: My mistake; I missed what hirsin was referring to.)
- rurp 2y agoRight, I think we're going to find that a test of "Does this sound like a waste to an uninformed person who has thought about it for five seconds" is a pretty poor framework for making sweeping changes.
- paddw 2y agoNot a fan overall of what DOGE is doing, but I disagree with your line of reasoning here. Obviously not all government agencies provide comparable amounts of value to the general public based on the resources they consume. Does one have to be an expert on the inner workings and initiatives of each of these organizations to have an opinion? Maybe, but that doesn't seem practical, outside of having some large oversight body employing many people to review this... which is just what DOGE purportedly is. Now, is the current DOGE proceeding to do this in a reasonable way? No. But that largely comes down your assessment of the people running it, not anything implicit
- vizzier 2y ago> Obviously not all government agencies provide comparable amounts of value to the general public based on the resources they consume. This doesn't seem obvious to me.
- hirsin 2y agoWe have an existing oversight body, the OIG, which is a couple orders of magnitude larger than DOGE. And a reasonable statement you could defensibly make is that OIG isn't doing enough to curtail spending, the same way you or I aren't doing enough to prevent bugs in the code. The only thing DOGE does, that OIG doesn't, is _not_ attempt to understand the value of the work being done. The people in DOGE are of course a problem, but the process they're following is flawed from the get go, namely "judge programs based on the opinion of some uninformed outsiders".
- vharuck 2y ago>Maybe, but that doesn't seem practical, outside of having some large oversight body employing many people to review this... which is just what DOGE purportedly is. The oversight body is Congress. They hold hearings, call on experts, issue subpoenas, and represent the will of the people. Plus, because Congress defines the agencies and apportion budgets for specific projects in those agencies, they're the perfect group to do oversight. DOGE could abide by the Constitution if it had simply conducted audits, compiled findings with suggestions, and presenting those at a Congressional hearing. They should not interfere with agencies carrying out legally required duties. It's insane how these days the "crazy leftist" point of view is that we should stick to Article I of the Constitution. We have peaceful transitions of power because the losing side knows there are still rules the winners can't break. If either side makes Constitutional crises their go-to tool, there are only two awful end-states: entrenched tyranny or violent revolution. Maybe both.
- jmclnx 2y agoWhich is why NOAA needs to be left alone. But Trump and maybe the GOP wants to privatize NOAA, which would be a disaster for the US.
- lotsofpulp 2y agoAlready tried once 7 years ago: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Lee_Myers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Lee_Myers
- WarOnPrivacy 2y agoWe don't seem to have any lesson-learning folks in play.
- jmclnx 2y ago>In 2018, an investigation by the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs found rampant, pervasive and severe sexual harassment at AccuWeather Depends upon the lesson, when it comes to harassment, the GOP learned and found ways to get the public to accept this. Seems the only reason it failed was it seems Myers was found to be a sexual predator. These days, that seems to be a requirement to be the head of an agency.
- jauntywundrkind 2y agoThe lesson seems to be that those who can keep attacking democracy again and again and again will eventually some day succeed in tearing things down.
- pridkett 2y agoRick Santorum tried doing this repeatedly starting in 2005. It was one of personal crusades in the Senate. https://www.politico.com/story/2012/01/7-year-old-attack-on-weather-service-could-cloud-santorums-campaign-071129 https://www.politico.com/story/2012/01/7-year-old-attack-on-...
- hnburnsy 2y ago[flagged]
- lazycog512 2y ago[flagged]
- mmooss 2y agoThey present a lot of factual information. Why do you call it appeal to emotion? Also, on what do you base your claims NOAA's activities? The article is by "Atmospheric scientists Christine Wiedinmyer and Kari Bowen, who is a former National Weather Service forecaster". > Post the data and let me decide for myself. For everything NOAA does and every agency? Who would have the expertise to even begin to evaluate it, much less the time.
- hirsin 2y agoIt's funny. We get up in arms because our boss's boss's boss wants to decide if the work we're doing this sprint is valuable - there's no way they can begin to understand what it is they pay me to do here! They've got dozens or hundreds of reports, no way they can decide if fixing this CSS bug is the best use of my time. And then people think they can decide if the radar station detecting low altitude systems near Palau is a good investment or not.
