Last night, Governor Bobby Jindal of Louisiana gave the Republican response to the President’s first address of Congress. In his response, Governor Jindal attacked some of the provisions of the recently passed economic stimulus package as wasteful including “$140 million for something called ‘volcano monitoring.’ Instead of monitoring volcanoes, what Congress should be monitoring is the eruption of spending in Washington, DC.” Earth to Governor Jindal; according to the US Geological Service there are 70 active volcanoes in the US and 50 of them have erupted in the past 200 years.

Now, I understand that there are no volcanoes in Louisiana, but is Governor Jindal too young to remember the devastation caused by Mount St. Helens? Is he unaware that, according to the USGS, “volcanoes produce a wide variety of hazards that can kill people and destroy property”?

This is not the first time we have seen Governor Jindal take a rather odd position on science issues. Just last July we pointed out that Jindal signed a creationist science education bill that was sponsored by none other than the Discovery Institute, the jokers pushing Intelligent Design as a legitimate science. More disturbing has been a larger GOP trend to point at science programs as wasteful.

We saw Senator McCain take a swipe at grizzly bear research and Governor Palin swing away at fruit fly research during the Presidential campaign. The tactic they are taking is simple, take a project that to some people might seem trivial and without carefully looking at it’s relative merits, slam it for cheap political points. Jindal acknowledged that he had not looked at the project by saying “something called volcano monitoring.” That is precisely the kind of parlor tricks that have been dogging the GOP for years now. Only, the public and press seem to be getting wise to this trite tactic and are fed up (see 2006 and 2008 election results).

I realize that Governor Jindal is trying to appeal to the very far right of his party, but he has let his political aspirations get ahead of reason. Maybe if Governor Jindal spent some time reading the USGS volcano hazard page he would not have been so flippant about monitoring them. I suspect the people of Montana, Wyoming, and Alaska might have a different view as well. Last I checked they were all red states that he will need to carry if he decides to run for the White House.

Will the $140m volcano monitoring program stimulate the economy? I don’t know. One thing for sure is that it is hardly a waste of taxpayer money to monitor for potential natural disasters so the public can be sufficiently warned about them. Just ask the people of New Orleans or anyone in the tornado belt.