The National Institutes of Health is one of America's greatest accomplishments. It does the slow, hard work of building up medical research that turns into cures and better health for our citizens. They're the reason we got fluoride in our water. The built the Human Genome Database. Here's an accounting of just some of their research internal breakthroughs (not to speak of work done with their grants). Their scientists have won 87 Nobel Prizes. I've been in their clinical trials for years and I can tell you they are one impressive bunch.
Ben Howe from RedState thinks they're a bunch of malingerers growing fat off Gummint welfare:
In case you thought that Republicans had in any way turned their back on frivolous spending, here is a reminder that they have not. According to The Atlantic, Republicans have completely surrendered on even the idea of curtailing government spending on frivolous research that could just as easily be funded by the private sector.
In this case, we’re talking about funding for the National Institutes of Health, which I’m sure does many useful things, but also spends a lot of money on really dumb experiments that have been done over and over again for years with self-evident results. A choice example of waste in taxpayer-funded “research spending” is seeing whether monkeys being addicted to cocaine has adverse health consequences for monkeys.
Haw haw! They's givin' cocaine ta monkeys! They should ask them monkeys why they ain't ee-volved yet! Also, they studied sexual responsiveness in rats, which is also ridiculous, like that time in the 1940s they experimented with X-rays and rat tumors. Using radiation to kill cancer! Have you ever heard such a crazy idea!
This is such an ancient trope -- crazy scientists doing outrageous experiments with money you could be investing in my uranium mine -- that I wonder if anyone actually falls for it. My guess is even Howe doesn't believe in it; its appeal is almost entirely nostalgic and emotional, based on fading memories of vaudeville comedians in fright wigs running around with giant hypodermic needles. In fact, in a way it's a scientific experiment in itself -- how little or how much power to enrage does this ancient bullshit still hold? Guess we'll find out!