- mmooss 2y ago'Do your own research!' A bad boss limits everyone's abilities to what the boss understands and can do. This governing approach limits world-class scientists to what the public understands - which is essentially the tactical argument made by the GOP: It looks useless to you and me and that is our source of truth! Are you condescending elites calling us dumb? The Dems are complicit because in about 25 years, they haven't bothered to come up with a simple, effective counterargument. I don't know anything about weather data. I couldn't imagine overseeing these scientists or their technology.
- krapp 2y ago>The Dems are complicit because in about 25 years, they haven't bothered to come up with a simple, effective counterargument. Because no counterargument, however simple, would be effective. Republicans mistrust "elites" and "academia" and "education" and "science" as a function of their own persecution complex and conspiratorial worldview. And yes, it does make them dumb - aggressively, proudly dumb. A lot of them want NOAA gone because they associate anything weather related with what they consider to be a vast left-wing climate change conspiracy. These are the same people who harass meteorologists because they think they control the weather. There's just no way to argue with that.
- mmooss 2y agoCui bono? One benefit to some is the continued assault on sources of truth: Academics, everyone even arguably left-wing, news media, science, now we lack a source of truth on weather. More generally, the idea of an apoltical, non-profit source of truth is actively denied and any example is destroyed. The CIA and FBI are other examples. Without a source of truth, how can any public agreement or action form? All information becomes social media. Notice who controls that too: Meta, X, and also Bytedance will be beholden to the same people destroying all else.
- throw0101d 2y ago> Cui bono? Barry Myers of AccuWeather for one: they charge for their services. See "The Plan to Privatize Weather Forecasts": * https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/fact-checking-what-project-2025-says-about-the-national-weather-service-and-noaa https://www.pbs.org/newshour/politics/fact-checking-what-pro... * http://archive.is/https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2024/07/noaa-project-2025-weather/678987/ http://archive.is/https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archiv... * https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/environment/project-2025-paywall-weather/ https://www.outsideonline.com/outdoor-adventure/environment/... John Oliver did a story about this in 2019 (Trump 1.0): * https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMGn9T37eR8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qMGn9T37eR8 * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Lee_Myers#Nomination_to_National_Oceanic_and_Atmospheric_Administration https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Barry_Lee_Myers#Nomination_to_... If NOAA discontinues free weather forecasts, everyone (news, websites, apps) will have to pay someone to get them.
- beowulfey 2y agoHonestly, I will never pay for a weather service. If I have to keep an umbrella in my bag, so be it. If it means an unexpected snow day, oh well. Other services that depend upon weather will pass those fees down to me anyway, no reason to pay for it twice.
- knappe 2y agoUm. Are you sure you don't want to know about forecasted natural disasters? This seems rather shortsighted.
- user3939382 2y agoI’d be ok with looking to streamline NOAA, double check budgets etc, but just disbanding it no.
- 01HNNWZ0MV43FF 2y agoI need to trim my fingernails but I am not going to let a crazed axe murderer in my house to do so
- imajoke 2y agoNothing about NOAA makes a dent in the federal deficit. You're thinking of entitlements (which are appropriated by Congress, a co-equal branch of government that makes laws (lest you forgot)), and defense spending.
- user3939382 2y agoI’m aware of the size of NOAA, it’s still tax dollars. If they were spending $10k that could be $8k it’s still tax dollars. That would apply to any federal agency.
- jonstewart 2y agoThank you for your service, President 3939382! It’s an honor to serve in your benevolent administration.
- user3939382 2y agoYour country thanks you.
- lotsofpulp 2y agoYou can double the NOAA budget and still not make any difference. https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/federal-spending/ https://fiscaldata.treasury.gov/americas-finance-guide/feder...
- willis936 2y ago
- GolfPopper 2y agoI'm extremely skeptical of the entire premise of DOGE. There are vast changes being made to very large organizations, in very short timespans, with the claim that those making them know what they're doing. But the timespans in question - days to weeks at most - mean that there's no time to review anything. So those making changes do not, cannot, be making decisions based on reviews of available evidence, because they haven't given themselves time to review the evidence. Which in turn means that when they claim they do, they're either delusional or lying. Chesterton's Fence [1] would also seem to apply here, but I mostly think it's not even getting that far. DOGE isn't doing an audit (if it was, there would be auditors, not talented young programmers) and then taking action. DOGE is executing already planned actions, while pretending to be an audit, and helping itself to a great deal of access and data along the way. 1. https://theknowledge.io/chestertons-fence-explained/ https://theknowledge.io/chestertons-fence-explained/
- hypeatei 2y agoDOGE seems to be treating this like a culling in a private company but you can't do that. It's completely normal for private businesses to fail but we rely on the government as a safety net (e.g. social security, FDIC, etc..) so failure there is catastrophic.
