I know my dad's been afraid for his job for some time now because he just so happens to work in a field whose very existence threatens the Rethug cabal (sea ice climatology). Ever since the government shutdowns his branch has been scared that it'll be defunded - luckily, forecasting sea ice is also pretty useful for various special interest groups who are involved in fishing and oil drilling in Alaska and the Bering Sea.

But you can generally believe most of what comes out of NOAA (or at least believe that the people who are saying it probably believe it). There are a ton of honest scientists there who pay a lot of attention to each other's work, and even if the top levels wanted to lie I seriously doubt they would be able to prevent the truth from leaking out via the channels of academia. Bush would have had his hands full trying to politicize NOAA - he managed NASA, which was quite a feat, but NOAA would be harder. Climatologists don't operate in secrecy.