Posey’s been re-elected twice since then, and on April 17, he got the chance to stare down the president’s science czar, John Holdren. Posey and fellow Republicans on the Science, Space, and Technology Committee wanted Holdren to explain why the National Science Foundation was wasting so much money from an asked-for budget of $7.6 billion. Posey read off titles of NSF-funded research projects. “ ‘Picturing Animals in National Geographic for the years 1988 to 2008’ costing $227,000,” said Posey. “ ‘Kinship, Women’s Labor and China’s Economic Performance in the 17th to 21st Centuries’ costing $267,000. ‘Regulating Accountability and Transparency in China’s Dairy Industry.’ … I mean, it’s just hard to conceive how those are important to our national security or our national interest.” Holdren wasn’t moved, but he’d heard this before—and he’d hear it again. After the hearing, committee chairman Lamar Smith of Texas sent a letter to the NSF asking what the “intellectual merit” of this research was. Shortly thereafter, as first reported by Science magazine, Smith was drafting legislation that would require the NSF to prove that grants wouldn’t embarrass anybody. Was the research “in the interests of the United States to advance the national health, prosperity, or welfare, and to secure the national defense by promoting the progress of science?” Could the NSF say that it was “the finest quality, is groundbreaking, and answers questions or solves problems that are of utmost importance to society at large?”