- dylan604 2y ago> we rely on the government as a safety net This is the issue though. They think the safety net is the problem.
- mrguyorama 2y agoTheir ideology is that safety nets let useless people take up too many resources.
- pfd1986 2y agoThe plan seems to be to (1) "RAGE: Retire All Government Employees (...), take over the United States government and gut the federal bureaucracy. Then, replace civil servants with political loyalists" So in essence, they think these short term problems can be reversed once the pawns are replaced. (1) https://www.thenerdreich.com/reboot-elon-musk-ceo-dictator-doge/ https://www.thenerdreich.com/reboot-elon-musk-ceo-dictator-d...
- hnburnsy 2y agoThis feels like a strawman, I haven't seen any proposal to eliminate or privatize NOAA. Just checking it looks like the un-avowed Project 2025 suggested commercializing the data which seems smart to me. Why let all these billion dollar weather channels, media companies, and apps ride on NOAA's free data? Non-commercial use of the data could still remain free.
- drivingmenuts 2y agoWell, there this: https://www.fastcompany.com/91274927/trump-wants-to-dismantle-the-agency-that-provides-weather-forecasts-it-will-make-your-life-worse https://www.fastcompany.com/91274927/trump-wants-to-dismantl... I'm sure Elon will provide AI-generated weather reports. Someday. Might be from Mars, but we won't have to deal with the smallest uniformed service.
- hnburnsy 2y agoFast Company, quoting Project 2025, really. Anyhoo, PBS said of the un-avowed Project 2025... >Project 2025 would not outright end the National Weather Service. It says the agency “should focus on its data-gathering services,” and “should fully commercialize its forecasting operations.”
- ryoshu 2y agoWhy should a government agency "fully commercialize its forecasting operations"?
- hnburnsy 2y agoSeveral countries have commercialized their weather data to varying degrees. Here are a few examples: United Kingdom: The UK Met Office has a commercial arm that sells weather data and services to businesses. They provide tailored forecasts, climate data, and other meteorological services to various sectors, including agriculture, energy, and transportation. Germany: The German Weather Service (DWD) offers commercial services alongside its public offerings. They provide specialized weather data and forecasts to businesses, particularly in industries that are heavily impacted by weather conditions. Australia: The Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) in Australia has a commercial division that sells weather data and services to private companies. This includes tailored forecasts and access to specialized datasets for industries such as agriculture, mining, and aviation. Canada: Environment and Climate Change Canada (ECCC) provides some commercial services, allowing businesses to access detailed weather data and forecasts for a fee. This is particularly useful for sectors that require precise weather information for operational planning. Japan: The Japan Meteorological Agency (JMA) provides some data for free but also has commercial agreements with private companies that utilize their data for various applications, including weather forecasting and disaster management. European Union: The European Centre for Medium-Range Weather Forecasts (ECMWF) offers commercial access to its data and forecasting services, allowing businesses to utilize high-quality meteorological information for decision-making.
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 2y agoYep. NOAA is the source of all the weather data that all of your weather apps and TV stations use.
- acomjean 2y agoI remember seeing "weather.gov" on one of the monitors of a local tv news station. (they had kind of an open newsroom). Weather.gov is a antidote from the add sponsored mess that weather websites are. Of course I suspect most people use phone apps now. But they have a lot of information on those pages, including weather discussions. I follow this because my startup had to normalize for weather so we needed weather information. We went to "weatherunderground" (a play on a 60s era group perhaps?) and paid some money to get that weather data. They got bought by weathercompany/IBM. I had a developer account and could pull hourly weather information (I had grand plans to compare predictions vs actual) that got axed weather.gov was always there. They don't have an api, but I love their weather graph which lets you look at a bunch of weather over the next couple days (and includes sunset and sunrise). Its very fast to read after a few days. eg https://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lat=42.3774&lon=-71.1225&unit=0&lg=english&FcstType=graphical https://forecast.weather.gov/MapClick.php?lat=42.3774&lon=-7... Forecast discussion: https://forecast.weather.gov/product.php?site=NWS&issuedby=box&product=AFD&format=CI&version=1&glossary=1&highlight=off https://forecast.weather.gov/product.php?site=NWS&issuedby=b...
