Suspense has been building as to who will be announced on Wednesday as the lucky one responsible for running the EPA, or as Trump called it in a debate when suggesting he’d get rid of it, the Department of Environmental. While there have been plenty of stories about Myron Ebell, the man running Trump’s transition team on the EPA, considerably less (though not nothing) has been said about one of the advisors to that team: David W Schnare.
Schnare is a former EPA attorney who is most notable for his involvement in failed attempts to FOIA Dr. Michael Mann’s emails and his current involvement with climate scientist-harassing, coal-funded EELI. But a little further digging suggests a weirder story.
Back in 1976, one David Schnare is listed as having achieved “Clear” status in the Church of Scientology, meaning he had gone through the auditing to clear his mind of “engrams,” could create energy at will (according to Hubbard), and paid something like $128,000 to the Church.
Through the early ‘80s, one DW Schnare is listed as a lead or co-author on five different papers that provide a scientific justification of safety for the “Hubbard Detoxification” or “purification rundown” regimen. This practice was invented by Hubbard to flush poisons (specifically recreational drugs) from fats by exercise, saunas, and high doses of vitamins. Despite Schnare’s papers suggesting it is safe and effective, patients have been hospitalized or died. A 1988 report by a toxicology expert called it “quackery” and others have called it “scientifically bereft.”
In 2003, Tom Cruise co-founded and fundraised a project to use this detox process to treat 9/11 rescue workers that had come into contact with the dust at Ground Zero. The fact that this partially government-sponsored project was prohibiting patients from other medical treatment, including using inhalers for asthma, brought renewed attention to the science behind the purification process. For example, the incredible claim that one of the studies (authored by DW Schnare) claims that the process raised IQ by an average of 6.7 points.
Another investigation into the validity of the purification rundown got a quote from a legitimate scientist that the studies praising the process “do not meet the basic standards for scientific research that a high school student would be forced to follow in freshman biology.”
Sources familiar with the Church of Scientology’s promotional materials say that the David Schnare, who wrote papers vouching for the safety and IQ-boosting properties of the process, and the one working at the EPA are one and the same. But we don’t know conclusively if this is the same DW Schnare.
But if it is, that probably shouldn’t come as a surprise. After all, “scientifically bereft” “quackery” that doesn’t meet high school science standards could just as easily describe the statements made by scientologists as those made by climate change deniers.
For instance, that it’s a hoax invented by the Chinese.
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