Controversy
While generally respected as one of the premier weather organizations in the United States, the National Weather Service has been perceived by some, particularly commercial weather services such as AccuWeather, as competing unfairly with the private sector. National Weather Service forecasts and data, being works of the federal government, are in the public domain and thus available to anyone for free in accordance with United States law, undercutting the ability for professional private sector meteorologists to earn a living through weather forecasting. In 2005, Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) introduced the National Weather Service Duties Act of 2005, a bill intended to limit the NWS's ability to provide data that could be given by commercial outlets, but at a cost to generate private profit. The bill was widely criticized by users of the NWS's services, especially by Emergency Management Officials, who rely on the NWS for information during situations such as fires, flooding or severe weather. The bill died in committee during the 2005 session.
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“Ours was a highly activist administration, with a lot of controversy involved ... but I’m not sure that it would be inconsistent with my own political nature to do it differently if I had it to do all over again.”
—Jimmy Carter (James Earl Carter, Jr.)
“And therefore, as when there is a controversy in an account, the parties must by their own accord, set up for right Reason, the Reason of some Arbitrator, or Judge, to whose sentence, they will both stand, or their controversy must either come to blows, or be undecided, for want of a right Reason constituted by Nature; so is it also in all debates of what kind soever.”
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