- sjsdaiuasgdia 2y agoweather.gov is so good! Between weather.gov and noaa.gov there is an absolutely incredible amount of information available. I'm a big fan the GOES viewer: https://www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/goes/conus.php?sat=G16 https://www.star.nesdis.noaa.gov/goes/conus.php?sat=G16
- 2OEH8eoCRo0 2y agoI love weather.gov and use it daily- even on my phone.
- TYPE_FASTER 2y agoIt looks like there is an API for weather.gov now: https://www.weather.gov/documentation/services-web-api https://www.weather.gov/documentation/services-web-api I really appreciate how the NWS products make it easy to create custom widgets that you can embed in a webpage.
- smfjaw 2y agoNOAA is fantastic, I was alpine climbing in the very bottom of south america near El Chalten and NOAA is pretty much the only place to get a reliable forecast down there. Fantastic service.
- jmyeet 2y agoWhat we're seeing here is the dismantling of necessary and useful government functions by people who have no idea about the consequences of what they're doing. I can't wait for them to come for GPS (run by DoD). All these people want to do is replace these government functions with a worse and more expensive private alternative but hey, someone gets to rent-seek massive profits, so that's OK. It's also a lesson in how for many things, them being run by a government entity is the best alternative. If you want to see actual waste, how about a current sitting Senator and former Florida governor who, at the time, run a company that got the largest fine in history for defrauding Medicare to the tune of $1.7 billion [1], something for which nobody faced criminal prosecution. [1]: https://www.factcheck.org/2014/06/floridas-medicare-fraud-flashback/ https://www.factcheck.org/2014/06/floridas-medicare-fraud-fl...
- gdubs 2y agoNOAA is a crown jewel of the American experiment. Agencies like this don't exist to turn a profit — they are there to serve the public interest.
- throw0101d 2y agoThis was all published ahead of time, and any one voting to Trump "should" have been aware this is was the plan: > The National Oceanographic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) should be dismantled and many of its functions eliminated, sent to other agencies, privatized, or placed under the control of states and territories. * https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_CHAPTER-21.pdf https://static.project2025.org/2025_MandateForLeadership_CHA...
- HocusLocus 2y agoDo you have any other sources? Project 2025 is neither authored nor endorsed by Trump. It was a Heritage Foundation conservative romper room where no idea was a bad idea, its members contributing for pats on the head, which is why it's 900 pages long. It's Wikipedia 'Talk' page is more interesting reading than the article itself.
- throw0101d 2y ago> […] nor endorsed by Trump. […] The non-endorsement by Trump was a lie: > He has also played a significant role in Project 2025, an initiative led by the Heritage Foundation that aims to advance conservative, right-wing policies and reshape the federal government.[3] […] In May 2024, Russell Vought was named policy director of the Republican National Committee platform committee.[83] The Center for Renewing America (CRA), founded by Vought, is on Project 2025's advisory board.[84] CRA drafted executive orders, regulations, and memos that could have laid the groundwork for rapid action on Trump's plans when he won.[85] The CRA identified Christian Nationalism as one of the top priorities for the second Trump term.[15] Vought claimed that Trump blessed the CRA, and that his effort to distance himself from Project 2025 was just politics.[85] * https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Vought https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Russell_Vought Vought has been labelled as the 'architect' of Project 2025, and has been appointed as the director of the OMB. "Senate confirms Project 2025 co-author as Trump budget chief" * https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clykpgxm4n7o https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/clykpgxm4n7o
- HocusLocus 2y ago
- evanjrowley 2y agoWhen people talk abouth NOAA, they're usually referring to the sub-agency National Weather Service (NWS). As someone who has had experience at NOAA, I'd like to point out that the way they manage information security seems really wasteful. All of the tools they need are present in the environment, but there has not been sufficient political will for the various sub-agencies to work together and integrate them holistically. The net effect is duplication of half-baked cyber security functions across NOAA. The line items are purchased but the sub-agencies lack the man-power to effectively implement what's possible because government processes are too much overhead. It doesn't help that their FISMA-reportable "systems" are their sub-agencies and not actual systems. The 'mangerial class' that Republicans have rallied against during the 2024 election is sucking the lifeblood out of NOAA's IT operations.